‘The Great Kanchana Circus’: A historical novel with a gripping premise but excessive details

The Great Kanchana Circus, written by Vishwas Patil and translated by Nadeem Khan, starts on the back of a successful performance by a circus run by Sarang Shinde, operating in Maharashtra and Karnataka. Shinde, a former army man, has built the enterprise from scratch, along with his daughter, the titular Kanchana. As the circus grows in fame and soon becomes sought after across the country, so does Kanchana.

Life in the circus

An acclaimed cat-handler herself, she is the main draw for the circus, with her breathtaking theatrics with her beloved tigress. Kanchana’s bravery and flamboyance serve as the driving force behind the circus’ success. The first half of the novel is spent entirely establishing the backstory and subsequent success of this small circus and the father-daughter duo running it. The relationship that Sarang Daaji shares with his daughter is explored in detail, revealing how he brought her up as a single father in the face of rejection by his own family and community.

The second half of the novel takes a sharp swerve to Burma, now Myanmar, in the onset of the Second World War. Now a pan-South Asia entertainment draw, Kanchana and her circus are invited to perform in Burma in the weeks leading up to Christmas, a time of festivities and celebration. The extended holiday period ensures that the circus receives more than adequate footfall, and the company soon makes much more money than they anticipated.

However, Japan bombs Burma on December 23, two days before Christmas, and the attacks continue, stranding the circus with hundreds of its workers and exotic animals. The rest of the novel is spent traversing the dangerous path home. As the British flee Burma, Kanchana is left to fend for herself and arrange the safe return of all those relying on her.

The highlight of the novel is the intricate details we are presented with about the day-to-day functioning of the circus. Author Vishwas Patil came upon the idea of travelling circuses stranded in Burma during the War, nearly 30 years ago, while researching his book on Subhash Chandra Bose (Mahanayak, 2005). He went through the accounts of the British evacuation from the country as the Japanese troops advanced, and in those, he found the surprising mention of circuses.

Years later, Patil tracked down circus artists in Mumbai, who used to be a part of these acts, and this eventually formed the basis of the novel. It is evident that Patil has extensively researched the functioning of circuses, and we are provided with a lot of information on the logistics of planning an act, or moving from city to city to perform. The picture of a tense Burma and the various ethnic troubles already brewing in it long before the Japanese attacks is painted with the same minutiae.

The country is already displeased with its ruler, who is packed off to India in the late 1800s, and local Indians are on the receiving end of xenophobia due to the large number of successful businesses that they own, in contrast to the poorer Burmese people.

The misses

I have only been to a circus once, maybe more than 20 years ago, and it was already nearing the end of its popularity by then. I remember being awed, but also being too aware of the death of the act that was soon to come. There is a silent undercurrent of gloom in the novel, not as intended by the author but maybe one that we as readers might detect, knowing the fate of circuses eventually. When the novel presents the sheer scale of the planning and work required to put into the enterprise, I couldn’t help feeling a little sad.

Patil also makes sure to present the animals as being well cared for and not forced into the acts, but it would be unfaithful to ignore that a major reason circuses fell out of favour was that making animals perform and using them in acts just wasn’t sitting as well with the audience as it used to. Serious questions on animal welfare were being raised before most circuses shut shop, and the few existing ones pivoted to technology and relying on human performers only.

While on paper the entire idea should work well, it ironically doesn’t translate into a gripping story. The flashbacks and relationships established in the first half eventually start to drag, and the text ends up sounding monotonous and almost factual. While the novel publicises itself as a story of the grand journey the circus is making back home, it ends up constituting only one part of it.

By the time the reader gets to this journey, we are already exhausted from the novel’s bluntness. I took much longer to finish this novel than I should have, because I was simply worn down by its tone. The strength of The Great Kanchana Circus remains in its details and the backdrop it uses to lay the story out. The downside, however becomes the excessive indulgence it seems to give to these details, often at the cost of the narrative of the novel.

The Great Kanchana Circus, Vishwas Patil, translated from the Marathi by Nadeem Khan, Westland.