Rumi: Gems from the Master
Rumi: Gems from the Master ‘Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.’ ‘If you are irritated by every rub, how will your mirror be polished?’ ‘The wound is the place where the...
Sit still and be still
Anushka Chatterjee Sit still and be still. Stop and stay. Breathe. Meditate. Revel in the knowledge that we are all seekers with infinite questions but no truth to discover. Revel in the knowledge that nothing is everything and everything is weightless. We are all...
First Touch –
Anushka Chatterjee Pale wings fluttered in the fading light, edges dipped in shimmer. Shadows stretched and awoke, yawning away the sleep. Light faded but also brightened. Spots of bright red and orange, streaks of burning heat atop delicate stems of wax. The wings...
Ashwati –
Anushka Chatterjee A gust of wind following a butterfly, tracing patterns into the fabric of sunlight, tripping through leaves rustling with dead secrets and whispers of brooks fed with liquid laughter. Laughter that echoes through rooms of a home filled with gold...
These Our Bodies Posessed by Light
- A Book Review First published in The Book Review - www.thebookreviewindia.org Author: Dharini Bhaskar Publisher: Hachette India Pages: 336, Hardcover, Price: Rs. 599 “…Look at the light through the windowpane. That means it’s noon, that meanswe’re...
Bombay Balchao – A Book Review
Author: Jane Borges Publisher: Tranquebar Pages: 224, Hardcover, Price: Rs. 499 First published in The Book Review - www.thebookreviewindia.org ‘Each time you prepare the balchao masala, think of the person you want to feed it to. If it’s someone you dislike, you...
The Colonial Roots of Racism
Anushka Chatterjee In an increasingly violent world, with constant news of death and destruction, questions regarding how it is possible for one group of humans to inflict such violence and exploitation on another are often asked. These are certainly complex questions...
From Sci-Fi To Reality. Metropolis: film Review
Anuradha Mukherjee A pioneering experience in the world of cinema, the 1927 release ‘Metropolis’ bravely played with the concept of a dystopian era and exposed the world to a whole new dimension of science-fiction films. Written by Thea von Harbou and directed by...
Sing street: Film Review
Anuradha Mukherjee “You can never do anything by half; do you understand that?” young Raphina once said, speaking of art, and of life. While the plot reads like a typical teenage romance novel, Sing Street is a movie that progresses much beyond the popular genre of...
Fashion and colour with Woody Allen
Anuradha Mukherjee Aesthetics of Fashion Often downplayed yet rarely unnoticed, costumes in the films of Woody Allen have inspired global fashion trends for years. Annie Hall prospered greatly as a film, but its triumph didn’t stop at its directorial and narrative...
Bicycle Thieves: Film Review
Anuradha Mukherjee ‘Bicycle Thieves’, a 1948 Italian masterpiece by director Vittorio De Sica, introduces us to a simple family struck by the consequences of the second world war, the movie depicting ever-cheerful Ricci and his struggle to find a job to make ends...
6:38 AM
Anuradha Mukherjee 6:38 am Dawn snuck in past the curtains, uninvited yet spreading across every surface, slowly chasing the flimsy shadows away. The phone screen that illuminated my face through the night slipped in importance, my attention shifting to the strange...
A Day In The Life – Stories – A Book Review
First Published in The Book Review (http://thebookreviewindia.org/) Author: Anjum Hassan/ Publisher Penguin/ Pages:234/ Price: Rs.599 Anjum Hasan is exceptional. The imagery in her stories comes at you so fast that you gasp as you try to absorb it all – and every...
I Love you are You are the Best!
Conversations with young parents It is a deliciously cold rainy morning in Coonoor as the parents of the St. Joseph’s fourth standard troop into the auditorium, looking just a little anxious. There is a slight trepidation often brought on by a visit to your child’s...
Samboli! Beware! – A Book Review
First published in the Journal – The Book Review on http://thebookreviewindia.org/ Translation of (Late) Lakshman’s Kannada autobiography Samboli Translator: Susheela Punitha Publisher: Niyogi Books Pages: 200 Price: Rs. 295 “Samboli! This expression is not from...
He, My Beloved CJ
Translation of Rosy Thomas’s Malayalam ‘Ivan, Ente Priya CJ’ First published in the Journal – The Book Review on http://thebookreviewindia.org/ Translator: G. Arunima Publisher: Women Unlimited Pages: 178 Price: Rs. 350 Playwright par excellence, literary critic,...
Ballad of Kaziranga – A Book Review
Ballad of Kaziranga – A Book Review First published in the Journal – The Book Review on http://thebookreviewindia.org/ Author: Dileep Chandan Translator: Parbina Rashid from the original Assamese Publisher: Niyogi Books Pages: 300 Price: Rs. 450 Kaziranga! The very...
Traitor – A Review
These stories of anguish, like those of the holocaust, must be told, over and over again, so that mankind remembers them with horror and avoids making those same mistakes.
The Power of Completion
A friend who has let you down, a relationship where you have let down the other, a son who will not speak with his father, a mother who cannot forgive her daughter… All of us have ‘incompletions’. An incompletion in a relationship is one where something critical is...
A terrorist lives Inside me
A terrorist lives inside of me. Every time I abuse someone silently. Every time I slam a door. Or preach ‘Why can’t you….’ Or shout, ‘How dare he!’ And hug my holier-than-thou self. Every time I curse in impatience. Point my finger in shrill, indignant protest or...
Heavy Threads by Hazel Hall
When the dawn unfolds like a bolt of ribbon Thrown through my window, I know that hours of light Are about to thrust themselves into me Like omnivorous needles into listless cloth, Threaded with the heavy colours of the sun. They seem altogether too eager, To...
The Patience of Ordinary Things
It is a kind of love, is it not? How the cup holds the tea, How the chair stands sturdy and foursquare, How the floor receives the bottoms of shoes Or toes. How soles of feet know Where they’re supposed to be. I’ve been thinking about the patience Of...
Green Mangoes
The afternoon sun beat down as Didi squinted up at the mango tree. “I got it,” Rinku said as she managed to pluck the fat green one. Shall I get that other one?” “No! Come on down now…they’ll wake up.” “Did you get the salt and chilly powder?” “Yes – in my pocket.”...
Fireflies
As the car crunches up the hill, a thin rain continues to fall. A shaggy, mud brown dog shakes the water off his back. A longhaired family of graceful black goats is climbing up the hillside. Clusters of Deodhars along the slopes stand quietly draped in mist. The...
Alive In Her Memories
She woke up at six as usual. It had become a ritual for her to wake up early and she didn’t even require the alarm anymore. She walked into the bathroom and washed her face, bunching her hair into a bun as she walked down the stairs to the kitchen. Her footsteps...
Aligarh – The Movie
I avoided watching Aligarh for a long time in spite of its rave reviews, mainly because I try not to watch depressing films. So I ended up watching it only last week when Tata Sky was showcasing a few films from MAMI, the Mumbai Film Festival, which I believe opened...
Revisiting ‘Second Class Citizen’ by Buchi Emecheta
Reading the title of the book, 'Second Class Citizen' the expectation is that the book will be about degradation, oppression, discrimination, etc. and will tell the harrowing tale of a person who may or may not have survived this subjugation. Add to this the knowledge...
Gulzar
मुझको भी तरकीब सिखा कोई यार जुलाहे अक्सर तुझको देखा है कि ताना बुनते जब कोई तागा टूट गया या ख़तम हुआ फिर से बाँध के और सिरा कोई जोड़ के उसमें आगे बुनने लगते हो तेरे इस ताने में लेकिन इक भी गाँठ गिरह बुनतर की देख नहीं सकता है कोई मैंने तो इक बार बुना था एक...
Tagore
If You Did Not If you didn’t fill my soul with love Why did you fill the morning sky with song? Why the garland of stars, Why the bed of flowers? And the south wind whispering secrets in my ear? If you didn’t fill my soul with love Why does the...
You Have A Good Day Now; I’ll Be Much Obliged!
It was sometime in 2001, in dry and dusty Dallas where I was recently posted, to handle HR for the US arm of my Indian Software Organization. The hysteria of y2k was settling down and 9/11 had not yet happened. Feeling lonely, unhappy and missing home, I had not quite...
Now books for every soul
A Bengaluru based startup lets you subscribe to books and goodies every month With an aim of bringing book lovers together, Surabhi S Rai and Desh Deepak set up the Big Book Box that offers subscription box services bringing books to your doorstep every month. With an...
Rev. Fr. Ed McGrath SJ
The deity in the temple has left. The last and the most beloved of our founding Fathers has moved on. XLRI is orphaned. Yet we cannot complain. He has left the institution stronger than ever. The values etched deeply into its psyche, his life a lesson till he...
White Crane Lend me your Wings: A Tibetan Tale of Love and War
Book Review by Malati Mukherjee First published in the Journal - The Book Review http://thebookreviewindia.org/ Author: Dr. Tsewang Yishey Pemba Niyogi Books 2017Hard bound, 468 Pages White Crane Lend me Your Wings is a heartbreaking story set in the idyllic Nyarong...