Intimacy by Hanif Kureishi Goodreads 43/50

By vinodnarayan on November 12, 2017 • ( 0 )

Intimacy by British Writer Hanif Kureishi is the story of a middle Aged Screen Writer. In fact 24 hours of his life as he is contemplating leaving his wife of many years and their two son’s aged 5 and 3 and move out with his much younger girl friend Nina.

This is the first book I have read of Hanif and intimacy makes me want to read his ‘buddha of suburbia’ sometime.

I loved intimacy because it entangles a person’s life with both it’s long term uncertainties and short term definiteness breaking him in one thought and fixing him in another.

At times you feel he is annoying, and then you feel his life is about his decisions but underlying I felt there is the question ‘How do we decide that what we choose is right?”

The protagonist also has two friends who he uses as two sides of the spectrum he has to choose from. One friend lives with his wife in a perfect family setting and the other lives alone in a rented apartment and does anything he wants with his life. I felt that at the end he does realize that the both sides of the spectrum are not complete in itself, yet the choice and the future rests in his hands.

The narration goes more like an intimate flow of thoughts of the protagonist, be it about his affair with the younger women, his relationship with his wife or about his kids or the friends he talks to. An interesting read as I complete my 43rd book out of the 50 Challenge in 2017