Better to have gone, by Akash Kapur

 

I enjoyed reading this account of the foundation of a utopian society called Auroville, the “revolution” or “civil war” between its founders and its inhabitants, and the resulting deaths of two of its early inhabitants. Auroville was founded in India in the 1960s, inspired by the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and his follower, a French woman called the “Mother.” Many of the early inhabitants were a mix of American and European hippies, and lost souls, some of whom were clearly suffering from a variety of mental illnesses. The author and his wife, Auralice, grew up in Auroville. Auralice’s mother Diane and her lover John died there in 1986, of suicide (in Diane’s case) and an illness that could easily have been prevented with medical care (in John’s case), but they were taking the advice of one of the men who was close to the “Mother.”

The story itself is quite maddening, but it serves as a cautionary tale for those who would get caught up in religious extremist fringe groups. Diane and John bought into the cult-like worship of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, reading their writings and believing in the flaky things they thought would come to pass. For example, the Mother preached for years that she was developing a new yoga that would cause cellular transformation and presumably lead to immortality. She went so far as to plead with her followers not to bury her too soon if it looked like she died, because she might in fact be just in a trance. Needless to say, she died and was buried, but this caused a huge rift in her followers, leading to the “revolution.” People in the village ended up fighting each other and everyone who didn’t take sides (i.e., “neutrals”) were treated the worst. Some were physically beaten; some were spit upon. The distrust also led to the burning of books in the community library. One of the Mother’s closest acolytes, Satprem (a French émigré whose real name was Bernard and who was a WWII concentration camp survivor with what sounded like depression and PTSD) warned Diane and John not to trust doctors or hospitals, which didn’t help much when Diane suffered an accident and broke her back, leaving her paralyzed from the waist down, or when John got worms, one of the parasites which may have killed him.

The book does have a few flaws: it gets a little tedious in the middle, with maybe too much detail about some of the events in Auroville. It also doesn’t include captions for its photographs; some people can be identified based on context, but there are group pictures where it’s unclear who’s who, which is a little irritating. However, this book's value is in the way it shows how easily people can be swayed, how quickly they can turn nasty, even in a society that is supposed to be about love and peace. Honestly, it was like Lord of the flies.

The origin of the title of the book is interesting; it comes from a letter written by John’s father (a wealthy man who funded much of John’s adventures in Auroville) who wrote that it was “better to have gone” to Auroville; I have to say that it was not better to have gone, at least for John. What took place in the past is not completely forgotten or forgiven, especially by the victims. Now Auroville is a tourist site.