How To Be You

If you walk through the winding, mist-covered roads of Landour, a quaint cantonment town just above Mussoorie, you might catch a glimpse of an elderly man looking out from a window framed by ivy. For more than six decades, this man has been observing the play of light on the pine trees, the eccentricities of small-town residents, and the quiet dignity of the natural world.

He is Ruskin Bond—the grand old man of Indian literature, a literary grandfather to generations of readers, and arguably the most beloved writer in India today.

Bond’s life is inextricably linked to the Himalayas, yet his story begins with deep emotional turbulence. His journey from a lonely, displaced boy to a celebrated literary icon is a testament to the healing power of the natural world and the enduring magic of the written word.

The Boy Who Learned to Be Alone
Ruskin Bond was born on May 19, 1934, in the cantonment town of Kasauli, Himachal Pradesh, to Edith Clarke and Aubrey Alexander Bond. His father served in the Royal Air Force during World War II, a job that kept the family moving across the subcontinent—from Jamnagar in Gujarat to Dehradun in the foothills of the Himalayas.

His early childhood, however, was marred by a deep sense of instability. When Ruskin was just four years old, his parents' marriage began to disintegrate. His mother, Edith, eventually separated from Aubrey and married an Indian man, Mr. Hari. The emotional fallout of this separation left a lasting imprint on young Ruskin. He felt alienated from his mother, a distance that would take decades to bridge.

In the wake of the separation, Ruskin formed a profoundly close bond with his father. Aubrey was a gentle, attentive man who introduced his son to the twin sanctuaries that would define Ruskin’s life: books and nature. They walked together, collected stamps, and read stories. For a brief period, while living in New Delhi, Ruskin experienced genuine happiness.

But this sanctuary was brutally shattered in 1944. While ten-year-old Ruskin was away at a boarding school in Shimla, his father died suddenly from a bout of severe malaria.

The loss was catastrophic. The young boy was thrust into a state of profound grief and isolation. "When my father died, my world fell apart," Bond would later reflect. Forced to live with his mother and stepfather in Dehradun, he retreated inward. He found solace in the quiet corners of his stepfather's house, spending hours reading Charles Dickens, Somerset Maugham, and P.G. Wodehouse, and observing the insects, birds, and trees in the garden. This tragedy, while devastating, forged the intense observational skills and deep empathy for the lonely and the marginalized that became the hallmark of his writing.

Finding a Voice in the Hills
Ruskin was sent to the prestigious Bishop Cotton School in Shimla. While he was never a spectacular academic student, the library became his true classroom. He devoured books and soon discovered a natural aptitude for writing. He won several writing competitions at school, including the Irwin Divinity Prize and the Hailey Literature Prize.

By the time he graduated in 1950, Ruskin knew exactly what he wanted to do: he wanted to be a writer. However, post-independence India offered few lucrative avenues for an aspiring author writing in English. Concerned for his future, his mother sent the 17-year-old Ruskin to the United Kingdom to live with his aunt in Jersey, hoping he would find stable employment.

The move to England was a pivotal chapter, not because he fell in love with it, but because he intensely rejected it. Working mundane clerical jobs in Jersey and later in London, Ruskin was engulfed by a crushing wave of homesickness. He missed the warmth of India, the smell of the rain on the parched earth, the chaotic bazaars of Dehradun, and most of all, the mountains.