Sun, sea and two books

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Friday Features

Friday, 03 February 2012

Author / Source : Latiful Quader

Imagine, you are in an idyllic place: a remote and private Balearic island; or somewhere in the south pacific. Its summer solstice: a cool breeze to breath, mild sunlight to bask in, and a mountain or sea view. In the background there are all the creature comforts to go back to: fresh organic foods, finest of drinks and warm spring water to swim in the evenings. The first few days your spirit will soar. You may want to spread your wings and fly. Feel the green of the mountain and hear the sound of the wind. You will talk to the trees as you feel the dew on the grasses under your feet. You may close your eyes and lie still under the sun or shade and let your body feel the tender zephyr, casually glimpsing at the sea in front of you. Close your eyes against the cerulean glare from the sea and sky. You count frothy rolling waves, one after another; unleashed on the shore and being swallowed up by the sun drenched sand. And all day (and night) the incessant concerto of the wind rustling through the leaves high above accompanied by the rhythmic clashing of the waves below craft a sound wave that besiege your senses like encomium from nature’s temple. You see and hear beyond the range of sight and sound.
But as they say: all good things must come to an end. Or said differently, things are good only if they do end in good time.
My books I'd fain cast off, I cannot read,
'Twixt every page my thoughts go stray at large
Down in the meadow, where is richer feed,
And will not mind to hit their proper target.
(David Henry Thoreau)
For how long? Your senses may want to rest or seek other ambiances; drinks will go on to taste tangy, and the “darkest pair of eyes may turn opaque”. But will your brain rest? You cannot possibility live on sensual pleasures alone. You need something to stimulate you cerebrally: to create, explore or to solve, or your mind will go vacuous.
And it is so very Homo sapiens. Men are the hunter gatherer, but men are also the thinker, the artist, the political animal and the curious explorer. These are the distinct features that separate us from lesser (or nobler) beings that roam on earth
That is why reading comes in mind; or watching television, surfing the net, for that matter. People read for a multiplicity of reasons: the noblest of all is the quest for knowledge. Wisdom gained through observation by all senses from previous generation needs not be told by the forefathers under the open sky. It can be stored by carving symbols on the cycled buckles of trees, or microchips.
But reading can do other things too. It is a past time. It could be occupational. To me it is stimulating of the kind that provides electricity in the brain.
I know very well that reading, after a certain age, diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. For it has been the reason of my gracious fall by the wayside from money and fame: I read too much and use too little of brain; and have developed the lazy habits of thinking. People spend time and money on drinks, I spend them on books: for the perpendicular joy it brings.  Hence, I carry two pairs of reading glasses with me, just in case. And what do I read.? Here are the tenets that I follow when taking reading materials if I am going to a faraway place to be away from it all.

One or two for the addiction,
Like a last century Bengali fiction;
One or two for a second read,
The first time round that I didn’t pay heed;
One that had accolade,
In time before in triviality it faded;
One for which my craving grew,
After the broadsheet gave it a review;
And finally, at least one by a contemporary great,
That is, of course, for the after dinner tête-à-tête
This year when I headed for somewhere tranquil, I had a collection of fiction and non-fiction that I had promised myself to complete. This piece is a revisit to two of them. What were they?
How wordplay can be sheer magic in the hands of maestros, to display: progress of innocence to experience; and crafting of a complex story of small lives devastated by disaster, by two dazzling literary amateurs of modern times. I am talking about the books: To Kill a Mocking Bird and the God of Small Things by Harper Lee and Arundhati Roy, respectively.
This piece is not a critique of their literary values. A neophyte as I am, I nevertheless know not to rush in to that foray; world literature has already passed the judgement. Let’s face it: To Kill a Mocking Bird sold more than 2.5 million in its first year and won Pulitzer Prize in 1961. Since then it has been selling in millions. When Hollywood made a film of it, in 1962, it won Oscar for Gregory Peck in his role as its central character. What the book did to the reading public, the filmed did it to a wider audience: it firmly placed the book in their minds and affection.
The God of Small Things sold millions too world-wide after it won the Booker Prize, in 1997. Both the books featured amongst the top 100 in UK readers’ best loved books in the biggest ever literary survey conducted in 2003 where 140,000 voted amongst 7,000 nominations.
But is it there, where similarity ends? No, I would say, rather it starts.
This piece is tender footing in that trivia. Look at the life and time of the authors. Lee grew up in a small town of southern state of Alabama and studied Law. She was working as an airline reservation clerk in New Work when she wrote the book. Truman Capote, the famed American writer, was a lifelong friend. After completing the book Lee accompanied Capote to Kansas to assist him in some research work. She did not pursue any literary work of mention after the book, and has remained somewhat a recluse.
Roy grew up in Kerala, India’s southernmost state and went to live in Delhi and Goa. She studied Architecture, and was encouraged to write a screen play by Pradeep Krishen, a film director whom she later married. After finishing the book she took up political journalism, and as of today she has not written another novel. She was arrested a number of times for taking up street protests, notably protesting the establishment of one dam on a people’s village in Madhya Prodesh.
Lee’s book was seen through the eyes of children. The story goes like this: six year old Scout and her elder brother Jem, lived with their widowed lawyer father Atticus, in a small rural town in Alabama. Atticus took up a case to defend a black man, Robinson, accused of raping a white woman. This aroused a lot of passion in the town’s white community, and Atticus had to face down a lynch mob who tried to attack Robinson. In the court Atticus provided compelling evidence to prove Robinson’s innocence. It came out that the woman was making sexual advances towards Tom, when she was caught by her husband in the act. An all-white jury nevertheless convicted Tom. Tom was shot and killed while trying to escape from prison.
Bob, the woman’s father, humiliated by the trial, spat in Atticus' face on the street and terrorised who were involved. Finally, he attacked Jem and Scout as they walked home on a dark night. During the scuffle and amid the confusion, someone came to the children's rescue. The mysterious man carried Jem home, where Scout realized that he is Boo Radley, a reclusive man, whom they knew only as a shy neighbour. In the struggle, Bob was killed, but the town’s Sheriff decided to write it off as an accident.
Scout walked Boo home, and said good bye at his front door, when Boo disappeared. While standing at the porch, Scout imagined life from Boo's perspective and regretted that they never repaid him for the gifts he had given them.
Roy’s story is also written from a child’s view, shadowed with adult awareness as a forbidden love affair stirred up the prejudices of a traditional community. Estha and Rahel were seven year old twins of almost a single sole. They had been forced to return in disgrace to their mother Ammu’s parental home in Kerala after her divorce. The day their cousin Sophie Mol arrived from England, Ammu had begun a secret affair with Velutha, an untouchable out cast in the caste based society, whom the twins had grown to love. The affair was discovered and Ammu was locked in; who then vented her frustration on the children. The twins and Sophie Mol ran away in a boat that capsized and Sophie Mol drowned.
Velutha was framed with attempted rape of Ammu, threatening the family, and kidnapping the children. A group of policemen hunted Velutha down and savagely beat him for crossing caste lines. The twins witnessed it; and were tricked into accusing Velutha of Sophie's death. Velutha died of injuries. Ammu went to the police station and disclosed her relationship and was kicked out from the house for the shame she brought on the family
Unable to find a job, Ammu sent Estha to his father. Estha never saw Ammu again, and Ammu died alone and impoverished.
After a turbulent period Rahel went to America, got married, divorced and finally returned to Kerala. Rahel and Estha, both 31-years old, are reunited for the first time since they were children. Both have been haunted by their guilt and grief-ridden pasts. Estha was unendingly preoccupied in his self and Rahel had a haunted look in her eyes.
In her book Lee drew parallels with her own upbringing in rural Alabama; she was the daughter of a respected attorney. The narrator in the story is helped by her father to understand that good and evil co-exist in people and that wisdom lies in appreciating one and understanding the other.
Roy spent her childhood in Kerala and grew up in similar circumstances as in the story. Her mother was divorced and “lived on the edge of the community in a very vulnerable fashion”.
Each of the books has two unnatural deaths and the victims of the injustices are two people who lived on the fringe of the society, subjected to prejudices.
I can go on. But interestingly, the respective stories ended in the tradition of the society the authors come from. Lee’s book bore witness to racism in American south during the depression of the thirties. But fore-mostly, it affirmed the potential of one person trying to make the difference. This went in the spirit of a new nation that was coming up in the world.
Roy’s book ended up in the manner of a Greek tragedy. The twin had found that there was no other person who understood them in the way they understood each other. An ancient society as India is, there is a plethora of outlet in its culture how human could react when destiny in life has been decided by fate, and when human beings are helpless. The twin’s renewed intimacy culminated in incest.
Did I speed-read the books? Read this: Biology designed the dance. Terror timed it. Dictated the rhythm with which their bodies answered to each other. As though they knew already that for each tremor of pleasure they would pay with an equal measure of pain ……….Gave each other slowly…..(The God of Small Things)
(To Kill a Mocking Bird) The defining moment of the book was when Atticus was spat at in public, but showed his strength in restrain. He believed that goodness in people would prevail over the evil, and he taught that to his children. He instilled in them sense of morality. When they got an airgun as Christmas, Atticus told them never to shoot at living things not least mocking birds, for mockingbirds never do harm to anyone. All they do is sing beautifully and live peacefully.
These books are not speed-reading material. These are to be read time and again.

The writer is a FCA and lives in UK and Bangladesh.