The Year Of The Graphic Novel

[Originally published here at passionforcinema.com]

(It’s been a weird kind of semester. Starting off at full steam, it seemed like it’ll all be over and done within two shakes of a dog’s tail… but it’s ended up dragging on and on. Mercifully, it’ll be over soon… my exams are starting in a week, and this will be the last entry in this blog for 15 days.)

Every year, around this time, I have a lot of reading to catch up with, (as the summer approaches) and as I start to look back at all the stuff I read, I notice a pattern. There are typically one or two writers/schools of writing to which I get attracted… and then I start to read up most or all of their work. And although I try to be as heterogeneous as I can while buying books, these writers inevitably end up on my list.

So,while the period around my tenth standard was mostly about magical realism(Rushdie, Marquez, Grass… the whole shebang…), after giving the Engineering Entrance Exams a couple of years later, I buried myself and my I/Me/Myself pangs into Camus and others of his absurdist ilk. Going even further back, I recall that I more or less saturated the Wodehouse rack at the local library in the summer vacation when I was in the seventh standard, before proceeding to do the same to the Asimov and the Stephen King racks.

Looking back at this year(Yes, being a student, I tend to treat an year from April to April) if I have to label it, it would undoubtedly be the Year of the Comic Book/Graphic Novel . I’d read some pretty good comics before, but the credit for introducing me to this wonderful world goes to my friend Arvind Sowmyan here on campus, geek extraordinaire, and brilliant artist himself. One day, when we were sitting in his room trying to beat the sticky Kharagpur heat, I commented on the drawing he’d made of a hooded, goateed figure (curiously resembling Colin Farrell!) he’d drawn on the wall, something which I thought had clear manga influences. He remarked, “It’s closer to Sandman than manga….”

It was then that I discovered Neil Gaiman’s stunning Sandman series, a huge, sprawling achievement in every way, something which has the density, maturity and texture comparable to the best of modern literary fiction. After that, there was no looking back. Afte completing Sandman, I quickly moved on to Alan Moore’s Watchmen, which is considered the definitive graphic novel of our times. By now, I’d well and truly caught the bug. I read up everything I could by Moore, including the massively entertaining LXG(League of Extraordinary Gentlemen) series and From Hell the stylistical masterpiece set in Victorian times. Later this year, I read dozens of prominent writers like Frank Miller(Sin City and Ronin are my faves). Among standalone graphic novels, I read “Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi and “Maus” by Art Spiegelman, two memoirs about different childhoods in different parts of the world, both of which are throbbing with poignance and utter beauty, as is the magisterial “Blankets” by Craig Thompson. Honourable mentions go to Sarnath Bannerjee, whose witty and ambitious novels “Corridor” and “The Barn-Owl’s Wondrous Capers” I enjoyed immensely; and also to Amruta Patil, whose dark and shadowy “Kari” serves as an intriguing advertisement for her future work.

I feel that as visual artists, graphic novelists have a lot to offer to the world of cinema. While it is a bald and mundane topic that the comic-book medium is inherently similar to the silver screen, things cannot be put in such a simplistic manner. The stylistic innovations brought to the genre by messrs Moore, Gaiman and Miller are testimony to the fact that comic books today can be as challenging as the best offered by Scorsese, Stone or the Coens. Read any “Sin City” title or any of Gaiman’s Sandman books , and you’ll know what I mean. Iron Man was the film which started pushing the barrier last year, before Christopher Nolan set the cat among the pigeons with The Dark Knight. Inspired from classic Batman titles like Frank Miller’s “The Dark Knight Returns”, Alan Moore’s “The Man Who Laughs” and Jeph Loeb’s “The Long Holloween”, he made what is sure to be an enduring classic among movie-goers everywhere, helped generously by a hauntingly macabre performance by the late Heath Ledger.

And yet it wasn’t good enough for the pundits. I won’t start a tirade about the quibbling idiots at the Academy Awards.(I loved Hugh Jackman’s song-and-dance routine “How come comic-book movies never get nominated/How can a billion dollars be unsophisticated?!”) What I’m surprised about is the people who’ve actually been lavish with their praise have managed to make it patronising and ultimately holier-than-thou. Roger Ebert is a critic I admire immensely, not just for his forthright reviews but also for his often self-deprecating humour. Now, he gave the Dark Knight four out of four stars, recognising the brilliance for what it was. But even his review came with a rider.

Towards the end, he says that The Dark Knight is “a haunting film” which “leaps beyond its origins” and that it “redefines the possibilities of the comic-book movie” , the implicit argument being that the origins of the film were inherently inferior because they were, at the end of the day, comic-books. The air smells of intellectual snobbery when people like Ebert come up with stuff like this. I dare these people to see “Persepolis” (the film version was co-directed by Marjane Satrapi, the writer of the graphic novel, herself) and not be moved to tears by the end. The power of comic-books as a storytelling medium was explored by the Manoj Shyamalan thriller “Unbreakable” which had some pretty cool theories about comic-book sensibilities.

Part of the problem is that filmakers in Hollywood are still not ready, for the large part, to think of comic-books of anything other than huge, flashy colours and “Kaboom” sound buubles. The “Wanted” comic-book series by Mark Millar was a brash, in your-face crime thriller, with plenty of spunk and bold brushstrokes all over the place. But the movie turned into an excuse to show off every last one of Anglina Jolie’s curves in devout super-slo-mo sequences. Later in the year, “The Incredible Hulk” too, disappointed on most counts. Ed Norton, an actor I like immensely, gave a shockingly ineffective performance. Neil Gaiman has expresed his disappointment at several abortive attempts at making a Sandman movie… but he also said that a project like this was only possible with a director who was as obesessed with the subject matter as Peter Jackson was with the LOTR saga. This is one of the reasons why writer Alan Moore distanced himself from “V From Vendetta” , which was actually a pretty good effort in the end. He had faced bitter disappointement earlier with the film adaptations of his books “From Hell” and “The League of Exraordinary Gentlemen” (I think we can all agree that we never want to see Naseeruddin Shah beat up people with his boots again!).

I fervently pray and hope that there’ll be a brash maverick out there somewhere who’ll replicate the magic of people like Moore, Spiegelman and Gaiman. I haven’t yet seen Zack Snyder’s “Watchmen” , but the initial rushes look very impressive indeed. Remember Watchmen was called “unfilmable” ….. Closer home, I’m eagerly waiting for the silver screen adaptation of “Doga”, one of Raj Comics’s more enduring titles, a Punisher-like ruthless vigilante wearing a dog-mask. At the helm of the project is Anurag Kashyap, who is currently the toast of the town with Dev D and Gulaal.Kunal Kashyap is said to be playing Doga. Having read a bit of Doga comics, the dog-man does kind of fit the bill as a typical Kashyap character…. Let’s wait and watch :)

Black Sunday at IIT Kharagpur

(With so much happening on campus for the past few days... I haven't had time to post here. Check this campus mag here, that I work for.....and once you are done reading this, you can check it out for the latest updates on this issue.)

Kharagpur readers.... you are not strangers to this. For others: On Sunday, the 23rd of March, a 3rd year student of IIT Kharagpur, Rohit Kumar died while on his way to the hospital in Midnapore, the district headquarters. He had sustained a head injury after falling off a rickshaw... but due to the callousness and negligence of the authorities at B.C. Roy Hospital on campus... was not treated properly. There was a 90-minute delay in issuing an ambulance.... there was no trained paramedic with him..... the horrorshow goes on and on.....

The students here had been angry about the pathetic medical facilities here for some time now.... (25 beds for over 7000 students, no MRI, no CAT scan...not even a 24-hour pharmacy) a few months back, about a thousand people attended an Open House meeting to demand the revamp of the hospital. Promises were made..... and forgotten.

This time, the students had had enough.

In a now-famous move, thousands of students gathered near the gate of the director's house and demanded that he come out and talk. After some aggresive and arrogant posturing by the guards and later, the Director, Dr.Damodar Acharya himself, the students decided to take matters into their own hands. They started to smash the window-panes of the bungalow. Bricks, stones, tree-branches.... whatever they could lay their hands on. Pretty soon, they were inside his drawing-room, which was soon to be a sorry mess of broken glass shards.

His car went next.... as it was upturned, and everything which could've been smashed in it was smashed with gusto.

Finally the Director was forced to come out of hiding.... faced with thousands of angry, indignant students, he immediately announced he was stepping down. Later on in the night, there was another massive Open House meeting, one which saw an unprecedented number of people.... The Dean of Student Affairs also resigned in this meeting, on principle of course.... (the principle being "Save Thy Neck" .... when he roared on mike " Behave yourself!" and "Kya problem hai! Iddhar aa kar bataao(translated: What's your problem,eh? Come here and tell me!); hundreds of sudents immediately obliged him by climbing on stage and literally breathing down his neck.)

The vandalism was unfortunate...but the anger and the outrage were genuine and justified in every way. Let's hope that nobody else has to lose his life for want of better medical facilities on campus.

May Rohit's soul rest in peace.

Gulaal and The Future of Indian Cinema

(Originally published here on passionforcinema.com)

I saw Gulaal today in a crumbling, fading, bleeding ramshackle masquerading as a cinema hall….at least from the outside. Gulaal was sandwiched between two contemporary gems “Dil Ko Churaanewaali” and “Maa Kasam Badla Loonga”. (I would have uploaded the posters as well…but wasn’t entirely sure where PFC stands on this…) The name of the theatre(Bombay Talkies) was emblazoned in massive letters, which were slightly dangly, at best. The balcony seats were the prized possessions, at thirty bucks apiece.

So far so good…..

The tangy aftertaste of “Dev D” hadn’t quite left the palate, and the prospect of another Anurag Kashyap film meant I was schoolboy-on-springheels excited and a bit apprehensive, too… for what if it flattered to deceive?I’ve seen hardcore Sachin fans solemnly declare that their man is going to smash every record in the book; everytime he goes to bat. I’ve a friend who has more than a thing for Federer….everytime Nadal overpowers the Swiss ace(as he does so often now) my friend declares that this would be undoubtedly the last time such a travesty would take place….

As the marquee started, my thoughts were, this better be good.

150 awesome minutes later, all I could think was, “Which do I like better, Dev D or Gulaal? “

Anurag Kashyap said in an interview that Gulaal was his “angriest film”. Sure enough, anger of all sizes and shapes can be found… Kay Kay’s alternating quiet menace and searing blazes, the laidback sarcastic anger of Abhimanyu Singh , who is a revelation as Rananjay “Ransa” , the prince who loathes his royal family and everything they stand for. As he acknowledges himself, he drinks, womanizes and generally is a wastrel, but he has a mind of his own and is sickened by the dinosaur that is his father, His Highness and others of his ilk.

In fact, so good is Abhimanyu that he manages to outshine(briefly) the man from whom we’ve come to expect bravura performances as a matter of course.

By now, it is more or less accepted that it’s humanly impossible to blink while Kay Kay Menon is on screen. Yet again, he captures the imagination, like few others can, as Dukey Bana, the man who is willing to get his hands as dirty as you like, for his dream of a united Rajputana state.
Newbie Raja Chowdhary(who is also a co-writer) plays Dilip Singh, a bespectacled, serious young Rajput, who is initially disapproving of Dukey’s political machinations. Raja looks the part so much that for the most part, we don’t mind his often amateurish performance, which only gains steam in the second half. Aditya Shrivastava, another Kashyap favourite, plays Karan, who is the illegitimate son of the Maharaja, Ransa’s father. He and his sister Kiran(played by newbie Ayesha Mohan) are the alternate power centre to Dukey Bana.

Before the films starts, we are told that Gulaal was inspired from the song “Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye” by Sahir Ludhianvi…… (there is a song of the same name featured in the film)and also the other poets who had a vision of India. They would’ve tipped their hats to Kashyap, I’m sure…..because the writing here is some of the best I’ve seen in Indian cinema. The outrage articulated by these poets of yore has been captured brilliantly by using the idiom of the lost glory of the Rajputs.

In Sarnath Bannerjee’s wickedly funny graphic novel “Corridor”, a character quips, “People are like onions, baba….they have layers and layers.” He might have been talking about Dukey Bana, Kay Kay’s character. Dukey is genuinely outraged about the state of his people, and has seen his family suffer the anguish and the alienation associated with the transition to democracy. To that end, he is ruthless in order to gain the power to reverse this position. However, all too often, he becomes painfully aware of his limitations. Kay Kay’s blazing eyes are pitiless, masterful, holding us all in the illusion of immense power.

Kay Kay’s not-so imposing physique is slyly used here by Kashyap. There’s a scene where Dukey Bana screams in frustration, standing at one of the windows of his mansion. The frailty of Menon’s body is nicely dovetailed with the aggressive instincts of his character, coupled with the natural machismo of the Rajputs in general.

The female characters in the film are a study in contrast. Jesse Randhawa, previously seen in the “Jab Bhi Cigarette” number from No Smoking, plays Anuja, a character which is low on dialogue but high on impact, and Randhawa acquits herself reasonably well. The cool conniving bitch is played competently by Ayesha Mohan, while Mahie Gill, playing Dukey Bana’s mistress, has a couple of songs, a couple of funny scenes and that’s about it. But as I said in the Dev D post, at this point I’ll be happy just to see her at all. She has an intriguing mix of abandon and assertiveness….heady stuff.

Some brilliant supporting hands, by Deepak Dobriyal in particular,ensure that the action never slacks. (Seeing Dobriyal in this film, I couldn’t help but think of Kashyap’s post-filmfare comments about two years ago about how Dobriyal’s performance in Omkara was “*****ing better than Abhishek’s performance in Guru” :) )

The music of the film has to be commended. Theatre veteran Piyush Mishra, (remember Kaka from “Maqbool”?) has written and composed the songs. He also plays one of the most macabre cameos I’ve ever seen on screen. When I say he’s the boss as far as music goes, I mean that quite literally. For he is the sole character upon whom music is picturised…. A sort of deranged minstrel of reworked folk ditties and patriotic hokum, with a typical Rajasthani bahuroopiya, or masquerade artist, in tow. As the John Lennon-worshipping bard, Mishra is haunting, to say the least.

As things start to get out of hand on screen, Mishra gets more and more manic, becoming a sort of a collective conscience for us. If the use of music in Dev D was innovative, here it’s a masterstroke. In the anthemic chant “Aarambh” Mishra claims
“Jis kavi ki kalpana mein

Zindagi ho prem geet

Us kavi ko aaj tum nakaar do”
Perhaps fittingly, a couple of days back, Anupama Chopra called Kashyap the “Anti-Yash Chopra” !

The cinematography of Rajeev Ravi, who wowed us all with Dev D, is back with a vengeance here. The red coloured gulaal smeared over the faces of the Rajputs like war paint is an image which will stay with you long after the closing credits. Red is clearly the colour of choice here, whether it is the colour of the frequent bloodshed pervading the film, red is the fiery colour of passion……

Gulaal works above all, because of its searing honesty…. a throwback to the times when outrage was still considered cool. Films like this have the richness and the scope comparable to the best of modern literary fiction…. and to my mind few films fit this bill better than Gulaal. Answering my own question earlier in this post, I would say Dev D is still my favourite Kashyap film… but I suppose at the end of the day… I’m just barely out my teens, and the urbane chic “coolness quotient” of Dev D coupled with the natural chutzpah of Abhay Deol is irresistible right now. Perhaps, ten years down the line…..

Seeing how Anurag Kashyap has stamped his authority all over 2009 with Dev D, and now Gulaal, one of my favourite quotes springs to mind. In 1974, Jon Landau, music critic for the Rolling Stone magazine was sufficiently moved to say
“I’ve seen Rock and Roll’s future and its name is Bruce Springsteen”.
Now this is precisely the kind of soppy prophesizing which was in vogue back then…..but Springsteen did become the Boss after all…….

So maybe, I’ve seen the future of Indian cinema after all.

Onyeka and I

Around August last year, when this blog had just about started to gather some momentum, I posted a really cheesy poem without giving much thought to it. As the blog didn't quite elicit too many comments, I was rather surprised to see a comment coming all the way from Nigeria.

That comment, the first of several since then, came from my friend Onyeka Nwelue, who at the ripe old age of 21, has got his debut novel "The Abyssinian Boy" , released by Dada Books. I haven't had the opportunity to read it, but I can tell you this: the man is undeniably, unbelievably talented...(check out his superb blog here)

Onyeka lived in India for six months on a "self-imposed" exile a few years back, where he was taken in by Abha Iyengar, the eminent Indian writer and social activist. The influence shows in "The Abyssinian Boy" which is the story of a child with a Tamil father and a Nigerian mother.

Over the past year, I've had the pleasure of interacting with him over several issues, both literary and otherwise :)Not only does he have a keen intellect, he has a self-effacing way and a child-like sense of wonder which make him special.

Recently he was at at a book reading at Abuja(the capital of Nigeria), talking to secondary school students. (The photos that you see are taken from another reading session at Abuja) . Also present there was Felix-Abrahams Obi, a writer based in Nigeria. He wrote this piece which I'm reproducing here... along with my response to it.


The Unsung Nigerian Writer in a Hip-hop World
- Felix-Abrahams Obi

She was staring at the computer when I grabbed a seat beside her to rest my tired body after a long stretch of activities to mark the World Book Day in her school; Regent School Abuja. With her right hand on the mouse, she clicked and navigated through various websites and top on the list was a social networking site. To kids in her generation, social networking, instant messaging, and music websites are the most popular because they are the shapers of today's culture. They are designed to attract and hold the attention of the young and even the older generations. We are now in a world where everyone aspires to become a celebrity; a kind of super star with the rare privilege of walking down the red carpet with the flashing lights of the paparazzi forming a halo around them. But it seems the contemporary Nigerian writer is seemingly wary of enjoying the spotlight like his peers and pals in the music/movie/comedy industry whose shows and concerts pull the crowds into opens fields and overcrowded halls. Yet the writer is as much an artist as all others. Upon whom the burden of recording of history and transmission of knowledge and wisdom rests upon their weary shoulders. This young girl was clad in a costume depicting her favourite book character like other pupils in the school. It was a special day to celebrate writers and lovers of books, and the school had opened its doors to some writers and lovers of books. As I settled into the chair, I engaged her in a short chat and asked if she would love to be a writer. She answered, 'Nope! I just love reading books'. Then I quipped, "But if no one writes a book, what then would you be reading?" She then got my drift and the message berthed in her heart, I supposed; that it takes a writer to write a book that others would have to read. And books are created and made by writers who have to depend on the goodwill of their literary agents, editors, publishers and the general public to remain afloat in today's world.

Most Nigerian writers and authors are not so well-celebrated and the economy has been harsh on their art. Many manuscripts are lying still in the hard drives of their computers, and many resort to self-publishing after series of rejections by the mainstream publishing houses. Unlike the 'full-time' hip-hop musicians, the Nigerian writer has to keep a 9-5 job to keep hunger pangs at bay. He has no access to government or private funds to attend literary conferences, arts residencies or fellowships where he can develop his art of writing. After a prolonged haul of frustrations, many give up their dreams and take up a career that ultimately leads them to the boardroom like the Toni Kan's of this world, and many others who are working in banks, Telecom andIT firms, the Oil Gas industries and many more.

To Mrs. Chiamaka Kalu-Uche, the librarian of the Regent School Abuja, the Nigerian writer needs to be encouraged and his books should also occupy prominent slots in the school's unique library that boasts of books that range from Greek classics to modern English and western writers. The children's costumes showed that they knew little about African writers as only a few dressed like Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, Cyprian Ekwensi, Niyi Osundare, Tanure Ojaide , Mamman Vatsa or our female writers like Zainab Alkali, Chika Unigwe, Chimamanda Adichie , Akachi Ezeigbo , Mabel Segun etc. To domesticate the World Book Day which is celebrated internationally on the 4th of March and in the UK and Ireland on the 5th of March, she desired to have Nigerian writers read from their works to the kids at Regent School Abuja.

Top on my list was one of Nigeria's youngest novelists, Onyeka Nwelue whose trajectory as a writer has been on the rise since his maiden novel titled 'Abyssinian Boy' was launched couple of weeks back. He had made a strong impression on me when he eloped with another teenage friend from his home in Imo State to attend a literary meeting that was held at the National Theatre Lagos as a 17years old boy sometime in 2004.His passion to write was palpable to all and I wasn't surprised when he chose to go on a self-imposed 'exile' in India to write the manuscript of his novel, rather than proceed to the Senior Seminary to continue his training as a future Catholic priest. I contacted Onyeka and his publisher about the possibility of featuring at Regent School and the idea made sense to them even when the librarian could not promise any stipends or 'appearance fees' to any featured writer due to funds constraints, Onyeka still showed his willingness to attend the world book day event on self-sponsorship. And on Wednesday the 4th of March 2009, Onyeka landed in Abuja, proving yet again how far he can go to promote the cause of writers and writing in Nigeria.

There was a buzz of activities at Regent School and the excitement among the kids was palpable. They grinned from ear to ear, and like models clad in colourful costumes, they filed out to the blue-draped assembly hall for the session with writers and celebrities. Earlier they had a parade at the school's field and had fathers read favorite books for the kids in their respective classes, made bookmarks/door hangers, juggled with cross word puzzles and book character games. Some were made to be on the 'hot seat' to answer questions from their peers as a book character to elicit the emotions and thoughts of each character in their favorite book. The children also visited the book stands set up by Bibi Bakare-Weate, the founder of the publishing house, Cassava Republic, and was the official judge of the writing contest for the kids. Mrs Emem Okpashi's "All for Kids" outfit also displayed their educational products at their stand, as well as other exhibitors. Jerry Adesowo who reports for the nearly-launched NEXT Newspaper was on grounds to cover the event.

The expectant kids sat calmly on the rug-covered floor of the hall with their teachers flanking them on both sides like a defense shield. After an introductory speech by Mr. Robinson, a Briton and Head Teacher of the school, Mrs. Kalu-Uche introduced the special guests; Chief Chukwuemeka Chikelu (erstwhile legislator and Minister of Information and Communication), Mr. Collin Connelly (Deputy High Commissioner of Trinidad and Tobago, Mr. Onyeka Nwelue and I. In an earlier session Hon. Nike Oshinowo and Mr. Denja Abdullahi had read book excerpts for the lower primary pupils in the same hall. In this session for the upper primary pupils, Mrs Kalu Uche publicly recognized a little girl, Azume Ajayi , and a boy , Ogechukwu Flagg-Igbo respectively for their avid interest in reading books, and they were asked to recommend their favourite book to their peers.

Chief Emeka Chikelu read excerpts from his all time favourite book, Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe, and another inspiring book titled 'Say it Like Obama" by Anna Lee, while Mr. Collin Connelly read excerpts from the book, "The Little Blue Boy". During the authors' interactive session, Onyeka Nwelue talked about his debut novel, Abyssinian Boy while I gave a synopsis of my short story, "A Date with Area Boys" which was featured in an anthology of short stories titled "Eko ni Baje" by Nelson Publishers in 2008. The kids asked questions that bothered on writing and there was the issue of what gains as an individual from writing. In my opinion, the writer has the rare privilege of documenting history and etching himself on the hearts of living long after he's dead and gone. We still read and interact with dead writers through their works and travel with them to remote climes and milieus that their astute minds had created.

Onyeka added a new dimension by reminding the kids that it is a hip thing to be a writer, and being hip is no longer the exclusive preserve of hip-hop stars and other celebrities. The writer is also a celebrity in his own right, and to 21 years old Onyeka, the older writers had adopted bland and unattractive lifestyles that may have seemingly made the young not to see writing as a hip thing. I may have been one of the culprits in Onyeka's as I was dressed formally like most writers in one of my best fitting suits. To engage the young and feel their kindred spirit, Onyeka made a fashion statement with his afro hairstyle. He also had a nice short-sleeved green top over his blue jean with a brown bag strapped across his shoulders and wore colourful beads on his right wrist. And it was this image of the writer as a hip celeb that he wants to project to the world and he has in some sense made that impression in the hearts of kids at the Regent School Abuja.at a personal cost with no one sponsoring his long trip to Abuja.

After the authors' interactive session, Mrs. Kalu-Uche had promised the kids a surprise, and from behind the curtains that shielded him from their bated eyelids, Jeremiah Gyang emerged and the kids roared in excitement at the sight of the popular singer and multi-instrumentalist whose debut album "Na Ba Ka" had hit the top charts few years back. He strummed his guitar as the children and their teachers, and guests clapped and sang the song 'Allah Na Ba Ka' along with him. He then read excerpts from the Cinderella story to the delight of the kids, who asked as well as answered questions that on the Cinderella story. It was obvious the children also want to be stars like Jeremiah Gyang as they asked him questions about his music career and none bothered to ask if he also writes, for Jeremiah writes passionately and this is evident in some of his blogs that I have read on facebook and hi5 in the past. The event ended on a celebratory note after the kids sang 'Happy Birthday" to their amiable Head Teacher Mr. Robinson who said that he has grown old enough to not answer the kids, the quizzy part of the song that goes " How old are you now..?

Jeremiah at my humble behest had agreed to Mrs. Kalu-Uche's request and invite to feature at the World Book Day for free, and he did that for the sake of the children ; an event that would have featured the Abuja-based R & B trio, StylPlus had they agreed on time. Jeremiah thereafter toured all the respective classes to read, sing and play with the cheery kids. The free appearance and alliance between writers and musicians must have made a strong impression on the children, and it wouldn't come as a surprise if these kids in the future turn out into hip writers and musicians. Though it's a lot more attractive for the kids to end up as musicians, they would really see writing as a hip thing when they can see politicians, business moguls, models, musicians, movie actors and other superstars also making exploits in the literary world. They would then realize that the culture of reading is a hip thing and they won't have to wait till another March 5th to wear the costumes of a favourite author or book character on World Book Day.

Though the reading culture is on a downward spiral nationally, writers must find a way to engage the teeming youthful population if we must remain relevant. Jumoke Verissimo, an eclectic poet and journalist with The Guardian last week lamented at an event hosted by Abuja Writers Forum that the gathering of writers oftentimes has writers as the audience. So we cook our literary food and consume same among our selves whereas arts should be shared with the public for whom the menu was designed.

We may have to find more creative and innovative ways to translate our writings from the present height to such a point that book reading will become fun like it used to be in the past. We may have to recruit premiership starts, supermodels, TV goddesses and music stars to cross over and become novelists and writers to have their fans root for our writings. For instance, once a music star crossover into acting like Will Smith, Jennifer Lopez and Beyonce Knowles, the movies charts at Hollywood. In Nigeria, our movie stars would rather crossover to music to gain more popularity.

I would have wished they crossed over into writing to show how creatively versatile they truly are, or is writing such a hard job that only a few have been able to tap into the mastermind of the Muse? If the playwright and dramatist, Tyler Perry could become a multi millionaire by turning his writings into movies, maybe writers should start thinking of diversifying their creative expressions to match the changing trends in our changing world. Most of the blockbuster movies and academy award winners have been adaptations of writings of novelists of the classical and modern era. And in today's hip-hop culture that is ruled and governed by the dictates of celebrities, the writer has to somehow find a way to become as relevant as the other mainstream artists. The time for a sequestered lifestyle is over for the writer belongs to this modern era. The 21st century writer has a duty to either write what will make him popular or write about what makes others popular and influential without compromising his creativity, intellectuality and more importantly, his spirituality.


Onyeka asked me what I felt about this particular piece..... here's my reply:

Hi Onyeka!

Obi does put forward several valid points. His chief concern is the poor health of the reading habit across youngsters in Nigeria. I, for one would take this one step forward and say that this is a global problem, and not just restricted to Nigeria or, for that matter, India. Soothsayers point at the rising number of young novelists coming from the subcontinent. This phenomenon has two explanations:

a)If you look closely, many of them are either foreign-educated or working abroad... or both. Look at Mohsin Hamid, Daniyal Muenuddin, Rana Dasgupta...
b)When you look at our sheer numbers, you get more of a perspective about the whole issue.

But I digress... Obi suggests that part of the problem is the image young Nigerians get when they think about professional writers. And from what I gather, you seem to share this opinion. The logic being, writers are just not upto scratch when seen from the judging eyes of your typical westernised pre-teen. They are mostly introspective, even the young ones, seldom flamboyant, and not all that gregarious. Adoloscents are more likely to be drawn towards actors or pop stars. Hence, Obi thinks you made a conscious decision to dress and present yourself in a certain way..... and you yourself think that "writers ought to live more popular lifestyles"

The thing is, I'm not sure if this can really happen, or if this is even the right thing to do.

In an interview, the Indian journalist and author Raj Kamal Jha once said two things which really got me thinking.... The first was "The few people who are damaged enough to love reading are essentially those who are comfortable with solitude..." and continuing in the same vein, he said, "People who feel the need to read will read. It's personal. Even a writer who is very full of himself will never say, "There are 150000 people who need to read me." With regards to this issue, I would especially stress the latter point.

So, while I'm not saying that any effort made to get youngsters to read is ultimately futile; I do think that trying to package writing and writers in a certain way is certainly pushing it a little.

And to suggest that actors or movie-makers should take up the pen in order to popularize reading is just wishful thinking.... to date, the only readable thing I've heard of in that direction is Ingmar Bergman's collection of screenplays...... and even he lamented the fact that he wasn't a novelist per se..... he thought that the novel was inherently a superior art form. (a view I don't subscribe to, by the way...)

By all means, encourage local writing, especially writers who practise their craft in their native tongue. There are few better ways to tell youngsters about their rich heritage....a seamless, coherent record of everything worth knowing about their past.

I can understand the fears of people like Obi and Verissimo..... I have seen some unbelievably talented regional Indian writers languish in oblivion simply because.........well, they never really left oblivion. But pragmatically speaking, trying to make writing "cool" can only be successful upto a certain limit.I'm sorry if I'm a wee bit pessimistic... but from what I've seen and felt...this is my opinion. For what it's worth, I think you did the right thing by presenting yourself the way you did at Abuja :)

Your friend,
Aditya

Novels have OST's...

I just became convinced of something I'd suspected for some time now: novels have soundtracks.

I just completed "Blankets" the superb graphic novel by Craig Thompson which I was reading on the laptop, while simultaneously listening to dozens of Coldplay songs. "Yellow" changed to "Politik" effortlessly, and then segued along merrily to "Lost", "Life In Technicolour" , "Sparks" , "Speed of Sound" , "Scientist" ....

The incredibly touching memoir and coming-of-age tale seemed to merge seamlessly with the soft strains of the alternative rock; coupled with the soothing yet darkly introspective vocals of Chris Martin....

Heaven.

Dev D on V-Day

Originally published here on passionforcinema.com

(Statutory warning: This reviewer has got an incurable Nostradamus complex and is prone to spouting pseudo-profundities just for the heck of it…..)

Valentine’s Day is not my favourite part of the year……. I have an extraordinarily strong mush-radar, which was going haywire at about midnight on the 13th of February. My college(IIT Kharagpur) stands out for its laughably skewed sex ratio(at last count, it was about 8 per 100 in my year), and because of that, guys who do have girlfriends on campus, feel obliged to throw bucketfuls of mush right in my(and every other blissfully single guy’s) face. So, as I was saying, around midnight, there was a buzz in the air. I was walking along the long stretch on campus which has most of the hostels on it…..

I felt like some poor sod victimised by the living dead in a zombie flick. There they were, in twos, sometimes in groups of four or even six. This was a cold-blooded, calculated attack. These were professionals…. the worst part was these were guys and gals I actually hung out with on an average day, who felt compelled to subject me to this.

Well, that was that. The severity of the attack left me with two options: grab a saffron headband and join the Sri Ram Sena…..or grab the first local train out to Kolkata. Tempting as the Ram Sena was, I decided to go with the latter. I didn’t even return to my room…..I phoned a friend who was similarly reeling under the attack, and we just headed out to the station…..and we decided to watch Dev D.

Now this was one film which I had been looking forward to for months…… following Anurag’s posts on the making, then the “Emosanal Atyachar” wave which swept us all, after the music release … my expectations had started reaching ridiculous levels….never a good sign. Films have flattered to deceive all too often for my liking, and given my own propensity for hero-worship….

Nothing of the sort happened. :) Dev D lived up to all my expectations, and then some. Anurag Kashyap has raised the bar a notch higher, confirming his status as one of the finest minds in Indian cinema today. Years from now, when we talk about the films which changed the face of Indian cinema, the name “Dev D” will slip off easily from our tongues. At nearly three hours long, the film seemed if anything, a little on the shorter side to me, believe it or not.But Kashyap’s brilliance, combined with a masterclass performance by Abhay Deol, kept me hungry for more.Dev D is that rare kind of film, which clicks on so many fundamental levels, and draws you deep into its world……the film excites, infuriates at times, tickles you silly, is intimate one second and shuts you out the other.

To say Dev D is audacious is like saying Salman Rushdie likes to scribble little somethings every now and then. When Heath Ledger died, I remember Chris Nolan wrote a stirring obituary titled “Charisma as natural as gravity…” . Something of the kind is in play here. It is in vogue to be tongue-in-cheek nowadays, slipping in rookie double-entendres in otherwise anaemic screenplays which are meant to underline their wannbe status as “alternative” cinema. But in the hands of someone like Kashyap, it works magically, never once do the sleights-of-hand seem forced or fake…..and believe me, he gets away with plenty here…..

Since this is not your average Taran Adarsh review, I will not try to break the film down into manageable quarters, which can then be converted to BO collections. The initial portions focus on Dev’s return to Punjab after his padhai-in -vilayat. Right from the beginning, it was obvious that nobody was gonna pull any punches. I might mention at this point that I had a girl with a very annoying ringtone sitting beside me(I hate the Black Eyed Peas more than any band after this…). When Dev asked Paro if she touched herself, the female in question dropped her cellphone, after the most audible gasp I’d heard in some time. There is some justice in this wicked world after all…. After I saw Oye Lucky Oye, and its superb usage of the rustic lingo, unlike its usual abuse in Bollywood for cheap thrills and a quick chuckle or two; Dev D gives us Paro, who is the Punjab-di-kudi from hell, when she wants to, that is.

And yes, the much-talked about mattress-in-a-khet was every bit as awesome a scene as you’ll ever see.

A word about Amit Trivedi’s soundtrack here. The music is used in liberal doses here, throughout the film, sometimes nearly back-to-back. Of course, big fat Punjabi weddings do give you license that way. But the score is just so versatile, you are surprised constantly. From the earthy strains of “Hikknaal” to the wistful “Dhol Yaara Dhol” , we segue merrily along to the special from Patna Ke Presleys…… “Emosanal Atyachar” has achieved cult status on my campus, as it has, I’m sure on college circuits elsewhere in the country. The in-your-face brashness, straight-laced parody and cool-as-you-like Hinglish has struck a chord, and I dare say it has already become an oft-used catch phrase. However, my personal favourite is “Nayan Tarse” , the slightly-wasted sounding vocals of Trivedi himself resulting in a very grunge-like effect on this soul-meets techno track.

A frequent complaint about the film I’ve heard since then is that Anurag Kashyap has slipped back into uber-indulgent No-Smoking-territory again in the second half. To them I say, “Kaun kambakht bardaasht karne ke liye peeta hai? ” Dev’s descent into the seedy world of “connoiseur bars” , seedy undergound bars, and one psychedelic pharmaceutical after another is wonderfully captured here, in some virtuoso cinematography and camerawork. (To know more about that you can read this post by the man himself , about how Danny Boyle advised him to use a special camera technique…..no wonder he is credited in the film). Dev and Chanda’s first encounter is filled with deliciously funny dialogues, where newcomer Kalki Koechlin more than holds her own against Deol’s carefully cultivated rage and indignance.

That brings me to the two women in Dev’s life. To call the interpretation radical would be stating the obvious…. Paro in particular was brilliantly sketched out as a character. Mahie Gill is quite a handful, for both Deol and the obvious. If Paro was supposed to be a docile, demure character, nobody told Mahie…

“These boots are meant for walkin’ ,
And that’s what they’re gonna do..
One of these days these boots are gonna walk all over you!!”

This is what she seems to tell Dev with every fiery glance, every defiant silence, and every sailor-like outburst of the choicest… check out her balls-out shaadi-ka-dance in the Emosanal Atyachar number(did I mention it’s her own wedding….?) Anurag sir, if you’re reading this, please cast her again in your next!

Chanda is alternately vulnerable and dominating. Half-child and half preying-mantis-seductress, Dev is intrigued by this strange and exotic creature who seems to be just as damaged as her. The use of the DPS MMS-scandal in Chanda’s backstory is a masterstroke…and tells us some very inconvenient truths. Kalki makes a solid debut with an utterly believable, if not compelling performance.

Which leaves us with the Curious Case of Abhay Deol. With every movie, the man has utterly reinvented himself. Perhaps fittingly, he was likened to a young Johnny Depp, by Anurag Kashyap in a blog post. Here, he has delivered the performance of his fledgling career. He has already put together a very impressive filmography, what with Manorama and Oye Lucky Lucky Oye….I have no doubt that he is the one Indian actor to watch out for in the days to come…would love to see him share screen space with Kay Kay Menon, another Kashyap favourite.
The great Frenchman Francois Truffaut first coined the word “auteur” in a famous essay, arguing that the director was in fact, the real “author” (auteur means author in French) of the film, leaving his handprints on each and every frame of the movie. He said that all great directors had a distinct visual and narrative style, which is unmistakeable, which is something separating the truly great from the merely good. I am not fond of singing paeans to anybody, but with Dev D, Anurag Kashyap has earned the right to be called one of India’s few true auteurs. I’m eagerly waiting for “Gulaal” and with every passing day, curse our luck and the Censor board for “Paanch” (someone, anyone please get in touch…how does one watch “Paanch?)
After this wonderful cinematic experience, I bummed along Park Street for a while, browsing through bookstores, munching down junk food……and come night, returned to a post V-Day Kharagpur, which was still as endearing , and still as much a pain in the ass as ever.
And now it’s my turn to annoy people, especially the committed kind, asking them about their V-Day. When they politely ask me about my own, I put on my best I-know-what-you-did-last-summer smile, and answer “I watched Dev D in Kolkata.”, like it was the most obvious, the most natural thing to do. Most of them give me a “what am I missing here” nervous chuckle, while their partners stare at me with undisguised loathing.

Come to think of it, at midnight on that Friday the 13th… it seemed the most natural thing to do, after all.

'Twas a Saturday...

(Meant to write this a lot earlier, but fest time is always lean for blogging.... anyway, had a whale of a time at the Spring Fest at my college....but the higlight was undoubtedly my creative writing workshop with Jadavpur University professor and author Rimi B. Chatterjee.(see pic above.... Check out her blog here.)

Much of what I've written over the past year and a half has been divided into roughly two parts: this blog here and the stuff I write for the campus mag. Even so, the overwhelming majority of these has been non-fiction, that is if you discount the odd play or two I've written as part of a theatre troupe in college. Therefore, as someone whose first love is, and has always been fiction, I was really looking forward to this session, at the end of which I would, hopefully, gain a new insight into the ebbs and flows of spinning a yarn.....

In the spirit of things, I'll narrate this like an old-fashioned Chandamama story. On the day itself, I reached the huge lecture hall, which, unfortunately, was the appointed venue for our day. I say unfortunately because that hall used to be my one-size-fits-all classroom in my freshman year....and it suffices to say, that room and I have a history.

Apart from about half a dozen people, most not from my college, I saw a bespectacled lady, not quite middle-aged, with cheerfully streaked waves of hair, and a general air of joie de vivre about her. Bingo. Later, during the course of the day, as I would find out, she had an infectious(and very mischievous!) smile..... Our session began with a round of introductions while Ma'am would talk to us about our individual stories, respectively.(Here's mine) I remember Ma'am talking about my story which she said was "Pretty delicately done......especially by someone who's not a practiced writer.. " (If that seems a tad too self-congratulatory, remember....a blog is the ultimate ego exercise!)

At this point, a few shady-looking guys sauntered into the room and sat in one of the back rows. Ma'am requested them to sit at the front as she had apparently caught the Kharagpur cold. At this point, they got up, as if in sync, and said they would be back. That would be the last of them we would see that day. My guess is that they were just plain curious, or plain dumb. Anyway, soon enough, we were all assigned a colour each and asked to write a page about how that colour made us feel. ("Emotional temperature" was how Ma'am put it.) Now, the thing about assigning colours to 20-odd people is, after a point of time, you have to get real inventive real soon. My friend Tiyasa, who's quite a character at the best of times, was assigned "tangerine".
This exercise was simple, yet surprisingly stimulating. (My piece, on "Moss-green" will be put up on this blog real soon.....and I hope to expand it into something more substantial...) I realized that there has to be some method to the madness, when it comes to writing fiction; indeed, seasoned pros, thousand-words-a-day guys like Roth or Coetzee will tell you, the discipline is all in the head. At this point, Ma'am decided she'd had enough of the depressing lecture hall, and in true Tagorean fashion, suggested that we take the session outdoors, on the rather splendid lawn at the Vikramshila complex. We must have been quite a sight to the people who were in the thick of things at the fest, busy with their cheerful revelries, slightly bemused to see such a passive group in an otherwise ebullient atmosphere.....

By lunchtime, we had gone over nearly all the stories.......some were abstract, some were nostalgic, a few had silver donkeys from other galaxies..... the good times were well and truly rollin'!

At this point, I should mention that I'm an avid quizzer, (as can be seen from the previous post) and we, that is me and my teammates have got quite a decent racket going, travelling around the country and winning quizzes. The day before the workshop, we had won both Biz and Cyber Quizzes, events which were our weak spots, traditionally(Entertainment, movies....that's much more down our lane!). Naturally, we were cock-a-hoop about the next quiz, the big one, The Mary Bucknell Trophy, which was the general quiz held at Spring Fest every year. The event had a lot of history behind it, and has been the stage for some legendary battles.

The catch was, it was the same day as my workshop.....

From here on, the serendipitous part of my story begins. My teammates had cleared the prelims without me, albeit not very convincingly. Just as the quiz was about to begin, Ma'am decided it was time for a lunch break! In the distance, I saw Ankit, one of my teammates gesturing wildly towards me, and shouting something unintelligible. I broke into a sprint towards the auditorium where the quiz was about to begin. I think I narrowly escaped knocking down about three people, at least one of whom called me something unprintable. I entered the auditorium, much to the surprise of some of my friends, and skipping three stairs at a time, hopped onto the stage, and into an empty chair.

The rest of the quiz went according to script.......staving off a ferocious challenge from the IIM-C team, we got our hands on the Mary Bucknell trophy at last.... ( the next day, we won the Movie Quiz as well, making it four quizzes out of four at SF-2009, a rare Grand Slam of sorts)
The adrenaline still pumping, I returned to the lawn, where Ma'am and the rest of the people were settling down after their lunch.Ma'am had apparently refused the SF guys' offer of lunch at Kharagpur's best restaraunt, preferring to eat at the hut-like canteen near the lawn, with its quaint fried offerings and its too-sweet tea. Even this, the smallest of gestures seemed to me incredibly charming and down-to-earth.

Next, we were each given a picture which had one or more than one person in it, and we had to pick our person and create a back-story about that particular person. This exercise reminded me of the premise for an anthology published last year, selected by Zadie Smith, called "The Book Of Other People". Anyway, this again proved to be a lot of fun, and not just creating stories, but listening to characters made by the other participants. I got a rather elegant-looking lady in a typical red Bengali sari.....again, who knows, someday she might pop up in one of my stories....
Ma'am said she was in the process of writing the story for a graphic novel called "Kalpa". At this point I told her about my fascination for the genre(see this, this and this) and my admiration for writers like Alan Moore and our very own Sarnath Bannerjee(my starry-eyed expression grew wider when she said she'd met the man himself!), author of the magnificent Corridor and The Barn-Owl's Wondrous Capers. It was amazing to discuss literary or cinematic stuff with her, like Moore's magnum opus From Hell, the noir style of filmmaking...... and loads of other stuff.
The round of build-a-story yielded some pretty wacky tales, with the Chinese whispers style format ensuring that there was never a dull moment.....we would jump from romanticism to science fiction to detective thriller to high fantasy in the blink of an eye!We rounded off the workshop with a unique exercise. We first named six characters/personas, places, props, emotions and locations. Then, Ma'am would roll this huge cardboard die and decide who gets which set of people, locations etc. So while I got something pretty feasible(A tragic writer.....in a pub, with a lighter!), people did get all sorts of crazy combinations(like a hopeful dog, in a jungle with a handbag!!!). We then wrote a plot or a full-fledged short story based on our respective sets. This one was the most intellectually challenging of them all....I did okay, I guess. (Ma'am said it was "very noir" :) )

When people talk about "a day to remember" and "experience of a lifetime" , it sounds and feels pretty banal and cliched, but I guess spending an entire day at the workshop, with Ma'am, falls firmly into that category. In a place where the average lecture is clinically drained of anything remotely resembling fun......I felt truly rejuvenated last Saturday.