As far as names go, Vassanji is immediately recognizable; his books are present in every bookstore in the city. He has written six novels in all, and in some way they all discuss the Indian Diaspora. His heroes tend to be South Asians living in East Africa who later migrate to Europe, Canada or the United States. Colonialism and the Diaspora suffuse his work, which is both a discussion and an interrogation at the same time. Vassanji is a Canadian novelist, yes, but he's also a South Asian, and there are few contemporary writers with more to say on immigration.
Take this quote, for example, from an interview conducted with Jai Arjun Singh (http://jaiarjun.blogspot.com/2007/08/short-conversation-with-m-g-vassanji.html),
"...it's a freedom to discover yourself - to step out into the world and find that you and your background are a very small part of the larger picture; that the world doesn't revolve around a single tradition, or community, or village. It can make you feel very small and uncertain, but it can also liberate you."
M. G. Vassanji is also undoubtedly a man of many talents. Before arriving in Canada, he attended Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied theoretical nuclear physics. After that, he was postdoctoral fellow at the Atomic Energy of Canada, and for nearly a decade after that, a research associate at the University of Toronto. It was only during this period - after a modest but successful nuclear physics career - that he developed his interest in medieval Indian literature and history. According to his site (http://www.mgvassanji.com/), "his contributions there he considers modest, in algebraic models and high spin states. The fact that he was never tenured he considers a blessing, for it freed him to pursue his literary career."
And a blessing it was, for his second career has given us classics such as "The Assassin's Song", "Gunny Sack", and "The In-Between World of Vikram Lall" - a novel that explored the turbulence in Kenya over the last fifty years. The characters within are forced to find their place amongst the new generation, something that people the world over have had to do since time immemorial. Like all of Vassanji's work, "The In-Between World of Vikram Lall" has a certain relevancy, a willingness to explore themes that touch all the diversity of humans in their scope.
