In this dark, inventive fable, rhesus monkeys are brutally massacred on the dusty streets of Kolkata by a troop of power-hungry langur monkeys. Mico, a privileged langur, becomes entangled in the secrets at the heart of his troop's leadership and is shocked at what he discovers. He feels compelled to help the few surviving rhesus, especially Papina, a young female he befriends, even though doing so goes against everything he's been taught. As more blood is spilled, Mico realises that choosing between right and wrong won't be easy.
Told entirely from the monkeys' points of view, Monkey Wars shines a black light on the politics of power, the rise of tyrants and the personal dilemmas that must be faced when life is on the line.
Told entirely from the monkeys' points of view, Monkey Wars shines a black light on the politics of power, the rise of tyrants and the personal dilemmas that must be faced when life is on the line.
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Imagine a marketplace in Kolkata. Can you see the vendors selling stalls full of colourful fruit? Smell the heady scent of spices lacing the hazy air? Hear the buzz and the bustle of customers bargaining and bartering? Good.
Now picture the marketplace populous with as many monkeys as men and women.
Were they peaceful creatures—the monkeys, I mean—it'd be a magnificent thing; a memory to truly treasure. But they aren't, and it isn't. These monkeys have no money, no manners, no morals. They take what they want, when they want it, and if someone comes between them and their ends... well. People have been hurt. But because "devout Hindus believe that all monkeys are manifestations of the monkey god, Hanuman," (p.3) authorities are unable to take action against said simians.
A true story, I'm told, though the tale screenwriter Richard Kurti spins out of it—an all-ages allegory of the rise of the Nazis arranged around a tragic romance right out of Romeo and Juliet—is as much fiction as fact.