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Râga d'après-midi
D'Amit Chaudhuri, on connaissait déjà Une étrange et sublime adresse, " un récit envoûtant, d'une malice délicieuse, d'un charme parfait " (Le Figaro littéraire). Voici Râga d'après-midi, où un jeune étudiant indien à Oxford découvre, en même temps
qu'une vie nouvelle, les intermittences de son cœur amoureux, partagé entre deux femmes, deux univers différents. Il se souvient avec nostalgie de son enfance à Bombay, et surtout de sa mère s'adonnant quotidiennement à la musique, en compagnie de son bien-aimé professeur dont on sait, dès le début, qu'il n'est plus de ce monde. Dans ce roman tout entier
dédié à la musique, les sons, les odeurs, les couleurs deviennent autant de variations mélodiques du souvenir. Au fil des détails qui s'égrènent comme des notes se déploie peu à peu un chant aussi subtil et sensuel qu'un rêve éveillé.
qu'une vie nouvelle, les intermittences de son cœur amoureux, partagé entre deux femmes, deux univers différents. Il se souvient avec nostalgie de son enfance à Bombay, et surtout de sa mère s'adonnant quotidiennement à la musique, en compagnie de son bien-aimé professeur dont on sait, dès le début, qu'il n'est plus de ce monde. Dans ce roman tout entier
dédié à la musique, les sons, les odeurs, les couleurs deviennent autant de variations mélodiques du souvenir. Au fil des détails qui s'égrènent comme des notes se déploie peu à peu un chant aussi subtil et sensuel qu'un rêve éveillé.
142 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
14 people are currently reading
452 people want to read
About the author
Amit Chaudhuri
67books167followersAmit Chaudhuri was born in Calcutta in 1962, and grew up in Bombay. He read English at University College, London, where he took his BA with First Class Honours, and completed his doctorate on critical theory and the poetry of D.H. Lawrence at Balliol College, Oxford, where he was a Dervorguilla Scholar. He was Creative Arts Fellow at Wolfson College, Oxford, from 1992-95, and Leverhulme Special Research Fellow at the Faculty of English, Cambridge University, until April 1999, where he taught the Commonwealth and International Literatures paper of the English Tripos. He was on the faculty of the School of the Arts, Columbia University, for the Fall semester, 2002. He was appointed Samuel Fischer Guest Professor of Literature at Free University, Berlin, for the winter term 2005.
He is now Professor in Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia. He was made Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009.
He is now Professor in Contemporary Literature at the University of East Anglia. He was made Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2009.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 56 reviews
January 19, 2023
This one is perfect in snippets. Sometimes the prose flows and atmospheres (mostly nostalgic) are perfectly captured; other times it’s indulgent and less captivating. I definitely wanted more to come of the music theme!!
April 8, 2018
There is little to like about the book but for its exquisite writing and prose. It is not easy to write 170+ pages with little happening, yet with such vivid descriptions, which at some points acquire an exceptionally beautiful texture and tone. [On others, when Chaudhari is describing some of the female characters though, he ends up being the typical male author with problematic and limited descriptions.]. The sense of alienation, of homesickness, of loneliness comes through strongly and is relatable at moments but given that the text relies heavily on description than on a plot, it's a book you could enjoy as you read it [and you can read it mindlessly], but I don't think so it is going to stay with me for long, or linger on in memory.
September 22, 2019
Delectable.
January 13, 2018
If it weren't for the effortless felicity of Chaudhuri's prose, I wouldn't have been able to get beyond page 2 of this rambling showcase of inaction disguised as fiction. But how long can one cover up the absence of even a semblance of a plot with clever turns of phrase? Luckily he seems to have discovered that you can only get away with for some time and has now widely started calling his work as 'essays' instead of fiction.
February 4, 2017
This is all form, no function. 134 pages of wonderfully crafted rambling prose with more relative clauses than hair on my head. There were occasional delights in the initial third. But after that I was so tuned out, nothing made sense.
Not the book to kickstart a reading year!
Not the book to kickstart a reading year!
November 6, 2019
The quiet tone and pace of this book is entirely appropriate for the reminiscent and nostalgic nature of the story. I was fascinating to see the juxtaposition of two worlds, both geographically and in terms of the life of childhood and early adulthood. I enjoyed it.
July 3, 2019
Meticulously structured and exquisitely finished like notes of a raag - is it Maand, Sarang or Madhuvanti?
Is it “transfiguration of the mundane� or an exquisitely beautiful spectacle unfolding in words?
Either way, its damn good writing that I sadly discovered only after all these years.
Is it “transfiguration of the mundane� or an exquisitely beautiful spectacle unfolding in words?
Either way, its damn good writing that I sadly discovered only after all these years.
September 16, 2024
beautiful, meandering prose. chaudhuri comes alive in his descriptions of musical languages, their heritage and legacies. I think this one is best consumed in short, contemplative snippets to tongue over the dense description. it doesn’t really build to anything but I loved lingering in the smaller parts, the loneliness of big cities, the intensity of communal lives in university and mumbai, moments unwittingly becoming your past as you move into your future.
August 7, 2024
Great campus novel!
December 27, 2017
From the start “Afternoon Raag� reminded me of V.S. Naipaul’s “The Enigma of Arrival� in that I found it equally unspeakably pedantic. The following are just two examples of what I mean by that :
Amit Chaudhuri on getting on a bus :
“Once, I took a double-decker to Cowley Road, it was like entering another life, right from ascending the wide berth of the foot-board at the entrance, clutching with great immediacy the pole-vaulter’s pole that rose there from the floor, ignoring the stealthy staircase that crept primitively upward, to make one’s way shyly inside, braving the curious but not unwelcoming glances of other people.�
Amit Chaudhuri on opening a door :
“In my pocket I carried, whenever I went out, two Yale doorkeys that gave me access to the building and my own door. Each was a twin of the other, unpretentious, golden-coloured, and dignified in the way it did not draw attention to the touch; one used the keys unconsciously and trustingly after the initial uncertain period of not knowing which was for which door was over.�
There is no detail insignificant enough not to be showered with a spray of adjectives, adverbs, analogies, similes, metaphors, etc. etc. What saved the book from a one-star-rating is the fact that most of it is set in India.
P.S. How can these snippets of remembrances be called a novel ?
Amit Chaudhuri on getting on a bus :
“Once, I took a double-decker to Cowley Road, it was like entering another life, right from ascending the wide berth of the foot-board at the entrance, clutching with great immediacy the pole-vaulter’s pole that rose there from the floor, ignoring the stealthy staircase that crept primitively upward, to make one’s way shyly inside, braving the curious but not unwelcoming glances of other people.�
Amit Chaudhuri on opening a door :
“In my pocket I carried, whenever I went out, two Yale doorkeys that gave me access to the building and my own door. Each was a twin of the other, unpretentious, golden-coloured, and dignified in the way it did not draw attention to the touch; one used the keys unconsciously and trustingly after the initial uncertain period of not knowing which was for which door was over.�
There is no detail insignificant enough not to be showered with a spray of adjectives, adverbs, analogies, similes, metaphors, etc. etc. What saved the book from a one-star-rating is the fact that most of it is set in India.
P.S. How can these snippets of remembrances be called a novel ?
March 12, 2015
Afternoon Raag is not a great musical journey but it left some nuances of poetic joy and memories to cherish for.
Narrator is an Indian student and entire novel revolves around him and two other girls,a love triangle and Oxford university.Sometimes you can feel the university area vividly as if you are studying there and enjoying the beauty,exploring the unexplored.Each chapter stands alone and it could be a collection of short stories in general.Chapter 20 describes Kolkata rather Calcutta.Here the Bengali viewpoint of the author is prominent,nobody can understand/picturise Calcutta than a Bengali.The Chapters have been framed in a layered format..shifting from time to time and a sense of melancholy or detachment is always there.A simple and easy read....hope my reader friends can give a try:)
Narrator is an Indian student and entire novel revolves around him and two other girls,a love triangle and Oxford university.Sometimes you can feel the university area vividly as if you are studying there and enjoying the beauty,exploring the unexplored.Each chapter stands alone and it could be a collection of short stories in general.Chapter 20 describes Kolkata rather Calcutta.Here the Bengali viewpoint of the author is prominent,nobody can understand/picturise Calcutta than a Bengali.The Chapters have been framed in a layered format..shifting from time to time and a sense of melancholy or detachment is always there.A simple and easy read....hope my reader friends can give a try:)
August 5, 2015
Afternoon Raag by Amit Chaudhuri is replete with robust descriptions of place, both India and England, razor sharp characterizations, and some of the most beautiful and illuminating writing on Hindustani music. However, the book is largely devoid of a traditional plot. A faceless narrator shifts back and forth between his college days at Oxford and his childhood home of Bombay and his family's new home in Calcutta and through it all Chaudhuri vividly evokes each of these places and the people that populate them. A vague love triangle between the narrator and two fellow female students is probably the most developed plot element. Once I accepted that this wasn't going to be a plot driven novel, I relaxed and enjoyed everywhere that Chaudhuri took me.
October 31, 2023
Given this book was written almost 30 years ago, I enjoyed reading how similar the experience of student life was to today. At times, I kind of lost the plot, which is easy to do because there really isn’t one. However, it is a great read when you appreciate the details and how the author is able to describe the individual memories with extreme authenticity - letting you feel as if you were there.
February 2, 2022
The introduction seemed very appealing, the actual content was alright. Perhaps I’ve missed the whole point. The writing is beautiful, elegant with some really unnecessary adjectives thrown in for no real reason. There’s something cold or mean about the author , an air of arrogance which I find very unattractive.
February 8, 2019
slow languid prose. Oxford, bombay, calcutta are painted in lovely water colours. dreamy.
July 15, 2020
So very forgettable.
English:
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English:
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April 16, 2025
At first glance, Afternoon Raag seems like a novella where not much “happens.� There’s no dramatic arc, no shocking twist, no hero’s journey. And yet, it’s full of things � memory, identity, longing, music, nostalgia, and cultural dissonance.
Set in the late 1980s, the novel follows an unnamed Bengali narrator � a student at Oxford � navigating the fluid space between India and England, past and present, East and West. The voice is gentle, almost hesitant, but fiercely intelligent and sharply observant.
Imagine if a Satyajit Ray character decided to write stream-of-consciousness prose while listening to Hindustani classical music � that’s the vibe.
The term rāg in Indian classical music is more than a melody � it’s an emotion, a time of day, a personality. The Afternoon Raag, or Madhyama, is known to evoke mellow introspection, warmth, and a touch of wistfulness. Chaudhuri doesn’t just title his book after a raag � the novel is a raag. It loops, it improvises, it repeats images (like water, old songs, sunlight), and it quietly builds mood over narrative.
The narrator is constantly in a state of "in-betweenness" � caught between Kolkata and Oxford, tradition and modernity, India and the West, nostalgia and present living. There's a sense of being a foreigner everywhere, even at home. The beauty of the book is how Chaudhuri refuses to exoticize this experience � instead, he presents it as ordinary, banal, and deeply human.
“When I first heard the Afternoon Raag,� the narrator says, “it was like a memory I never had.� This paradox becomes the soul of the novel � feeling at home in places that were never quite home.
Amit Chaudhuri doesn’t write prose. He writes liquid silk. His sentences are like brushstrokes � impressionistic, elegant, richly detailed, and often lingering on a single image or idea for a page. The rhythm is slow, like alap before the raag kicks in. If you're looking for page-turners, this might feel like a literary lullaby � but if you surrender to its pace, it’s deeply rewarding.
For example: “The sun fell like a blessing on the yellow stone, the lawns, the solemn buildings, and the girls with open mouths lying on the grass like sacrificial offerings to the season.�
Uff. Tell me that isn’t lush.
There’s a quiet undercurrent of emotional tension throughout. The narrator has two primary friendships � with Shehnaz, a cosmopolitan Indian student, and Mandira, more rooted in Indian culture. Through these women, we get fragmented glimpses of affection, jealousy, cultural commentary, and a kind of subdued yearning. But nothing is explicit. In classic Chaudhuri style, everything is implied, never spelled out.
If you’re even remotely interested in Indian classical music, this book will sing to you. Music isn't just a hobby for the narrator � it’s a metaphysical space. References to raags, tanpuras, and gharanas are scattered throughout the text, not just as decoration, but as structure. The novel’s form mirrors the way music unfolds � cyclically, through repetition and return.
And for those not steeped in classical music, don’t worry � Chaudhuri writes with such ease that even unfamiliar terms feel like part of the rhythm.
Instead of loud postcolonial angst, we get small, exquisite ironies. Like the way the narrator’s English professors are more interested in Shakespeare than he is. Or the way he notices the “unspoken� rules of class and race among his white classmates. The colonial hangover is still there, but it’s whispered in undertones, not banged on a drum.
Afternoon Raag is not a novel for everyone. It’s for the readers who love to pause, re-read, reflect, and sink into a mood. If you're in a hurry, you'll miss the music. But if you let it wash over you, it becomes a meditative experience. It’s about the unsaid, the in-between, the blurred edges of identity and memory.
Like the afternoon itself � neither morning nor evening, neither here nor there � it’s a story that exists in liminal light.
Set in the late 1980s, the novel follows an unnamed Bengali narrator � a student at Oxford � navigating the fluid space between India and England, past and present, East and West. The voice is gentle, almost hesitant, but fiercely intelligent and sharply observant.
Imagine if a Satyajit Ray character decided to write stream-of-consciousness prose while listening to Hindustani classical music � that’s the vibe.
The term rāg in Indian classical music is more than a melody � it’s an emotion, a time of day, a personality. The Afternoon Raag, or Madhyama, is known to evoke mellow introspection, warmth, and a touch of wistfulness. Chaudhuri doesn’t just title his book after a raag � the novel is a raag. It loops, it improvises, it repeats images (like water, old songs, sunlight), and it quietly builds mood over narrative.
The narrator is constantly in a state of "in-betweenness" � caught between Kolkata and Oxford, tradition and modernity, India and the West, nostalgia and present living. There's a sense of being a foreigner everywhere, even at home. The beauty of the book is how Chaudhuri refuses to exoticize this experience � instead, he presents it as ordinary, banal, and deeply human.
“When I first heard the Afternoon Raag,� the narrator says, “it was like a memory I never had.� This paradox becomes the soul of the novel � feeling at home in places that were never quite home.
Amit Chaudhuri doesn’t write prose. He writes liquid silk. His sentences are like brushstrokes � impressionistic, elegant, richly detailed, and often lingering on a single image or idea for a page. The rhythm is slow, like alap before the raag kicks in. If you're looking for page-turners, this might feel like a literary lullaby � but if you surrender to its pace, it’s deeply rewarding.
For example: “The sun fell like a blessing on the yellow stone, the lawns, the solemn buildings, and the girls with open mouths lying on the grass like sacrificial offerings to the season.�
Uff. Tell me that isn’t lush.
There’s a quiet undercurrent of emotional tension throughout. The narrator has two primary friendships � with Shehnaz, a cosmopolitan Indian student, and Mandira, more rooted in Indian culture. Through these women, we get fragmented glimpses of affection, jealousy, cultural commentary, and a kind of subdued yearning. But nothing is explicit. In classic Chaudhuri style, everything is implied, never spelled out.
If you’re even remotely interested in Indian classical music, this book will sing to you. Music isn't just a hobby for the narrator � it’s a metaphysical space. References to raags, tanpuras, and gharanas are scattered throughout the text, not just as decoration, but as structure. The novel’s form mirrors the way music unfolds � cyclically, through repetition and return.
And for those not steeped in classical music, don’t worry � Chaudhuri writes with such ease that even unfamiliar terms feel like part of the rhythm.
Instead of loud postcolonial angst, we get small, exquisite ironies. Like the way the narrator’s English professors are more interested in Shakespeare than he is. Or the way he notices the “unspoken� rules of class and race among his white classmates. The colonial hangover is still there, but it’s whispered in undertones, not banged on a drum.
Afternoon Raag is not a novel for everyone. It’s for the readers who love to pause, re-read, reflect, and sink into a mood. If you're in a hurry, you'll miss the music. But if you let it wash over you, it becomes a meditative experience. It’s about the unsaid, the in-between, the blurred edges of identity and memory.
Like the afternoon itself � neither morning nor evening, neither here nor there � it’s a story that exists in liminal light.
June 4, 2024
Every year I make it a point to read one book of Chaudhuri. His books are an indulgence both at an aesthetic and an intellectual level. I know it's rather difficult to separate the two and it does disservice to create such unnecessary binaries. But let me explain what I mean by the two. In this 1993-novel, Chaudhuri moves away from Calcutta that was the setting of his debut. Here, we are taken to Oxford and Bombay. Calcutta features occasionally but starkly different from his first book. We follow a student who is researching on D.H. Lawrence. He is a young boy who befriends another Indian boy from rural North India. He is going on dates and having sex with two Indian girls his age. He is in Oxford for a global experience but the narrator's engagement with people in the UK are getting more Indian as days go by. You see, this is what I am speaking of. Chaudhuri indulged me with his charming style, of a scholar studying D.H. Lawrence (one of my favourite writers) and his flâneur extravaganza. I was luxuriating in the beautifully thought out descriptions of the narrator, of a young boy born to Bengali parents, bred in Bombay always used to seeing his life in transition. It made me think of his comportment through music, musings from his past, and how he is finding the same raag here in a distant locale. He knows his existence here, like his friends' is fleeting, temporary and yet he is unable to feel free of the roots that he has already found in Oxford and with Lawrence. The music that made him into a man he feels dissociated with in Oxford is what binds him to the people he surrounds himself with. They don't play the instrument, or sing but they seem to be lured by his attachment to it. If read closely, you see the flawed nature of the urban, middle-class gaze of a man running throughout the text. They offer a cadence, a story more to do with what it means to simply exist. As Mantel as rightly described him, his books are Proustian and that succeeds every time for Chaudhuri.
June 23, 2024
A bit limp. The music theme is broached but not really developed, and one is left with the hesitations and a young man torn between this country (England) or that (India), or this woman or that, in a style that alternates between lyrical, beautifully turned sentences, and odd clunkers. These well-trodden themes have been better explored elsewhere.
The book does have the best description of Indian classical music recitals I have read, describing the role of the musicians vs. the singer: "The tabla and harmonium players behave like palanquins-bearers carrying a precious burden, or like solemn but indulgent guardians who walk a little distance behind a precocious child as it does astonishing things, seeing, with a corner of their eye, that it does not get hurt, or like deferential ministers clearing a path for their picturesque prince�" Anyone who has attended vocal music recitals will recognize what Chaudhuri is wittily capturing here.
The book does have the best description of Indian classical music recitals I have read, describing the role of the musicians vs. the singer: "The tabla and harmonium players behave like palanquins-bearers carrying a precious burden, or like solemn but indulgent guardians who walk a little distance behind a precocious child as it does astonishing things, seeing, with a corner of their eye, that it does not get hurt, or like deferential ministers clearing a path for their picturesque prince�" Anyone who has attended vocal music recitals will recognize what Chaudhuri is wittily capturing here.
February 26, 2025
This book does have some unique qualities not to be found anywhere else, that much is true. A beauty of its own kind. Lots of personification. An indian scholar attends Oxford, although this is plotless, an ode to poetry, rather than an exploration of Oxford life. This scholar draws on the ethereal depths of his surroundings, wallowing in the ambience, whilst others are paddling hard and, in his opinion, creating anxieties. The angle that this author has chosen to script from, gave an arrogance to this scholar, and it seemed to me that given the time he dedicated to paint an alternate picture of the world's most celebrated educational institute, indicated the ease of a usually tumultuous journey. The tone is rather condescending. Halfway through I'd had my fill of it.
December 28, 2023
On the face of it, this book is all about nostalgia. But I was miffed by what the description said is a love triangle - it is not.
The narrator is a man who cannot decide between the two women he is dating simultaneously and is going in and out of nostalgic moments of his time with his parents in India and the two women in Oxford while sprinkling the chapters with little anecdotes about his neighbor, Sharma, his love for music, his music teacher and his love for Lawrence.
I could not care for this protagonist.
The narrator is a man who cannot decide between the two women he is dating simultaneously and is going in and out of nostalgic moments of his time with his parents in India and the two women in Oxford while sprinkling the chapters with little anecdotes about his neighbor, Sharma, his love for music, his music teacher and his love for Lawrence.
I could not care for this protagonist.
April 2, 2022
The book is like a raagamaalika that demands and pushes you into a Zen mode to cherish it. There are few to no dialogues in the book (I wish there were more), but the author never failed to appreciate his memory back in the 80s eloquently. The nostalgia back and forth, from India to England, is told in a melodic manner with his observation of the people, and the environment he encounters. His sensitivity to details will make one appreciate the details in their lives too.
December 29, 2019
A wonderful lilting read. Amit Chaudhri's ability to make even a description of a rainy afternoon in Oxford or the meandering of his music teacher chasing a raag something special is enchanting and endearing.
To me - an Indian migrant now living in UK but on a visit to my home town in India - this was specially heart warming.
To me - an Indian migrant now living in UK but on a visit to my home town in India - this was specially heart warming.
March 16, 2025
Had no idea what is going om. There is no structure or story in this book. I guess its about a feeling. The way he writes is very nice. I do agree with the reviews that how he writes about women is super weird and problematic. There are a few nice quotes and connections to my life I really like and will cherish but yes weird book
June 23, 2019
This is my first Amit Chaudhuri book. I like these kind of "Kazuao Ishiguro" style books that are basically about recollections of episodes of life but not necessarily in a linear way but more weighted by impact on the memory. Good read.
August 18, 2020
Loved this beautiful, dreamlike meander through Oxford, Bombay and Calcutta. It would’ve got 5 stars, but a chapter late on from a secondary character’s point of view give me a taste I wanted more of.
December 1, 2022
Was an interesting read without any plot. Its almost like its a collection of writings on one persons reflection on different societys. Well written but it wouldve been better if there was actually a proper story.
March 24, 2019
Feelings of haunting nostalgia upon completing it.
April 4, 2020
Not for everyone; slow description page by page but it takes you back to places you’ve never been ....magnificent
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