Varying the pace...

I finally read Barack Obama's autobiography, Dreams of my father, over the weekend. It is extremely well-written and engages the reader from page 1, and Barack raises a lot of questions about race, people's assumptions about it and the different ways in which they choose to address their own ambiguities on the issue. As you read through the book you realise it can't have been easy to be the child of a white American and a black african, with an Indonesian step-father and step-sister, growing up in the 60s and 70s, even if much of that happened outside the continental United States. Throughout the book you see how people try to go outside their comfort zone or even their reality, trying to prove how 'non-racist' they are or how true to their own race. It certainly gave me a lot of food for thought, to the extent that I couldn't sleep...like the time I read Roots and was haunted for weeks by images of slavery and the anguish of Kunta kinte...

So I descended to the ridiculous and picked up some Hardy Boys books to calm me down. The first one I picked up was hilarious - somehow beset with Indian characters with names like: Ramhud Ghapur; Tava Kapoor; Bangalore; Mr. Bhagnav and Nanab!!! The only Indian name they got right was a character called Ragu. I was just imagining the coterie of writers responsible for this series randomly scanning menus from Indian restaurants and coming up with these strange monickers. Not to mention a priceless climax straight out of a Hindi movie in the 70s, where the book states that Indians love wrestling so the gang of villains agree to let Frank and Joe Hardy engage on a wrestling bout with some members of the gang, with 2 out of 3 falls being the condition for winning...

Old Tag

Doing Mystic Margarita's tag after ages...and what a fun tag it is too - to talk about your 10 most favourite fictional characters...
1. Ashton Pelham (Pandy) Martyn - the protagonist of my favourite book, The Far Pavilions. Ashton is a mixed up, idealistic soul who believes passionately in justice and fairness and thus is always at loggerhorns with the world. Torn between two culture, he is also unable to decide which one he belongs to and is forced, yet unable to compromise at every turn, and eventually turns his back on the world, looking to found a new one where, like in Martin Luther King's dream, 'people will be judged not by the colour of their skin but the content of their character'...Delightfully complex, idealistic...Not a guy I would fall in love with but would love to chat and get to know
2. William - irrepressible, mischievous, imaginative, frightful...no amalgamation of adjectives is enough to describe this eleven year old who lives in his own world and causes such disruptions to the world of others around!
3. Ramona - the female equivalent of William, with her own unique take on the world.
4. Mr. Darcy - I'm not sure if I'm more in love with the character from the book or Colin Firth's portrayal of him - both are yummy.
5. Sherlock Holmes - how could anyone not be intrigued by this strange mixture of a person who knows everything about obscure alkaloids, rare strains of mud and knows so much about human nature in the course of his investigations yet fails to know as much about human nature in his own life...and of course, the television series starring Jeremy Brett...
6. Tommy and Tuppence Beresford - Agatha Christie's most charming detective duo, blithely romancing their way through life...
7. Jo Bettany - the heroine of 62 Chalet school books, and of my own first book
8. Winter de los Ballesteros - the heroine of Shadow of the Moon, by MM Kaye - passionate, wilful, determined and in love with India
9. Scarlett - yes, despite all her faults - for her passion, her belief that whatever happened she could make it right, her never-give-up attitude, her love for the land...
10. The Fossil sisters - the heroines of ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild - original, funny, charming, self-willed...do I see a theme here?
I pass the tag on to: Mad Momma, Kiran and Asha