A-festering-they'll-go

You,
are like a repulsive scab
that I shall tease
and turn over
fiddle with

And know
that in the end
I shall look back
at
ugliness.

Once more, I shall laugh at you.

Fuyu wa chouto
okashi, anata no
hakuchi kara.

Celebration calls for the employment of new languages learned. To write tottering half-haikus, it's upstart nature belying it's truly serious intent to ridicule.

Ningen tamashi
wa hontou ni yaruki
wo naku shi te.

Beauty

In The Lake

In Wad Hamid's Doum Tree

And in the Sunshine Through the Rain.

And breaks the Heart

Like the Blue Bamboo I read while still soaked

Like the tea leaves I brewed so carefully for you.

Mine to help beguile

Mine in helpless hoarding and then ferreting out again

To break my heart again.

I had forgotten how pleasant it is to sit at a desk in an empty library.
I sang while taking a walk today.
The icicles outside my window are melting.
It really is a pretty sight.
I have my window open.
I feel a light heartedness that is unusual in winter.

I have no memory at all - Stendhal.

I came across this completely by chance. It makes mention of a friend with whom correspondence has been scarce for the past four years. We were quizzards - it is a term I seldom hear used outside the Indian quizzing circuit - and first met as fellow illegals in a district quiz. Perhaps I shall devote an entry to the mythical etymology of quizzing and quizzes some day but it is New Year's tomorrow and one finds oneself musing about the past and becoming rather silly about it all. One wishes for an exiled fraternity like the one found in Joseph O'Neill's "Netherland." It is, by the way, one of the finer books of 2008. The Oxford Quizzing Society quizzes provided solace for a year. My only complaint was its complete colonization by the University Challenge. Understandable all the same. Might I also be permitted to show off a little by saying that I was part of the winning team at one of the University quizzes. My contribution to the triumph is, as they say, another story.

"Netherland" inevitably reminds of Ramachandra Guha's "Corner of a Foreign Field" which is a lovely book on the evolution of cricket in India. I have never been fond of cricket; preferring instead the slightly more spirited game of football. One day I too shall contribute to the otiose debate about the superiority of one game over the other. For now allow me to dwell on Guha's book. The narrative of the civilized viciousness of colonial cricketing was so absorbing that I found myself quite moved by the sight of my brother's school mates running around in their cricket whites practising for the Edinburgh Cup so precious to the two competing schools. It is our little town's Ashes. "Corner..." is what a historical account of a sport ought to be. It does no good to the sport when all we have in terms of literature these days is self indulgent autobiographies of players who should really should be reminded of Andres Escobar every one in a while.
I am of course, merely, jesting.

A blog can hardly be expected to carry one's best work so in the spirit of general Christmas conviviality here's a little raillery. My Professor of poetry would ask why, very earnestly in his typed comments on my essays which is precisely why I refuse to explicate any further. Petty subversions, if you must.

Anywhichway let us all laugh at Aiba-kun and be merry on Christmas.





I hope everyone is as happy as Aiba-kun and I. Yes, I am very very happhee.

Halycon Days

Unproductive as this weekend might have been certain re-discoveries have made me very happy. One of them was the wonderful "Malgudi Days" series that I would wait for each week when I was younger. And I found entire episodes on that veritable storehouse of the delights of one's youth; youtube. Here is a favourite and another.

Uper the gur gur ...

Taking a break from my study of the Ulster poets I came across this video on a website while watching another a friend recommended. Manto has always been a favorite amongst friends. I only like to read him with/alongside his compatriot Chughtai. The only reason as to why I have this preference could be the rather all-too-obvious madness of it all. The simple reason ofcourse would be because Chughtai preceded him in the slim volume of "Indian" short stories my first year in English Hons, Delhi University. But out of all of them I liked Basheer the best. The alliterative name of the cross eyed lover, the treachery of the card sharper's daughter and the ramshackle tea shop was all I needed to fall in love with Vaikom.

26th September.

Having transformed into a conscientous student I walk into the designated room for the Philosophy Club meetings. I notice I shall be in the minority again. That doesn't bother me unduly because I've managed to bond with my kind while at a reading of Soyinka's "Strong Breed." I see the sultry voiced, pony-tailed student of Philosophy I have noticed at some earlier time hanging around the Writing Center. His name is, he tells me, Day-vid. The President of the society, Sam, thanks me rather grandly for coming to this meeting. I shoot him a contrived, quizzical look. The resident Alisdair MacIntyre expert walks in and wishes the gentlemen a good afternoon. With a flourish befitting Dayvid he motions towards me in an effort towards inclusivity. The resident expert ignores him. I am very amused. We discuss teleology in Kant and everyone who comes after Kant. I itch to leave the room but I think it might betray bad manners on my part. Towards the end of the meeting David sneezes and leaves for the restroom. His feminine waddle reminds me of a friend's sister. It is then that I stop listening altogether and wait for David to return. The belt of flesh that disappears into his jeans is accentuated by the tucked in t-shirt; a cotton t-shirt that looks suspiciously like something I have seen at Primark. He waddles back and puts his leg up on a chair.
The resident is tiresome and tells us an anecdote about MacIntyre's "strange humour." I raise an eyebrow.
I walk back quite glad that I can tell my friend that I'd spent Friday afternoon constructively. She insists I do something more than just read. I do agree. So today she gives me a makeover and I dutifully go to the recreation centre to get coffee so that the good work is put to use.

N.B. It is disconcerting to preserve and store and tag the documentations of a muggy night in October.
See facebook.com

The Autodidacts



Russell Brand, who I think is quite easily the best looking man I've read this year and most certainly the funniest, at the Oxford Union with his autodidact's take on racism and the BNP.


Another autodidact (he claims somewhere in one of his essays) whose works I have read and loved is Ved Mehta. Author of the wonderfully amusing Delinquent Chacha, his essays on Oxford intelligentsia (he studied History at Balliol) containing amusing tidbits about English philosophers make his Reader a delightful read. And like all art that deals with one's recent history we all but succumb to the pleasure of its consumption. Having desired to write about Oxford and failed, I resort to Mehta's version of the truth of academia past, present and future.

As we grew older, we discovered, of course, that many of these supposed certainties did not always hold true even in England, to say nothing of the larger world. Moreover, there was a definite closing in of options for clever men, and one could sense a creeping gloom among top undergraduates as they approached the end of their Oxford years; it sometimes made them reactionary in politics and out of sympathy with the mass culture that was taking shape around them. (Now that the mass culture has arrived, some people at Oxford speak of it as the New Dark Age.) They felt like misfits in their own country and culture. Many of them settled for an academic career, doing so not because they were natural teachers or because they felt there were certain books that had to be written but because there was nothing better to do out there. In contrast, like many good students from America, I had come to Oxford in the hope of perhaps being an academic, but I was beginning to doubt my abilities. I felt I could never be as good as , say, the Greats men (those who workd toward a degree in ancient Greek and Latin literature, ancient history, and ancient and modern philosophy), because I had long since missed the bus for learning the ancient languages thoroughly. Nor could I comfort myself with the thought that I was as knowledgeable about Indian culture as they were about Judeo-Christian culture.

In the Force and Road of Casualty - Ved Mehta

The Memory of All that

What nerve. Asking the Bangladeshi man at the corner store if the bootleg cd of Jaane Tu Jaane Na has "come out" even before it's release. My friend who seems quite thrilled at her audacity is rewarded with the disconcerting availability of the two dollar cd of the film. And thus came about the viewing of this ridiculous film about two college going students who refuse to acknowledge their love for each other.

I choose to ignore the many scoffs that I have had to suffer after my own declaration of love for this film. I like this movie; despite it's antediluvian (indeed, S.) relationships formed in colleges so devoid of the heirarchy that typified all of mine. Because it gives me an opportunity to tell a tale about someone, not unlike the central male protagonist, who was not only an equally adroit singer and dancer around trees but also (accepting the inescapability of common jargon) a wonderful person.

Despite being the recipient of this person's numerous generosities the only incident concerning her that I re-remember has little to do with generosity or goodwill. We had just gotten off a rickshaw and the rickshaw wallah seeing that we were of that bohemian tribe of guitar strumming, non-college-going college student chinkies, demanded ten more rupees than was the normal fare. My hindi speaking abilities having a rather strange way of faltering and spiralling into blubber did not help. My friend spoke little Hindi. She was annoyed, she said, not at having to pay ten extra rupees at this obviously overworked and malnourished rickshaw wallah, but at his impertinence to demand that extra ten rupees because she aspired to loftier goals than bachelor degrees. We then went to the English department's seminar room and watched Sooraj Ka Satva Ghoda.

I drink now. Wine. And I am now able to distinguish between red wine and what only looks like red wine (partially fermented grape must, Sainsbury's tells me). Beer must be an acquired taste, I think. I've also gotten terribly lost for almost four months now. I blame the all too many pictures people have taken of me. The camera was given away but it hasn't helped; there's the boy's iphone.




To make up for the terrible post.

Memento Mori

After a point even an image was not enough, and he invoked concepts, like Post-Impressionism or Neo-Plasticism, and favourite of favourites, the Lyapunov functions, he seized upon an idea, a theory, a searing flame of thought, to match the jolt of bloodlessness between his ears, he told you and you laughed, perhaps you should cultivate blankness, you advised, that perfect blankness essential to any man's happiness.
The Glassblower's Breath-Sunetra Gupta

I realize I've neglected the blog for far too long now. But then why ought I fill spaces with the pain quotidien? Precious little has been done. Today. I feel like a little decadence. I'd like to see my words form, savour their uselessness, reject nourishment that would never arise from their pointlessness. Et in Arcadia ego. And so, a little triteness won't hurt Jack.

Why don't you just kill me?

I sometimes covet phronesis. Wishful thinking, perhaps, to assume it would temper my sudden griefs. I shy from using the term “violent griefs” because my mind is still ripe from the pounding it received at the meeting. Luke’s paper on violence seemed just an excuse to drink the Corpus Christi wine. But all these digressions distress me so. Am I not capable of discipline of any sort? My tutor has decided to take draconian measures to keep my wild and untamed metaphors in check.
I want only that my grief be checked. The grief that in quite an admirable display of coquetry coaxes me to lie like a turquoise in the depths of the Teesta. The dream, the triumphant return of the exile weighs on my soul. The need of more beauty than mine is required to sustain you, him, a grief.



(Niggling passages. Albee's latest wasn't impressive.)

I doubt I shall be writing much for the next few weeks. The weeks past have been far too interesting for me to do it unnecessary violence by recording it. Oxford's been gentle so far; I have managed to write perfectly sensible essays without really reading the texts. That makes me happy. The ciabattas (excellent ones found in almost every shop) make me happy too. I am in love again. The tutorials once a week have softened the scars left from the numerous hours of being in lecture halls. Mike, my tutor of Ancient Philosophy, talks to me about coconut climbers and crocodiles. I am going to watch a silly musical in London, dance on a boat the same weekend and visit old friends.
Now is not the time to mull. I shall have my share of fun and frolic. I shall sing.

Augusts were glorious when I was in school. It was the busiest month for me in terms of quizzing.
This August I come across this church and a plaque so small one would never even notice it and ruefully acknowledge the three Augusts I have let pass without awakenings.

Question: We are celebrating the 70 year anniversary of which popular board game?

My answer, ludo, was wrong.
My indignation was wrong too; 2pac did sing "Missing You." His, I doubt, was dedicated to the memory of B.I.G.
My apologies to the Master.

Struggles could have been a dog I
Make houses shrink
And trees diminish
Marauders' eyes and one anna hats. By going far; my look's leash
Maiden's hair and shoe lace traps. Dangles the puppet-people
Actors' heath and bamboo rings. Who, unaware how they dwindle,
Coffee spoons and fake fish scales. Laugh, kiss, get drunk,
Laura and Lizzie dream ten times tonight. Nor guess that if I choose to blink
They die.

- Sylvia Plath

And now for some frivolity.

Waugh

I have desisted from writing about the immense pleasure Evelyn Waugh’s writing has always provided me with for various reasons that need not be recounted here. However, a recent re-perusal of Brideshead Revisited seemed to agree with the prevailing mood of hesitant anticipation of the year I shall spend in Waugh’s alma mater. So much so that I think it’s only right I share my new found state of warm waiting with the four (?) people who read this blog. Infact it even brought about strong bouts of giddy whoops when I successfully pulled out it’s tableau. I have one for every book and it is with some amount of pride that I say I could recall quite a few minute details. For example the strange turn of fancy that made me model Sebastian in the image of a young man whose picture I’d found in a book; Delinquent Chacha, I think it was. I also remember how I’d decided to name an ugly neck-less stuffed toy “Adrienne” much in the same vein of Sebastian’s “Aloysius.” I suppose this will disappoint some but my reckless christening of all objects dear is to be credited to Waugh and not Murakami. Yes, myths do edify quickly, do they not? And Stephen Fry hovers in the horizon for some strange reason. Awful isn’t it?
Any which way I shall promise some other time a fuller account of my Waugh-picaresque when I am settled in a ground floor room in the front quad - happy coincidence permitting . At present a very short snippet from Brideshead ought to do:

It was not until I was within a fortnight of going up that he mentioned the subject at all; then he said, shyly and rather slyly: “I’ve been talking about you. I met your future Warden at the Athenaeum. I wanted to talk about Etruscan notions of immortality; he wanted to talk about extension lectures for the working-class; so we compromised and talked about you. I asked him what your allowance should be…”

A good friend tells me that I should leave out the last line. But I insisted that it be included.