You know that old I Am The Walrus inspiration? The one that goes Yellow matter custard, green slop pie/All mixed together with a dead dog's eye/Slap it on a butty ten foot thick/And wash it all down with a cup of cold sick?
Well, last night's dinner was like that. What you do, after you've had a superlative meal of pongal and twenty other things - the kind of meal, in effect, that no one except insane bloggers would decline - is this:
Take a large (very large) vessel. Pour in the remains of the kozhambu (made with seven different vegetables in it) followed by the rest of the meal barring only the rice, the curd, the fried papad and the pongal, and place it on the gas. Heat on a low flame for half an hour or so. Eat for dinner.
What it looks like actually defies description so I think I'll leave it to your imagination.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Festive Restive
I lay in bed at 6am listening to my mother in the kitchen. Feeling pressured by all this excessive energy early in the morning, I got up. The smell of roasted rice and dal greeted me halfway down the stairs. But before I could reach the kitchen, my mother had disappeared somewhere.
Every available surface on the kitchen was occupied by cut vegetables and ingredients for pongal. The coffee was relegated to some corner and much effort had to be made to heat up some milk. The pongapanai was all decorated, with fresh haldi - leaves and root - and chandana-kungumam and all. If my mother was not busy in the kitchen, it meant she was doing some competition entry type kolam outside.
Sigh.
Can someone tell me why this business of varying the tedium of our days and celebrating every minor shift in the skies falls to the women? I mean, most of these festivals seem to be about eating different kinds of food not available during the rest of the year (with good reason. I mean, try making some of these things every day of the year) or waking up at the crack of dawn to stare at each others' very familiar faces in a different light, and somehow drumming up enough enthusiasm in the middle of wanting to murder somebody for making you lose sleep.
But coming back to the women question - seriously. Name one festival that requires the men to do most of the work: the cooking, decorating, feeding and cleaning up. No, don't talk to me about Rakhi: it's the women who fast until they manage to tie a little bit of thread around some fellow's wrist.
As for me, my idea of a festival is one that celebrates not having to w
ake up early and cram a days' worth of activity into the first two hours. But Pongal I remember with especial fondness: in Delhi during the old-style film festivals - the one that used to run from the 10th to the 20th of every other January - I remember some young men from Madras shivering in the wet and cold January morning, shouting pongal-o-pongal! to each other in their thin, miserable voices. Lines of people waiting to go in to the warm theatre looked at them curiously and wondered what all this waving of leaves and festive looking pots were about. Ah schadenfreude!
Happy Pongal, everyone. I suppose.
Every available surface on the kitchen was occupied by cut vegetables and ingredients for pongal. The coffee was relegated to some corner and much effort had to be made to heat up some milk. The pongapanai was all decorated, with fresh haldi - leaves and root - and chandana-kungumam and all. If my mother was not busy in the kitchen, it meant she was doing some competition entry type kolam outside.
Sigh.
Can someone tell me why this business of varying the tedium of our days and celebrating every minor shift in the skies falls to the women? I mean, most of these festivals seem to be about eating different kinds of food not available during the rest of the year (with good reason. I mean, try making some of these things every day of the year) or waking up at the crack of dawn to stare at each others' very familiar faces in a different light, and somehow drumming up enough enthusiasm in the middle of wanting to murder somebody for making you lose sleep.
But coming back to the women question - seriously. Name one festival that requires the men to do most of the work: the cooking, decorating, feeding and cleaning up. No, don't talk to me about Rakhi: it's the women who fast until they manage to tie a little bit of thread around some fellow's wrist.
As for me, my idea of a festival is one that celebrates not having to w
ake up early and cram a days' worth of activity into the first two hours. But Pongal I remember with especial fondness: in Delhi during the old-style film festivals - the one that used to run from the 10th to the 20th of every other January - I remember some young men from Madras shivering in the wet and cold January morning, shouting pongal-o-pongal! to each other in their thin, miserable voices. Lines of people waiting to go in to the warm theatre looked at them curiously and wondered what all this waving of leaves and festive looking pots were about. Ah schadenfreude!Happy Pongal, everyone. I suppose.
Monday, January 14, 2008
Sunday, January 13, 2008
Gems from The Hindu our local papers
Time was when it was the ToI that provided one's morning entertainment. Now the Hindu has, with its elbow aggressively out, ousted the ToI.
Here, from yesterday's Metro Plus, is a portion of the review of a play performed as part of the Kalakriti Annual Arts Festival:
Jashoda, in order to feed a family of 17 members, agrees to be a wet nurse to feed the children of a rich person of the village. She remains to be pregnant through out her life to feed the rich man's children, by getting food and clothes in return, and in turn supports her family.
However, she suffers from breast cancer and the family including her disabled husband deserts her and she dies unattended. The pain with which she calls her children to help her, fall on deaf ears and ironically shows how the real mothers are ignored in society.
The play directed by Alok Gagdekar, an NSD product was presented well, though it seemed too loud at times and crude in depiction which put off the audience. It also showed a little amateurish portrayal of the play by the group. Such serious plays need more control on the emotions and should be more subdued.
The use of two artistes to portray Jashoda was meant to give the mirror image and also to highlight the character. The dance form used in the play and the narration style was NSD style of presentation. The settings were simple and apt for the play. The posters of heroines, goddesses as part of the setting ironically portray the society, who worships them, but not the real mother.
Also, theatre reviews on the lines of such prescriptions as 'Such serious plays need more control on the emotions and should be more subdued' make me wonder if the people writing these reivews have any idea at all of what they're talking about. The ghost of Ghatak will have to down a few to get over it.
But as usual, I've saved the best for last:
The invitees who came with their family members were dumbfounded with the seriousness of the play that many of them walked out in the middle of the play, not understanding what the play was about?
Update: Can poetry be anything but soulful? What would our newspapers do if, for instance, some alien intelligence removed that word from our collective vocabularies?
And no, I did not read out poetry. Oh my god! Does this mean I should now believe every politician who comes along and says the media misrepresented their words/misquoted them/took their words out of context?
Please also note that Hoskote is clearly not photogenic enough for the ToI photographers; I would be grateful if someone could tell me who Reema Bannerjee is.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Ranjit's reading
Ranjit was supposed to Meet The Press at half past five. Like the unpunctual idiot that I am, I brushed aside his pathetic pleas for coffee and we were at the GZ by 5. Yes, I know.
The Press - such as they are - didn't show. Two young men from some channel did, but apparently waiting is made easier when it's a film star they have to meet. They left without speaking to RH.
Large crowds poured in, however, and the reading went off swimmingly. I humbled Ranjit* with my introduction (he said so), there were approximately 60 people at the reading and nobody asked any spectacularly stupid questions (this, in my personal opinion, is Not a Good Thing. How will we mark our readings except with the questions that are memorably dumb?)
Some people said I looked stunning, others said I looked elegant, yet others remarked upon my glittery footwear. Those who turned up too late for the reading - but just in time for the dinner afterward - asked if I also read my poetry.** One well-known (at least locally and in certain circles) poet/professor languished and flirted and spoke immense quantities of Parsified Gujarati.***
Three of Ranjit's poems were read out in German translation and though I don't know how accurate they were, they sounded fantastic. Swar, you'd have enjoyed it.
In effect, a good time was had by all.
Update: Some of the poems from The Randomiser's Survival Guide can be found here.
* This business of finding out that the most unexpected people - in this instance, Ranjit - read your blog, is unnerving. Especially if one intends to write about them. How much can one say without becoming either self-conscious or garrulous?
** Of course I didn't. I know that much of the contents of the preceding sentences was about ME, Me, Me, Baby, but even so, I wouldn't hijack someone else's reading (just their display table where the books are laid out.† )
*** I know better than to mention names now. The last time I did that, it turned out that the gentleman had a Google Alert for his name and once he read the post, he knew who I was and called and I just wanted a ready made hole in the ground to sink into. See [*] above.
The Press - such as they are - didn't show. Two young men from some channel did, but apparently waiting is made easier when it's a film star they have to meet. They left without speaking to RH.
Large crowds poured in, however, and the reading went off swimmingly. I humbled Ranjit* with my introduction (he said so), there were approximately 60 people at the reading and nobody asked any spectacularly stupid questions (this, in my personal opinion, is Not a Good Thing. How will we mark our readings except with the questions that are memorably dumb?)
Some people said I looked stunning, others said I looked elegant, yet others remarked upon my glittery footwear. Those who turned up too late for the reading - but just in time for the dinner afterward - asked if I also read my poetry.** One well-known (at least locally and in certain circles) poet/professor languished and flirted and spoke immense quantities of Parsified Gujarati.***
Three of Ranjit's poems were read out in German translation and though I don't know how accurate they were, they sounded fantastic. Swar, you'd have enjoyed it.
In effect, a good time was had by all.
Update: Some of the poems from The Randomiser's Survival Guide can be found here.
* This business of finding out that the most unexpected people - in this instance, Ranjit - read your blog, is unnerving. Especially if one intends to write about them. How much can one say without becoming either self-conscious or garrulous?
** Of course I didn't. I know that much of the contents of the preceding sentences was about ME, Me, Me, Baby, but even so, I wouldn't hijack someone else's reading (just their display table where the books are laid out.† )
*** I know better than to mention names now. The last time I did that, it turned out that the gentleman had a Google Alert for his name and once he read the post, he knew who I was and called and I just wanted a ready made hole in the ground to sink into. See [*] above.
† Which reminds me, Penguin Man - the Penguin books sales rep - gave us a few anxious half-hours by losing his way in the vicinity of the building in which the GZ is. Some birds, clearly, are never meant to go south in the winter.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Short Thoughts on Performance and Poetry
The Hindu Literary Review this week has - count them! - five articles on poetry, with at least one that only tangentially touches on the poetry. This is astonishing, because if poetry gets mentioned at all the Lit Review, it is when books are reviewed. At least one part of this issue's emphasis on poetry, I suspect, is because of the Poetry with Prakriti Festival.
In the lead article of the LR Rajaratnam says of Vivek Narayanan's readings, that he
Now, I must confess that in Prakriti's enterprise of 'taking poetry to the unsuspecting public', this aspect of how one ought to approach a reading is the one that had me baffled. And location has nearly everything to do with this question. Art Galleries, for instance, are spaces where people are not likely to wander in without purpose; whereas bookshops or cafes definitely are. So it would have been safe for me to assume that the audiences at Forum or Apparao were there because they wanted to be and not because they were 'unsuspecting' and unaware of what was in store for them. That puts me, the reader, in control of the proceedings.
But what of Landmark? How ought a poet to approach an audience that is not traditionally arranged - in chairs in front of the reader, listening with rapt attention - but scattered, and though occupying the same space as the reading, wandering in and out of it through stages of attention and diversion?
Vivek's approach of refusing the stage and wandering around with the potential audience while engaging them in conversation before reading out a poem is one way. It is radical and different from regular performances where readers take the stage, either sitting or standing and either recite their poems from memory - as Anjum Hasan does - or read them out while occasionally notating their work with brief sketches of the circumstances of the poem or a few words about the poem itself.
I thought back to other readings. And the thought occurred to me that such a radical involvement of the audience is possible even while never leaving the designated spaces that divide audience from author.
How?
I know most of my poems. I don't often need the book in my hand except as moral support and because I'm eternally pessimistic and expect disaster (what if I forget my poem!) This gives me ample opportunities to look at the audience. I know who has their eyes closed and their feet up but who will look up sharply when there's a sudden change in tone; I know the restless ones, the one surreptitiously checking text messages, or doodling; I know the ones who look at me while I'm reading but look away when I look at them.
It's this last bunch that I've been thinking of. Why would they look away? I've taught in classrooms and read other people's work in front of audiences, and in those cases nobody looks away when I catch their eye. Why, then, would poetry affect them this way?
Could it be because poetry occupies territory that appears dangerously personal (people often want to know of poets, how much of their work has its origins in the quotidian events of their lives) so that to speak it aloud and look someone in the eye while doing so is to say, 'You're a stranger, but I'm letting you into my life. Listen.'?
Does reading poetry impose an intimacy on the listener that is tolerable only to the extent that they maintain the illusion that they are distanced from it both spatially and emotionally? That is is okay for the audience to watch the performer, but the minute the performer watches the audience watching her, some barrier has been dissolved?
And what does this say about methods of performance and how to adapt them to locations where such strategies are not possible - such as Landmark, where eye contact is not possible except where it is imposed on the listener by other means such as Vivek adopted?
I don't know. Any thoughts?
In the lead article of the LR Rajaratnam says of Vivek Narayanan's readings, that he
strolled across the bookshelves in Landmark “assaulting” the unsuspecting public with his verses. His reading was experimental (as is his poetry), often defying notions of fixity and permanence. Laced with humour, cynicism and bold stylistic devices, his reading up-fronted the element of theatricality, avoiding passivity of objectification.
Now, I must confess that in Prakriti's enterprise of 'taking poetry to the unsuspecting public', this aspect of how one ought to approach a reading is the one that had me baffled. And location has nearly everything to do with this question. Art Galleries, for instance, are spaces where people are not likely to wander in without purpose; whereas bookshops or cafes definitely are. So it would have been safe for me to assume that the audiences at Forum or Apparao were there because they wanted to be and not because they were 'unsuspecting' and unaware of what was in store for them. That puts me, the reader, in control of the proceedings.
But what of Landmark? How ought a poet to approach an audience that is not traditionally arranged - in chairs in front of the reader, listening with rapt attention - but scattered, and though occupying the same space as the reading, wandering in and out of it through stages of attention and diversion?
Vivek's approach of refusing the stage and wandering around with the potential audience while engaging them in conversation before reading out a poem is one way. It is radical and different from regular performances where readers take the stage, either sitting or standing and either recite their poems from memory - as Anjum Hasan does - or read them out while occasionally notating their work with brief sketches of the circumstances of the poem or a few words about the poem itself.
I thought back to other readings. And the thought occurred to me that such a radical involvement of the audience is possible even while never leaving the designated spaces that divide audience from author.
How?
I know most of my poems. I don't often need the book in my hand except as moral support and because I'm eternally pessimistic and expect disaster (what if I forget my poem!) This gives me ample opportunities to look at the audience. I know who has their eyes closed and their feet up but who will look up sharply when there's a sudden change in tone; I know the restless ones, the one surreptitiously checking text messages, or doodling; I know the ones who look at me while I'm reading but look away when I look at them.
It's this last bunch that I've been thinking of. Why would they look away? I've taught in classrooms and read other people's work in front of audiences, and in those cases nobody looks away when I catch their eye. Why, then, would poetry affect them this way?
Could it be because poetry occupies territory that appears dangerously personal (people often want to know of poets, how much of their work has its origins in the quotidian events of their lives) so that to speak it aloud and look someone in the eye while doing so is to say, 'You're a stranger, but I'm letting you into my life. Listen.'?
Does reading poetry impose an intimacy on the listener that is tolerable only to the extent that they maintain the illusion that they are distanced from it both spatially and emotionally? That is is okay for the audience to watch the performer, but the minute the performer watches the audience watching her, some barrier has been dissolved?
And what does this say about methods of performance and how to adapt them to locations where such strategies are not possible - such as Landmark, where eye contact is not possible except where it is imposed on the listener by other means such as Vivek adopted?
I don't know. Any thoughts?
Wednesday, January 09, 2008
Ranjit Hoskoté at The Goethe Zentrium on Friday, 11th January
Ranjit Hoskote will be reading from a new manuscript (The Randomiser's Survival Guide) at the Goethe Zentrium, Hermitage Building, Hill Fort Road, Hyderabad, on Friday the 11th of January at 6.30 pm.
So now you know.
All are, I need hardly add (since I'm posting it here), welcome. So Ludwig, Kuffir, Sheetal, Shweta, if you're reading this, please come!
I understand the poetry reading is going to be competing with the Nizam - the last one, the one who rears sheep in Australia - who will be opening something or the other. We will open only books at the poetry reading.
***
These invitations are something else: here I'm described as 'Hyderabad poet'. What does that mean? That I write about Hyderabad mainly? Do they mean 'Hyderabad based poet'? How does location matter?
The second funny invitation was for some Poetry thing that's happening at the Hyderabad Central University later this month. Yesterday, I found that I had been conferred a doctorate without my knowledge. Yes. I am Dr. SS and I didn't even know it. I wonder what my dissertation was?
In the poetry reading session, Ranjit Hoskoté will read from his new manuscript, a suite of 80 poems that follows his Vanishing Acts: New and Selected Poems 1985-2005 (Penguin, 2006).
Ranjit Hoskoté will be introduced by Hyderabad poet Sridala Swami.
So now you know.
All are, I need hardly add (since I'm posting it here), welcome. So Ludwig, Kuffir, Sheetal, Shweta, if you're reading this, please come!
I understand the poetry reading is going to be competing with the Nizam - the last one, the one who rears sheep in Australia - who will be opening something or the other. We will open only books at the poetry reading.
***
These invitations are something else: here I'm described as 'Hyderabad poet'. What does that mean? That I write about Hyderabad mainly? Do they mean 'Hyderabad based poet'? How does location matter?
The second funny invitation was for some Poetry thing that's happening at the Hyderabad Central University later this month. Yesterday, I found that I had been conferred a doctorate without my knowledge. Yes. I am Dr. SS and I didn't even know it. I wonder what my dissertation was?
Tuesday, January 08, 2008
Nail Biting Finish
Blogging will be slow or non-existent. (Yes, I've said this before many times, haven't I?)
This time there's a very good reason. I have whitlow'd my thumb and now I can barely type. Do you know how difficult it is to hit the space bar with any other finger than the thumb?
I briefly considered taking a photograph of the infected nail for your collective edification but, you know, the dexterity involved in negotiating cameras, cables and what-nots is making me faint.
And I have much driving to do today. On the assumption that thumbs, like batteries, have only so much stored up energy, I need to save it all for the steering wheel.
Now I feel like some lower life form.
Bah.
This time there's a very good reason. I have whitlow'd my thumb and now I can barely type. Do you know how difficult it is to hit the space bar with any other finger than the thumb?
I briefly considered taking a photograph of the infected nail for your collective edification but, you know, the dexterity involved in negotiating cameras, cables and what-nots is making me faint.
And I have much driving to do today. On the assumption that thumbs, like batteries, have only so much stored up energy, I need to save it all for the steering wheel.
Now I feel like some lower life form.
Bah.
Monday, January 07, 2008
Kala Ghoda Competitions Part 1
The Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2008 has so far announced two competitions: The Short Film Competition and the Lantern Competition.
The Latern Competiton submission date is the 10th (sorry about the late announcement!) and the short film on the 26th.
*
Expect more announcements shortly. I'm going to be the town crier for a bit.
Update: The Open Mike Sessions and The Open Screen Sessions.
*
Did you know that moths make a sound? Neither did I. This morning, I found a giant moth near the front door. It had either got in the night before, or earlier in the morning when it was still dark out and warm inside, when I'd gone to unlock the gate.
I fetched a broom and gave it a soft whack to stun but not kill it. That was when it made a sound and made me jump out of my slippers. It was a cross between a mouse's squeak and a door creaking in the wind: not so long drawn out, but sawn off at the start.
That's how I knew that though I'd made gathering gestures with the broom, I'd still left it behind. I picked it up more carefully the second time, and felt through the broom how solid the moth was. it had weight...did you know? If it sat on a leaf, the leaf would bend under the weight.
The moth squeaked a little more and tried to move. I wonder if it will survive. What - apart from lizards - eats moths?
The Latern Competiton submission date is the 10th (sorry about the late announcement!) and the short film on the 26th.
*
Expect more announcements shortly. I'm going to be the town crier for a bit.
Update: The Open Mike Sessions and The Open Screen Sessions.
*
Did you know that moths make a sound? Neither did I. This morning, I found a giant moth near the front door. It had either got in the night before, or earlier in the morning when it was still dark out and warm inside, when I'd gone to unlock the gate.
I fetched a broom and gave it a soft whack to stun but not kill it. That was when it made a sound and made me jump out of my slippers. It was a cross between a mouse's squeak and a door creaking in the wind: not so long drawn out, but sawn off at the start.
That's how I knew that though I'd made gathering gestures with the broom, I'd still left it behind. I picked it up more carefully the second time, and felt through the broom how solid the moth was. it had weight...did you know? If it sat on a leaf, the leaf would bend under the weight.
The moth squeaked a little more and tried to move. I wonder if it will survive. What - apart from lizards - eats moths?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)