Sémantique

Rarely have I found it possible to read a book after I have already seen the movie. The process, I think, is much better the other way around , i.e. you first read the book and then read the movie. However, I have a penchant for horror tales and movies, and laying my hands on a tattered copy of The Exorcist at home was the best medicine for sleepless nights. I was very impressed with the book - the movie having made a general “green-pea-soup-vomit” impression on me. (Don’t get me wrong, I think the movie is nice and super-scary).

Moving to the book, it was extremely entertaining, fast-paced, and impressively enough - scientifically sound. While the movie deals with the exorcism, the book deals with the exorcist and his struggle to deal with Regan McNeil’s possession from the point of view of a priest and a psychiatrist. The book will be especially interesting for people who are scientifically inclined and even for an uninitiated person like me, it was an compelling read.

You may know how it all ends, but that won’t stop the book from being suspenseful and nail-bitingly chilling. I think we all agree that book versions are always better and that a book can never be translated into a satisfactory 70mm version. But the movie The Exorcist is a classic, and no one can argue about that. It is no wonder that it is, because it’s based on a brilliant book.

Coming back to Mumbai has been fun. The last time it was only my wedding frenzy. But during this trip, I’ve had the time and space to soak in the feel of my home-town. I’m not sure whether the country has changed, or whether I have become un-used to it, but it definitely took me a while to acclimate myself.

In my naïveté, I thought India was still quite touchy about bedroom-affairs. People still ooh-aahed when a crazy Richard Gere kissed an embarrassed Shilpa Shetty, and talks of “culture,” “tradition” and what-not immediately took center-stage. But that, from what I see, is not only a hypocritical way of seeing things, it’s also given rise to people wanting to freely talk about things that Indian “culture” still considers evil in a very Puritanical way. Case in point, Rakhi Sawant, who – and I cannot believe I am saying this – is admirable for her efforts to say things as they are. Ok, so she’s totally artless as far as speaking her true point is concerned, but at least she does not hide behind a façade that allows many of our lead actresses to go from 3-minute item song-dancers to “ideal” bahus in a heart-beat.

What goes on on the TV is simply ridiculous. I wonder where the talks of the Indian tradition disappear as far as advertisements are concerned. One has to see the Amul Macho ad to understand what I’m saying. Call this ad whatever you want – but you cannot help but raise an eyebrow, or giggle at its openness. I don’t call the ad “bold” – it’s only an attempt to create havoc. Why does this ad still play during prime-time television? I don’t know, but I do care.

They say art imitates life; and what we see on television and on the silver screen might be dangerously close to what’s going on in people’s minds. But for me, I’d like to think that what I see around me is not art at all. It’s just a bogus attempt to stay in the viewer’s eye for more than a breath, earn a little moolah and then disappear – hopefully for good.

Have you ever purchased a book, forgot you had it, and later found it hiding somewhere beneath a mess? I’ve done that several times, but the problem with Ice-Candy Man was that I remembered having left it in India and couldn’t bring myself to buy another copy in the US. I wanted to read the book because I enjoyed the movie so much, in spite of not being a fan of Deepa Mehta’s style, that I knew there had to be a powerful story behind the movie.

Initially, I was pleasantly surprised at how true the movie stays to the book. Subtle nuances are clearly translated into the movie - even minor character definitions. Although Ice-Candy man and the Masseur might not look in the movie as they are described in the book, nor Nandita Das’s Ayah make a convincing 18 year old, I could not find faults in the way the movie portrayed the characters - pat down to Lenny’s mother’s wavy, short bob described somewhere near the end of the book. To cut a long story short, I was very impressed with the way Mehta brought the book to life in the movie. Rarely has a movie interpretation of a book pleased me so much. Or in this case, vice versa.

However, can you imagine how surprised I was when the movie’s end arrives in the book only half-way through the author’s narration. I wondered why the movie does not tell us what I was to read on? Was the rest of the book so boring? Did it not mesh well? I kept reading, of course, and realized that I was glad the movie ended where it did. And at the same time, I was not upset with what happens later in the book. While the movie focuses on the love triangle between Ayah, Ice-Candy man and Masseur with the violent Indo-Pak division as a backdrop, the book is primarily about Lenny and her involvement with Ayah and Ice-Candy man. The movie leaves us wondering what happened to the kidnapped Ayah, Lenny telling us that she either became a prostitute, or died, or married Ice-Candy man, and that she never found out. But in the book Lenny finds out what happens to Ayah. And is there a better reason I could give you to read the book? And if you haven’t seen the movie, here’s me telling you, go see it.

Helen Fielding is one crazy gal. For after all, an author who has created a character like Bridget Jones, has to be a little kooky herself. And that’s exactly why I love her style. But Bridget Jones and Olivia Joules, even if they’ve sprouted from the same mind, are completely different characters. They might have a few similar shades of eccentricities, but while on one hand Bridget is down-to-earth as far as her appearance and insecurities are concerned, Olivia is confident, beautiful, and has no difficulty landing herself a man. So for a reader like me who loves Bridget for her close-to-real problems, would not completely identify with Olivia’s stunning looks and near-perfect-ness. However, Olivia is not proud, and has characteristics that makes you think that she could be your scatter-brained friend. She wins you over in the first few chapters with her morals and bravery, and you can’t help but cheer for her to have the right intuition.

Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination begins with Olivia being sent to Miami to cover a beauty related event for her freelance stint with a newspaper and a magazine. There she comes across an attractive so-called Hollywood film producer Pierre Feramo who wishes to court her. But Olivia’s hunch tells her that there’s more about this smooth-talking man than appears on the surface. She goes with her intuition, nearly missing death, and in a series of adventures ends up working for the CIA as a spy in order to stop terrorists from another attack on the United States.

Olivia Joules is Fielding’s attempt to break-free from the Bridget Jones mold by creating a semi-realistic post-9/11 world. By no means does Olivia leave the same impact as Fielding’s previous cult work, but the book is a fun, quick read that at times leaves you in giggles. You’ve got to give that to the Brits - they have a whacky sense of humor.

Developed by Harvard researchers, the Implicit Association Test (IAT) is an interesting way to spot your own prejudices, even if you think you don’t have any. Case in point, me. I am most open about racial differences, having faced prejudice from various sources, may they have been at a minor level, I am fully aware of them. I study African-American literature. I identify with the race. However, the test proved that I am “Slightly biased towards the European American race”, consisting of 17% of the population. Although it was better than being completely biased towards the European American race, or against the African American race, I wished it proved I was not biased at all.

The test is simple, but by the time you get to the end of it, it will play games with your thinking capacity. I’m no scholar, but I do feel that the way it was organized, resulted in me giving a few wrong answers. Also, I am not good with my fingers on the keyboard, and hit the wrong key a few times. However, there is no denying that unknowingly, we associate certain words with certain kinds of people. The constant bombarding of images on our minds through the television results in us thinking in a certain way, although on the exterior we might think that we are not discriminatory. All of us, especially people of color in the United States, must take this test. The test does not give you measures to change your bias, but identifying it might be the first step to bringing about a change. Even if we change simple things like racial slurs (which happens unknowingly), we can take away racial discrimination at the level of common people.

Take the test here. Read the directions carefully before you start. Good luck.

I am a bad literature student. In spite of having an interest in Indian literature, I have yet to read any work by Anita Desai. I have read a few of her short stories, but not any of her renowned longer works. Judge me if you will, because I will not give any explanations. If I have the chance, I’d love to read Desai’s novels. I was happy to come across her daughter’s latest Booker-prize winning novel at a reasonable price. I hiccuped through reading it, getting a little lost on the way to the middle of the book. Some books just don’t draw you in instantly, and this was one.

But when I took it up the second time, I went at it relentlessly, reading it not as hungrily as I do other books; but at the same time, finishing it in a span of three or four nights. A prize-winning books comes already loaded with expectations - but a seasoned reader should know that heightened expectations always lead you to a downfall. That’s why it was easier for me to enjoy this book - I expected nothing, and got something.

At the center of Desai’s work is Jemubhai Patel, a retired judge and a totally despicable character. Sai is the judge’s estranged grand-daughter and more or less the protagonist. But the novel would be contrived and narrow if it had stopped at Sai and the judge. Wonderfully enough, Biju, his father the cook, Gyan and a plethora of other characters receive space in the book, narratives running parallel throughout the book - the reader getting a chance to know everyone enough and yet not too deep. The character whose past we see most deeply is the judge - and if you still warm up to him, you’re a saint. As for me, I hated him throughout the book - and was glad that the rest of the characters were left in the shadows. Familiarity after all, leads to contempt.

Desai is lucid. I loved the way she moved comfortably between borders, people, politics, history, and language. The book is almost like a movie, giving you a glimpse of worlds known and unknown. I am not sure, however, if I can say I loved this book. I don’t know if I’ll ever pick it up again, coming back to it for hidden meanings and deeper levels. I am sure of the fact that this book deserves to be read.

Does it make any sense to review a book when you’ve just read a little over a 100 pages of a 500 page book? I guess not. But as far as Suketu Mehta’s “gripping, compellingly readable account of a love affair with a city” (Amitav Ghosh) is concerned, I really am not motivated to read any further. I love Bombay. The city is like a family member, you go back to it when you need comfort, but when you’re with it for a long time, you tend to hate it just a little bit. When I picked up Maximum City with enthusiasm, I hoped to receive that sentiment from his work. To some extent, I did; but largely, Mehta’s work seems like a parody of the city that I was born in and love dearly.

Right from the beginning, I noted times when he spoke in a belittling manner of Mahahrastrians. But I let that issue pass me by. It would be stupid of me to say Bombay belongs to the Maharashtrians. Maybe at some point of time it did, but not anymore. However, Maharashtrians are loyal and deserving residents of the city as any one else from any other part of the country who works there, fends for themselves, and generally leads a civic life. However, Mehta seems to think otherwise. In just the second chapter, he notes how Maharashtrians were deemed as “servants” when he grew up. Fine. Many people are stupid when they are kids. But Mehta does not go back and improvise on his childhood misunderstanding. Again, I’d be silly to be offended by that. I kept reading, to see Mehta generalize Maharashtrians as the goons of Bombay, while the Gujaratis were the peace-loving “seths”, the South Indians the educated officers and Muslims the victims of all the Maharashtrians’ racial hatred. Metha makes this sweeping generalization, not once, but several times (in the few pages that I have read).

But here’s what hit the nail in my coffin of displeasure:

“Name-changing is in vogue all over India nowadays: Madras has been renamed Chennai; Calcutta, that British-made city, has changed its name to Kolkata… This is a process not just of decolonization but of de-Islamicization. The idea is to go back not just to past but an idealized past, in all cases a Hindu past. But to change a name, for a person or a road or a city, there had better be a very good reason. And there was no good reason to change the name of Bombay. It is nonsense to say that Mumbai was the original name… In 1995, the Sena demanded that we choose… Mumbai. This is how the ghatis took revenge on us. They renamed everything after their politicians, and finally they renamed even the city. If they couldn’t afford to live on our roads, they could at least occupy the road signs.”(141)

Oh no. Did he just refer to Maharashtrians as “ghatis [that] took revenge”?? When he said “us” did he mean the Gujaratis? And when he says “politicians” does he mean Shivaji?? Do you think as a Maharashtrian I will have any impetus to read this book? I am brave, but I am not an idiot.

And by the way, in these few hundred pages, Mehta continuously talks about how over-crowded Bombay is. If anyone planning to go to Bombay chooses to read this book first, it’ll solve the over-crowding problem right away. Amitav Ghosh is my favorite writer and I don’t know what he was on when he wrote the glowing recommendation on the jacket.

PS: This might be the longest rant for a book I have not entirely read.

PPS: Because I hate the book so much, there’s is no visual aid to help you look for it in bookshops.

The first time I heard about Narendra Jadhav was when my father told me about him. Coincidentally, Jadhav’s original book in Marathi is titled Amcha Baap ani Amhi (i.e. Our father and Us), and just like Jadhav’s father was responsible for his education, my father is a constant source of my interest in reading. Although it would have been a pleasure for me to read Jadhav’s original work in Marathi, I was just as happy to see his book at a friend’s place and remembered his name in spite of the gap in time that I first heard about him.

Initially I had a rough time reading the book because I was constantly reminded of the fact that it was translated from Marathi to English. The language seemed awkward and I wondered if that was because of translation difficulties or just a bad case of translating phrases. [1] I wondered if translating this book was a mistake. But as I kept going on, the story started to become more important than the language. When I got to the end and read Jadhav’s own writing from his perspective (rather than his father’s or mother’s, which is the case through most of the book), I realized that Jadhav’s own language was fluent and rich in its simplicity and intellect.

For a Marathi-speaking girl, this book was a fairly easy read, and I’m not sure how someone who is completely removed from the life that Jadhav describes will identify or empathize with him. But judging from the book’s success and wide-spread recognition, I don’t think that was a problem. And for precisely that reason, I hope that the book is read by more people. In Maharashtra caste-system is still a problem, and I’ve experienced it first hand, when an aunt refused to accept her daughter-in-law, who was supposedly from the “lower” or “backward” class. My grandmother, who was very advanced and educated for her years, was not open-minded about the caste-system and it was disappointing to have such people in the family. Fortunately, my parents never made such distinctions. Jadhav’s book is a great reflection on the life of the people who come from the lower caste of the Hindu religious system. Can you tolerate being labeled “untouchable”? Can you imagine how it feels to have restrictions on moving about in society, with a broom attached to your waist, so you’re constantly wiping out your own existence? Jadhav talks about this, all the way up to Dr Ambedkar, who initiated the movement to discontinue the caste-system. Dr Ambedkar’s influence on Jadhav’s father and Jadhav himself is quite heavy and it is really useful to read about Ambedkar’s work.

Overall, although it started sort of strangely, I got engrossed in this book, and only hope that more such works get translated into English, so that the world is aware of the intricacies of India and its history.

[1] Most Marathi readers will tell you what a big tragedy it is that P.L. Deshpande cannot be translated into English and we’re robbing the English-reading public of one of Maharashtra’s greatest writers.

Around two years ago when I was a new student in the United States, the International Students program hooked us up with American families. The Browns and I were introduced because of our similar interests in reading and books. A few meetings later, the Brown family asked me whether I would like to take some of their books, of which they had extra copies, while they were cleaning out their library. Of course, I jumped to the offer. A week later I was a few dozen books richer. I adored the new books, most of them hard bound. But I had very little time to read or even look at them. The following year, a group of us working at the Writing Studio at the department were discussing books set in the University. Someone suggested a book called The Secret History. I had never heard about the book, but it sounded vaguely familiar. That evening, I rummaged through my books and was pleasantly surprised to find the book nestled between others. I didn’t read it then, and wondered if I ever would, because it seemed dense and rather long.

Lack of reading material pushed me to pick this book up and I was quite surprised that it pulled me in. The Secret History is Donna Tartt’s first novel and a bestseller. This is quite strange taking into consideration the unusual story and structure of the book. In this first few pages itself, the narrator, Richard Papen, tells us that he and his friends have just killed their friend Bunny. The story then goes back in time and chronologically reveals the events that lead to the murder and so forth. But the suspense does not end there. Richard’s life at the new university and his amalgamation into a special group of students studying Greek is very interesting, especially for someone who has had a taste of university life. All the characters in Richard’s story are uniquely weird - he tells us a lot about them, but they are mysterious with secrets of their own. The twins Camilla and Charles, the distant yet friendly Francis, the elusive and magnetic Henry Winter, the oddly normal and uncharismatic Bunny and Richard. The six of them form an unlikely group - studying under the aegis of the parental Julian Morrow.

The plot is linear, with several allusions that literary lovers might (or might not) recognize. The story is simple enough yet and has details that can be scratched off the surface if needed. Until the very end, the author keeps the plot moving, giving the characters and reader no rest. The story affects your mind, forcing you to see beyond reality and fiction, to analyze the affect of life and taking it away. Tartt’s characters are young, but they are strong and mature beyond their years. Richard Papen makes an agreeable protagonist, trying to find his way in a new world.

The Secret History is jarringly new in its creation of an old world in a modern country. The six students are just as human as the next person, but their love for Greek makes them a little extra-ordinary. Anyone who loves what they do will identify with these characters. The book makes for a very interesting read, especially to anyone who has come close to academia.

You might have experienced this. Whenever you hear too many praises for a book, and you read it, you don’t like it that much. The heightened expectations sort of spoil the pure, innocent experience of reading. However, there is an exception to every rule (or gross assumption).

Hosseini’s epic tale of an affluent Afghan family begins from the point of view of the young heir to the richness, Amir. The story spans over twenty-five years, skipping unimportant time periods. What is fascinating (or strange, as your perception deems) is that in spite of the quarter century mark, the story revolves around one essential incident witnessed by Amir. The novel however is far from simple. Amir is the protagonist of the novel, but his father and his friend Hassan steal as much of the limelight, and deservingly so. In my reading, Amir did not even stand up to the responsibility of being the central character, but his human flaws and his endearingly fearful nature redeem him towards the end of the book. Amir grows along with the movement of the story and by the end we’re cheering on for this helpless, caged young man who tries hard to change the doomed nature of his life.

Hosseini’s style is crisp, beautiful and succinct. Somewhere right in the middle of the novel, the story slackens and starts to slow down, but even that seems natural as you go on reading. It picks up pace in the last hundred pages, and you’ll find yourself reaching out for the book every now and then.

The beauty of most well written books - I’ve come to believe - is not in what they say, but in what they don’t. And although Hosseini’s says a lot, and says it perfectly, the beauty of his writing is in all that he leaves to the reader’s imagination.