Beyond Belief Book

With the publication of Paul Theroux's devastating memoir of his broken friendship with V.S. Naipaul, Sir Vidia's Shadow, Naipaul's reputation has been seriously revised in recent years. His early, lyrical novels like A House for Mr. Biswas quickly gave way to a darker, increasingly pessimistic and conservative vision of postcolonial chaos and cultural dislocation, reflected in novels like Guerillas and Naipaul's early travel books, such as India: A Wounded Civilisation. One of the problems with dismissing Naipaul as a patrician cultural mandarin is that he tends to tussle with uncomfortable issues which lesser writers either avoid or romanticise. It is this desire to confront painful questions about religion, belief and belonging which characterises Naipaul's travel writing, and was a particular feature of his highly acclaimed study Among the Believers: An Islamic Journey (1981), which chronicled his travels and observations through Indonesia, Iran, Pakistan, and Malaysia. Beyond Belief: Islamic Excursions among the Converted Peoples should be read as a sequel to Among the Believers, as it relates the story of Naipaul's five-month journey to the countries he visited, and often the people he interviewed, nearly 20 years earlier. Beyond Belief is a fascinating, unrelenting story of Naipaul's travels through countries which have been subject to what Naipaul calls Islamic "conversion", and the people he encounters and their complex, problematic relations with their faith. Written with Naipaul's usual precision and elegance, Beyond Belief is a controversial and uncompromising read, which has been angrily denounced by the Muslim community. However, it is an excellent antidote to so much current travel writing which uncritically reproduces myths of the exotic orient, and should be read by anyone who wants to begin to travel throughout the non-Arabic Muslim world. --Jerry BrottonRead More