Rupees! Rupees!

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Rupees! Rupees! (English: Q & A ) is a 2005 novel by the Indian author and politician Vikas Swarup . It describes the life of the slum boy Ram Mohammad Thomas, who starred in an Indian TV quiz show. Despite a lack of general education, his eventful life story allows him to answer all questions and is therefore suspected of fraud. The book became world famous through the Oscar-winning film adaptation Slumdog Millionaire .

background

Swarup was already a successful diplomat when he lived in London for a long period in 2003 and was separated from his wife and children. In his spare time he decided to write an "Indian novel with Indian characters". According to his own statement, he was inspired on the subject of his book by a visit to one of the learning stations of the Hole in the Wall educational project. He chose a quiz show as the framework, as there was “tension that you can feel at all times”. Since he is also an action fan, he built in lots of dramatic scenes in addition to local color and quiz show and admits that the book is "quite commercial". Swarup wrote "four and a half chapters" and sent them to various literary agents in London. We got positive feedback in August 2003 and Swarup finished the book in a month.

action

Poor 18-year-old waiter Ram Mohammad Thomas wrote on the quiz show Who Will Win a Billion? (short: W3B ) (German: Who will be a billionaire? ) answered all twelve questions correctly. Since the production company of the quiz show cannot pay out the prize money of one billion rupees , he is accused of fraud by the corrupt quiz master Prem Kumar and the producers together with the police (which is also due to the fact that no one trusts such a poor youth to have so much knowledge, that he could answer all questions). In prison, Ram is tortured and forced to admit that he cheated on the show. Only the lawyer Smita listens to him. In flashbacks , Ram tells her twelve chapters of his life full of privation.

Author Swarup uses the twelve questions from the quiz show as a guide to have Ram tell twelve short stories about life in the slums of India. The topics discussed include ethnic tensions between Hindus, Muslims and Christians, drug consumption, child abuse, corruption, the social gap between rich and poor, the difficult relationship with England and Pakistan and much more. Although Ram is poor and relatively uneducated, he gets by with luck and skill. All twelve chapters end with a quiz question from Kumar, which Ram can answer through his experiences. Among other things, the author lets Ram work as an illegal tourist guide at the Taj Mahal , which is why he can answer a difficult historical question that has indirectly something to do with this building.

Although Ram is a migrant worker throughout the book, he keeps thinking about his best friend Salim, who dreams of a career as a Bollywood actor. Ram also saves a girl named Gudiya from her father, who is an alcoholic (but still in his youth). Ram's great love becomes the prostitute Nita, who was forced to buy it by her family at the age of twelve and whose virginity was once auctioned off at the maximum price.

In the end, it turns out that the lawyer Smita is the same girl that Ram saved years ago, namely Gudiya. She helps Ram with her defense to his money, with which he can buy Nita out and marry. Salim becomes a Bollywood movie star with Ram as producer, and the corrupt quiz show operators go broke by paying Ram.

Reviews

  • "Very Indian, very colorful, very piquant and quite loud ... a virtuoso linked plot ... this book will definitely not be a critical problematic film." - Deutschlandfunk
  • "Definitely recommendable for friends of cross-border and cross-cultural social satire." - Deutsche Welle
  • “Downright funny, but also deeply upsetting. A loud YES to life. ”- wdr.de
  • "A novel that ... renounces cautionary index fingers and sultry Indian exoticism, but is also so trimmed for global readability that it hardly needs the cultural peculiarities of India." - faz.net

filming

British director Danny Boyle filmed the story under the title " Slumdog Millionaire ". The film was a hit with fans and critics and won eight Academy Awards at the 2009 Academy Awards . The content of the book has been streamlined so that topics such as B. homosexuality, child abuse, voodoo, parentlessness and nationalism are no longer discussed in the film. Some of the quiz questions are different, and the names have mostly been changed. The innocent younger Salim in the book and only best friend became a criminal in the film and Ram's older brother, while the role of Prem Kumar was downsized and that of Gudiya was omitted entirely. In addition, Nita appears in the film even in Ram's childhood and the plot is almost entirely different from the book. Ram does not escape voluntarily in the film, as in the book, but is thrown out by Salim. Otherwise, the film is far more critical than the book and presents the conditions even tougher, which Deutschlandfunk would not have expected (see above criticism).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS191330+17-Feb-2009+BW20090217
  2. ↑ Who wants to be a millionaires? , rediff.com
  3. ↑ Very colorful, very piquant and quite loud , deutschlandradio.de
  4. ↑ Rupees! Rupees! ( Memento from September 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), dw-world.de
  5. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: Rupees! Rupees! , wdr.de@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.wdr.de
  6. ↑ Who Tortures the Billionaire?

Web links