The ultimate nail, of course, is the heart attack that comes in his forty-seventh year. Still, he soldiers on. At at time when V. S. Naipaul is blocked in his writing, his father urges him to begin a new novel and offers himself as a possible subject. It's not known what his son thought of this suggestion, but now we have that very book. It's almost enough to make one believe in a divine Providence, at least for those who trust.
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Go back to the text. From The New Criterion Vol.