A look in the mirror

I've been brought up on a diet of English and American Writing. I first read Indian writing in English in my late teens, loved some of it, found the rest quite pedestrian. But this is not about the quality of English or American or Indian writing.

As I make my first, tentative attempts at story telling, I've realised what this extremely western diet of literature has done to me. It's made me feel unnatural about using Indian names in my stories. At the same time, I feel false if I try to situate a story in any place but India. Do you see the dichotomy there?

More than the dichotomy though, I felt a gut wrenching sadness when I realised this. I like to think of myself as sufficiently over the colonial hangover. Of not looking up blindly to the west, of being sufficiently appreciative and proud of my culture. And here I am, fighting in my mind over what name sounds more attractive! This is what a lifetime of exposure can do to you. 

I am left with a sense of envy for authors like Murakami and Pamuk, who write in their own language and yet connect with audiences across the world.

Tolkien - the influences that could have shaped Middle Earth

I was rabbit holing through the web today, as I am often won't to do on a light and/or moody day. I first stumbled onto to this infographic (I was searching for a Lord of the Rings book cover for a little home project and google images threw up this result):

After promptly pinning it to my bookworm pin board, I happened to browse through the blog on which this infographic was posted.

I was pretty surprised to find J.R.R Tolkien (and C.S Lewis) being described as Christian authors on the blog. Now I'll admit I don't research authors much but Tolkien is one of my absolute favourites and I've read most of what he's written on Middle Earth. And it never struck me as particularly Christian. However, now that I think about it, there are similarities - the creation story, that of the elves being exiled from the home of the Valar in the western lands (the fall from the Garden of Eden), the battle between good and evil. I wonder though if Tolkien meant it to be Christian so to speak.

From what I've read Tolkien's intention was to create a British mythology but I'd definitely be interested to find out if there was a strong (and intended) Christian influence in Tolkien's writing. As a first step I plan to pick up this compilation of letters that Tolkien himself wrote once the Kindle version is out in November this year. If anyone out there has any other suggestions, do drop in a note.

I'd definitely love to delve deeper into the influences that shaped Tolkien's expansive and wonderfully imagined fictional world. I think it's one of the most completely imagined alternate universes ever written about!

In time

Just yesterday, I was thumbing through (well not literally... what do you expect in this digital age?) some photographs from last year's trip and I stumbled upon some photographs that I hadn't processed, uploaded or shared with anyone. Going through them, I realised that back then I'd let them be because I wasn't sure they were good enough and also because by the time I got around to this last set of photos, I felt everyone had heard enough about my trip... I really couldn't stop talking about it back then!!!

But then as I browsed through these pictures yesterday, I saw a story emerge. The story that I had observed personally as I went to visit the floating villages on the Great Lake in Cambodia and had managed to capture to some extent in the pictures. A year ago, each photo was an individual moment in time, capturing a part but not the whole of that experience (it was one of the experiences that touched me the most on that trip simply because taking a boat down that river, all on my own, brought me a serenity that is often hard to come by). Yesterday, seeing the photos again, I could see what had amazed me and the story that I wanted to tell of a life lived so differently from anything I know and of the incredulousness that I felt at some of the things I saw -Churches, Schools, A restaurant, a tourist shopping complex - all floating in the middle of an humongous lake!

Sometimes, distance and time are good things I suppose.

The set of six photographs that I finally uploaded out of this lot is on my flickr stream.

"Shady"

English is a funny language and its words even funnier. Imagine you are walking on the road with a friend and (s)he says to you, "Let's go to a shady place." While you may not exactly slap the other person, the thing that pops into your head when you hear that is, "ewww that sounds so gross." And it does too. 

Now imagine this: You are climbing up a mountain (or should I say trekking). You are walking on rocks, through under growth and there are spiders, crabs and insects all around you. The sun chooses this very day to be at its sunshiny best and is beating down upon you. No matter how you twist and turn, it is sure to catch your back, your head, or some other part of you. Beads of sweat drip down your face and soon your clothes will feel like you went for a swim wearing them. 

When someone now says to you, "Let's find a shady place", believe you me, you are going to jump at the opportunity and try to accomplish the task in a jiffy. And if the other person leads you to one, you'll thank and bless them. 

Such are the vagaries of the language brought to India by the British.

It's Been A While

It's been a while... not just since I wrote, but since I visited my own blog. A lot's happened. Putting it factually, I've moved to Mumbai and finally started work. 

One and a half lazy months at home have not prompted me to write nor has the move to a new city (though my head is abuzz with thoughts). Maybe a prodded visit to my blog will. I shall keep my fingers crossed. :)

There will come a time to say more, I guess.

The Truth in Letters

“Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup
They slither wildly as they slip away
Across the universe
Pools of sorrow, waves of joy are drifting through my opened mind
Possessing and caressing me”

--The Beatles (Across the Universe)

Words sometimes are so apt, so perfect. In rare moments, they state a truth so simply, becoming poetry and music from mere words.

Melodies and lyrics floating in the wind name the nameless; random strains weave to make perfect sense; capturing the memories missed by photos – Memories as they remain in the head and heart.

A chng in da lang

As life gets faster, da words grow shorter. With gr8 thks 2 sms & im, a new eng vocab emerges. Purists would be turning in their grave as they must've when victorian eng was abandoned. But purists be damned, my you's r becoming u's even as I type formal emails & reports.

So maybe an universal language shall come into being where spellings will no longer confuse the confunded, words will be written as they are spoken and much paper and consequently trees will be saved as unnecessary verbosity is done away with. English may yet cease to be the funny language where pneumonia is spelt with a 'p' for god alone knows what reason.

Then again in a spurt of nostalgic recollection, "you" does look more complete than 'u' or is that just me?

PS: Dips in response to your comment, I heartily agree. The "da" in the title is to drive home the point!

G-Talk - Taglines and more

craptastic life

available...very available

in waiting line...

in office

do geese see god?

when did reality become TV?

From the mundane to the obscure to the profound. Reading other people's g-talk taglines has become quite a hobby of mine. People put up everything from poetry to abuses. And surprisingly most if it is very honest and hence, rather illuminating. They reflect moods, desires, and everyone's own private reality in a very public domain.

I read somewhere the other day that the Internet has changed our generation, our notions of private and public. We put in the virtual world, things we would never say or show face to face. The neon stripping away veils that shroud the private in the harsh glare of sunshine. Virtuality mirroring reality far more than reality itself, opening windows, giving glimpses.