How often do we flow into the city and see it as a living, breathing space that weaves in memories? Imraan Coovadia, the author of five novels (‘The Wedding, ‘Tales of the Metric System’, to name a few), Suketu Mehta of ‘Maximum City’ fame, in conversation with Ravi Singh of ‘Speaking Tiger’ were in to discuss the workings of the city, and what these residents bring to help the cities thrive. Both authors bring in their experience of being in multiple cities in their lives, tracing it from their forefathers seeking to move out of their cities in India to cities elsewhere around the globe. Continue reading “The City as a Protagonist”
Whose Side are You On?
Two of the most prominent sports writers and columnists sat to deliberate on the ever-changing landscape of the game of cricket. As T20s shatter all records of sports viewership and fandom and the International cricket based on the idea of nation loyalties paves way for the domestic leagues of T20s, Gideon Haigh and Suresh Menon discussed the significance of modern cricket dynamics and the future of fandom in the session titled ‘Whose side are you on?’.
History of the Kannada Script and Language
Pulling in a 1600-year timeline of the evolution of a language so dear to its folk in its homeland into a half an hour slot is a task that could very well be passed off as a herculean task. Yet, Dr S. Settar brought in the history of Kannada, with the clearest of details with ease. Dr Settar is a prolific writer in two languages- English and Kannada- and his themes pan across languages, art-history, religions, and the likes.
Continue reading “History of the Kannada Script and Language”
சாதியும் நானும் – Caste and I
“Caste haunts you in the food that you eat. It might offer a moment of solace through community support. It might even offer you a god but there are more disadvantages to it”, says Ambai (C.S.Lakshmi) who has translated the Perumal Murugan’s ‘சாதியும் நானும்’ into English. The book is titled, “Caste and I” which was also the subject of discussion of conversation between Ambai, Perumal Murugan and the publisher Kannan Sundaram.
The book is an anthology of 32 essays written by people from 20 different castes. The original version in Tamil was released during the 50th meeting of Koodu in Namakkal. The contributors of these articles were not mainstream writers but students and other acquaintances of Perumal Murugan who have either been victims of casteism or have not had the courage to give up on casteism. The articles were personal experiences of these contributors.
Ambai talks about the various intriguing tales from the book which affected her greatly.
– A young boy from the lower caste who was not allowed to sit in the swirling chair of a salon because the hairdresser was afraid that his customers from upper caste will shun his salon for letting a lower caste boy sit on it.
– A dying patient who asked his doctor for his caste.
– A student who was mockingly called Rajiv Gandhi by his friends because he was provided with the Rajiv Gandhi scholarship for scheduled caste.
– A child from the lower caste who was given black coffee in a coconut shell because the dominant caste believed that serving milk to the lower caste would dry up the cow.
Ambai recollects how the courtesy of offering water to a guest when you enter a household in the rural Tamil Nadu was a subtle way of enquiring about her caste. Not just the rural area, even in the urban set up there indeed are people who refuse to rent out houses to Muslims and Dalits, added Murugan.
Perumal Murugan while talking about the book and the experiences that affected him says, it wasn’t an easy task to put the book together. People were hesitant to talk openly about caste and how it played out in their lives. But when they spoke about it eventually their worst fears came true. Some of them lost friends and relative severed ties with them. However, there were also good things that came out of it. When a friend from the upper caste wrote about how he could not bring his friends home because his family was against it and how small he felt about it, their friendship only got stronger. Some of them could take off their chest, the pain, humiliation and guilt that they had carried forever, by writing about it.
Perumal also talks about two essays that he wrote when his mother passed away. In one of the essays, he talks about his relationship with his mother and how she herself was a casteist. His mother did not approve of his marriage initially since it was an inter-caste marriage but did come to love her daughter in law later. But what shocked him the most was that even when her memory was slipping due to Parkinson’s disease she did not approve of the Dalit girl who was attending to her. Casteism is so deeply ingrained the blood of our people and we continue to pretend as if it does not matter. Ambai has translated these two articles into English and they were published in Sparrow.
He also remarks how even today there are different burial grounds and cemetery for different castes in the villages of Tamilnadu and how his mother insisted that he pay taxes to multiple villages to ensure she gets a burial ground. He also humorously adds that when his mother passed away it was the electric cemetery came to his rescue. When people ask him about where he has kept (buried) his mother, he continues to points to his heart.
Kaavya Sanje
Kaavya Sanje, or an evening of poetry is a regular event that was started in 2013. Sixteen editions later, the 17th was at Bangalore Literature Festival 2017. These evenings bring together various poets from across the cities who write in various languages. Poetry in Kannada, Hindi, Urdu, and English found their way this evening.
This Is My Story
Good writing or Good marketing? Ask Savi Sharma & Varun Agarwal.The session had both Savi Sharma and Varun Agarwal and was a treat not to be missed. Ying and Yang, they definitely do not fall under the same stars. Savi Sharma, India’s first successful female self-published author navigated the audience through the journey of her success. It was astonishing to hear about her writing flight which started through Facebook and ended in Amazon.
Her love of writing took Savi Sharma from her C.A. pursuit. The first novel she wrote took about 4 years to complete and was discarded by her as it did not feel right. Ironically. her second book, ‘Everyone has a story’ took about just 3 months, and that is now the sensation. In the session, Savi Sharma’s love for writing and her belief that good content can always garner an audience was evident. It was a juxtaposition to what Mr Varun Agarwal of Anu Aunty fame felt.
Varun Agarwal’s claim that anyone can become an author if they can pen down 60,000 words might have raised some eyebrows in the audience. But he charmed the audience when he himself admitted that his debut novel, How I Braved Anu Aunty and Co-founded a Million Dollar Company’ required quite many spell checks and was grammatically wailing. After all, who doesn’t love self- depreciation?
The importance of marketing was stressed upon by both the authors. However both the authors had different views on the same. While Savi Sharma admits that it is a necessary evil, Varun Agarwal expressed that marketing is what that can make or break a book. It was quite inspiring to hear how Savi Sharma used social media to market her book by posting quotes and extracts from her book. This eventually garnered her enough audience that she felt quite confident to sell her books on Amazon.
The session thus provided the aspiring authors’ different takes on the path to success.
About the Author – Vibhuthi Viswanathan is a Potterhead and chocoholic.Curling up with the ‘Balabhumi’ and spinning out tales from its illustrations to her little brother was her first interactions with a book. Although she has moved on from good old BalaBhumi, she still hasn’t stopped twirling words and pauses. She currently writes for Bookstalkist.
Indira
Journalist and News anchor, Sagarika Ghose’s book titled ‘Indira: India’s Most Powerful Prime Minister’, was published by Juggernaut Books to commemorate the 100th birth anniversary of Indira Gandhi. ‘Insecure daughter, Betrayed wife, National heroine, tough dictator’, reads the blurb for the book. Journalist, Political commentator and documentary filmmaker, Paranjoy Guha Thakurta too began his discussion with Sagarika on the same note. Continue reading “Indira”
How India’s T20 World Cup Win Changed Indian and World Cricket
“I was looking at the end of my career when T20 came in. I played my first T20 for Surrey. Yes, World Cup victory in 2007 changed the entire scene. I played 3 IPLs. The first one was a major challenge. While it took me 4 overs to warm up otherwise, I had to produce results in 4 overs in IPL. It was said that the RCB (Royal Challengers Bangalore) was the best test team of the century. Everything was against us.”, Anil Kumble quipped in his inimitable style. Continue reading “How India’s T20 World Cup Win Changed Indian and World Cricket”
Perilous Interventions – The Use of Force and the Continuing Chaos
“India’s aspirations to become a permanent member of the UN security council is realistic and doable”, says, Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs during his conversation with Ambassador P.S. Raghavan at the Bangalore Literature Festival. The session was on the back drop of his book ‘Perilous Interventions: The Security Council and the Politics of Chaos’. Having had a 40 years long momentous career in diplomacy, the Minister spoke about his time in the UN Security council as representative of India and India’s diplomatic relationship with major countries across the globe. Continue reading “Perilous Interventions – The Use of Force and the Continuing Chaos”
Conversations with People not like Us
Madan Padaki, co-founder & CEO of 1Bridge, a last-mile services platform for Rural India was right when he said, “Conversations today are having a different meaning altogether. There is so much of impatience and distrust in conversations these days”. He was in discussion with Arun Maira, Former Member of Planning Commission of India and author of ‘Listening for wellbeing: Conversations with people not like us’. The book talks about how to have conversations with people who are different from us and have a different perspective.
Arun says the trigger to write the book came when his grandson pointed out that he did not answer the woman who was knocking at his car’s window begging for money. Arun had not even realized that someone was knocking. He says it was a shocking self- revelation about how he has been conditioned to not listen. Effective communication is not just about conveying your message across rightly but also about listening to the message being conveyed. Communication is incomplete without listening. Arun says, his friend who was surprised to learn that his brother was an ardent supporter of Trump was probably not listening to the conversations with his brother during family gatherings.
Arun quotes Tagore from Gitanjali,
“Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls”.
He says the consequence of not having a conversation has resulted in the divisions of the world as it is today. The structures of social media are only making the walls tighter every day. People are friends with likeminded people and are not ready to indulge with people who are different.
He quotes from Tagore again,
“Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit”
He talks about how the mind today has been trained to think fast that we have lost the ability to thinking slow. Thinking slow, he says, helps you with empathy and compassion.
Arun remarks that the media houses today are yelling at each in debates and discussion. Everyone yells and it looks like a tribal war. He wonders which one of them is listening.
Dalai Lama who wrote the foreword for Arun’s book observed that listening is first of the two wisdom tools advocated by Buddhism. The other two being contemplation and meditation. The way yoga which is about conscious breathing can help in healing a lot of ailments, something as simple as listening can fix the problems of the world.
Arun leaves his audience with a very profound message about listening. In his own words, the cultivation of skills for deeper listening begins with the listening to the stranger within us. How true can that be!
Death by Litigation – The Perils of Business Reporting
Paranjoy Guha Thakurta – a leading Indian journalist and a political analyst, quite amusingly quoted the abbreviation ‘SLAPP’, as if it were one of his favourite jargons from the Oxford dictionary. For a journalist like Guha, SLAPP or Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation is no fun actually. Now globally prevalent, it is a lawsuit that is intended to silence and even harass critics, to the point when they withdraw their voice of dissent. Lawsuits come with burgeoning legal costs and journalists often have to fight them with their own money and this can take years in the court. To add, a journalist can also lose his or her job while all this happens. Continue reading “Death by Litigation – The Perils of Business Reporting”
Writing Workshop
Creative writing, that many would love to hone, brings in a certain kind of joy, and pride to the writer. Rajorshi Chakraborti’s session on a breezy Sunday morning was packed with exercises that not only helped budding writers develop skills but also experienced writers go back to the basics. Chakraborti was born in Kolkata and grew up in Mumbai. He currently lives in Wellington, New Zealand. He is the author of 4 books, two of which have been nominated in different categories for the Crossword Book Award. The fifth one is due in Australia and New Zealand in March 2018, and is titled ‘The Man Who Would Not See’.