tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-202230732024-03-18T08:31:54.567+05:30Small TalkBooks, Movies, Travelsmall talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.comBlogger222125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-5442796790934879562024-03-10T13:12:00.000+05:302024-03-10T13:12:00.760+05:30The Power of the Story<h3 style="text-align: left;"> <span style="font-family: arial;">Victory City by Salman Rushdie</span></h3><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp7kt47eyKJcFm3YbwRtHR4gFH30r9lpxqq-5un2eDk0h2tADVWaVGfF1sOI0GkCp6KhSZ7kLd4TLH_00aSjGDGta02CWZ9of0ZGw6eRgh6thYTExPaJAUIjrHFttSghawmNnJ1Kc12Uo4x6H8eX9LAB1sLIOPERA8NsuH4kpckEp4ifnyk_jBKQ/s650/victorycity.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="650" data-original-width="414" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgp7kt47eyKJcFm3YbwRtHR4gFH30r9lpxqq-5un2eDk0h2tADVWaVGfF1sOI0GkCp6KhSZ7kLd4TLH_00aSjGDGta02CWZ9of0ZGw6eRgh6thYTExPaJAUIjrHFttSghawmNnJ1Kc12Uo4x6H8eX9LAB1sLIOPERA8NsuH4kpckEp4ifnyk_jBKQ/w127-h200/victorycity.jpg" width="127" /></a></div><br />It is amazing to see how much of real history finds its way into Rushdie's latest novel Victory City. Rushdie does his normal blending of fact and fantasy telling the story of the Vijayanagara empire that ruled over much of southern and central India between the 14th and 16th centuries. His Saleem Sinai in this case is Pampa Kampana, a nine-year girl who witnesses a mass Sati when the Kampili empire falls to Muslim invaders. As she watches her mother walk into the flames she vows she will never let something like that happen ever again. Her vow is backed by a divine power that gives her a life span exactly matching that of the Vijayanagara empire - and she proceeds to build it from the ashes of the battle of Kampili. We hear her story as she pens it down in her JayaParajaya epic and it is this creation that outlives her empire. It also forms the basis of the book, the author tells us. </span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><br /></span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Bisnaga is the name she gives the city she births, and we follow the story wide-eyed with wonder - from the first rulers Hukka and Bukka (Harihararaya I and Bukkaraya I), through the golden age of Devaraya II, the fall of the Sangama dynasty and the rise of the Tuluva dynast with Krishnadevaraya as the shining pinnacle of the empire. Through it all, Rushdie does his trademark magic - enchanted forests and talking animals, seeds that grow a full-fledged city, whispered stories turning real, metamorphoses and soothsaying. He also has wicked fun with his allusions - the three sons of Bukka are named after famous Karnataka cricketers, two brothers Narayan and Laxman, enter the story somewhere, Pampa Kampana cannot distinguish between the foreign travellers she falls in love with (all these white men look the same to her!), pink monkeys invade a forest after turning the native inhabitants against each other. Rushdie does Rushdie very well indeed.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">And yet... this book feels different. For one, it is a linear story, unusual for a Rushdie novel. And while his writing continues to enthrall, I miss his incredible word play that can stop you in your tracks, marveling at his command of the language. It is far more sedate - in some ways a dilution of the classic Rushdie novel.</span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">But I will not complain. His themes remain constant - the need for syncretism and tolerance for cultural differences, the love of art and poetry and architecture and everything that gives joy to human life, and ultimately the belief in the power of stories and words. We need the re-iteration of these themes in our polarized world and every Rushdie novel is one. Heck, his life is one. </span></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Victory City makes me long to go see Hampi. It also makes me grateful that there is still a Rushdie in our midst, continuing to spin his yarns, making magic as he goes along.</span></span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-13021224272214857072024-01-01T20:08:00.001+05:302024-01-01T20:41:40.137+05:302023: My year in reading<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLqQZt6A35dNb7DgOhMCC6sfDfFAVXb_LjlwhGK04lyo0tK4TATk0wPWZj450FKlFXAzHlv1whOE8FI8RO-Rg92s_BxMh3xY1R1iTaVG35xaKj8lA92Zn3VddGHGxSMHtfi6-ZwV8lCyGQJZ9irhG8a7XhFG3j7Kzbg66V3pE4Mb6KSvydZH4og/s3783/2023%20books.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2533" data-original-width="3783" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLqQZt6A35dNb7DgOhMCC6sfDfFAVXb_LjlwhGK04lyo0tK4TATk0wPWZj450FKlFXAzHlv1whOE8FI8RO-Rg92s_BxMh3xY1R1iTaVG35xaKj8lA92Zn3VddGHGxSMHtfi6-ZwV8lCyGQJZ9irhG8a7XhFG3j7Kzbg66V3pE4Mb6KSvydZH4og/w400-h268/2023%20books.png" width="400" /></a></div><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><p><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><br /></span></p>56 was the number this year. Though I tell myself numbers don't matter, the quality does, I always start with the number. The least it does is give me an indication of the amount of time I spent reading and not scrolling through social media feeds. </span><p></p><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">So what was my reading like, this year? Some disappointments - no poetry at all (what a shame!) and as with every year, not enough classics or travelogues. But I did discover some awesome writers new to me. And I did read some very good translated Indian writing.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">So let me start with my favourites, in no particular order:</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><u>Fiction:</u></b></span><div><b><u><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /></u></b><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><i><b>Benyamin's Goat Days:</b></i> Takes the cliche of the Malayali in the Gulf and creates a harrowing, cautionary tale of enslavement. A fresh new voice for me.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Ashapurna Devi's The First Promise:</i></b> The Bengal Renaissance seen from the ground up. Satyabati is a character for the ages - an independent female voice advocating the breaking of tradition and changing the world around her forever, even as she pays a price too dear.</span></div><div><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Abraham Verghese's The Covenant of Water:</i></b> A riveting intergenerational story of a Mar Thoma family in Kerala. Verghese tells a great story that is so evocative of place and character that you forgive him the obvious weakness in social commentary.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five:</i></b> A devastating book that evokes the inhumanity of war through the eyes of someone who lived through Dresden. It is a masterclass in describing trauma with tenderness and grace.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Jerry Pinto's The Education of Yuri:</i></b> A coming-of-age story in 1980's Bombay. Brings to life both the city and that college-going phase of life beautifully. </span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Jhumpa Lahiri's Roman Stories:</i></b> A set of vignettes set in a Rome fraying at the edges and an Italy that is turning right-wing. It's a superb chronicle of the immigrant experience and the impact of racism on the outsider.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><u>Non-fiction/ Memoir:</u></b></span></div><div><b><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /></b><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Ed Yong's An Immense World:</i></b> Taught me a new word - Umwelt. Yong takes us on a dazzling journey into the perceptual spaces of the various species inhabiting our world. It's a biology lesson that we have not learnt in any biology class. Totally goose-bumpy stuff.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Annie Dillard's The Writing Life:</i></b> In gorgeous, gorgeous prose, Dillard sets out a manual for living a writing life. Read it just for the breathtaking writing if nothing else. Dillard was a writer I fell in love with, this year (her Pilgrim at Tinker's Creek is another masterpiece I discovered) and I cannot wait to read more of her.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Annie Ernaux's Happening:</i></b> Another writer I read for the first time and loved. This one is a stark account of Ernaux's experience of getting pregnant as a college student in Catholic France where abortion is still illegal. Some of the imagery stays with you long after you have finished the book. Exteriors is another book of hers I got to read this year and loved as well.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Ambedkar's Annihilation of Caste:</i></b> A fiery, ublinkered view of the caste system and an argument for the destruction of the sanctity of the Shastras. A must-read for every right-minded Hindu.</span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Colin Thubron's The Amur River:</i></b> Old fashioned travel writing that reminds you that there are still places in the world that retain mystery and that do not feature on the gram.</span></div><div><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>John Hersey's Hiroshima:</i></b> In a year when Oppenheimer dominated the headlines, it is essential to read this one. A journalist's account of interviewing six survivors of the bomb, it makes clear what the fallout of nuclear war entails.</span></div><div><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><br /></span></div><div><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><b><i>Michael Schur's How to be Perfect: </i></b>Distils the writings of the philosophers from Aristotle to Kant to Sartre to Thich Nhat Hahn to<br /> answer current questions of morality. A smart, witty primer on being good.</span><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"> </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">There were many more I could have called out. Willa Cather's <i>My Antonia</i> and Edith Wharton's<i> The House of Mirth</i> were some American classics I got to, and enjoyed. Svetlana Alexievich continued to dominate my Russian reading with her <i>Boys in Zinc</i>, a shocking account of the 'forgotten' war -the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Janice Pariat's gorgeous writing in <i>Everything the Light Touches </i>makes us question, ever so gently, our received notions of progress and development. This was the year I finally got to Douglas Adams and his <i>Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy</i> - so very clever and funny. K.R. Meera's <i>Qabar</i> was my introduction to this must-read Malayalam writer and it was an intriguing one. Adichie's <i>Half of a Yellow Sun</i> taught me about the Nigerian civil war in the way only great fiction can teach us history. Dederer's <i>Monsters: A Fan's Dilemma</i> asked questions on whether you can really separate the art from the artist. </span><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Peter Singer's <i>The Life You Can Save</i> provoked, asking if we were doing enough as individuals to lift people up from the bottom of the pyramid.</span><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">And Woolever's </span><i style="color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography</i><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"> brought a behind-the-scenes look at one of the most compelling personalities of our times. </span></div><div><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">What does 2024 have in store for me? Each year I resolve to be more intentional in my reading - more classics, more poetry, more translations. But the heart wants what it wants, resolutions be damned. So perhaps it's best I resolve to just wing it, like I do every year. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-49638202495967372282023-09-24T15:09:00.000+05:302023-09-24T15:09:51.132+05:30Love, Loss and Renewal<h3 style="text-align: left;"> <span style="font-family: arial;">The Covenant of Water <br />Abraham Verghese</span></h3><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG7IijDYuT8qaFzhcLkCQmm6rGvSghmjBQBpyxWGwIbw2e8z71bRhJc9V-kpJjFXNkkJQyepaSl3a822u1uQD-trZWUNTSReXiI_4Z7m0w6jPIvwVZsvsz2ZYVEjfwsjtK90OhxrHMhDRbwl7j4JuNiUl7nmfoeRHlJEDO6afcr9EgWZEPHf1ZAw/s210/The%20Covenant%20of%20Water.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="210" data-original-width="210" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhG7IijDYuT8qaFzhcLkCQmm6rGvSghmjBQBpyxWGwIbw2e8z71bRhJc9V-kpJjFXNkkJQyepaSl3a822u1uQD-trZWUNTSReXiI_4Z7m0w6jPIvwVZsvsz2ZYVEjfwsjtK90OhxrHMhDRbwl7j4JuNiUl7nmfoeRHlJEDO6afcr9EgWZEPHf1ZAw/s1600/The%20Covenant%20of%20Water.jpg" width="210" /></a></div><br />An engrossing inter-generational story set in lush Kerala, it is easy to see why this made it to the Oprah Book Club. Why she called it 'one of the best books I have read in my entire life' is harder to understand.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Mariamma comes to Parambil as a 12 year old bride to a 40 year old man. Over the next seven decades, she weathers the highs and lows of birthing and nurturing a family, managing a 500 acre property and the changing political climate around her. </span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">There are adjoining stories as well that blend into those of Parambil - of a Scottish doctor in Madras, come to learn to be a surgeon in the Indian Medical Service and of a Swedish one who sets up a leprosarium near Parambil. Valiya Ammachi, as Mariamma comes to be known, is in many ways the backbone of the novel. The best parts of the book are hers, and we stay riveted as she grows into her role as the matriarch of the family, learning of the hereditary 'condition' that afflicts her loved ones, dealing with death and medical emergencies, joyously accepting her differently-abled daughter and talented daughter-in-law, acknowledging her privilege and working to bring some sort of justice and equality to the world around her, always keeping her faith as the cornerstone of her life. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">There are several strong strands to the stories and characters - Elsie's passion for her art that is the abiding motif of her life, Philippose's passion for Elsie and grief for his son that destabilizes him, the saint-like Rune Orqvist's crusade for leprosy patients, Mariamma junior's quest for the diagnosis of the 'condition' leading her to medical college. Verghese loves the characters he creates and the love is so very visible to the reader. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">It's a great big book but Verghese's story telling is so on point and fast paced, the language so evocative of time and place, it's an easy read. I finished it in less than a week. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">All the wonderful storytelling notwithstanding, there are obvious weaknesses. The plot has too many co-incidences for one (the characters fortuitously run into each other when needed). Most of the characters are 'good', and terrible things keep happening to them - and it gets to a point where you can almost sense the next tragedy unfolding. There is very little social commentary, and what there is, is pretty superficial - whether it be the caste system or the ills of feudalism that led to the rise of the communists and Naxalites in Kerala. There is absolutely no mention of the sexism inherent in the Mar Thoma communities that led to the landmark Mary Roy case in the 1980s.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">Overall, it's a story very well told. But I cannot help but compare this to another great story set in almost the same milieu, again with evocative writing and unforgettable characters - Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. That one though, was an angry book, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">railing against the casteism, sexism and the political expediency that impacts the individual</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">. It was also a book that made us look at the world differently, from the perspective of the 'small things'.</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.1px; white-space-collapse: preserve;">The Covenant of Water is a wonderful, entertaining read. It is best that we leave it at that, and not expect more of it than it offers.</span></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-72311941647225659092023-07-21T16:14:00.002+05:302023-07-21T16:32:40.417+05:30The World As A Miracle<h3 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Pilgrim at Tinker Creek<br />By Annie Dillard</span></h3><div><br /></div><div><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: arial;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN8QfrKaoyRL4nLsP7-RDMwJp8U-AnwxsE-vOsgo6_lC16gW4n3-PwuQnPNt99jVc0EmEZaQIF7DQb79io21JU_bpdJkeajxu98fiYMjcR1Wxrd7kPJMfsju2iX1mWcghKAUZpVKlbiMIvLRXZ0tclgX6hOukQOvs4tJgEa0sVK9Dcgnj192s6lg/s386/pilgrim.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="386" data-original-width="260" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhN8QfrKaoyRL4nLsP7-RDMwJp8U-AnwxsE-vOsgo6_lC16gW4n3-PwuQnPNt99jVc0EmEZaQIF7DQb79io21JU_bpdJkeajxu98fiYMjcR1Wxrd7kPJMfsju2iX1mWcghKAUZpVKlbiMIvLRXZ0tclgX6hOukQOvs4tJgEa0sVK9Dcgnj192s6lg/s320/pilgrim.jpg" width="216" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br />Annie Dillard does a Walden, only this time set in ‘70s
Virginia. She describes a year in her life, living in a valley in the Blue
Ridge Mountains next to Tinker Creek. She spends the year, observing the
natural world around her -and there is much to observe in the creek and in the
mountains – observing minutely, paying attention to the changing seasons, the
light, the wind, the insects and the bugs, the muskrats and the birds, the fish
and the snakes. She is a devotee of paying attention – to experiencing the
present, ‘catching grace’ as she calls it, unselfconsciously, losing oneself in
the tree, the bird, the cloud. It’s the only way to catch the ‘now-you-see-it,
now-you-don’t’ quality of the natural world. ‘’A fish flashes, then dissolves
in the water before my eyes like so much salt. Deer apparently ascend bodily
into heaven; the brightest oriole fades into leaves. These disappearances stun
me into stillness and concentration; they say of nature that it conceals a
grand nonchalance, and they say of a vision that it is a deliberate gift, the
revelation of a dancer who for my eyes only flings away her seven veils.”<o:p></o:p></span><p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Dillard writes beautifully – her descriptions of nature are
transcendent. In one passage she describes starlings going to roost, how they
flew over her head, for over half an hour, how they ‘seemed to unravel as they
flew, lengthening in curves, like a loosened skein…Into the woods they sifted without
shifting a twig, right through the crowns of trees, intricate and rushing, like
wind’, how it left her transfixed, ‘bashed by the unexpectedness of this beauty’.
In another, she describes a stunning sugar maple tree in autumn –‘it was as if
a man on fire were to continue calmly sipping tea.’ And in yet another, she
describes the migration of the monarch butterflies – “The monarchs clattered in
the air, burnished like throngs of pennies, here’s one, and here’s one, and
more, and more. …It looked as though the leaves of the autumn forest had taken
flight, and were pouring down the valley, like a waterfall, like a tidal wave,
all the leaves of hardwoods from here to Hudson Bay. It’s as if the season’s
colour were draining away like lifeblood, as if the year were molting and shedding.”
Gorgeous, gorgeous prose.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Dillard is not just an observer of nature. She also reads
extensively about the living world around her. It allows her to display a
naturalist’s knowledge that deepens her engagement – she observes the praying
mantis and gives us an insight into its mating habits; she tells us a newt can
scent its way home from as far as eight miles; that the average size of all
living animals, including man, is that of a housefly; that there are two hundred
and twenty eight separate muscles in the head of a caterpillar. She has the
ability to find the dramatic – the egg laying of the praying mantis, the abdomens
of South African honey ants, a dragon fly’s enormous lower lip, a water bug
draining the flesh of a frog…Dillard is amazed at the intricacy of creation and
the variety of form, the utility of each of the forms – and we stand amazed
with her.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;">And it’s not just the beauty. Dillard is as aware of the
horror that goes hand in hand, and the ubiquitousness of death. “The world has
signed a pact with the devil; it had to. It is a covenant to which everything,
even every hydrogen atom, is bound. The terms are clear: if you want to live,
you have to die…The world came into being with the signing of the contract. A
scientist calls it the Second Law of Thermodynamics. A poet says, ‘The force that
through the green fuse drives the flower/ Drives my green age’. This is what we
know. The rest is gravy.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Annie Dillard was 28 years old when she wrote this (and when
she won a Pulitzer for it). She writes with all the passion and intensity of
that age, but it is never empty rhetoric. There is an underlying self-confidence,
and a wisdom and gravitas that recalls the writings of Walt Whitman and Mary
Oliver and of course, Thoreau. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As with
the best of nature writing there is a deeply spiritual vein that runs through
the work - Dillard quotes the Bible and the Koran and sees the world as a
wondrously inventive creation. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: arial;"></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: arial;">It's a beautiful piece of work that Dillard has created, one
to savour slowly and mindfully. There was a sense of loss when I finished it,
but with so much of note taking and underlining, I am sure it will be a source
of joy for years to come. </span><o:p></o:p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-77799154163998030252023-01-01T11:45:00.005+05:302023-01-01T12:05:43.917+05:30My Good Reads of 2022<p style="text-align: justify;"><span face="Roboto, Arial, sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhba6QiPecMdTzdR5SLOiqukHTFpBLy_ITgS8vbBxNagY2bLB5VZApLm-rJbRQSZQETrbLUCFRD7MXzDcd2HcDI1DGvyQMXzhSFCrhLtqOVCXZIweBji8cuP3rY94pagkH3REnBzwM5WIsQBUrnCZEFgy3mvw3OR5xnkGt32YDDbzI3Y1Nbmcg/s3646/Goodreads.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2475" data-original-width="3646" height="271" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhba6QiPecMdTzdR5SLOiqukHTFpBLy_ITgS8vbBxNagY2bLB5VZApLm-rJbRQSZQETrbLUCFRD7MXzDcd2HcDI1DGvyQMXzhSFCrhLtqOVCXZIweBji8cuP3rY94pagkH3REnBzwM5WIsQBUrnCZEFgy3mvw3OR5xnkGt32YDDbzI3Y1Nbmcg/w400-h271/Goodreads.png" width="400" /></a></div><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">A reading slump in the latter half of the year saw me average just less than a book a week in 2022. There was a good mix of fiction and non-fiction, new authors and old favourites, happy-making and thought-provoking. But there was less poetry, less Indian writing, less classics, than I would have liked. My favourites in no particular order were:</span><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">1. Devotions. The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">A self-curated anthology of Oliver's poems, it is a lesson in paying attention to the miracle of our world. Her poems are prayer, consolation, magic, redemption. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">2. The Living Mountan, by Nan Shephard</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Probably the best book I read all year. It is nature writing at its best, as Shephard pens a peaen to the Scottish Cairngorms where she lived all her life. She is precise and exact and scientific; but also lyrical and meditative, bringing a poet's sensibilities to her descriptions of the mountains. Gorgeous, magical writing.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">3. Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, by Mario Vargas Llosa.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Stories within stories, fantastical, funny, tragic, this one is an example of how fiction can be truly spellbinding. Left me wanting to read more of this Peruvian Nobel Prize winner.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">4. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking. By Susan Cain</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">As an introvert, this book spoke to me. It might exaggerate the power of introversion, but it does a good job of arguing for balance, where quiet certitude can be a counter to a world of networking and Dale Carnegie.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">5. Midnight's Borders: A People's History of Modern India. By Suchitra Vijayan</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Vijayan travels along the borders of our nation, documenting stories that describe the human toll of borders and the nation state. A powerful, hard-hitting book that asks questions most of us do not want to hear - what makes a nation, does culture trump nationhood, do borders make good neighbours or unequal people.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">6. The Places In Between. By Rory Stewart</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">A superb travelogue describing Stewart's walk from Herat to Kabul after the fall of the Taliban in 2002. It is an observant, non-judgemental look at a wild, harsh country with multiple ethnicities and loyalties, whose concept of nationhood is fragile and of democracy non-existent. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">7. The Lincoln Highway. By Amor Towles</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Towles' storytelling abilities were on full display as I finished a 550 page book in 3 days flat. It's an ode to road trips and friendship, myths and fables, as we are taken on a roller coaster ride across America.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">8. Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood and The Story of a Return. By Marjane Satrapi</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Combining political history and personal memoir, this graphic novel is warm and funny and poignant. </span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">9. These Precious Days: Essays. By Ann Patchett</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Patchett is masterful at the personal essay - warm and witty, frank and vulnerable. She writes on a wide variety of subjects, bringing in perspectives of a wife, daughter, writer, friend, bookshop owner. All the while re-iterating the preciousness of the lives we live.</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">10. Underland: A Deep Time Journey. By Robert Macfarlane</span><br style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;" /><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Macfarlane takes us deep into subterranian spaces, where we still find the reach of human activity and where we encounter mystery and awe, fear and fascination. His erudition is on full display, bringing into play knowledge of biology and geology, history and epic poetry. A masterful tome.</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were others that kept me engaged too - a Maggie O'Farrel, a couple of Le Carres, Keene's fascinating narrative of 'The Troubles' in Northern Ireland in 'Say Nothing', Srinath Perur's funny look at us Indians on our conducted tours in his 'If It's Monday, it must be Madurai', Mischa Berlinski's superb debut novel 'Fieldwork' - a mystery set amongst the tribes of northern Thailand, May Sarton and her brilliant Journal of a Solitude, Shrayana Bhattacharya's study of a generation of Indian women that has seen possibilities open up for them without corresponding support of the men in their lives in her Desperately Seeking Shahrukh.</span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="background-color: white; color: #202124; font-family: Roboto, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-variant-ligatures: none; letter-spacing: 0.2px; white-space: pre-wrap;">That's my list for 2022. Tell me about yours.</span></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-90295879527130149752022-03-13T18:18:00.003+05:302022-03-13T18:18:59.805+05:30Shah Rukh as metaphor<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh </span></h2><span id="docs-internal-guid-bdc199fe-7fff-ae51-3a4e-f1a74930bab4"><h3 style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">By Shrayana Bhattacharya</span></h3><div><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjkmz6dwCaA393z1C7_K9q01X6kO_pCb1BC5RdTSzODERCjSTQAIC_W821BjGmqkuZAArIs1W64UO41LXBb3FtiIvngTNFMzJF_JePfaBhm6cFjugi59aSKIG1c-RHwuBZWd7ggr6UYtXl2kKtsuVKatcDYURrWSlw7xczFoorLiTCvRZviej4=s499" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="499" data-original-width="331" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjkmz6dwCaA393z1C7_K9q01X6kO_pCb1BC5RdTSzODERCjSTQAIC_W821BjGmqkuZAArIs1W64UO41LXBb3FtiIvngTNFMzJF_JePfaBhm6cFjugi59aSKIG1c-RHwuBZWd7ggr6UYtXl2kKtsuVKatcDYURrWSlw7xczFoorLiTCvRZviej4=w133-h200" width="133" /></a></div><br />This is an important book, one that documents the lives of a certain generation of Indian women, born in the early 80s, straddling a time period when society changed irrevocably with liberalization, “women who were on the cusp of adulthood when the world entered a new century.” A generation of women that has seen possibilities opening up for them personally, yet having to deal with families less enthusiastic about their enjoyment of them.</span><p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Bhattacharya tells the stories of these women, across social classes - a housewife in high society Delhi, a young cabin attendant from Jaisalmer, a single independent working woman in Delhi, an accountant in a government job, a young Muslim woman in UP doing piece work embroidery in Rampur. She peppers these stories with statistics. The labour force participation in our country is heavily skewed (77% of India’s workers are male). Nearly 71% of urban Indian women between the ages of 30 and 34 are engaged solely in unpaid housework. Among the wealthiest twenty percent of urban Indians aged 20-55, only 6% of married women are employed. 84% of marriages are arranged, nine out of ten are within the same caste. In 2018, only 43% of women in India owned a mobile phone, compared to almost 80% of Indian men, the largest such gap in the world. The suicide rate of Indian women is twice the global rate. All of these to show that “there is no meaningful dimension of well-being on which men and women are equal in India. None…All the data on gender in India, despite progress since Independence, confirms that our country is profoundly unequal and that the gap between male and female achievement and access to resources continues to grow.” </span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">It is within this context that we read the stories of these women. Bhattacharya frames them through the fandom of Shah Rukh. The conceit is wonderfully worked. Through this shared fanhood, Bhattacharya draws out the desires and fantasies of these women, as they tell her why Shah Rukh is so important to them. They tell her he is self-made, that he is intelligent, that he understands women, that the love he portrays is the stuff of their dreams, that they have never seen a man peel carrots in the kitchen as he did in DDLJ. But, as one woman says, “No wonder our generation of women is so fucked when it comes to love. We saw this beautiful man dance on top of a train, romance women in the most beautiful settings and do it all with such conviction that we all bought the dream of love that he sold us.” But the men in their lives are far from the idea of Shah Rukh - “Every fan-woman I had met - from Lutyen’s Delhi to rural UP - would offer stories of how a man had compromised her selfhood, how her family would treat her like a ticking time bomb, how the marriage market made her feel worthless, how they were underpaid and how public spaces remain unfriendly.” </span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">But the women Bhattacharya writes about, all defy some convention, negotiate some form of space for themselves even while never openly breaking away from the patriarchy that holds them back. It could be taking a short break from a stifling marriage, or staying single and committing to a career, or seeking new guideposts to negotiate love. Bhattacharya distinguishes these ‘deeply private rebellions’ from the vociferous sloganeering on the internet about smashing the patriarchy. This is real, lived feminism, that ‘chips away at the social structures everyday’ - ‘feminism that won’t catch the eye but that can trigger change.’.Critics of DDLJ might see Raj’s refusal to run away with Simran and his attempt to stay and work to gain the support of her family as a concession to patriarchy. Yet, one of the women, Manju, the home-based textile worker in Rampur, sees it as a measure of Raj’s strength and maturity. Because in her lived world, she knows the dangers of being cut off from her family, the only source of support if, in fact, something does go wrong. And so we realize that “freedom is won through incremental negotiation, that dialogue amongst loved ones can be a path towards social change.”</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">Bhattacharya, through her research and reading, has come to believe that access to independent income is one of the most powerful tools of resistance women can have. And that as long as our institutions tax us for ‘seeking a self beyond beauty and duty’ and as long as the state does not recognize the unpaid labours women perform, it is difficult to keep women in the workforce. Which is why a mass female exodus from employment (women’s participation in the workforce has declined quite dramatically) can be so dangerous. </span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">It is a thought-provoking book, and a very interesting one, putting faces to the data points we read about. It uses Shah Rukh as a topic of mutual interest for women across social classes, in a country as diverse as India, women for whom it would otherwise be difficult to find common ground. As Bhattacharya says, she is “obliged that all talk of Shah Rukh liberated me from a researcher’s extractive gaze of ‘data collection’, that his films and songs freed me from having to look at the lives of women through the prism of deprivation and poverty alone.” It’s a Shah Rukh fan-girl’s take on a generation’s collective ideal of masculinity.</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline;">It’s a tough world out there, the change women seek is always too slow in coming, and the next generations still continue to have to negotiate their way through social change to try and achieve the autonomy they crave. As the author says, “Change involves regular people imposing censure and costs on friends and family members, on making personal acts of discrimination dishonourable and shameful. For the brave, change requires bearing the isolation and costs of resistance…Mindset isn’t enough, morality is embodied in how we demonstrate our liberal views in our daily encounters with people, places and our self. Without these intimate revolutions, the best laws and the strongest movements will fail.”</span></p></div></span>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-19221498052846637232022-02-24T13:30:00.003+05:302022-02-24T19:43:41.662+05:30Imagining Nations<h2 style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: arial;"> Midnight's Borders by Suchitra Vijayan</span></h2><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjc_1lJOKrVpsQbCViEhjU7tLYnk6zTygTio588ZzSfom-y091nxVS60iynvfI1eQ_-SL1-bnEhdAKzdd7qwYBvbsSSpbfP8d6toiikg_003aOh3RRr_FyD6O0cUKEhQourgZ0o0I9WpdPAiON3Wfwsmfyvq32orMpqfzcvRL7Mg5D2rH5ZNv0=s3075" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="3075" data-original-width="2400" height="231" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjc_1lJOKrVpsQbCViEhjU7tLYnk6zTygTio588ZzSfom-y091nxVS60iynvfI1eQ_-SL1-bnEhdAKzdd7qwYBvbsSSpbfP8d6toiikg_003aOh3RRr_FyD6O0cUKEhQourgZ0o0I9WpdPAiON3Wfwsmfyvq32orMpqfzcvRL7Mg5D2rH5ZNv0=w181-h231" width="181" /></a></div><br />This is a hard-hitting book, one which raises more questions than it answers - what makes a country, does culture trump nationhood, how does one define empire, or freedom, and ultimately, do good fences make good neighbours, or do they just make unequal people?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Suchitra Vijayan, a journalist and a lawyer, travels 9000 miles along India's borders - through Afghanistan, Rajasthan, Punjab, Kashmir, West Bengal, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Assam.. documenting people and their stories at 'the frayed edges of the republic', counting the human toll of borders and the nation state. "Where you are born, what passport you hold, can shrink your world, cripple you and sometimes kill you," she says. Of course, most of the people in her stories have no conception of a thing called a passport. All they know is that Messrs. Durand, Radcliffe and McMahon drew lines on a map that changed their lives forever, dividing families, uprooting homes lived in for generations, disrupting ways of life unimaginably. </span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">The stories are hearbreaking, the ones from the eastern borders especially so, since these are stories being enacted now - in Assam and West Bengal, people who have lived in their homes for decades, whose families live across a line that exists only in maps, forced to prove their citizenship with documents they do not have, their futures dependent on arbitrary rulings by courts and lawyers they cannot afford. "They all look the same, speak the same," says a BSF guard in the Bangladesh-India border, "..that is why we need to keep a close watch." Vijayan calls this "the perfect distillation of Indian nationalism, a foundational myth about the nation's beginning and who belongs within its boundaries and who doesn't."</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">The partition vignettes from Punjab are less startling, mostly because the tragedy happened more than seven decades ago. Yet even here, Vijayan makes us realize that while we might know the history, and we have all read Train to Pakistan and watched Tamas, there still remain thousands of stories to be told - harrowing, soul-destroying, tragic.</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Kashmir and Nagaland are different. For the first time in the book, we encounter people who do not want in, who believe they are not part of our country. Vijayan writes of a memorial outside Kohima dedicated to Khrisanisa Seyie, the first president of the Federal Government of Nagaland (!), with a plaque that says, "Nagas are not Indians; their territory is not part of the Indian union. We shall uphold and defend this unique truth at all costs and always.". The counter-insurgency operations impacted thousands of Naga families, and have left graves across the state, some of which have stark messages for us - a gravestone in a remote border with Burma reads "India killed my son." The Nagaland chapter is terribly disconcerting - it is a chapter in Indian history we have never learnt, and this, along with the Kashmir one are the ones that make us wonder the most about the Indian state - what makes us less of an empire than China or Russia?</span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></div><div><span style="font-family: arial;">Vijayan writes with passion and deep empathy. She is transparent about where her sympathies lie and is scathing about Modi and the Hindutva agenda that seeks to discriminate against a particular religion with state instruments like the NRC and CAA. But this book is not a political rant. It serves as witness to the large human cost of manmade borders and the narrative of the nation state. It is an important book, a complex one, one that as Indians, we need to read, if we want our nation state to mean anything more than lines on a map guarded by an armed force.</span></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-10369981475130091222022-01-01T14:52:00.002+05:302022-01-01T14:52:55.920+05:302021: My year in reading<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh7cMXzdmIhtC9fJZ0vkbfgx44Azp2RbxVsisarnTWeMswp2_wXhStyvBh3c-9q-hGNCAHgYv7oFQyMB-6ErXAjnYCPnie3ToGpCZWSSqX5dK0V013bcXZKm-5mmdOtVHrhKc983MCW4IwqZ4Sge-sTwxoHltsOlYsjAG-3DcsrBRSsrSIuErc=s1600" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh7cMXzdmIhtC9fJZ0vkbfgx44Azp2RbxVsisarnTWeMswp2_wXhStyvBh3c-9q-hGNCAHgYv7oFQyMB-6ErXAjnYCPnie3ToGpCZWSSqX5dK0V013bcXZKm-5mmdOtVHrhKc983MCW4IwqZ4Sge-sTwxoHltsOlYsjAG-3DcsrBRSsrSIuErc=s320" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span id="docs-internal-guid-0509adbd-7fff-b2c4-f3c0-8e7dd1612356"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were so many good reads this year, it’s tough to pick favourites. Let me start by pointing out the missing parts. Not much of poetry in a year that deserved poetry, more than any other form, I think. Vijay Nambisan’s darkly humorous collection First Infinities was the only one I read. Not much of Indian writing in translation either - something I had sworn I would do more of. Qurattulain Hyder’s excellent Fireflies in the Mist was again the only one.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">On the other hand, I discovered two delightful English writers I had never heard of before. Barbara Pym in her Excellent Women was wry and enchanting, and so was Elizabeth Taylor (no, not the actress) in Mrs Palfrey at the Claremont. I also managed to finish a big, big Russian book (on my journey to read big, big Russian books) - And Quiet Flows the Don. As usual, anything Russia intrigues me. </span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And so onto picking my favourites for the year, out of the 54 I read, in no particular order.</span></p><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Non-fiction:</b></span></p><ol style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Languages of Truth: Essays (2003-2020). By Salman Rushdie</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Very erudite, very opinionated, Rushdie is as usual, fabulous, making even the novels of Samuel Beckett sound interesting.</span></p><ol start="2" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Priestdaddy. By Patricia Lockwood</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I love memoirs, and this one is truly a great one about growing up Catholic with a priest for a father!! Lockwood’s brilliant writing was a revelation, and she can make even the most horrific scenes laugh-out-loud funny. </span></p><ol start="3" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A Short History of Nearly Everything. By Bill Bryson</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Bryson condenses centuries of scientific knowledge about our cosmos into a 600 pager, imbuing it with his characteristic sense of curiosity and awe, all embellished with that humour we all know him for. </span></p><ol start="4" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Vesper Flights. By Helen McDonald</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A wide ranging selection of essays showcasing the wonder of all things wild. The writing is absolutely exquisite - this is nature writing at its best</span></p><ol start="5" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future. By Elizabeth Kolbert</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Kolbert follows up her The Sixth Extinction with this one, about people trying to heal the earth that is being destroyed by people. It’s not a pretty picture, there are no silver bullets and it is a scary read. But Kolbert is spellbinding, as usual.</span></p><ol start="6" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At Large and at Small: Familiar Essays. By Anne Fadiman</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A superbly eclectic collection of intimate, clever essays written with that incredibly difficult-to-achieve lightness of touch. Informs and delights in equal measure.</span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Fiction:</b></span></p><ol style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Writers and Lovers. By Lily King.</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A coming-of-age tale of a late bloomer. There is sorrow and longing and passion and staying true to one’s self when all around you are taking the easy way out. A simple tale, lightly told.</span></p><ol start="2" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox. By Maggie O’Farrell</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">O’Farrell has become one of my favourite novelists of all time. This one has her trademark Gothic intensity and is about deep family secrets and tragic early twentieth century asylum horror. A bittersweet read.</span></p><ol start="3" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Whereabouts. By Jhumpa Lahiri</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A splendid little book about nothing and everything, Lahiri describes the rich inner monologue of a single, unmarried woman as she goes about her life in an Italian city. </span></p><ol start="4" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Jorasanko. By Aruna Chakravarti</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">About the Tagore family and its women as they evolve from a generation of child brides in purdah to becoming social reformers, novelists, freedom fighters. A fascinating look at a way of life in an upper class Brahmin household during the Bengal Renaissance.</span></p><ol start="5" style="margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 0; padding-inline-start: 48px;"><li aria-level="1" dir="ltr" style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; list-style-type: decimal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;"><p dir="ltr" role="presentation" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Asoca: A Sutra. By Irwin Allan Sealy</span></p></li></ol><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-left: 36pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">A first person fictional narrative of one of India’s greatest kings. Sealy creates some finely etched characters as he sticks to the broad narrative arc we all know. It is an intimate portrait he paints, of a man and the times he lived in.</span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were many more books and writers I could go on about - Francis Cha’s If I Had Your Face, Girish Karnad’s memoir This Life at Play, Brian Dillon’s fabulous Suppose a Sentence, Colin Thubron’s travelogue To A Mountain in Tibet, Maggie O’Farrel’s The Hand That First Held Mine… but then this would no longer be a listicle.</span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And so we move onto 2022. What do I hope for? More poetry, more classics, more books in translation. Today is the first day of the rest of the year. Let’s start.</span></p><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br /><p></p>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-42353977910742519642021-07-05T21:22:00.000+05:302021-07-05T21:22:12.850+05:30The Wonder Of It All<p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-U4ihESWyz_g/YOMqAhtEhNI/AAAAAAAAIp0/EHGSkiz87-gjE7dDtbY1nA0hRDyMdojcwCLcBGAsYHQ/s500/a%2Bshort%2Bhistory.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="321" height="200" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-U4ihESWyz_g/YOMqAhtEhNI/AAAAAAAAIp0/EHGSkiz87-gjE7dDtbY1nA0hRDyMdojcwCLcBGAsYHQ/w128-h200/a%2Bshort%2Bhistory.jpg" width="128" /></a></b></div><b><br /> <span style="font-family: arial;">A Short History of Nearly Everything</span></b><p></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;"><b>By Bill Bryson</b></span></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;">Centuries of scientific knowledge and discovery about our cosmos, condensed into a wonderful 600 page book that a complete layman can find interesting. That is Bryson's achievement. Some delightful factoids from the book:</span></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;"><br /></span></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><span style="font-family: arial;">For all we know, the North Star may have burned out at any time since the early fourteenth century - and news of it hasn't reached us as yet.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">Every atom you possess has almost certainly passed through several stars and been part of millions of organisms on its way to becoming you. And so we will have atoms in our body that once belonged to Shakespeare, and the Buddha and Genghis Khan! A little bit of genius in each of us.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">Rutherford, the 'father of nuclear physics' as we know him, was terrible at mathematics!! There is still hope for that kid who hates it.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">Since atoms are mostly empty space, the solidity we experience around us is an illusion. So when you are sitting on a chair, you are not actually sitting, but levitating above it (albeit at a height of a hundred millionth of a centimeter).</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">There are two bodies of laws in physics - both leading quite separate lives. One for the world of the very small (quantum theory) and one for the universe at large (relativity).</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">We, us brilliant humans, really know very little! We live in a universe whose age we cannot calculate, surrounded by stars whose distance from us or each other we do not know, filled with 'dark' matter we can't identify, operating in conformance with physical laws we don't understand.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The study of plate tectonics tells us Kazhakstan was once attached to Norway and New England. Pick up a pebble in a Massachusetts beach and it is most closely related to ones in Africa. And sometime in the future, California will float off and become a Madagascar in the Pacific.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">There are about a hundred million asteroids larger than 10 meters, at any point in time, in trajectories that cross earth's orbit. Earth is of course, trundling along at a brisk 100,000 kilometers an hour. These speeding bullets are impossible to track. Near misses happen two or three times a week and go unnoticed. Talk about living on borrowed time.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The distance from the surface of the earth to its middle is 6370 km. We have penetrated 3 kilometers at the most (searching for gold). So as Bryson says, if the planet were an apple, we wouldn't have even come close to breaking the skin!</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">All the glass on earth is flowing downwards under the relentless drag of gravity. So a pane of old glass from the window of a European cathedral is noticeably thicker at the bottom than the top.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The earth's magnetic field reverses itself every once in a while - the last reversal happened 750,000 years ago. And we have no idea why it happens!</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The last supervolcano explosion happened in Sumatra 74000 years ago. That whopper was followed by 6 years of volcanic winter. It reduced global human population to no more than a few thousand (all of us are descended from those thousands - and so all that fighting over race and caste is quite insane, given the lack of our genetic diversity).</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">And Yellowstone National Park is an active supervolcano. It's cycle of eruptions is a massive one every 600,000 years. The last one was 630,000 years ago. Still want to visit?</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The world belongs to the very small! If you totaled up all the biomass in the planet, microbes would account for at least 80% of all there is!</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">When you see lichen the size of a dinner plate, know that it is likely to be hundreds of years old! That is slow-growing!</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The dust on your table or shelf is most likely old skin. You slough off several billion fragments of your dead skin every day.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">When man arrived, North and South America lost about three quarters of their big animals. Australia lost 95%.</span></li><li><span style="font-family: arial;">The second Baron Rothschild was a scientific collector of species - and a very deadly one. When he became interested in Hawaii, it lost 9 species of birds in a decade of his collecting!</span></li></ul><p></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;">The sense of curiosity and awe that Bryson imbues through everything he explains, the very things that are missing in all the science textbooks I have read, is what makes this book such a treasure. Add in his trademark humour and you have one of the most engaging pop science books ever!</span></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;">And it has a lesson - that we, humans, are truly lucky to be here, at this time, in this planet, a tiny speck, both in terms of size and time, in this infinitely vast and unknowable universe. So as a poet once said, "Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it."</span></p><p><span style="font-family: arial;"></span></p><p><br /></p>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-59025692702400016642021-03-20T19:41:00.000+05:302021-03-20T19:41:05.639+05:30Reading Art<p> <span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ET6z-nneF5E/YFYCHjbBMsI/AAAAAAAAIlU/zMmZDiJIkpsugBEwwcbhVqDleWpw28ERwCLcBGAsYHQ/s400/laing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="267" height="320" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ET6z-nneF5E/YFYCHjbBMsI/AAAAAAAAIlU/zMmZDiJIkpsugBEwwcbhVqDleWpw28ERwCLcBGAsYHQ/w214-h320/laing.jpg" width="214" /></a></div>Olivia Laing has been quite a favourite. Over the years, she has introduced you to new ways of seeing the world, through the eyes of artists and writers, and her own personal take on them. This one is more patchy than her normal work, perhaps because it is a collection of essays and pieces she has already published, a bit of a hodge-podge. It still inspires.<p></p><span id="docs-internal-guid-ca9d3fb1-7fff-15d2-a8bb-eaf8038abeae"><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Laing writes about the value of art - about artists “who look with sharp eyes at the societies they inhabit but who also propose new ways of seeing.” She believes art can change things, by opening us to possibilities, while showing us the interior lives of others. She did that for me - managing to create that feeling of a window opening somewhere, into a world you haven’t really traveled to before. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">She leads you to artists who worked through rough times - when being gay was a crime, when Reagan-era government ignored the AIDS crisis, when borders closed and the world became insular. Literally, artists who created art in an emergency. Jean-Michel Basquiat, David Wagnarowicz, Derek Jarmen, all names I had to google. She has essays on Georgia O’Keefe and Hilary Mantel, painting and writing during times of personal crises. She writes love letters to David Bowie, Freddie Mercury. She writes about contemporary writers - Maggie Nelson, Deborah Levy, Chris Kraus, Sally Rooney; about women writers and alcohol (an echo to her own previous The Trip to Echo Spring); about Frank O’Hara and the New York school. She despairs about the state of the world - Brexit and Trump, walls and inhospitality. And it is always the art that is ‘reparative’ - planting a garden to stop a war. </span></p><br /><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are times when it can all be too much - too many artists you haven’t heard of, too many artworks you haven’t seen. But Laing writes as beautifully as ever. And as she brings one more unknown name into your consciousness, or when you are thrilled you have read someone she is writing about, you open yourself just that bit more to the ‘abundance of the cosmos’, to the ability to smell the flowers amongst the ruin. Laing does that to you. She is quite terrific that way.</span></p><div><br /><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div></span>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-1232751122480728032021-01-02T15:38:00.001+05:302021-01-02T15:45:48.902+05:302020: My year in reading<span style="font-family: arial;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3NpkAh-WYI/X_BHwtc5cOI/AAAAAAAAIjM/dHB_1kpv-LQG6e-l6Ug8rpnTP_mENlDBQCLcBGAsYHQ/s1221/books.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="744" data-original-width="1221" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-w3NpkAh-WYI/X_BHwtc5cOI/AAAAAAAAIjM/dHB_1kpv-LQG6e-l6Ug8rpnTP_mENlDBQCLcBGAsYHQ/s320/books.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><br />It’s been quite a year! Shut in at home for the most part, I should have been devouring books. Instead, I found myself endlessly scrolling social feeds, Facebook and WhatsApp groups that had proliferated. The scrolling mostly had purpose – keeping me updated on the pandemic, feeding me kitchen hacks and recipes for a ‘help-less’ world, motivating me to work out, even providing some voyeuristic fun. Reading was somewhat of a casualty.<br />I did manage to finish 56 books, a book-a-week number that is my normal in most years. But I went through bouts of reading block that were quite upsetting – and a lot of the reading felt quite forced. It didn’t help that I felt Kindle had decided to up their e-book prices, causing me to question the value of buying every book I read. <br />And so, 56 it was, even if I felt it should have been so many more. Here are the ones I was truly engaged with - my best of. <br />1. Svetlana Alexievich continues to enthral with her reporter-style writing. Her <b>Last Witnesses: Unchildlike Stories</b> narrates World War II in Belarus (which lost almost a quarter of its population to the war) through the eyes of people who were children during the war. War is horrifying in itself, but is especially terrible when children bear witness to it. A great read. <br />2. Kantor and Twohey’s <b>She Said</b> is another great piece of journalistic reportage. This one is about breaking the Weinstein sexual harassment story and igniting the Me-Too movement. It reads like a thriller – and the courage on display, of the journalists and the women who spoke up, is inspiring. <br />3. Joan Didion’s <b>Slouching Towards Bethlehem</b> is an old classic I just got to in 2020. ‘60s America comes alive in this set of essays where Didion’s writing is sharp, evocative and masterful. <br />4. Stephen Fry’s <b>Mythos </b>and Neil Gaiman’s <b>Norse Mythology</b> were totally entertaining reads – the old gods are so human and so much fun! <br />5. Lisa Brennan-Jobs memoir <b>Small Fry</b> was a captivating read on a complex man and a complex relationship. Steve Jobs does not emerge smelling of roses in this one. <br />6. My favourite discovery this year was Hope Jahren. Her <b>Lab Girl </b>is a memoir, describing what it takes to be a woman in science. But it is also an ode to plants – making us see a tree as a unique being. And her <b>The Story of More</b> builds a case for less consumption – as man’s excesses are slowly but surely endangering our world. A science writer with a love for language! <br />7. Maggie O’Farrell’s <b>Hamnet</b> was a truly touching fiction read. I loved her gorgeous prose imagining the origins of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, and describing the utter agony of grief. <br />8. Two delightful fiction reads were Guareschi’s <b>The Little World of Don Camillo</b> and Jane Borges’ <b>Bombay Balchao</b>. The former brings together a hot-headed Catholic priest, a Communist Mayor and a talking Christ on the Cross in a small Italian village in post-war Italy. The latter is a through-the-years exploration of a Goan community in South Mumbai. Both are funny and poignant with a great set of characters. Both were perfect for an anxiety-ridden time. <br />9. Two long reads, that took me some time to get through, yet were completely fulfilling were Maria Popova’s <b>Figuring</b> and Dalrymple’s <b>Anarchy</b>. Popova tells us of inspiring people – women and men who were geniuses in their own ways, who left an impact on the world. My personal favourites were Emily Dickinson and Rachel Carson. And Dalrymple made history come alive as he described a corporate takeover by the East India Company of some of the wealthiest kingdoms in the world.<br />There were other good reads. Ann Patchett and Alice Munro, Bill Bryson and Madeleine Miller, Elizabeth Strout and Tina Brown, Tove Jansson and Vivian Gornick. So in a very strange year, they were the ones I retreated to, for familiarity, comfort, refuge. They have rarely disappointed.</span><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left;"><o:p></o:p></p>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-29553007496934395292020-06-25T11:03:00.000+05:302020-06-25T11:03:15.068+05:30The Faraway Beckoning<span id="docs-internal-guid-36db615a-7fff-3019-37cd-0bbb0a7cb58b"><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Your reaction to a book is influenced by a number of things, chief among which has to be the time when you read it. Imagine you are in lockdown and haven’t stepped out of home for close to a hundred days. And you decide to read a book about a place as far away from home as </span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RVWqdxSVpbc/XvNyetleL_I/AAAAAAAAIbw/AUd2uDypdSk8upvtDyT3NjuJgqAXeFvjwCK4BGAsYHg/s475/1263600.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: justify;"><font color="#000000"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="318" height="256" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-RVWqdxSVpbc/XvNyetleL_I/AAAAAAAAIbw/AUd2uDypdSk8upvtDyT3NjuJgqAXeFvjwCK4BGAsYHg/w171-h256/1263600.jpg" width="171" /></font></a></div><div style="text-align: justify;">you can get. </div></span><p></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Barry Lopez’s descriptions of that wild distant place called the Arctic have a strangely calming effect on you - anxiety levels drop as you imagine the endurance needed for a tree to survive, or an animal, or a human being, in that most inhospitable world. “...the most salient, overall adaptive strategy of arctic organisms is their ability to enter a frozen state or a state of very low metabolic activity whenever temperatures drop, and then to resume full metabolic activity whenever it warms sufficiently.” It’s a lesson we can all learn, perhaps.</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The world he describes is wondrous - where the concept of the sun rising in the east and setting in the west doesn’t apply; neither does the convention of a morning, noon, afternoon, and evening. It’s a world that strangely receives the same amount of sunlight as the tropics, but it comes all at once, and at a low angle, so without vigour. As much moisture falls here as in the Mojave desert, and it is available as liquid water, the only form plants can use it, only in summer.</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The organisms that make a life here are far fewer in number - but they do exist.The muskox and the caribou, the polar bear and the narwhals. Lopez writes about them in detail, describing their coping mechanisms in an environment where survival can be so very hard. And then there are the people, the Eskimos (or the Inuit or Yupik, as we call them today) who have an instinctive understanding of the harsh, beautiful land and its creatures, borne out of centuries of interaction and reflection and observation. Lopez calls them the ‘hunting people’ and takes pains to describe this understanding and contrasts it with Western civilization’s relationship with nature. This understanding he says is a ‘state of mind’; one that means you ‘have the land around you like clothing’, that you ‘release yourself from rational images of what something “means” and to be concerned only that it “is”.’ It is a very different take from how we traditionally look at the natural world. Lopez writes, “ Eskimos, who sometimes see themselves as still not quite separate from the animal world, regard us as a kind of people whose separation may have become too complete. They call us, with a mixture of incredulity and apprehension, “the people who change nature.”</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Lopez also writes extensively about man’s quest to discover and own these harsh lands - that primordial quest for fame and fortune that led the western man to risk life and limb in journeys into the unknown, journeys that are quite unimaginable to us in modern times. The harshness of the environment has very little parallel - “No summer is long enough to take away the winter. The winter always comes,” he says. And even in late summer, he says, “Eventually the cold, damp air finds its way through insulated boots and wool clothing to your bones.” The will needed to get there and survive had to be quite extraordinary.</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But ultimately, it is Lopez’s descriptions of the beauty of that extreme north, that made the book for me. To quote just one instance: “After dinner I went down by the water to wash my hair and to sit. Two silver-gray caribou were gazing at the far end of the river. It was so warm I was barefoot. In the hills beyond were the black dots of muskoxen and white dots of browsing arctic hare. The sound of the river was in my head, and its cold drops ran down my chest. A Chipewyan guide named Saltatha once asked a French priest what lay beyond the present life. “You have told me heaven is very beautiful,” he said. “ Now tell me one more thing. Is it more beautiful than the country of the muskoxen in the summer, when sometimes the mist blows over lakes, and sometimes the water is blue, and the loons cry very often? That is beautiful. If heaven is still more beautiful, I will be glad. I will be content to rest there until I am very old.”</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><br /></div><p dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">At its heart, this book is an elegy, for a world that is most likely lost to us. Where modern technology has made redundant the knowledge of the land and its inhabitants that comes from living off it, using what is available in the harshness. This loss affects our relationship with our environments in a very fundamental way. It makes us look at our landscapes and the animals within as things to ‘use’ today without understanding the larger picture. And because today’s science allows man to, as Lopez says, ‘circumvent evolutionary law, it is incumbent upon him... to develop another law to abide by if he wishes to survive, to not outstrip his food base. He must learn restraint. He must derive some other, wiser way of behaving toward the land. He must be more attentive to the biological imperatives of the system of sun-driven protoplasm upon which he, too, is still dependent….” Lopez wrote these wise words in the 1980s. How much more relevant they are today!</span></p><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-9109677597356946702019-12-30T17:22:00.002+05:302019-12-30T17:22:44.422+05:302019: My Year in Reading<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<br /><br />Goodreads tells me I have read a total of 18,309 pages across 58 books in 2019. Numbers do not tell the whole story, though. There have been years when I have read more, yet less satisfactorily. This year has been a relatively good year in reading, with a good mix of fiction and non-fiction, a number of new writers I will definitely explore further, and a couple of spectacular works I will treasure for a lifetime. So without much ado, here are my top reads of the year, in no particular order:<br /><ol>
<li>Kathleen Jamie’s Sightlines: I adore Jamie’s writing. This one has her doing her trademark lyricism on Scotland, its landscapes and seascapes. The essays are poetry in prose form. </li>
<li>Svetlana Alexievich’s Chernobyl Prayer: A Chronicle of the Future. The disaster from the trenches. Horrifying beyond belief.</li>
<li>Elizabeth Kolbert’s Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History. We are in a mass extinction period in the earth’s history and Kolbert tells us why and how, in her irony-laced low-key style. Doomsday it is, for sure.</li>
<li>Tara Westover’s Educated. Grit, fortitude, courage. A memoir of incredible power.</li>
<li>Helen DeWitt’s The Last Samurai. My favourite fiction read of the year. Incredibly geeky, totally original.</li>
<li>Baburao Bagul’s When I Hid My Caste: Stories. Stories of caste inequity and life in the margins. Stories that need to be told over and over.</li>
<li>Nora Ephron’s I Feel Bad About My Neck: And Other Thoughts On Being A Woman. Ephron’s smart writing tackling women and ageing strikes close to the bone.</li>
<li>A A Gill’s Lines in the Sand: Collected Journalism. A great introduction to AA Gill and his wit, empathy, wisdom.</li>
<li>Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer. A long, compelling, scary read</li>
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There were more notables: Scott Fitzgerald’s The Crack-Up, his Esquire essays on addiction that seem so ahead of its time; Tina Brown’s Vanity Fair Diaries, a romp through ‘80s New York publishing, perfect reading for a celebrity junkie like me; Madeline Miller’s Circe, great characterization and a riveting retelling of a Greek myth; Pomerantsev’s Nothing is True and Everything is Possible, tales from surreal modern day Russia; Anthony Marra’s A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, a touching tale set in Chechnya that made me tear up in parts; Alain de Botton’s How Proust Can Change Your Life, bite-sized pieces of Proust, a man I will never read in my lifetime; Bakewell’s How to Live, again, digestible pieces of Montaigne, another man I will never read.<br /><br /><div>
There were disappointments too - Ted Chiang’s science fiction (I should never attempt this genre), Ghosh’s Gun Island (even Ghosh can go wrong!), Ian McEwan Machines Like Me, Stella Gibson’s Cold Comfort Farm, Michael Dirda’s Book by Book.<br /><br />But the good ones more than made up for it. <br /><br />So, goodbye 2019. Thank you for the words. They made my year.<div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-32845142835186555022019-11-22T12:04:00.000+05:302019-11-22T12:14:07.736+05:30My Commonplace Book of Wisdom<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I turn 50 this year. It is a funny sort of age to be. You know you have more years to look back on than to look forward to, your back aches in the morning, your hair is almost all grey (do not believe the photographs), your birthing years are long gone, and losing weight is a battle you have surrendered. Yet you can refuse to concede you are old - you run a moderately quick 5 km on days you hit the gym, the world and its people haven’t lost their ability to startle, you still dream impossible things.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">So you think back on this strange thing called life and you wonder - just like Kathleen Kelly in my favourite movie of all time, “I lead a small life – well, valuable, but small – and sometimes I wonder, do I do it because I like it, or because I haven’t been brave?” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I like my small, un-brave life. And it has yielded me some certitudes. The first of them being there is no such thing as certitude. (Pluto was a planet and now it isn’t, see?). But for whatever it's worth, my version of a book of commonplace wisdom, an ongoing work-in-progress, at the moment contains this:</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">The answers to the big questions - is there a god, what is the purpose of the universe and what is my part in it, what happens after death, and so on and so forth - do not exist (even if Stephen Hawking and Jaggi Vasudev act like they do!). All we can do is try and find answers to some of the smaller questions - what makes us happy as individuals, how do we reconcile that with the happiness of the communities we live in, and that of the larger world.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Since we do not know the answers to the bigger questions, it's best to treat every variable in life as a roll of the dice. Where and to whom you are born and the genes you inherit, the choices you are given and the ones you make, the earthquakes and tsunamis you avoid, the fall you survived. Your personal agency is just a teeny, weeny part of what has brought you to this place. Knowing this should make us all kinder. It rarely does, though.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Wearing life lightly and yet being fully engaged with it - that’s the key to some form of awesomeness. For the anxiety-ridden me, this is a virtual impossibility.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">The pursuit of knowledge, for its own sake, is a worthwhile endeavour. It might or might not have anything to do with building a career. At the very least, it makes you a more interesting person.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Religion is by and large a crutch. The trick is to know that it is, when you are using it.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">The older you get, the more you appreciate your body. Few things are more important than keeping it well-tuned. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is very little downside to hard work and perseverance. It’s a fine enough substitute for outsized talent. More often than not, it gets you to your goal.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">There is beauty in the world. There is also horror. Philosophy can help in dealing with the contradictions. So can poetry, sometimes. Marcus Aurelius and Mary Oliver always help.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Nothing gives you a sense of accomplishment as earning your own money. Knowing you are not dependent on anyone else for your basic needs is a key benefit of adulthood.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Whenever, wherever you find joy, best to grab it. There are too many un-joyful things anyway.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">A hot shower is an effective cure for bad days. So is exercise.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Learning some things early in life is important - swimming, cycling, playing racket sports. Learning them as adults is not quite the same. And going through life not having these skills is quite a bummer.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">It's important to not need people too much. Easier said than done.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Niceness is an underrated quality. One of the best things to encounter in life is a genuinely nice person. And it's not as rare as it's made out to be.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Moderation is key to long term well being. Call me boring.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">Most people aren’t in love with their day jobs. So it’s important to have a hobby you truly love.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">You take for granted the people who love you the most. As you grow older, you discover what a big mistake that is.</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is important to feel deeply inspired once in a while. By people perhaps and what they have done, or by books or movies, art or architecture, nature or landscapes. And it’s worth going that extra mile or spending that extra money, to feel that feeling. </span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And here is something that is inspirational to me - someone else’s life learnings, her own book of common-place wisdom, a site that is so totally wonderful, one that has given me new books to read, new art to see, new poetry to listen to, new thoughts to think - <a href="https://www.brainpickings.org/2019/10/23/13-learnings-13-years/">Brain Pickings by Maria Popova</a>. Enjoy!</span></div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-52447957365333070322018-12-31T20:10:00.001+05:302018-12-31T20:10:40.536+05:302018: My Year in Reading<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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This wasn’t a bumper year for me, even if my count remains slightly above a book a week (56 to be precise). Too many distractions (think Netflix, Prime, Hotstar, Instagram!), too many hours at work, too many vapid books. It means my favourites list for the year is a pretty short one.</div>
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In fiction, Russia was a recurring theme. I loved Amor Towles’ A Gentleman in Moscow, a joyous book set in decidedly un-joyous times - Russia in the first half of the 20th century. Benioff’s City of Thieves brings alive the Siege of Leningrad with surprising humour and tenderness without making light of the horror. Anthony Marra’s The Tsar of Love and Techno is very David Mitchellesque - cleverly interconnected stories, going back and forth in geography and time, all intensely touching, laced with a humour so very black. </div>
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In non-Russia themed fiction, one of the notables was The Adivasi will not Dance, a set of remarkable short stories of life in the margins in tribal India - essential reading for upper class folks. Another was an old classic, Carson McCuller’s The Ballad of the Sad Cafe and Other Stories - the title story hits you like a sledgehammer and you remain convinced no one can do quiet tragedy like the masters of the American deep south.</div>
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Non-fiction had my only two 5 starrers. Jane Hirschfield’s Ten Windows: How Great Poems Transform the World is an incandescently lyrical exposition of how and why poetry works. It’s a keeper for all lovers of poetry. And in the same vein, Kathleen Jamie’s Findings is a gorgeous set of 10 essays - meditations on birds, landscapes, cityscapes, prayer, personal crises. Poetry in prose form, I would call it.</div>
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Other non-fiction note-worthies include Olivia Laing’s To the River: A Journey Beneath the Surface - part travelogue, part memoir as Laing travels the length of the river Ouse (the one in which Virginia Woolf drowned herself); Trevor Noah’s Born a Crime, a breezy tale of his rags-to-riches story; Theroux’s The Old Patagonian Express, where he remains his curmudgeonly, judgemental self, as entertaining as ever; and last but definitely not the least, Tharoor’s Why I am a Hindu, a book that deeply echoed so much of what I feel about my religion.</div>
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And so onto 2019. Maybe this will be the year I finish War and Peace? I can keep hoping...</div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-2821624678135971512018-09-04T07:12:00.000+05:302018-09-05T06:41:24.594+05:30Spiti - Why It Should Be Your Next Adventure<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><b>The landscapes.</b> Spiti falls in the rain shadow of the Himalayas. And so, like it’s bigger sister Ladakh, it is part of the desert Himalaya. What that means is, you get to see the Himalayas in a different hue- grey, harsh in a way the greener parts can never be. But those greys and the whites of the snow capped peaks, the deep canyons and gorges, the small whitewashed villages, the crumbling monasteries, all set against the incredible blue of the sky make for landscapes that inspire awe, quite like no other. </span></div>
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<b>The river Spiti itself.</b> It looks like a wide stream of mercury in most places, the glacial grey glinting in the sunlight. Spitian villages are mostly on its banks, or the banks of its tributaries, and you are invariably following it as you drive around the valley. It’s rarely very wide, but you can feel its power as you gaze awestruck at the gorges and canyons it flows through.</div>
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<b>The monasteries.</b> Spiti is Tibetan Buddhist land. And there are an incredible number of monasteries, for such a small population. Most of them are set high up, a number of them are the oldest living monasteries and are crumbling, and each has its own mythology that the monks are happy to tell you about. My favourite was the ancient Tabo one, with beautiful murals on its mud walls that are not going to remain for much longer if the archeological society isn’t going to do something soon. The Kee monastery has a stunning setting and is probably the single most famous image of Spiti. The Dhankar monastery (Dhankar means fort on a hill) stands on a cliff that is eroding. And while it provides some spectacular views, UNESCO declares it endangered. </div>
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<b>The high altitude lakes.</b> We saw 2 of them - the breathtaking Chandratal and the Dhankar lake that required a bit of a hike to get to. These, to be honest, are no comparison in size or beauty to a Pangong Tso in Ladakh, but surrounded by snow-capped mountains, these water bodies still have a magic difficult to ignore. </div>
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<b>The villages and the people.</b> Literally hamlets, with each comprising of little more than a dozen houses, the villages are spread right across the valley. They are some of the highest inhabited ones in the world - Komic is at at 4750 meters and claims to be the highest motorable one in Asia, Hikkim, at 4400 meters has the world’s highest post office. The houses are white washed and they stand out beautifully against stark backgrounds. Given that the valley is cut off from the rest of the world for more than 6 months in the year, the villages house hardy but simple folk, who tend their sheep, cows and yaks and farm the little they can in a really short summer. They welcome you with smiles and happily offer you what little they have. Tourism is gaining ground and home-stays and guest houses are gaining popularity, but it’s going to be a while before these pretty villages become part of the mainstream. </div>
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<b>The night skies.</b> We were pretty unlucky on this front in Spiti- cloudy skies meant little chance to stargaze. But one night in Tabo, we looked up and were mesmerised. I hadn’t ever seen this many stars or the Milky Way. We weren’t adept enough in photography to capture that beauty - but it sure will stay with me in my mind’s eye. </div>
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<b>The inaccessibility.</b> It literally takes 2 days to get to Spiti - the European Alps have easier access. The roads are terrible and crumbly, it takes incredible driving skills to get there, you will have to budget for extra time spent on the roads due to landslides, and god forbid you fall seriously ill - the nearest well equipped hospital is at least 12 hours away. Combine that with altitudes between 3800 and 5000 meters, and you are in a place that is quite untamed from a tourist perspective. But that’s part of the thrill that is Spiti travel. How many beautiful places in the world can you think of that provide this kind of an adventure? </div>
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Our 7 day trip to this wild gorgeousness was rough. As it should be. The altitude meant our day hikes needed to be taken real slow, to take into account the the low levels of oxygen. Everything that the valley needs comes in by trucks through high passes on almost non-existent roads. So the food tends to be simple (though Kaza has some organic restaurants) and was mostly dal rice and Maggi. Hotels were basic, homestays were rudimentary. We were stuck for 12 hours on a mountain road that had been washed away. For a middle aged city dweller, it all tends to come as a bit of a shock. And then you take a look at the incredible beauty around - at the grey, snow capped mountains and the sky that invented blue and the ever-present winding river, the blue sheep and the yaks, the whitewashed villages and the monasteries. And you offer up a prayer of gratitude, and recognize how lucky you are to be there at that time, that place. </div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-49764168761790853762018-03-31T16:17:00.000+05:302018-03-31T16:17:32.200+05:30In Defence of Liberal Hinduism: Tharoor's Why I am a Hindu<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The politics of religion forces one to re-evaluate faith. At least, it did for me. You are born a Hindu, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">you grow up conditioned in the traditions of the religion, follow the rituals almost unthinkingly. And then</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">there comes a time when you feel you can’t defend it in the world anymore. Not when you see terrible</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">things committed in its name, not when you realize the contradictions within it (the caste-ism and </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">sexism, for example), not when you start to despise at least some of the people who proudly claim it. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Your liberal soul revolts.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Yet you want to defend it. Because there really is so much to love about it. Those rituals, for one - the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ones you cannot do without, the ones that center you - the lighting of the lamp every morning, the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">reciting of the shlokas you learnt as a child, the visits to temples where you can almost feel the power </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">of the idols that have been prayed to, for centuries. And then what about the sheer beauty of the idols </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">and the architecture? And the joi-de-vivre of the epic stories you grew up hearing? The familiarity of </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">your favourite gods and goddesses, beings who are almost part of your family? What about a </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">philosophy of the religion, one that you know vaguely, but one that makes some sense in this screwed </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">up world - a philosophy that preaches a universal soul, and looking inward to find oneness with it? Oh, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">there really is so much to love about it.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Shashi Tharoor, in his book, Why I am a Hindu tries to reclaim all that, defending Hinduism against the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">ones who preach a narrower version, an illiberal one, one that goes by the name of Hindutva. Part of </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">his book looks at the history and the philosophies and the route to today’s version of the religion. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Reading that part, you want to go back to the basics, re-learn Sanskrit, read the Vedas and the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Puranas and the Upanishads. You want to read Ramakrishna Parahamsa and Swami Vivekanand, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Radhakrishnan and Aurobindo. Because all of them just seem so interesting - as literature and as </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">philosophy, as reformers and explainers of a religion. You know there are parts that will contradict </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">each other, that there is a terribly regressive Manusmriti, but that there is also beautiful poetry, hugely </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">entertaining fables and philosophies for the modern soul. Tharoor does not shy away from the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">contradictions - yet his take on them is the weakest part of the book. Because honestly, not even the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">erudition of a Tharoor can explain away those.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">He then goes on to chronicle the rise of political Hinduism and the Hindutva brigade. You read about </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Savarkar and Golwalkar and your heart starts to sink. This is the most painful part of the book, and </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">you can feel the welling up of despair as you see how much destruction this pair has caused to the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">fabric of a religion and a nation. He is soft on Deen Dayal Upadhyay and his Integral Humanism, but </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">is quite merciless on the others. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">The last part is meant to be a call to arms, a totem pole for the liberal Hindu, a refusal to cede ground </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">to rabidness and the ‘Semitization’ of his religion. Here he is passionate and intense, and the ardour </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">is inspiring. Deep in your heart, you want to believe that we can do that - that we can reclaim the </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">vastness of our faith, we can shame those who choose to narrow it to a holy book and a few gods, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">that we can prove to enough people our faith is ‘eclectic and non-doctrinaire’ and that it is the perfect </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">one for a plural society, since it never has to put down another religion to uplift our own. Deep down, </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">you want to believe we can. Deep down, you are not entirely sure we really can. </span></div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-16303034742667217372018-01-01T17:17:00.003+05:302018-01-01T17:17:57.851+05:302017: My Year in Reading<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">59 was this year’s number - slightly above my average of a book a week. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Poetry was a theme. It was probably that kind of a year, where you needed the consolations of verse </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">to deal with the world. And I actually bought physical books of poetry this year, having decided poems</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">need the tactility of paper and pen. Mary Oliver was, of course, high up there, as a means of dealing with</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">the world - American Pastoral, her Pulitzer winner, and her New and Selected Poems, Vol 1, </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">the best kind of self-help book there is. There was also AK Ramanujan’s classic translations of ancient </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">Sangam poetry The Interior Landscape - gorgeous, lush love poems; and his translation of medieval</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">Kannada Bhakti poetry, Speaking of Siva - mystical, obscure sometimes, beautiful always. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Some of my favourite reads this year were non-fiction. Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">was powerful beyond measure. Svetlana Alexievich’s Second-Hand Time was a very long read; but</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">it was a heart-breaking one about the collapse of the Soviet Union and its impact on the soul of its </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">people. Krakauer’s Into Thin Air combined adventure and tragedy into an engrossing tale. </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Harari’s Sapiens challenged some fundamental concepts we take for granted, as it took us through</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">70,000 years of human history. Olivia Laing’s The Trip to Echo Spring explored the intimate connection</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">between alcoholism and literature, through the lives of Hemnigway, Scott Fitzgerald, Cheever, Carver</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">and Tennessee Williams. And this year, I finally got to Thoreau’s Walden (long-winded and boring</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">in parts) and Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own (greatly inspirational).</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">After all that glorious non-fiction, the fiction was a bit of a let down, really. There were the regulars -</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">Rushdie and Murakami, Le Carre and Strout., Mahfouz and Patchett. - all of whom were wonderful.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">But if I had to pick a few that I thoroughly enjoyed, I would start with the long awaited The Ministry of </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">Utmost Happiness - as dizzyingly dazzling as only Arundhati Roy can make it. Lucia Berlin’s short </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">stories were a revelation. She writes uncompromisingly about life in the margins, a kind of rawness </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">that is quite unforgettable. And Tana French was such a discovery - her Dublin Murder Squad mysteries</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: arial; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre;">are marvelous. And to think I have only read three of them and there are so many more out there!</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">So that, folks, was my 2017 in books. And it’s such a comfort to know that whatever 2018 may throw</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">at us, there will always be a little corner where we can retreat into, where we can sit engrossed in </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">some story that some writer is telling us. That magic is never going to go away. Isn’t that something </span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre;">to be grateful for?</span></div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-23556180842322212692017-07-11T09:11:00.000+05:302017-07-11T09:11:49.166+05:30The Ministry of Utmost Happiness : An authentic, beautiful mess<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It’s untidy. Like the India in which it is set. Characters, each of whom deserves a novel himself/ herself, drift in and out. All the causes worth fighting about, in this strange, beautiful country of ours, find their space - gender, caste, religion, class, Kashmir. All the major political events in the last three decades are there in some form or the other. Like I said before, it’s a complete unholy mess. Like watching the world in Krishna’s mouth.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It works, though. Because somehow, in spite of the overwhelming political backdrop, Arundhati Roy does what she does best. Makes you care about the small people - the boy Aftab who becomes a girl Anjum, my favourite character in the book; the IB officer Biplab Dasgupta, on the wrong side of the war in Kashmir; Gulrez, the old, simple Kashmiri, who is killed and paraded as a dreaded militant; Dayachand, aka Saddam Hussein, the lower caste boy who sees his father lynched by upper caste Hindus as he clears a dead cow’s carcass; Azad Bharathiya Guru, on permanent fast in Jantar Mantar; Maoist Revathy, raped and tortured, and yet writing to the world from her grave.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The small people stand tall amongst the ruins. They make the fight worth fighting. They are the redeemers, the salvation of a world gone horribly wrong. They make the book.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">My least favourite character was Tilo - an amalgamation of Rahel and Ammu from GOST and Arundhati herself. It’s a rehashed character and feels like it. But she is the conduit to another beautiful character - Kashmir.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Yes, Kashmir is a character by itself. Roy has some exquisite passages describing its beauty amongst the rubble of a self-destructive war. It’s a long death spiral we cannot look away from - and it forms some of the most powerful parts of the book.</span></div>
<span id="docs-internal-guid-46c1bcfe-2fba-61a4-8fdb-f4da3f220488"></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The Ministry of Utmost Happiness is a great read. It is also an important one as it conflates some of our country’s biggest issues into fiction. Is it great fiction? Yes, the agenda could have been better framed. The pulpit could have been better disguised. But then, would it have been an authentic Arundhati Roy? And can anyone ask for anything more than an authentic Arundhati Roy - conscience-keeper, rebel, wordsmith, a god of small things?</span></div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-63389302470614158892017-04-17T09:22:00.001+05:302017-04-17T09:38:05.732+05:30Goa, beyond the beaches<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Forts:</b> When I dream of Goa, I dream of forts by the sea. My favourite spot in Goa is atop Chapora fort in Vagator. It’s a short climb up a very small hill. A little effort for some absolutely fabulous views of the shoreline from the top. Fort Aguada is of course the most popular fort in Goa - and if you get there at sunset time, the stone, the sun and the sea can prove magical. There are other forts worth your time as well - Terakhol up north and Reis Magos near Panjim, Corjuem fort in Corjuem and Rachol fort overlooking the Zuari river. One of these days, I will do a fort holiday in Goa, and catch up with all these beauties. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>The historic district of Fontainhas:</b> A heritage walk through this district was one of the highlights of my last Goa trip. The colourful houses, the dolls on the doorways, the roosters on the roof, the pretty tiled nameplates and the mother-of-pearl on the windows - it might have been a walk through a European small town. A not-to-be-missed experience.</span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 11pt; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;">Divar Island:</b><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"> A sleepy little island on the river you can get to, only by taking a ferry. There is hardly anything to see here, except a lovely old church and some paddy fields. It’s quaint and quiet, and if you can get a meal in a local home, you can go back to the mainland replete and completely charmed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 11pt; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are other things to do as well - see the Churches of Old Goa, the prettiest of which in my opinion is the Se Cathedral; experience the backwaters and the waterfalls; go whale watching; and go on a temple tour ( I had just a glimpse of them - and they seemed to made in such a unique style!). So the next time you want to catch up on some susegad in Goa, remember, Goa is more than that shack on the beach or the newest restaurant.</span></div>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-952399822512938002017-01-01T14:37:00.001+05:302017-01-01T17:06:47.561+05:302016: My year in reading<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">54 is the number of books I read this year, says my Goodreads app. That is about a book a week - pretty much what I have averaged most of my adult life. What was a bit different this year, though? My list had more non-fiction than usual. I am a fiction junkie through and through, and when I find myself drifting towards non-fiction, I worry I am growing old. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In any case, I enjoyed some great books here - Krakauer’s Into the Wild was a revelation. Who knew you could turn the story of a foolish young man into a page turner!. Alain de Botton’s The Consolations of Philosophy was a five rater for me - and led me to read Marcus Aurelius’ Meditations, which I have resolved to read in a more modern translation soon. Travel was a big theme. Colin Thubron’s In Siberia was a moody, dark study of post Soviet Siberian hinterland; and his Shadow of the Silk Road described his Marco Polo-esque journey through possibly some of the most interesting places in the world today. Alice Albinia’s Empires of the Indus was another unforgettable book, taking you through some dangerous places with fascinating histories. Chatwin’s In Patagonia was a long overdue read - and now Patagonia has become a bucket-list kind of place in my head. Other notable non-fiction reads were Sidharth Mukherjee’s The Gene: An Intimate History and Ghosh’s The Great Derangement, both managing to illuminate without boring you to death. Mary Oliver’s Upstream was of course another five rater for me - how I love her plush wordsmithing and her simple wisdom!</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I had resolved to read more Indian fiction in translation - and I did manage a few, though nowhere enough. Basheer’s Poovan Banana and other stories introduced me to an author I had been meaning to read for a long time. Ashapurna Devi’s story collection The Matchbox was a peek into a middle class Bengali milieu, Austen-esque style. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I did re-read some old favourites - To Kill a Mockingbird felt as fresh as when I read it more than three decades ago. And the set pieces in Goldman’s Marathon Man were as horrific as the ones in my memory.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were a number of disappointments. Sittenfeld’s re-telling of Pride and Prejudice in Eligible was pretty terrible. Anne Tyler’s re-imagining of The Taming of the Shrew in Vinegar Girl was slightly better - but was definitely not Tyler at her best. Helen Oyeyemi’s Mr. Fox was not a patch on her Boy, Snow, Bird, one of my favourite books of 2015. Vivek Shanbagh’s Gachar Gochar was a translation I went into with a lot of hope - but was quite let down (a number of my reader friends liked this though - so maybe there was something here I did not see).</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And now to my favourite fiction of the year. I finished the Ferrante books, and loved them to bits - Lila has to be one of my most loved fictional characters ever. Julian Barnes did not disappoint with his The Noise of Time, a fictional account of the life of Russian composer Shostakovich. The sense of dread he manages to conjure up in Soviet Russia is riveting. Neither did Ian McEwan with his Nutshell, a cleverly crafted re-telling of Hamlet. My discovery of the year was Elizabeth Strout. I loved Olive Kitteridge, a character that will go into my list of all-time favourites. And her My Name is Lucy Barton is such a study in compressed emotion and spare writing. Ruskin Bond’s Rain in the Mountains made me want to rush to the Himalayas right away. And what can I say about Tove Janson’s Fair Play? That was the book of the year for me - so simple and so profound, I took a day after I finished it to just soak it in!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.6667px; text-align: justify; white-space: pre-wrap;">So all in all, 2016 might have been a forgettable year for the world, but it was a good year for my reading. Now onto 2017 - and I should start to get some reading resolutions in place, I suppose.</span><span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.6667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span><br />
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-66902482379505272462016-10-03T06:52:00.001+05:302016-10-03T06:53:09.071+05:30My grandmother: A life<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Have you heard the term ‘matriarch’? I am very familiar with it. Because I knew its embodiment - my grandmother who passed away yesterday at the age of 96. The word conjures up images of a strong woman, a strong-willed woman, presiding over an extended family. She was all of that. What she wasn’t, was a grandmother who was soft, and who cuddled you and told you stories from the epics. She did stuff you with the most delicious food, though.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Gomathy Kunjamma was just 17 years old when she was married to a man she had never met before. She came from a large family, with wealth in the form of large tracts of land, a ‘kalari’ and a ‘kaaranavar’, a family presided over by yet another matriarch. She had never seen the ‘city’ before - which in this case was Thiruvananthapuram (hardly a city by any standard but that of the village she had grown up in), she had only been home-schooled, and most of the men in her family stayed home to tend the land and property. And till the end of her days, I believe she wore the conflict - of the pride of a truly old and esteemed family she came from (her father started a newspaper; her grandfather was a distinguished man of letters, they were part of the Travancore Maharaja’s court), and the trepidation of going into one which was more ‘sophisticated’ - where education and jobs seemed to matter more than family heritage, where women had been to college, where the men were doctors and college professors, civil servants and engineers. </span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">I believe it inspired in her a life-long respect for learning. She herself had never been to a formal school, let alone college. But her children and grandchildren had to do well in the education department - there were no two ways about it. She must have died proud of her grandchildren - all of whom, girls and boys, are well-educated and independent, able to stand on their own two feet, never having to face the apprehension she had, being under-prepared in the learning area.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There were some parts of her personality that could be very vexing - again, stemming from her past. She had rigid ideas about what was the correct thing to do, in any situation. Sometimes, irritatingly to me, the correctness was defined by, ‘what will people think.’ And her strong will ensured everyone followed those ideas, irrespective of the inconvenience it caused, even till her last days. And her sometimes-misplaced and blind pride in her ‘family heritage’ could be annoying.</span></div>
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<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">But it was this same strong will and the same sense of pride that helped her work herself and her family through some very tough times - when the family went through awful financial troubles, when she had to care for her bedridden mother and brother, when my grandfather died. </span></div>
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<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Most of all, what I will remember her for, is her ability to transcend her upbringing, in so many ways. She had a lifelong regret that she never had a son - and her favourite grandchild remained her first grandson. But she never, ever treated her granddaughters as any less than her grandsons. There was no one prouder when her first granddaughter, became an engineer - the first woman engineer in our family. She was very encouraging of my younger cousin going abroad to study - again, a first for a girl in our family. She loved to see my girl cousins driving around Trivandrum on scooters, independent and free. And one of the last times I saw her, she proudly told me how her youngest granddaughter actually had to go out to ‘sites’, as a civil engineer, just like men. And she herself, was so very independent. She remained in charge of her house, alone sometimes, sometimes with grandchildren in it, till her eighties. For someone who had never been to a school, she was really very ‘modern’.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.6667px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Rest in peace Amooma. You leave behind a rich legacy - a family that will remember you as strong and encouraging of independence, a woman who rose above tradition, a true ‘matriarch’, who prized family above anything else. There is so much of you in each of us.</span></div>
</div>
small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-18813126908243879572016-07-23T13:33:00.001+05:302016-07-23T18:32:13.868+05:3010 things I loved about the Amalfi Coast<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bRuH0rpmbZA/V5MdbsbZtqI/AAAAAAAAGYQ/0WvkqBmL6KQlp5N6BX0w_7xdRleVnHm4gCLcB/s1600/20160707_091818.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="99" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-bRuH0rpmbZA/V5MdbsbZtqI/AAAAAAAAGYQ/0WvkqBmL6KQlp5N6BX0w_7xdRleVnHm4gCLcB/s640/20160707_091818.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hiking the Path of the Gods</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i5V4besobH0/V5MdeAuOs2I/AAAAAAAAGYc/0ipQE74MLWY3c7eQqRSy5suaZe-NF9OsACLcB/s1600/DSC_0226.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="427" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i5V4besobH0/V5MdeAuOs2I/AAAAAAAAGYc/0ipQE74MLWY3c7eQqRSy5suaZe-NF9OsACLcB/s640/DSC_0226.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Walking towards Punta Campanella with Capri following you</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MWCMGtAhOOM/V5MddkGolRI/AAAAAAAAGYY/S-i6HsYLmX8CFVJesrhv8PhEbx_XKATGQCLcB/s1600/DSC_0161.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="424" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MWCMGtAhOOM/V5MddkGolRI/AAAAAAAAGYY/S-i6HsYLmX8CFVJesrhv8PhEbx_XKATGQCLcB/s640/DSC_0161.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View from atop Mt. Solaro</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-D-n-ROMtdRA/V5Mdc3aPpXI/AAAAAAAAGYU/VLzjU3XqTdA2OeIRldCyCGtfrj6Y1R-mQCLcB/s1600/20160706_172349.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="358" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-D-n-ROMtdRA/V5Mdc3aPpXI/AAAAAAAAGYU/VLzjU3XqTdA2OeIRldCyCGtfrj6Y1R-mQCLcB/s640/20160706_172349.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Terrace of Infinity, Ravello</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XGM6Z0hRv-s/V5MdeuYi4kI/AAAAAAAAGYg/Do-Tjj_koGgXkm9Ll39detBjZtuqclU5wCLcB/s1600/DSC_0268.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="424" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-XGM6Z0hRv-s/V5MdeuYi4kI/AAAAAAAAGYg/Do-Tjj_koGgXkm9Ll39detBjZtuqclU5wCLcB/s640/DSC_0268.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pretty Positano</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Y_1OqZCYc_Y/V5MdYnApwyI/AAAAAAAAGX8/LtnfTdb02qI8nhkRsZWXbwoVCxWZfuDzwCLcB/s1600/20160703_202228.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="360" src="https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Y_1OqZCYc_Y/V5MdYnApwyI/AAAAAAAAGX8/LtnfTdb02qI8nhkRsZWXbwoVCxWZfuDzwCLcB/s640/20160703_202228.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sorrento</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View from the top of Vesuvius</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ymgaoAHto0k/V5MdZn62lXI/AAAAAAAAGYE/vWNfq7FNaB0x8mMKtpzx7vjHKCd0tFD0gCLcB/s1600/20160703_194533.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="358" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ymgaoAHto0k/V5MdZn62lXI/AAAAAAAAGYE/vWNfq7FNaB0x8mMKtpzx7vjHKCd0tFD0gCLcB/s640/20160703_194533.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The limoncello chill</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img height="358" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-BuM8llIM-dA/V5MdaMqnb8I/AAAAAAAAGYI/0S_gIoDl4vsABupFFtp9vIbDiqKZNj8wwCLcB/s640/20160705_201717.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="640" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Seafood gluttony</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KDqTU3lEbrY/V5MjuuA_fCI/AAAAAAAAGY8/yEPYDozn2Q0F_ENq4Pu3JhkJT_Rc2L0-ACLcB/s1600/selfie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="438" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-KDqTU3lEbrY/V5MjuuA_fCI/AAAAAAAAGY8/yEPYDozn2Q0F_ENq4Pu3JhkJT_Rc2L0-ACLcB/s640/selfie.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Selfie paradise</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xJnR9dhy0Y0/V5MdZ69m2_I/AAAAAAAAGYA/k7WgJVClpEkBmSWe8R5-KdD7sA4u8APsACLcB/s1600/20160702_191500.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-xJnR9dhy0Y0/V5MdZ69m2_I/AAAAAAAAGYA/k7WgJVClpEkBmSWe8R5-KdD7sA4u8APsACLcB/s640/20160702_191500.jpg" width="358" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Cooling off</td></tr>
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<a href="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-50-WJbdF998/V5Mda-AA_OI/AAAAAAAAGYM/DHPGUaTUt4wN1_IlsfHoTB9nVwFM0SKbQCLcB/s1600/20160706_111847.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-50-WJbdF998/V5Mda-AA_OI/AAAAAAAAGYM/DHPGUaTUt4wN1_IlsfHoTB9nVwFM0SKbQCLcB/s640/20160706_111847.jpg" width="358" /></a></div>
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Ceramics abound in Positano</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Blue, blue waters, high cliffs hugging the shore, the
narrowest roads, lovely little towns – what is not to love, you say? Quite a
bit, to be honest. When you go in high summer, the unrelenting heat can get to
even someone like me, who lives the Mumbai summers. And the crowds – everyone
and their mother seems to descend on this strip of land in high season. Driving
prices sky-high and jamming up the traffic on those narrow lanes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yet, this strip of coastal land from Sorrento to Salerno is
pretty in a way that can’t stop your camera clicking away; so you end up with
thousands of gorgeous pictures and you really struggle to choose the ones you
want to share. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Here are some things I really couldn’t get enough of – in my
8-day vacation this July.</span></div>
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<b style="text-indent: -18pt;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">1. Beating the heat with granita and gelato</span></b></div>
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<span style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">When the heat gets to you, nothing beats walking into a
gelataria (they are all around) and ordering a granita. It’s a coarser form of
a sorbet – and our favourite was the lemon-flavoured one. And a super
after-meal sweetener was the gelato. Raki was a great one in Sorrento.</span></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span>Hiking along the coast</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There are tons of possibilities. You base yourself in one of
the small towns and you can hike to other towns close by. We did a couple. The
Path of the Gods was an obvious one. And another from Termini to Marina Del
Cantone via Punta Campanella. The walk from Termini to Punta was absolutely
stunning – we could see Capri through the walk and Punta Campanella had some
great views. And all those calories burnt were a good excuse to gorge on even
more great food.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span>Visiting an island</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We went to Capri. It’s a day trip from Sorrento and the
ferry itself is a great experience. You take the funicular to Anacapri and then
the chair car up to the top of Mount Solaro. The views are to die-for. Anacapri
is sweet, with white-washed buildings set against the deep blue of the water.
You take a ferry boat ride around Capri, check out all the grottos, pass under
the arch of the Faraglioni rocks (legend has it that you kiss someone under
that arch and you are bound for life!) and see all the famous-people houses up
on the cliffs.</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span>Wandering around Villa Cimbrone in Ravello</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Ravello is a delicious little town a bus ride away from
Amalfi. You walk up to the Villa Cimbrone and wander around its gardens and
terraces. The Terrace of Infinity begs for travel-magazine-worthy photographs;
the views are so very photogenic. </span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span>Browsing the shops in Positano</span></b></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Supposed to be the prettiest place on the Amalfi coast,
Positano is overwhelmed with tourists. But it is striking. Set on a cliff, its
pastel-shaded buildings rise above the coast and seem built on top of each
other, rising vertically. Its streets are narrow and winding with shops selling
linen clothing, leather footwear, painted crockery and other fine-looking
things. A pretty town with pretty streets selling pretty things. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<b><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; mso-list: Ignore;"></span></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; mso-list: Ignore;"></span></span></b></div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span>Drinking limoncello</span></b></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The coast is known for its lemon groves. And the lemons here
are huge. Of course we had to try the limoncello. It’s very sweet (I love all
things sweet) and the alcohol in it can hit you hard. But it’s a great
chill-me-down after a hot and tiring day.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></b><br />
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"> 7.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span>Enjoying the laid back vibe in Sorrento</span></b></div>
</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">It is one of the bigger towns. With some nice cafes,
gelatarias and a cool night life, you can easily spend a couple of days
relaxing and winding down for the start of a nice holiday. The Euro cup that
was underway, ensured there were some boisterous scenes on the main streets. </span></div>
</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Cambria; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">8.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal;">
</span></span></span>Climbing Mt. Vesuvius</span></b></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Its signature shape is constantly in your sights as you
travel from Naples to Sorrento. History lessons in school remind you of how it
destroyed a city – and when you realize you can actually climb a living
volcano, you cannot wait to try it. It’s a pretty tame walk up to the crater –
but just the feeling of having climbed something so historic gives you a
thrill.</span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
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<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">9. Eating rum baba in Naples</span></b></div>
</div>
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<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A Neapolitan specialty, we had it at the Gran Café
Gambrinus, an elegant, turn-of-the-century coffee house, which boasts of
heads-of-states, Popes and movie stars as patrons. The rum baba is exquisitely
melt-in-the-mouth soft and when you have it with strong Italian coffee, you
have a bit of Naples in your mouth.</span><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">10. Taking selfies against gorgeousness</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Wherever you go, everything is so very pretty and photogenic,
it makes sense to carry a selfie-stick. This was the first time we ever did –we
have been traveling for years – and we were initially terribly self-conscious.
But it is rather cool to have pictures of you against the most heavenly
backgrounds. A selfie-stick sure comes handy.</span></div>
</div>
</div>
small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-61887835371422852002016-05-29T20:23:00.000+05:302019-03-04T15:12:57.641+05:30The Wisdom of Olive Kitteridge<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<h3 style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.6667px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Olive Kitteridge</b></span></h3>
<h4 style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">By Elizabeth Strout</span></h4>
<a href="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0laPFZ1Vg30/V0sBmB4ogQI/AAAAAAAAE_E/VptYXILDt8IkbNUhiyetEJZAbr-9kNI-wCLcB/s1600/olive-kitteridge.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0laPFZ1Vg30/V0sBmB4ogQI/AAAAAAAAE_E/VptYXILDt8IkbNUhiyetEJZAbr-9kNI-wCLcB/s200/olive-kitteridge.jpg" width="129" /></a><b id="docs-internal-guid-33923b06-fcfc-1407-a720-00d455e675dd" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b><br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In my teens, when there was a chance to watch world cinema on television, I watched a Russian movie. I remember very little about it - except that it was in black and white and there was a boy and a girl, very much in love. The boy goes off to fight in World War II and does not return. But the last scene is something I can see clearly so many decades later. The girl is grieving, in a way that chokes you up as a viewer - and then she looks up at the sky. A flock of white geese is flying through and for that fleeting moment, the beauty of it makes her smile through her tears. It is almost like the world is telling her and us, that it’s all ok. That however hard are the punches life throws at you, it also throws you lifelines and hope and beauty. You can survive.I read Olive Kitteridge and it brought that scene back to me so very vividly. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Olive Kitteridge is a series of 13 interconnected stories, set in Crosby, Maine - a small seaside town where everyone seems to know everyone else. Olive Kitteridge, a crabby school teacher is the character that holds it all together. It really is her story - but we see her not just through her own eyes but also through others’ stories. Olive is not particularly nice - acerbic, unused to showing affection, a bit of a bully with her young son and accommodative husband. But she has a strong vein of love for her son and her husband running through her, even if that vein is wrapped up in something hard and harsh. It’s that same vein that allows her to deeply empathize with people around her -hurt people, damaged people. People like Kevin who cannot recover from his mother’s suicide; or Denise, the young girl who her husband is almost in love with, who loses her beloved husband in an accident; or Nina, an anorexic; or a criminal in a hostage situation.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Olive herself has her set of life’s challenges - her son, the love of her life, grows apart from her, and she cannot understand why. Her father’s suicide is a lifelong haunting. Her old age is marred by her husband’s invalidity. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And then there are the stories where Olive is not a central character. A piano player whose set life is upset by the return of an old love; a wife who finds out her husband’s infidelity the day of his funeral; a young girl who finds the courage to run away from an overbearing mother.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">These are small lives, making just tiny dents in the universe. Very few people are truly likeable. Yet the magnificence of Strout’s characterization ensures we find the universality in every single one of them - each is trying to cope with what life is throwing at him or her, trying to make connections, big or small, trying to find that burst of hope or joy or comfort that makes everything seem bearable. That is the essence of what Strout is trying to say - life is hard, but all of us will find that flock of geese that lightens the soul.</span></div>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">It is a very wise book - the kind that shows how great fiction is really the best kind of teacher there is in the world.</span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: "arial"; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
</div>
small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20223073.post-58118049714730514252015-08-21T07:52:00.001+05:302015-08-21T08:00:49.734+05:30City of the blue god<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Benaras, Varanasi, Kashi… names of an ancient city, one of the oldest living ones, evoking images of the Ganga, sadhus, Shiva, temples, tourists, widows, cremations. That’s a lot to take in. And the city throws all of it at you and more. There is no holding back here.</span></div>
<b id="docs-internal-guid-7a2f6dd6-4df7-943c-65ba-9f9f682c4e91" style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2u2kxNkDMeg/VdaHhkQqpmI/AAAAAAAABpk/aw4yItc81I4/s1600/DSCN6801.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-2u2kxNkDMeg/VdaHhkQqpmI/AAAAAAAABpk/aw4yItc81I4/s320/DSCN6801.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The crowds</span></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The crowds hit you like a sledgehammer. Especially if you are in a hand-drawn rickshaw - very commonplace here. People, cows, bikes, autos, rickshaws...all throng the busy streets into the old city. You are from Mumbai and you think you have crowds covered. Mumbai has nothing on Varanasi. You wonder how your rickshaw man is going to maneuver his way through it all. But maneuver he does, weaving himself and his load through, leaving you with that feeling of distaste - you have indeed treated a human being like a pack mule.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">You leave that feeling behind, soon. Now you maneuver through the throng on foot. Cows are maneuvering too...and it’s best you get out of their way if you don’t want to be headbutted by the holiest of the holies. The smell of dung is pervasive. There are a lot of holy men - with matted hair and trishuls and ochre robes. You stop to look at some knick-knacks and soon you are engulfed by hawkers. You try to lose them and make your way, along with a thousand others, to the river. Everyone is heading to the river.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Because it’s time for the Ganga arati. The water level in the river is too high - so the arati is performed on a platform high above. It’s all prayers and lights and some strange dance-like posturing by priests in satin dhotis - a bit tacky and touristy. But it draws you in, even if you are disappointed it’s not on the river bank as in the famous pictures..</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zpQvxWxGmgg/VdaH8S6bk3I/AAAAAAAABps/dlwhDJU-PYg/s1600/20150814_194753_LLS.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-zpQvxWxGmgg/VdaH8S6bk3I/AAAAAAAABps/dlwhDJU-PYg/s320/20150814_194753_LLS.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Ganga Arati</span></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We walk down to the river and even in the darkness we can see the filth. I slip and my shoe-clad, jean-clad leg goes into the water. I can’t wait to get to my hotel to wash it.</span></div>
<b style="font-weight: normal;"><br /></b>
<br />
<div dir="ltr" style="line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 0pt;">
<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The next day is an early one. We leave the hotel at 5.30 am to see the sunrise on the Ganga. The sun though, is already up. We make our way once more to the water. We climb into a motorized boat and we see the city from the river. Ghat after ghat make for pretty pictures. There is even one where a body is being cremated. Men and women immerse themselves in the muddy water, washing their sins away I presume. That water is punishment enough for any manner of sin, I think. We step off the boat into the bylanes of the old city. Narrow lanes, bright coloured doors, painted walls. Some lanes bring European ones to mind - until you look down and see the cow dung and the plastic in the drains. But there is some peace and quiet and you are grateful for it amongst the chaos. We see a lot of stacked wood in one of the lanes, along with a weighing scale. People die and wood is weighed for the pyre. This is serious business for a Saturday morning walk, I think.</span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Db32gdi-770/VdaIqDG-gbI/AAAAAAAABqE/dGGFn-htIqI/s1600/20150815_060045_Richtone%2528HDR%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Db32gdi-770/VdaIqDG-gbI/AAAAAAAABqE/dGGFn-htIqI/s320/20150815_060045_Richtone%2528HDR%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">A Varanasi dawn</span></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QNyznspGUAo/VdaIiZ9zoJI/AAAAAAAABp0/zk4Zm4k3ZHo/s1600/DSC_2358.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-QNyznspGUAo/VdaIiZ9zoJI/AAAAAAAABp0/zk4Zm4k3ZHo/s320/DSC_2358.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The Lord of the city</span></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nq4BsTj14Jc/VdaI3InNwAI/AAAAAAAABqM/1nMNxxkYgpc/s1600/DSC_2379.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nq4BsTj14Jc/VdaI3InNwAI/AAAAAAAABqM/1nMNxxkYgpc/s320/DSC_2379.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The ghats</span></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EpT0g4dIAtc/VdaJFEBg6fI/AAAAAAAABqk/PibRqU54Q10/s1600/DSC_2448.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-EpT0g4dIAtc/VdaJFEBg6fI/AAAAAAAABqk/PibRqU54Q10/s320/DSC_2448.JPG" width="214" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>A quiet narrow lane</i></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Weigh the wood for the pyre</i></span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-equ8lwVUdNg/VdaI9uaZPnI/AAAAAAAABqc/8cnzk-jezMU/s1600/DSC_2404.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-equ8lwVUdNg/VdaI9uaZPnI/AAAAAAAABqc/8cnzk-jezMU/s320/DSC_2404.JPG" width="214" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The colour!</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-size: 14.6666669845581px; line-height: 20.2399997711182px;">We make our way through the lanes to the Kashi Vishwanath temple. We stand in queue, are frisked again and again, and finally get pushed into the sanctum sanctorum. The gold on the gopuram shines bright. But the lingam itself is immersed in liquid that people throw on it. It is small, we get a glimpse of it and we are packed off by the milling crowds behind us. And that was the darshan. Before getting off the temple trail, we buy sealed containers of Ganga jal - we couldn’t bear taking the real deal from the river.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: transparent; color: black; font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.666666666666666px; font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">We drink tea from mud cups, but run away from other street food. All those food joints recommended by guide books are on the ghats… and getting back into those narrow crowded lanes is an experience we aren’t willing to go through again. We prefer the relative neatness and symmetry of Sarnath, half an hour away.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Ci3emi1pg_I/VdaI6HAO-jI/AAAAAAAABqU/qqN1LsQAsMw/s1600/DSC_2401.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="214" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Ci3emi1pg_I/VdaI6HAO-jI/AAAAAAAABqU/qqN1LsQAsMw/s320/DSC_2401.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>The ghats</i></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: 14.6666666666667px; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">And so the weekend trip to Varanasi is over. We come back to the pictures of Varanasi and discover the ghats all over again. So much of it is broken down and yet everything is held together too. There is an element of Wabi Sabi, I suppose - a quiet sense of beauty in all those ancient run down buildings. The camera does see things the eye does not.</span><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kXyqNUP6vP8/VdaJFNmVBDI/AAAAAAAABqo/aX14WPMYla4/s1600/IMG_20150815_061738396.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="180" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kXyqNUP6vP8/VdaJFNmVBDI/AAAAAAAABqo/aX14WPMYla4/s320/IMG_20150815_061738396.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><i>Indeed some beauty</i></span></td></tr>
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small talkhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07067866444227186612noreply@blogger.com0