English, August

I'm reading Upamanyu Chatterjee's profoundly absurd book, English, August. Chatterjee's writing style is totally engrossing; his grip on the language impeccable & his descriptions brilliant. If you liked The Catcher in The Rye, you'd like this one too. Some would find some similarities with Catch-22 too. The blurb of the book says - "Agastya Sen is a young civil servant whose imagination is dominated by women, literature and soft drugs. As the novel opens, he has been posted to the small town of Madna. English August is a funny, wryly observed account of Agastya Sen's year in the sticks."

I could relate very well with the confused soul, Agastya. Though he does get a bit condescending at times towards almost everyone around him, which gets irritating & seems snooty, most of the time he just can't get less interested. He is really bored with his life and doesn't really know what he wants to do. He has made it to IAS, which is of course dream of millions, still he can't really fit into the life style, however hard his father and peers try. I'm yet to finish the book, perhaps I'd write a detailed review, perhaps I won't. Meanwhile, following is one extremely profound excerpt from the book; I really feel like this some time! Do get hold of the book, ASAP.

In his state of mind marriage was awfully remote - like a death in a road accident, it was something that happened to other people. It was inconceivable, sharing his room in Madna with someone unknown - perhaps a twenty-year-old girl with an MA in English, and getting stoned in front of her to read Marcus Aurelius. While Manik chatted with Pultukaku and elicited from him a few misanthropic monosyllables, the familiar feeling of the absurd, as much a part of him as his names, overwhelmed Agastya, and he wondered whether, when married, he would be able to exercise in front of his wife, and what he would do if, just when he was lunging for a push-up she were to say, For someone who exercises so much you're in awful shape. And suppose she stole his money? And the all-important subject of kinky sex - she might not like sharing each other's used underwear, then?

Eventually, he knew, he would marry, perhaps not out of passion, but out of convention, which was probably a safer thing. And then in either case, in a few months or years they would tire of disagreeing with each other, or what was more or less the same thing, would be inured to each other's odd and perhaps disgusting ways, the way she squeezed the tube of toothpaste and the way he drank from a glass and didn'’t rinse it, and they would slide into a placid and comfortable unhappiness, and maybe unseeingly watch TV every evening, each still a cocoon, but perhaps it would be unwise to be otherwise. And his once-secret life would be entombed in a mind half-dead to an incarcerating world, and he would remember, with a sense of bemused embarrassment, and in epiphanies flashes, brought on by uncontrollable jolts to his memory through a smell of some unexpected sight (perhaps the view from a train or an ad on TV), his this experience of Madna, that once the restlessness of his mind had seemed the most important thing in this universe, and that he had once been shaken by the profundity of an ancient Hindu poem.

Incidentally, this would be my second book by an bureaucrat, after We Weren't Lovers Like That by Navtej Sarna. Upamanyu Chatterjee, born in 1959 at Patna, Bihar, joined the Indian Administrative Service in 1983. In 1998, he was appointed Director (Languages) in the Ministry of Human Resource Development, Government of India.

Book Review: We Weren't Lovers Like That

Q. What's worse than a depressing book?
A. A depressing book you can't put down.

I'm afraid We weren't Lovers like that is one such book. It's depressing to start with, dejecting in the middle and it ends with a possibility, but without the promise, of something better. But at the same time, it's a treat to read with its almost poetry-like fluent language and strong emotional undercurrents. It doesn't put its characters in absolutely abject situations and induce pity. Its depressing quality comes from the mundane failures of the day-to-day life; from the realizations about the missed chances and what-ifs and from the familiarity of the plot to our lives.

Navtej Sarna tells the story from a first person perspective. This has definitely allowed him to depict the emotional state and the thoughts of the central character with more authority. I particularly liked his way of following the trains of thought and not hesitating to digress from the flow to capture some poignant moments from the various corners of the memory of the protagonist.

The theme of the book is a winner - Aftab's wife Mina walks out of their weary marriage for another man, Rajiv. Aftab, humiliated but not hurt, gives up his insipid job, pissed off by petty office politics, and takes the Shatabdi Express to Dehradun, following a frail hope of reunion with his long lost love, Rohini. The books covers his journey from Delhi to Dehradun; his journey from his conformist and timid past to the promise of a content future.

The book reminded me of The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro. I wonder if Sarna took some inspiration from Ishiguro. Sarna's work shares its reflexive and introspective qualities with Ishiguro's work. Both the books tell their stories using the flashbacks and trail of thoughts. I personally found Ishiguro's work more complex and sophisticated. The reader has to interpret the thoughts of the Butler as the layers of information are made visible to him/her. It makes you want to read the book all over again, just after you finish it once.

In the end, Navtej Sarna must be congratulated for his marvelous book. What makes this feat more commendable is the fact that this is his first novel. I have read that his collection of short stories is set to come out next. Waiting for that one eagerly!

P.S.: Navtej Sarna, as you might know, is the spokesman for the Indian Ministry of External Affairs. He isn't the only diplomat to write a book; Vivek, an undertraining IFS officer & my cousin, is writing one too!
(Recently I was invited to join Desicritics.org. This review is also cross-posted here.)

Kahani Poori Filmi Hai

One Night @ the Call Center: A Book Review

This is the latest book by Chetan Bhagat, whose last book - Five Point Someone - was an instant hit among the youth. If the initial sale is any indicator, this one too can cash in good money. But I doubt if it'll reach the heights of its predecessor. It's mainly cashing in the good rapport Bhagat made among youth after his last book; with time it'll run out of gas.

It might not turn out to be a "contemporary classic" but this book is surely enticing. Once you pick it up, you can't put it down, it captures the reader in it's twists & turns. The writer has thought enough to put all the masalas to keep reader bound. I'm told they are making a movie on this book. I'd say once the movie is out it'll be very hard to guess which came out first among the book & the movie; the entire book is so filmi. To start with, the central character, Shyam, is our typical underdog hero. He might remind you of Amol Palekar in Chhoti Si Baat. You will also find a saas-bahu drama, casting couch, an angry young man, old parents-young daughter-in-law angle, heartburns, NRI groom, extra-marital, pre-marital, divorced parents - covered the entire Bollywood infact. And to top it all, in the end the author has put a rather out of the world twist to ensure a happy ending.

The book is about six people who work at a Gurgaon call center. Although it's about just one night, but using dialogues & flashbacks details about their lives are provided. All of them are painfully distressed & depressed with their lives & most of the pages cover this despair in details. While its not a typical Bollywoodish "..and they lived happily ever after" ending, its not really very far from it. The book leaves a bit of depressing aftertaste. Imagine reading 250 pages about their despair & then in 20 pages it evaporates - who'd buy it? Bhagat has done good research about call centers and tried well to connect with the youth. He has used his professional experience too to make it authentic (and he has vented his anger on one of his old bosses too ;-)).I'm sure almost everyone would find something in the book to relate with. But at times he appears to be trying a tad too hard. The Bollywood effect is evident on almost every page of the book.

In the end, I'd say read the book if you can lay your hands on it. Better borrow than buy, but even if you buy it you won't regret spending just 95/- on it. Another option is to wait for the film, its surely gonna be full of masala :-).

Helen : The woman who could not care

Friday Poora Filmi Hai

Last week I was on a book buying spree. Fortunately, I stumbled upon First Proof. Its a compilation of writings of various upcoming Indian authors. Jerry Pinto has contributed perhaps the most interesting piece in the book - The woman who could not care. It talks about Helen and early days of bollywood in general. I enjoyed reading it thoroughly and I recommend it very strongly. Following are some of my favorite parts from the essay.

The nation state was not very old when Helen began her first rehearsals. The memsahibs were not yet a distant memory to be retrieved by Raj enthusiasts and professional nostalgists. They had left only a short while previously. And while they were not precisely white goddesses to whom all Indian men aspired, there was that old colonial hangover of the woman who you could not touch because she belonged to the ruling class.
...
If the heroine was the ethereally unavailable Hindu woman, objects of male lust would also need to be devised.
...
For a nation not old enough to ogle its own women, Helen must have seemed the ideal vamp. What better way of exacting revenge for all those years of frustration than to cast the available white women as objects of lust?
...
It would be very many years before a Hindu vamp would be accepted in the form of Bindu in the late 1960s. Until then outsiders to the Hindu mainstream would be called in to be lusted after, either as Anglo-Indians, Christians, Jews and one or two Muslims.
...
It is also interesting to note that in Helen's breakthrough number, the lyrics emphasize her alienness. 'Mera naam Chin-Chin-Choo', she tell us in Howrah Bridge, and later in the song informs us, ' Babuji mein Cheen se aayi/Cheeni jaisa dil laayi/Singapore ka yowvan mera/Shanghai ki angdaai'. Thus everything in her physicality has been imported from elsewhere.

I understand Pinto is writing a book on Helen. What amazing read that would be! It never caught my attention, but now it looks so obvious - the vamp was always necessarily a westernized lady! Even if it was a Hindu lady, like Bindu, she would be dressed in western outfits (figure hugging stretching pants and glittery tops, etc.).

But Pinto seemingly missed a different kind of vamps altogether, namely the witch in the family or the evil mother-in-law/daughter-in-law. The mere sight of Lalita Pawar must have frozen the blood of many newly wed ladies in those times. And then there were evil sister-in-laws. Although, family dramas picked up bit late in early 80's, I believe such characters were present even in earlier movies. I can't recall the names, but I have watched some black-n-white movies with such characters. Perhaps Pinto's idea of a vamp is a bit particular. The vamps in family dramas were not meant to be the "objects of lust" for sure.

Pinto's essay brought back to me one observation - early hindi movies had a very clear demarcation about the role of the characters. They will be either pitch black or rin white. The hero will be the ideal of every viewer in every possible aspect - be it academics, be it sports, be it music or even high speed car race. The villian will be a pucca son-of-devil, without even a trace of humanity in him. He'll have no regard for relations or sentiments. Thankfully, movies have gone much more sensible nowadays.

Neighbours of Fanatics.

In the book Husband of a fanatic, the author, Amitava Kumar, cries out, "We aren't even given chance to swear at each other". He is talking in the context of Indo-Pak relations. Not political relations but men to men relations. It's a brilliant book and would not disappoint any one who picks it up. It talks about the rifts present between various religious communities in the sub continent. Kumar has taken pains to do meticulous research over the subject and his analysis is very deep. He has travelled extensively for the book & met numerous people.

The Indo-Pak scene is given ample importance in the book. Kumar, himself married to a Pakistani Muslim, travelled to Pakistan and cared to meet various people over there. He carried out a very interesting experiment:- he asked children from his school in Patna to write letters addressing their counterparts, studying in schools at the other side of the fence. He asked the same thing from the students of his wife's school in Karachi†. What came out of this experiment really shows how skewed and indoctrinated our views are. Many children though agreed that the children on the other side are just like themselves, they couldn't let go of the negative emotions fed into them since start.

If we think about this, what do we know about Pakistan & Pakistanis? All we get to know, and that isn't enough for sure, is hugely superfluous information. Considering the popularity of Bollywood movies (and lately, TV serials) in Pakistan, one would imagine atleast they have a fair idea about us. But we know how far from reality those movies are! So, is there any way to get to know each other better? Few years earlier, perhaps there wasn't, but with the arrival of internet, people are coming together like never before. And of course, the cricket series, with people crossing borders to watch matches and mingle with the "neighbours", are helping.

Take Orkut for example, it's a networking website from Google, with growing popularity worldwide. The users are allowed to maintain groups with other users can join and they can then discuss various topics of their interests. It has found sizable following in the sub continent too, just like the rest the world. Not to be left behind, many groups are formed with Indo-Pak relationship as the theme. There is India Pakistan Friendship Club and soon people fed up of it and formed IPFC SNOBS (India Pakistan Friendship Club Sans N00bs Or Borders). The Cricket community is hijacked by Pakistanis & Indians for all practical purposes. There are basically three kinds of people there; 1) Curious lot, 2) Friendly kinds and 3) Jerks or people with different opinions :). Curious ones are there to know more about the other side, they are interested only in questions, raising and clearing doubts etc. Friendly people "invest" their time in all sorts of silly games and general chit-chat ("Write something about the person above", "Suggest a future for the person above u...", kinds). They have lots of time and lots of bandwidth to waste and apparently it thrills them even more to find that there are like minded people on the other side. And we have jerks, these are real combative punks! They start all the "controversial" topics, they are interested in insulting the other party & picking up fights. There are lots of them from both sides. While most of them allege baselessly, some of them are really well informed over various conflicts and charges put on the other side, like the issue of Baglihar Dam, RAW & ISI, Kargil War, etc. Despite the venom they spew, some discussion turn out to be really rich in information and provide great insight towards what they know & think about the other side.

Then there are blogs. I don't know many Pakistani bloggers but there is this excellent photoblog, "Who Am I?", maintained by a Karachiite (The link also appears on my photoblog). Some more pakistani photoblogs are listed here.

Last time when Indian cricket toured Pakistan, first time many Indians crossed the border to watch the contests. When they came back, welcomed warmly & treated excellently, they brought along many "feel-good" stories about Pakistan & the Pakistani awaam. I remember, one write up from some one from Wipro was circulated in the software circles. It narrated the beautiful experience he had in Pakistan; shopkeepers would not take money from him, people would greet very warmly and all. I once met a Pakistani in a Paris subway (I was in Europe in Summer 2002 for my internship with few other batchmates). He told us, in Urdu with a heavy Punjabi accent, "Awaam aman chahti hai. Saale Politicians hi ***** hain". It was the first time I met a Pakistani. Now, I want to visit Pakistan.

† The Letters by Indian and Pakistani school-children collected by Amitava Kumar

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time - Mark Haddon

Confession time: When I bought the book from the roadside vendor along with The Broker, I had no clue what is this book about. But I remembered reading about how good it was or someone having recommended it highly. The cover read "Winner : Whitbread book of the year" and the graphics were kinda abstract and funny! I thought, rather assumed, it will be another light/comedy book.

The first thing I noticed when I started to read was the unusual chapter numbers (It has chapters listed by prime numbers!). At first I thought I got a damaged copy with the first chapter missing (Note: 1 is neither prime, nor composite :) ). Many misconceptions about the book (and my copy) were lifted as I dug deeper into the book.

As a matter of fact, although the book is not a comedy, its very interesting nonetheless! Its about Christopher, who is a special kid (I always thought calling someone special is just euphemism for retarded, but he is certainly not retarded! He is indeed special kid!). He has a photographic memory (My memory is like a film….And when people ask me to remember something I can simply press Rewind and Fast Forward and Pause like on a video recorder….If someone says to me, 'Christopher, tell me what your mother was like,' I can rewind to lots of different scenes and say what she was like in those scenes.). He never lies (A lie is when you say something happened which didn't happen. But there is only one thing which happened at a particular time and a particular place. And there are infinite number of things which didn't happen at that time and that place. And if I think about something which didn't happen I start thinking about all the other things which didn't happen.). He has nutured his own simple philosophical thinking (I think people believe in heaven because they don't like the idea of dying, because they want to carry on living and they don't like the idea that other people will move into their house and their things into rubbish.). He is intelligent enough to score an 'A' on 'A' level math. He is also a walking encyclopedia, he can talk about various topics under the sun, varying from types of heart attacks to black holes to molecules to species of monkeys. He keenly observes his surroundings, contrary to the grazing "normal" people do. Sometimes, just because of this, he can't handle too much information at once. He normally avoids crowded places as he can't take all the information coming into his brain. In such situations, he kneels down and starts groaning (to cut off the noise!). He thinks of it just like pressing CTRL-ALT-DEL on his computer (this is a metaphor, he can differentiate between a metaphor and a simile, but can't understand similes :) ).

The adventure starts when his teacher at his (special) school encourages him to write a book. As he can't lie, he thinks of writing a book from what he observes. He wants to write a murder mystery (his favorite book is The hound of Baskervilles by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle). He starts to write a book on the murder of a dog in the neighbourhood. When his teacher tells him that no one cares much if the dog is dead, he argues that two hounds were murdered in The hound of Baskervilles :)! He starts to investigate this murder, much against his father's wishes and in the process he unveils some very important realities about his own life!

The charcter I hold in very high regard is Christopher's father, Ed. He is really patient with Christopher. Ed's wife has left him because it was too painful for her to take care of Christopher. Ed gets really heart-broken when Christopher also runs away from home. It's really heart-rending to see how hard he tries to win his son's trust back. His situation is kind of hopeless and somewhat depressing.

It's the first novel for Hadden and indeed an extra-ordinary effort on his behalf. I recommend this book highly to all readers! Welcome to the curious world of Christopher.

Favorite quote from book: Prime numbers are what is left when you have taken all the patterns away. I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spend all your time thinking about them.