Politics from an economist

Which is really nothing new. I don't read Friedman or Krugman anymore with the expectation of academic analysis. But I expected better of Amartya Sen. Is it the natural course of things that once a person becomes famous they promptly pretend to be experts in every other field? For Amartya Sen, these fields include history, philosophy, theology and naturally, politics. Though everyone is an expert political commentator in their own heads.
When I started off with "The Argumentative Indian" I expected something a little more academic. I don't want to read the same commentary I can read in "The Hindu" every day! I expected some incredible insight into poverty alleviation or microfinance or base of pyramid. Instead, I got a "India has so much misrepresented history. A zillion years of civilization. A culture of tolerance" spiel. There was the occasional interesting point. What annoys me is that this is a book written primarily for the non-Indian. Maybe because that's where the money is (was).

Fantastic Indian Historical

- which is Amitav Ghosh's 'Sea of Poppies'. This one book makes worthwhile all the terrible pieces of pseudo literature I've wasted so many hours on this summer. The characters are beautifully drawn, so that you can see them in your head, their mannerisms, their accents, their colloquialisms, each a product of their particular society, each breaking out of their particular confines. The settings are unbelievably well imagined - its hard to believe that this is set so many years ago - it seems as though the author has been there, seen it, heard them talk - its all made very immediate, very present.

The story is incredibly global in scope - far more so than so many stories set in the present day. It passes through rural and urban India, China, the Mauritius, all through the opium supply chain - the fields where it was grown, the factories where it was processed, the ports where it was loaded, the ships that carried it, and to China where it was finally sold. And all along the way, the people who were enslaved by it - some who had given up their food crops to serve the empires growth - and others who had simply fallen prey to the drug, and given up everything else. The book recognizes how much of a person's identity was caught up in the enormous class, caste, religion, and racial differences that divided people - with each person having to cross their own particular barrier simply in order to survive.

Booker prize winner 2008...and weekend in Rhode Island

So, I’m quite deeply impressed with myself. For an entire month I have now gone without buying any new clothes for myself- in spite of Ann Taylor, Boscov’s and JCP throwing coupons at me every time I head to the mailbox. What have I bought? A couple of gifts, 1 book, a brief weekend in Rhode Island, and a ridiculous number of lunches and dinners (where I used to previously eat at home). *Sigh*, if it’s not one thing, it’s another.

The book I read recently was Aravind Adiga’s recent Booker Prize winner- “The White Tiger".It’s a brilliantly written boo, but it paints a painful picture of India. I’m happy I read it, but I don’t think I’ll be re-reading it again any time soon.

Other books I’ve read lately? Robin McKinley’s “The Hero and The Crown”and Gail Carson Levine’s “Fairest”, both so called kids book’s but with ideas that make them appealing to adults too.

I read Mary Stewart’s “The Wicked Day”– the last tale in her Merlin and Arthur chronicles, where she gives Mordred a decidedly kinder treatment that he’s received nearly anywhere else, but to no avail; it all ends in tragedy (as we already know).

Then there was Susanna Clarke’s “Jonathan Strange and Mr.Norrell”, which was written in the style of English novels from the 19th century. It’s a enormous book (the more the merrier, eh?), and her characters are drawn incredibly minutely, their flaws and virtues, that make you sympathize and despise them in turn. The plot is excellent too, and if you like fantasy at all, you’ll love this one. (I'm thrilled that there might be a sequel in the works -speaking of potential sequels... what happened to the one for "Good Omens"?

Also (god help us all) the Twilight sequel. I went with my cousin to the midnight book release, to see kids all dressed up as vampires and werewolves (there was this one kid who was a particularly convincing werewolf – I stayed well away from him). The book was … (what little of it I read, anyway)… overrated does not begin to cover it. Parts of it read more like a horror story from makers of SAW, than any decent book should. Honestly, people scream to burn books like “The Golden Compass” and “Harry Potter” ; do the world a favor, and ban this book – are you seriously telling me it’s “age appropriate” for teenagers to read about baby monsters clawing their way out of theirs mother’s womb? Ugh!

Also, I love Norton Anti virus (yes, they should be paying me for random endorsements, but... ) my computer's been so well-behaved since I installed it!

And here are some pictures from Rhode Island

The great pre-India pilgrimage

This time next week, I will be in India, likely enjoying thai chaadam with (dare I hoe) paruppu thogayal and veggies on the side. And I expect to be doing a circuit of temples while I’m there. The small middle-of-the-road Vinayakar kovil in Gandhinagar; the Padmanabha Swami temple almost next door to it ;and others that my mother will no doubt take me to.

But it looks like my pilgrimage has started off early. In the last couple of weeks I have been to two temples and one kutcheri, practically filling my cultural quota for several months. The Delaware Mahalakshmi temple and the Pittsburgh Sri Venkateswara temple. And the concert was by TM Krishna, in nearby Blue Bell, and I must say, it was brilliant. He has an amazing voice, and the range of notes that he hits, apparently effortlessly, is stunning. It was a long concert – 3 and a half hours, but I (shocking myself) managed to sit through the whole thing (more credit to the singer, I think, than any musical inclination on my part).

Of course, during the long journeys to these temples(5 hours to Pittbutgh!) I occupied myself with some of the second hand books I had acquired at various garage and library sales. I got done with the mysterious and slightly supernatural ‘Mistress of Spices’ by Chitra Divakaruni, and the very suspenseful and extremely supernatural (not to mention ghoulish- a good buildup to the X-Files movie coming out next month) ‘This Historian’ by Elisabeth Kostova.

‘The Mistress of Spices’ was a little sad, and little sweet, a little Rushdie-esque I thought, maybe a lighter version of Rushdie.

‘The Historian’ on the other hand was a decidedly heavier version of Dracula, with much of the myth of Dracula mixed with a lot of historical references. The settings in Eastern Europe come alive in each word, the spooky beauty, the sense of being a step behind (or is it in front of?) the monster through a beautiful maze builds in a crescendo.

Some time ago, I also found myself in unhappy circumstances (into the details of which I will not go), sitting and drowning my sorrows in Barnes and Noble, over Diana Wynn Jones’s ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’. The book (not about a dog, as I had for some reason expected), a lightly written fantasy, with a toehold (but an important one, to the plot) in the real world, successfully lifted my out of the doldrums, so that I was later able to appreciate Ann Taylor Loft’s collection that had just come out.

Anyway, I now have to pick a book to carry on the plane. I wish now, that I had saved ‘The Historian’ for that. At 650 pages it would have lasted me the whole way layovers and all. Now I have to depend on the In-flight entertainment, of which I have no expectation (what are the chances they’ll be playing ‘Sex and the City’?)

Two Lives- All Done!

I’m finally DONE with Vikram Seth’s ‘Two Lives’. I think it’ll be a while before I can bring myself to pick up a biography again. The story was a bit slow, detailing the author’s Aunt and Uncle’s lives before, during, and after World War II, she a German Jew during the Holocaust, he a dentist working for the British Army. The parts pertaining to the war, and the recovery period after it was very compelling, but the long list of friends and relatives, the hot and cold of relationships was a bit wearying to go through.

Another book I recently read concerning the Holocaust was ‘Briar Rose’ by Jane Yolen. It was my cousin who gave me the book, and it was from her school library. I was rather surprised to hear that it had been in the children’s section. Though it was based on the Sleeping Beauty fairy tale, I thought it dealt with some ideas that are far too disturbing for a child to read. But then again ‘The Diary of Anne Frank’ is considered children’s literature by many, I read it when I was about eleven myself, and I don’t think this one is that much harder to read.

One point that made an impression on me in both Briar Rose and in ‘Two Lives’ , was that they both dealt with the fact that the trials and tribulations of the victims did not end with the war. Even afterwards they had to cope with massive bureaucracies, and just the unwillingness of people to admit that they had been wronged – because to admit that would mean admitting that they had to make reparation, perhaps giving up some of what they had gained, even if not directly, then indirectly through the oppression of others.

Now, the next book on my agenda is Schindler’s List. It’s another of those books I have always been meaning to read, but never got to reading.

One more book I quickly got through, over the weekend, was ‘The Prisoner of Zenda’. It was as good as I remembered, but compared to some of the other books I was reading, felt a bit soap-opera-esque or fairytale-ish, though its not really a happy ending…

That brings me to other books I want to re-read. The Hunchback of Notre-Dame for one, then Wuthering Heights. I only remember the vaguest details of the plots of these books. I read them when I was in sixth standard, in my room, with the door locked so that no one could see what I was actually doing when I was supposed to be studying.

Maybe I’m just uninterested in the real lives of real people, but I’m just finding ‘Two Lives’ by Vikram Seth really hard to finish- 200 pages down (over the last month) and 250 (or more) to go. It’s a really good book though, a little slow, but nicely written (dub – like I said real people – not heroes endowed with magical or supernatural powers), but parts of it are very nicely written. His fondness for his subjects clearly comes through, and his unwillingness of pry too far into their lives (this far and no further) which leaves you with something to ponder when all is done. (I like that in a book – if it ends all roundly and satisfactorily, with no spaces in between, how boring! The best stories are the ones that have you day-dreaming, about all those unmentioned thoughts, those unspoken words, that make you author, a co-creator of the universe.)

But in the middle of reading the above book, I got swept away by a real page turner. It was my sister who sent me ‘The Kite Runner’ by Khalid Hosseini, and since then, it has been passed around the family. That was an absolutely heart-wrenching book. The characters are painfully real- their flaws so believable, as is their need to rise above them. It was so hard to read, and so hard to put away. Then of course I had to go on and read the next book by the author – ‘A Thousand Splendid Suns’. Not as good as the first, (you’d think I’d like it better, being about the plight of women and all), still is was an excellent book. Bittersweet satisfying ending and all.

I had read Stardust last Winter actually, during a sort of read many, many Neil Gaiman’s and Terry Pratchett’s as possible thing I was going through. It started with Good Omens. Have I told you what an incredibly funny book that is? Well, it is an incredibly funny book. Nice (and accurate? (you’ll have to read it to get that inside joke)), light, without being stupid, happy ending (or is it?). Talks on a sequel, talks of a movie… nothing seems to be happening…

Still back to Stardust- it was a very good book, which was why I was so surprised that it became such a good movie (so young and yet so cynical !) Of course they messed with the story a bit, as I complained through those scenes to my long-suffering cousin, still even that didn’t make a hash of it. I’d like to see ‘Neverwhere’ come out as a movie too. I never really got ‘American Gods’ though , or ‘Anansi Boys’.

And I must make a mention here of Enchantment(seems like an appropriate place to mention this book), not quite sure when I read it, though definitely in the past one year, it’s a modern Sleeping Beauty by Orson Scott Card ( ‘Ender’s Game’) . Was V.V. Good! Remember being surprised, didn’t expect to like it (my mistake, all his stuff is generally at least readable), but I did anyway.

Now on to Stephanie Mayer’s New Moon , Twilight , Eclipse trilogy about Vampires, Werewolves and the humans in between. Actually just one human, who (wouldn’t you know it)has one of each in love with her... aaah what angst. Its actually kind of addictive – like Ice cream, that you know isn’t going to do anything for you, but you can’t resist anyway. Lots of general teen angst, sappiness, tall dark (and blonde – whatever you taste, it will be catered to) handsome, brooding heroes.

And… that’s all folks! ( Looney Tunes song plays)