A static character is a character that does not change throughout a novel, one who does not learn a lesson or change his person. A dynamic character is one that changes and develops throughout a story. Balram is one of the most dynamic characters I have ever seen, with his development being a central part of this novel.
At the beginning of the novel, Balram is a mere child and a peasant in the darkness. He is a completely unimportant and unloved person, to the point no one will even bother to give him a name. He is expected to be completely submissive to the will of his family, and he is, dropping a lifetime opportunity without even a say in it to get a job in a teashop, working with no pride for little pay.
After he gets the idea to become a driver, his family gives him 300 rupees to learn, an act of some generosity. He becomes the number two driver of the Stork family, gaining a salary of 1500. Which his family steals almost completely and thanklessly. It becomes clear that his family wants to use him, suck him dry, “scoop him out from the inside and leave him weak and helpless, until he got tuberculosis and died on the floor of a government hospital, waiting for some doctor to see him, spitting blood on this wall and that!” (74). And so he rebels. He refuses to get married and dedicate his life to their ends. This is the first time in the book he does such a thing, and it signifies a major transition for him.
Later, he gets the ambition to go to Delhi. A rather hopeless cause: he cannot hope to get enough money to bribe the Nepali, and the family likes the other driver more. Balram decides to conspire and act to get what he wants. He sees the number one driver is secretly a Muslim serving a racist master, and blackmails him into leaving. While he feels some guilt upon doing this, he becomes happier. By now it becomes clear that in this story and as far as Balram is concerned, the more ruthless he becomes the happier he is. The more ruthless he becomes, the stronger his sense of himself as a person becomes, a person that was raised like an animal, made to provide dumbly until he died unceremoniously. Ruthlessness is a good element for Balram.
What does this indicate for Balram? Is he a horrible human being? Does he delight in killing and bribing and blackmailing his way to the top in exchange for money and such pleasures? I believe its more of the fact that Balram values individuality and freedom more than he does morality. Freedom is a cause worth dying for, and thus it must be a cause worth killing for. Balram is not a bad person, for what he does he does in the process of becoming a person at all.
When Balram gets to the city, he is lost and humble and unsightly. He doesn’t know anything would be the conclusion drawn by most, something humorously observed on his comment on the shaved women. Balram is a simple country boy. But he learns. He sees how toothpaste can improve his teeth and he uses it. He stops scratching his crotch and using as much paan. He wears better clothing. He even gets himself a little coming of age ritual by getting a blonde whore, a luxury almost completely unheard of for a servant. He rapidly improves himself into a civilized city dweller.
One of the most interesting things in this book is the link between Ashok and Balram as he changes. Balram looks up to Ashok. Ashok is a good man. So he doesn’t steal, so he doesn’t cheat him. When Ashok tries to get him to take the blame for the traffic accident, it shatters that illusion for him. He is devastated by how he was cheated and used. When Ashok gets dumped, he gets corrupted. He starts sleeping around and partying, he partakes in every sin from gluttony to lust. He sleeps with that Russian actress while Balram sits there, “…hoping he’d come running out, arms flailing, and screaming “Balram, I was on the verge of making a mistake! Save me-lets drive away at once!” (187). When Balram becomes disillusioned with Ashok, he losses respect for him. And ironically his makes him imitate him, follow him in his corruption by stealing petrol, by using the car himself, by using it as a taxi, by going to corrupt mechanics. Until finally the idea of stealing the bag pops up. The idea of taking 700,000 rupees and be free.
He wrestles with it. He can finally understand what freedom is. He can finally see what it is he was to gain by killing Ashok. He would lose his family, but they only saw him as a resource. He would become a fugitive, but he would become free.
The instant he hits Ashok with the bottle, he starts referring to Ashok as an “it.”
Balram is now an entrepreneur, a “pillar of Bangalore society”. He is a philosopher. He has strong opinions on government on the macro and micro scale. He is knowledgeable on the city more than almost anyone. He is superstitious. He has ventures in real estate and transportation. Before he was a servant treated like an animal and acting like a piece of furniture. That is the transition he made in this book. It was worth everything he did to change.
For he became the White Tiger.
Dear Mr. Premier 