Narayan’s
The Guide—as well as his larger body of work—represents part of the emergence of Anglo-Indian literature in the first half of the twentieth century, under what was then British rule in India. During this period, a number of Indian writers, most notably Raja Rao and Mulk Raj Anand, in addition to Narayan, began writing and publishing works in the English language which would go on to find a wide readership both within India and outside of it. The themes with which
The Guide grapples—including the conflict between tradition and modernity, as well as the theme of transformation and redemption—find echoes in the work of Narayan’s two contemporaries. While Rao’s 1939 novel
Kanthapura is more explicitly political in its content, it nonetheless grapples with the issue of social and cultural upheaval brought upon a small village in southern India as a result of the teachings of Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948), the nonviolent freedom fighter who led India to independence from British rule. Like
The Guide,
Kanthapura touches on conflicts over caste relations, feminism, and the liberation of women in its examination of the larger transformations brought about by modernity. Likewise, Mulk Raj Anand—the third of the trio considered to be the founding fathers of the Anglo-Indian novel—also documented the conflict between tradition and modernity, particularly in relation to caste, in novels such as
Untouchable (1935) and
Coolie (1936). All three writers often focused on small Indian towns and villages (sometimes fictionalized, as is the case with the town of Malgudi in
The Guide), through which they could dramatize, in miniature, broader changes taking place in Indian society at large. Through their collective body of work, these three authors established the Anglo-Indian novel as a force to be reckoned with, and laid the groundwork for the future of Anglo-Indian literature.