Like a dismal, meandering, nightmarish dream flows the narrative of The Castle - truncated as never finished, comprised of a series surreal and mundanLike a dismal, meandering, nightmarish dream flows the narrative of The Castle - truncated as never finished, comprised of a series surreal and mundane events, long and seemingly meaningless passages about matters apparently trivial and ancillary to the main theme, and goals and people that always remain elusive to the hapless land surveyor K. The celebrated text lends itself to many interpretations and critics and commentators have persuasively read religious and philosophical meanings into it. However, to me it remains the most brilliant exploration of stifling and unaccountable officialdom. A meticulous dissection and decimation of a domineering and overlording bureaucracy and the resulting plight of applicants and supplicants lost in the labyrinthine passageways of its rules, systems, files, paperwork, processes, and procedures. Despite its dreary mood and that of the locale in which it is set, the narrative often offers highly witty takes on the ridiculousness of K's situation. I was often reminded of Lewis Carroll's brilliant humour as like Alice K. is confounded time and again by the illogic of what he confronts and has to deal with.
K. is a land surveyor who when he reaches the location where he believes he has been hired is confronted by a habitation that appears in great awe of The Castle which is inhabited by the authorities and a large, inscrutable, pompous and socially aloof bureaucracy. Hence there is much uncertainty and speculation about what this authority actually does or omits to do and why so. K. is informed that the intimation of his recruitment was an error and the rest of the novel deals with his futile attempts to remedy the situation - the factual status of his hiring remains undetermined till the end. He never never manages to meet Klamm - the enigmatic and powerful Castle Official essential to the removal of K.'s predicament. He manages to have encounters of varying duration and intensity with various other more junior officials and secretaries such as Momus, Erlanger, and Brugel, but never Klamm who remains elusive till the end. There has not been to my mind a more brilliant exploration in literature of the utter helplessness of an individual caught up in a large, complex, opaque and powerful bureaucratic world, its obscure internal workings, and its incomprehensibility to the helpless outsider. The novel also offers ingenious emotional and psychological insights into the self-doubt, confusion and emotional stress that grips someone at the mercy of a system that decides his or her fate while denying him a transparent process, access to information, adequate agency and voice, time to prepare, and an opportunity to appeal - all essential ingredients of fairness, natural justice ad due process. It is therefore unsurprising that I carry Kafka's works whenever I embark on any project that requires interface with the bureaucracy - for perspective as well as for solace.
Amongst the most surreal, irksome and yet entertaining characters in the book are K's assistants Arthur and Jeremiah, assigned to him to help him out but more of a liability and persistent source of irritation to him. Equally problematic is the messenger Barnabas whose status and effectiveness as a messenger is as fickle and uncertain as his personality. Then there is the former barmaid Frieda who is conflicted between her fiancee K. (for most of the novel) and her loyalty to the authorities. Confronted with irrationality and intransigence Kafka insightfully shows the changes in K.'s character and personality and his slow descent into an almost manic obsession with getting close to the authorities, as if trapped and being sucked into a maelstrom. This debilitating psychological predicament is epitomised in the character of Barnabas's father who is unsuccessfully trying to obtain a pardon for his family for an offence about which no one is even sure it was committed or was seen to be committed.
Count Westwest (whom we never meet) like his Castle (which we never visit) and his bureaucracy (that we never fully understand) - ever aloof, inaccessible, and unknowable to the denizens of the habitation they rule over - are abiding symbols of the gargantuan modern officialdoms that alienate individuals at multiple levels. Officialdom invents its own insular and self-serving logic which it then imposes over ordinary logic, not brooking any criticism of its mechanisms no matter how obtuse, confusing, cumbersome and contradictory its edicts and stipulations. The 'Authority' first of all never admits to being capable of making an error and even if it does who can conclusively say it was an error. An Authority and its bureaucracy that overwhelms and subsumes the popular consciousness. As Kafka observes: "Nowhere before had K. seen officialdom and life as interwoven as they were here, so interwoven that it sometimes even looked as if officialdom and life had changed places."
The book is full of scenes and instances that amuse due to their ridiculousness and are a sharp satire on the political ad bureaucratic milieu Kafka lived in. There is the unseen Castle Secretary Sordini with his legendary abilities who even recognises people he is has only read or heard about and his room full off collapsing files. Then the illusory information communicated on the official telephones where, as K. is informed, only the hissing and the singing are the reliable things. The ever uncertain legal status of someone like K, that continues to be inconclusive as all relevant files are inaccessible and all official decisions unknowable - here the morale line in the novel, "official decisions have the shyness of young girls." The top decision-makers are like mythological figures with the outcome - "And a man so often aspired to and so seldom attained as Klamm easily takes on different forms in different people's imaginations." In such vast and hierarchical systems many spend their lives in fear of being found out and exposed for any error or omission, thus paralysed into inaction -"he's so afraid he might lose his job by unintentionally violating some obscure code." Strict protocols and hierarchies are maintained even if transgressions happen behind the scene - "most officials appear apathetic in public."The system lends itself to manipulate if you can afford those who know how to play then system - "we have very clever lawyers here, capable of taking nothing and turning it into whatever you like." Officials in this hierarchy are exalted as desirable people of power - "We know, though, that women can't help loving officials, once the officials turn their attention to them." In a system such as this the presumption of innocence turns on its head as punishment and its official communication is what takes precedence. Hence the highly illogical and unjust situation - "But to obtain a pardon he first had to establish guilt."
One of the most powerful parts of the book describes a long passage with ostensibly sleeping bureaucrats in closely situated office, night-time examinations (even though they are frowned upon as the night reduces adherence to the principle of overlooking any cares and concerns of the parties while deciding their matters), ruthless and yet also over-sensitive secretaries, the secretive distribution of files, and summoning of supplicants at unholy hours for erratic and perfunctory interviews and more epitomises the nightmarish landscape of officialdom which is Kafka's most humane contribution to an increasingly dehumanised world. ...more
This Folio edition like that of The Jungle Book, is gorgeous with some fantastic illustrations. It also contains some of my favorite Mowgli stories anThis Folio edition like that of The Jungle Book, is gorgeous with some fantastic illustrations. It also contains some of my favorite Mowgli stories and like its prequel has both stories from Mowgli's world as well as independent stories involving animals. Other than classics such as 'How Fear Came,' 'Letting in the Jungle,' 'The King's Ankus,' and 'Red Dog' - some of these visually etched in my memory from childhood due to Classics Illustrated comics - it also contains 'The Miracle of Puran Bhagat,' 'The Undertakers,' 'Quiquern,' and 'The Spring Running.' Each story is succeeded by a poem on its central theme.
'How Fear Came' is perhaps the most reflective piece, and its preoccupation is once more the Law.
"Law was like the Giant Creeper, because it dropped across everyone's back and no-one could escape."
Though in the context of the Law of the Jungle and referring to when in a situation of extreme drought (Kipling's description of the advent of drought is masterful) a Water Truce is declared so that it is forbidden to kill at the drinking places, it is resonant with deeper meanings about the role of law in society in general. Interspersed with Kipling's particular humor it underlines the value and need to live by certain laws and then narrates a story from the earliest times when no Fear existed amongst the creatures of the jungle; and, how the First of Tigers killed a buck and thereby lost his position as a judge, introduced the smell of blood and the notion of killing and death to the jungle, and got his stripes as the trees and creepers marked him as the culprit. The Gray Ape proved an unworthy successor being foolish and senseless. After killing and shame, Fear then came to the jungle. It had no hair and walked on hind legs. He feared the animals and they were wary of him. The jungle deity Tha ordained that he was not to be harmed and shown mercy. The First of Tigers again disobeyed and killed the Hairless One and thereby taught Man to kill without mercy, in new and inventive ways, to the eternal anguish of animals. All the animals now feared him, except for one night in the year (at different times of the year) when he is fearful of them.
'The Miracle of Puran Bhagat' is about a westernized, astute, powerful and highly successful man of the world who turns ascetic and traces his journey to a remote refuge, his kindness to all, his affinity with animals and his ultimate sacrifice for those who had come to revere him deeply. The descriptions are lovely:
"Through three good months the valley was wrapped in cloud and soaking mist - steady, unrelenting downfall, breaking into thunder-shower after thunder-shower. Kali's shrine stood about the clouds, for the most part, and there was a whole month in which the Bhagat never caught glimpse of his village."
Exploring and seemingly reconciling the paradox of modernity and traditional spirituality this is an unexpected tale where rather than being skeptical Kipling appears to be valorizing the decision of Puran Bhagat to turn his back to the world, leaving its roar behind after all his successes, and seek an inward life which nevertheless manifested in largesse for all those around him.
In "Letting in the Jungle" Mowgli gets fully disenchanted with the cruelty of the Man-Pack that he scorns for killining not for food but for sport, and seeks to rescue as well as seek revenge for the persecution of the woman Messua and her husband who were kind to him. Though dark in its mood particularly entertaining are the scenes involving the terrifying of Buldeo the village hunter. Directed by Mowgli and led by the elephants a vast number and variety of herbivores and carnivores join forces and lay waste the village crop fields and grazing grounds, destroyed the grain stores, and forced the inhabitants through starvation and intimidation to abandon village, trampled by the elephants as they retreated through the rain. There is an interesting mention of Gonds - aboriginal tribals - whom the villagers ask if they have somehow angered their gods. The old gods. There is also the usual sense of racial superiority - "...when the Jungle moves only the white man can hope to turn it aside." The Gonds concluded that now only the wild gourd would grow where they had worshipped their God - "And the Karela, the bitter Karela/Shall cover it all." The metaphor here of nature striking back when humans become undeserving of occupying a space is a poignant one.
The Undertakers presents a wickedly humorous engagement between a mangy jackal, an adjutant-crane and a wily, huge and ancient crocodile Mugger of Mugger-Ghaut - all three hungry, conniving, false and looking for a kill and coming up with delightful puns, proverbs, veiled ridicule, repartee, flattery and cunning attempts at manipulation. There are interesting descriptions of places, people, terms, flora and fauna local and the usual extolling of English Law - it is eventually the white face as it is shown, that brings accountability, whether to man or beast.
'The King's Ankus' too lives in the mind for its brilliant depiction of death leaving its trail in murder after murder due to greed for a jeweled ankus that comes to embody death, and the menacing great white Cobra, sitting on a heap of bleached human bones, resolutely guarding the treasure in its subterranean vault below the deserted city of Cold Lairs. The story shows Mowgli growing in courage and strength and also teh close bond between him and Kaa and their constant banter.
'Quiquern' shifts the scene to the icy, desolate northern lands of the Inuit - at the back of everything in the world. Evocative in its description of the snowy landscape, Inuit living, customs, lore, and superstitions, and hunting for seals in sleighs pulled by dogs, it is a story of survival in the harshest of environments.
'Red Dog' is what has etched in my mind the image of the Indian wild, red dog or the Dhole of the Dekkan and its voracious hunting in merciless packs that the entire jungle fears. Mowlgi has to use great agility and ingenuity to save the jungle inhabitants from this bane and it is a particularly thrilling story full of action. Passages where Mowgli mocks and goads the Dhole and leads them into his trap are particularly entertaining.
'The Spring Running' is where Mowgli enters young adulthood. It has some beautiful descriptive passages that bring to life the Jungle and all that makes it dear to Mowgli. This is a story of pain and longing with Mowgli deciding where to live as he is good reasons to move on from the jungle but to also stay away from the habitations of men. Here are some lovely excerpts:
"They were lying out far up the side of a hill overlooking the Waingunga, and the morning mists hung below them in bands of white and green. As the sun rose it changed into bubbling seas of red gold, churned off, and let the low rays stripe the dried grass on which Mowgli and Bagheera were resting. It was the end of the cold weather, the leaves and the trees looked worn and faded, and there was a dry, ticking rustle everywhere when the wind blew. A little leaf tap-tap-tapped furiously against a twig, as a single leaf caught in a current will."
"In an Indian Jungle the seasons slide one into the other almost without division. There seem to be only two—the wet and the dry; but if you look closely below the torrents of rain and the clouds of char and dust you will find all four going round in their regular ring. Spring is the most wonderful, because she has not to cover a clean, bare field with new leaves and flowers, but to drive before her and to put away the hanging-on, over-surviving raffle of half-green things which the gentle winter has suffered to live, and to make the partly-dressed stale earth feel new and young once more. And this she does so well that there is no spring in the world like the Jungle spring.
There is one day when all things are tired, and the very smells, as they drift on the heavy air, are old and used. One cannot explain this, but it feels so. Then there is another day—to the eye nothing whatever has changed—when all the smells are new and delightful, and the whiskers of the Jungle People quiver to their roots, and the winter hair comes away from their sides in long, draggled locks. Then, perhaps, a little rain falls, and all the trees and the bushes and the bamboos and the mosses and the juicy-leaved plants wake with a noise of growing that you can almost hear, and under this noise runs, day and night, a deep hum. That is the noise of the spring—a vibrating boom which is neither bees, nor falling water, nor the wind in tree-tops, but the purring of the warm, happy world."
"All green things seemed to have made a month’s growth since the morning. The branch that was yellow-leaved the day before dripped sap when Mowgli broke it. The mosses curled deep and warm over his feet, the young grass had no cutting edges, and all the voices of the Jungle boomed like one deep harpstring touched by the moon—the Moon of New Talk, who splashed her light full on rock and pool, slipped it between trunk and creeper, and sifted it through a million leaves. Forgetting his unhappiness, Mowgli sang aloud with pure delight as he settled into his stride. It was more like flying than anything else, for he had chosen the long downward slope that leads to the Northern Marshes through the heart of the main Jungle, where the springy ground deadened the fall of his feet. A man-taught man would have picked his way with many stumbles through the cheating moonlight, but Mowgli’s muscles, trained by years of experience, bore him up as though he were a feather."
"There were still, hot hollows surrounded by wet rocks where he could hardly breathe for the heavy scents of the night flowers and the bloom along the creeper buds; dark avenues where the moonlight lay in belts as regular as checkered marbles in a church aisle; thickets where the wet young growth stood breast-high about him and threw its arms round his waist; and hilltops crowned with broken rock, where he leaped from stone to stone above the lairs of the frightened little foxes."
I went back to The Second Jungle Book for the sheer beauty of many passages that describe the Central Indian Jungle, its denizens and its seasons. To get inspired. I was not disappointed. ...more
Based on the screenplay by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, written by Chris Ryall and illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez, puritans may have legitimate issuBased on the screenplay by Neil Gaiman and Roger Avary, written by Chris Ryall and illustrated by Gabriel Rodriguez, puritans may have legitimate issues with this version's emphasis on blood, gore and sensuality rather than the complexities of temptation, greed, lust and betrayal. However, as an illustrated take it is quite outstanding and impactful. Grendel is terrifying, his mother is enigmatic and seductive, Beowulf drips rawness, courage and valor and his moral transformation is well captured. I particularly enjoyed the drawings and coloring - both the action sequences as well as the more panoramic ones showing the castle from above and in varying light. This is not a kiddy version and the dialogue is meant to capture the roughness of the age, which it does well. I can see myself revisiting this book for its powerful and memorable illustrations. ...more
Introduced to Balzac's La Comédie humaine by Father Goriot, this is the second book I read by him. I was entranced by his description of old Parisian Introduced to Balzac's La Comédie humaine by Father Goriot, this is the second book I read by him. I was entranced by his description of old Parisian quarters in Father Goriot and thought the scene shifts to provincial life in Eugénie Grandet, we find the same genius for building a certain mood around old architecture.
This is how he starts: "In some country towns there exist houses whose appearance weighs as heavily upon the spirits as the gloomiest cloister, the most dismal ruin, or the dreariest stretch of barren land. These houses may combine the cloister's silence with the arid desolation of the waste and the sepulchral melancholy of ruins. Life makes so little stir in them that a stranger believes them to be uninhabited until he suddenly meets the cold listless gaze of some motionless human being, whose face, austere as a monk's, peers from above the window-sill at the sound of a stranger's footfall." Talk about a brilliantly fashioned atmosphere of doom and gloom permeating the very start of a story. Not surprisingly what follows is a narrative revolving around a household steeped in gloom and melancholy.
Set in the two of Saumur, Eugénie Grandet introduces to us the character of Felix Grandet who is right up there with Scrooge and Silas Marner as a man so tight-fisted that he has become near soulless with avarice. The novel is particularly powerful in its social and psychological exploration of greed - both in how it describes a miser's habits, techniques, exactitude, machinations and caprices, as also the withering and demise of all that is noble and generous in his personality due to the corrosiveness of lust for money and material possessions. It is shown most poignantly by Balzac as Grandet gazes at the various kinds of precious gold coins he has gifted his simple and loving daughter Eugenie, whenever he gives her a new one on special occasions in the year.
The story is relatively straightforward - starting out as a master cooper Felix Grandet accumulates, double-crosses, tricks, ventures, invests and consolidates to get richer and richer while the womenfolk of his household - his long-suffering wife, Eugenie, and the loyal servant Nanon - bear up with an austere, parsimonious and joyless existence. Rival families converge at the house on an almost daily basis - the Grassinistes and Cruchotins - aspiring to Eugenie's hand in marriage in order to eventually claim Grandet's wealth. Grandet plays them against each other, shrewdly planning all the time to rise further in the world through a more superior match for his daughter. Balzac dwells in detail on Grandet's financial cunning and successful ventures that lend authenticity to the story of his rise through different eras of political upheaval in France. Felix Grandet is thus a good example of the kind of men who are dexterous and malleable enough to thrive no matter who is in power and pursues which ideology.
Eugenie's character is relatively unidimensional and she epitomizes innocence, trust, affection and a deep sense of romance. These traits cause her to fall head over heels in love with her cousin Charles who is sent off to stay with Felix Grandet by his deeply indebted and crisis-ridden brother Guillaume. Not entirely a cad, Charles responds to his cousin's pure-hearted affection and gains from her generous gift to set him up in a career across the seas, but ends up as a typical man of fortune of the times who has no qualms to trade in goods or men, in order to amass great wealth, try and marry into a titled family and move into the Parisian smart set. The Grandet traits of greed and avarice eventually prove to be dominant in his case. Eugenie on the other hand is a stoic and generous character till the end, while her parents, rather anti-climatically, exit the world stage 30-40 pages short of the book's end. Felix Grandet remains rigid and fixated in his worldview and ideas and enslaved by greed till the very end. There is a palpable underlying gruesomeness to the extent of his malady. Such is its terribleness that towards the end of his life he is appalled by the prospect of his daughter becoming co-heir of their join t property after his wife's demise and sets out to ensure that he controlled all their wealth. Earlier, he shows no anguish at his brother's tragic death and plans to profit from his failed business, under the pretense of clearing his name. He swindles his orphaned nephew out of his jewelry for a small sum, and heartlessly punishes his daughter for handing over her gold to help him. Most callously he drives his wife to her grave due to the parsimonious life she had been subjected to as well as his treatment of his daughter, anxious till the end not about her survival but about having to spend too much on her care.
Rich in descriptions, interspersed with wit and sharp dialogue, and embedded in a certain age which imbues it with its particular flavor, as a study of greed and how it diminishes one's humanity, Eugénie Grandet is quite brilliant....more
The Makioka Sisters is like a gentle, unhurried stream through a picturesque countryside. You can stop and gaze at the seemingly changeless scene, steThe Makioka Sisters is like a gentle, unhurried stream through a picturesque countryside. You can stop and gaze at the seemingly changeless scene, step away for a while, come back again and resume your observation to note subtle alterations. At times something tumultuous disrupts the harmony. But then things resume their old, charming, unrushed quality. Set largely in the pre-World War II era (1936-1941) and essentially revolving around the closely intertwined lives of four attractive sisters some argue that not much happens in the novel. However, that is not accurate at all as both in terms of the larger political and cultural changes taking place in the backdrop as well as those within the lives of the sisters, The Makioka Sisters is deeply engaging and remarkably reflective of life as it is, as well as it once was in a period that has irretrievably expired.
The most fascinating part of the novel is its description and assessment of Old Japan transitioning into new Japan - the contrast between the pace, quality and nature of life between modern Tokyo and traditional Osaka & Kobe, the traditional arts and artists and how they fared in uncertain and altering times, old customs and etiquette (especially those pertaining to match-making and matrimony), the nature of extant patriarchy, family structures and women's empowerment, changing norms of sexual relationships, social attitudes and gender roles - there is much that Tanizaki explores with great sensitivity and insight. Simultaneously his intimate exploration of the sisters' relationships with each other as well as the ups and downs of all such relationships, is highly moving and memorable. It is a women's world that he painstakingly recreates and he must have been done it very well if that was the reason used by the censoring authorities at the time who wanted a non-effeminate and manly spirit to imbue the nation at a time of conflict. Reminiscent in some ways of Pride & Prejudice and Little Women, this novel is entirely in its own league when it comes to brilliant characterization, gradual and astute plot development, and subtle, incisive commentary on changing times as well as people coming to grips with them. Or not.
The sisters are quite wonderfully imagined. The staid, generous, overwhelmed but traditionally officious eldest Tsuruko; the selfless, loving and ever so sensitive Sachiko who to my mind is the central figure in the novel who holds the family together and is the vital link between the main branch of the family in Tokyo (with their traditional house in Osaka) and the branch house in Ashiya (a suburb between Osaka and Kobe) where she lives and where both you're sisters like to spend most of their time to be away from the main branch; the classically beautiful, shy, stoic and empathetic Yukiko who is the protagonist in many ways it is the always active search for a suitable match for her that drives the plot (as many as five atcha-making attempts are described) - her reticence, demureness and lack of initiative leads to many setbacks; and finally, the willful, spirited, witty and enterprising youngest sister Taeko (known fondly as Koi-san, being the youngest) who has her own mind when it comes to choice of vocation as well as of men, and is the rebel of the family whose exploits trigger more crises of reputation than one.
There are multiple additional characters but in Sachiko's husband Teinosuke we have a wonderfully charming and devoted brother in law whose innate goodness is heartwarming. Sachiko and Teinosuke's curious daughter Etsuko provides many of the lighter moments as do Taeko's awkward, self-indulgent and indolent long-time suitor Okubata and the feisty, loyal and gossip-loving O-haru, through whom and other servant characters Tanizaki dwells on class. Indeed class plays a prominent role as he examines both the titled upper classes as well as the many layers below them. The many and varied suitors for Yukiko also provide interesting insights into the social and cultural mores of the time when wife-hunting in many ways was similar to how it still is in many parts of the world, involving match-makers (Itani is a particularly assertive representative of this category in the novel) and formal marriage interviews (the miai).
Tanizaki was a great admirer, exponent and chronicler of the Japanese aesthetic. Though the translated prose is simple and unaffected there are passages of great elegance as well as exquisitely beautiful descriptions of natural scenes. The annual ritualistic Cherry blossom watching expeditions to landmarks and famous shrines are beautifully rendered; as is a particular match-making trip that also involved catching fireflies along a river at dusk. The Kansai region/Kobe flood of 1938 has been described in immaculate detail and successfully produces high drama and a powerful sense of foreboding. Contrast as it does with the otherwise placid living of daily lives, it underlines the disruptive capacity of nature and the unpredictability of human existence. Particularly unnerving also are some important, even harrowing, episodes involving quack or irresponsible doctors - the photographer Ikatura's gangrene treatment and Taeko's anthrax in particular - that also indicate the state of the medical profession at the time. At the same time, trains, high rises and other infrastructure indicates a Japan that has entered the modern era, even as it stares a devastating war in the face. A German family is present all through the narrative (as less frequently a Russian one) and exchanges with it provide interesting possibilities of culture comparisons and friendship transcending cultural difference.
There are references time and again to the historically upper-middle class Makioka family's declining fortunes and how they try and maintain a traditional respectability in an increasingly commercial milieu and also come to grips with the fact that they can no longer turn down promising matches with the haughtiness of a traditionally well-placed family. Nevertheless, losing face, stirring a scandal, and going against traditional norms are considerations that continue to influence the senior members of the family, especially Tsuruko and her cautious and conservative husband and the formal head of the family, Tatsuo.
The novel is rich in cultural references and imagery and indeed in gastronomical details - from the festivals to Kimono patterns to traditional dances (styles, schools, exponents and individual performances) to Kabuki theatre to Japanese poetry to traditional paintings and painters and the various types of cuisine on offer in that era and through the sisters' enjoyment of the same Tanizaki takes us on a highly pleasurable tour and sampling of these delights. Though not overtly doing so Tanizaki's The Makioka Sisters nostalgically evokes a more traditional Japan and its cultural and value system - despite its blindspots and limitations - that must have appeared to him to be fast disappearing. Hence the Osaka-Kobe region's life style emerges as the more attractive, more rooted in the past and yet engaging with the modern, and thereby ultimately a more harmonious approach to progress. In Yukiko he openly celebrates the traditional Japanese ideal of beauty - gentle, quiet, graceful and shy while Sachiko is the bridge between the world of the ultra-conservative and traditional Tsuruko and the often reckless and relatively untethered Taeko.
The Makioka Sisters is a glorious tribute to the traditional Japanese aesthetic and way of life - of which Tanizaki was a major exponent and chronicler - as it comes to grip with and faces decline in the face of modernity. Tanizaki creates characters who lived and breathed in a different century but remain believable, charming, relatable and lovable across temporal, spatial and cultural divides. What would I not give to have a leisurely cup of tea with them, while contemplating the spring garden. Or for accompanying them on a cherry blossom sighting trip....more
A sociology of despotism. A psychology of tyranny. A political and historical tour de force on the geo-political contestations and turf management betA sociology of despotism. A psychology of tyranny. A political and historical tour de force on the geo-political contestations and turf management between various players in the Caribbean region, Latin America and the US. The Feast of the Goat is all of these things and more. Yet despite the somberness and darkness of its various themes, it is quite remarkable in that it reads like a thrilling page-turner. However, at the same time it provides important insights into the emergence and perpetuation of dictatorships and how they can continue to dominate and sunder societies, polities and national politics even after demise.
Told from multiple perspectives and going forward and backward in time (before and after the assassination in 1961; and then much later in 1996), the story essentially revolves around various highly discontented men lying in ambush to assassinate the brutal Dominican Republic dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina who had a huge impact on the politics of the entire region. While we know that he will be killed, Llosa brilliantly explores the inner recesses of the minds of his would be killers and the various personal and societal resentments that have led them to undertake their intended action. Through their painful recollections one is presented a graphic and chilling illustration of how totalitarianism controls, dehumanizes and decimates anything that comes in its way. At the same time Llosa takes us into Trujillo's mind and we are exposed to the idiosyncrasies, caprices, fetishes and attributes of a ruthless and cunning man who managed to rule the roost for over three decades. From his shrewd and brutal political maneuverings, to his ability to gauge,, overwhelm and dominate people, to his love for kitsch and designing uniforms, his commitment to fitness due to his earlier training as a Marine in the US, his hypnotic gaze, his disappearing and throwing his enemies to sharks, his sleaziness, sexual excesses and eventual insecurities, his admiration and emulation of Petronius in Quo Vadis, and his obsession for cleanliness and order, Llosa puts together the picture of a compelling megalomaniac.
The protagonist of the novel is a Harvard trained successful New York attorney Urania Cabral, whose father Agustín Cabral was initially a prominent part of the Trujillo regime but then fell out of favor, to his great anguish. Having lived abroad for many years Urania returns to the Dominican Republic, visits her invalid father, and gradually reveals to her relatives the dark and sordid secret of why she fled from the country all those years ago and never kept in contact with them.
Set in a complex political milieu, Llosa painstakingly constructs the politics of the times, particularly the 1950s of Castro's Cuba and Kennedy's US - American interests, Communist aspirations, the clergy, the CIA, local political factions, regional leaders, and importantly, the various men Trujillo picked, co-opted, elevated and used to perpetuate his iron rule as well as family business empire over a period of 31 years. The latter characters are drawn with great adeptness - Dr. Joaquín Balaguer (the initially puppet President who eventually displays his remarkable prowess for politics and diplomacy); Johnny Abbes García (the sadist chief of the military intelligence service (MIS)); Agustín "Egghead" Cabral (a high-ranking member of the dictator's inner coterie who falls from grace); Senator Henry Chirinos (a physically repulsive legal maverick who is also referred to as the Constitutional Sot, and mocked by his master was The Walking Turd; the brutal Major Figueroa Carrion, Trujillo's high living, handsome son Ramfis Trujillo, the handsome cad and Trujillo's supplier of women Manuel Alfonso, and various others in the government and Trujillo's family.
The conspirators are also wonderfully built and we are led to explore their individual stories, grievances, resentments, hopes and fears - Turk Salvador Estrella Sadhala, Amado Garcia Guerro, Antonio de la Maza, Fifi Pestoriza, Huascar Tejeda, Pedro Livio Cedeno, Tejeda Pimentel, Juan Tomas Diaz, Antonio Imbert, Luis Amiama, General Jose Rene (Pupo) Roman, and others. The varied nature of human personality is underlined as various characters react differently when the chips are down, particularly after the assassination when brutal persecution and blood-chilling reprisals follow.
We learn also of the Dominican Republic's troubled history with Haiti, the massacre of Haitians during Trujillo's reign, and the racial prejudice against the same. Llosa's also explores the nature and discontents of a culture where machismo is prominent. Trujillo and his henchman are shown to epitomize the worst aspects of such a culture. The novel is riveting and insightful also for its shrewd exploration of political corruption, regime perpetuation, the use of violence as a tool for rule, censorship and thought policing, propaganda and construction of icons, the disturbing devotion that emerges amongst the subjugated and the oppressed, and the difficulties and challenges of not just toppling a tyrant but also his tight psychological control over the psyche of those tyrannized. In parts the novel is very hard to read because of scenes of torture at La Cuarenta and other torture chambers, graphic violence and sexual abuse but none of it is gratuitous.
Live as we do in times of personality cults, populists with more than a streak of megalomania, and continuing abuse of power and violence in politics, The Feast of the Goat is a sharp and poignant reminder of how these phenomena corrode the lives, happiness and aspirations of an entire people. Loyalty at all costs (Llosa describes Trujillo testing his ministers by sleeping with their wives as well as the persistent anxieties on their part to remain in his good books), mindless devotion to autocrats,, hierarchical societies, misogyny, gendered roles, state's crimes against it own citizens, selective erasure of memory, sacrifice of individual rights for the so-called 'larger good,' control over who writes history, relationship between sexuality and power, the linkages between the real and the fictional - the novel offers a rich menu of themes that it compellingly explores. Vargas Llosa incorporates actual historical figures (which he further details and augments), composite characters and purely fictional characters with remarkable effectiveness. His brilliant exploration of the mind of the dictator himself is arguably the book's biggest triumph....more
The most famous student-murderer in the history of literature, Raskolnikov's complex medley of emotions are hard to capture visually in such a short bThe most famous student-murderer in the history of literature, Raskolnikov's complex medley of emotions are hard to capture visually in such a short book. Yet this volume in the Classics Illustrated series is wonderfully imagined and executed. From his planning of the pre-meditated events to unforeseen events and the ensuing panic, delirium, fear, paranoia, guilt and anguish, the artist captures the moods of the book and the murderer with great skill. Oftentimes such complex books provide a truncated feel when converted in a comic but here the writer maintained the flow and captured the essence and the horror of the novel. For a much deeper appreciation there is no substitute for reading the original of course....more
There is a certain lightness and airiness to it; ocean spray, the scent of distant rain; and the gale blowing from the sea where far away a ship may bThere is a certain lightness and airiness to it; ocean spray, the scent of distant rain; and the gale blowing from the sea where far away a ship may be facing the fury of a storm. No wonder for its protagonist is a maker of magic, a conjuror of tempests, with resourceful airy spirits at his command. This is the most magical of Shakespeare's plays and lends itself to fantastic productions. At heart a story of injustice, intrigue and revenge it explores ambitions and plots of men and weaves a tale around the sorcerer Prospero the Duke of Milan who was ousted from that position by his brother Antonio, in turn assisted by Alonoso the King of Naples. Prospero and his daughter Miranda were set adrift on the sea and eventually stranded on an island which they made their home. Twelve years later an opportunity presented itself when finding his foes in proximity Prosepero conjures a tempest to shipwreck them so that they are forced to seek refuge on the island where Prospero schemes to reverse the injustice he faced at their hands. Divided into different groups through Prospero's machinations there are further conspiracies to seek power amongst various characters and also a romance between Alonso's son Ferdinand and Miranda, which Prospero encourages. Though these events form the bulk of the action, to me the two most fascinating characters and aspects of the play lie elsewhere.
The first is Prospero's resentful servant Caliban - a mysterious, monstrous, brooding figure - who appears as the quintessential example of what is now referred to as "Othering" and "Demonization." It is Shakespeare's genius that Caliban is not a unidimensional and villainous figure, seen to be spitefully trying to overthrow his exacting master. Instead, he is complex and conflicted; bent on mischief but also deeply wronged. Therefore, one has no choice but to empathize with his torment at his subjugated plight, and the Bard puts timeless lines in his mouth that have been brilliantly examined by Post-Colonial scholars as echoing the anguish of myriad people who have been conquered and dominated by voracious and cruel outsiders. For all his apparent hideousness Caliban is the most poetic and the most feeling one - his lines are in verse - amongst the entire lot and one detects a distinct simplicity, sensitivity and closeness to nature in his soul. His 'The Isle is Full of Noises' speech is a fine example of these attributes:
"Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises, Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight, and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twangling instruments Will hum about mine ears; and sometime voices, That, if I then had wak’d after long sleep, Will make me sleep again; and then, in dreaming, The clouds methought would open, and show riches Ready to drop upon me; that, when I wak’d I cried to dream again."
However, what is even more palpable and significant is his lament - the lament of the conquered, dominated, and subjugated, by sea-faring colonists, from Shakespeare's times to ours:
"This island's mine, by Sycorax my mother, Which thou takest from me. When thou camest first, Thou strokedst me and madest much of me, wouldst give me Water with berries in't, and teach me how To name the bigger light, and how the less, That burn by day and night: and then I loved thee And show'd thee all the qualities o' the isle, The fresh springs, brine-pits, barren place and fertile: Cursed be I that did so! All the charms Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you! For I am all the subjects that you have, Which first was mine own king: and here you sty me In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me The rest o' the island."
Caliban remains a multi-dimensional, outwardly repellant but inwardly sensitive, wronged, raging, and pitiable character - one of Shakespeare's most memorable - who adds great distinctiveness and texture to this play. On the other hand, the magical creatures, particularly Ariel, and then all the nymphs and reapers, lend an enigmatic and otherworldly mood and character to the play as Prospero - no less complex himself than Caliban - weaves his spells to entrap his enemies and achieve his goals. Ariel's desire to be freed is a recurrent theme as his master employs him for the final essential tasks before setting him free - another sub-theme of servitude and yearning for freedom. At the same time, his character brings great talismanic playfulness to the otherwise dark and brooding text.
"Where the bee sucks, there suck I: In a cowslip's bell I lie: There I couch when owls do cry. On the bat's back I do fly After summer merrily. Merrily, merrily, shall I live now Under the blossom that hangs on the bough."
Some of the other memorable lines for me are the ones that reflect on the meaning and transience of human existence and possess that deep and compelling melancholy, wistfulness and wisdom that I always discover also in Ghalib.
"Our revels now are ended. These our actors, As I foretold you, were all spirits and Are melted into air, into thin air; And, like the baseless fabric of this vision, The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve; And, like this insubstantial pageant faded, Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep."
Other lines from this play have set into motion major future works of creativity or become adages and proverbs:
"O, wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world, That has such people in't."
"My library was dukedom large enough."
"With hair up-staring � then like reeds, not hair � Was the first man that leaped; cried ‘Hell is empty And all the devils are here."
"Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows."
Nothing like Shakespeare to escape the humdrum and drudgery of everyday existence and find perspective. The Tempest is the most magical of his plays and in Caliban and Ariel we find two different but equally poignant confrontations of conquest & domination & a deeply felt desire for liberty....more
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