Orhan Pamuk’s Snow: Tiring But Insightful

In Orhan Pamuk’s acclaimed novel Snow, a middle aged writer on political exile returns to his home country only to find that everything that was once familiar to him is changed. The novel set in Kars, a border town in Turkey, is a multilayered story dealing with subjects as varied as the conflict between East and West, religion, belief, God, secularism,love, art and power. The book has a snail-like pace, but rewards the patient reader with several profound insights about the topics it deal with. It makes us think about real people living and dealing with issues in a world where the gap between politics and religion is getting narrow by the day. Ka reaches the border city of Kars (Snow) as a journalist to investigate the suicide of several young girls and also to report on the mayoral elections. The previous mayor was killed and this time Muhtar Bey, of an Islamic party is the popular candidate expected to win the election. Radical Islam is slowly getting popular in a nation governed by seculars. The secular government has banned girls coming to educational institutes wearing head scarves. Political Islamists claim this as the reason for suicides. Ka has one more personal agenda to fulfill- returning to Germany with his old lover Ipek, ex-wife of Muhtar. Heavy snowfall blocks the road for three days and there occurs a chain of events that change the life of everyone in Kars. Ka witness the death of an official and a drama troupe with the help of secret police and ex-military personnel conducts a coup. These events makes everyone involved introspect and find what is really important to them in life. More than the plot, it is the characterization that makes this novel interesting. Each person in the story is integral to the plot. Every one of the characters is strong willed and has their own value system according to which they act. Some of them like Blue, the enigmatic terrorist and Sunoy, the actor who leads the coup, pronounce their belief outright. But some of them like Ipek or Kadife, her sister reveals it through their actions. Snow that falls incessantly and blocks all the exits to Kars is also an integral character in the drama. Sometimes Snowfall is contributes to solitude, sometimes to happiness and many other emotions according to the occasions. Ka gets back his ability to write poems in Kars and later he organizes his poems that ‘come to him’ in Kars in the shape of a snow flake.Orhan Pamuk’s Snow is a profound novel that can be tiring but also insightful to readers who are ready to invest their time and effort.

A weird dream

I have had my share of weird dreams. Flying snakes, war scenarios, cob webs, oceans, guns, dragons, whales, pirate ships, mountains, ghosts… you name it, I’ve seen it. I’ve even dreamed waking up, doing my regular chores and going to office, only to wake up and find that I’ve to do it all over again. But these days I’ve acquired a knack of forgetting my dreams just moments after waking up. So there are mornings when I ponder hard about that great dream that I had moments before, but all that draws in my mind is a blank wall. Last week one early morning I saw this dream that lingered a little while in my mind even after waking up. I don’t remember the whole episode but just some highlights and the ending, as it caught me totally off guard. I am not a person who believes that dreams point to one’s future or analyzing the images and the symbols in dreams can give insights to one’s psychology. But if any of you can make any deduction with this one, I don’t mind you sharing it with me. I saw myself at a relatives’ place. They are very close relatives of mine, or so I should assume by the manner I behaved with them. (Now don’t ask me how I am related to them. I don’t have any idea, nor am I remembering any of their faces.) Time is late evening and I have to return from there to Bangalore. Bus starts at 10 pm, but before that I have to pick the rest of my family from a nearby place. Many people are entering the household, greeting me and chatting with me. I am looking at my watch and noting that it is time to go. Then I noticed that these guys have a dog at their home. And what a dog it was! I should call it a hound... such a ferocious and mean looking dog. I saw it standing on its hind legs and effortlessly placing its forelegs on the shoulder of a man. And then it was time for me to move from there. I collected my luggage, bid farewell to the people there and walked towards the place my family was. I walked some distance and looked back to see the hound and another dog following me. The other dog was a dwarf compared with the hound. Its barking was more of yelping and was irritating. It tried to run behind me and when I threw an imaginary stone at it, ran back and hid behind a tree. All this time the hound was peacefully strolling behind me with an indifferent look on its face. I was about to reach my destination, just few more meters will take me there. The hound increased its pace. It was just behind me within seconds. I turned back to face it with a slight tension in my mind. The hound stood on its hind legs, placed its forelegs on my shoulders, looked on my face with a friendly expression and enquired: “What time is your bus?” “Ten O clock” I replied calmly.

SPIRITual Bliss And A Bewildered Friend

A couple of years back, I had met this guy from North India who was on a short term assignment to Bangalore. He was a pale, lean and tall person, so naive that I crossed a busy Bangalore road and had to wait for ten minutes for him to cross. I had spent a couple of days with him and had took him around our locality to show the place. Everything in Bangalore- food, transport, culture, language, people- was all very new to him. If you are from Bangalore, you probably will be familiar with the sight of men fallen on ground in deep drunken stupor- in a real SPIRITual bliss. That day when I took him to a crowded market there were three of them lying just some ten meters apart. When my friend saw this sight that was alien to him, he stared for some moments, then looked at me and whispered nervously: "They are not dead. Are they?" "No, they aren't... I hope they aren't", was my reply. ...who knows?

Book Review: The Krishna Key

The Krishna Key by Ashwin Sanghi falls in the category of conspiracy theory fiction. The fact that it has to compete with such giants like Faucault’s Pendulum or Da Vinci Code makes the task of the writer difficult. But Sanghi has already proven his mettle in story telling with already a best seller Chanakya’s Chant in his credit. Thus the expectation from this novel is sky high. As the name indicates, the novel is an adrenalin ride based on the life of Krishna, the most enigmatic character in Indian mythology. It reads in between the lines of Mahabharatha, Bhagavatha and many other ancient scriptures and tries to tell a story of treasure hunters whose fate lies on solving the clues provided in them.  

The biggest issue with Indian history is its ambiguity. Our ancient history is never recorded in a factorial manner like Greek or Roman history. There are only loose versions of events and personalities spread over many epics, scriptures and folklores. Many incidents are exaggerated, many are subdued and most are allegorized thus leaving many black holes in the narrative. Half baked and prejudiced historic studies in Colonial times also worsened the ambiguity. This gives ample scope for writers to reinterpret the events and form conspiracy theories. Sanghi uses this to his advantage by using up almost all the conspiracy theories related to Indian mythology in his narrative.

A man claiming to be Kalki Avataar, the last of ten incarnations of Lord Vishnu, is on a killing spree. A Professor with expertise in Ancient Indian History is framed for the crimes. His only chance of survival now lies in solving a mystery from past. Along with him or against him in the rat race are some curious personalities with motives of their own- greed, love, loyalty, revenge and piety. An underworld don with a curious lineage, a stubborn lady police officer, a corrupt CBI officer who will do anything for money, a criminal lawyer and so on… Lead by Saini gathering clues from Indian mythology and History, they are on a dangerous journey to uncover a secret from past that can render every modern technology obsolete.

The Krishna Key uses every conspiracy theory and controversial historical theories perpetrated in the subcontinent to prove its point. In Umberto Eco’s novel Faucault’s Pendulum there is a very interesting observation about conspiracy theories. It is very easy to make a connection between too seemingly unconnected events if one has a superficial but wide knowledge and good imagination. In that novel some men starts making a new conspiracy theory for fun and it goes out of their hands, finally they themselves believing the lies. Here too this complex is evident. Every bit of historical information, however farfetched it may seem, is made to bear a connection to Krishna. I am not making this point to demean the work of its immense readability, because in this genre, this quality is a must to make the novel interesting.

The Krishna Key as I have told is very readable thanks to the fast pace, clever plot twists and diverse information thrown at the reader in regular intervals bewildering them. One negative point about the narration is its lack of good characterization. One does not feel a bit for Saini or any other character however deep distress they are in. But this deficiency is mostly covered up by the ambiance that Krishna Key creates in reader’s mind. It takes us into several mystery- laden and exotic places in the subcontinent. I would definitely suggest this novel to people who loves page turners.  

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Acidic Wit: Stories by Saki (H H Munroe)

Saki is one writer who brings back memories of High School English classes- memories of several teachers with their different styles and methodologies, different (mis)pronunciations, mannerisms and different levels of interest they evoke. Saki or H. H. Munro was a regular story writer featuring every year in our English text books. Also if we take any anthology of English short stories, one story by him is a must. So when I saw a collection of Complete Short Stories I grabbed it eagerly and devoured it. 

The book contains stories from five of his collections. The first two Reginald and Reginald In Russia, features his famous character Reginald. He is a young guy, outspoken and infatuated with his own good looks. Theme of all these stories is his unfruitful and embarrassing (for others around him) social interactions. Third collection, The Chronicles of Clovis features Clovis Sangrail, another clever youngster always making elaborate practical jokes much to the discomfort of other civilized beings of society around him. The Beasts and Super Beasts is a collection that involves stories concerning nature. Other two collections – The Toys of Peace and The Square Egg are his early works and stories published posthumously. The stories are readable though comes nowhere near stories from other collections.

Just like many other story writers of his time, the stories by Saki are predominantly humorous. He satirizes the social structure of his times. What makes his stories different from his contemporaries is his scant regard to political correctness and absence of any contempt to his characters. Most of thestories are of pranks played by someone onan unsuspecting victim and in most of the cases the fun causes some sort of permanent damage tothe victim. We never see any poetic justice happening in them. The satire is acidic. Saki makes fun of the pompous upper class, aspiring middle class and struggling lower class alike. These stories thus make a striking social commentary of his times and also to some extent, of ours.