The Lowland

Two inseparable brothers grow up in the Tollygunge neighbourhood of Calcutta, until the younger, Udayan, is drawn into the Naxalite revolution and killed in the lowland behind their home, and the elder, Subhash, marries his widow and takes her to America. Lahiri roots it in real Calcutta: the Tollygunge family house, the low flooded ground and its two ponds where Udayan dies, and the walled Tolly Club that borders their world; across the ocean lies the Rhode Island life Subhash builds on that grief.

Udayan

The Tollygunge home

Part 1

In the modest Tollygunge house, the cautious Subhash and the bolder, more brilliant Udayan grow up as near-twins, sharing everything. It is from here that Udayan is drawn into the Naxalite movement's dream of revolution, the path that will divide the brothers and destroy the family.

Part 1

explicit The brothers grow up in a house in Tollygunge, a real southern neighbourhood of Calcutta; the specific house is invented and sited in that district.

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Gauri

The Tolly Club

Part 1

The exclusive Tolly Club, its manicured golf course walled off beside the crowded neighbourhood, is where the boys trespass in childhood and where the era's inequalities lie plainest. It is the world Udayan burns to overthrow, and against which Gauri, drawn into his cause, first knows him.

Part 1

explicit The walled, green Tolly Club, the real golf club of Tollygunge, borders the brothers' neighbourhood; as boys they sneak onto its forbidden grounds, and it stands for the colonial privilege the revolution attacks.

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