Look at the treasures on offer:
1. Who the Foucault Stole My Cheez?
A brief but wildly satirical and clever piece by "Timothy Paperphadkar" on the dead-end nature of academic seminars.
2. Paperback Messiah
Who doesn't know (about) Chetan Bhagat? And which young person hasn't read at least one of his books? No hands going up? That's not at all surprising considering India's most popular author in terms of sales has become a youth icon in less time than you can say 2 States: The Story of My Marriage.
Here Srinath Perur immerses himself in Bhagat's world to learn what it is exactly that the banker-turned-writer has done to get millions looking up to him as their role model.
Here are some excerpts:
Bhagat has said he thinks of himself as 90 percent entertainer, ten percent reformer. This mix ensures that his novels occupy a strange literary register, one in which stories dealing with social concerns are written using the conventions of pulp fiction. In the tradition of pulp, Bhagat’s books employ linear plotlines, simple language and short sentences. Readers speak fondly about how quick-paced Bhagat’s books are and how they never get boring, something achieved by never requiring the reader to pause. Characters do not aspire to the complexities of realism, but are constituted of a few clearly defined characteristics in rough accordance with which they behave. They often behave in disjointed fashion, hurtling along from one mood to the next before the reader’s attention can wander. And they never respond to situations in nuanced ways which might require the reader to pause and reflect; their responses are clearly communicated through word, gesture or expression. To whatever extent possible, plausible stereotypes are employed over fresh and telling detail, freeing the reader from having to rely too heavily on the text. Events in the books can sometimes take melodramatic turns, and depending on what one is used to, this can require a significant ability to suspend disbelief.
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Interestingly, none of the Chetan Bhagat readers I interviewed seemed particularly aware of any larger message or intention in the books. Kavitha Gopinath, an ardent Bhagat fan, works for a telecom company in Bengaluru and was an enthusiastic audience member at the launch of 2 States. She says about Bhagat, “For me he’s the ultimate entertainer. His books are effortless to read.” Asked about the larger significance of his books, she says, “Honestly, I didn’t realise there was any. It was only when he spoke about it during the launch that I went, ‘Oh. Okay.’”
Read the article in full here.
3. Tales from the Indian Fish Trail
A detailed investigation by well-known journalist Samanth Subramanian into the controversial Hyderabad fish cure. In the great tradition of the old New Journalists, Subramanian also volunteers to swallow the "miracle" fish live so that he can write about the whole experience:
And then, suddenly, it was my turn.
The most disconcerting moment of the entire process was a few seconds of stasis, when Harinath held the fish up, medicine gleaming in its mouth, and I stood with my mouth open as if it were the Eucharist wafer, dimly aware that I could still twist away and run. Then the stasis broke, and Harinath’s hand, full of fish, was in my mouth.
From all the first-hand observation that evening, I must have somehow learned how to swallow right, because the fish went down, tail first, much easier than I expected. It was slippery and small, and although I felt an initial tickle, I think it had expired by the time it was a third of the way down my throat. Right away, though, I realized that it wasn’t the fish that was making people retch; it was the asafoetida, so strong and vicious that tears started in your eyes in that very first second. Then, as it slid down, it burned such a trail of further pungency down your throat that your hair stood on end and your fingers clenched involuntarily. Eyes still streaming, I grabbed at a bottle of water behind Harinath, although somehow, my mind had inscrutably fixed on its own preferred solution to the asafoetida’s pungency: fresh-cut mangoes.
These paragraphs appear towards the end of the article, but the whole piece is bursting with lustrous writing.
4. His Personal World of Sound
An entertaining profile of Vijay Iyer, the jazz musician from India who's galvanising the New York music scene. I love jazz and I play it often in my car and at work but I would be stumped if I were asked to talk about what makes jazz "jazz". So I am grateful that the author, Akshay Ahuja, has helpfully given me a few pointers:
Today ... many no longer perceive modern jazz as a part of vernacular culture. As Iyer acknowledges, the music has become freighted, for whatever reason, with various anxieties. “There’s a certain kind of guilt factor that comes into play with jazz. People will be like ‘I don’t know anything about jazz...therefore I don’t listen to it, or therefore I don’t want to pay attention to it.’ And part of it is that people feel obliged to be experts on it in order to listen to it.”
Part of the challenge of being a jazz musician today—or a painter or a poet, for that matter—is simply getting people to actively engage with the work and trust their response. “There’s no great mystery,” Iyer says. “It’s just about letting people in the door."
Like most improvisational arts, jazz gains immeasurably from being experienced live. Every musician produces sound not just with an instrument or a set of vocal cords, but with the entire body. A melodic phrase can be formed with the motions of a pair of hands, its rhythms accented by the slide of a foot. As Amiri Baraka wrote of Thelonious Monk, “The quick dips, half-whirls, and deep pivoting jerks that Monk gets into behind that piano are part of the music, too. Many musicians have mentioned how they could get further into the music by watching Monk dance, following the jerks and starts.”
Brilliant! Do read the article in full.
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Also, there is a highly educational feature on the latest game the big boys (and girls) play: carbon trading.
Sadly, the computer screen is not the ideal medium in which to enjoy long-form journalism. So if you can, buy this month's issue of The Caravan to savour the goodies. (For those at Commits, a copy has been placed in the college library.)
LONG-FORM JOURNALISM SITE
If you are looking for more in the way of long-form reads, here is a site that's right up your alley. The editor, Aaron Lammer, sent me an email this morning after he came across The Reading Room while, he says, he was looking for Indian long-form journalism pieces.
At Longform.org, the editors "post articles, past and present, that we think are too long and too interesting to be read on a web browser. We started this site to bring together our enthusiasm for both great longform reads and the excellent Instapaper reader".
Check it out here and see for yourself what the Instapaper reader is all about.
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