Galle Literary festival 2010

Time flies... the festival is back again in 2 months. Saw a festival-related news on the paper. Fathima Bhutto will be one of the guest speakers this time.

My highlight of the upcoming festival will be Michael Frayn. I loved reading and directing 'Copenhagen' for a university production.

Galle Literary Festival this year

The annual festival this year will be from Jan 28 - 31.

I am very much interested in going to the following programmes:
(1) Where I escaped the tyranny of the typewriter - the tour of Taprobane island by its owner and the festival founder Geoffrey Dobbs. I have been interested in visiting this tiny private island off the coast of Matara where the rooms are rented out at exorbitant prices of over 100 dollars a night.

(2) Out of Africa - reading from Abyssinian chronicles and new writing from Africa by Moses Isegewa

(3) Time/Travel - Colin Thubron's recounting of his 7000 mile journey along the ancient silk road from China to eastern Turkey

(4) Beyond Schindler - Robert Keneally's talk about his other works

Joke of the week

Last week, I received a book package from an editor of a journal. This was a journal for whom I had sent a book review earlier, at their request.

So, when I received a package, I assumed first that it contained the journal with my review published. Luckily, in time, I saw that the package was addressed to someone and C/o my name and address. I didn't know who this said person was but thought it may have been a mistake on the editor's part and that name had been inserted by mistake when it was actually for me. Especially since I had not been requested if it was ok with me to receive a book on behalf of someone else and hand it over to someone else and I didn't think anyone would be foolish enough to spend money and courier a book all the way from Canada to a wrong address in the other part of the globe.

Anyway, I decided to write to the editor and clarify before opening the package. I simply asked her what the package was, for whom was it and why has it been sent addressed to someone C/o me.

I got the funniest reply ever:
"Thank you for your message. Do you know E_ ? If so, the book is for her to review."

So, now I have a book in my hand without anyone to give it to. Might as well have a look at it myself or donate it to the local library.

I am not pleased anymore that my first academic book review will be published in that journal.

Poetry competition

Anyone interested in writing poetry, the Poetry Society's 2008 competition might interest you.

Some beautiful photos

from Sri Lanka... A talented friend's album...

The Last lecture

by Professor Randy Pausch is a very touching and inspiring lecture delivered on September 2007.

I recommend all to watch these four videos: Part I, Part II, Part III and Part IV which are on ABC news. The last lecture is an annual lecture at Carnegie Mellon, except that for Professor Pausch, it is more significant, as his doctors had said that he has only 3-6 months to live. The Last Lecture has also been published as a book and was launched on April 8 2008. His discussion with his co-author on Jeff Zaslow can be found here and his interview with ABC news from October 2007 to April 2008.

I wish the Professor the best in building the safety net for his family and that they will always appreciate his legacy.

You can find Professor Randy Pausch page on the Carnegie Mellon university website and his blog updates on his health.

His software project, Alice, which is a project that teaches computer programming to students, especially female students, in a 3D environment through creating animation for a story script.

Sad news: Professor Randy Pausch passed away at his home on July 25 2008. If you want to leave a message for his family, you can do so at the Last lecture blog.

Remains of the Day

I saw the movie when it had been released years ago before I read Kazuo Ishiguro's book this month. I recalled the pace of the movie had been slow and had had a stuffy atmosphere. The book too was the same.

On completing the book, I felt a sense of sadness for the protaganist who had lost the most important part of his life in his fixedness with his duty and realises it only when it is too late.

The writer chose well to choose the profession of butler for his central character to illustrate the stuffiness and constraints of a life focused too much on details within the profession, while missing out on the living.

Sommarnatt leende

Or, Smiles of a summer night.

Funny that the three years that I lived in Sweden, I never bothered to watch a Swedish movie and yet when I came across a Swedish movie at my DVD store last month, I had enthusiastically bought it. I guess I was also interested in watching a movie directed by the famous Ingmar Bergman. Anyway, treated myself to the movie last night.

A slow moving comedy of mixed matches and each character finding their correct partner in the end. With all the eight characters portrayed as devious and out to get what they want from relationships and having a surprising outspokenness when discussing love or marital relationships, I was surprised at the difference in approach from the American and Indian movies I had seen from the period. The actors and actresses were theatrical in their acting, especially as if they were acting on a stage, and therefore their characters were a little wooden and it would have helped had they acted more naturally thereby enhancing the story.

I wonder whether the house that was used in the movie is the house of Prins Waldermarsudde, the uncle of the current King of Sweden, and now a museum.

Kalki

When I saw that there was a translated book of Kalki's short stories on the Penguin website, I had immediately decided to get hold of that book.

Kalki, for those who don't know him, is a Tamil writer who took the world of Tamil writing by storm in the 20th century. I remember that my mother said she had read his works avidly during her school days. I myself had not read any of his writing and one look at the humungous novel 'Ponniyin Selvan' threw me off reading it in Tamil. So, it was a pleasure to be finally introduced to the work of a prominent writer in Tamil literature.

This particular book, is a selection of his short stories from the 129 short stories that he had written in his lifetime (1899 - 1954) and translated by his granddaughter Gowri Ramnarayan. Gowri Ramnarayan states in her introduction to the book that she had started translating some of the short stories so that her children could experience the writing of their great grandfather and as they had found reading his Tamil difficult. She also gives a nice sketch of her grandfather's life and how the pseudonym 'Kalki' was derived from the first letter of his writing mentor Kalyanasundara Mudaliyar and the first letter from his own name Krishnamoorthy.

A thinker and writer living in the pre and post independence era of India would have been greatly influenced by the prevalent reformist thoughts of the time and most of the selected short stories seem to have a social message pertaining to the social evils of that period: from the need for education for all women (The letter), to the abolishment of the caste system (The poison cure), in support of the freedom struggle movement (The big swelling sea, Madatevan's spring) and against suicide attempts by young lovers (The ruined fort).

Throughout his stories, there seems to run a light playfulness. Even in the above short stories written with a social message in mind. When Annapurani Devi, the founder principal of Devi Vidyalaya - a school for women, confides in her younger colleague the reason behind why she embarked on her path of studies and felt that all women had to learn to read first, the reason that she had been unable to read a missive given her by her lover had resulted in losing out on the relationship, seems to be so pathetic and trivial that I felt the writer was at once laughing and yet sad about the state of affairs.

He also embarks on light satire in the Governor's visit, Rural fantasy and The tiger king.

I guess the reader of today would find the messages in the story obsolete and simplistic today but for the reader who would be interested in learning more about the prevalent social issues of Tamil Nadu and Tamil writing during that period would be rewarded.

The Yacoubian Building

I was glancing at the backcover of a book displayed at the cash counter at a book&CD store in a mall in Amman during my October visit, while waiting for my purchase to be processed, when the cashier said, "You should read that book. It is really good and will give you a complete insight into the Arab's way of life and especially an understanding of the women and why things are the way they are now."

With this strong recommendation, I glanced again more seriously at the back cover to see what the novel was about and whether it did tackle in some way the lives of Arab women. It did have a high blown statement, "This controversial bestselling novel in the arab world reveals the political corruption, sexual repression, religious extremism, and modern hopes of Egypt today." It went on to describe a building and the various residents of that building.

For the enthusiastic young cashier, who probably had never read that book and was practicing her sales skills, and for the nose ring she wore, I decided to go ahead and buy the book, translated into English by Humphrey Davies. Moreover, I have not had the opportunity to read any novel written by an Arab writer.

Simply put, the Yacoubian Building is primarily focussed on sexual interactions and how women are viewed by the male characters in the book as sexual objects and the female characters themselves viewing themselves as such. That the book presumes to give an indication of 'modern hopes of Egypt today' is I feel an overstatement given the limited focus of the novel.

However, the writer has a certain talent for satire, the way he presents his characters as if he is laughing at them all the time. I also liked the writer's personal opinion coming out when he puts the satire in hideous Hagg Azzam's thoughts, after he has successfully divorced his second wife without even providing a decent alimony and after having forced her to abort their child without her permission, "As a man will flick off with his fingers a few flecks of dust that have clung to the breast of his smart suit and continue on his way as though nothing has happened, so Hagg Azzam got rid of Souad Gaber and was able to erase his affection for her... Beautiful poor women were in good supply and wedlock was holy, not something anyone could be reproached for."

Also, while the author makes fun of the central character of Zaki Bey throughout the book, he has a change of heart towards the end and decides that his character will be redeemed and have a happier ending than the rest of the characters in the book.

Excerpts from Alaa Al Aswany's book is given here.

A quite interesting reading into the lives of the characters who lead miserable lives, especially the female characters.

Delhi

An absorbing historical novel by Khushwant Singh on the history of the city from the Moghul invasions to 1984. The past and the present are linked nicely and gives the reader a good view of both at the same time. I couldn't put down the book once I had started it and read through the day till I came to the end.

I loved the way that the guide would take some of his clients to a site and tell the summary of the story behind the ruins and the next chapter would take the reader back to the time when the ruins were flourishing living areas. I also loved the thoughtfulness that the writer had put into introducing characters at different levels of society, from kings and queens to labourers and sweepers, at each point when the past is brought to life, thus bringing the reader awareness of how the society as a whole existed, rather than focus on only one section of the society.

It was interesting to read the character of Aurangzeb treated favourably in the novel, while Shah Jahan and his eldest son Dara's character not so favourably treated, in contrast to popular fictive takes on idolizing Shah Jahan and vindicating the son who became the successor to the throne. The writer choses to do this by showing that ruling families will always be fraught with survival of the fittest which they do so by eliminating potential competition, their own siblings. In light of this, he suggests that when Aurangzeb came to the throne by killing his two brothers and imprisoning the third, Murad, for life and confining his old father to the confines of the Agra fort, along with his eldest and youngest sisters for the remainder of their life, he was doing what his line of ancestors had been doing so, including his own father, and thus he could not be looked upon as a tyrant king. He also further goes to highlight the fact that he was the first and only ruler who choose not to live the royal life the royal way but lived meagerly on his own earnings from the sale of the religious books he copied in his own hand, while treating state wealth as being in his custody for the state and not for his own pleasures. Neither did he maintain a harem as was the trend of the Mughals. It was an interesting insight into a character who has been blackened in history and provides a angle which seeks to show the personal traits which governed his actions. Even the demolition of places of worship other than Islam was explained by his devout Islamic upbringing and his concern that his father and brothers were deviating from a life that should be inherent for a good Muslim and he felt that as a ruler he had to show all his subjects that Islam was the only religion of God.

What is special about the book is that while the writer has clear feelings about the characters he brings to life through his writing, he justifies the actions of each in their lives by recreating their upbringing, their personal paths in lives which brings them to a particular place and action in time, thereby inviting the reader to not judge but simply observe the historical passing moments.

The book also manages to link the actions in the past with results in the future. The killing of a Sikh Guru in the past resulting in a movement centuries down the line, vowing revenge and the actions of later day leader of India, Indira Gandhi to quench this rising with violence leading to her own assassination, which in turn results in the state supported killings of Sikhs living in Delhi.

The story also highlighted the toils and labours and petty vanity that human beings put into their brief existence on this earth and that it is meaningless in the passing of time and yet, history continues repeating its horrors and power struggles and power hungry individuals bring up some historical incident to justify their actions to the rest of the world, while it is pure greed or sadly mistaken logic that drives them on to destruction. Yet, life goes on and these human made destructions a drop in the continuing violence in the existence of human beings. And, will the earth continue tolerating these violations on her?

A story very well handled by the writer and the language flawlessly flowing to create visions of the past.

I now look forward to getting hold of Khushwant's Singh more famous book 'A train to Pakistan'.