A Weblog

Friday the 19th:
Its not every evening that u walk into a city and the first thing that u notice is a thalluvandi selling second hand books. Much to my delight, thats what exactly happened.I walked into CBE and the first thing I noticed was the ubiquitous thalluvandi selling books instead of gobi manchurian(or in some cases, kaka biriyani :P).The usual fare: Rushdie,Roy,Stephen Covey; an iCON here, a Road Ahead there. My favorite book haunts were the three bookshops(I call them thrimurtis of luz) that dot the luz corner. But I was not ready to pass up an opportunity to buy a book at cbe(A souvenir :-P). God chose not to play dice and I found a lil book hiding behind "Seven steps to Succes" (or was it "Seven approaches to success?" who cares!). It was the booker prize winner "Inheritance of Loss" by Kiran Desai. An Indian winning a Booker prize is a rarity and trusting the judgement of the Booker Committee members, I bought it. My patience as usual ran out and I started reading it the moment I got into the train.
Strangely, I felt disappointed after reading the first few pages. Oh no!not another novel on post colonial angst and pseudo-Anglican thoughts! As I read on, I realised that the book had lot more to offer. But I was still stuck by one thing: why is there an obsession with everything Raj? Do Indian-English writers still write to please the Sahibs? Or is it the only thing that gets them recognised? Of course I may be wrong. But glance through all award winning Indian authors (Roy, Rushdie, Naipul,Jhumpa Lahiri, Vikram Seth and now, Kiran Desai) and you will realise that the recurring themes are the effects of colonial past and the pressure of being a migrant somewhere outside India. I do accept that the two above stated issues have affected our lives but can't our writers write or think about anything else? Why should it always be about stuff like racism,colonialism,imperialism and all the shit that comes along?? Or are the authors caught in some kinda time warp which forces to look behind these issues?
Two articles that shed some light on these issues:
1. Writing the Raj way by Una Chaudhuri
2. The Currency of Arundhati Roy by Amitava Kumar

Bak to the few hours @CBE:
After buying the book, I had some time to spare and so walked around an empty Race Course Road. The road seems to have been given a neat facelift and there are models of Architectural landmarks like Tower of Pisa, Red Fort, Hawa Mahal,etc placed arnd the Road. I paid a visit to my favorite Sringeri Temple. I was visiting it for the first time in 4 years. And its still the same. One among the very few places where my mind somehow manages to stay clear of all unwanted things and I feel truly who I am.

Yeah, I still love the city :-)

Sunday the 21st:
People of Chennai, listen up!!Therez a Higginbothams@Alwarpet. Seems they are clearing out stock to make way for fresh arrivals.Guess wat this means???A "Midnight's Children"@ Rs. 100(added that to my lil collection of books :D). I even found a book on David Feckham(yeah, the spelling is rite!) and a psycho analysis of Samuel Beckett(how absurd!) but I wanted Vikram Seth's Golden Gate.Unfortunately, it wasnt available. No II hand bookshop seems to sell it these days:-(.Nevertheless there are lots of other gud novels and non-fiction stuff available. The collection is gr8 and all are available at rock bottom price.

Before plundering Higginbothams, I had spotted a gem at a bookshop near the LIC building@Mount Road: We, the People by N.A. Palkhivala. It is an incisive analysis of what went wrong with India 20 years back(1984 edition). The author has expressed much pain and regret about the state of public affairs in our country. If the eminent jurist were alive today, he wouldnt have made many changes to '84 edition. But he does hold onto an "unquenchable confidence" in the long-term future of India. The same confidence which we hold onto even to this day.