Versedays: New Year's Eve by Charles Lamb

Image Credit: eou

Ah, I can't believe it. This is our last Versedays for this year! This year went by fast and slow at the same time for me. At times it would seem as if time was flying and at others it was unbearably sluggish. All in all a year of mixed feelings, full of moments of happiness, a touch of worry, some celebrations, a bit of sadness, little nostalgia and lots of smiles. Every year is so different.

So is every Verseday, in it's own way. So for our last poem post this year, I decided to post quotes from an essay called New Year's Eve by Charles Lamb. I had this when I was studying as an undergraduate and I remember my teacher telling that though it seems like a sad essay it's not. It ends on a note of optimism. It felt good to revisit it after so many years and here I post some of my favorite passages from the essay. What's more, Lamb also wrote a short poem within the essay, a part of which I have posted. Hope you like the selections.

Here's wishing all our readers an excellent year ahead, filled with joy, love and laughter. Happy New Year!

New Year's Eve by Charles Lamb

Every man hath two birth-days: two days, at least, in every year…


No one ever regarded the First of January with indifference. It is that from which all date their time, and count upon what is left. It is the nativity of our common Adam.


I begin to count the probabilities of my duration, and to grudge at the expenditure of moments and shortest periods, like miser's farthings. In proportion as the years both lessen and shorten, I set more count upon their periods, and would fain lay my ineffectual finger upon the spoke of the great wheel. I am not content to pass away "like a weaver's shuttle."


I am in love with this green earth; the face of town and country; the unspeakable rural solitudes, and the sweet security of streets. I would set up my tabernacle here. I am content to stand still at the age to which I am arrived; I, and my friends: to be no younger, no richer, no handsomer. I do not want to be weaned by age; or drop, like mellow fruit, as they say, into the grave.


Sun, and sky, and breeze, and solitary walks, and summer holidays, and the greenness of fields, and the delicious juices of meats and fishes, and society, and the cheerful glass, and candle-light, and fire-side conversations, and innocent vanities, and jests, and irony itself--do these things go out with life?


Every dead man must take upon himself to be lecturing me with his odious truism, that "such as he now is, I must shortly be." Not so shortly, friend, perhaps, as thou imaginest. In the meantime I am alive. I move about. I am worth twenty of thee. Know thy betters!


Then let us welcome the New Guest
With lusty brimmers of the best;
Mirth always should Good Fortune meet,
And renders e'en Disaster sweet:
And though the Princess turn her back,
Let us but line ourselves with sack,
We better shall by far hold out,
Till the next Year she face about.


And now another cup of the generous! and a merry New Year, and many of them, to you all, my masters!

Versedays: Twas the Night Before Christmas by Clement Clarke Moore

That's "Wish you a Happy Christmas!" in Malaysian!

Image Credit: Birdy

After absconding last week, Versedays is back! Since this is Christmas week, I thought it’s only natural that I feature a poem with that theme. I found some nice, classic poetry written by poets like W B Yeats, Coleridge and Emily Dickinson but none caught my attention. Then, I came across this poem “Twas the Night Before Christmas.” Written by Clement Clarke Moore in the 19th century, it is also known as “A Visit from St Nicholas” and is a classic Christmas verse. In fact, before this poem was written Santa Claus was never associated with reindeers! Today, it is part of tradition, as families across the world read out the poem every Christmas Eve. I am sure most of you would be familiar with this poem. I had heard the famous first two lines but hadn’t read it entirely until now. Enjoy this merry poem and do read it out loud to yourself if possible to get the full effect!

We at Lifewordsmith wish all of you a very jolly Christmas and may your stockings be filled with wonderful books!

Twas the Night Before Christmas


by

Clement Clarke Moore


Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St Nicholas soon would be there.

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads.
And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap.

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below.
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tinny reindeer.

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name!

"Now Dasher! now, Dancer! now, Prancer and Vixen!
On, Comet! On, Cupid! on, on Donner and Blitzen!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! Dash away! Dash away all!"

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky.
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of Toys, and St Nicholas too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot.
A bundle of Toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler, just opening his pack.

His eyes-how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow.

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook when he laughed, like a bowlful of jelly!

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself!
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings, then turned with a jerk.
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose!

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ‘ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!"

Persepolis: Marjane Satrapi

Image Credit: Birdy

I never knew graphic novels could be so entertaining. I have a couple of them on my TBR, which I haven’t found yet. But there was Marjane Satrapi’s Persepolis on my shelf waiting to be read. Let me tell you, this really has to be one of my favorite books of this year because it struck just the right balance among all emotions. Before I continue gushing, here is the story in brief from the book jacket –

The intelligent and outspoken child of radical Marxists and the great-granddaughter of Iran’s last emperor, Satrapi bears witness to a childhood uniquely entwined with the history of her country. Persepolis paints an unforgettable portrait of daily life in Iran and the bewildering contradictions between home life and public life. This is a beautiful and intimate story full of tragedy and humour – raw, honest and incredibly illuminating.

I have to agree with every word of that. It’s rare when a book moves you from within, amuses, bewilders, makes you wonder and laugh out loud. Satrapi begins with her childhood when she was perhaps about five or six and introduces the people in her life through the descriptions of various moments. Politics is an integral part of her household right from the beginning. Strangely enough, Marjane seems to be a precocious child who is curious about her country and its government. She is always asking questions and her parents are patient enough to answer most of them.

Marjane’s parents and her grandmother are very liberal and unlike the rest of the country. They take part in the Revolution but feel let down when it does not turn out to be what they hoped it to be. The country hosts what they are sure is a rigged election in which “99.99% voted for the Islamic Republic.” Their lives change after that as innumerable restrictions are placed on people, especially women, in the name of morality. To add to it, Iraq attacks Iran and war begins.

Satrapi’s simple storytelling brings Iran alive in every way. About 95% of the book flits around politics but Satrapi’s superb writing made even a person like me, who is not at all interested in the subject, really get inside Iran’s skin. To make things interesting she deftly intersperses moments from her personal life with Iran’s political changes.

What stands out is the humor that lends an unflagging momentum to the book. Though she writes about solemn events, like how the war changed people’s lives, the disillusionment that followed and the utterly unbelievable many times comic disparity between people’s lifestyles indoors and outdoors, Satrapi’s highly witty wording takes the weight off them. Since it’s a graphic novel I can’t quote because the illustration too is very much part of the fun. But what I will do is post pictures of the page that made me laugh the hardest. Or let me say one of my favorite pages.

Marjane is running, veil and all, to catch a bus when suddenly she hears a voice through a megaphone asking her to stop -



So she stops and turns around to see two "moral guardians." They stopped her because her behind made "obscene" movements while running. Her retort and the expression on all of their faces made me burst out laughing. My apologies for the page coming upside down, it's some technical problem, which I am not able to solve. -





It’s difficult to encompass this book in a review because Satrapi’s book is like a tree. There are so many branches dealing with so many aspects that it’s not easy to write about all of them without sounding very disjointed. Yet, the book firmly stands on a single trunk.

I happened to have the movie with me, which I hadn't watched until now because I wanted to read the book first. So as soon as I finished reading the book, I watched the movie. As expected, the movie does not hold a candle to the book when the two are compared. But to be fair, the movie would be a good watch by itself. The editing is slick, sometimes too much though, and maintains the main outline of the book. I would prefer that to the movie any day though I could be biased by the fullness of the book, which is lacking in the movie.

I have to specially mention Satrapi’s family before I end this review. Her parents and her grandmother are some of the most levelheaded people I have come across. Marjane is allowed all liberties (her mother offers her a cigarette to smoke when she is grown up!) yet is taught to not let go of principles. She is brought up to be fiercely independent yet not so that she forgets her family and her country. It’s another thing that she gets derailed in the middle.

Well, read the book to find out how and why. You won’t put it down till you finish, so keep aside a good four to five hours!

PS: Now I know that I LOVE graphic novels!

Verdict: One of my favorite books

Rating: 5.5/5

The Edible Woman : Margaret Atwood

A few years ago, I remember feeling like I was at the circus - I was the performer and my life the pantomime. Having somehow coerced myself into thinking that I was old enough to marry the wrong guy, (there's never the right guy, you just somehow see your life calendar, and think you are old enough now to marry the wrong one) I had found my life take on varied forms of dissolution, resolution and simple and ample confusion. Somehow, I wasn't in control of this frail thing we call the self at all. Dates were being fixed, parties were being thrown, friends were being introduced, families exchanged - in short I had this strange sensation of being the onlooker to my own life - I could visualize myself as the helpless pony that was lassoed and toed into the eternal mundane brevity of ordinary life - I choked. And then the pony just flopped on to the grass. And refused to get up. Lights at the circus off. Pantomime over. Over to your own shows, folks, I had thought then.

I was reminded of all this after reading Margaret Atwood's debut novel, The Edible Woman. Wonderfully witty, acerbic and thought-provoking, this is the work of a maturing author, not the seasoned one who won over hearts and critics with The Blind Assassin. But even a raw Atwood can make you laugh, think, and feel at the same time. The protagonist here, Marian McAlpin, is a young woman working in consumer marketing. Set in the 1960s, this was a time when jobs for women was considered the preliminary stage towards the real job of mothering and being a dutiful wife. Etc. Hmm...what has changed? Far as I can see, the attitudes are still the same. But Atwood's theme is here of the self - the female identity. When Marian agrees to marry the decent lawyer with a great future and wonderful clothes, Peter, her life begins to unravel. She finds that she cannot eat -

First meat. Then eggs, vegetables, cake, pumpkin seeds–everything! Worse yet, she has the crazy feeling that she’s being eaten. Marian ought to feel consumed with passion. But really she just feels…consumed.

There cannot be richer symbolism than that. Atwood declines to call this a feminist work, instead preferring to label it as proto-feminist, preceding the feminist era. Later interpretations of this book have analyzed Marian's failure to eat as being anorexic. I decline. Bulimia was not really identified at the time this novel was written, and somehow I feel Marian's eating disorder was a reflection of her mind - in a consumerist society, she feels consumed. Her impending marriage to Peter is raising the fear of the sublimation of her own identity. It is then that Marian tries to find herself - reinvent herself. The way she does so is entirely unconventional, and may even leave the reader bewildered. But Marian is crazy. And Atwood has peopled The Edible Woman with a whole of crazy characters.

Ainsley - her roomate is on the quest for ultimate fertility - she is the anti-thesis to Marian, desperate to have a baby, then desperate to have a husband for the baby. There is Duncan, by far the strangest and most inexplicable character in the book. A student, he becomes Marian's obsession. Exactly why is unclear, and it is here, during long passages with Duncan, that I feel the plot is weakened. There is a lack of tight unity in the plot. Things happen, then drift. Things happen, then drift. The denouement therefore lacks a little bit of punch - it is suffused with irony and metaphor - I loved the way Atwood uses a cake to convey cannibalism of the self. Well, as humans we eat each other all the time, don't we? I mean we use that in slang - "I eat your head." But I somehow think that we do that in real soul time too - we perch ourselves like ravens, and nibble away at each other. Bit by bit. Bit by bit. Till that which was you is not yours and that which you had was never yours. Ah well, forget my ramblings. This isn't Atwood's best. But The Edible Woman is fun to read - meandering it may be in parts - but Atwood's satirical pen is worth the wandering.

Verdict: Not quite classic Atwood, but a revealing look into a brilliant author's earliest work. 


Rating: 3.5/5

Summer: Edith Wharton

Image Credit: amazon

When I bought Edith Wharton’s Summer I had kept in mind SoulMuser’s glowing review of Age of Innocence. And I must say Summer did not disappoint. Summer tells the story of an unconventional girl Charity Royall, a child of mountain moonshiners adopted by a family in a poor New England town. She is craves her independence and begins working in a library so as to go away from the town and be on her own. It is in this library that she meets Lucius Harney, an educated young man from the city. Thus begins her passionate love affair with him, an event that changes her life in a direction that she never anticipated.

Now, this sounds like the stuff of various movie scripts that we have repeatedly seen over the years. What makes it a classic is that this was written during the 1920s, a time when women’s sexuality was so secretive that I am sure that even that phrase was non-existent. In such a world, Charity dares to be openly seen with Harney, escorting him through the countryside, showing him different houses to sketch, since he was an architect. When this friendship turns into love Charity is swept away by the new emotions that she feels. Harney seems to reciprocate too, but its Charity whose every emotion and tremor is revealed through Wharton’s luscious prose.

Ah, as I said, there is not a lot different in the plot from our movies. But Wharton’s writing is so delicious that it just flows over you. It is remarkable the way she sets the scene, I felt as if I was right there. This is one of my favorite passages in the book –

“The kitchen window was open, and Charity seated herself near it, her idle hands on her knee. The evening was cool and still. Beyond the black hills an amber west passed into pale green, and then to a deep blue in which a great star hung. The soft hoot of a little owl came through the dusk, and between its calls the men’s voices rose and fell.”

Isn’t that simply beautiful? I admit that I am immediately drawn to descriptions of landscape and I enjoy reading them. This is one of the best I have ever read. Through her rendering of prose we see the slow change in Charity. Initially, her thoughts are all about herself, contemplating her home that she had never seen in the Mountains and about the library where she would earn enough to get away from the village. There is a certain determination about her. Slowly, we see the shift in her being, her feelings and thoughts. The ending was perhaps expected but again thanks to Wharton it does not fall flat. I enjoyed reading Summer and I can’t wait to read my next Wharton.

Verdict: Beautiful


Rating: 5/5

CSN Stores Giveaway Winner!

Time to announce the lucky winner of the CSN Stores Giveaway!



Congratulations to JONNIE!

Jonnie from Mom of Boys with Toys has won the $75 gift coupon and we hope you get to do some Christmas shopping with it!

The winner was chosen through random.org. Thanks to CSN Stores for hosting this giveaway through us!

The Blood of Flowers: Anita Amirrezvani

Image Credit: spreadtheword

I am just back from a wonderful journey to Iran. Through the book I just finished of course. Anita Amirrezvani’s beautifully wrought book The Blood of Flowers swept me off to 17th century Iran with all its sights and sounds laid out leisurely in the books 430 pages. From the book jacket–

A village girl’s dreams of marriage end on the death of her father. Cast on the mercy of relatives in fabled Isfahan, she and her mother are reduced to servitude until she reveals a talent for designing carpets – an invaluable skill in 17th century Iran. Hope is short lived, for a disastrous, headstrong act results in the girl’s disgrace. Caught between forces she can barely comprehend, she faces a life lived at the whim of others – unless she is prepared to risk everything and choose a future based on her own strength and will.

Amirrezvani who lives in the US, took nine years to write this book during, which time she visited Iran three times. The result of her intensive research is there to see in this superbly imagined tale of a girl who dares to be different in a society that believes women are meant only for marriage and childbirth. Our narrator, who is the brave carpet maker, is unnamed and Amirrezvani says she did that deliberately as a “tribute to the anonymous artisans of Iran.”

Indeed, rug making was a treasured art three centuries ago and Persian carpets, which are still cherished today, were much in vogue among the wealthy. In fact, I saw a parallel between the way the book’s narrator, also the protagonist, evolves and her skill at rug making. It’s like a metaphor of her life. In the beginning, she is a child-woman at 14, with dreams of getting married and becoming plump and round as a pampered woman. This image is repeated many times at the beginning of the book, showing what society expected of a girl at that time. On the other hand, she displays a keen interest in carpet weaving. Her skills get enhanced when she comes to the city and Gostahan takes her under his tutelage. She begins to weave tighter and finer knots producing better rugs. Similarly, her life becomes clearer to her as she becomes more mature and she becomes more unified from within.

I was constantly observing the differences between the mindset with regard to women between today and then. There was one particular instance, which actually struck me as quite humorous. We are so used to hearing about the importance of fitness today. But back then, the fatter you were the better your status! Especially as a woman –

“I fretted at my chores, knowing that my fortunes might change in a single day. If I married…I would be forever changed. I imagined the days of leisure and nights of love, the bowls of honey and dates; the growing rolls of flesh on my belly. But what if I were no longer married after only three months? I would hardly have time to grow fat.”

I couldn’t help but laugh when I read that. Here I am, sweating and huffing at the gym five days a week so that I prevent any rolls from forming on my tummy. And here is our narrator wishing to have honey and dates so that she can flaunt her rolls!

Amirrezvani does a great job of portraying the lives of carpet makers, both the well established ones as well as the strugglers like the narrator. We get a peek into how designs are decided upon, how the perfect wool is chosen and how the right colors are mixed and matched to create the softest and most delicate rug. While designers like Gostahan agonize over color swatches and wool quality down to the thread, the actual weavers including the narrator suffer from different problems.

“I had heard stories about women who became deformed by long hours of sitting at the loom, so that when they tried to deliver a child, their bones formed a prison, locking the baby inside…Even the youngest knitters suffered aching backs, bent limbs, tired fingers, exhausted eyes. All our labors were in the service of beauty, but sometimes it seemed as if every thread in a carpet had been dipped in the blood of flowers.”

That last line is one of my favorite lines. It is so apt, so rightly describing the work of the rug makers.

Amirrezvani also incorporates story telling within the book, with each story beginning with, “First there wasn’t and then there was. Before God, no one was.” This is the equivalent of “once upon a time” in English. Not only do we learn about one of Iran’s most famous products but also about one of its traditions, which is telling a story within a story.

The Blood of Flowers is thus in many ways a multilayered story, with various aspects to it. Perhaps it could have been made a bit shorter, maybe it needn’t have stretched a bit too much towards the end. But that’s fine. I loved reading about 17th century Iran with all its faults and glory. The nameless narrator added to its allure with her very different yet very human personality.

Last but not the least, thanks to Thoughts for lending me this book!

Verdict: Some great historical fiction

Rating: 3.7/5

This Rock : Robert Morgan

Last weekend was a delicious reading weekend. Remains of the Day, followed by the Room - it was wonderful reading heaven. This weekend would have been a pretty hard act to follow after the highs of those books. But I didn't expect to be brought down so harshly. Thump. Plonk. I ruined my reading rump.

Robert Morgan's This Rock is one of the books that I picked up for less than $2 during a book sale two years ago. It started off promisingly - the blurb on the cover promised what I thought would be a Cain and Abel kind of showoff between Moody and Muir. It was supposed to be a 'gripping story of two brothers struggling against each other and the confines of their 1920s Appalachian Mountain world.' Moody and Muir are expectedly as different as chalk is to coffee - Moody is the sour, sarcastic black sheep, and Muir is the quiet, hard-working builder in life - the would-be preacher and the do-gooder of the family. Morgan uses Muir's voice for a majority of the book, interspersing it with Ginny, his mother's voice in intervals.

We read of Muir's constant struggles - his inner dialogue as he seeks to make something out of his life, and the failures that accompany each of his undertakings. He tries to preach, he croaks. He tries to drive to Canada to catch muskrats, he turns around thinking that better muskrats are to be found closer home. He has ideas. He is young, he fancies Annie in the valley where his village is situated in, and he thinks Moody is the source of all trouble. Indeed, Moody appears so. A confirmed bootlegger, Moody is painted as an extremely unlikeable character - yet, Morgan drops enough hints to keep us guessing that Moody is laying the path for some grand redemption. Yet, while the reading is fast, the dialogue - mainly the inner dialogue in Muir and Ginny is rather ponderous. Muir and Ginny are never fully-fleshed out - and the most irritating aspect for me was that all actions ultimately have no purpose. Each time something happens, I think, right, the novel begins now. But no. Long passages lead to fruitless endeavors. A road trip is packed in between. Ginny reminiscences about her dead husband, and worries about Moody. That chap himself can't seem to care about anything except his drink. And Muir keeps running off suddenly for no real reason...only to of course, flounder in miserable failing. Sample this for what has to be one of the worst passages I have ever read in a book. Muir gets a job as a clerk in U.G.'s store:

I sold sausages too, and boiled eggs from a jar. I sold soda crackers and wedges of cheese off the wheel. I sold canned salmon and sometimes canned beef. I sold taters out of bushel baskets, both sweet Irish. From kegs in the back of the store I scooped up nails of all pennies and weighed them. I sold hammers, and hoes and shovels, picks and mattocks, scythes and swing blades. I sold pliers and wire cutters, hedge clippers and carpenter levels and saws. In the dark space in the back of the store there was sacks of dairy feed and laying mash, shorts for hogs and cottonseed meal. I liked the smell of molasses in dairy feed. I sold bags of crushed oyster shells for chickens and scratch feed for little chicks. There was oats for horses and mixes of sweet feed. 

This is before Muir tells us he sold candy bars and chewing gums, dripping Co-Colas, cups of ice-cream and cookies and strings of licorice and pickles in a crock of brine. AFTER this passage, he goes on about how he sold guano, bags of bean seed, fertilizer, flower seeds, cough syrup...it goes on! For two pages!! What is Morgan trying here? A shopping list of the 1920s?

Morgan has also infused the book with a heavy religious overtone - almost all actions of Muir are influenced by the Lord, and Christian symbols are interlaced throughout. Muir's final act is to build a church on a mountain. But even religion seems to have no steadfast sense of stay here. The ending bumbles to an incomprehensible ending that makes you wonder if anyone in this book had any purpose at all. It is almost as if I feel Morgan himself had no idea what to do - he thinks he is writing a beautiful novel of Christian virtue and forgiveness and redemption - zilch. It is a pathetic novel of failing. Not Muir's failing. But Morgan's. Sorry. But as a reader, I so hate it when words get wasted on paper. There is no doubt that Morgan is a better writer than This Rock. I so wish I have a rock myself to throw at this book.

Verdict: Read only if you derive a peculiar pleasure in torturing yourself. 


Rating: 1/5

CSN Stores Giveaway!

Image Credit: mysavvysavings

This giveaway is now CLOSED.

Alright readers, this is a very different post from what LWS has published so far. This is our very first giveaway! You have a choice of products from briefcases to bookcases to pet accessories, which you can purchase from CSN Stores. They have over 200+ stores and if you are lucky, you could win a coupon worth $75 to shop at any of them!

As an avid traveller and photographer, I really liked this product of theirs - a great looking Naneu camera bag, which also combines as a laptop bag -




I also particularly liked this CD rack in the shape of a Stradivarius -



Unfortunately, my location does not allow me to shop at their stores because this giveaway is open only for residents of the U.S. and Canada. Sorry, rest of the world. But LWS is sweet as always and we are throwing open the giveaway to those who can!


The last date to enter is 14th December.


International shipping charges may apply in the case of Canadian addresses.


Unlike other giveaways, you don't have to comment to stand a chance. You don't have to become a follower of this blog. All you have to do is fill up the form below, just so that we can email you in case you win, and LWS will pick a winner randomly. Good luck!

Versedays: Dawn Dreams by Rachel Hadas

Image Credit: Birdy

All this time for Versedays I had been choosing classic poetry. So for this week I am putting up the work of a modern poet. Rachel Hadas is a professor, writer and poet who lives in New York City. I found her poem, Dawn, to be quite metaphoric and vivid. Short but impressive. Here it is, hope you all enjoy it!

Dawn Dreams

by

Rachel Hadas


Dreams draw near at dawn and then recede
even if you beckon them.
They loom like demons
you tug by the tail to examine from up close
and then let fly away.
Their colors at once brighter and less bright
than you remembered, they
hover and insinuate all day
at the corner of your eye.

Room : Emma Donoghue

Image Credit: Goodreads

Sometimes, you come across books that make you marvel at the writer's sheer artistry. You shake your head in wonder, and lose yourself in the story. And then you come out of the story, and then find that you are just a little bit changed for that experience. Just one leaf may have changed color. Just one cloud may have moved. Just one drop of water may have fallen. But something has been altered. That sort of reading experience only a skilled artist can give you. I haven't read any of Emma Donoghue's other books, but in Room she has come as close as I can say its possible to create the perfect reading experience.

Room is where Jack, all of five years, and his mother spend their days together. In a small space dominated by Bed, Wardrobe, Rocker, Tub, Table and Rug and TV. Bound to the Room by Old Nick. Jack has never known a world other than Room - he has been taught that the world he sees on TV is not real - everything outside the Room is really Outer Space. Until the day his mom tells him otherwise. You can immediately imagine the difficulty in conveying such a voice - a five-year old with no concept of the outside world as we know it. Yet Emma Donoghue never manages to lose the five-year old voice. Jack is at once endearing, wise, thoughtful and so very scave. (Scared+Brave = Scave. A 'word sandwich' as Jack calls it). It's this  - the first half of the book that I found rather irritating at first - Jack's use of capitalization for things like Bed, Tub etc, take some time to get used to - you do get used to it pretty fast - but in the process, I found that I wasn't understanding as well as I ought to. Not that it matters much, the sheer emotive power of the story sweeps you through.

Donoghue doesn't to her credit, exploit much the sexual angle - we still only hear of Old Nick through Jack who hides in the wardrobe whenever Nick comes and counts the creaks till he leaves. Old Nick is not much of a character hence - really, the focus here is on Jack's world. Or rather his understanding of the world, which undergoes a dramatic shift when Jack finally comes face to face with that which he thought was unreal - the Outside. Here's where the real emotional pull of the book starts to seep through, and then slowly evaporate. Don't mistake me - Room remains just as gripping, but I would say that credibility gets stretched a bit too much - Jack is now the wise overseer to the human world, at times funny, and at times the mask falls, and you can almost hear the adult Emma Donoghue whispering into his ear. There was this moment when Jack comments that lottery buyers are a bunch of 'idiots' (sorry for the lack of quotes, my borrowed book is already lent to Birdy), and I thought ah, don't ruin it now. But Emma doesn't. The book moves towards an ending you guess is coming, but is still touching.

Now when a book receives as much publicity as Room does - I think it will either be loved or hated. Most of the reviews I read seem to veer towards both sides of the pendulum. I loved it though. For me, Room is the book of 2010.

Gosh, how can this year be ending so soon? And yet, I am glad. This year I feel is how a tomato feel once its been made into ketchup. Pulp. Squash. Squealch. What are your New Year plans? I have mine :-) - a break in China and a new job, and some new words so that I can forget the path of scars others have left in their trail in all the months that made this year another one to add in the Life register.Ah well, it's nice at least we have another year to look ahead to. Even if life seems another Room.

Verdict : Outstanding. A page turner. Riveting. Touching. 


Rating: 5/5

Extra: Trailer for the Room. 

Literary Blog Hop

Thanks to Crazy-for-Books for hosting this blog hop. The question for the hop is -

"What very popular and hyped book in the blogosphere did you NOT enjoy and how did you feel about posting your review?"

A book that was hyped that I didn’t like? I would say Midnight’s Children! I am taking part in a Read Along but I have not got beyond 50 pages. I know I am in the minority but I just could not get into the book. It is a Booker Prize winner and has also been voted as one of the best novels of all time. Well…

Flights of Love: Bernhard Schlink

Image Credit: fantasticfiction

I am not much of a short story person. The only short stories I used to read were the really short ones for children, when I was a kid. When I bought Bernhard Schlink’s Flights of Love last year at a book sale I hadn’t noticed that it was a short story collection. Once I realized it was, I kept putting off reading the book until now. And it turned out that I wasn’t disappointed at all. Here is the summary from the book jacket:

Love as a desire, love as confusion, love as a quick affair, love as a drastic life changing rebellion, love as a force of habit… Bernhard Schlink uses his characteristically unsentimental, elegant and spare prose to unveil characters and relationships haunted by betrayal and guilt. Flights of Love examines the universal human desire to find a lasting, loving relationship, however thwarted that desire ultimately may be.

That description is a very apt summation of the seven stories that make up this book. All of them are different yet similar. The theme of failed marriages, restrained emotions and relationships link all the stories in a well-knit thread. Schlink’s observations of a marriage and understanding of people’s behavior is sharp and very precise. He is not preachy at any point, but merely states what most of us know. In the first story, “Girl with Lizard” the son confronts his mother after he learns a lot of unpleasant facts about his father’s past when he was a German soldier during World War II.

“Why did you stay with Father?”

“What a question.” She shook her head. “For a while you have a choice. Do you want to do this or that, live with this person or that? But one day what is you’re doing and that person have become your life, and to ask why you stick with your life is a rather stupid question.”

Indeed. I guess most marriages become a habit in the long run. All the stories are set in a post-war world and Schlink’s characters are what he calls part of the second generation, those Germans who were children during the war. Schlink shows that though they were not directly part of the war, they are still very much affected by it. The war, including Germany’s own division between the East and West, continue to loom large in the sky like overcast clouds, casting a shadow over their every move. In “The Circumcision” Andi’s bond with Sarah is never smooth due to the fact that Andi is German while Sarah is a Jew. Sarah is touchy about the Holocaust and that many of her family members had suffered in it. Andi’s relatives, especially his uncle is aware of this friction and he insists that what happened in the past should be deleted from the present. “That was fifty years ago. I don’t understand why we can’t let the past be.”

It’s the same with Germany’s own battle with the Wall. The story “A Little Fling” depicts the lasting consequences of Germany’s segregation and its reunification. A West German judge is a very close friend of a couple who was in East Germany but after a while their relationship develops cracks.

One of the stories I liked very much was “Sugar Peas,” in which a man’s desperation to find love and acceptance is shown through his relationships. He is married but he has flings and carries on relationships with two other women. Towards the end he sees that he need not search for love in others; he is very much in love with himself. At least that’s my interpretation of it.

Schlink writes in unhurried prose, which reflects the tedium of life. No glance, touch or look escapes his pen. He makes statements and asks questions that set you thinking. In “The Other Man” the husband reminisces after his wife’s death.

“Even though he could never imagine putting the question to the test, he would ask himself if it was really his wife he missed or not simply a warm body in bed and someone to exchange a few words with, who found what he said fairly interesting and to whom in return he could listen with a fair amount of interest.”

And in “The Woman at the Gas Station” Schlink quietly notes that “their marriage was full of rituals, and that was the very reason for its success. Don’t all good marriages live by their rituals?”

Don't they? As I said, I think habit and ritual are what sustain most marriages. It's so ingrained that people don't even realize it. In this way, Schlink provides fodder for thought in each of his stories, which explores emotions, particularly love, from various angles. Like a person sitting on a park bench, watching the people around him with amusement, Schlink absorbs and writes. I liked the subdued and in many instances resigned nature of the stories. Life is clearly not simple for Schlink’s characters. But it is not to say that the book moved slowly. Life is definitely not boring and so are not Schlink’s stories about it.

Verdict: Thought provoking

Rating: 3.5/5

One Last Look: Susanna Moore

Image Credit: bibliostylebooks

Lately, my reading has been progressing at quite a slow pace. For myriad reasons, I finished just three books last month. That’s too less for my usual pace. Even the book I am about to review, took me a little more than a week to finish due to interruptions and a wandering mind. Maybe it’s just a phase I am going through. Anyway, Susanna Moore’s “One Last Look” cannot be blamed for lack of pace or interest. Here is the brief from the book jacket –

“After several wretched months at sea, Eleanor Oliphant arrives in Calcutta with her brother Henry and sister Harriet. It is 1836, and her beloved Henry has just been appointed England’s new Governor General for India. Eleanor is to be his official hostess.

Despite the imported English gowns and formal soirees, India makes a mockery of Eleanor’s sensibilities. Burning heat, starving people, insects as big as eggs – it is all an unreal dream, rife with tumultuous life. Harriet gives herself over to the adventure. Henry busies himself with official duties. Eleanor, though groping for her bearings, slowly finds her isolation punctuated by moments of elation: her first monsoon, graceful women in vibrant sarees, Benares rising out of the mist. She discovers she likes curries and her native servants – and often dislikes compatriots. Over the course of six years and a trek from Calcutta to Kabul and back, India manages to unsettle all of her “old, old ideas.”

Moore does spin a yarn that is at times fantastical and at times gritty. I got a taste of 19th century India, the way of life and the kind of mindset that people had in those times. Life for the English is filled with a certain opulence that is at times suffocating. The richness is cloying and the grandeur dazzling. Eleanor and her sister need not move an inch to get their chores done. In fact at one point Eleanor remarks how her legs are wobbly from lack of walking because she has been carried in “palankeens” all over the place. Sample this –

“Harriet and I have seventeen walking-men between us, all dressed in scarlet and gold. Ten blackamoors from Bihar stand guard at my door. Seven pen wallahs come every morning to iron our clothes. Fourteen runners in gold turbans and sashes carry my letters (would that I had a correspondent)… On my verandah, five owlish tailors sit cross-legged, sewing two dozen new nightdresses.”

The interesting part is that we don’t get just a one sided view of Indians, who are ready to wait hand and foot on the English. We also get a picture of the rajahs and powerful kings, some of whom sided with the British and some of whom didn’t.

More than anything I saw India the way it was in the 19th century. Messy, dirty, muddy roads and people dying in poverty. Oh, didn’t I just describe Bangalore today? Perhaps people are not dying as much in poverty, but the dust and the mess I felt has persisted from the 19th century! The divisions in society are very clear. Beginning with starving people, the next level are the servants of the British, then the kings and then whites themselves. At least, these are the kinds described in the book, I don’t know if there was such a stark division.

And yet, there are also beautiful passages, which show Eleanor’s attraction to the place. After witnessing the first monsoon rains she is mesmerized.

“Oh, the dazzling greenness! The greenness of Bengal! The air is heavy with the scent of queen-of-the-night. The river is a silver stream. Even Harriet’s hair has changed color. I thought at first that she’d resorted to henna, but it is only that is always wet.”

Eleanor also makes a note of the local customs and beliefs, some of which were fascinating. Her observations of cheetahs roaming freely, huge insects and sightings of other wildlife are all described with a certain casualness of tone. She is hardly surprised by a snake she chances upon or elephants she encounters. Life, it appears, was larger than life, bordering on the fantastic and magical. At the end of her Indian sojourn, when Eleanor returns, she is “most unprepared for London. It is as if we’ve been away for a hundred years. The very sounds are foreign to me: no crows, no pariah dogs, no jackals, no flutes or drums…no pearls, no monkeys, no betel. Worse still, there is no color. Not even a sun in the sky. The air is black, the people pale. Everyone is dressed in gray. Most disturbingly, but for the fog, but for the river at low tide, there is no smell.”

This from the same woman who for six years was almost under a stupor brought on by the intense heat and who struggled to travel on roads due to the dust. Eleanor had not realized how much she had come to like this country with all its wonders.

I enjoyed reading this book. It had a certain languid air about it, a somnolence, which did not interfere with its pace. What makes the book more interesting is the fact that Moore has heavily borrowed from the letters and diaries of three real women who did travel to India during that time. One of them actually came with her brother and sister. That is also what lends the book a grey shade because I am not clear as to what is Moore’s imagination and what has been taken from the diaries. Well, leave a small space for suspension of disbelief and read this wonderful tale. You will surely be transported.

Verdict: Know about India in a different era and century

Rating: 3.5/5

Further reading: A nice review from the New York Times, which had selected One Last Look as the Notable Book.

Notwithstanding: Louis de Bernieres

Image Credit: Telegraph

It's been a bit of a slow reading week for me. Too many things in life intruding and with the weather here too exuding a rather sad melancholic air, I turned to Louis de Bernieres' oddly named book, Notwithstanding.

A set of short stories set in an English village called Notwithstanding, this book packs a rather quaint punch. Owing to my struggle with words and life this week, this review may not be the brightest ever written on this blog. Notwithstanding is an institution - a quintessential English village that is also loosely based on Louis de Bernieres' own childhood village in Surrey. Peopled with the oddest characters. Yet people you feel rather drawn to because they are so human in their fallibility. And so adorable in their eccentricities. In a way, Notwithstanding reminded me of a recent trip to Banavasi - a village that was adopted as part of a Rural India tourism project. I know - that doesn't sound appealing. But the village was rather nice. And even in the two days I spent there, I could sense a difference in the people.

There was this fiery lady who served the most heart stoppingly good food, while talking non stop in a dialect that had my head and stomach spin at the same time. And there was an old man who had tears in his eyes because we, the 'young generation', were not able to answer enough of his questions on Hindu mythology and Indian culture while on a tour of one of India's oldest temples. I remember them. Somehow they are part of a tradition that is inexorably dying as more villages turn into cities that turn into shapless blobs of humanity crapping their lives into mundanity. Ah well.

Notwithstanding was a book therefore I could sense, and feel. If you know what I mean. There was Robert, and his wonderful little rook chick. Archie the dog with an insatiable appetite for golf balls. A couple of old people swimming in loneliness. A few stories are funny. A few are sad. And almost all of them are packed with life. Not to worry, there is no overt sentimentality here. Is there nostalgia? I detect so. It is so hard to write about something that you know even as you write is disappearing into the past. It 's a collection of short stories - but they are all linked. Really, the main character is Notwithstanding, the village, where "strange things happen from time to time."

There is a rather interesting afterword by Bernieres, which made me chuckle at this passage:

Britain really is an immense lunatic asylum. That is one of the things that distinguishes us among the nations...We are rigid and formal in some ways, but we believe in the right to eccentricity, as long as the eccentricities are large enough.

And there was this line that really made the book for me, when the mother of one of the characters chides him to get married. And his reply?

"Marriage? What for? I am only 40!"

Now...if only I can say the same! Even though I am not 40!

Verdict: A rather lovely little book. Reminds me of The Guernsey Literary And Potato Peel Pie Society. But. And this was a factor to me - the language was too English for me. :-). Well, I am not a native speaker, and my English levels may be juvenile, but having to reach out for a dictionary every few sentences makes it rather difficult.

Rating: 3.5/5

Versedays: Morning at the Window by T S Eliot

Image Credit: pjakers

I am not a morning person. I prefer to sit late into the night to finish my work especially if it involves learning or concentration. So when I came across this poem of T S Eliot’s, called Morning at the Window I identified with it from that angle. He describes a dull morning that lacks energy and where people move around with an “aimless smile.”

Of course Eliot was not writing with such simplistic thoughts. In one interpretation it shows an industrial landscape while another one says that since this was written during World War I, it reflects the general depressive atmosphere. When you hear the name T S Eliot, the first thing that comes to mind is perhaps The Wasteland, his belle epoch. Though this is not as famous, it is not any less brilliant.

Morning at the Window

by

T S Eliot

They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.
The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.