The Distorted Mirror by R K Laxman: Curios and Collectibles

R K Laxman, creator of common man is the most revered of Indian cartoonists. Many cartoons that he drew decades ago still resonate with the political and social situations of the country. The Distorted Mirror is a collection of his writings and includes short stories, short travelogues and sketches in prose.

After reading the book, I felt that stories are the weakest in the lot. For me they were a little bland and too simplistic. An Accident, the first and then best of the lot is a mystery about how a newspaper became a murder weapon. The Golden Frame is a story about a frame maker who accidentally spoils a revered photograph of his client and his attempts to restore it. Other stories are simple childhood anecdotes which has just a very low amusement value.

Travelogues are considerably better written than stories, though I felt more details would have considerably added to the reading pleasure. The writer just superficially touches on the aspects about the places that he visited. But we can clearly see his acute observation skills illuminating the sceneries that he describes now and then.

The third segment contains sketches about his life, career and society. The ones about cartoons are clearly great pieces, must read in my opinion because of the glimpses they give into his genius mind.

But the elements that stand out in the book are the illustrations by the author. They supplement the text beautifully lending it personality. It is not a surprise as R K Laxman is in his elements while doing what he does best.

As an admirer of R K Laxman, I am not satisfied with The Distorted Mirror. But it does not in any way takes away the greatness of the cartoonist in my mind. I have a feeling that these pieces are curios made for amusing himself rather than for public consumption, collected for commercial sake.

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The Spy by Paulo Coelho: Crossing Wisdom and Wikipedia

When Paulo Coelho's novel The Alchemist was published more than a decade back, I had really enjoyed it. Not because it was great literature, but for the simple wisdom that it dissipated and for the dazzling narrative. Later I tried reading his subsequent novels like Veronica Decides to Die and Adultery. But I wasn't able to move past 50 pages every time. When I chose to read his latest novel, The Spy, I decided to read on and finish it no matter. Surprisingly, it took just two hours to read.

The Spy is a story about Mata Hari, the famed femme fatale, the queen of espionage, as legends claim. I had heard about her intriguing story of seducing army men, trading top secrets and daring double crosses. The biggest take away from this book was the knowledge that this was all an eye-wash and in fact Mata Hari was a victim of war games between nations. She had taken jobs of smuggling war secrets for Germans and for French with money and favors as remuneration, but it seems the only secrets she diverged were gossips. When the French arrested and executed her, as her prosecutor later divulged, there was not enough evidence even fit to punish a cat against her.

There was enough scope in her life to write in hundred different angles and come up with a great novel. But Coelho chose to squander the opportunity and write a quick, shallow book that never goes in depth into her psyche or persona. I felt that for writing this book, he selected hundreds of motivational quotes that we regularly share on social media and joined them together using a plot copied from the Wikipedia page  of Mata Hari. I can tell that because after reading the book I visited the Wikipedia page and I could see passages lifted verbatim!

The Alchemist was good because the motivational message gelled with the plot being told, but in case of The Spy, the plot suffers due to the author's fetish for disbursing street wisdom in between every sentence. I felt he did a disservice to Mata Hari, who I feel is not an emotional wretch as the novel depicts. The dialogues too were too much mushy and generative for my liking. But like hundreds of motivational images shared daily on the Facebook wall, some of the wisdom hits the mark and we are able to resonate with it. If you are into that, then you will like this book.

The first half of the novel, I feel strangely find parallels with author's literary endeavours. Mata Hari after living in Indonesia for some time and learning the local dance form, later imitates it titillatingly in her stage shows leading to tremendous praise from top critics and public. After repeating it for years and leading to the emergence of several imitators, all got tired of her and her popularity declined. Paulo Coelho struck gold by writing a novel that infused traditional wisdom from east and west in the form of a fable. With The Spy I think he is tapering off like his protagonist.

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When Breath Becomes Air: Dealing With The Ultimate Certainty

There are books that tugs your emotions. There are books that make you ponder on existence. There are books that adds new perspectives about your dealing with life. Then, there are very few books that achieve all these and more..! One such is When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi, who was a neurosurgeon diagnosed with incurable lung cancer. This book is an effort by the author to frame his perspectives about staring on imminent death, with hopes that his experiences may be helpful to others sharing his fate.

The only certainty in an otherwise totally uncertain life- of which we have no idea where it may take us the next moment- is death. But for all of us death is an abstraction, a highly improbable event lurking in a distant, blurred future. It is an evolutionary trait that serves our survival as a species. But what would be our reaction when we get a solid reference of how our death may occur? What will we do with the remaining time that we have? How will we look at our loved ones after that? How will our priorities change?

Paul was a skilled neurosurgeon. He became one as a result of his quest for the meaning of life. His searches in literature and philosophy lead him to his decision that being a neurologist may help him to explore human mind. In his thirties, he believed he had a bright future and was looking forward to a great career. But then the bad news befell. His priorities changed, his outlook changed. This book is about how Paul, without turning cynical, faced his future and created something that have the potential for making the world a better place to live.

Before his diagnosis, his married life was on the verge of collapse. But the news of his terminal illness brought him and his wife Lucy together again. They even decided to have a kid. There is a beautiful and profound love story here, to be found in between pages. Lucy became instrumental in publishing this book after Paul's death and the epilogue written by her makes us appreciate and understand Paul's philosophy and his motives.

What struck me while reading the book was the contrast between two extremely opposite roles that Paul had to don intermittently- that of a doctor and a patient. On one role he was the subject, something to be treated on while one other role he became the doer, who treat other subjects. The book deals considerably on his struggles in balancing these two roles.

His mulling on his future is another important theme that interested me. With every development of his illness, with every recovery and every setback, he has to balance his views about future, alter his priorities and make decisions. He states that if he knew he had three months to live he would spend time with family, if he had a year he would write a book and if he had ten years he would get back to doing surgeries.

When Breath Becomes Air is a phenomenal read because it is a pure exercise in writing.  It is not written for money or fame or not with the intention of an entry in best seller list. It is written with the most basic intention why books are written- to communicate an idea, to tell the world what one has in mind. And this book tells something that is very important in a beautiful manner.

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നന്മ നിറഞ്ഞവർ...

ബംഗാളി നോവലുകളായിരിക്കും മലയാളത്തിലേക്ക് ഏറ്റവും കൂടുതലായി വിവർത്തനം ചെയ്യപ്പെട്ടിട്ടുള്ള ഭാരതീയ ഭാഷാസാഹിത്യം. എത്രയോ മികച്ച ബംഗാളി കൃതികൾ മലയാളത്തിൽ വായിക്കാൻ സാധിച്ചിട്ടുണ്ട്- ആനന്ദമഠം, പ്രഥമപ്രതിശ്രുതി, ആരോഗ്യനികേതനം... ഇപ്പോൾ വായിച്ചു തീര്‍ത്ത നോവലാണ് ബിഭൂതിഭൂഷൺ ബന്ദ്യോപാധ്യായയുടെ ആദർശ ഹിന്ദു ഹോട്ടൽ. 1930കളിൽ പുറത്തു വന്ന ഈ ആഖ്യായിക, ഒരു ശുദ്ധഗതിക്കാരനായ പാചകക്കാരന്റെ കഥയാണ്.

ബിഭൂതിഭൂഷണിന്റെ പഥേർ പാഞ്ചാലി വായിച്ചവർക്കറിയാം അദ്ദേഹത്തിന്റെ കഥകളുടെ ലാളിത്യം. ആദർശ ഹിന്ദു ഹോട്ടലും ഇതേ പാരമ്പര്യം പിന്തുടരുന്നു. ഇതിൽ വായനക്കാരന്റെ ഉള്ളുലച്ച് കളയാനുദ്ദേശിച്ചുള്ള വൈകാരിക പ്രകടനമോ, ആശയ- വർഗ്ഗസംഘട്ടനങ്ങളോ കാണില്ല. എല്ലാ ദൗർബല്ല്യങ്ങളുമുള്ള, എന്നാൽ ചില കഴിവുകളുമുള്ള ഒരു കഥാപാത്രം, ഈ കഴിവുകളും ക്ഷമയും കാരണം ഔന്നത്യങ്ങളിലെത്തിച്ചേരുന്നതാണ് കഥ. തന്നെ സ്നേഹിച്ചവരെയും സഹായിച്ചവരെയും തന്റെ നല്ലകാലത്തിൽ പങ്കാളികളാക്കുന്ന അയാൾ തന്നെ ഉപദ്രവിച്ചവരെപ്പോലും കൈവെടിയുന്നില്ല.

ഒരു നല്ല തര്‍ജമ വായിക്കുമ്പോൾ രണ്ട് ഗുണങ്ങളുണ്ടാകും. അപരിചിതമായ ഒരു നാട്ടിലെ ജീവിതവും ആചാരങ്ങളും വ്യവസ്ഥിതിയും അറിയാനുള്ള സാഹചര്യം ഉണ്ടാക്കിത്തരും. അതേ സമയത്ത് ലോകത്തെ ഏത് നാട്ടിലായാലും ആത്യന്തികമായി മനുഷ്യനെ മനുഷ്യനാക്കുന്ന പൊതുസ്വഭാവങ്ങൾ കാട്ടിത്തരികയും ചെയ്യും. കഴിഞ്ഞ നൂറ്റാണ്ടിലെ ആദ്യപകുതിയിലെ ബംഗാളി ജീവിതത്തിന്റെ മനോഹരമായ ആവിഷ്കാരമാണ് ഈ നോവൽ. അതേ സമയം ഒരാളെ ഉന്നതങ്ങളിലേക്ക് സ്വയം ഉയർത്താനായി വേണ്ട ഗുണങ്ങളെന്താണ് എന്ന അന്വേഷണവുമാണ് ആദർശ ഹിന്ദു ഹോട്ടൽ.

My Praise For Dangal....

Manipulation of viewer's emotions is one of the major yardstick of success for Indian movies, particularly Bollywood films. That is also one way they escape from the clutches of logic and laws of physics. If your movie make viewers overtly emotional- make them cry, laugh, be angry or anything else other than think, you have a winner on your hand.

Aamir Khan is one movie maker (I would say movie maker because, as he involves in the production of his movies too, he definitely is a decision maker in the process) who is the master of manipulation games as evident from his movies like Lagaan and Taare Zameen Par. I am not demeaning him by this statement, I am being positive. His major achievement is that people expect something different every time his new film is announced. He delivers consistently by making movies with unique themes that also entertains because their structure doesn't vary from other standard Bollywood movies. Audience feel that they are watching something fresh, at the same time they are still in very much their familiar territory.

His latest movie Dangal is not different. I don't want to go into details about the movie itself. But it is a standard Aamir Khan fare- it's about a social issue, it entertains you a lot, it is well made in technical and artistic fronts, Aamir does a brilliant job and the same time ensures that his co-actors get meaty parts themselves, thereby backing his performance.

But my praise for the movie is for another matter. If you remember Aamir's movie Taare Zameen Par, which is about the proper upbringing of kids, you will be astonished to find that this movie portrays something extremely opposite. The easiest way out for the makers was to cover it up beautifully in emotions so that we won't identify this discrepancy.

But here their choice was to show it off by making Aamir's character a bit in grey shade and his behaviour bordering on child abuse. It adds another dimension to the movie. And that is why I feel the movie should be praised, along with several other positives. It gives an opportunity for the viewer to think.