Me ThInKs

Learning to appreciate

I made a hurried trip to India a few weeks back in a desperate bid to escape the swine flu that has its arms tightly wrapped around Singapore. As of yesterday the number of cases had touched 4500, with an added 60 untimely deaths. Well. Lesson number 1 is that when you are in the midst of a pandemic, DO NOT try to run away from it. All 3 of us came down with the flu when we were in India. We paid a huge price to fall ill there, and then we spent the next two weeks trying to recuperate. By the time we got back, hubby and I were irritated out of our skins. What could have been a beautiful monsoon touched holiday turned out to be a dampener. AND my baby boy still fell ill with the swine flu. Thankfully he is making a fast recovery.

And I can never resist a book sale, even if they offer a mere 2% discount. Going by my experience, I have found some real treasures in the unlikeliest of places. The Penguin sale was good. Imagine my sadness when I was handed a pamphlet stating that there would be a much BIGGER Penguin sale, with books from every genre covering a whole stadium. I could have wept. Who knows how many gems I might have found there.

I couldnt resist dragging my dad, and sister to the DC book shop just down my lane. Thankfully dad wanted to carry my kid ( what are grandparents for) and I wanted to make use of the fact that it was the last day of the Penguin sale. Imagine my horror when I am told that no madam, there is no sale here in this store. The sale is happening at the MG road store. But point to be noted is that I had made it to the book store after all, and HOW could I leave without a book in hand. So, I picked up 3.
Selected works of Kamala Das, short stories by MT Vasudevan and selected works fo Basheer. Believe me when I say this, I would never have reached out for these vernacular writers a year back. So what happened?

Anita Nair happened. Of course, I had read her 'The Better Man', and 'Ladies Coupe' when I was a student at college, with free access to the neighbourhood library. She gave me my first taste of Kerala, in english. And then I lay hands on 'Where the rain is born', and 'Mistress'. The first is a collection of essays merely edited my Anita, but each has a very distinct Malayali flavour to it. Mistress is a unique novel. She has explained the emotions that are the soul of kathakali, and each chapter ( it is a love story of sorts), opens with a reference to each such emotion. How beautifully she had entwined the drama and ethos of Kathakali with fiction. I had just begun to drink at the poetry and soul of literature and I wanted more.

So it was without a moment's hesitation that I swooped upon O V Vijayan's novels and short stories. All of them celebrate what is Kerala, its many dialects, the many customs and rituals as well as traditions and superstitions of the locals. Even the names are so familiar that they could only be Malayali. I feel like I am unraveling a literary heritage that is so diverse, unique and beautiful. I am proud to say that Malayali writers stay that way, without trying to please a foreign audience. I know that the language would have been even more deep had I ventured to read the works in Malayalam, but truth be told, my hold on the language isnt so good, and what takes me a week to finish could stretch into a month's labour otherwise. I wonder if readers of my generation, go back to what their parents and grand parents grew up with. I grew up with Anita Desai, NOT Salman Rushdie ( I dont understand his works at all, his allegories and all that fly above my head), Vikram Seth I adore , Tagore and even Satyajit Ray.( am proud to say that I am now the owner of his selected short stories). I like Bengali literature. I can relate to it and the manner in which the Bengaliness is proudly show off, reminds me of Malayalam literature. Which is why I bought Choker Bali and Tagore's stories as well.

The poetry and beauty of such literature opens my eyes to the many different levels I have yet to reach. I am not yet there I know. Every time I read a line that spoke about "how the rain resounded like drumbeats' or how 'the sun had caught the dew drop on the lotus leaf', I wonder why didnt I think of that. Then it dawns on me. Because I am just a student of poetry. And they. They are the masters.