By Dean Nelson, Jaipur
6:36PM GMT 21 Jan 2015
Theirs was among the most poisonous of literary feuds. V.S Naipaul, the Nobel Prize-winning author, and his American protÉgÉ Paul Theroux fell out in a spectacularly-bitter war of words, after Naipaul sold some of Theroux's gifts at auction. The anger seethed for almost two decades.
But on Wednesday the hatchet was resoundingly buried, with 82-year-old Naipaul breaking down in tears after Theroux praised his latest book at a literary festival in India, and compared the author to Charles Dickens.
"What I was reading was a book which described an entire world," said Theroux, describing Naipaul's A House for Mr Biswas. The novel, set in Naipaul's Trinidad birthplace, tells the story of a disappointed man who fails in his ambition to become a writer.
"A family on an island where nothing was left out, every cultural artefact, the food, the way of speaking, the weather and houses, everything was there. It was the most complete novel I had read since, I suppose, Dickens," he said.
Theroux hailed his novel at the festival, seated on stage alongside fellow writers Hanif Kureishi, Farrukh Dhondy and Amit Chaudhuri.
Minutes later Naipaul, now in a wheelchair, joined the writers on stage, but faltered when he was handed the microphone.
"Thank you all very much. I want to thank the speakers who have been very generous," he said, before his face crumpled and he struggled to maintain his composure.
His wife took the microphone and said: "I think my husband is overwhelmed with your reception and the wonderful things said about his book. He's very moved by Paul, Hanif, Farrukh and Amit, who are good friends, so I think we'll say goodbye." She was seen dabbing his eyes with a handkerchief before he was wheeled away.
"He was completely moved," an aide later told The Telegraph. "He was in tears and could not speak. I think seeing Paul Theroux was an emotional moment but there was also a sense of it being one of his last few public appearances. He said 'my life has come full circle'".
Theroux began writing after he met Naipaul in Kampala in 1966. Their relationship was initially based on correspondence and Theroux's fan-worship of Naipaul. And, under Naipaul's mentorship, Theroux went on to become one of the world's most celebrated travel writers.
Theroux went on to author The Great Railway Bazaar on his epic journey from Britain to Japan and in 1975 and his novel The Mosquito Coast was made into a Hollywood blockbuster in 1986, starring Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren.
Their friendship was shattered in 1996 when Naipaul offered personally-signed and dedicated copies of Theroux's books for auction. Theroux faxed a copy of the auction list to his old mentor with a teasing note asking "How are you?" - but was stunned to receive a withering response from Nadira, Naipaul's second wife, who he had recently married, criticising Theroux's work and accusing him of trying to portray his mentor as "fanatical and extreme" in his views on Africa.
Theroux wrote to Naipaul – who was knighted in 1989 – to ask why his new wife had written in this way. But he received no response.
In 1998 he published Sir Vidia's Shadow, an account of their personal and professional relationship, in which he said Lady Nadira was from a "s----- little town" in Pakistan and described her letter as a "crazy" diatribe written in "Babu English".
He blamed her for the deterioration in their friendship.
Naipaul was not a bridge burner, he wrote, but a "mushy soul afflicted with a cruel streak, and like many severe men, something of a sentimentalist. He cried easily." He was, said Theroux, also a mean freeloader who rarely paid his share of bills.
Patrick French, Naipaul's official biographer, poured fuel on the fire when he said that throughout their friendship Naipaul belittled Theroux's writing. In the first few years of their relationship, Naipaul described Theroux as a "absolute bore" who "had no views" and "did not know what he thought about anything".
Their feud lasted 15 years and was ended when the writer Ian McEwan nudged them to shake hands at the Hay literature festival in 2011.
Their first public meeting on stage at India's Jaipur Literature Festival on Wednesday cleared any doubts over how they now feel about one another.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new...estival-reunion.html
