''The Mountain Is Young'' is the fourth novel by Chinese-Flemish author

Han Suyin Rosalie Matilda Kuanghu Chou (; 12 September 1917 or 1916 – 2 November 2012) was a Chinese-born Eurasian physician and author better known by her pen name Han Suyin (). She wrote in English and French on modern China, set her novels in East a ...

. A love story set in Nepal, it was first published by Jonathan Cape, Ltd. London in 1958. It became a ''New York Times'' bestseller in Fiction that same year. It was republished by

Penguin Books Penguin Books is a British publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers The Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the following year.HarperCollins HarperCollins Publishers LLC is one of the Big Five English-language publishing companies, alongside Penguin Random House, Simon & Schuster, Hachette, and Macmillan. The company is headquartered in New York City and is a subsidiary of News ...

in 1987 and by Rupa & Co. in 1999.

Origins

The novel is based on Han Suyin's experiences as an invited attendee of the 1956 coronation of the King of Nepal, an event which is described in the novel. In the preface, Han Suyin writes that the book, while being a work of fiction, endeavors to give as exact a picture as is possible of the time. The school at which Anne Ford teaches, many other institutions and places referenced in the book, and of all the named characters, are invented. ''The Mountain is Young'' is written in the

confessional A confessional is a box, cabinet, booth, or stall in which the priest in some Christian churches sits to hear the confessions of penitents. It is the usual venue for the sacrament in the Roman Catholic Church and the Lutheran Churches, but si ...

style and is considered to reflect autobiographical details of the author's personal life, specifically the difficult ending of her second marriage with British officer Leonard Comber, and meeting the Indian army colonel, Vincent Ruthnaswamy, who would become her third husband.

Plot summary

''The Mountain Is Young'' is set in

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

in 1956. The protagonist, Anne Ford, is a writer whose husband is a retired colonial civil servant. She travels to

Kathmandu , pushpin_map = Nepal Bagmati Province#Nepal#Asia , coordinates = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = , subdivision_type1 = Province , subdivision_name1 = Bagmati Prov ...

after getting a job as an English teacher at a Girls Institute there. Then, she meets and falls in love with the engineer in charge of building the dam. It is a story of rediscovering yourself after a long sleep of fitting in, boredom and misery. The reader of this story is inspired to discover the same self, become aware of the unseen rules of society and challenge the fact that they threaten to take away the joy of using our gifts and live our unique lives to the fullest, just as happens to lead character Anne when she awakens.

Reception

The book was described in ''The Rough Guide to Nepal 2002'' as "the first—and still only—bestseller in English set in Nepal". The ''

Rough Guide Rough Guides Ltd is a British travel guide book and reference publisher, which has been owned by APA Publications since November 2017. In addition to publishing guidebooks, the company also provides a tailor-made trips service based on customer ...

'' says it shows how much has changed in Kathmandu 56 years later, and "somewhat surprisingly" how much has not changed since then. In ''Forster and further: the tradition of Anglo-Indian fiction'',

Sujit Mukherjee Sujit Mukherjee (21 August 1930 – 14 January 2003) was an Indian writer, translator, literary critic, publisher, teacher and cricketer. Career Sujit Mukherjee was born in the village of Ariadaha, south of Calcutta, and educated at St. Xavier's ...

writes "The novel appears to be a command performance because Han Suyin was specially invited to attend the coronation of King Mahendra and Queen Ratna in May 1956. This work, a direct outcome of that experience, is nearly as fabulous as the occasion it celebrates. The central fable combines resuscitation of a writer along with reawakening as a woman."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mountain Is Young 1958 American novels Novels by Han Suyin Novels set in Nepal Jonathan Cape books Novels set in the 1950s Fiction set in 1956