How To Get Filthy Rich In Rising Asia, Mohsin Hamid
This book is written so well, but the audio reader doesn’t do it justice. Often, when the author reads his own book, I find that he doesn’t add the emotional texture that a professional reader usually does, which makes an audiobook a “theater of the mind” for me. Hamid’s voice droned on in a monotone, perhaps because he read it as the instructional book it was supposedly intended to be, rather than as the underlying love story between the two main characters, two individuals trying to rise to the top of the world in their own distinctive way. If the book had been longer, I might have given it up altogether. It was the beauty of the narrative which flowed smoothly and eloquently, that held my attention and kept me listening, and also, it was the intriguing dual narrative of a handbook and a life story.
The book is meant to advise its reader on how to make his fortune in Asia. It is the story of a poor young man and a “pretty young girl” with whom he has an on and off friendship/affair throughout his life. Both characters are well developed and the psychology of their behavior is subtly and richly explored. The characters have no names, and where they live is unidentifiable. They exist in their moment of time, each pursuing their dream, as the world moves on around them, and often, even without them, somewhere in Asia. The culture described in Asia is different than mine, and what is considered acceptable there, even though it is sometimes dishonorable behavior, would be completely unacceptable where I live.
The book begins with the view of a very sick young child, a young boy who dreams of being “filthy rich”. Born into poverty, he attains success and prospers over the years by being rather unscrupulous in his single-minded approach to getting rich. He does anything and everything necessary to achieve his purpose. Although he is not ethical in business (a fact the author makes known is a quality necessary for success), he is compassionate toward his family and supports the surviving members with his fortune, so he is not without virtuous qualities.
This is the story of his rise to the pinnacle of his career and then his ultimate fall from grace, betrayed by those he knows, those he has helped, and those who are jealous of him and want to climb to success on the back of his failure when he is at his most vulnerable and more in need of kindness than sabotage, but this is a practice considered normal in his world. This behavior is the nature of the beast in search of wealth and power. Everyone seems to wait for the opportunity to take from those above them, and it seems to be a conventional practice, not even condemned by those who are robbed, for after all, they view the thieves as those in need, they view the crime as one they themselves would commit in similar circumstances. It is an odd juxtaposition of immorality and morality, compassion and cruelty. It seems like the personification of schadenfreude, at its worst. The victim accepts his victimization by those who destroy him, as if it is their right, and they don’t look back! They enjoy the fruits of their contemptible behavior without shame or remorse. They consider it their reward for their years of loyal service to the person they defraud.
When this boy who has now become an old man, finds that his past behavior has caught up with him, he doesn’t seem to mind. Age and illness have mellowed him, as it has also mellowed “the pretty girl” he treasured his whole life, the “girl who rose to stardom and fame, but who still came in and out of his life over the years, cultivating a hunger within him that he could not dispossess. In the final part of the book, their love story comes to fruition in a close and warm friendship. They share an apartment and offer comfort to each other in their waning days. She precedes him in death and the conclusion is somewhat mystical and spiritual, as he finds true happiness with her in his imagination.
Is the effort to be rich above all else truly worth it, if, in fact, when you lose it all, it is really of little consequence? If you have become fragile and old and your needs have changed, are your riches any longer of much use, or is the friendship of someone you care about and who cares about you of greater importance? Should that not always be more essential to one’s life?