Samskara by U R Ananathamurthy, Oxford Paperbacks

U R Ananthamurthy’s Samskara was written in the 1960s and I am thankful to my friend for suggesting that I should read it. Originally written in Kannada the English translation is a very good read. The story is quite famous and has been made into a film also. The story revolves around the  death of a Brahmin man  and the confusion around the performance of his last rites .The man  is considered a heretic by the village Brahmins and was shunned by his community when he was alive , yet his last rites cannot be performed by  any non-Brahmin  according to social rules. Life in the tradition ridden village society is wonderfully portrayed and  the conflicts amongst castes, the various social taboos have been narrated in great detail.

What I enjoyed reading most was the close analysis of the psychological conflict waging in the mind of the revered Brahmin pundit  . Pranesacharya the central protagonist is faced with a life changing situation which completely destroys his peace of mind but in a way it also liberates him from the fetters of tradition. He tries to escape from his known surroundings initially but later on longs to return to his village and among his fraternity. A celibate who shuns all kind of vices and  weaknesses , who deliberately marries a sick woman and seeks spiritual release by serving her unfailingly, has a chance encounter with a low-caste beautiful woman . The ancient texts which he knew by heart and used to recite everyday suddenly come to life as he experiences reality in the shape of this beautiful woman. He feels he is not a Brahmin anymore but does not repent it.

The social situation might seem dated for urban tastes but anyone who has been brought up in  conservative brahminical traditions cannot fail to notice the striking resemblance to one’s own emotional, cultural and social response to similar situations in life.  Samskara can have a vice like grip on society and sometimes can destroy human lives completely. Pranesacharya reminded me about Tagore’s Gora. Both rediscover themselves  .

Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng, Myrmidon books 2012

After ages I have read something so hauntingly beautiful , so mystical, so romantic and yet so sad. I simply raced through the pages of this lovely historical novel only to be left completely mesmerised by the magic of Twan's narrative .
The story is told in flashback. Yun Ling is a retired judge battling the onset of dementia .Before her mind fails her she wants to capture her memories in words.
Below is a quote from http://www.tantwaneng.com/

"On a mountain above the clouds, in the central highlands of Malaya lived the man who had been the gardener of the Emperor of Japan.”

Teoh Yun Ling was seventeen years old when she first heard about him, but a war would come, and a decade would pass before she travels up to the Garden of Evening Mists to see him, in 1951. A survivor of a brutal Japanese camp, she has spent the last few years helping to prosecute Japanese war criminals. Despite her hatred of the Japanese, she asks the gardener, Nakamura Aritomo, to create a memorial garden for her sister who died in the camp. He refuses, but agrees to accept Yun Ling as his apprentice ‘until the monsoon’ so she can design a garden herself.

Staying at the home of Magnus Pretorius, the owner of Majuba Tea Estate and a veteran of the Boer War, Yun Ling begins working in the Garden of Evening Mists. But outside in the surrounding jungles another war is raging. The Malayan Emergency is entering its darkest days, the communist-terrorists murdering planters and miners and their families, seeking to take over the country by any means, while the Malayan nationalists are fighting for independence from centuries of British colonial rule."

For Aritomo creating the garden  is almost like being on a spiritual journey. As his disciple and later his lover Yun Ling becomes part of this spiritual quest. There are lot of cultural similarities with India which I could relate to .The descriptions of the workers' lives in the tea gardens, the atrocities carried out inside the camps and the exploitation of women who are treated as commodities and slaves, the lifelong love and friendship of  two adults who could have married yet both chose to remain single, the almost spiritual personal love story of two human beings belonging to enemy camps in the public eye, how an adopted country and its people can mean  so much to someone that you end up by paying with your life  and above all the beautiful descriptions of the Malayan landscape - all contribute towards making this novel intensely likeable.The book has intimate details of the Japanese tattoo art form, which is quite fascinating to read.
Twan's language is beautiful , almost philosophical at times. The language is languid and slow at times and at times open to interpretation because of the philosophy behind the words.This is a must read for all . 

In the falling snow/ Caryl Phillips, Harvill Secker 2009

 Caryl Phillips is one of my favourite authors. As usual he writes beautifully and deeply .

The book is about an individual’s search for identity in a modern multi-cultural world. Keith is a black man married to a white woman and they have a son. His one act of infidelity damages his carefully nurtured relationship with his long time sweetheart, university mate and wife Annabelle. Keith starts living away from his family and gets involved with his office colleague who is a divorcee. When he tries to withdraw himself from this relationship he is charged with sexual harassment by his young colleague who feels she has been used by him. Meanwhile Annabelle finds it trying to handle her son who is at a difficult stage in life and seeks Keith’s help to sort out matters .Though Annabelle and Keith have great mental bonding the book does not talk about their reunification . On the other hand the characters all live as isolated individuals trying to chalk out their own existence in this world.

The book also deals with old age problems. Keith and Annabelle both have to deal with aging parents. Keith’s sick father stays all by himself .He refuses to go and live in institutions where his other friends stay. He talks about the betrayals, disappointments, sufferings that he and his other friends had to suffer as black men in a predominantly white society. Annabelle’s father on the other hand is ashamed of his black son in law and never really accepts him as one of their own.
Keith’s son Laurie is again a victim of various racial prejudices. His white mother feels his black father can understand him better and protect him from trouble. However what Keith experiences when he meets his estranged son goes beyond mere racial problems .It becomes more of a psychological problem which is universal in nature.
 “Of course he wants his son to talk to him, but he understands why his son feels a little distant. Sons can be unforgiving towards those who they believe have hurt their mothers. “

While racial and social issues form the overriding theme of this book the story also depicts the impatience of modern man. Keith has no real feelings for the women he beds casually, Annabelle is deeply concerned about her family’s well being and hates to find Keith in a sorry state ,yet the two cannot find the words which could have saved their love and lives .
A lovely book which leaves you thinking about possibilities.

Ref : Image
http://www.tower.com/in-falling-snow-caryl-phillips-paperback/wapi/114299487

The Dhammapada /Translation and commentary in Hindi by Dr Wangchuk Dorjee Negi ,Director of Central Institute of Buddhist Studies,Leh , Translated from Hindi to Bengali by Ramkrishna Das. Paraspathar Prakashan.2012

It is always a pleasure to discover new books from displays put up by small publishers at major bookfairs. . While picking up this book at the Kolkata Bookfair this year , I was more attracted by the cover design and yes of course the title of the book . However I was expecting this to be another complex , esoteric,difficult to understand –kind of book . But I was in for a pleasant surprise. Parashpathar Prakashan has done a wonderful job by bringing out a Bengali translation of Dr Negi’s work on the Dhammapada . Reading this much revered spiritual text of Buddhism in Bengali was a wonderful experience. Mr. Das’s translation is lucid and extremely easy to read. For ordinary human beings trying to make sense of the chaos around him a book like this can provide some direction to his confused inner world .

Dalai Lama in his foreword says ‘The Dhammapada is a handbook of practical ethics, that may be of interest or benefit , whether you are a Buddhist or not. …a disciplined mind leads to happiness and an undisciplined mind leads to suffering. The Dhammapada describes a path of ethical behaviour that is a feature of this kind of inner discipline that leads to happier life.'

The Dhammapada is a collection of Buddha's sayings in verse form . The language is Pali /Prakrit which has its roots in Sanskrit. It is believed that the each verse is related to a specific situation in Buddha's life and times . Dr Negi’s original book in Hindi was published and distributed free to people at large. Mr. Das was one such recipient who sought permission to translate Dr Negi’s edition into Bengali. I can only thank him for doing so . Each verse is followed by a brief story  and a simple commentary. Most of us are familiar with some of the stories linked to Buddha’s teachings to his followers. One of my favourites is that of the lady named Kisagotami who lost her son and roamed around grief stricken with her dead son's body . Someone took her to Buddha and she asked him to bring her dead son back to  life. Buddha agreed to do so only if she could fetch him a handful of mustard seeds from a family that has not known death. The book is full of such fascinating stories. The book can be read if not for anything else then just for its easy to understand collection of stories which illustrate the eternal truths of life.

While reading the book I once again rediscovered some of the stories which have lived with me from my schooldays. Today when I am re- reading them it is a different experience since life’s sufferings, setbacks, betrayals and moments of joy and happiness have already coloured my perceptions of life. While I can agree with most of the concepts some can appear alien in today’s context. What I feel Dr Negi has been able to achieve is to provide a commentary on the concepts in a manner suitable for contemporary readers. The Bengali translation is equally good to hold the attention of ordinary readers like me.