My life in books - 2015

Childhood dreams are a great thing, sometimes they bring you back to reality.

My childhood dream was a simple one, to live in a library with an unending supply of Maggi. It may have been simple, but as it turned out, not easy.

To cut a long story short, it's been a while since I rediscovered this dream, along with my childhood ambition of becoming a writer, which I did fulfill if this blog and countless other spur-of-the-moment outbursts plus elaborate projects are to stand in testimony; I am a writer, just not the kind, yet, that gets paid in money. Or at all.

This post though is less about my awakening and more about what's helped keep me awake this year - my books. It's a bit of a narcissistic journey down my reading list and an attempt to parse it for meaning.

2015 started with me reading '2014: The Election that changed India'. This was the year I discovered the joy of reading non-fiction, as is evident from the others I also read - 'India in Love: Marriage & Sexuality in the 21st century', 'Introducing Marx', 'Why is Sex fun? The Evolution of Human Sexuality' and 'Human Universe'. And those I couldn't complete, but which equally satiated my curiosity while opening up new doors of wondering and wandering. Now, before I get into summarizing these books and their relative or absolute merits, let me add a dash of personal insight here. Fiction has been my poison all along, I think the first book I ever read was at age 6 or 7 and it was the 'Famous Five and the Z-rays', if I remember right. To an introverted, shy kid who never really felt at place in most groups, and consequently believed there to be something the matter with self, this world of make-believe was very very real. More than twenty-five years along, I can still recall the feeling of having a new Enid Blyton in my hand, the smell of it, the feel of my fingers on its shiny embossed cover page lettering, the absolute ecstasy of looking forward to reading all summer. Reading fiction gave me another world to relocate to and I needed that, then. But over the years, I have become more confident, more able to navigate society and my personal social anxieties, so much so that sometimes I fool even myself with respect to the I vs E question :) I think this and other factors have led to a central shift - from me wanting to escape the world to me wanting to understand it better. And that's where the non-fiction comes in.
So of all the books I read, I loved every single one. Politics is another (genetic) obsession, and 'The Election' helped me apply a strategic lens to, as well as understand the nitty-gritties behind, the election to beat all elections, the grand 2014 dance of democracy. Coming to something very different but equally if not more compelling, 'India in Love' was a collection of anecdotes from across the length & breadth of the country and spanning every segment possible, and as the name suggests, these anecdotes were about how India has loved in the past and is changing its game, real fast. It was peppered with a high quality of quantitative data, that mostly served to edify. A couple of examples to illustrate its illuminating power: apparently one in every fourth man in Urban India is having an extramarital affair and around 70% of all homosexual men are married! It's a wonder the wedding industry continues to grow in size and complexity every year, given how the marriages it leads to today are likely to be as short lived as the ceremonies themselves. Similar in theme, but addressing the Why rather than the What, was 'Why Sex is Fun'. Written by Pulitzer winning scientist Jared Diamond, this book was a synapse-coupler. Understanding that we are what we are, from our sexual habits to our social structures, because of natural selection across the millenia of evolution, is eye-opening. 'Introducing Marx' was like a crash course in the history of philosophy, leading up to dear ol' Karl. What a guy, no other thought school has had the kind of lasting impact on our world that Marxism has had. I don't pretend to know everything about it, and will need to keep revisiting this and other material to gain a deeper understanding. But while 'Why Sex is Fun' is about unconscious acts on the part of our ignorant ancestors, 'Introducing Marx' introduces us to the brilliance of our first scientists, philosophers and other challengers of the status-quo. I remain fascinated. And lastly, Human Universe, positioned as a love letter to mankind, is breath-taking in scope and jaw-dropping in content. Written by a British physicist, Brian Cox, it covers everything from the origin of the Universe to present moment (give or take a few years) and is equivalent to marathon training for the brain cells. Not an easy read but then the Universe wasn't created in a day, not even by God.

All amazing books.

Another niche I read was African origin literature. 'Americanah' and 'Half of a Yellow Sun' are both very interesting books, shedding light on what has remained largely under wraps for most of us confined to western culture and its writings apart from our own. Nigeria is more than one thing or two things, its stories are both extraordinary - as in 'Yellow Sun' about a country fraught with strife - and ordinary like in 'Americanah', speaking about the lives of people like you and me, except with a different starting point and hence a different trajectory. I liked both of them, 'Americanah' more than 'Yellow Sun' because it was better written (although by the same author, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie), and was more like the kind of storytelling I like replete with the nuances of human emotions.

This was also the year I finished reading 'Anna Karenina'. And read 'An Equal Music'. 'Anna K' was everything it promised to be - intense, thought-provoking and a difficult read. Tolstoy leaves no thought un-inspected, ranging from the insecurities of Anna to the agricultural and political pursuits of Levin, and this could be tedious for many, it was to an extent for me too; but the chance to time-travel to the Russian society of the 1800s made up for it, for me at any rate :) The best part of the novel though is how feelingly Tolstoy writes through a woman's eyes, capturing her trials and hopelessness, being both a superb author in taking us along in her madness, and also an extremely progressive human being in defying through an impulsive, confused but an extremely honest Anna, the mores of the time. 'An Equal Music' was disappointing for me at least, but just the kind of thing you could expect from Vikram Seth - a writing for the sake of writing. I cannot overstate how much I admire his writing and now after having heard him talk, him. So I wish for my sake that the novel had been more mainstream, about something I could connect with, but it was what it was, a largely esoteric piece of literature combining two of the author's passions - writing and music.

Coming to some light literature, I read some stuff from my old favorites this year as well - 'Career of Evil' by JK Rowling, 'The Girl in the Spider's web' by David Lagercrantz, 'Go Set a Watchman' by Harper Lee and 'Ideal' by Ayn Rand. 'Career of Evil' was better than the previous two installments of the series (both of which I loved as well, JK R can do no wrong in my eyes) and getting more interesting by the minute with regards to the Cormoran-Robin equation. Nobody quite creates characters the way JK R does and I am eternally grateful to her for bringing all the people she has into my life :) Btw does anyone else think that the trio of Cormoran-Robin-Mathew is reminiscent of Harry-Hermione-Ron? If so, give me a shout. 'Spider's Web' was good, and I am thankful to Lagercrantz for giving us another installment of Lisbeth Salandar, I only wish he hadn't infused her with normalcy. She appears more emotional, more human in this one and no, that's not the Lisbeth I know. Harper Lee was another who could do no wrong, and I was of the same opinion about Atticus Finch, but in 'Go Set a Watchman', she decided to shatter my little bubble. I know people are never what you build them up to be inside your head and that is one of the reasons most of my heroes are either dead or imaginary. Having said that, I also liked that she infused him with some grey - fiction with a touch of reality, a beautiful reminder of the fact that nobody is perfect and if we set such an expectation, we are bound to be disappointed forever. As for Scout, I doubt if she will ever manage to accept a society that has such a different value system from her own, even if it is to try and change it gradually, but it's an interesting thought, one that rebels like me need to think about while hibernating in our ivory towers of disengagement. Now for Ayn Rand; I had an intense love affair with her around ten years ago, but gradually realized how dogmatic she was and regurgitated her out of my system. Picked up 'Ideal' on a whim, and was completely taken aback at the memories it brought back. I realize now how fundamentally her beliefs have shaped me, and while I may have broken out of the rigidity she imposes, the conflicts I face at many points in my life as well as the values I revere arise from her work. It was shocking to me that I could have been in denial for so long. In that, this book, though a slim volume, was a very rich experience.

As an aside, for those who have persevered through this piece thus far, kudos. You can most definitely make it through 'Anna Karenina' and Levin might just be your soulmate.

Talking about favorite authors, I doff my hat to Alexander McCall Smith, whose writing is so ethereal that few people get its charm. I love his Scotland series, of which I read copiously this year. He is the kind of writer who can make the most basic of actions seem rich in meaning, and I believe they often are - we feel a myriad of emotions in the blink of an eye, past biases, self perception, value-system all coming together to decide the course of action, what we then endeavor to rationalize ad infinitum. It must be said though that his 'Emma' was an unqualified disaster, but then Jane Austen is, well, Jane Austen.

Some other light reads were 'The house that BJ built' by Anuja Chauhan, a couple of Georgette Heyers, the 'Rosie' series by Simsion Graeme and 'Yes, Please' by Amy Poehler; three of them being romantic fiction approached from very different angles, and the fourth a true autobiography in that you would do well to pass time with it during commute.

And then there were some quirky ones, like 'Panty' by Sangeeta Bandopadhyay, 'Dangerous Women', a compilation by several authors and 'The Stranger' by Albert Camus. 'Panty' was odd and other-worldly, the kind of book that is open to interpretation. 'Dangerous Women' had some good tale telling, especially 'Second Arabesque, very slowly' by Nancy Kress, a story set in a post apocalyptic world where any form of art is heresy. 'The Stranger' was strange, the kind of book one reads because it so defies any tenets of good story telling, coming deep from the author's psyche and speaking of his anguishes and turmoils.

And now we come to the ones that truly influenced me one way or the other. '40 Rules of Love' by Elif Shafak, 'Middlesex' by Jeffrey Eugenides and 'Rustom and the Last Storyteller of Almora' by Gaurav Parab. '40 Rules' was that catalyst that accelerated a very fundamental shift in how I interact with the world. Given as I am to intense self-scrutiny and reflection, I know increasingly better with each passing day where I stand and where I don't wish to, and I have always struggled with how to balance openness with discernment. Openness for a multi-centric humanity that is a mix of very different value systems, some of which I might have a strong point of difference with, AND discernment or an expectation for some amount of value match, at least on the core ones, with everyone I interact with. Increasingly this year, I had been feeling a pull towards the former, openness and acceptance, and that in tandem with this affection-inducing book, and a conversation with Rashmi, set me on that path with even more angularity. So much so that I started an initiative (Ze Salon), whose primary objective is to meet new and different people and perspectives. Mighty influence :) Similar was my experience with 'Middlesex', which in addition to being informative is also an extremely touching and engaging story about a hermaphrodite, and it again brought home how different people are, and that it is okay to be a freak, imperfect, abnormal, for who really is normal? I highly recommend both these books to everyone, they will bring you closer to accepting others and more importantly, yourself.
Now 'Rustom' is a special book, it has been written by someone I know (Gaurav Parab), who had done a great job of not only writing it well with an original and engaging plot but also of making it a success, all the while paying obeisance to Corporate life on the side. It is inspiring, and 2016 will be about me trying to walk in his footsteps.

This brings me to the end of this post and this year, give or take a day. I am glad I did it because it revealed to me how significant these books have been, the whole for each being far greater than the sum of its parts.

And now as I watch the sunlight around me gently wave farewell, its warm fingers lightly grazing my cheek for the last time (or nearly so), I decide that next year, I want it to be more of this year, and I want myself to be - nothing less than the Sun.