"The Ivory Throne" by Manu S. Pillai

This book explains a lot, almost everything that is Kerala’s politics and society today. All the roots are here. There is brilliant and ever resourceful Raja Ravi Varma. There is also a bit of history of Tea and Coffee in India. Still, it is a story of the House of Travancore and its’ matrilineal system the knowledge of which can surprise most of the Indians. Manu S. Pillai does a wonderful job as in each chapter he starts from the history and context of an event in not so particular a manner until he makes the reader look at something very particular. In this journey one learns about the system of regency, whims of British Viceroys and Indian Royal houses. Like any ruling family there is jealousy in the house of Travancore, there is opulence, ambition, tyranny, decorum, even black magic and ultimately there is the struggle to survive against democracy. Hero in this book is the Senior Maharani or Maharaja Sethu Lakshmi Bayi. One has to read the book to know why a queen would be called the King. It is strange that from the era of freedom struggle wherein social reformers have been celebrated all over India, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi’s name is almost forgotten. Availability of telephone to public, electricity, agrarian reforms, women’s education and employment, mid-day meals at schools, cooperative societies movement, a public health division; when most of the Indians had not heard  of these terms, they were all being implemented by Sethu Lakshmi Bayi in Travancore. In 1930 under her rule the British Regent noted, Travancore had the highest budget for education among all the states and provinces of India. Kerala’s literacy rate comes with no surprise now. One appreciates the industry of British people a bit more; one understands the caste struggle in India a little more after reading this book. Then there is antihero Sethu Parvathi Bayi, the relentless. Her presence at times takes this book close to being a thriller. From the Portuguese brutality to the divine grace of Swamy Padmanabh, this history is unlike that of any other Indian state.

'Steve Jobs' by Walter Isaacson

The enormity of a creative process or a life led in a near absolute manner can be deemed success or failure depending on what is generated by that life or that process. Steve Jobs’ is that life and the process he followed. Vedas would say that when you have absolute clarity about the choices you are making, you are a God or a Demigod at least. A fan of Bob Dylan and self-proclaimed ambassador of counter culture, Steve Jobs was difficult to live with, toughest to work with, seemingly mean most of the times, charming occasionally and a visionary for all times. He believed in poetry and defined computer experience for us, redefined music industry along with our lifestyles. A Mac book air is a statement not because one possesses it, it’s because Steve Jobs thought of it as a modern cultural statement. Walter Isaacson’s book ‘Steve Jobs’ is not an in house publication of Apple. He doesn’t glorify the man and his achievements. Isaacson looks at Jobs as he must have been. For the reader sometimes it’s like watching a mean character in a drama whose moves you like because he is not around you to push you or to tell you that your life sucks. It's marvelous to realize the impact he has on our daily lives via so many features of android and iphones. Steve Wozniak was a genius with empathy but he says he could never have done it without Steve who lacked empathy. It raises the question if a brutal focus is really required to do great things and define the times you live in.

"To Live" by Yu Hua

‘To Live’ is like a child who is sobbing and smiling in between because there is someone tickling her. ‘To Live’ is a story of human frailties and the celebration of them. The village, the ox or the loss, nothing is permanent. Fugui looks back with a common objectivity shared by many like him because it happened to a lot of them, because he is nearing his end too. All the experiences he lived through and made his family go through are alive only because he is telling it all, and after him there will be no one to tell. That is the beauty of him looking back. This book is looking back at a wife who sacrificed everything, a father who was angry but generous, a kid who ran every day, then suddenly stopped and a country going through civil war. As you read Michael Berry’s translation of Yu Hua, the lightness of words makes you fly till you are suddenly grounded by death, plain and simple without much analysis of grief. Life moves on as you read on with a sense of loss in your heart. The politics and the horror of it get buried under the beauty of human life. Fugui has lived this story a long time back and all the characters he narrates stare at you, asking you, what do you make of their lives? What do you make of your own life?

"Second Hand Time" by Svetlana Alexievich"

Could truth be second hand? If time could be second hand then the truth of that time could be second hand as well. This line of thought is really complicated, but not for those who have experienced those times or those truths. Because then, it becomes a matter of making peace with either this or that. In between this and that there are a million stories which either have the luxury of sadness coming out of intense love or a senseless, ugly death or an amputated life. The people in the stories collected by Svetlana Alexievich are not fictional but they either have been or still are extreme romanticists. This romance is curated till it takes a life of its own.  Where did the creation of myth start and why did it suddenly fade away giving immense room to some expectation? That is the story of USSR in this book where people are cogs of giant machinery and its glory, and suddenly the machine is dismantled and the cogs are left to think for themselves, total strangers to each other.

                                      Identities are changed in an instant, the myth is changed overnight; centre of power is moved from an idea to a deep sense of personal ugliness or fairness. Suddenly the tribes are there, nationalities are there, God is there and Satan is there. All of them in people because they are the tribes, nationalities, Gods or Satan. This work would not fit into any category of fiction and non-fiction because these are people telling their own stories, their own perceptions and their own truths. Truth, even repetitive is not boring. There is love, immense love in this book. 

जानते हुए ...

जानते हुए 

दूर किनारों की सच्चाई 

यहाँ से कैसे दिखे ?

लबालब रहता है 

गलतफ़हमियों का समंदर ,

तैर के जाने की 

फ़ुरसत किसे ?

बहुत हौसला चाहिए 

किसी को 

पूरी तरह से 

जानने के लिए...

                                                             

                                                                    - मायाराम 

मंटो के नाम , मंटो की ज़ुबान.

बम्बई की गलियों की किस्सा फ़रोशी

अमृतसर से शुरू हुई 

लाहौर में खत्म न हो सकी,

कलम चलती रही 

बेशरम हरामजादी,

शराब के दौर, चाय की चुस्कियां

सिग्रेट के कश,

कुछ आज भी 

नाक़ाबिल ए बर्दाश्त हैं 

इस आदमी के गश,

आवारागर्दी पसंद है इसे 

सड़कछापों का नुमाइन्दा है, 

बलवों की लाशों को इसने 

कागज़ पे उठाया है ,

खाकिस्तरी आसमां इसका 

अब ज़र्द हो गया है 

 कितने अफ़साने उगते होंगे 

जहां मंटो गया है ...

                                                            - मायाराम

किस्सा फ़रोशी - कहानी बेचना 

गश - घाव 

बलवे - दंगे - फ़साद

खाकिस्तरी - मिटटी के रंग का 

ज़र्द - पीला 

"A Brief History of Seven Killings" by Marlon James

If a man is sitting in a chair in the middle of a hall which is carpeted and there are three dozen people of both genders and multiple ethnicities who are dancing around trying to tell him their version of an event simultaneously, then I am that man and these people belong to Marlon James’ “A Brief History of Seven Killings”. They are not exiting the hall, some of them are taking a break to copulate, some are drawing cutlasses and enacting a scene, a few are going to the windows drawing their pistols and shooting someone on the road five floors down, some are sniffing cocaine and some just stay back and stare at me from time to time demanding my undivided attention. Everyone and everything lacks something, of which they are not aware and there is something always left to tell you because either the upbringing was such or this is too much fun. It transforms from almost magical realism to the pace of Mario Puzo as you turn the pages. The metaphysical is almost always in range without hinting it's reality. The people who have been just shot on the road are climbing up the stairs and standing behind those who have shot them, but it is not haunting because it is “A Brief History of Those Seven Killings”. All the research that has gone into the novel is buried under the trash hills of Jamaica. On those hills are loitering these characters who are fully armed with machine guns, glocks and their immediate realities. So, one is not going to find that the work is inspired by real events, and if one is able to, it will be buried under the next round of excitement that comes with every chapter or the next round of the trash truck. Read it if you don’t mind Jamaican tongue. It will even take you to Brooklyn.