Reparation

When gaps get filled,
surface is created.

Orwell on Mahatma Gandhi

Of late years it has been the fashion to talk about Gandhi as though he were not only sympathetic to the Western Left-wing movement, but were integrally part of it. Anarchists and pacifists, in particular, have claimed him for their own, noticing only that he was opposed to centralism and State violence and ignoring the other-worldly, anti-humanist tendency of his doctrines. But one should, I think, realize that Gandhi's teachings cannot be squared with the belief that Man is the measure of all things and that our job is to make life worth living on this earth, which is the only earth we have. They make sense only on the assumption that God exists and that the world of solid objects is an illusion to be escaped from. It is worth considering the disciplines which Gandhi imposed on himself and which — though he might not insist on every one of his followers observing every detail — he considered indispensable if one wanted to serve either God or humanity.

Full essay here.

Its refreshing (an old essay, it just resurfaced. I might have shared this here earlier) to see a critical view on Mahatma Gandhi in a world of psued-activists who have found it fashionable to quote him and talk hastily about his philosophy.

...

Saying 'certainly' without confidence,
or,
having values without conviction,
are both ineffectual.

Design Like You Give a Dump

Where all that is toxic, is annihilated to green clouds and green thoughts.

Annie Leonard's newest addition, Story of Electronics.



Amusing thought: Imagine, Bill Gates, Gordon Moore and all those honchos taking a nice swim in a pool of same warm toxic water and saying to each other, "how are we gonna get out of that one, man!"

Orhan Pamuk's My Name is Red

I haven't gone too far with this book yet, thanks to several failed attempt to revive reading it. However, this time, it looks like I will make it and who knows without a failure. Grouses aside, little bit from the book where Pamuk through his narrator in Chapter 'I am called "Butterfly", explains about Style and Signature:

As long as the number of worthless artists motivated by money and fame instead of pleasure of seeing and a belief in their craft increases, we will continue to witness much more vulgarity and greed akin to this preoccupation with 'style' and 'signature'. I made this introduction because this was the way it is done, not because I believed what I said. True ability and talent couldn't be corrupted even by the love of gold or fame. Furthermore, if truth be told, money and gold are inalienable rights of the talented [...]

Detail review shall follow once I finish the book, whenever that may happen. Or so I hope!

As a bonus, to all you handful but wonderful followers of my blog, I would like to pose this quote by Mario Vargas llosa. (See, I can be very kind and generous too, at times).

Prosperity or egalitarianism- you have to choose. I favor freedom, you never achieve real equality anyway. You simply sacrifice prosperity for an illusion.

Wonderwall

Wonderwall by Ryan Adams remains my most treasured song, probably, in all my lives. The composition gets even more special because it belonged to Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind.



I haven't been able to keep count of how many times I have seen this movie or others in which Kate Winslet has acted. Revolutionary Road, The Holiday, The Life of David Gale, The Reader. She is a bliss, she is magical. Her performances are powerful. Burnt-orange color haired, free spirited Clementine of Eternal Sunshine remains my personal favorite and somewhere in that space also belongs April Wheeler of Revolutionary Road.

In Broken Images

Happen to read this poem, In Broken Images by Robert Graves. Sharing it here for greater common good. Its about our perceptions and of two or more facets of anything and our penchant to pick and stick to our very own version.

He is quick, thinking in clear images;
I am slow, thinking in broken images.

He becomes dull, trusting to his clear images;
I become sharp, mistrusting my broken images,

Trusting his images, he assumes their relevance;
Mistrusting my images, I question their relevance.

Assuming their relevance, he assumes the fact,
Questioning their relevance, I question the fact.

When the fact fails him, he questions his senses;
When the fact fails me, I approve my senses.

He continues quick and dull in his clear images;
I continue slow and sharp in my broken images.

He in a new confusion of his understanding;
I in a new understanding of my confusion.

~Robert Graves

Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground

I recently managed to understand what Orhan Pamuk was implying when he said,

It was as if Dostoevsky was whispering into my ear, teaching me secret language of the soul, pulling me into a society of radicals who, though inflamed by dreams of changing the world, were also locked into secret organizations and taken with the pleasures of deceiving others in the name of revolution, damning and degrading those who did not speak their language or share their version.

Above is quoted from Pamuk's views on Notes from Underground in Other Colours and how deeply he was impacted by it and how it was also one of the key readings early in his life to shape and shook his thinking. Pamuk's Other Colours remains one of the most important book that I have read to say, if, I have to be economical with words. Returning to Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground, sample these.

Man has such predilection for systems and abstract deductions that he is ready to distort the truth intentionally, he is ready to deny the evidence of his senses only to justify his logic.

And what is it that civilization softens in us? The only gain of civilization for mankind is the greater capacity for variety of sensations- and absolutely nothing more. Have you noticed that it is the most civilized gentlemen who have been the subtlest slaughterers?

Our choice is usually mistaken from a false view of our advantage.

For if a desire should come into conflict with reason we shall then reason and not desire, because it will be impossible retaining our reason to be senseless in our desires, and in that way knowingly act against reason and desire to injure ourselves.

And finally the notes that struck me the deeply,

You know the direct, legitimate fruit of consciousness is inertia.

All "direct" persons and men of actions are active just because they are stupid and limited. How explain that? I will tell you: in consequence of their limitation they take immediate and secondary causes for primary ones, and in that way persuade themselves more quickly and easily than other people do that they have found an infallible foundation for their activity, and their minds are at ease and that is the chief thing.

George Orwell's 1984

Much has been written about this classic, 1984 by George Orwell and in all its sanity, justifiably so. I am glad to have it read and honestly it was easy as the book seemed to pace itself and pages turned swiftly and effortlessly. I hope no one misses this book in their lifetime. I was struck with its finesse, right from the beginning, where in opening pages, Winston Smith, the protagonist, contemplates about and pen and yet to be written creamy paper. He goes on to think:

The pen was an archaic instrument, seldom used even for signatures and he had procured one, furtively and with some difficulty, simply because of a feeling that the beautiful creamy paper deserved to be written on with a real nib instead of being scratched with an ink pencil.

To mark the paper was a decisive act.

All he had to do was to transfer to paper the interminable restless monologue that had been running inside his head, literally for years.

But he realized, even in his panic he had not wanted to smudge the creamy paper by shutting the book while the ink was wet.

And what follows in the remaining pages is nothing but similar genius quality. Don't miss it.

Inverted

With clear sky under your feet,
you will always be head over heels.

Something that works...

...for those who are working towards to get that perfect waistline. Here is a tested food formula that has worked and can make you feel that universe is working perfectly with you in magical ways to get you what you want, bite by bite. Its simple, quick and delicious. Its a salad. Ingredients like sprouts (moong), onions, cucumbers, de-seeded tomatoes, carrots, beetroots, corns, fresh lemon juice, olive oil and black salt are simple to assemble. Just finely chop all the veggies and toss them altogether with sprouts. Add black salt, lemon juice and a dash of olive oil and add in fresh coriander/cilantro leaves for all the benefits it promises. For the time I have tried this recipe, I can vouch for two things, one it did not make me feel that I made a compromise to a foodie that I have become and two, the results have been sweet and surreal.

Try it. And if this salad works for you too, I prefer cash. I can settle for something less controversial, say, good books. Jokes aside, wheeeeeee for it!

Distant Relations: Orhan Pamuk

At quitting time, while buses and streetcars as old as Satsat’s clerks rumbled down the avenue, shaking the building to its foundations, Sibel, my intended, would come to visit, and we would make love in my office. Despite her modern outlook and the feminist notions she had brought back from Europe, Sibel’s ideas about secretaries were no different from my mother’s. “Let’s not make love here. It makes me feel like a secretary!” she’d say sometimes. But, as we proceeded to the leather sofa in the office, the real reason for her reserve—that Turkish girls, in those days, were afraid of sex before marriage—became obvious.

Little by little, sophisticated girls from wealthy Westernized families who had spent time in Europe were beginning to break this taboo and sleep with their boyfriends before marriage. Sibel, who occasionally boasted of being one of those “brave” girls, had first slept with me eleven months earlier. But, by this point, she felt that the arrangement had gone on long enough and it was about time we married. I do not want to exaggerate my fiancée’s daring or make light of the sexual oppression of women, because it was only when Sibel saw that my “intentions were serious,” when she was confident that I was “someone who could be trusted”—in other words, when she was absolutely sure that there would, in the end, be a wedding—that she gave herself to me. Believing myself a decent and responsible person, I had every intention of marrying her; but, even if I hadn’t wished to, there was no question of my having a choice now that she had “given me her virginity.” Before long, this burden cast a shadow over the common ground between us, which we were so proud of—the illusion of being “free and modern” (though, of course, we would never have used such words for ourselves), on account of having made love before marriage—and in a way this, too, brought us closer.

Full story, here.

Amitav Ghosh's The Hungry Tide

To me, The Hungry Tide, came across as a manifesto of complex relationships we human beings form with each other and also with, nature and its fury, as the circumstances unfold. Portrayal of intricacy through each characters ambition seems like Ghosh's proficiency he was born with which he uses with supreme poetic and romantic yet remains somewhat mellow in approach.

The backdrop, a vast archipelago of islands, the Sundarbans. Characters, Piyali Roy mostly referred as Piya, a scientist who hails from Seattle and comes looking in Lusibari (evolved from Lucy's abode) for rare kind of dolphins and not looking for love, at least, that's what she thinks. Kanai Dutt, a Delhi based businessman, who comes to Lusibari at a request by Nilima to fetch a packet written by her husband Nirmal and has been instructed to be given to Kanai only. And finally, Fokir, an illiterate man but who possesses deep unique knowledge of river and wildlife like no one else does. Fokir, rarely, almost never speaks directly to readers, since he only speaks Bengali and his words are often translated to Piya and others and thus to us readers. Yet, he manages to bind you with an emotional and enduring sympathic bond since not many understand his fiercely true soul. He, with his depth of knowledge and integrity to his work, persuade you that being truly adept and deeply involved in your field of work knows no barriers. His impassioned connection to the river, tides, wildlife have a spellbinding impact throughout his presence and even in his absence towards the end of the novel.

Once, during a conversation with Kanai, Fokir tells him, "truly honest people have no fears and have nothing to worry about." And this captures the essence of his character and his superiority over worldly matters and Kanai. who is once described in Nilima, an elderly and experienced woman's words,

"Kanai's problem is that he's always been too clever for his own good. Things have come very easily to him so he doesn't know what world is like for most people." Piya could see that the judgment was both shrewd and accurate but she knew it was not her place to concur. Nilima said, "Just a word of warning, my dear- fond as I am of my nephew, I feel I should tell you that that he's one of those men who liked to think of himself as being irresistible to the other sex."

To Kanai, Fokir once explains his inexplicable bond that he had and still has with his mother. To a nonplussed Kanai, a question like, "where do you see her face?" seems really appropriate. To which Fokir simplistic response says it all.

"He smiled and began to point in every direction. Here, here, everywhere. The phrasing of this was simple to point of being childlike and it seemed to Kanai that he had finally understood why Moyna (Fokir's wife) felt to deeply tied to her husband, despite everything. There was something about him that was utterly unformed, and it was this very quality that drew her to him: She craved it in the same way that a potter's hands might crave the resistance of unshaped clay."

The Hungry Tide has much to be cherished for its words craft and few things that cannot be captured in words, all said and set in a world away from this industrialized world which is again not devoid of multiple layers of human emotions. In his own words, Ghosh tells us, that words are like the winds that blow ripples on the water's surface. The river itself flow beneath, unseen, and unheard.

Outdated

Not so long ago, a teenager girl threw this below message in a missive, my way with much profundity and I gasped as if each word in it was meant to hurt me. Deeply. I read the message several times over. With each attempt, as I tried to decipher this new language, I felt like an obsolete crazy woman who is unnecessary obsessed with words, complete words, correct sentences and spellings. Buh.
Do people wonder why their results were never ever slutty? It could be that we didn't watch too many muvys. :wink: :wink:

hmm...k......cet resluts wer gud...score ws decent enuff...i think ill get in2 vet college:D....nd... vll go 4 a muvy wid frenz.

Quote unquote

"Too many women, in too many countries, speak the same language, of silence."

"There is no bigger hoax than the fidelity of a man, married or otherwise."

I cannot recall the sources of either of them but remember them very distinctly. Missed writing down the names, so if you know it, do share it. And another quote, its source I do know:


"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, suffering, loss and have found a way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a sensitivity and an understanding of life that fills them with compassion, gentleness and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do not just happen." ~Elisabeth Kübler-Ross

I did finish reading The Hungry Tide and I am hoping to write on the book sometime soon, not the extended review though, mainly because I feel incapable of doing justice to the book. It got really engaging after the half mark. Sigh.

Amitav Ghosh: The Hungry Tide

Somewhere around half mark of the book, The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh and it occurs to me that for me one long story goes much slower than long book of multiple shorter stories. I do not know why that is. Perhaps, some quirk about myself that I am unaware of. In any case, I am finding that Ghosh's writing is rich in texture created out of subtle texts and interrelated nuances and makes you want to go slowly, ruminating it, savoring it, bit by bit. I cannot say for certain that I will be writing a review later but few lines that I jotted down so far are here, shared:

The true tragedy of a routinely spent life is that its wastefulness does not become apparent till it is too late.

***
We were on the river, heading home, when the wind suddenly started up. Within moments it was on us- it attacked with that peculiar, wilful malevolence that causes people to think of these storms as something other than wholly natural.
***
In my mind's eye I saw them walking these thousands of people who wanted nothing more than to plunge their hands once again in our soft, yielding tide country mud. I saw them coming, young and old, quick and halt, with their lives bundled on their heads, and knew it was of them the Poet had spoken when he said:

"Each slow turn of the world
carries such disinherited ones
to whom neither the past nor
the future belong."

...

Saajnaa, a noteworthy song from upcoming movie Lamhaa, a breathtaking ensemble of lyrics, voices and all else, all added with a perfection of a measuring spoon, after a long long time. Whole album looks very promising.

04 - Saajnaa.mp3

Sea. Silence. Solitude.

Sea. Silence. Solitude. Yet, there was something missing in this serenity that he had longed for.

He had watched the vastness, deeply with empty soulless eyes. It was both liberating and enthralling for some reason. He had traveled his gaze as far as those gloomy gray clouds spanned, up to that straight line at the horizon. Multiple thoughts were gushing to his mind beneath that calm façade to seek refuge and a reply. In any event, he wanted to deny both.

He thought, "Isn't it ironical that a moment will arrive when both will collide and clouds will shed all that they held for so long, purging to achieve that lightness? Lightness that will bring freedom, freedom from this chase." Peace was often fragile and transient and simmered underneath, he had come to understand.

A quick wave had approached under his feet making a clean slate of sand urging him to scribble something on it. He resisted, effort-fully. Brackish wind had bothered him as couple of more waves milled around him and slapped his feet leaving remains of sparkling sand crystals on his toes. He had disliked the clingy nature of wet sand. And dry sand had slipped way too quickly every so often.

Previous betrayal had not fatigued him. Ideally, he should have been battered by now. Strangely, he was not. Part of him was damaged. And life's unpleasant truths were all too clear and corrosive. He wasn't as uniquely strong as he often projected himself to be. He was neither excited nor morose about it. Just the fact he knew more clearly, now. Appearance of peace on the surface seemed uncanny.

Musty heaviness in air had come along with this quietude. He hadn't quite enjoyed this bargain, this moist feeling that had settled heavily on skin of his face and hands. Few strands of hair had decided to stick to his temple. He had raised his finger to brush them aside without breaking his gaze from the horizon, as if all the answers were to be found there. And as if finding difficult answers in life were all that easy.

The Thing Around Your Neck: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Last month, I reread Adichie's The Thing Around Your Neck and had to make minor adjustments to my previously held perception of the author whom I had mistakenly put in same genre as Jhumpa Lahiri. The similarity seems small now between the two except for that both write immigrants' stories, their bottled tragedies, implicit sufferings and paradoxical anxieties that unfold in pursuit of a seemingly better life in USA albeit with very different methods. While Jhumpa is a pro in creating stories in the form of slow motion, detail by detail, never ending affliction, so much so that you feel gloomy and tortured during and after the end which certainly end but do not get over. That is probably her expertise and she does it with poised dexterity. Ngozi, on the other hand, produces sharp and witty narratives in a powerful story-telling format and you will feel like feeling amused at her sarcasm and subtle humor but you hold it as she brings it out along with profound understanding of cultural nuances and you muster your understanding for a right reaction. Sample this, from one of the stories, On Monday of Last Week in which Kamara, a Nigerian woman who has joined her husband in America takes up a job as a nanny to an upper class family and becomes obsessed with the mother:

She was still holding the phone; it had started to buzz noisily. She touched the PROTECT OUR ANGELS stickers that Neil had recently placed on the cradle, a day after he called, frantic, because he has just seen a photo on the Internet of a child molester who had recently moved to their neighborhood and who looked exactly like the UPS delivery man. Where is Josh? Where is Josh? Neil had asked, as if Josh would have been anywhere else but somewhere in the house. Kamara had hung up feeling sorry for him. She had come to understand that American parenting was a juggling of anxieties, and that it came with having too much food: a sated belly gave Americans time to worry that their child might have a rare disease that they had just read about, made them think they had the right to protect their child from disappointment and want and failure. A sated belly gave Americans the luxury of praising themselves for being good parents, as if caring for one's child were the exception rather than the rule. It used to amuse Kamara, watching women on television talk about how much they loved their children, what sacrifices they made for them. Now, it annoyed her. Now that her periods insisted on coming month after month, she resented those manicured women with their effortlessly conceived babies and their breezy expressions like "healthy parenting."

For those who want to know more about the author, I would recommend her talk on TED which will mesmerize you, that much I am certain: The Danger of Single Story.

In Captain's Defense: MS Dhoni

If one decides to seek depression these days, the simplest and surest way is to read current Indian media's outburst over Mahendra Singh Dhoni and his team's early departure from Twenty20 International. It's thoughtless, abrasive and if simply put very pedestrian. And with all it's glorious mediocrity, it has managed to demand Dhoni's captaincy out of vengeance. The reaction is quick, rushed and more often than not, with no due diligence and lacks analytical perspective. Allegations are thrown at his competency with unsubstantiated emotions and flashy news items are nothing more than another way to sensationalize the readily marketable commodity, cricket, in a cheapest possible way. So much so that former players have also unleashed, speaking in a manner as though they never played cricket or any other game in their lives. Ever. Most amusing has been from Mohammad Azharuddin, here. Has he forgotten his own dismal performances and many controversies that he was mired in? Get out, toil and till in the sun and develop (or at least try) all the tricks, tactics, stamina and game skills before having a strong opinion. It's different to spit opinions sitting in a nice air-conditioned room and give thousand advices on how things should have been done in that game and those conditions. The silliest (albeit dublew tee efff) comparison I have stumbled across is "Dhoni and co - please take some lessons from Anand on performing on the "big stage" under pressure." quoted verbatim. I almost rested my case here. Almost. This reminds me of an apt reply by Rachel Green of Friends when a doctor calls her Braxton Hicks contractions as mild discomfort. She quips, "no uterus, no opinion."

Update: Found an article by Kunal Pradhan that echoes my sentiments, here. A passage from it, below:

Next was the fairly regular, but usually standalone, players-have-become-too-fat-because-they-make-too-much-money angle. I’ve always loved this one, especially because it comes from pot-bellied former cricketers who haven’t gotten over the fact that they missed the party by a couple of decades but are trying to make it up by random TV appearances which they want to regularise.