Book Review: All You Need is Paper by Ruskin Bond

The short story ‘All You Need is Paper’ by Ruskin Bond is a part of the Rusty series book: Rusty Comes Home. Rusty left Dehra for England when he was twenty or so comes back to the city after publishing his first novel in England at the age of twenty four.

This story contrasts the difference between the life he spent in England and now the life he is leading in Dehradun. Rusty recollects life in England was quite lonely: one have had no noisy company of neighbors and had to walk down the street to have had meals and to kill time cinema was the only option. On the other hand, in Dehra he can find chirpiness all around, every time.

Ruskin takes a dig at the uncertainty of future when he remembers his teenage friends of Dehra - all of them disappeared one by one in search of good life that meant career and fortune - since no one loves to onboard the simple life with limited money and where the hope of making fortune is always in the fog.

Even his favourite and very simple friend, Sitaram, the son of a washerman, who always relished joy from simple things and looked void of worldly pretensions has now moved on for a better life and money, though he didn’t change his profession so drastically but still a change of place may bring him good money. He has gone to Shimla to work as a waiter in a big hotel.

Somi has moved to Calcutta, while Ranbir to Bombay. And his lafunga friend Sudheer, who once took him to Lansdowne to get him to meet his aunty, was working in a tea estate in New Jalpaigudi but got killed by the labourers. This didn’t surprise Rusty as he knew that he was a man of wits and earning fortune by risking life was like a daily gamble for him.

Kishen, a dear friend of him, whom he tutored English lessons died at the age of twenty seven when he attempted to save a drowning child from a river. Rusty remembers him as a shy Punjabi lad but he was never meant for daring and adventurous tasks, like saving someone drowning from a violent river.

As a writer, he feels lonely in Dehra since all his good friends have been scattered or passed away. He writes stories for Indian magazines to sustain. Success is yet to come but somehow he manages to survive a decent lifestyle on fiddling amount which he receives from the publishers. Despite the fact that his first book has been published abroad, fortune and fame is still a distant dream.

One of his neighbors, a Punjabi woman in thirties, takes time to narrate the tales of supernatural powers to him, which he subtly uses in his stories. One day, at the behest of his landlady, Rusty begins selling vegetables thinking he will make better money than his passive writing, profession. Paradoxically, the venture fails miserably.

From Dilaram bazaar, a handful of middle-class students went on to make great fortunes, like setting up wine businesses in England and so on. Comparison and inspiration both come to him so chaotically that he becomes so bewildered that his self-confidence, many a time, begins stirring away.

Evidently, in this lovely story he underlines the need of having a career. Also, what one career one can have very much depends upon the situations of life. For Rusty, as he was not better off with basic aspects like buying vegetables or cooking, writing looked impractical to his friends, nevertheless he took it ahead with all courage and temerity he held within.

This story recounts the memories of old days, mixed with nostalgia and fits of loneliness. In short, he mentioned two things at a time: the loneliness as a writer and the type of loneliness that descends upon losing good friends.