The Guru of Ghazals

I've had my 'phases'. These ranged from the extreme depression to the exact opposite. And in one of these phases, Jagjit Singh figured prominently.

I think I was in the 10th standard back then. A sudden bout of gloom had overtaken my life. I was on the verge of literally switching career choices. I had been a 'Brilliant Tutorials' target IITJEE correspondence course student till then because well, I wanted to become an engineer. But of course things were changing drastically for me primarily due to the awesomeness of one Biology Sir (whose name I can't recall right now, and yea shame on me for that), we students of his affectionately called him that, and the ridiculously boring regimen of ICSE mathematics. I wasn't sure if that was the right thing to do, taking drastic steps with regards to career choices. My parents being neither doctors nor engineers didnt help matters. So, confused I was back then, and bored too. It was then that I found solace in someone's voice.

My dad has always been a huge music listener. Even in my childhood I had seen cartons full of audio cassettes and photographs of musicians at every corner of the house. And dad's obsession only grew with time albeit he switched from cassettes to CDs. Jagjit Singh was someone my dad listened to back then almost daily. The Akai home theater at our place buzzed with the thick baritone of Gulzar and the melancholic voice of Singh everyday. I wasn't a fan of this 'Ghazal stuff' initially or maybe I didn't want to be. I mean lets face it, my friends were listening to Linkin Park back then, it was the cool thing, the 'in-thing'!

Yet the man grew on me, his voice did. Ghazal, which I had once thought of as 'lame' and 'slow' and 'dull' was suddenly starting to make sense. I felt as if a giant jigsaw puzzle was falling into place. The world started making sense. Soon i found myself spending hours listening to Jagjit Singh's beautiful rendition of ghazals. Linkin Park and Limp Bizkit suddenly seemed way too fake and goofy for my tastes, which of course were changing quite drastically.

It was during this 'phase' that I discovered ghazals. The entire genre became a favourite of mine. I got hold of literally every single Jagjit Singh album released till date, and my dad was only too happy to buy me all those. Now that I look back, I think he felt glad that he had finally bridged the generation gap. I was so obsessed with ghazals, especially the ones sung by Jagjit Singh, that I had almost memorised every single one! Even to this day, I can recall the lyrics of quite a few.

My interest in ghazals has since then faded. But Jagjit Singh's voice and his songs, (along with Gulzar's impeccable elocution), helped me through one of the toughest phases of my life and I can only be grateful to the man for that.

Rest in Peace, Jagjit Singh. The heavens are apparently in greater need of your songs.

The O.C. - Revisited

I remember watching The O.C. on TV back in my schooldays. In India, back then, TV series from foreign shores were rare. One either had to buy DVDs of entire shows from the stores, which was bloody expensive. Not to mention the hilarious ‘collections‘ at those stores. Simply put, TV shows from the US were plain inaccessible. Now in 2011, I find it very hard to imagine myself living in that India. Yet, as the cliche goes, those were the best days of my life.

Image via Wikipedia

The O.C. was a show which was actually telecast here, on some obscure English soap channel, again something which was rare during that time. I had watched a few episodes of The O.C. and found it interesting. At the time, having the television in the ‘dining room’ was in vogue. The guests come in and BAM, there’s the big screen TV, that was the logic I presume, both flaunting the ‘treasure’ and guarding it from the prying eyes of a fourteen year old searching desperately for easy access to porn. To be honest, considering the amount of ‘resources’ we kids could get our hands on, shows like The O.C., with its occasional ‘hot scenes’ almost substituted the need for the real thing (admit it, season one of the show was pretty hot and intense and Marissa Cooper, she was HOT!). I know, people will find it hilarious now, but yea, that’s what life was like back then. No internet, no porn.

Many years later, after ‘maturing’ (both porn-wise and emotionally, emotionally as in not interpreting shows like these as mini-porn), I got down to the task of finally watching that goddamn show. The O.C., which deals with the lives of the uber-rich, is all that it’s made out or blamed to be. It’s awfully fake, its surreal and its way, way over the top. Bottomline, it should have sucked. Only it didn’t.

Some terrific acting performances were put on display throughout the four seasons of the show and I had some pretty amazing revelations too.

1. Marissa Cooper is still HOT, albeit she seems a bit fake now.

2. Marissa Cooper may be hot but Mischa Barton cant act to save her life!

3. Summer Roberts is a darling (Realisation - I’m totally not a lovey-dovey-comfy-cosy person, but hey, sometimes being all that is okay)

4. Sandy Cohen and Kirsten Cohen are one of the most adorable mom-dad characters ever seen on TV.

5. Seth Cohen is my hero (in a completely non-gay way). Yes, he is. And Adam Brody is awesome. I’m surprised how underused he has been since the show ended. I have barely seen him in a couple of decent movies but that’s pretty much it. The guy deserves better.

6. Say what you may, but the title track "California" by Phantom Planet, defined an entire generation.

Final words? Well I’m glad the show ended the way it did. I’m also glad that the it finally ended and didn’t keep going on with the increasingly sloppy plotline (yea, I agree season three was pretty lame). This show was a part of me growing up (in whatever weird way that may be) and I am so glad to have finally watched it in its entirety.  I do like my share of Dexter, House, True Blood and Breaking Bad, but a dash of nostalgia surely can’t hurt.

The O.C. wasn’t even close to being a great show, hell I doubt if that was even the most popular show on TV back then, it was fake and unreal, but god it was good!

Q&A: Not really that bad

Ask anyone who has read it and you'll most likely, get the same reply. It's either "isn't that the Slumdog Millionaire book?" or "yeah, read it, sucked man". Enough of a reason for me to give the book a try.

Q&A by Vikas Swarup isn't your conventional run of the mills 'coincidental' fiction novel. It's pretty well crafted and elegantly put together novel with a thrilling plot which comes alive with every single chapter. The protagonist Ram Mohammad Thomas, (weird name you would say, well even that has a pretty humourous explanation) lands up in a KBC-esque (Who Wants to Be a Millionaire, for people not familiar with KBC) quiz show to win a billion rupees.

Of course, being a boy from the slums, he is left to fend for himself at the show, with the help of his extensive experiences. To the horror of the producers of the show and the surprise of everyone, he manages to answer all the questions correctly and win the prize money. The producers, who weren't prepared to pay a billion rupees to the winner in the first place, bribe the police and have him arrested on charges of cheating, only to be saved later by a lawyer.

This is where the story takes off. Q&A is essentially Ram's explanation to the lawyer (whose identity is revealed later in the plot) as to how a boy from the slums managed to scrape through the maze of all the questions on the quiz (and life) without having any formal education.

The reason why most readers hate this novel is because of its literary character (rather the lack of).  Granted its not literature. But then again, popular fiction isn't all about literature only is it? It's about entertaining the reader and making sure the reader has enough interest to not throw the book away after reading the first few pages. To that extent, Vikas Swarup definitely succeeds. And we must give him credit for that.

Its quite a departure from the movie Slumdog Millionaire, (the other way round it should be, but since this was a post-movie read I'll keep it that way) and frankly I like this one better!

Neglect the reviews for once and go read this book, you wont regret it.

The Shiva Trilogy

It's not very often that we Indians come across books from our compatriots which turn out to be page turners. Sure we have the Amitav Ghosh-s and the Kiran Desai-s, but the mass market popular paperbacks are what is lacking here. Chetan Bhagat broke that seemingly insurmountable barrier with Five Points Someone.

Amish Tripathi has taken it one step further. His books, The Immortals of Meluha and The Secret of the Nagas, which is a sequel to the former, have found admirers among many Indian readers who would have otherwise been loath to the idea of reading formulaic books. The Shiva Trilogy (the final book in the series yet to be released) is an epic retelling of the tale of Shiva, a subject rarely dealt with in popular culture. Amish has clearly done his research and starts off with the premise that claims Shiva as a human being who was elevated to the stature of god for his virtues and his deeds. Thus identifying with Shiva, all of sudden, for the reader is not really as difficult as it would have been had he been a god.

Writing a book on a topic yet to be 'discovered' has its advantages. But thankfully, Amish doesnt seem to take his readers for granted. Action packed to the point of being a thriller, both the novels are absolute page turners. 'Unputdownable', I'd say (as a certain newspaper in Kolkata promises to its readers).

It's not literature though and the amateurish (or populist?) writing can at times get to you, but the sheer magnanimity of the main plot, the well thought out subplots and the adequately if not well developed characters lend a certain charm to these novels, not found in most tales by Indian authors these days.

I will go as far as this, Amish is definitely the GRRM of Indian literature as of now. The scale of the plot is as grandiose as A Song of Ice and Fire. A must read. 

The Garden of Solitude - Review

I'll be honest here. I rarely read books from 'debut authors'. However Siddhartha Gigoo's novel had to be an exception. It just had to be. 

The Garden of Solitude deals with the plight of the Kashmiri pandits, the pain and the suffering the migration caused and the emotional turmoil the pandits had to go through. There aren't very many books on the subject. The ones which exist are either out of reach, in all senses of the word, or written in a documentary format, which to be honest, doesnt really make for an interesting reading experience.

So there I was, the book in my hand, eagerly awaiting to delve into the pages. The novel starts off lazily, describing the lives of the residents, the near utopic state which prevailed before the turmoil. Although the descriptions are vivid and eloquent, it gets pretty boring eventually. Hence, even before the real story kicks off, I felt tired and bored.

The story in itself is quite shocking and the events dealt with an amazing amount of sensitivity. However at the end of the day, it just feels like way too impersonal an account. The author does come up with a few glimpses of his literary brilliance, but those are few and far between. It almost feels like an overstretched poetry gone wrong due to the poet's over-eagerness to impress.

This is a must-read though. The plight of the Kashmiri pandits has been a neglected topic for many years now. The author should get all the kudos just for bringing the subject to light.