Yesterday

Yesterday, I got a treat, some nice flash animated e-cards, some cash and some nifty gifts including a swell diamond bracelet from my mother. But, I kept thinking about the person that forgot. Even if that is what I did expect from said person. To be fair, I had been told not to expect any remembrance. So, I should not have. It was wrong and stupid. Still, I did think of the possibility……….people change their minds. But, it did not happen this time. And I had just wasted my time on a really nice birthday.

Strange are the workings of the human mind. Why would any sensible person think about something that she knows will not happen instead of enjoying what was. But, there I was doing just that and I know that I won’t even have learnt a lesson from it. This will happen again. And the only thing that I would have got out of it is a post for the day.

Still reading Ulysses

I would like to warn regular readers (no less than an impressive three on the last count) that all future posts may be on the subject of “reading Ulysses”. Because that is what I am going to be doing for the rest of my life. A few days back, I contemplated just throwing in the towel and quitting. But the krishnaswamys do not quit. Besides, I had finished reading as much 300 pages……..that is a good 38 per cent of the book. I feel unable to give up at this advanced stage.

But, it is slower going than I had anticipated because I spend time doing some supplementary reading the web. It does help to get more out of the experience. It also ensures that the experience is going to last a longish time. And this experience also brings me to my pet peeve regarding unreadable books and indeed any work of art that is largely incomprehensible.

I strongly believe that every creator must have complete artistic freedom to express his/her ideas. But, there has to be some justification for the form that the end product has taken. (It is another thing altogether though that it would appear that I go out of my way to pick books that have a reputation for being unreadable. And if I choose to visit art galleries exhibiting “modern art”, I am just asking for it). It does look like some writers are deliberately obtuse and that seems unacceptable.

Sticking specifically to Ulysses, judge Hon. John M. Woolsey in his verdict that lifted the ban on the book in the US (for pornography) says that the content and form of the book is a result of “Joyce’s sincerity and his honest effort to show exactly how the minds of his characters operate”. An admirable reason that would justify writing of any sort. But, here lies my crib. In many ways, it does not appear to be an unrelentingly honest account of the interior landscape of the protagonists’ minds. I highly doubt if the following words are anything more than just a collection of syllables.

“ Seabloom, greasebloom viewed last words. Softly. When my country take her place among.
Prrprr.
Must be the bur.
Fff. Oo. Rrpr.
Nations of the earth. No-one behind. She’s passed. Then and not till then. Tram. Kran, kran, kran. Good oppor. Coming. Krandlkrankran. I’m sure it’s the burgundy. Yes. One, two. Let my epitaph be. Karaaaaaaa. Written. I have.
Pprrpffrrppfff.
Done.”

Anyway, if it is claimed to be inner workings of the mind of an individual, I cannot dispute it. But, surely the voice of the omniscient narrator can conform to the rules of normal writing. Surely it does not have to be so clever ass and surely it can be distinguishable when said voice takes over. Of course, it might just turn out that there is no such narrator and I have got it all wrong. Who can be sure in such territory?

Joyce himself once said of Ulysses "I've put so many enigmas and puzzles that it will keep the professors busy for centuries arguing over what I meant...". This, in my opinion is both ridiculous and unacceptable. Any creative person must, through some means, be held more accountable for what they inflict on an unsuspecting public.

Viva Google

I have suspected this all along. And it is true. The answer to all of life’s questions and problems lies in a Google search.

I have had a recurring dream for several years. It takes many torturous forms but it basically boils down to not being able to prepare for an exam, missing an exam that I was not able to prepare for, failing to submit an assignment on time because I could not prepare for it. You get the idea. Over a time span of ten years myriad bizarre reasons have prevented me from preparing for this key exam. And it is so annoying every single time I have it. The strange part to me was that never have I been unprepared for any exam ever. Underprepared may be but never unprepared. I was also not even a student during all of the time that I have had this recurring dream.

I was curious to know more about this and I was sure there would any amount of sites with information on the subject of recurring dreams. But, I did not expect pronto to be lead to an explanation for the “unprepared for the exam” one. I also did not expect that I would like what I read, which was the following.“Interestingly, the person who has this dream is almost always someone who would never let themselves attend a test unprepared. That is why it can be so puzzling: you are the last person who would forget to do your homework. This dream recurs for people who have a tendency to take on too much and then judge themselves quite harshly for not measuring up to a pretty tough standard. It is most common to people with a strong track record of achievements who drive themselves somewhat hard.”

I was glad not to be told that I had a major problem that would require years of therapy. I found the reasoning behind the dream satisfying and comforting. May be I will be a lot less vexed when I next have this dream. The next time something is bothering me I know what I have to do. A google search!

Reading Ulysses

A cousin of mine gifted me a copy of "Ulysses" recently. I have wanted to read it for a long time and it appeared to me to be a sign from God that now is the right time to do it. Why else would it have come into my life suddenly? Of course, as my sister said, “Dude, it is because you asked her to buy it for you". But, I don’t think she gets these things. I asked for it almost three year back. I definitely prefer to look at it as divine intervention asking me to read the book.

Anyway, here I was, the proud owner of a brand new copy of the book and it literally called out to me saying, “ Read me, read me”. And I did just that. First up, I would like to address the charge that it is an “unreadable” book. It is not unreadable. Not if you can read something that does not make any sense. I can read anything, whether it makes sense or not and so I have finished reading a third of the book. Once you learn to ignore what does not make sense and stick to what does, ok, I won’t go so far as to say that it becomes readable but it can be read. Working at current speed, I expect I can finish it in another 31.1 days. I would like to reserve any judgment before I actually finish reading it.

However, in the meanwhile, I do have a theory. A number of powerful literary critics came together on April 1st sometime in the 1920s. They decided to play a prank on lovers of literature. They had all received a copy of Ulysses to review, read 8 pages and promptly used it as a doorstopper. But, now they decide to promote it heavily. Fashionable readers worldwide bought the book eagerly, read 8 pages, used it as a doorstopper and spread the word that this was indeed a masterpiece as the critics has said.(Some hapless readers such as myself actually tried reading the book in its entirety and many, it is believed, swore off books for a lifetime and others turned into nihilists). However, the cult of Ulysses grew, as these cults are wont to. It gained a reputation as the finest work of literature of the 20th century. The original pranksters now all dead were nevertheless smug and satisfied (in hell) at the magnificent success of their prank.

And I am left counting down to 31.1 days.

Cloud atlas

I have not posted for a couple of weeks . I would like to say that is because I had been reading, “cloud atlas”. Whilst that might a bit much, it contributed in some part to robbing me of time in which I could have done something else.

The Sunday Telegraph did not review ''Cloud Atlas'' because its critic found the novel ''unreadable.'' That critic is a very sensible person. Someone who cannot be swayed by public opinion that has by and large heralded “cloud atlas” as a minor literary miracle. Unfortunately, I am not that sensible. The kind of effusive praise that the book received was hard to ignore. I have to say this. Mr. Mitchell is a brilliant man, a creative man, a man who is not content unless his creations are grand and sweeping in scope. I can admire all this but I cannot admire his book.

Enough has been said about the six independent narratives of “cloud atlas”-stories of an American notary sailing somewhere down under in the mid 19th century, a young composer serving as an amanuensis to an acclaimed composer in Belgium the 1930s, a young female journalist investigating some nuclear conspiracy in 1970s USA, a book publisher in present day England who finds himself forced into a home for the elderly, a product of genetic engineering sometime in the future being interrogated for wanting to be human and finally somewhere in the distant future a goatherd in Hawaii witnessing the end of mankind-that span a 1000 years over the past present and future. Somehow, I started with the expectation that something incredibly fascinating will link these tales together to create an overall vision. That is far from being the case. The narrator in strand two reads a journal written in strand one. Letters written in the second narrative find themselves in the hands of the protagonist of narrator three. It as simple as that. There is also some reincarnation idea floating around that is so lame it is best ignored.

The language that every story is told in is suitably different as demanded by the nature of the tale. Stories set in the distant past as in the future are composed in language is so tedious and so unreadable that is it painful at times. That makes for more than half of the book. Even if there were any promising ideas therein, it can be missed, as one is busy just trying to get through the book.

In trying to describe too many human experiences, no great picture about the rise and fall of humankind emerges from this, as perhaps envisaged by the author. It looks like it might have worked best as six different works each exploring it own theme satisfyingly. But that would not satisfy the authors of genius like Mr. Mitchell who are too busy creating works of epic proportions to see whether it works or not.