the world forgetting by the world forgot

A few days ago I was having lunch with a friend in the office when a bird flew past us. A noisy miner. I don't know how it managed to get in through the revolving doors but it was hopelessly disoriented, confused and, possibly, panicking. It kept flying around and every couple of minutes would fly straight up, mistaking the glass for the sky, and bumping into it and falling back down. It was a wretched sight and we didn't know what to do. The security personnel either didn't mind it or didn't know how to get it out, so it was condemned to be stuck in there until it injured itself or lay down exhausted, and someone could pick it up and fling it out. Ofcourse, like any self-respecting bleeding-heart liberal my heart pined for it, for a few minutes until I went back to my desk- out of sight, out of mind. That incident happened when I was midway through Siddhartha Deb's The Beautiful and the Damned, and it seemed like the perfect metaphor for the lives he was writing about. 

In the film Piku, Deepika takes Irrfan saab around Kolkata on a sight-seeing trip imposing onto places her personal connection with them. At one point she finds a shopping mall where there was an old single-screen, to which were attached fond memories, and is surprised and disappointed with the change. To which his character replies, "लोग शायद इसीको डेवेलपमेंट कहते हैं |". It is a stunning line that conveys way more than it should. It could only be uttered by a bourgeoisie, someone who is capable of noticing even massive change only with respect to how it impacts his feelings. I identified with it so much. 

The people Deb writes about in this magnificent, invaluable book though are impacted so fundamentally and violently by what we would call modernity and development, that they feel lost and tormented for years if not decades. Their lives so quickly and brutally picked up and cast away into the vast maw of the capital-industrial machine (though the word machine feels impossibly meek to describe the vastness and hunger of this amorphous, but unbearably heavy, entity we call Industrial Modernity) that their sense of self, family, community, tradition and culture, everything that makes life meaningful, bearable, occasionally enjoyable, is shredded. This, this thing snatches away their humanity and treats them as nothing more than nuts and bolts required to keep this waves of 'progress' running. I have begun to understand the importance of economic growth (thanks in no small part to Amit Varma's The Seen and the Unseen) but it is not only ridiculous to lazily assume that this is a net good (even if it were what about all the bad?) but that this is the only bloody way to improving the human condition.

I have been fortunate enough, over the last few years, to read, and occasionally watch, incredible social portraits of the effects of modernity on Indian society

• Butter Chicken in Ludhiana - Pankaj Mishra
• Maximum City - Suketu Mehta
• A Free Man - Aman Sethi
• Capital - Rana Dasgupta
• My Seditious Heart - Arundhati Roy
• Shanghai - Dibakar Banerjee
• Leaving Home - Jaideep Varma
• Dreamers - Snigdha Poonam (to read)
  

and to that stellar list, I must add this book. Deb's incisive prose is sharp, strong, deep and poetic, and I had to pause after each of the 6 chapters because it was too much to bear. In contrast to almost all the other works I've cited above, except possibly Roy, it is direct in its indictment of the Indian elites for their greed and collusion in the incredible human suffering. It is easy to say I haven't felt as much shame and anger from reading a book in a long time but only my actions will tell if it really has had an impacted or if its just self-signalling. I'd like to believe that the feelings were real. Deb is a master prose stylist, I was underlining entire paragraphs, and marvelling at his ability to see through all the layers of distractions and get to the heart of the matter.

Briefly, the subjects are as follows:

• Introduction: After painting a broad picture of the changes spreading across India in the mid-2000s- the rise of the Hindu far right, the glamour of the BPO jobs, the exploding urbanisation- he spends time with Abdul Jabbar, a man who runs an NGO in Bhopal for victims of the gas tragedy and tries to capture the reality of a large section of poor, marginalised Indians who have to fight not only with rich corporations, but also the state, for justice.
• The Great Gatsby: I first read this essay in The Caravan many years ago and loved it. Arindham Chaudhuri, at that point in time, was huge and while I always had the suspicion that he was a fraud, Deb's incredible essay not only painted the socioeconomic milieu in which he was operating and gaining such success, but also used his story to convey the cultural shift in the country with regards to notions of success, wealth and an individual's dharma, subsequently even calling out people like myself for our snobbery and condescension.
• Ghosts in the Machine: In which he tries to understand the transformation of Bangalore into the Silicon Valley of India by following a couple of software employees. The return from US but a desire to build a mini-US there, the unmoored-ness waiting to be compensated by New Spirituality, the desire to see Software Engineering as Brahminical in its pristineness and abstraction ignoring the messy materiality in which IT operates, the desire to use technology for greater good that is quickly undermined by corporate and political vested interests. He also understands fairly quickly that the growth story in India wasn't as much about software efficiency as it was about real estate, financialisation, crony capitalism, and broken promises of politicians.
• Red Sorghum: In which he contrasts the increasing richness of Hyderabad with the poverty of surrounding Telangana districts- the farmer suicides, the destruction of older, rural lifestyles, the inequality in development creating a schizophrenic sense of two different worlds less than a hundred kilometres apart. I found this particularly hard reading because I grew up in Hyderabad during this era, had atleast a passing knowledge of the political and economic changes, but no one around me seems to have acknowledged the fact that the rise of one and the fall of all others were interrelated.
• The Factory: He spends time in a TMT factory interacting with workers, mostly migrants from the East and the Northeast, and tries to convey the harsh lives of these men. This was again a tough piece to get through because for once the manipulating factors weren't abstractions like information technology or neoliberal policies, but rather old-school oppression, uprootedness and dehumanising physical work.
• The Girl from F&B: About the life of a particular Manipuri girl who works in the hospitality sector in New Delhi. Deb uses her story to talk about the hundreds of thousands of people from the Northeast who come to mainland India (his phrase) in search of better opportunities and how they're treated as different ("..in the pejorative language commonly used in Delhi for all Mongoloid people - a Chinky") and discriminated against.
  

I want to offer a taste by quoting a few lines:

• And when the writer needs the stories of people's lives, those narratives that insert recognisable, human shapes into large but abstract conflicts, he or she depends on people who have a sense of their own trajectories and who are willing to impose form on the chaos of their experiences and memories. -On how a writer sets out searching for stories
  
• But the glamour was irresistible when combined with his middlebrow characteristics. He was one of the audience, even if he represented the final stage in the evolution of the petite bourgeoisie.. distilling down for them that cocktail of spurious tradition and manufactured modernity. -Reg Arindham Chaudhuri's Leadership Seminars
• ..invisible for the most part in the social landscape, they are considered safe people, productive at work, conservative in values and unlikely ever to raise difficult questions about race or inequality. -Reg NRIs considered the model minority
• ..where Western men in khakis accompanied their Indian co-workers on a hesitant sampling of the food court version of native cuisine. -On gora corporate employees traveling to their Indian workspaces
• He was alternatively opinionated and nervous, making random statements that seemed to have no point to them.. in a long rant that was perfectly articulate in flow if incoherent in thought. [Next to this line, I wrote, "OMG Aditya, be careful"] -About a young, frustrated man who spent a little too much time on rightwing message boards
• The simplicity of the surroundings as well as the idealism it evoked seemed intensely familiar, until it brought to me, in a sudden, unbearable wave of nostalgia, my childhood and a time in India when many middle-class households had been like this, animated by literature, art and politics, and where people still lived in a community and believed in social justice. -During a meeting with an old Telugu Marxist in his middle-class, book-lined house late into the night as his granddaughter slept on his lap
• ..leaving farmers to function in the best way they could in the free market with its syndicates, price volatility and speculation. -On the effects of the Naidu-McKinsey approach
• When I put these different fragments together, I got not a whole but a bewildering, cubist image. -On trying to understanding the workings of a factory by interacting with people in various roles
• It was utterly masculine in atmosphere.. the barracks were shorn of the softening aspects of the worst slum, from the liveliness of the children playing to women talking with each other. In a slum, there would have been colourful saris hung out to dry, the smell of cooking that was more than just functional.. -On the living quarters of the factory workers
• Yet Delhi as an imperial capital was also a postmodern, millennial city where Esther traversed different layers of history everyday on her way to work. -The other side of the celebrated adage, "India lives in the 12th and the 21st century, and all the centuries in the middle, simultaneously"
• In the West, with its long excess of capitalism, it might be possible to scoff at luxury brands. They had been around so long that they had lost some of their meaning. But in India, luxury brands still possessed power. -On reflecting on his own nervousness for entering a Paul Smith store in an upscale Delhi mall

At the end of one of Prof. Mehta's Justice lectures, I remember writing to myself that one of the primary duties of education is to de-invisibilise the invisible. In that sense, this is a supremely edifying and eye-opening read. Since moving to Australia 5 years ago, every Indian visit has opened my eyes to complexities, injustices and travails that people face there. However, reading this book has peeled further layers to show the ruthless, harsh conditions in which people live. It is one thing to imagine and theorise on the stunning power of Big Capital and Big State and Big Technology; Something else entirely to see the impact on millions of lives (the loss of older forms of knowledge, the lost cultural practices, broken social bonds, major psychological shifts) that these manifest. 

In an old The Seen and the Unseen episode, a guest tells Amit Varma that he doesn't feel like a citizen of a country, or a state, or even a city as much as the citizen of a particular village or a mohalla. I now understand better what he means. We are embodied beings, able to move only slowly and thoughtfully in the quarters of our actual geography, but we don't use the same caution when creating big theories and selling grand narratives based on them. Maybe those of us who wield that power (granted by money, social status, technical skill etc.) would do better by being more circumspect. This book will help that cause.

how awesome are books

I had the immense privilege of reading two excellent books in the last few days. I should've been reading sections of Nietezsche's Birth of Tragedy and Walter Benjamin's The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction for my Aesthetics, Criticism and Theory class but I found them too tough and, so in true Dyerian fashion, bunked that to first pick up Mark Fisher's Capitalist Realism (that's been in my reading list for a long time) and Amia Srinivasan's The Right to Sex (which I discovered via reviews and bought for Sravani). Oh how fortunate have I been.

Capitalist Realism tied-in neatly with, and enriched, the subject of the relationship between narratives and society that I've been thinking of in the last few months. The central argument of Fisher's thesis is that since the end of the Cold War and the 'End of History', Capitalism has turned into the most hegemonic ideology in the world. Not only has its ubiqutousness blinded us to it omnipresence, but it has also lead to a failure of our imaginations in envisioning alternate forms of organising the economy, and the society. I was reminded of Fisher's book after listening to this interview about the new Auphebunga Bunga book. And it helped me clearly see what Jameson/ Zizek meant when they said, "It is easier to imagine an end to the world than an end to Capitalism." 

A major part of it ofcourse is the immense inequality and environmental destruction it creates and Capitalism's refusal to neither care about nor be able to do something about it. But the additional reason I found it incredibly valuable is because it gave credence to my thesis that the failure of imagination, of not being able to envision a different world, is ofcourse a bigger crisis than charting a path to it. We seem resigned to our lives and lifestyles, with both its good and bad, and no wonder it feels like the future is some vague, scary vision. We can see the contours of a catastrophe but because we can't chart a path to avert it, we can only get more anxious and thereby more consumerist (as a coping mechanism). 

So many of the ideas that he explored in the book, among them, Interpassivity, Eternal Presentism and Reflexive Impotence are absolutely remarkable. I found that they spoke to my condition, condition of the people I see and interact it, and I highly recommend it. 

I know that I should be writing a more cogent, useful review but I'm currently so excited with all those ideas floating in my head, that I'm unable to get myself to calm down and share calmly. The same applies to the next book.

The Right to Sex is so important, so accessible and so incredibly thoughtful that I have this extreme urge to shove a copy into the hands of everyone I know. The philosophical tools that Srinivasan gifts are so enriching that I'm filled with immense gratitude. 

Each of the six essays in the book deals with a contemporary problem (usually for Feminists, Progressives and even Liberals), sets the context, gives a historical brief and then lays out arguments from many angles. It is the highest kind of scholarship that I've come across and not least because of its unputdownable readibility. I will try to give a brief of each essay, but I recommend you pick up the book and read it. The follows notes are only so that I can reexperience the pleasure of thinking about those ideas:

1. The conspiracy against men: On the #MeToo movement. And how so many men are freaking out that so many innocent men can be, "are being", unfairly blamed and Cancelled on Social Media. After setting out to disprove that specific claim with statistics, elaborating on the inequal hierarchy even in women who're coming out (class, race, caste, sexuality etc.), she convincingly argues that men who're claiming that they assumed what they were doing was normal, and now have been caught unawares and are being punished retrospectively, are still evading responsibility and refusing to admit to their entitlement. She says it is impossible for most men to not know that what they were doing was wrong. They knew but they didn't care because there would be no retribution. And now what's changed is not them suddenly realising that their actions were wrong but that they're being called out.

2. Talking to my students about porn: Super interesting. Because the target demographic of the problem is the generation after me, I didn't relate too much to it personally. Having said that, the arguments around banning/ allowing porn was very interesting, because it can be applied to, say, item songs in Telugu films (which similarly objectify women for the sake of male arousal), and the analysis of how sites like PornHub, which like any major platform/aggregator, while being shaped by people's preferences also then start shaping people's preferences.

3. The Right to Sex: This and the next essay both confronted my self-proclaimed liberal sensibility.

4. Coda- The Politics of Desire: Somewhere in the middle of this essay, Srinivasan asks an amazing question: True, liberalism is about consent and about individual choice, and while it forbids one from imposing one's desires on others, it also stays away from judging people for their desires (and Id've argued rightly so). But it must also be accepted that our desires are shaped by society. Isn't it, then, important to ask what exactly shapes our desires? Why do we want what we want? What impact do the contours created by the majority, with each individual 'choosing as they wish', have on the minority, who for, ostensibly, no fault of their own, wish differently?

5. On not sleeping with your students: I felt she takes her strongest position in this essay. When dealing with male faculty members who have sexual relations with their female students, she again questions if consent is enough. Srinivasan's arguments regarding the role of the teacher, regarding the insitution of learning, and the implications it could have on the psyche of an individual who probably has internalised some notions of right behaviour and is acting consciously, or unconsciously, on them is an absolute masterclass. This is public philosophy on par with what I heard from Prof. Pratap Bhanu Mehta in his class and from Michael Sandel's Justice book.

6. Sex, Carceralism, Capitalism: This essays extends the Feminist movement to Capitalism and tries to show how it might not be possible to create a just world via Neoliberal Economics. In this essay, specific to the de/criminalisation of sex work, she talks about the reformative vs revolutionary axes of politics. I think it's a really powerful distinction to analyse public policy.

The genius of both books, especially The Right to Sex, is its refusal to reach simplistic conclusions and its willingness to complicate all matter political. The stellar achievement though is that that doesn't create nihilism nor escapism. It reinvigorates the mind and reminds us that the world is incredibly complex, most of our political posturing is so simplistic that it causes more problems than it resolves, and to fight against injustice, not only do we need empathy but also education and imagination.

While I feel I have not done justice to either book, my sincere hope is that my enthusiasm is communicated and will make you want to read the books yourselves.

on the guilty pleasure of reading middlebrow

What makes great art great? Who's claim elevates a book or a movie to the status of a Classic? And is being called a classic always a good thing? Most artists would agree that they would want atleast a part if their oeuvres to end up as classics and be studied long after they're gone. But its also most likely that they were hooked to their artforms not because they were astonished by the genius of a classic but because they were captivated and engrossed by the sheer spectacle of highbrow's lower cousin, the middlebrow art piece. Again, these terms are just for the sake of convenience. All labels are just useful contrivances. I had been watching films since I was a child. I enjoyed watching cartoons and the occasional movie in the television. I must admit that going to a theatre had less to do with the merits of the movie and the good time I was going to have there in the presence of friends or family. Understanding and critiquing, judging and pondering over the art was still a long way away. But then one day Amma took me watch Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring with a large bunch of her animation acquaintances. They were going to the film because they wanted to look at the technical aspects of such hyped special effects. I was probably 11 and still remember the look of  shocked faces of her friends who saw that I was deeply sleeping while sitting on the bike between them. Those days, I could doze off in seconds on any automobile; It just had to be moving. Anyway, I didn't move out of my seat as the film ended, enthralled by the visual spectacle and as the end credits rolled, I, who had wanted to be a diver, astronaut, soldier, mountaineer, scientist among a whole bunch of other things till then, for the first time ever, wanted to be a film director. I didn't know what a director did or if I had it in me to be one. I had seen something magical, something that engrossed and engaged me so deeply for the duration of its running time, that for the first time, I was awakened to the possibilities and powers of the art form. All movies till then had kept me firmly in the state I was in. I was never thrust out of the sphere of my immediate consciousness.  This movie, however, had shown me glitz and colour of the world outside. That, for me, is middlebrow. It's that spectacular car chase, that totally unexpected twist in the tale, that captivating bit of original orchestration. Its engaging, entertaining and enthralling. It removes the burden of our self-conscious, even if only for a few moments, and frees us up by its breathtaking audacity. It unshackles our dreams and fantasies, helps us see the world in an entirely new light, takes us to the fantasyland full of interesting people and surprising events. It relieves boredom. Lowbrow, atleast for the scope of this essay, is not smart enough for us to invest in it as much as we'd like to. These thresholds, obviously, change from person and person and their respective moods, but nevertheless, lowbrow is what we feel like when forced to play with children in their annoying games. "What the fuck am I doing here?", is the unanswered question looping in our brains. Middlebrow is like that fantastic puzzle that's neither too easy nor too hard. Just hard enough to tantalize us but eventually conceding the upper hand so that we can feel better and smarter about ourselves when its over. Figuring it out isn't too hard.

Harry Potter was that watershed moment for me in literature. I grew up on a steady supplement of Tinkles and illustrated, bold-font fairy tales. Harry Potter, likewise, opened the trapdoor that was curtailing my imagination. It gave direction to my reveries. The instant I realized you were allowed to think like that, I started adapting and supplementing it as per the requirement of my daydreams. Life doesn't have to mean boring realism where you followed morals. It can mean magic, adventure, becoming a hero and having great friends. This was followed by Enid Blyton, who though I hear is forbidden to be read in England, has given us Indians a great place to escape to where we could walk the moors, swim in lakes, eat bacon and eggs, and the like. Now, as I write this, I'm beginning to wonder why fantasy is such a popular genre with teenagers. When you're too young, either you're not equipped to grasp what its trying to say or life is more or less fairly easy and comfortable. As you step into twenties, you become your own man and reality seems to offer more possibilities than any fantasy. But your teenage years are the years where you want an escape route from the oppressive tyranny of normalcy and the unpredictable behaviour of your immediate society. You can neither adjust nor escape in real-life. Fantasy offers an alternative universe.

Admittedly, all art is escapism. Whatever your reasons are- there are times when you want to escape the incessant talking of the annoying git in your head or he's become so silent in grief that you want to reignite his passion. Art's, apologies for the choice of the word, the fuel. The elixir. But, I'm digressing. I was talking about how middlebrow introduces us to the world outside. After that phase comes a period in time where stuff starts happening to us. Love, grief, responsibility, questions on morality and mortality, on the purpose of life. You know, the grown-up stuff. Sherlock Holmes will seem childish then, Shantaram cinematic. Finding Neverland too kitschy, Dil Chahta Hai too unreal. This is the time when the world within takes priority over the world outside. The silence between the words seems to contain multitudes than the non-stop chatter. For me, this phase was brought about by three books- The Catcher in the Rye, The Fountainhead and One Hundred Days of Solitude. They might not be in the same league as Ulysses and Anna Karenina. Or Dostoevsky or Dickens. But for me, at that stage in life, these books were revelations. They led me away from vain spectacle to the profound everyday. From the artificial propulsions of plot to the altering rhythms of reality. They were not offering me escape routes, though, looking back now, I'm afraid I can't say the same about Ayn Rand, but were asking me to confront the reality of my being, my nature, my existence. I was becoming a grownup.

I lived like that for a while. Trying to get my hands on masterpieces, in literature, music and cinema. I imitated the lofty air of a connoisseur, dismissing anything approachable as unworthy, entertaining as a sellout, understandable as dishonourable. It was during these days that I shivered at the thought of ever having enjoyed reading Five Point Someone, The Alchemist and City of Joy. I was letting literati get the better of me; Mimic others' opinions as my own, unable to understand that that'd make me a trained monkey and not an independent thinker. I wanted to be separate from the majority, even if it meant cheating myself in the process. I championed avant-garde and bad craft, without really being able to differentiate between the both. Hopefully, I've grown out of this phase too.

Now, I like my Jeffrey Archer as much as I like my VS Naipaul, middlebrow magazines as much as JM Coetzee. And yet, even now, I feel guilty while reading an airport paperback. I know I have limited time and I want to experience art at its richest. Great art, as per my understanding, is something that pushes the limits of the form itself. It takes shapes that no one before could've envisioned. But after a point in time, it becomes the norm, it doesn't seem as earth-shattering anymore. Like TH Huxley once said, all new truths begin as heresies and end as superstitions. The Seventh Seal doesn't invigorate me because it seems too slow, too cliched, too predictable. It suited the lifestyles and rhythms and philosophical investigations of a specific time and place. It might have been groundbreaking then, but is just an old, boring film now. Crime and Punishment might have raised some very important questions in Czarist Russia, but I can only see good intentions and bad writing. Accepted, the fault may lie within me for not being able to appreciate the genius of the work and when the right time comes, it might lead me to salvation but the time's not now. Great piece of art, by definition, should be able to transcend time and space and be universal but it sometimes can happen that a neglected, ridiculed piece of art in its time might be praised and lauded years later. The fate of an art work and the legacy of an artist is as much a chance of luck and randomness as anything else in life. There might be unheralded, unknown symphonies by a now forgotten 18th century Venetian artist, which might be rediscovered and reinterpreted a 100 years from now to greater acclaim than a Mozart.

I'm digressing, yet again. My point of starting this post was to ask whether impenetrability is the mark of a great piece of art. Modernism and Post-modernism have certainly lead us to believe the same. Infinite Jests, Waiting for Godots, Ulyssesss among a whole lot of other 20th century classics are bought and preserved but seldom read. I have the entire set of Viswanatha Satyanaraya's Ramayana Kaplavriksham in my Thatha's library but its reputation scares me to the point where I have been waiting for the right time to approach it. As much as its my stupidity and lack of erudition, I sometimes can't help but feel if being called a Classic, or Profound, or Staggering affect the artwork adversely. Art, after all, should be approachable. It should help us question our prejudices, alter our opinions, ignite dormant passions, create new interests and help us lead better lives. For that, they have to be watched, read, listened with love and an open mind over and over until we develop a relationship with them. Until we complement and complete them. I recently read a wonderful quote in Telugu that roughly translates into, "A book is rewritten everytime a reader starts reading it". I'd rather love a piece of art than admire it respectfully from a distance. I'd rather live messily with it than protect it in a showcase as an adornment. And I wish more writers would read all sorts of stuff and write books that are, both, approachable and profound. With the insouciance of lowbrow, craft of middlebrow, and the art of highbrow. 

Might just qualify as a proper post

Quite sometime since I published anything here. Not that many are waiting. Also, no update really because nothing much's really happened to update here. I'm still going to work, I'm still scribbling ideas, I'm still confused and irritated and happy and depressed. Been reading some interesting articles, books. Discovered some really good music ( All the Little Lights, Jag Changa, Loma Vista ). Anyway, I was going through J Somers' blog the other day ( after reading his article on Hofstadter ) and I came across a post that had a list of all the books he'd read since college with little write-ups describing his feelings towards them. I liked the idea. So I thought I'd do a little post similar to it detailing if not all, atleast the 25 or so books I've started reading in the last few months. Mind you, I haven't finished most of them, probably because I have an Attention Deficit Disorder, but also because there's this high when picking up a new book that slowly dissolves as you make progress through it and it requires discipline and perseverance to stick through till the end. Two qualities, I'd like to add, I'm not really known for. Anyway, here's the list.

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1. Disgrace- Coetzee is such a powerful writer. His writing has been described as sparse, obtusely political, humanitarian, prosaic. It also is extremely vigorous. It is, if I could call it that, pure literature. Its to-the-point, angry and polemical. Having read his The Life and Times of Michael K too, I couldn't help but find similarities with Milan Kundera, whose The Unbearable Lightness of Being I found quite unsettling.

2. A Matter of Rats- A fast read, thankfully. I really liked Amitava Kumar's pieces online and so I bought the book. It's probably aimed to be a primer of the Dark Indian Heartland for the uninitiated, but for those of us here, it's not much.

3. The Wes Anderson Collection- I should probably dedicate a large post to Wes Anderson for his quirky humour, his genius for evoking nostalgia and the extraordinary usage of film form. I am a fan of his work and I read the book with fetish as soon as Bujji mama brought it. The book's a great advocate for the print medium, for the lush illustrations are astonishing, but I didn't really enjoy reading the interviews all that much. Sometimes, it's better not to look behind the curtains; Especially if you love the show too much.

4. The Murder of Roger Ackroyd- I have always wanted to read Agatha Christie. This book's held up not because its not good but because I'm neck deep in other commitments already.

5. The Last Mughal- It's funny; As much as I love Dalrymple's Nine Lives, I've had a tough time negotiating his other books. I couldn't get past the first half of City of Djinns because I found it too dreary and now I can't get past the first couple of chapters of this book. Dalrymple is an invigorating speaker ( I was enthralled by his performance in The Hindu Lit for Life 2014 talk ) but I guess his historical ventures aren't really working for me yet.

6. Shallows- I loved reading Carr's The Atlantic essay, Is Google making us stupid? I connected with it deeply because it was within the latitudes of my acceptance. And so I started reading Shallows but my interest soon drifted away when I realised it was only a more elaborate explanation of what he'd said in his seminal essay. I like it that he's elaborating on his argument. It's just that I don't need much of it because I was able to grasp the idea intuitively. Reading the book would help me understand better, I know, but I have more interesting books waiting in the queue right now.

7. The Pig that wants to be Eaten- This book's on my phone and I pull up one of its tiny chapters when I'm bored at work. It's the perfect book to be read in byte sized doses because it poses a philosophical problem, and argues for and against it in the space of a couple of pages. Takes less time to read but leaves you with a lot of thinking to do.

8. The King of Torts- I like reading Grisham. They're more of escapist fantasies than books that force you to pay attention but don't let that hide the skill it takes to pull one of them off. The story of a poor lawyer, who makes a lot of money, then loses it all only to finally get what he most wants. Vintage Grisham territory, yes, but still not a bad read. The man does something right that most of us don't. Evidence- he still reigns the bestseller lists while his umpteen clones struggle to break even.

9. The Romantics- I don't even know why I read Pankaj Mishra. His essay are a drag, his reviews swagger around tut-tutting and he gives off too much the air of an intellectual to be taken seriously. And yet I was enamored by his interview and how closely he resembled the editor/writer that I once wanted to be. The Romantics has been lazing around in my bag for sometime now and I hope to finish it soon.

10. Does he know a mother's heart- I heard of this book when it was out. I basically bought it because Amma adores Arun Shourie and I thought I'd find it interesting because it deals with topics very close to my heart. I finished the autobiographical part but the intellectual arguments required more time and mental space than bedtime reading and so I should probably read it in the mornings.

11. Red Earth and Pouring Rain- Ambitious. Vast. Meandering. Just quarter way into the book and with my undisciplined reading, I couldn't get on with the story because everytime I opened the book, I had to re-read atleast the previous ten pages to get a hold on the proceedings. Everytime. I think it was written with an intention to emulate the storytelling patters of Indian grandmothers but it demands attention. Chandra's writing is lyrical, his imagination wild and his control absolute. I want to sit down with it over a weekend and read it from start to finish.

12. The Complete Yes Minister- For years now, I've been seeing the monstrously thick book, with its fading yellow cover, in the book rack. I'd been hearing from Amma that Manju mama and Moni mama loved it, I'd read that it was classic British humor and I wanted to really understand the British comic touch. The book was funny, wryly so, but I had to abandon it soon because the pages were coming loose at the turn of every page. I didn't want to ruin the book. It'll stay on the shelf until I devise a way to read it without ruining it.

13. Accidental Empires- During my Steve Jobs mania phase, I discovered Cringely's fantastic documentary on the original geeks. I loved it and I'd been searching for the book it was based on since then. Recently, I found it on a torrent and because I know almost the entire story, I read a part of the book whenever I want to relive those memories.

14. The Annotated Godfather- The opening shot of The Godfather, with Bonasera and the slow zoom out, is one of the greatest milestones in Cinema history. The economy with which Coppola sets up the entire scene, and subsequently the movie, is a directorial masterclass. For a few years now, I've wanted to watch the film while reading the screenplay. Then I discovered this book. A great read for the fan. I haven't finished it, but what's the hurry? You don't want to rush through an exquisite seven-course meal. You savour every bite.

15. Philosophical Investigations- I don't even remember how I discovered Wittgenstein. But that image in Wikipedia, with that look in his eyes amidst the disheveled surroundings, refuses to go away from my head. This is like my Godel, Escher, Bach Part 2. I keep saying I'm reading it but the energy required to finish it is something I can't summon just yet.

16. Mrinal Sen: Sixty years in Search of Cinema- I've never seen a Mrinal Sen film. I took it from Vikranth because he said he was a filmmaker I should watch. Didn't get past the introduction.

17. Logicomix- A book pretty similar to Feynman: The Graphic Novel in both writing and artwork. Like Feynman tried to explain Feynman's work through the prism of his personality and interests, this book tries to do something similar for Logic as a Science and Bertrand Russell's part in it. Not really satisfactory.

18. Collected Stories: Gabriel Garcia Marquez- I picked this book up a long time after I'd read the master. I don't know if I've outgrown the Gabo phase, or if these stories are some of his weakest or if I didn't give them enough time, but I had to struggle to get through the first couple of stories.

19. India in Slow Motion- I was expecting so much from the book because of Tully's reputation that the experience of reading it had to be a bad one. I know he's a journalist and his pieces are constrained by time and space but I did not expect writing this ordinary, insights this commonplace. Agreed all of us are not the most poetic of writers but a little enthusiasm on the writer's part would've probably helped. Tully is a diligent reporter but one of the best writers about this exotic land, I'm afraid he's not.

20. The Algorithm Design Manual- This book is an easier read than CLRS because Skiena is more practical in his approach but it gets incrementally tougher as one proceeds though the book. It helps that his tutorials are really interesting. I still have a lot of syllabus to get through.

21. Cracking the Coding interview- The book provides some interesting perspectives of how candidates are selected after technical interviews but let's face it, despite the inside help, the questions are unbelievably tough.

22. Gone Girl- I am yet to watch the film but I had great fun reading the book. It's not often that you find books that both earn your respect for their intellect and also satiate your need to be told a story in the best possible way. Flynn does a fantastic job of holding her own despite repeated attempts to guess where she's taking the story. I was stumped chapter after chapter for her masterly control of the narration and was dazed after the twist in the middle. It made me realize that a writer's primary job is to outwit the reader. Every single time.

23. Curious: I like Ian Leslie's short pieces and Curious is a good read, albeit the fact that it gets repetitive after a certain point. Leslie has a central point and he stacks it up with evidence to prove that he's right but he reveals almost nothing new after the first few pages. The entire book is used to consolidate his initial points and just that.

24. Against Interpretation and Other Essays- I'd been hearing about Sontag's seminal essay whenever the discussion spurned towards art criticism. I read Against Interpretation with stunned disbelief not just because she was making such brilliant statements and convincing me how true they were, but also because this is one of the rare events when the reputation holds up. The essay truly is a classic. Will get to the rest of the pieces in the book.

25. Action Philosophers- Great idea, to introduce the major ideas of famous philosophers in comic book format. I'm turning into an admirer of graphic novels for their power and subtlety in the hands of masters. I finished the first two books in the series.

26. The C Programming Language- I will complete K&R. I definitely will. Such great ideas, such beautiful writing.

27. Easy Riders, Raging Bulls- I'd been searching for this book since I saw it in Subhakar's bag all those years ago in Vidyaranya. Its been what, almost five years now. I recently got the ebook and started it enthusiastically. I know the story of the movie brats in broad strokes but this book fills in the details. It's just that I need to have watched these movies to really understand their significance so I'm putting it off until I find the time to read it while educating myself on the films as well.

28. Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman- I think I'm developing a taste for Murakami. I was left cold by his Second bakery attack, was too apathetic to get past the beginning of Kafka on the Shore, got to about half of What I talk about when I talk about Running until he started repeating himself to the point of irritating the reader ( Geoff Dyer takes on the book in his own inimitable style ) but re-discovered him in The Newyorker recently and loved his Scheherzade, and Yesterday. And so I started off with this book and I must confess I'm beginning to like his writing. They're weird, yes, but they manage to grip the reader's attention and tell something about the human nature along the way.

29. Fooled by Randomness- A book full of ideas and other books and life philosophies and quiet musings. Loved listening to it.

I also recently read this wonderful story about a struggling writer and identified a lot with it. Moreover, reading some wonderful longform essays on The Blizzard and The Cricket Monthly.

So, that's the exhaustive list. And despite so many of these books waiting to be read, I'm going to bed now reading Budugu. 15 December was Bapu's birthday and I wanted to revisit the wonderful memories BapuRamaneeyam gave me by going through the wonderful book.

3 books

I read three wonderful books in the last two weeks. Well, read is only two-thirds true. I listened to one, Aman Sethi’s A Free Man, narrated by Vikas Adam. And what a relentless experience it's been. The story of a few friends- footpath dwellers, people who escaped from their homes at a fairly early age, exactly the kind of people we see lying drunk on roads and grimace, is told with uncharted intimacy and careful nuance by Sethi. The lead is a painter ( not of canvases, but of walls yours and mine ), mostly when he is out of money for drinks, called Ashraf who recounts his life with the flair of a thespian, ventures into philosophy much too often and directly answers only when he knows his circuitous story-telling has no patient takers, makes for a rather unlikely hero for a story talking about the ‘other’ India. And the characters that come and go into the narrative are equally, if not more, interesting while describing their travails in Bara Tooti, their need to get out of the stringent society they were born in, how their relationships with people they virtually spend their whole days are still tinged with aloofness and practicality. In that kind of a world, where people are robbed of money and footwear while dead drunk on footpaths, it is understandable.

Sethi constructs the world so powerfully that within minutes we are lost in the gulleys of Bara Tooti, feeling the stench of illegal liquor bars, echoing the belief of Ashraf or Lalu or Rehaan when they talk about a lack of comprehensive meaning to their existence, lapping up on the inside jokes soon and eventually understanding their lives like we’ve seen them live right infront of our eyes. Sethi’s voice is firm but understated, his serious narrative sprinkled with humour so much so that I burst out laughing a few times, his use of colloquial language brings to the proceedings a very earthy feel and most importantly, his observant eye doesn’t miss anything interesting. The structure is anecdotal, which is probably why even without concretely knowing the entire story in a traditional arc, we still get to know our characters very deeply. True, there is some repetition in parts and Sethi’s structure could have been a little more traditional, but these are just ruses to critic on an outstanding achievement. The only books I’ve read that are similar to A Free Man are Gregory David Robert’s Shantaram and Suketu Mehta’s Maximum City. Though the first one can be, at best, described an engrossing tale, I loved the breadth of its scope and its buccaneering hero, and I rate the second one as of the finest books I’ve ever read. A Free Man deserves a space on that shelf. Read it to understand the staggering spirit of human endeavor in the face of utter absurdity, for the language and the control with which Sethi steers us through a very alien world but mostly read it for A Free Man teaches us to empathize with those we share our cities with.

Rahul Bhattacharya’s Pundits from Pakistan covers a topic almost as phenomenal in scope as Aman Sethi’s. The things the two books deal with are worlds apart- one is about the destitute flocking into Delhi, the other is about one of the world’s most glittering sports events, India’s historic of Pakistan in 2004. One is largely set in the confines of Bara tooti, a bazaar in Delhi; The other travels in and around the entirety of Pakistan. And while one is almost microcosmic in its breadth, the other tries to capture the political, cultural and historical similarities between two of the world’s most populous nations. Nevertheless, by and far, both achieve what they set out to. Both are amazing reading experiences, I was practically skimming through pages, both are first books by erudite, globe-trotting, charismatic young writers and both, no matter how rooted in earthiness, are ambitious enough to try and capture the phenomenal depth of human spirit. Rahul Bhattacharya has been compared to VS Naipaul for his second book, The Sly Company of People who Care, and though I am yet to read it, I could find traces of Naipaul in this one. The book is most emphatic when it adheres to the cricket ground; Bhattacharya’s careful exaggeration of lives of sportsmen and the arena of sport finds the right tone to elevate them to the planes of heroism, his deep insight into cricket history provides hilarious comparisons and his very enviable ability to strip a long innings into its essence is used to great effect. But when he moves out of confines of the grounds, the narrative slips up and it does not help that his rather oblique writing style calls attention to the author’s cleverness a few times. Don’t get me wrong, it is indeed a great book, but I thought it would have been so much better if it didn’t contain that tone of intellectual arrogance, the author’s need to look down upon everything that did not confirm to his tastes ( quintessential Naipaul ). Bhattacharya is at his most exquisite, fittingly, when he is describing VVS Laxman bat. Despite the series being not one of his greatest, infact both Sehwag and Dravid played better parts, it is the memory of his glances and cuts that stays vividly in memory long after the book is completed. If you want to get a taste of Bhattacharya, check out his essay on the 281 era and the masterfully built eulogy to Indian cricket’s most exciting and enigmatic pair, Dravid and VVS. Its craftily nuanced architecture with flashes of brilliance is befitting both the wonderful humans, who also happen to be outstanding batsmen. This book is also very funny, but where Sethi’s was hilarious because of the amalgamation of characters in a scene ( the one in train with Ashraf and the bangle-seller is a gem ) and their unexpected behaviour, Bhattacharya’s is more because of his wry, deadpan humor. It was especially in moments of humor that I was reminded inadvertently of Naipaul’s masterpiece, A House for Mr. Biswas, because of the similar way in which Bhattacharya drops a bombshell of a line and had me go back, re-read it and double up with laughter. The only other instance of me laughing so hard while reading was probably when I read that Sardars-Traffic Constable-Traffic Jam episode in Tarun Tejpal’s The Alchemy of Desire. I must have read it six times back to back and still couldn’t stop laughing.

Talking of cricket books, I am in the middle of another thoroughly entertaining and insightful book, It takes all sorts, written by that master of Sports prose Peter Roebuck. Roebuck, with Rohit Brijanth, is my favourite sportswriter on the planet. Following them are wacky and witty Ahmer Naqvi, prosaic and robust Ed Smith, and erudite and romantic Jonathan Wilson. Having grownup on a steady diet of Roebuck and Brijnath, thanks to Sportsstar and Thatha who subscribed for it, and of late Cricinfo and The Straits Times, I fell in love with sports in all its shapes and sizes thanks to their passion and knowledge. But it took me a long time to realize the difference in their approaches to sport. While describing an emphatic cover drive, both of them would be equally tantalizing with their description, but where Brijnath induced that feeling of Godhood descending onto Earth, Roebuck talked of mortals rising briefly to the status of Gods. For one, a Federer forehand was like the baton in the hands of an orchestrator; for the other, it was more like a whip stirring up slumbering horses. For one, sport showcased the pinnacle of human imagination and acumen. For the other, sport was so compelling because of the normalcy and mortality of those pursuing it. Brijnath’s pieces on Nadal and Messi give impression of superhumans; Roebuck’s pieces on Sangakkara and Dravid marvel at men behind those helmets. The former composed sonnets, the latter constructed brilliant prose. It is indeed my great fortune to have access to both their work.

The third book I read recently was Albert Camus’ The Stranger ( the Matthew Ward translation ). Ever since I discovered Existentialism, mostly from Wikipedia pages and sometimes from quotes of writers, I’d been meaning to read Sartre and Camus. So, one day, during a particularly dull afternoon at work, I downloaded the book, came back home and finished it in one sitting. Not much of an achievement because the novella’s pretty slim and also is an immensely compelling read. I loved the vivid description in part one and thought part two was too philosophically inclined without a compelling narrative but I think it is a testimony to the work’s greatness that it is still being read and discussed about seventy-five years after its publication. And for some reason, probably because I'd read Camus was French-Algerian or because the description was evocative, I kept picturising the work of French New Wave masters, especially Godard’s Breathless and Truffaut’s 400 Blows. And oh, I also read this beautiful Sci-Fi story by Kin Liu called Mono no aware, which is eponymous with the beautiful Japanese concept I learnt about while reading Roger Ebert’s review of The Moonrise Kingdom.

And now, I’m rearing to go start UR Ananthamurthy’s Samskara , the AK Ramanujan translation. What a wonderful fortnight it’s been.

States of Indian Cricket

I have heard a lot about Ramachandra Guha's eclectic interests- his passion for Marxism, his ability as a historian, his interest in environmentalism and his love for Cricket. And having read his articles occasionally, I respected his skill as a writer. That made me pick up his book States of Indian Cricket, an anthology of essays based on Cricket; It is basically two different books reprinted together. The first one, called Wickets in the East, is where Guha picks up Best XI's from six of India's most important Cricketing states, and proceeds through the history of the respective regions, comparing batsmen across eras, talking statistics and discussing societal influences on the players' styles. It begins as a fairly personal chronicle of a man who loves the sport and who has a deep interest in its history. But it turns fast into a plethora of numbers, venues, records and names. For one, the writing is very dull, and two, Guha comes off less as a passionate fan and more as a snobby intellectual who is far too in love with himself and his theories. No, it's not bad writing. Its just that it is as interesting as a History thesis detailing Lord Curzon's report regarding the political upheaval in India. The subject is very interesting, its just that the narrative is very conceited.

I have been a fan of sportswriters, the romantics who never fall out of love with the game, the dramatists who know which points to highlight and the astute analyzers who know enough about the history and the technicalities of the game to put it in context. I didn't know what was wrong with the book but I knew something was amiss. This was not an ode to the game he loved, not a tribute to his favourite players. It was more of a thesis statement. Which is kind of ironical because in his preface he states that the reason behind the existence of the book was Ashis Nandy's Tao of Cricket, which I haven't read, but which Guha claims was boring because it was way too analytical and not anecdotal. I have a similar complaint against Guha. Yes, he has a few interesting anecdotes, but they are not narrated with the excitement of a raconteur but rather, with the habituality of a stand-up comedian.

Only after I started reading the second part, Spin and Other turns, which is a much better offering, did I realise why Guha wasn't as gripping as my other favourite sportswriters. I am a huge fan of Rohit Brijnath, Peter Roebuck and having read the occasional Norman Mailer and Neville Cardus, I know you don't have to be boring just because you were classical. And Paul Wheeler's Bodyline is one of the most interesting books I've read, which plays out as intriguingly as drama despite being historical, and is as inspiring as fiction precisely because it loves its heroes, the good, the bad and the ugly. Guha, on the other hands, comes off as too cocky to fall in love. He has a knowledge of the craft but I don't think he truly comprehends the art. There is respect in his voice but no reverence. There is appreciation, no awe.The reason great sportswriters are so great is not just because they analyse the game. But, instead, they try to understand the athlete from the game he plays. Cricket, for that matter any sport, is so full of life and interesting precisely because the men who love and play it are so interesting. Tendulkar and Dravid, Federer and Nadal, Messi and Ronaldo; They play the same game. But the way they do it talks so much about themselves and the game. Guha looks at everything with an air of superiority, his head filled with preconceived notions, and like that adage goes, When you have a hammer in you hand, everything looks like a nail, he is more attuned towards fitting people into his theories than to try and unravel the man who plays the game so well.

All in all, a rather dull affair the books are. Guha is a statistician who can write and an historian who likes Cricket. If you are the kind who reads every sportsbook that hits the stands, this ain't a bad read. But if you are an occasional sports book reader, stay away. There are far better and much loved books than this.

Chahat

One of my friends, Prabhat, an ICICI Fellow who I met in Darewadi, wrote this poem which I just read. It stunned me into awe and left me speechless that somebody as hilarious as he is, somebody I'm beginning to know is such a good poet. I'm a believer in the power of poetry and this poem reinstates it.

--

Ek sama jalana chahta hu,

Logo ko jagana chahtu hu,

Aasma ke upar apna ghar banana chahta hu,

Har dard ko apnana chahtu hu,

Khusiyo ko lutana chahta hu,

Har ghar mai gyan ki jyoti jalana chahta hu,

Apne Ma ke dard ko bhulana chahta hu,

Har gaon tak aspatal pahuchana chahta hu,

Bihari Marathi ke bhed-bhav ko mitana chahta hu,

Ek sasakt Bharat banana chahta hu .

--

Here is the link to his blog.

Of Spirit and Harmony

Robert Twigger's Angry White Pyajamas probably ranks among the finest books I've ever read. I've always considered writers to be dreamweavers, storytellers of the highest order. People who inspire, who instigate people into moving out of their houses and towards the wide worlds beckoning them. They are the greatest of our explorers, people who enter the realms of uncharted territory and get back to tell us the story. There are very few people out there who've written biographical content and inspired their readers into emulating the lives of their subjects. For me, the list would include, Robert Kanigel, Masanobu Fukuoka, Laura Hillenbrand and now Robert Twigger. Never before was any Martial Art made so romantic. Even when he describes the insurmountable pain undertaken, you still want to be there, to experience, to understand Ki, to sit in Seiza and to be kiai-ing.

Its a wholly different experience, reading Twigger. I can't seem to write no more now; rusty as hell.

Later. But if you ever get a chance to lay your hands on this book, you're in for the book equivalent ride of Enter the Dragon.

Beyond maximum

I have always been lucky. More often than not, I've come across books which have left me spellbound, awed and expanded. Suketu Mehta's Maximum City: Bombay lost and found is a book that has done all that but beyond everything else, it's a book that paces with a furious energy, at a bristling pace, tugging you into the local trains with it, involving you in gang wars, drowning you into the din of films and the colour of the night clubs and in the end, like it is making up for all of this, it has you meet a jain monk who contemplates and questions such a busy life.

I have no idea how long it took Suketu Mehta to research his material for the book but from what I can comprehend from the size of his canvas, he's left nothing that has ever been Bombay. This is gritty non-fiction writing, paced like a thriller, as unbelievable as myth and astounding as a story. It is one of those very rare books you can't wait to finish while dreading the fact that you might finish it too soon. I have always been an ardent non-fiction reader; The diversity of the world out there beats the greatest of imaginations. Its not just the writing that stands out, not the scope, and definitely not the research. All that is definitely great, but its been done before. What bowled me over completely was the approach, the intimacy with the city where Bombay ceases being just a place, or its people, or its food and culture but transforms itself into an organism, a living entity which forms a symbiotic relationship with everyone of its residents.

Mehta talks to everybody you ever thought of when you thought of Bombay; the encounter specialists, the gang lords, Bal Thackeray, the immigrants, the footpath dwellers, club dancers, film stars and all those anonymous individuals who can be identified only in a mob as local train commuters, slum dwellers, vadapav eaters or bomb blast victims. It reminded me sometimes of Gregory David Robert's Shantaram and William Dalrymple's Nine lives, but then it's on a different plane by itself. Mehta waits for his narrators and then pursues them with relentless zeal. He's ready to travel to the stinkiest of slums, to the farthest corners of the city, to the illegally run nightclubs and interview shooters jeopardizing his life.

Meeting all those colourful characters is every writer's dream and Mehta admits his delight. These people are the heroes of everyday-ness, who are all the same in their motivations and ambitions but differ in their methods and moral obligations. Everybody who comes to Bombay is either overtly ambitious or foolish enough to follow his dreams. Those ambitions and dreams range from buying a pucca house, to going to the US, to save money for the children's education, to fight a religious war, to become the country's next superstar, or to see the city clean of pollution and poverty. In a city which is a juxtaposition of all those dreams and dreamers trying to stay afloat, it could well prove to be the greatest spectacle of human beings as a society where We always comes before I and where to live is to live together.

By choosing a topic which is enchanting and intriguing as Bombay, half of Mehta's job was done. With the other half, he's done more than enough justice. In his quest to find his Bombay, he shows us our Bombay. Maximum City is not half much a narration as a journey. He never tells us anything. All he does is wake up every morning and take us along with him in local trains, on dirty pavements, through the slums and skyscrapers, from discussions in air-conditioned rooms to meals in one roomed sheds in his quest to find the soul of Bombay.

flied to try

"Hey, watch out, you'll step on it."
Too late, I had already stepped on the insect. But as soon as I heard the warning, I shifted my balance onto my other leg and hopped around the insect, Where, where.
And then I spotted it. It was some sort of a flying insect, hardly half as big as the nail on my little finger.
When I bent down to observe it closely, I saw it wriggling, it's honey-coloured body wreathing in the pain and it looked like it's wings were almost broken.
"Shit", thought I, "where the fuck was I even looking."
But I noticed more closely, it wasn't rolling around in pain but it was trying to get up onto it's feet. Well, it succeeded and when it tried to try fly, it toppled over.
After that happened a couple of times, I blew right at it hoping that it would be of some assistance. And then there was again the episode of wriggling, jerking around, and it turned really painful to look at. It was suffering and all it was really trying to do was fly, nothing else mattered to it, not the pain, nothing. I tried lifting it up with a piece of paper but that didn't work either. In the intense jerking that was happening, it managed to fall off the paper every single time.
It was when I was beginning to grow exasperated that I blew it to a corner of the room so that it wouldn't be trampled upon by nobody else, that it flew. And it flew away.
I walked away, grinning like a stupid.

Marquez and Macondo

Because races condemned to one hundred years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth. As I write this, I am in a state of trance. About a year and half since I read it the first time, I picked up One Hundred Years of Solitude 3 days ago to rekindle my interest into reading in the hands of a master. I have not been proved wrong in my firm belief that Marquez is perhaps the most original writer of our time, endowed with a rare streak of disbelief in reality and more so with an uncannily obsessive quest for originality.

You will not be really able to fathom what I say unless you have been absorbed in the lives of Buendias and only when you become one of the men in Macondo, breathing out the hot noon sun, and be a part of the banana workers' strike will you understand the awe in discovering ice for the first time in your life. It is so weird talking about One Hundred because it cannot be talked about like anything else real, like a thing which has existed forever. Like both we and Marquez discover at the end of the harrowing journey, Macondo is true but only confined to the limitations of our imaginations, it is real but only as real as you would want it to be.

Only as I sit down now to write about the book, do I realise upto the full extent the prowess, genius and unbelievable tenacity of a writer of Marquez's calibre and the gaping holes in my writing abilities come to the fore. Forget writing anything atleast half as good as One Hundred, even writing about it is stretching my abilities to the limits and I lack a sense of, like Marquez would say, lucidity in deciphering the most obvious of strokes. One Hundred Years of Solitude is not a story to be told and re-told. It is a journey which has to be made to the deepest and darkest of human emotions and a test of human belief in reality in the face of an overwhelming adversary in the form of imagination. Much has been spoken of Marquez's magic realism but it is not something which can be talked about, but is something which has to be experienced to be believed.

Through the constant effort of reading, you will be tugged in a war between real and imaginary, truth and lies, memory and reality and hallucinations and life. You will be stuck in spiral of time, space where all that can happen to you is fall deeper into the abyss and all you can hope for is that impending halt. You will want to finish it but at the same time, you will want to continue the journey because nothing more in this metaphorical journey would be truer than the cliche of journey being more important. Travelling in a land where people accept flying women but are awed by ice and magnets, where people are unflustered by following butterflies but are frightened of trains and where hundred years of life is but lived in one moment, it is hard for you to keep your bearings of the world. But that is what precisely Marquez's masterstroke has been. He does not narrate you a folklore as much as make you a part of it. As is realised in the end, you are not reading somebody else's story but of fate of people interwined with yours and all you can do in the end is gape in horror and awe.

That is all I can write about now. If you have read it, you will know the kind of nervous tension in the pit of the stomach which accompanies every word that gets into your conscience and even you put the book aside, the flurry in your subconscious mind does not let you rest until you have straightened out the relationships between all the people in the family. There are two ways of reading books, one is reading them, looking at all the characters talk from a third person point of view, not getting mingled with them. The other way is to live with the characters, share their fears and apprehensions, grow with them and share their fates. Marquez, here, does not give you a choice of staying untouched. All you can do, is take a deep breath in, dive and get submerged in a land of magic realism.

The Prayer

Sai Madhurika Mamunuru. MADster. Topper. Hothead. Small Dynamite. And a feminist to the core. One in the long list of women(?) for whom I've fallen. Anyway, she sent this story to me like about 2 months ago. I fell for its innocence. Far too pure for me not to fall in love with. I didn't tell her I was posting it up my blog, so if she wants me to remove it, I'll have to. So, read it fast before she realizes I posted it.

--

Suhi slowly pulled the blanket off a small bundle stubbornly
lying on the bed. A naughty, smiling face, slender arms and thin
legs, all tightly coiled up, revealed themselves reluctantly.

“5 minutes Akka, please!”

“Wake up, Komi! We’re going to be late for school!”

Komi quickly grabbed the blanket from her sister and tried her
best to go back into the cosy position she was in before being
woken up. Under the blanket, the warmth was blissful but
the sleep had gone. And however hard Komi shut her eyes, it
refused to come back. She drifted instead, into a happy (almost
voluntary) dream.

“Komi! Do you want Akka to leave without you? Don’t you
want to go to school?” her mother said, trying her best to sound
inquisitive and innocent.

School. Komi’s eyes were wide open under the blanket now.
She suddenly wished the night had never ended; that this was a
dream; that today were a Sunday; that her sister would actually
leave without her. Something. Anything. Not school. No!

But like every other day, none of the wishes materialised. Not
long after that, she was at the gate, her father kissing her good
bye. The kiss was a daily ritual she enjoyed. She loved it when
her father’s moustache lightly tickled her soft cheek. It made her
feel wanted and loved, not stupid. She always returned his kiss,
with both her arms wrapped around his neck.

After a breezy ride on her sister’s scooter and a deliberately
slow walk down the long corridor, she reached her class room.
Her classmates were excitedly talking about the home work that
was supposed to be submitted today. Each student had to copy
the first paragraph of the chapter Snoopy-The Dog into her note
book in the “best hand writing possible”. Komi as usual had not

done it.

“Komi! Show me your hand writing,” an enthusiastic girl
asked. “Oh no! I forgot my note book at home,” Komi lied.
Disappointed, the girl found other girls to share her enthusiasm
with.

Komi on her part, decided to do what she loved doing. She
slipped into her own world. She positioned herself comfortably
on the chair with her head resting on the desk and began
dreaming.

In her world, there were a lot of wrist watches to choose from.
There was a pair of high-heeled shoes that made noise when she
walked around the school, distributing sweets on her birthday.
She had a dress that resembled Kareena Kapoor’s in K3G.
Home work for some reason was never an issue in her world.

She was still dreaming when her class teacher walked in. Mrs.
Patel was a short, plump woman. Her hair was cut short and her
face was always bloated. Komi loved noticing how a little bit
of the lip stick that she smeared on her thin lips always stuck to
her teeth. It made her look like a vampire, according to Komi.

The girls swiftly rose to their feet and sang, “Good Morning,
Miss!” She mumbled a quick reply and heavily settled on the
chair in front of the teacher’s desk.

“Now! Children! Hand me your assignment notebooks so that I
can check and return them by the end of the Assembly! Quick!”

The class monitor quickly stood up and assumed responsibility.
She seemed to be an expert at it. She collected all the copies
(sixty of them) and handed it to Mrs. Patel. Komi’s heart was
thumping. Her lips were drying. She looked around nervously.

She was making up fake excuses in her head when the assembly
began. Assembly in Komi’s school went this way. The
Principal, Sister Nivedita addressed the Assembly sitting in

her cabin. She spoke into a mike placed at her desk. In each
classroom across the school, the girls could hear it through a
speaker hung at the head of the black-board. The Assembly
would often begin with a Prayer and would be followed by the
Thought for the Day and general instructions, if any.

Now, the box-shaped speaker started to ring. The bell was then
replaced by Sister Nivedita’s voice.

“Good Morning Girls!”

“Good Morning Sister!”

“Join your hands; Close your eyes and pray to the Almighty.
Dear God! Please give food to the hungry, a home to the
homeless….”

Join your hands. Komi tried to think of the many different ways
in which one could join her hands. The first was the boring
obvious way. You could also join your hands so that the fingers
of one hand touched the palm of the other. The other way was
to join only the fingers of both the hands. Or you could join
only the finger tips. You could also join the tips of different
fingers together. Unconsciously Komi was trying these things
practically through out the prayer. By the end of the prayer
Komi was delighted to discover that there were 13 practical
ways in which one could join hands. Imagine the theoretical
possibilities, she thought.

“… Amen!”

“The Thought for the Day. Speech is silver but silence is gold.”
Komi laughed to herself. How stupid, she thought. She ignored
the instructions that followed. They were generally never for
her.

“Komali Sharma,” Mrs Patel called. Komi had now gone
back to her Join Your Hands Game. She didn’t hear her name
called out. “KOMALI SHARMA!” Komi looked up, startled.

“Will you please come up in front?”

Komi did not move. She had sensed what was coming her way.

“Can you understand English, Komali?”

Komi sat on, like a stone. She did not want this happening.

“I AM TALKING TO YOU,” Mrs. Patel spat into her face.

Komi stood up slowly, timidly. She walked towards the front of
the classroom, her legs shaking, and heart thumping. She could
feel sixty pairs of eyes on her. She could also feel this heavy
thing at the base of her throat. Guilt, maybe.

She was barely at an arm’s distance from Mrs. Patel when she
felt five hard, long-nailed fingers dig into her cheeks. She was
swung around to face the class. Her cheek hurt. The sensation of
her father’s tickling moustache that she had savoured so far was
vanishing rapidly

“What were you doing through out the Prayer? Acting like a
clown and playing with your fingers all the time!” Mrs Patel
now mimicked Komi by putting her hands in front of her face
and making strange formations with them. She coupled these
hand movements with distorted facial expressions. The class
laughed in chorus.

Komi’s eyes stung.

“Answer my question Komali. Were you listening to the prayer?
Were you?”

Komi thought silently of how Mrs. Patel was not listening to the
prayer either. She was busy looking through the home work note
books. Komi lacked the courage to say this, of course.

Mrs. Patel became impatient now. She pulled Komi’s slight

body towards her and gave her two hard slaps. They made
Komi’s ears ring. Her jaw felt out of place. She was astonished
at her own capacity to endure. Why was she not screaming
and kicking, like she generally did at home for the slightest of
things?

“Did you do your home work at least? I don’t remember
correcting your notebook.”

“Miss, I left my note book at home.” Komi spoke for the first
time. This was, however not the first time she was lying.

“LIAR! I will take you to Sister Nivedita today. Not only do
you not do your home work, you also lie. The other kids are
quickly learning from you. I can see a change in some of the
girls who you are befriending. And look at how untidy you are.
Why is there no ribbon on your hair?” Mrs Patel went on to pull
the rubber band that was holding her hair together. “Can’t your
mother tie your hair properly?”

Mother. Komi thought of Amma back home. She thought of the
trouble she had given her mother while getting her hair combed.
She thought of the satisfied smile on her mother’s face when
the hair was finally done. She wished Mrs. Patel left at least her
alone.

Komi stood there, looking at her fellow class mates. She could
see amusement in the eyes of some and indifference in some
others. The ones that made her cry that day, however, were the
eyes filled with pity. She hated it.

“You are going to stay like that for the rest of the day! You are
not going to tie your hair back.” She now faced the class and
continued. “No ONE is going to help her tie it back together.”

“This is your punishment. Go back to your bench and sit down.
AND. Dare disturb the girl sitting next to you,” she looked
down at Komi and said.

Later through the day, Komi would almost forget about what
happened in the morning. She would actually wave Mrs. Patel a
good-bye on her way out of school. She would lie to her sister
about how a friend had pulled the rubber band off her hair. Her
parents would never know of the episode.

But for years after that, she would never be able to do any
assignment that required her to copy blindly from another book.
For years after that, whenever a prayer was being said, she
would close her eyes and join her hands, but never EVER listen.

--Sai Madhurika

And he told me...

Sravani wrote this. Can you actually believe it? I couldn't the first time I read it. But I think somewhere deep inside I knew only she could write this. One of the most heartfelt works I've read. Loved reading it. To you Sravs.

--

As i looked into his eyes
And found his longing stare
I stopped myself from saying words
That would show how much i care

I put my hand upto his face
To hold my feelings in
I wouldn't say the words again
To show my love for him

The last time I had told him
How much he meant to me
He put my hands away from his
And said to leave him be

I never spoke the words again
For fear of his deep fright
I thought it was the last time
Until that blissful night

His fingers traced around my face
Pushing hair away
And I was quite unprepared
For what he was to say

My heart beat quickly,my head raced on
I thought that I might cry
He looked as if he might faint-
Imagine this strong guy

But never would I be more impressed
With anything he'd do
Than when he took that heartfelt leap
And told me,"I Love You"

--

Here's the link to her blog.

Invictus

I stumbled upon this poem yesterday. Written by Willian Ernest Henley from an hospital bed, its one of the finest examples of human will. Loved it.

--

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of fate
My head is bloody, but unbow'd.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years finds
And shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

The good ol' list

ani wrote this today. and when he told me he actually wrote 75 things, i was stunned. that's a huge number, ain't it. and he made me smile all through it. if you've really grown up in the 90's, you can really connect to it. writing that is a huge feat and i can never do it. ani.

here it goes.

its a remainder of all those 'good ole times' when life was less complicated, more fun and revolved essentially around bubble gums, cartoons, 'action shoes' and sachin tendulkar. and when we were far too shy to talk to girls, not yet inquisitive about sex and were happy if allowed to watch tv till 10.00.

prob'ly a few years form now, looking back, i might just say teenage was great too. you never know.

read it and let him know what its like. he'll like it.

P.S- to our own superhero. to shaktimaan.

--

I realised anirudh ain't making his blog public. so here is the piece.

You Know You Grew Up in India in the 90s When...

1) You know the words to ‘In-pin-safety-pin’ and ‘akkad-bakkad’ by heart

2) Cricket is almost a religion for you, and you idolize at least one of Kapil Dev/Rahul Dravid/Sachin Tendulkar/Saurav Ganguly

3) You have read at least some Chacha Chaudhary or Tinkle comics

4) You’ve watched Shaktimaan on TV at least once in your life. And you can immediately recognize the character when you see him.

5) You have some ‘NRI’ relatives.

6) You couldn’t wait for it to be December so you could have the Toblerone chocolates your NRI relatives brought you

7) You watched Cartoon Network, and then the late night movies on TNT that came after Cartoon Network ended.

8) You watched corny dubbed versions of Small Wonder, Silver Spoon, and I Dream of Jeanie

9) You were THRILLED when McDonald’s opened in your neighborhood (or even eight kilometers away)

10) Your first Pizza's were at Pizza corner and Burger's at John's bakery (chermas)

11) A visit to Pizza Hut used to mean a special treat

12) You have seen Kuch Kuch Hota Hai and Hum Aapke Hain Kaun at least 5 times each

13) You still remember the theme song to Hum Paanch.

14) You have played hours upon hour of Pukdam-pakdai, oonch-neech, kho-kho, ‘Doctor, doctor, help us!’, ‘Lock and key’

15) You have played ‘Uma Joshi’ more times than you can remember.

16) Dog ‘in’ the bone was your favorite co-ed game.

17) Much of your free time in school was spent playing UNO.

18) You collected trump cards of wrestlers, cricketers, and airplanes, and did not quite understand why your younger siblings were obsessed with Pokemon and the other Japanese trends that followed.

19) Your summer vacations were often synonymous with visiting your grandparents

20) Your parents, at some point, told you ‘Dark Room’ was a bad game to play. But you still loved playing it.

21) Bole mere lips, I love uncle Chips!

22) You know the song ‘Made in India’ by Alisha Chinoi

23) You have seen many many many episodes of ‘Antakshri’ on Zee TV and know the only thing constant in the show is Anu Kapoor.

24) Many evenings have been spent watching little kids gyrate vulgarly on Boogie Woogie on Sony.

25) You were the coolest thing in class if you had a computer in your house while it was still the 90s.

26) You learnt LOGO in school!

27) You couldn’t wait to start 4th/6th standard so you could start writing with PENS instead of with pencils!

28) You often use terms and phrases like ‘kutti’, ‘abba’, ‘same to you, back to you, with no returns’, and ‘shame shame, puppy shame, all the donkeys know your name.’

29) You most probably saw Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge at the cinema at least once. You also fantasized about singing songs in mustard fields as in the movie.

30) You have seen David Dhawan and Govinda movies and laughed at them.

31) You have said ‘haw’ or ‘haw ji ki pwji’ when you saw people kissing in English movies

31) You have seen Titanic at least 12 times.

32) You thought seeing English movies and speaking English made you the coolest thing ever.

33) You remember the Orissa cyclone, even though you didn’t know what a cyclone was.

34) You remember the Gujarat earthquake very clearly and could possibly tell everyone EXACTLY what you were doing when the earthquake occurred (yes, this happened in 2001, January 26, 2001, to be exact -- but this group is about the things that Indian kids that GREW UP in the 90s remember and identify with).

35) Barbies for girls, and GI Joes for boys were the ultimate status symbols. You just wanted more more more and more. And how can I forget Hot Wheels, for both boys and girls? I personally have a collection of over 200 little Hot Wheels cars.

36) You have worn Osh-Kosh B’gosh and United Colours of Benetton clothes while growing up. And you thought ‘imported’ clothes were definitely way better than ‘made in India’ clothes (never mind that a lot of clothes brought from overseas by NRI relatives were actually made in India, before ‘Made in China’ started appearing on EVERY existing thing)

37) You know the words to ‘Posham Paa’, and like it better than ‘Oranges and Lemons’ even though you’d sing the latter to sound cool (see 32 above).

38) At some point or other, cool was your favourite, and therefore, most overused word.

39) Captain Planet was your first introduction to environmental consciousness.

40) You have tried to convince people around you to not burst crackers on Diwali, and then gone straight back home and burst them yourself.

41) You have had endless packets of Parle Gluco G biscuits, and of Brittania Little Hearts biscuits.

42) You loved licking off the cream from the centre of Bourbon biscuits.

43) There were no Nike, Reebok, Adidas, Puma- Bata and Liberty was the way to go for your sports shoes.

44) You have probably consumed more Frooti in your lifetime than there is oil in Iraq.

45) You watched Baywatch on Star World even though (or because) your parents said you shouldn’t watch it.

46) You bought packets of potato chips for the specific purpose of collecting Tazos. And you had Tazos depicting everyone from Confucius to Daffy Duck to Daffy Duck dressed as Confucius.

47) For the longest time, the Maruti 800, the Premier Padmini, THE Fiat, and THE Ambassador were the only cars you saw on the road, and the Contessa was cool because it was bigger.

48) You would literally jump up in excitement if you ever chanced upon an imported car (Oh my gosh, is that really a MERCEDES?)!

49) You spent a good part of 1998 drooling over the Hyundai Santro and the Daewoo Matiz , debating which one was better.

50) You chewed Big (big) Babool and/or Boom Boom Boomer chewing gum. They were bright pink and disgusting tasting, but you loved them for the temporary tattoos.

51) Talking of temporary tattoos, you sometimes had contests with your classmates about who had more tattoos on their arm, leg, knee, hand, forehead, wherever.

52) You thought Mario and Tetris were the coolest things ever invented, especially if you were a boy.

53) You knew that having the latest Hero or Atlas bicycle would make you the coolest kid on the block.

54) You can imitate Sushmita Sen’s winning gasp to perfection.

55) You have, at some point of time, worn GAP clothes (real or fake) like SRK in KKHH.

56) Seemingly senseless acronyms like SRK, DDLJ, KKHH actually make sense to you..

57) You have at some point debated who was more beautiful- Aishwarya or Sushmita.

58) If you lived inHyderabad, you went picnicing at Lumbini park, or Go-Karting at Runway 9 and couldn't think how you could get any cooler than that.

59) Baskin Robbins ice-cream was THE thing to have!

60) You know what Campa Cola is. And you also knew that Coca Cola was THE drink.

61) When you would watch WWF keenly every evening/afternoon and really think that Undertaker had 7 lives and he made an "actual" appearance in the Akshay Kumar- starrer Khiladiyon ka Khiladi.

62) When all backpacks (or 'schoolbags') and water bottles and tiffin boxes had strange cartoon characters that were hybrid versions of seven or eight different characters, and you still bought them, because a green man wih a water pistol, boots, a jet-pack, Johnny bravo hair, a rajasthani mustache, gloves, and underwear (long johns) over his pants, called 'Mr. X' was OBVIOUSLY a status symbol.

63) You remember the Nirma tikia jingle.

64) You remember the Nirma girl.

65) You remember the 'doodh doodh' ad and also the 'roz khao andey' ads.

66) You grew up reading, if you read at all, some or all of Nancy Drews, Enid Blyton books, Hardy Boys, Babysitters Club, Animorphs, Goosebumps, Sweet Valley series, Judy Blumes, and Tintin, or Archie comics. Because naturally, reading foreign authors made you much cooler than reading Tinkle.

67) Towards the late 90s (1998-99) at least some of us started our Harry Potter obsessions!

68) You absolutely HAD to go to Essel World if you went to Mumbai! "Essel World mein rahoonga main, ghar nahin nahin nahin jaaonga main!"

69) You watched the Bournvita Quiz contest on TV pretty religiously. The smarter ones amongst you actually took part in it and had your entire school and your entire extended families watch you on it!

70) "Jungle jungle baat chali hai, pata chala hai. Chaddi pehen ke phool khila hai, phool khila!"

71) Maggi 2 Minute Noodles = ultimate snack (and tiffin, lunch, dinner)!

72) If you grew up in the early 90s, you recall the nation's obsession with Mahabharata on TV

73) In the later 90s, you religiously followed Hip Hip Hooray on Zee. Maybe Just Mohabbat on Sony too.

74) You eagerly awaited Friendship Day, so you could give friendship bands to all your friends, and get bands from them in return. Then, of course, those with the most bands loved to show them off (and on Rakhi, boys with the most Rakhis loved showing those off too!)

75) This list made you smile. :)

Anurag Kashyap on life- his and others'

Considered one of India's finest film makers, its not just his films that I admire. I mean, yes Black Friday and Dev D are my favourites, the former for its courage and the latter, for its honesty. But there is more to Anurag Kashyap than what his films tell about him. I've been reading his blog on PFC now and then and today I came across this, something he wrote in November 2007, after the release and extensive negative criticism of No Smoking. Not having watched the film, even if all that's been said about it is right here, Kashyap is brutally protective of his ideas and justifies his supreme confidence in himself. I loved reading it and I know this will influence my thinking, atleast for sometime.

--
IN DEFENCE OF "I"

You know when they bring up their children in the mountains, especially in tibet, and their child sees the burning firewood and walks to it, they let him, when he wants to touch it, they let him, when he touches it and screams and cries, they let him , they ignore him, and that’s how the child learns to deal with fire..this is also what the monks do..
My dad always said something that i never forgot..he said “poot sapoot to ka dhan sanchay poot kapoot to ka dhan sanchay”.. it means why do you save money for your children, If your son is a good son he will earn his own, if he turns out to be a brat he will throw it away.. and he never did save and all three of us are independent and had never taken from him, since we left college..
I know a lot of people right here on pfc who wants to be filmmakers but can’t because they do not have the heart to lose their sense of security.. a lot of people do the mundane jobs they don’t want to but do not step out because they get insecure.. rahoonga kahan, khaoonga kya, paise kahan se aayenge, i can love them but not respect them.. the best way to make anyone an individual self is to abandon them.. when you do they stand up on their own and they do not need role models, they go out and do it because there is an urgent need to survive.. that need takes over everything..i write this because people ask me that why did i not explain the end.. You know in Black friday the end was explained, and everyone called it great cinema and they will watch it a zillion times but in the end it remains just that, great cinema..it has stopped bothering people, they don’t think about the 93 bomb blasts.. they do not think about the lives lost, the politics, nothing, they revisist their favourite sequences and say wow and that’s it.. i do not remember such heated discussion anywhere after the BF release, i even tried to initiate it but none happenned.. One lone post was about continuity jerks and cinema issues.. none about the event.. with NS all that has changed..
Why does everyone want to get it? and will you still like it if you do get it? wouldn’t you say-that’s it!!! is that all you were trying to say..
why the eagerness to gen(e)re[alize] everything? why the symbols used have to be perfect? aren’t symbols about “what’s the best way i can say what i want to say, because what i want to say i already know, and i also know if i say it directly they wouldn’t let me” .. so if i do not find the perfect symbolism should i not say it? should i shut up? looks like? should i let go of my soul? what does my soul signify? is it not me? me with my imperfections?
No smoking does not make a valid point, it tortures you and then laughs at you, the same way i have felt the world do..forget the end.. lets come to the begining.. did anyone read what it said, what the film is about is spoken in the three captions in the beginning, but no one wants to connect.. who is abbas, he is a writer, he has lost his two fingers, the ones with which he holds the cigarette and also holds the pen, what does the pen mean to a writer, freedom of expression, and abbas’s freedom is taken, he is soulless and he doesn’t feel anything even while manipulating his friend, and what does he want the most more than his friends, his freedom back.. did anyone decipher that .. no.. they were too busy being thrilled..did anyone listened to what baba had to say.. he did not agree with democracy, he had his own take on it, he is the man who deems himself more powerful which he is, he thrives on who, minorities(woman in veils) and underprivileged(dwarfs) and his fanatics(teeka toting henchmen).. he lives in his own hell..which is hell from the audiences POV.. when K enters there he wishes for an elevator and a much more straighter designs, not the maze of stairs.. he does it straight.. but baba doesn’t..you see the man’s entry but never his exit.. did anyone think of it .. no.. did anyone listen to baba saying aatma, antaratma, bhogi hoti hai use mukt karna padta hai..if you really heard that.. the ending won’t be so strange..there is a definition of democracy i used in GULAAL and tried to use in GURU..
“Democracy is for the (Powerful) people
By the (Powerful) people
Of the (Powerful) people”
the wife, when she decides to leave her husband, she plays inky pinky ponky.. the man to her is as inconsequential as his cigarette, the wife and the secretary .. two different facets of a woman a man wants to see, the complex, dignified trophy wife and the completely servile slut, and what kind of a man is he.. an arrogant fuck up, not the man you would look up to or sympathise with.. do men like those exist.. yes they do.. i am a similar asshole or was or maybe still is.. just more aware that i am a slut too.. it would have been so easy to make him sympathetic and today i really wish i did make him sympathetic.. baba bengali is winning or has won.. did any one hear the song phoonk de .. the words spoken in english ..
“you have travelled a hole…………to………you will now experience the power to change the semantic sensory feel that influences the final consequences of your journey, you are now at the limits of the multi(uni)verse but not beyond the space of this stream”
Noone heard that.. what does that prove .. that people do not listen and either they are deaf (like in the film) or they don’t want to pay so much attention.. it creates the same situation as in the film.. this film was my angst and now mirrors my life.. only difference being i know what’s happening .. it was expected and i have learnt from it.. will be more accessible next time.. i swear everyone, even the infant will understand what i am trying to say in HANUMAN RETURNS.. i need that to survive, and survivor i am..
OK so getting back to explaining what i intended, admitting i wasn’t so successful at it.. from the point K falls into the water in the police station(there is a voice over there too- jin jin logon ne poore paise nahi bhare hain etc,that connects it with the last scene), it is the journey of the soul, by which i mean the internal agony of the man, trying to make a choice, trying to decipher what did he do to deserve this, is this the price one pays for his ego, to choose between the cigarette and the bathtub, and when he chooses the bathtub he is choosing to negate himself hence being completely owned by the baba..
it is not just the body that looses soul, it’s also the soul(read idealism, belief, spirit) loosing a body.. that gets evaporated while it is watching.. the idea is lost..
Now where that comes from.. i wrote a poem on my wall years ago when i was doped out.. my idea of an ego, my interpretation of selfishness..
A big drop of sperm was falling from the sky
Mother (earth ) quaked for it and conceived it
and I bloomed out
That is how the idea was born..
I do not want to bore anyone, but that explains it ,my POV, ego comes from I and I is when you have an idea of self.. and selfishness is not that shallow definition of what you can take or gain from others.. to me
“Selfishness is the ferocity with which you protect the I”
, hence the “Idea” and to the world “your Ego”..and arrogance is just a defence mechanism that the selfish man has against the enemy..
And the fact that i have the need to defend myself proves that i have yet not perfected selfishness or maybe i am too clever and know exactly what i am doing.. my argument is should a man be punished for his arrogance.. yes if he harms others by doing the act.. but what if his arrogance is aloof.. who is he harming except himself..
there are many interpretations floating around of the film.. well i lost my authority over the film the day it released.. it was open to interpretation like any work of art or anything pretending as a work of art.. but various interpretations do provoke a thought in my subconscious.. did i really intend that, i don’t know.. the whole film was stewed over in my head over last eight years, years ago it was a straight story from quitters inc ( the first half of it, because that is how much ramu told me) , but it kept changing with my life.. i don’t even know when and how it became my story, i only realised it after writing it.. i wrote it in one flow like everyother script over two days or three..it was a stream of subconscious.. i just wrote..
and now i have learnt.. that success is important.. and i have learnt that the audienca needs to be served and i will.. but i would rather provoke them than please them, i would rather force them to go back to the world they came from than provide an escape route, i would rather unsettle them than to put a smile on there face, i would rather make them feel impotent than to make them feel virile, i would rather show them the mirror than show them a photograph of their best selves, i would rather make their nightmare come true than realise their dreams..but this time they would know what’s happening.. they will know it while they are getting raped.. they will understand every bit of it.. none are going to lose their modesty without knowing it..
I have learnt my lesson..and with that i try to say goodbye to no smoking and apologise once and for all to all those who wasted their time and money over it.. Better luck next time..