Towering Babel

By * Chrisfopher Porterfield

ALL ABOUT H. HATTERR by G.V. Desani. 287 pages. Farrar, Straus & G/roux. $5.95.

Some books make the reviewer want to shout; others, to weep; still others, to pontificate. All About H. Hatterr makes one simply want to point at the words on the page. When a novel speaks for itself with such a bizarre and delightful voice as this one does, to paraphrase would be travesty. What can be said in mere critical language, for example, about the following passage, which ends the book?

"I carry on. Meanwhile, and regardless, I am putting questions to fellers: and regardless of the unanswerable what is truth? . . . Maybe, damme, all humans --the Shem, Ham and Japheth--just like you say, come from one branched-off source: our Grand-dad chimpanzee, our gorilla grandma, and the orang-patriarch. O.K. and granted. But sans sense, primates, and progeny of puny primates! Why bite one another now, though your ancestors might have? Repondez s'il vous plait! man hunting man! Ach, mein Gott! are human beings fools or what? In the interim . . . while I wait, and you tell, mach's nach, aber mach's besser, viz., carry on, boys, and continue like hell!"

Cultural Carpetbagger. In his unique and cheerful way, Author Desani is a one-man tower of Babel, a cultural carpetbagger who hawks the flotsam and jetsam of at least five civilizations and three continents, with odd lots of Latin, Shakespeare and the Bible thrown in. His peculiar comic note derives not only from this exotic mixture, but also from his sweet-tempered narrative of sour experiences. The punning jumble that results might be called a cracked hymn to the Joyce and sorrows of life.

Desani's hero, H. Hatterr, is an Anglo-Indian and a "true spiritual devil-may-care." In seven symmetrical chapters, he seeks enlightenment from some sages of India, then sets out to the countryside to apply his new-found wisdom. Each adventure turns out to be a con game, with somebody else working the con and Hatterr as the game. Attempting to exorcise the mystical fit of an itinerant bard, he is himself accused of being possessed by a spirit and is nearly burned alive on a pyre. "Damme," he says, "this is Life and contrast for you!"

Contrast is Desani's key philosophical concept. Make no mistake. All About H. Hatterr is a philosophical novel that deals, however obliquely, with such eternal conundrums as love, free will and appearance and reality. Its protagonist formulates no doctrines. But without ever quite losing his innocence, he does arrive at a visionary acceptance of all mortal matters as so much moonlight on the Ganges. "To hell with judging!" he concludes. "I have no opinions, I am beaten, and I just accept all this phenomena, this diamond-cut-diamond game, this human horseplay, this topsy-turvyism, as Life, as contrast."

Awakened by a Gong. All About H. Hatterr is one of those genuine literary rarities, the lost-and-found masterpiece. Originally published in Britain in 1948, it was a first novel for Govind V. Desani, a shy, eclectic philosopher by trade who was born in Nairobi of Indian parents. The book received an initial phalanx of favorable reviews. But sales were poor, and soon afterward both novel and author dropped out of sight. Desani went to India, where Prime Minister Nehru commissioned him to create a new literary academy. One night, he recalls, "I was awakened by a gong and I had the feeling that I had forgotten something very important. So I wandered away in search of it and lost myself in the jungles and monasteries of Asia."

Desani's somewhat Hatterrian quest included a brief masquerade as a member of Tibet's Tantra sect, whose religious practices include ritual sex in the temple. In 1960, still deeply involved in meditation, yoga and Buddhism, he returned to writing as a contributor to the Illustrated Weekly of India. For the past two years he has taught philosophy at the University of Texas. At 61, he plans to wander no farther.

Like Hatterr, Desani has roots in both East and West, and he considers the book "a criticism of both corrupt cultures." It seems to be something of a last word. Although pleased to see it reissued, Desani has no other novels in his trunk and no intention of writing any more fiction. "Hatterr was a kind of insanity. I'm glad to have it out of my system," he says. Disappointing news for readers, perhaps; but, as Hatterr might say, damme, this is contrast for you.

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