The Mutiny by Julian Rathbone

The Mutiny by Julian Rathbone
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The 1857 rebellion a.k.a the first Indian war of Independence is a point of interest to me and it is fascinating to read about the different people with a different agendas were able to come together for a cause albeit their selfish motives.
So it was with a lot of interest that I picked up this one to read of the rebellion from the perspective of the British people who lived through it. However, I should say the book for all its promises delivered very little.

For some odd reason, the author insists in the prologue and in the Epilogue that the British did a lot of good things (like they sent only about 1% of the tax revenues back to UK) in India and also insisting that it was not a war of Independence. I was not sure how that related to the story other than showing a glimpse of the author's political leanings.

The answer, as some one from the country where the British did so much good is that, the last famine in India was in 1942 in Bengal and since 1947, after independence, the country never had a famine. And I think while the railways and telegraph were good, it was only developed as a means of moving military transport and any civilian comfort from that was just accidental and I do not want to start on the number of native industries that paid the price to keep Manchester and Birmingham in the middle of the industrial world.. While I don't want to be spoiler of the 'good imperialist' philosophy, I cannot let it go unanswered as well.

Now, back to the book, while it documents the historical incidents more accurately, the story just limps along the unfolding of the events. Sophie, Lavanya, Bruce and almost every fictional character wanders all along the Gangetic plains without any purpose other than be at the next battle or siege. That is sad as the initial chapters of the book on the Meerut barracks were well written.

However, the author in his zeal towards the history keeps losing his characters and by extension us, the readers as well. It could've been an excellent spy story with Bruce in the middle or a tragic love story with Sophie and Bruce as the drivers or it could've been a historical rendering of events. It ends up us nothing. That is a pity.

It is still an interesting book overall if you can forgive the plot holes and focus on the history.



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முள்ளால் எழுதிய ஓலை

முள்ளால் எழுதிய ஓலை by உ.வே.சாமிநாதையர்
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

தமிழ் தாத்தா உ.வே.சா அவர்களின் 'என் சரித்திரம்' எனக்கு பிடித்த நூல்களில் ஒன்று. 19ம் நூற்றாண்டின் மத்திய பகுதிகளின் தமிழ் வாழ்வை ஆவண படுத்திய நூல் அது. எனவேதான் காலச்சுவடில் இருந்து அவரின் கட்டுரை தொகுப்புகள் ஐந்து பகுதிகளாக வருகின்றன என்றவுடன் இந்த புத்தக கண்காட்சியில் வாங்க வேண்டிய புத்தக பட்டியலில் சேர்த்து விட்டேன்.

அந்த ஐந்தில் நான் முதலில் படித்தது 'முள்ளால் எழுதிய ஓலை'. பெரும்பாலும் செவிவழிக் கட்டுரைகள், தனி மனித வாழ்வு சம்பவங்களின் தொகுப்பான இந்நூல் 18-19ம் நூற்றாண்டு வாழ் தஞ்சை தமிழ் மக்களின் வாழ்வின் ஒரு பகுதியை ஆவண படுத்துகிறது. இந்த நூற்றாண்டுகளின் பெரும்பாலான தரவுகள் 20ம் நூற்றாண்டின் பின் பகுதியில் திராவிட, கம்யூனிச அரசியலின் பின் புலத்தில் எழுதப்பட்டவையே. அந்த அரசியல் தாக்கத்தின் முன்னர் தொகுக்க பட்ட கதைகள்/நிகழ்வுகள் வெகு அரிதாகவே இருக்கின்றன. இந்த ஒரு காரணமே இந்த தொகுப்பை ஒரு முக்கிய தொகுப்பாகிறது.

உ.வே.சாவின் அரசியல் என்ன? நான் படித்த வரை அவரின் அரசியல் தமிழாகவே இருக்கிறது. அவரின் ஒவ்வொரு செயலும் தமிழின் வரலாற்றை பாதுகாப்பதும், பேணுவதும் மட்டுமே. சில கதை/கட்டுரைகளில் அந்த கால சாதி அரசியலை அவர் கோடிக் காட்டினாலும் அதை ஒரு விமர்சனமுமின்றி தாண்டி போகிறார். அந்த நிகழ்வை ஆவண படுத்துதல் அன்றி அதன் அரசியலில் நுழைய மறுக்கிறார்.

இந்நூலில் அவர் காட்டும் உலகம் தமிழ் சமூகம் சிறு சமஸ்தானங்களாக இருந்த காலகட்டம். வெள்ளையர்கள் பட்டும் படாமல் 'கிஸ்தி' வசூல் செய்து கொண்டு தமிழ் அரசர்/சமஸ்தானாதிபதிகள் தங்களுக்குள் சண்டை/சச்சரவுகளுடன் இருந்த காலம். இந்த நூலில் பெரும்பாலான கதைகள் சொக்கம்பட்டி (இது திருநெல்வேலி அருகில் உள்ளது) சமஸ்தானாதிபதி பொன்னம்பலம் பிள்ளை, ராமநாதபுர சேதுபதி அரசர்கள், தஞ்சை சரபோஜி ராஜா முதலானோர் பற்றிய நிகழ்வுகளும், உ.வே.சா கேட்ட செவி வழிக் கதைகள் சிலவற்றின் தொகுப்பாகும்.

புத்தக பெயர் உள்ள கதை மருது பாண்டியர் பற்றிய ஒரு கதை. இக்கதையில் வரும் கிராமம் இன்னமும் இருப்பதாய் உ.வே.சா கூறுகிறார். ஒவ்வொரு கதை/நிகழ்வுக்கு பின் குறிப்பில் அதன் கதை மாந்தரின் இன்றைய நிலை குறித்து ஒரு குறிப்பும், அந்த கதை/நிகழ்வு அவருக்கு யாரால், எப்போது கூறப்பட்டது போன்றவற்றை சொல்கிறார். மருது பாண்டியர் பற்றிய மற்றும் ஒரு கதையும் பதிவு செய்கிறார்.

பெரும்பாலான கதை/நிகழ்வுகள் தஞ்சையின் நில சுவான்தார்களாக இருந்த பிராமணர்களை பற்றி இருந்தாலும், அவர்கள் கிராம சூழ்நிலை, வெள்ளையர்களுடன் அவர்களுக்கு இருந்த உறவு, மற்றைய சாதிகளுடன் இருந்த உறவு முதலியவற்றுக்கு பதிவு பெறுகிறது. பறையருக்கு தெருக்கோடியில் மரக்காலில் அன்னம் வைப்பதை கூறுகிறார்.

கோயிலில் தாசிகளை முதுகில் கால் ஏற்றி, பிரம்பால் அடித்து தண்டனை கொடுப்பதையும் அதை எந்த சலனமுமின்றி ஒரு கூட்டம் வேடிக்கை பார்ப்பதையும் பதிவு செய்கிறார்.ஒரு விதத்தில் இந்த புத்தகத்தை படிப்பதும் அது போன்று எந்த முன் முடிவும் இன்றி வேடிக்கை பார்த்தல் போன்றதே. இன்றைய அரசியல் முன் முடிவுகளோடு வாசிக்காது ஒரு வரலாற்று ஆவணமாகவே வாசிக்க வேண்டும்.

மொத்தத்தில் தமிழ் ஆர்வலர் அனைவரும் வாசிக்கவேண்டிய தொகுப்பு.

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Review: Going Solo

Going Solo by Roald Dahl
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Roald Dahl has been a favorite author for many, many years now and I went into the book hoping to read another five star book. And of course, he delivers again.

The book is different not because it documents the adventures of him as a pilot in the second world war but because he keep referring them as more of 'misadventures'. There are places he glazes over details but if you only pause and reflect, then it dawns on you.

The book starts with his journey to Africa on a 'floating bath-tub' to work for Shell. He meets all these Empire builders and memsahib, all of whom come out as nutty. His relations with the native Africans are more on a neutral ground and he has a lot of good things to say about them but I was a little surprised that he didn't say anything about the social conditions in the continent at that time.
Its either he didn't notice or decided not to get into political talk. So it was all about the animals of Africa, the snakes, the servants and cooks and little anecdotes.

Then war breaks. Being in the fringe of action and with lower priority on everything, becoming an Air force pilot was a little different than in the other theaters of war. And Dahl goes over the craziness of war and the idiosyncrasies of the people who are running it.

In the middle of the war, he drives across the continent, across the Sinai and them passes over them in a couple of pages. I wish he had written a little more on the sights and adventures during this time.

But then, I am nit-picking. Over all, an wonderful adventurous book if you are a young adult or an adult.

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Review: Flashman and the Tiger

Flashman and the Tiger by George MacDonald Fraser
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

It is with a mixed feeling that I took up this one. This is the last of the Flashman for me. Letting Flashman go away is like having a fun part of life come to an end.

I started the series without much expectation thinking of it to be a period romance. So the non-conventional story telling of Fraser was a surprise, a pleasant one though. Every book had its quirk and watched the movie adaptation of the one book, it was like I was not getting enough of Flashman.

So it was with a bit of sadness that I took this one. However, I ended up feeling that probably Fraser stopped the series with the next one as otherwise he would've been trapped by the template of the stories and would've killed the fun of Flashman. By ending the series, he made sure the sense of longing lingers on.

Now to the book itself. This one is one novella and two smaller stories. Of course, the Novella follows Flashman in Vienna in the middle of the Balkan crises. There is the lady spy, the princess and of course the multiple conspiracies with a murder attempt on the Austrian emperor. Though it was good, it was not matching up with the intrigues Flashman was part of in the other continents.

The Tronby craft affair is the center of the second story which of course is the weakest of all. In fact, I stopped reading for a while with the boring back and forths of a domestic intrigue.

'Flashman and the Tiger' the last story in the book is probably the best of the lot. Again a domestic issue with flashbacks into the Zulu war, the story is racy, has Flashman in his elements and have a cameo of Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson at the end.
Overall, an interesting (though partially) book.

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Death...

This I wrote 2.5 years back when we faced a tragedy in the family. Today, I was forced to re-open and re-live the same again. It may be difficult to find sleep again for some days to come.

Why? This year, 2016, has been so far absolutely merciless with deaths strewn across the months like a crazy monkey tearing away flowers.

But again, the helplessness one feels to console oneself or others makes one humble and absolutely mad. There is no healing for this wound. 

"How does one reconcile with death? It stares at you and mocks. All that you thought will hold melts away in a minute. The face of the baby still-born remains in one's mind always. The terrible reality of of the realization that you are robbed of your precious dawns like a snake in the grass. Stealthily and steadily. The stab it makes in the heart marks a permanent wound and may never heal. The happiness drains away so fast you don't even realize the world you are in.

You lose a bit yourself, some part of it dies, when the grave is filled. It fills the world with grief, unbearable silence, a sense of hopelessness which may never be recovered.The world loses its meaning and you reel under the merciless wheels of time.

Time may heal the wound, the scar remains. How do you reconcile with yourself when you know that it is not going to be the same world you are going to live in again. Never again. The world changes a bit for worse. There is no going back.

The one you love, the one you want to be happy, when you see that he and she grieving and when you know that whatever you say will not turn back anything, how to live with that?

The supernatural, the God, has a terrible pact with death and lets Him take little babies away. What is the point of Him if He cannot save one little baby? Merciful, He isn't.

It was like a beautiful dream. A dream which just flitted with reality for a moment. It vanished the moment it touched reality. The dream gave such happiness to everyone. It was such a beautiful dream it breaks my heart to realize that it is no more.

Farewell, little one! We did not even had time to give you a name. You somehow detested to live in this sinful, pathetic world and chose to leave us all for the happiness beyond. We are happy for you, for you showed us what absolute happiness is, even though it is for a moment. You showed as what life could've been and that was absolute bliss. May be you will chose to come back to us. We will wait for that day and we love you with all our heart, it broke mine to bid you farewell this morning.  May you find eternal peace and take pity on us and send us another angel to our house. We hope and long for that."

An afternoon with Bernie

My introduction to American politics happened with the 2000 election between Al Gore and G.W.Bush. I've had notions of the way the American democracy works before but never bothered to learn about it. However, on the merit of being the oldest democracy, it was easier to blame on a system which was confusing and too vague from a largest vote getter wins narrative. 

So when the 2000 election and the subsequent commotion happened, that is when I thought it worthwhile to read about the American electoral system. It was difficult to understand and was counter-intuitive. I couldn't for the life of myself figure out why the electoral system is the way it was. It needed a lot of reading into the lives of the founding fathers of American politics and introduced some of the leaders I consider great and who actually were visionaries and pioneers in defining democracy so many years ago (Jefferson, John Adams, Hamilton, Burr, Madison, Ben Franklin). 

That said, a lot of the issues with the current state of American politics also can be traced to most of the issues plaguing the system today. I am no expert but understanding the issues makes it more interesting to follow them.

So I've been following the election years of the America with more interest as the civil blows of the day make for good reading. So it was in  2004 & 2008. 2012 was timid compared to those elections. Infact the 2008 Dem primary was more interesting than the 2012 election.

So it was again with interest that I started watching this year's primaries and the rebellious candidacies of Bernie and Trump. Trump, I lost interested in him the moment he started behaving like a crazy guy. Bernie, he looks like one, but talks more like how I used to be while in college. 

Now, the inequity of the world used to piss me off so much that I was expecting a revolution to come to sweep off all that and bring in a utopia of sorts. This is something I strongly wanted to happen till at least 3-4 into the job stream. And attributed to the heavy reading of Soviet literature in my early days. I remember the snowy nights in Omaha when I used to argue hotly with Haridas about the coming revolution. 

Then something happened and I became skeptical, then cynical and then lost faith in the revolution. In fact the revolution seemed like a cruel idea to keep dreaming about the life during the college life. 

Now Bernie was like the guy who still lives in college with the same dream for the past 50 years. I am not sure whether that is a good thing or not. So it was that by chance, I happen to be in the area during the NY primary and decided to check out Bernie in one of his rallies.

So after a few transfers and quite a bit of walk, reached the Bronx Community college. A short introduction by Susan Sarandon and Bernie came and spoke for about 45 minutes.

 I was listening with interest as Bernie starts off with the list of how his revolution will proceed. Free college, $15, On par wages for women, Healthcare for all, closing down jails etc. And every time he touched the particular item, the crowd went crazy. 

The crowd consists of mainly college kids, mostly white but some Latinos and African-Americans as well. It was fun to see all that enthusiasm and the inevitable reality that will take over. For all the believing in vs pragmatism, I do not think Bernie is no FDR or Lincoln to push through his agenda and I thought the Americans learnt it in the past 8 years of Obama and how much he had to struggle to push through incremental changes.

But then I would love to see Bernie as president trying to push through his agenda in a Republican congress. That will be something. 

But then my limiting knowledge of American politics may be a reason why I am skeptical. Any way it was an learning experience to be there feeling to be part of the great American election experience.

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome

SPQR: A History of Ancient Rome by Mary Beard
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

There are a lot of books on Rome that read like history. They talk about the well-known actors of the Roman stage and go about explaining the history of Rome. Mary Beard takes on the task of trying to put together a history of the first millennium of Rome in perspective and she does it in the most unorthodox way.

Instead of trudging through the usual players of the first Roman millennium, starting with Romulus, Numa, Tarquin and then jump a few hundred years into the interesting stories of Marius, Sulla and Ceaser, she constructs a story based on multiple sources of archaeological evidences gathered and more importantly, the quaestors, praetors, the slaves and the citizens (and non-citizens) of Rome.

Thus the book tries to take a perspective of things through the lenses of the ordinary people of Rome. Thus we get to read about the bar fights of the day, the toilet humor (who knows the philosophers will be so much useful there!), the laundry unions of Rome, the lives of the people of Rome which has scant evidence and as the author acknowledges in the epilogue, would've taken a lot of time to gather, analyze and infer from whatever evidence available.

For me, what was interesting was that the book dodges the salacious stories of the emperors and tries to focus more on the Roman history of people. However the written evidences only offer a glimpse of the people and so the author reconstructs the events through the evidences that are available. Starting from the letters of Cicero to Pliny and the (now preserved) museum of Pompeii, she constructs a story which is as interesting to read and learn about the emperors of the era.

A must read if you are a history lover.

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