tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-55230282024-03-13T10:02:30.481+05:30Literary MosaicLiterary Musings...Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger77125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-87235360571516764432009-09-17T10:04:00.003+05:302009-09-17T10:10:24.369+05:30LeisureWHAT is this life if, full of care,We have no time to stand and stare?—No time to stand beneath the boughs,And stare as long as sheep and cows:No time to see, when woods we pass,Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass:No time to see, in broad daylight,Streams full of stars, like skies at night:No time to turn at Beauty's glance,And watch her feet, how they can dance:No time to wait till her Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-6489965215180016842009-03-04T17:18:00.001+05:302009-03-04T17:27:09.009+05:30DaddyYou do not do, you do not doAny more, black shoeIn which I have lived like a footFor thirty years, poor and white,Barely daring to breathe or Achoo.Daddy, I have had to kill you.You died before I had time--Marble-heavy, a bag full of God,Ghastly statue with one gray toe Big as a Frisco sealAnd a head in the freakish AtlanticWhere it pours bean green over blueIn the waters off beautiful Nauset.I Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-34569707711715918422008-12-31T22:56:00.003+05:302008-12-31T23:02:44.553+05:30A New Year's PoemRing out, wild bells, to the wild sky,The flying cloud, the frosty light;The year is dying in the night;Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.Ring out the old, ring in the new,Ring, happy bells, across the snow;The year is going, let him go;Ring out the false, ring in the true.Ring out the grief that saps the mind,For those that here we see no more;Ring out the feud of rich and poor,Ring in Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-40164156861571369932008-12-16T08:19:00.004+05:302008-12-17T22:49:03.846+05:30Les PoissonsMémoire des poissons dans les criques profondes,Que puis-je faire ici de vos lents souvenirs,Je ne sais rien de vous qu'un peu d'écume et d'ombreEt qu'un jour, comme moi, il vous faudra mourir.( Memory of fish in the deep-water coves,what can I do here with your slow-moving recollections,I know no more of your than a hint of foam and shadow,and that one day, like me, you will have to die.)Alors Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-80089200888942438202008-10-30T20:40:00.002+05:302008-10-30T20:44:05.065+05:30A Fairy TaleOn winter nights beside the nursery fireWe read the fairy tale, while glowing coalsBuilded its pictures. There before our eyesWe saw the vaulted hall of traceried stoneUprear itself, the distant ceiling hungWith pendent stalactites like frozen vines;And all along the walls at intervals,Curled upwards into pillars, roses climbed,And ramped and were confined, and clustered leavesDivided where thereUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-3005382630942845052008-10-02T12:29:00.005+05:302008-10-02T14:05:01.285+05:30A Tale of Two CitiesThere was once upon a time, in a big city, a colony of fish who lived in a pretty plain little aquarium on a bedside table. There were three couples - goldfish, angelfish and shark. They lived in mutual harmony, swimming around the tank peacefully, with no reason for any discord. They were fed, they had plenty of fresh water, air and light. Then one day, they were shifted to a smaller city (a Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-26766956687202511572008-09-01T20:13:00.003+05:302008-09-01T22:41:25.814+05:30Une Vie de Boy - Ferdinand Oyono (1956)Une Vie de Boy (Ferdinand Oyono) - a beautiful novel - has been written in the diary form, making it much more realistic and lending it a more personal touch thus making the reader feel like he's privy to the innermost thoughts of the main character, in this case Joseph Toundi a.k.a the Boy. Houseboy or Une Vie de Boy narrates the story of a young Black who runs away from his tribal village, Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-6699533633651923642008-08-31T11:54:00.003+05:302008-08-31T12:13:49.356+05:30Waiting for Godot - Samuel Beckett (1949)A play that can be interpreted at many levels, I've always favoured the existentialist interpretation which deals with the meaning of human existence and the onus of each man to carry his own burden and make of his life what he can, however difficult it might be...An excerpt I once knew by heart and could recite at the drop of a hat and to me, perhaps the most important part of the text...Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-11863311336471323952008-08-17T19:14:00.003+05:302008-08-17T21:42:29.190+05:30Tanguy - Michel del Castillo (1957)An autobiographical work by Michel del Castillo, a Spanish born writer who writes in French, Tanguy is a powerfully moving novel highly reminiscent of The Diary of Anne Frank (due mainly to the child's point of view as opposed to that of the adult). Narrating in first person, the story of a young Spanish boy, Tanguy, the novel is set against the backdrop of the war. The novel starts in Spain in Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-85454943022389913662008-08-10T10:31:00.008+05:302008-08-10T11:32:28.700+05:30My Family and Other Animals - Gerald Durrell (1956)I like animals. I understand their importance in our ecological system. I even admire and appreciate certain species. But I wouldn't go as far as calling myself a generic animal lover, because frankly there are some whose existence is quite beyond my grasp. Lizards for example, or snakes, or crocodiles...basically the entire gamut of animals that are categorised as reptiles. And thus when I Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-58807407521313486682008-07-11T19:52:00.002+05:302008-08-04T19:55:18.411+05:30The Penelopiad - Margaret Atwood (2005)Margaret Atwood, steals yet again and presents us a delightfully tongue-in-cheek feminist version of an otherwise accepted, rarely questioned and highly glorified tale. Re-interpreting the Greek myth of Odysseus as a part of The Myths series, Atwood presents The Odyssey (originally written by Homer) from Penelope's point of view, in The Penelopiad.Unlike her beautiful cousin, Helen of Troy, Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-71803881835674369452008-07-07T20:13:00.008+05:302008-07-08T14:44:15.492+05:30Slowness - Milan KunderaRare is it that I devour a book within a couple of hours. Rarer that I find myself unable to lift my eyes from a book when I am in a moving bus. Yesterday on my way back from the Tinsel Town I started Milan Kundera's Slowness and before I knew it, I had turned the last page, having spent two hours nodding in admiration at the weight in the words chosen to weave this delightfully tongue-in-cheek Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-84701949998226050792008-07-07T19:44:00.003+05:302008-07-07T20:09:47.159+05:30The PatriotI am standing for peace and non violenceWhy the world is fighting fightingWhy all people of worldAre not following Mahatma GandhiI am simply not understandingAncient indian wisdom is 100% correct,I shuold sayeven 200% correct,But mordern generation is neglecting-Too much going for fashion and foreign thing.Other day i'm reading newspaper(Everyday i'm reading Times Of IndiaTo improve my English Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-11300318874221281642008-07-01T19:22:00.005+05:302008-07-01T21:23:45.158+05:30Life Without Books Would Be A MistakeI was born in a book. This is not a metaphor. I was born to myself by reading. I was born to rejection, to excess, to enigmas, I was born to the incomprehensibleness of things, I was born to what is called the inner life thanks to a book. I was ten. I remember it well. The book was called "Sans Famille" (Nobody's Boy) by Hector Malot.I belong to books. All other affiliations reduce me and sut me Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-15483297156661342092008-07-01T19:17:00.003+05:302008-07-01T21:23:04.678+05:30Being Alone With The World In Your HandsReading is absenting yourself from the worldreading is finding the world againreading is being alone with the world in your handsreading is being alone in the company of othersreading is thinking before actingreading is taking the time to thinkreading is imaginingimagining is putting yourself in the Other's placereading is an act of humanityreading is being with the other and with yourselfreadingUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-85101444113094530592008-06-19T19:45:00.002+05:302008-06-19T20:07:50.045+05:30From "Slowness" (1995),Why has the pleasure of slowness disappeared? Ah, where have they gone, the amblers of yesteryear? Where have they gone, those loafing heroes of folk song, those vagabonds who roam from one mill to another and bed down under the stars? Have they vanished along with the footpaths, with grasslands and clearings, with nature? There is a Czech proverb that describes their easy indolence by a metaphorUnknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-66687637734554085602008-06-17T19:52:00.005+05:302008-06-17T12:54:36.769+05:30La Langue FrançaiseWhy is French such a complicated language(with such impossible to conceive pronounciations)?Oft has this question been posed to me and I've always shrugged in response, saying that the people responsible have long been interred and are by now decomposed to the point that even if you tried tracking them down in hell (they couldn't have gone to heaven, surely, after having been this cruel and come Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-85301606275042668302008-06-16T19:33:00.007+05:302008-06-17T12:35:34.469+05:30Booked by the Mother HenTagged by Extempore, a.k.a the Mother Hen, to :-Pick up the nearest book. Open to page 123. Find the fifth sentence.Post the next three sentences. Tag five people, and acknowledge the person who tagged you.She declares having struggled with the choice of book since she often reads more than one book at a time. I must admit, a similar dilemma awaited me, since my bed-side table currently hosts a Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-68470130861654521562008-03-21T20:55:00.007+05:302008-06-17T12:37:00.185+05:30The Robber Bride - Margaret Atwood (1993)Margaret Atwood’s The Robber Bride, offers us a feminist version of the fairy-tale The Robber Bridegroom. Familiar with the world of fairy tales, this isn’t the first time Atwood has been inspired by one, having spun off the Blue Beard tale in her collection of short stories, Blue Beard’s Egg. While the original fairytale is about a band of robbers with predatory, cannibalistic characteristics, Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-82400946163852015582008-02-10T16:28:00.003+05:302008-02-13T22:01:43.279+05:30From the Literary DeskOft do I miss my Literature days, the thrill of discovering yet another brilliant author, the awe that coursed through my veins discussing the genius behind the words, the complete satisfaction after having discussed, interpreted and analysed a particular work. The module on francophone literature that I had taken up during my stage at Montpellier not only gave me the opportunity to go back to Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-3507976905782491892007-12-22T14:17:00.000+05:302007-12-22T15:16:14.582+05:30Perfume – Patrick Süskind (1985)In the period of which we speak, there reigned in the cities a stench barely conceivable to us modern and women. The streets stank of manure, the courtyards of urine, the stairwells stank of mouldering wood and rat droppings, the kitchens of spoiled cabbage and mutton fat; the unaired parlours stank of stale dust, the bedrooms of greasy sheets, damp featherbeds, and the pungently sweet aroma of Unknownnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-55149927454643422252007-12-15T20:10:00.000+05:302007-12-22T15:19:57.508+05:30The Girl from the Chartreuse – Pierre Péju (2005)Translated by Ina Rilke from the French original La Petite Chartreuse (2002), The Girl from the Chartreuse is a heart-breaking story about Vollard, a book-seller who accidentally runs over a 10-year old girl with his van. The novel revolves around the three protagonists of Vollard, the little girl Éva and her mother Thérèse. Struck by the accident, Vollard reads fairytales to Éva, who sinks into Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-1157045555787659782006-08-31T22:52:00.000+05:302006-08-31T23:02:35.810+05:30Alias Grace - Margaret Atwood (1996)I really didn’t expect to come away impressed this time, specially when I was still crawling slower than a snail through the book a 100 pages down – but Jesus, this woman knows how to spin her tales, for just when I was beginning to desultorily flip the pages and start preparing myself to either trudge through the book or abandon it completely, she reached out and ensnared me in the fine web of Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-1149170134309905672006-06-01T18:57:00.000+05:302006-06-01T19:25:34.386+05:30Lady Oracle – Margaret Atwood (1976)The third Margaret Atwood I’m reading after Handmaid’s Tale and Bluebeard’s Egg, it has lived upto my expectations. When I started the novel I didn’t expect it to hold my attention for long – I was sure that one author couldn’t possibly churn out novel after novel, all of which would succeed in pulling me into the intricate mesh of its plot, make my chuckle, smile, shed the occasional tear…feel. Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5523028.post-1147021651655397182006-05-07T22:34:00.000+05:302006-05-07T22:37:31.670+05:30The Fairy Tale World of Children's LiteratureCharles Perrault. Jean de la Fontaine. The Brothers Grimm.Do these names mean anything to you? If not, then I must say you've had a very deprived childhood, for they are the names of the authors of the world's best-known and most-read fairy tales...or maybe not so deprived after all. For quite a while now, even before the arrival of my nephew I'd been taking little jogs down memory lane thinking Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1