New Statesman - <![CDATA[Lieve Joris]]> http://www.newstatesman.com/writers/lieve_joris en <![CDATA[Home, to the snakes and the sensitive plants]]> http://www.newstatesman.com/200112170031 http://www.newstatesman.com/200112170031 Mon, 17 Dec 2001 12:00:00 GMT Lieve Joris A few miles from the legendary Lion House, built for Mr Biswas, Lieve Joristalked to V S Naipaul and his family in Trinidad in the early 1990s. Her essay, published here in English for the first time, casts fresh light on the the novelist and his often shocking attitudes to his native land and its people

''You should have put on a skirt," Kim says. "Naipaul doesn't like women wearing trousers."

"I look fine! Have you seen his nieces? They wear shorts."

"Yes, but he lets his family get away with things he'd never accept from an outsider."

We're on our way to the house of V S Naipaul's sister Kamla, where he usually stays when he's visiting Trinidad. The second viaduct to the left, Naipaul [...]

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