Painters and painting

Painting is perhaps the origin of all creative activity. All five senses come into play to create unimaginably magical works of art that go down in time. I have heard from many people who profess that their ultimate desire is to stand in front of Da Vinci's Mona Lisa and forget the world ticking by. And who cannot be moved by Vincent Van Gogh, the original mad genious's paintings and his throbbing life?

Biafra

Just read Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's second novel, Half of a Yellow Sun, which had won the Orange Broadband Prife for Fiction 2007. Exquisitely written, it is the heartbreaking story of a war torn African Nation. Nothing like what has been written on war, as this one is written by a woman. Her language is breathtakingly fresh.

The Black Book

Pamuk's The Black Book is one of his earlier works which itself is the cauldron from which most of his later novels came into being. It is darkly mysterious and a fantastic example of how a book could change you. The finest in magic realism.

My Novel

My first novel,which I have been writing for the past four years is in its last stages of revision and is titled Mantra of Belonging. I hope to release it internationally. It talks off the disintegration of the joint family, the positive and the negative aspects and the journey towards the nuclear family.

For the Unsung

Last evening, I had an occasion to attend a different kind of awards function, hosted by a Bollywood actor of repute, Ashish Vidyarthi. He honoured unsung people, the ordinariest of the ordinary in a small village and people thronged the small auditorium. The trophies, incidentally were hand - crafted as also the shawl that he draped aroung the shoulders of the awardees. Sincereity is the flavor of the day. And the crowd was an amalgam of people from various states, like West Bengal, Assam, Tripura, Andhra Pradesh and so on. A little can also be enthralling.