I am reading Indira by Katherine Frank, and it is truly engrossing. And yet I feel strangely guilty. Why do I find it interesting? Is it because of the momentous stages in Indian history that it captures or because of the political intrigue and nice bit of family gossip of the first family of India that it dishes out? A lot of references are made to letters, supposedly authored by the various personalities that people the book, and parts of me find it kind of sad, that these letters so intimately personal are laid out there…to be cut copy pasted. I know it’s a stupid feeling, but there…it’s the same whenever I think of the mummified pharaohs of Egypt…an afterlife meant to be spend in splendour, instead they are nicely boxed up in special scientific glass boxes to be gawked at and to be tested periodically to ascertain the ‘true’ reason for their death. Yes, I know they’ve been dead too long to care, but still…glad my body is going to be burnt into fine ash to be scattered in some oil slicked ocean after my death…okay! why am I talking of morbid stuff anyway?
Right, back to the book. Intriguing to be sure at least as far as I have read, and perhaps as has already been alleged by others not completely sticking to the facts…yet it is a portrayal of Indira Gandhi not just as this Iron Lady or Epic Woman (God, history books in school made saccharine god figures of everyone) but as a human being. I confess my reading of history is too sketchy to appraise the book either as good or bad, but it is good reading so far.
I was making a list of all that I have been reading this semester and the numbers are quite impressive considering that last semester I was only able to manage perhaps two books in all. This semester, I am in double digits all ready! Yes, Yes, I know it’s superficial to count the number of books I’ve read and then feel proud of the number, but I can’t help it.
In other news, I continue to search for a place to intern. People keep pointing at human rights associations…Amnesty, National Human Rights Commission, but I think my heart’s in Environmental or Trade and Development organizations…CENTAD for e.g. (crosses fingers). There’s another personality quirk, waiting to be figured out.
Weirdly rambling post, isn’t it? I’ve never written something quite like this in here and I think I’ll weird it a little more. Presenting…what I think is a Haiku written by yours truly…
” Pit patters the roof,
I think it’s raining.
In response, the gutters overflow. “
