Desicritics Category: Culture: Books

Book Review: The Next Christendom

Shantanu Dutta — Mon, 9 Mar 2009 09:43:17 EDT

What does the future hold for Christianity? Many books have been written which make a case that secular forces will instigate Christianity to grow to be more open-minded and less literal. Such statements may be confrontational and engaging, but they don't appear very convincing in light of the concrete demographic and geographic facts

These are some of the issues that are the subject of Philip Jenkins’ book on the possible future of Christianity. If Jenkins is correct, by the year 2050, six countries (Brazil, Mexico, the Philippines, Nigeria, Congo and the United States) will each have at least 100 million Christians and Europe will have long been displaced by Sub-Saharan Africa as the most important hub of Christianity, while Brazil itself will have at least 150 million Catholics and 40 million Protestants. More than one billion Pentecostals, among the poorest in their diverse populations, will be spreading their own beliefs to the rest of the world. And as Christianity moves steadily south, it is also taking on a new character: Kinshasa, Buenos Aires, Addis Ababa, and Manila are on their way to replacing Rome, Athens, Paris, London, and New York as the new focal points of the Christian Church.

While many Western analysts have stated that Christianity is in decay and that it must refashion its thinking or hazard being deserted by its followers ¾ or, even worse, becoming largely irrelevant, Professor Jenkins argues that just the contrary is true: Christianity is on the rise again and leading to a very different religion that barely resembles the Western reading of it. It is a variant of Christianity that most Westerners are not habituated to seeing

The book also parleys about how in spreading South, Christianity is in many ways returning to its native soil. Founded in the ancient near east, its earliest contact was greater toward the south and east than northwest into Europe. Of course, Jenkins’s designation of Christianity is broad, encompassing notional believers (i.e., “Christians” spanning actual believers to those whose declaration to Christian associations is merely traditional or cultural) in the Roman Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Coptic, and Ethiopian traditions, and even Indian churches tracing their roots to the apostle Thomas, and branches like the Nestorians.

The books describes how Christianity is beginning to look as it journeys south: Southern Christianity tends to be visibly more traditional theologically than northern. They are far more likely to be Pentecostal. They wait for God to work in signs, wonders, and visions–and they see it happening. Latin America is becoming more Pentecostal than Catholic. They are sending missionaries north and west. The largest church in London today is led by a Nigerian pastor. They are competing hand to hand for numbers and members with Muslims, and often, as in Darfur and previously in Rwanda, experiencing unbelievable maltreatment. They are the face of Christianity

Most books on Christianity today have had a tendency to concentrate on the experiences of the Christians in the United States and Europe - hardly a surprise, since predisposition that is where most of the readership for books tends to be situated. However, this preconceived notion offers a patchy and erroneous portrait of the factual nature of global Christianity. Deciding by the books now presented, it is nearly as if Christianity doesn't exist in the South. Jenkins’ scholarly book shows that the truth is entirely unlike from what we might tend to assume.

Art for Art's Sake

Amodini Sharma — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 07:38:35 EST

I see art everywhere - from beautifully framed prints in a home to grafitti on a bill-board. It's someone's idea of art. My thing with art has always been that is should be good enough to be remembered, and who cares if it is deep enough for the critics ! If I go to a home or to a public place and there’s stuff hanging on the walls, and when I return home, all I can remember is “stuff” and not the details, then that has really not been art. Hence my dislike for the generic plant/vases/fruits/animal paintings you see everywhere - one flower vase looks pretty much like another.

Figurative art is always interesting, because of the expressions and emotions attached to the painting. And it's always intriguing to read someone's views on something you yourself have strong views on. So while reading a not-so interesting novel, "The Sunday philosophy club" by Alexander Mcall Smith, it was most interesting to read the protagonist's view on artwork. The book falls in the mystery genre and some of you would recognize Smith for his other well known books (The No. 1 ladies detective agency) featuring lady detective Precious Ramotswe.

The protagonist here is a wealthy lady of independent means, Isabel Dalhousie, who has a penchant for solving problems not her own. At a suspect's house, Isabel, given to philosophical musings, observes the artwork :

"There were prints on the wall – the landlord’s taste, presumably mixed with that of the tenant: a view of the Falls of Cyde (landlord); A Bigger Splash, by Hockney, and Amateur Philosophers by Vettriano (tenants); and Iona, by Peploe (landlord). She smiled at the Vettriano – he was deeply disapproved of by the artistic establishment in Edinburgh, but he remained resolutely popular. Why was this ? Because his figurative paintings said something about people’s lives (at least about the lives of the people who danced on the beach in formal clothing); they had a narrative in the same way in which Edward Hopper’s paintings did. That was why there were so many poems inspired by Hopper; it was because there was a now-read-on note to everything he painted. Why are the people there? What are they thinking now? What are they going to do now?”

Edward Hopper’s paintings indeed do have that “now-read-on” feeling about them. Each of his painting is a snapshot of people doing something – it could be something as prosaic as reading a newspaper, but they leave you curious.

I do like Vettriano too, although some of his paintings are too mushy and too obvious for my taste. I like the "Singing Butler" because it’s got that hint of romance, but then again, “Dance me to the end of love” is a bit much. A lot of Vettriano paintings feature nicely dressed people on the beach. And interestingly, Vettriano started out as a mining engineer, only accidentally turning to painting when he was given a set of paints by a girl-friend.

Vettriano’s art is much maligned as being “vulgar and devoid of imagination”. But in that respect I think the criticism of apparently “frothy” art is similar to the criticism of “frothy” books. Must we read only literature and must we view only “deep” art? What about the whimsical, the light-hearted, the fun? Should we give all that up because it isn’t deep or worthy of us? That would be silly – if it pleases the eye and warms the soul, why not?

Book Review: Suite Francaise

Shantanu Dutta — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 08:45:51 EST

Suite Française is an interesting book for several reasons. The book is written by a Russian Jew and consists of two novellas bundled into one. They portray life in France from June 4, 1940, as German forces prepare to invade Paris, through July 1, 1941, when some of Hitler's occupying troops leave France to join the assault on the Soviet Union.

The second novella ends abruptly, because the author was not able to finish the manuscript. This was because she was arrested and sent to the concentration camps and eventually to the gas chamber. Irène Némirovsky was a Russian Jew who had lived in France since 1919 and had established herself in her adopted country's literary community, publishing nine novels and a biography of Chekhov. The edition of the book that I read ends with lots of correspondence between Irene’s husband and many of her associates in the publishing industry and the occupation regime of Marshal Petain. The family tries hard to establish her whereabouts after she was arrested and sent off without any information provided to her family. =The correspondence reveals that her husband’s efforts at tracing her continued for long after she had been sent to the gas chambers ; of course these facts became known only after the war ended.

Suite Francaise was originally meant to be a set of five vignettes of French life under the Nazis but of course only two were completed. “Storm in June” is the first novella. What is interesting about the book is the diversity of characters that Irene has created and their range of responses as German bombs dropped over the Paris sky and people were forced to retreat to the countryside. So there is the aristocracy, the artistes and writers, the trading and merchant class, middle class bureaucrats and commoners; all of whose familiar way of life comes to an end and they must no prepare to move to the countryside. How they do so, the priorities in their lives as they surface under the pressure and the eventual choices they make seems to underscore the basic selfishness of the human race and the instinct for self preservation that overrides every thing when the chips are down.

“Dolce” is the second novella where the occupation is now a reality and German Army is stationed in the villages of France and most things have been requisitioned by the occupation army for military use. Again the reactions and responses of the French villagers are beautifully captured. The young women are welcoming of the German Army – the French young men are all away fighting and the German officers and men are invariably polite and respectful.

The older generation (and mostly women are portrayed) are more confused. they have memories of the First World War when the French were victorious; their husbands and sons are away fighting – some are prisoners of war and some are killed and the fate of many is not clear as France has just surrendered, and here they are; under duress, having to provided hospitality to the enemy who seen and heard close by is courteous, polite and even embarrassed at what is now happening.

A great strength of the book is that although it depicts the political scenario and the military occupation of France for what it was, it doesn’t not demonize the occupying German Army, but rather portrays them warmly with families and loved ones of their own.

Shaleen Singh's unusual poetry, Proprietary Pains

Amitabh Mitra — Sat, 21 Feb 2009 05:33:18 EST

Shaleen Singh belongs to a small town of Budaun in the province of Uttar Pradesh in India. Post Colonial Poetry in India came in varied extent from the metropolis. Yes, there is definitely an invisible bond in ones creativity to the town or village of residence. The rustic surroundings of Budayun have influenced Shaleen’s poetry to a certain level.

The Indo-English Poetry Movement that dominated with a few names from the sixties to eighties has lost the anarchy that it professed. Instead poets like Shaleen Singh have brought their own vivid and iconoclastic imagery that defies any norm of poetry, grammar and even English. It is a poetry that is truly Indian. His poems are ultimate, radical and spoken in two or three words. They are like the hot wind that blows so often in summer at Budayun. Its searing effect is reflected on words that are immediate, poetry that seems to grow unhindered in unusual circumstances like the old Banyan tree in his house at Budayun.

Cover Watercolor by Amitabh Mitra, Poets Printery Publishing, South Africa

Book Review: Down Memory Lane by Ravi Govender

Amitabh Mitra — Sat, 7 Feb 2009 00:49:37 EST

My friend Ravi Naicker is a poet and a teacher in Umzinto, Kwa Zulu Natal. I told him about my desire to publish a book of South African poets that would focus on the politics of New South Africa.He immediately asked me to contact his friend Ravi Govender in Durban.

I called him up and requested him to introduce me to South African poets from Natal who were affected during the apartheid regime. He was enthusiastic and promised me to do the same. The same afternoon I chanced upon Ravi’s book, Down Memory Lane at a used book shop in East London. Definitely, this is the same Ravi Govender I had been talking that morning.

Quoting from Radio Lotus FM website –
Govender.....Ravi Govender was born in Victoria Street, Durban just two blocks from the Indian Market on October 17th not too long ago.

He writes two popular columns for POST newspaper - of which he is also on the editing team. He is a public speaker, entrepreneur, serves on the board of a Durban Hospital and also a successful author. His hobbies are rugby, reading and watching movies and he is a Hollywood film buff as well as a James Bond nut. Ravi’s favourite actors are Anthony Hopkins and Al Pacino and his favourite movies are The Wild Geese and any 007 movie. His take on Bollywood is that "Priyanka Chopra is the cutest thing on two legs" and he rates Veer Zara as his best Eastern movie.

Ravi has a regular programme ‘Off the Shelf’ on Lotus FM which has gained immense popularity over the years.

Down Memory Lane is a book of historic value as it documents events through the eyes of a small boy growing in an apartheid era. This book had me engrossed as pages unfolded the Indian culture that blossomed even in severely restricted conditions of that time.

Aziz Hassim, Award winning Author of the Lotus People writes in his Forward, ‘There is a saying that if you forget your past you will be condemned to repeat it. When I read Ravi Govender’s essays and his reminiscences about our somewhat chequered history, I marvel at his ability to recall Durban’s bitter sweet past with touching finesse and a depth of perception’

Regarding the ‘bhais’ (gangsters) that prowled the Durban streets during that time, Ravi has aptly named this chapter as ‘Bada Bing, Bada Boom’. He writes, ‘Some of the cadres that ruled the streets were as follows: Victoria Street where I was sired boasted The Victorians, The Queens Brigade reigned in Queen Street. The Salots which consisted primarily of brothers operated taxis near Kapitan’s Balcony Hotel in the Grey Street area. The Dutchins laagered in Old Dutch Road and The Young Americans were united in Bond Street.

They were mostly ‘toothless tigers’ trying to live off their former reputations. You know the type: one guy initiates an argument and then edges backward into his mate, declaring “hold me back, hold me back, before I kill him”

Ram Gopal Verma can actually make a film based on such a story in Durban involving such characters.

In his column ‘ Proudly Indian – Our contribution to a better world’ Ravi recounts, ‘November 16 1860,the first vessel, the SS Truro, left Madras, sailed to South Africa and was borne along more through sheer human spirit than spook and diesel.
Another factor attests to our success. Foremost in the life of our forebears was the need for a place of worship and a place for education. Parents still sacrifice their own comfort and luxuries to ensure they give their children a good education and go on to further studies, to enable them to have good careers and be productive citizens. It also serves to preserve the hard earned reputation that Indians have as valuable contributors to this country'.

Not bad for people who arrived here to be cane cutters and who have gone on to produce doctors, educators and captains of industry.

Cato Manor is synonymous with the apartheid in South Africa. During1949 and 1950 when the Group Areas Act was passed on by the government, people were forced to move from the place to townships like KwaMashu and the Indians moved to places like Chatsworth and Phoenix. Cato Manor became an international symbol of resistance to apartheid by Indians.

Ravi has written about forced removals of Indians from a place called Magazine Barracks. He writes ’the murder weapon was the diabolic Group Areas Act and the misery and turmoil caused by its death blow is unpardonable. The action of its perpetrator was unconscionable.’

Ravi Govender’s book, Down Memory Lane is an unforgettable narration of the Indian community’s resistance to alien laws, their sacrifices and finally their victory over all odds. The present generation of youth in India and overseas have a lot to learn from reading this book, his words continue to inspire us all.

A Landmark Love Story

IdeaSmith — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 09:14:26 EST

The Landmark bookstore opens its doors on 23rd January 2009. Landmark has been shut these past three months after a fire broke out in Infinity Mall where it is housed, causing much damage to merchandise and fittings. Mercifully no human casualties except of course for avid Landmarkers who've missed the store sorely all this while that it has been undergoing renovation.

I'm irrationally excited over this. Come Friday and I'm making no plans, except to trek back to my favorite bookspot and just savour the feeling of being able to walk around in its interiors again. Is this an indication of the shallow, consumerist lifestyle I lead, that I miss a shop so much? Let me tell you just what Landmark means to me.

I've been an avid reader from my early childhood, dating right back to when I missed having siblings to play with, fight with and keep me occupied and hence turned to books for company, for entertainment, for solace, for answers and finally for identification. I've also been a loner all my life, never mind the huge groups of people I always seem to have around me.

For the longest time ever, in Mumbai, a booklover's only source of soul nourishment was to scour the neighborhood raddiwallas and make an occasional trip to Churchgate to browse the street stalls at Flora Fountain. Then came Crossword with its ubiquitous yellow-and-black stores, retailing books. So books were available in a shop close to home. Though, if your tastes extended beyond potboiler bestsellers and management/self-help books, you were still obliged to fall back on your bohemian book-haunts or still brave the journey to town to visit Oxford.

Landmark opened its first store in Mumbai in 2006.

I remember stopping and staring at the poster announcing its soon-arrival at the mall and smiling with sheer joy. My Chennai soujourns had made me quite familiar with this bookstore chain famous in the south. On my first visit to the store, I wandered in curiously, wondering whether the insofar bookstore had only decided to set up its music and movie business in Mumbai. All I could see were aisles and aisles of DVDs and CDs! And then at the very end, almost like a tunnel suddenly opening up, I stumbled into a huge...paradise. Books, books, books as far as I could see.

I'd only ever seen so many books in one place at the annual Strand book sale, which would still be unorganized piles of books, stacked onto cloth-covered tables. But here I was standing among rows and rows of gleaming shelves neatly categorized as Humour, Literary Fiction, Classics, Romance, Spirituality, Teen Fiction, Children's books, Feminism, Travel, Science, Architecture, Movies, Art and so on. I walked passed authors I'd never known existed, genres I'd never conceived and books I'd never heard of.

Landmark became an integral part of my weekend schedule. I'd plan to catch a movie or lunch or dinner with a friend and find an excuse to be at Landmark. I'd either ask to meet them at the mall that also has a theatre and a food-court. Sometimes I'd drop by after an outing or arrange to meet someone between Magazines and Featured Books. Some days I'd go there by myself and spend hours browsing, walking out for a snack, poring over a book I'd bought or just feeling - something - just walking around.

My relationship with Landmark has grown in parallel with my relationship with my own writing. For a very long time, writing and creative endeavours were distant dreams, fantasies that I never really thought about seriously. I started my blog on a whim, to 'get it out of my system' so to speak. Surprisingly I found, my inspiration and my inclination...and my obsession to write only grew with time. After much teenage angst, anxiety-ridden desicions of education and work, job-switches and on/off relationships, I've discovered my passion. Words are my one and only real passion.

Writing is an indescribable feeling, one that rejuvenates me and one that takes me over in a fury and leaves me feeling quite spent - and fulfiled. I've never felt the same sense of completion with anyone or anything or anywhere else. The best thing about my job is how much it allows me to write. And where is a poet more at home than in a garden? Landmark is a garden of ideas, of people and stories and poems and articles and books all the many different ways we find to share our impressions with each other. The world outside disappoints me, hurts me, wears me down. But I walk back into a world of books and I find authors I deeply admire, words that bring me comfort, ideas that rekindle my zest for life, so much inspiration to just be me.

You might argue that I could have this in any other bookshop in the world. Yes, perhaps, if only there were others that offered the mind-boggling variety of books, a friendly but not intrusive staff and the convenience of location. If you've seen the movie 'You've got mail', you might say that Landmark has the staggering variety of Fox books set in the cosy ambience of the corner bookshop.

Now, three years later, I have a sentimental attachment to the Landmark store as well. The staff not only knows me by face and name, one of their employees has become a close, personal friend. I remember meeting Lord Jeffrey Archer, idol of my teenage years and buying a book for a special lady in my life. I walked through the aisles playing a 'now-you-see-me-now-you-don't' with a date who enjoyed books as much and picked out Knots by R.D.Laing for him. Weeks later, when he broke my heart, I healed myself in the comfort of Milan Kundera and Alexander McCall-Smith. I found a new friend, a new circle of people, a new interest and a new path to the future in Graphic Novels. I nurtured the early stages of a long-distance relationship through my SMS-chats and whispered conversations about the books I was browsing (while he'd be doing the same in the store in another city).

In these past three months, I've visited two countries, been in love and out of it, borne two deaths, has my sense of stability shaken by the terror attacks, discarded a friendship, renewed a few, acquired some more. I haven't had that haven that Zen calls 'the place of stillness' through all this. My friends have made babies, celebrated wedding anniversaries, had birthdays, returned to India after years. And I haven't been able to greet them with my choice of gift - a book specially chosen for the person and the occasion. Yes, I've missed Landmark so much. Friday, reunion!

And of course if any of you reading this post, have decided you love me enough to send me a gift, Landmark has a gift voucher program! ;-)

Book Review Comdex : Computer Course Kit - Windows Vista with Office 2007

Kim — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 17:30:32 EST

The Comdex - Computer Course Kit - Windows Vista with Office 2007 written by Vikas Gupta costs 229INR with the CD. Vikas Gupta has earlier co-authored books for Wiley, McGraw Hill and IDG.

This book, comes with a CD Training kit and the book aims to help you master Windows Vista, Internet, MS Word, MS Excel, MS Access and MS Powerpoint.

The book is developed with the premise that the qualification of the person using the book is "ability to read" hence it is extremely simple, straight forward and easy to follow, with step by step instructions accompanied by appropriate illustrations.

The book provides explanations, with screen print outs to demonstrate the described functions. The CD provides an audio video demo and a self practice mode.

The book starts out with the first 24 pages outlining the types of computers, the hardware units, and the basics of software and networks which is an excellent preface for someone not well versed with computers. This took me back to our ITC (Introduction to Computers) course, but this book was much simpler.

At times the language in the book dips a bit into the formal, flowery, government office kind of English, but it soon recovers and gets back to the simplicity, that is its selling point.

It even covers new features like Windows Aero, Windows Meeting Space, Internet Explorer 7.0, Windows Mail.

My only feeling of discontent with the book is that the paper quality is not the best and it gave me the feel of a pirated cheap reprint.

The book and the CD may be used completely independently of each other.

The text instructions on the CD are in English only, but the audio has the option of Hindi too. The audio can be turned off, if you feel that it is slowing you down during the audio-video demo mode. The voice on the audio is pleasant and not robotic or irritating except for a few mis-pronunciations(/heavily accented pronunciation) like "appears" and "adjust". This is an ideal method for auditory learners.

The Hindi version, still uses a lot of English words in the voice over and some Hindi words that aren't common vocabulary.

In some modules, The control panel at the base of the screen, takes an inordinately long time to follow instructions. You can increase or decrease the speed of the verbal instructions and the demonstration time during the demo module.

This is a wonderful book for someone who is just starting to learn about computers. Quite a good book to gift your parents and preserve your own blood pressure from escalating. Or if you are looking to brush up your knowledge or upgrade your software and need a quick primer on the subject.

Book Review : The Jewel of Medina

Kim — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 05:21:05 EST

I had heard of the controversy surrounding "The Jewel of Medina" a couple of months ago, but it hadn't really inspired me to go out and buy the book immediately. Of course there was the other matter of it not being available in a Middle Eastern country. But when a friend of mine told me she had the book in case I was interested, I decided to see what the fuss was all about.

The book was initially quite ho-hum (compared to some of the other books I have read on the subject) while it covered the childhood politics around a little girl growing up in a polygamous family where her own mother was the second wife. The girl just happens to be Aisha Bint Abi Bakr, herself an extremely controversial character in Islam. After the Prophets death, she led an army against his son-in-law Ali, which was the cause for the Sunni-Shia split.

Sunnis claim Aisha was the favorite wife of the Prophet, while Shiites believe that he disliked her for her disobedience. Sunni accounts put the Prophet in Aisha's embrace at the time of his death and Shiites believe that he died in Ali's arms.

Why is The Jewel so inflammatory?

Conservative Catholics across the globe were vociferously against "The DaVinci Code" as it was based on the anti-thesis of a non-negotiable fact - that Jesus was married and sired a bloodline. This questioned the foundations of the Catholic faith and the vows of celibacy taken by priests and nuns.

"The Jewel of Medina" portrays each edict passed by Mohamed as being one for personal gain. It also caricatures him as an old man in constant sexual overdrive, whose only interest was in finding the next beautiful young bride. Drawing conclusions and elaborating on the fact that, when his male followers were allowed only 4 wives, the limitations did not apply to him. And other such incendiary conclusions.

For someone who is not familiar with the basics behind the Islamic teachings, it is a disastrous book to read, because it will completely distort the idea of Islam and its foundations. Ms Jones in her interviews has claimed that she wrote this book to make Islam more accessible and understandable to the general public in USA.

If this is her target audience, it will only serve to further aggravate the differences between Muslims and non-Muslims in America where a majority of non-Muslims already look upon Muslims with suspicion and in extreme cases, even hatred. Among the non-Muslims in America, there is a wide spread belief that women are completely dominated by men in this religion, they are forced to cover up from head to toe by overbearing fathers and husbands. This book will only serve to deepen and worsen those beliefs. I do not see any "understanding" coming out of this book.

The problem with writing fiction with characters from real life is that very few readers actually have the ability or knowledge to distinguish the line between the blurred lines of fact and fiction in a novel. And how much of this book is fiction? As a non-Muslim with basic information about Islam from my Muslim friends, I was quite riled up about certain injustices being described in certain sections of this book. This is a normal process when reading a book, the skill of the author is in making you feel for the characters. But the way it is portrayed as fact, brings these feelings out back into the world beyond the reading of a book.

What Ms Jones has written is a piece of fiction and not even a well researched one at that. Friends of mine who are scholars in Islamic studies, say that the inaccuracies are innumerable.

Geraldine Brooks (who has extensively researched the history of this era), author of the 1995 nonfiction book, "Nine Parts of Desire" whom Jones has cited as one her initial inspiration, says this in her review of The Jewel of Medina, "if you wish to claim that your novel is "extensively researched", why lurch around in time and space, grabbing at concepts such as hatun, or leading wife, which Jones knows full well belongs to the Ottoman empire of centuries later, or purdah, which exists in Persian, Urdu and Hindi but not Arabic? Why refer to an Islamic veil by the modern Western term "wrapper"? Why have Muslims bowing to Aisha, when bowing is an alien custom to desert Arabia and to Islam's egalitarian ethos?"

Is "The Jewel of Medina" a good story? - Well, it manages to keep your interest going after the initial chapters, wondering what is going to come next? and How will Aisha manage this latest calamity?. But in most parts it reads like Mills & Boone/ Silhouette kind of Soft Porn.

I ask a larger question : "Is it ethical to write a book like this, which caricatures a person who is the cornerstone of a particular religion?

Disclaimer : I do not want to get into a debate about death threats, riots and fatwas that inevitably follow a book of this kind.

19 Varieties of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East by Naomi Shihab Nye

Vivek Sharma — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 02:03:31 EST

Naomi Shihab Nye's collection contains sixty poems about Palestinians and Middle East, about love and longing for lost and imaginary homelands. The poems are fragrant with spices of the Middle-East, flavors of figs and olives, and served with a tenderness of a grandmother talking to a grandchild, a five year old to his mother, an aged man to his beloved he unites with after a lifetime.

In the world torn by religious and political conflicts, these poems represent an oasis of hope. It is the humanity of these verses, that leaps from the page like the memory of nineteen varieties of gazelle described in the title poem.

The poems assume special significance in the context of post-September 11 world, for they contain a platter of understanding and taste served to assuage our need to be comforted. The solace is brought in by the mint green language of a poet born to a Palestinian father and an American mother. Perhaps the unique identity of Nye offers her perspectives about the Arab East and American West which her creativity has shaped into a narrative that offers respite from the reactionary rhetoric that dominates our daily thinking and actions.

As an Indian residing in America, I sense a brotherhood with Nye's characters, who chase the voices, flavors, visions, music and familiarity that maps their nostalgic world. As a poet with Indian heart and Americanized mind, I find Nye, like Agha Shahid Ali, present our cultural and emotional duality in a lyric that is both powerful and poignant. The tapestry of inheritance of the East is laced with tales quite unknown in the West, and this wealth can nourish many a chasms that exist between the material and spiritual. It is voices like Amichai's and Nye's that remind us that the transcendental humanity within us can help us to outlive the wounds inflicted by the fanatic forces everywhere.

Chick Lit

IdeaSmith — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 10:21:51 EST

My new literary obsession is Chick Lit. Helen Fielding, Sophie Kinsella and Marian Keyes keep me in chocolate-box mood while Meera Syal and Advaita Kala add the desi tadka. Why, even fellow-blogger/'I-know-this-girl-friend-acquaintance' Compulsive Confessor flashes her characteristic grin at me from my bedside bookstack.

I found this rather interesting piece on the internet, describing Chick Lit:

"Chick lit" is a term used to denote genre fiction written for and marketed to young women, especially single, working women in their twenties and thirties.

Now, I know I'm doing an about-face, especially after such rabid commmentary. I'm coming to this acceptance with much prior reluctance. I still have trouble accepting the term 'chick' to describe me or any woman I know. It's degrading. However, I'm willing to lay down my shackles and admit that I've been reading (and enjoying) the genre called Chick Lit.

Chick Lit is the new Romance Novel. And it isn't. As a genre it certainly is finding as much favour and spawning as many writers (and books) as the ubiquitous M&Bs. On the other hand, one may argue that romantic fiction was a genre built on common women's fantasies while Chick Lit inter-twines what we consider our ideal life along with the proverbial gang-cribbing that each of us indulges in with our galpals over men, weight loss problems, career concerns and PMS.

Chick Lit, as most of the definitions state, is usually about twenty-something women, career-minded or not, married or not, successful or not. One thing they all are, is discontent with their lot. The careerwoman struggles with loneliness and jerky boyfriends, the beauty queen is slapped around and paraded as a sex toy/trophy partner and the housewife is wistful about missed opportunities. The Chick Lit heroine is Superwoman who survives on a steady dose of gal/pal advice, gay friends, alcohol-and-career swings and roller-coaster relationships. Friends are family, chocolate is the manna for all evils and the root of all evils can be summed up into one word - MEN.

Bosses, colleagues, friends, lovers, ex-boyfriends, flings, husbands of friends, partner's buddies, friends' partners, gardeners, milkmen, grumpy old men, uncles, teachers, fathers, cheery grocers, lecherous neighbors....men in every possible shape, size and relationship are examined back and forth. It is the Chick Lit'ter's favorite hobby - Men.

If the Indian versions are different, it is only in that they're usually set in Mumbai/Delhi instead of London/New York. The protagonists gorge on chicken tikkas and grab their capuccinos from Barista instead of M&S or Starbucks. Their mothers want to see them 'well-settled' instead of 'settled down'. The men are just as committment-phobic, the careers just as unsatisfying, their bosses are just as demanding, their married neighbors consider them just as flighty and sluttish and their credit card bills are equally long.

Why do I like the genre so much? Simple. Because it is about me. That's my life, my friends, my mistakes and my victories that are getting written about. Every page brings a, "Don't I know it!", an "Aha! You got 'im there, girl!" and a "Bullshit, I heard the same thing from my second boyfriend when he was cheating on me." It's almost like having a new set of friends with every book.

You might even say it's the modern, literary woman's Soap Opera in a book format. If the women of yore wanted fantasy to keep them entertained, at least this I can say for my generation - we're thriving on reality...or some warped version of it. Who needs a perfect fairytale when our own messed-up, vodka-spiked, overstressed lives are so much more interesting?

Chick Lit is empowering in a very strange way. It tells me that other women are having a hell of it too. That having a zero social life at twenty, in favour of slogging away at work was not a mistake. That getting married at twenty-three would not have spelt 'happily ever after' either. That my smug married, whiz-in-the-kitchen housewife friend acts superior to me but also thinks I'm living the glamourous, carefree life she only reads about in magazines.

It tells me that it's okay to not feel diva-like at all times, to nurse worries over weight gain and cellulite. That it's even okay to worry more about these than a missed deadline. That bad temper, unreasonableness and pukey-head-feeling are permissible once a month.

Chick Lit tells me life isn't perfect (yes, I know someone said that long ago but catch me listening?). I mean look at the titles - The Undomestic Goddess, Life isn't all Hahaheehee, Shopaholic, Almost Single. It also tells me that each of us is figuring out a new way of perfect. And who knows? Maybe Perfect will be the way I do it - My perfect!