Not a Review: My Experience with A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara | Spoiler Alert

 

My Experience with A Little Life (Spoiler Alert 🔔)

Not a Book Review by Dhiraj Sindhi

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara

Author: Hanya Yanagihara

ISBN: 978-1447294832

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Length: 720 Pages

Publication Date: 2015

Publisher: Picador Collection (10 March 2017)

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3NSCqm5

About the author:

Hanya Yanagihara is the author of the internationally bestselling A Little Life. She lives in New York City.

Hanya Yanagihara (The New Yorker)

Instagram: @hanyayanagihara

A Little Life: @alittlelifebook

To Paradise: @toparadisenovel

Disclaimer: This is not a review, it is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

As you start reading, you're happy to know the characters and you appreciate the relationship they share with each other and the friendship, affection, care, and support. Their origins are exposed to you, where they are coming from, some of them simple to understand and the others, complex. You're told of their current struggles, finding a footing in their respective careers, regarding their identity, their altering relationships as they cannot live together anymore and grow apart. Years go by, Thanksgiving after Thanksgiving and they eventually establish prominent positions in their fields.

Meanwhile, there comes a turning point in Jude's life when he is adopted by Harold. Things turn grave from now onwards as these changes and events keep reminding us that life is difficult. Jude suffers a lot because of his leg injury, the reason behind which is yet to be revealed and his traumatic past, only the slightest details of which have been revealed yet. Then comes JB's addiction and how the group literally falls apart. Willem and Malcolm also have their own troubles but now the focus narrows down on Jude's life.

At some points, I felt like I could relate to Jude at many different levels, not to the level or extent Hanya has heightened the stakes and circumstances, but very basic level and I would agree with his perception of the world and the people in his life and his relationship with them and I felt terrified. She has made it so raw and real that you cannot imagine these things outside of your own reality. The episodes I could relate with, which is not a problem anymore thankfully. And whenever there was the 'cutting' scene, after I'd stopped reading, I'll watch my own hands and wrists as if it would have been replaced with Jude's and I'll cover them and wrap arms around myself. And the next bathroom trip wouldn't be easy as you can't brush off these memories that would linger for some time before you distracted yourself. But then you get accustomed to it. I got accustomed to it and accepted Jude's life as it is. 

I loved how Yanagihara announced most of the shocking, horrifying, traumatic events way before they'd take place in the novel. You'll read a line, a sort of advanced notice or forewarning and you'll know how this is going to end. One example is 'He knows Caleb hates his walk' or 'The First time Caleb hit him.' She always lets you choose whether you'd want to continue or not. Once you're past this chapter, there's no going back, things have changed and it only gets worse even if she promises a little relief in 'The Happy Years'. By the end of 'The Axiom of Equality', I imagined tearing apart the book and its pages and drowning it in the water tank and flinging it from the terrace to some unknown terrain that it wouldn't return to me. But I knew, as much as I hated it, I loved reading it too, in fact, more. 

I wanted to know what 'the home' was and who this Dr. Traylor was. And this explanation wasn't too far from where I stood. In the meanwhile, the relationships changed, and everyone was around again. Yanagihara portrayed so well, the situation of Jude, how he felt about everything, how a person thinks after going through what he'd gone through and enduring so much of it. For me, it couldn't get more real than this. Still, now, because of his relationship with Willem, and for Harold, Jude tries even harder to not just survive but do his best at living, the extreme he could touch like he reaches the highest sound frequency, at which it becomes the constant silence. And then comes Harold's point of view, how he discovers gradually what Jude meant when he said he'd be disgusted to learn who he was, rather what he is. That he really thought he deserved this all that he still believed those people, his tormentors, after all. In this particular Harold's narrative, you go through this pain all over again.

Then there are some events you could have never expected to arrive without warning, they hit you suddenly on the face like a slap and you're left dumbstruck. This happens at the end of 'The Happy Hours', still you can't swallow it. I had read the previous 60 pages in one sitting and I tried to continue. I started reading 'Dear Comrade' still unable to accept what had happened. Then this line— 'he goes first to Willem's side of the closet, which he still has not emptied.' and I just couldn't continue reading further. I put aside the book and tried to let the fact sink in and as the night was approaching, I made up my mind that I'll be finishing the remaining 90 pages that night only no matter what. I got over the fact that Willem was gone, nothing can be done, but what about Jude after him? It was painful but a few pages after that I learned none of them survived, not Malcolm, not Sophie. And the dams burst open at the mention of it. I could've kept crying but I needed to get this done with and I wiped away my tears and took a swig from a water bottle and continued.

My face, my cheeks and my head were hurting as I tried to control my emotions, to keep myself from crying because I wouldn't be able to read then. It became a slippery hill from then on, at regular intervals there would come stumbling stones and I will be knocked down. I would fall, I would cry and then get up again and resume descending towards the end we had all anticipated. There are more such stumbling blocks in the last 'Lispenard Street' and because narration has returned to Harold, who is conversing with his son's partner—Willem, it is obvious that it's done. On every page, you expect this to happen like this is the moment and then finally! I gathered myself quickly and resumed. And I read, 'I didn't know Andy would be dead three years later of a heart attack' and I lose it. This destruction is beyond repair. There could be nothing worse than that and you see Harold and Julia left alone, only JB to their company, them reading eight long pages of Jude's confession of what had happened to him.

Do I recommend this book? Most definitely. Not to everyone though. There are enough trigger warnings you can find on Goodreads. And as I said earlier, you will know what to anticipate and you will be forewarned. So it will be completely in your hands whether to continue or not. But yes, mere curiosity and 'want' to cry wouldn't suffice, it'll demand much more effort.

Am I going to re-read it? Yes, of course. I have kept the book very clean for the type of book it is. It can be studied with different readings because it has a lot of content on many subjects. I'll use pencils to underline text, I'll use sticky notes to annotate, I'll use highlighters, etc. That will be my second reading.

Thanks a ton to the person who recommended this book to me: Raul Jeremiah Rai. Wishing him success in his UPSC CSE journey.

Happy Reading!

Are you on Instagram and Goodreads? Let's connect!

Dhiraj's 2022 book montage

Dhiraj Sindhi's favorite books »

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The Sage's Secret by Abhinav | The Kalki Chronicles | Book Review

    

The Sage's Secret by Abhinav (The Kalki Chronicles)

Book Review by Dhiraj Sindhi

The Sage's Secret by Abhinav

Author: Abhinav

ISBN: 978-0143442363

Genre: Children's Action and Adventure

Length: 256 Pages

Publication Date: 31 August 2018

Publisher: Penguin Random House India

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3gY43Ln

About the author:

Abhinav is a Mumbai-based software developer working for a financial services firm. His debut book The Sage’s Secret is the first instalment in the Kalki Chronicles. He has since published a second book in the series, Kali’s Retribution.

Instagram: @am_abhinav

Goodreads: @am_abhinav

Disclaimer: This review is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

The Sage's Secret by Abhinav is the first instalment in the series The Kalki Chronicles, an Action and Adventure book series for children based on Hindu Mythology. Set in the year 2025 and onwards, the book has several fantastical elements and a set of characters. The premises is far removed from the reality of the novel itself. The Kalki avatar is not 'all-knowing' like Krishna and so Lord Krishna had already arranged for Kalki's training in Kaliyuga before he died. The twenty-year-old protagonist, Anirudha receives communication and instructions from the lord via dreams, God's favourite mode of communication as is evident in Indian folklores. Sage Dweepa is going to teach Anirudha everything that he'll need to defeat his enemies and fulfil his duties as the tenth avatar.

The antagonist for this first book is Kalanayaka who is given the position in the army of Kalabakshakas, led by the lord of time—Kalarakshasa. It is said that the formation of this group can be traced back to Dvapara Yuga, although the author has not provided any explanation of the origins as to how they came to be or why. The Sage's Secret includes the journey of Anirudha from being an ordinary boy to a well-equipped combatant. 

What I liked about the book is the use of sorcery and the fantastical power of controlling energy, though the idea is poorly executed. The writing style is engaging and the narration provides more information than what can be considered adequate. I also appreciate the secret after which the book is titled after. The character development of Kalanayaka and Anirudh is what made me stick to the book till the end. In the last few chapters, the story progresses exponentially which sets a quite dramatic stage for the next book, 'Kali's Retribution'.

I do not understand though that while the story spans over such a vast expanse of time, places and possibilities, the story's focus narrows down to just a few characters and an isolated battlefield. As it is categorised as children's fiction, I think it should have provided something more useful instead of repetitive expositions, making it slower and boring to follow. 

Happy Reading!

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Corporate Eagle: A Soaring Success Story by Madhukant Acharya

   

Corporate Eagle: A Soaring Success Story by Madhukant Acharya

Corporate Eagle by Madhukant Acharya

Author: Madhukant Acharya

ISBN: 978-1685233372

Genre: Contemporary Fiction

Length: 180 Pages

Publication Date: 23^rd August 2021

Publisher: Notion Press

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/32oEoaS

About the author:

Madhukant Acharya was educated in some of the best schools and colleges in India and was adjudged the best student in his class. Soon after he joined the corporate world, working with eminent multinational companies and rose from a management trainee to the company’s board position in a short span of twenty years and was awarded 'Marketing Man of the Year' from the President of India. He has widely travelled in India and abroad and continues to be an avid reader. The author leads an active social life with friends and family and is a popular member of premier clubs. His interests involve being a fitness enthusiast and doing social and charitable work in rural areas. Many of his friends call him ‘people happy’.

Settled in Mumbai for nearly forty years with wife Kalpana, his children pursue careers in the US and Mumbai being doctors, engineers and MBAs. The idea of writing a novel motivated him some years ago after professional retirement when he rescheduled his priorities and lifestyle to devote required time to creating his debut novel Friends and five seasons in two volumes — Rupen's Early Years and Publishing hero Rupen.

Madhukant Acharya

Instagram: @authormadhukant

Twitter: @authormadhukant

Disclaimer: This review is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

Corporate Eagle by Madhukant Acharya is a fiction book spanning Mohan Dutt’s twenty-five years long corporate life that is indeed, as the title suggests, successful and always moving in an upward direction; set in India, it covers a handful of remarkable events that took place from the late 1970s to the mid-2000s; the book depicts the journey of its canny, perspicacious and enterprising protagonist from being a management trainee to becoming the chairman and country head of the fashion and clothing company, for which he worked doggedly and made contributions that proved indispensable to the making of one of the top corporate giant conglomerate in India; gives you an insight into the challenges and crucial decision-making processes faced by companies and the ethics and policies to go by to keep soaring high in the air; lastly, it shows how giving back to the society (CSR) is important, not only for the economic and social upliftment of the country but also the company itself.

The stated corporate theme here has strong political overtones, which is obvious because the influence of politics within and outside industries cannot be overlooked in any case. The book also starts with the communists winning the elections and what followed was the exodus of industrialists from West Bengal to other parts of India because of the labour disputes and lock-outs. There are a lot of such political events in the book inspired by Indian political history. For instance, finance minister Manmohan Singh and prime minister PV Narsimha Rao doing away with the license-raj regime. The other part of the theme is corporate warfare, which includes dealing with other rival companies, countering their efforts of a hostile takeover, remaining competitive in the market, warding off unwanted influences, etc. The protagonist Mohan deals with it very tactfully and manages to keep his records clean. Additionally, he looks for opportunities to expand the company in whatever aspects he could. Being a chairman, he keeps every department head in check and provides required guidance dutifully. There come a lot of obstacles and challenges pertaining to income tax, shifting of headquarters, politicians withholding raw materials, the factory shut down, legal battles, etc. The author has given detailed insights into the decisions that the protagonist takes while dealing with the obstacles as well as while planning for the expansion of the company into various other fields such as Information Technology, Finance, Sports, etc. 

As you can see that the corporate journey of the protagonist as well as the company is very compelling, although the novel as a whole is not as compelling considering the plot, narration, and setting. The book reads as if being non-fiction, documenting the life of a veteran industrialist in a particular company, stating data and information without any regard for surrounding elements. This also makes it an overview of the many modifications and expansions that the company has undergone. For instance, a single chapter runs you through several years of company-related happenings but doesn't offer how it is executed on the ground. While the corporate-specific insights may be interesting, the novel falls prey to the problem of ‘too much information’, where each chapter has the potential to be an independent novel. Being a successful story, this novel doesn’t even have a single falling moment, a crisis or a disaster, which also discards any possibilities of having any climax. However, as compensation for the missing action, the novel has two significant sports events that will keep you on the edge towards the end. The book is definitely not what you would expect after reading the synopsis on the back cover, because the novel exceeds your expectations in the corporate aspect, while also failing to deliver what it promises—the presence of Kumud and Cindy. They were mentioned in the book now and then, but they didn’t have even the littlest of roles to play.

Happy Reading!

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How ‘If I’m Honest’ helped me identify and acknowledge my own mental health-related issues and showed me the way forward

  

How ‘If I’m Honest’ helped me identify and acknowledge my own mental health-related issues and showed me the way forward

Book Review by Dhiraj Sindhi

If I’m Honest: A Memoir of My Mental Health Journey by Sidhartha Mallya

If I'm Honest by Sidhartha Mallya

Author: Sidhartha Mallya

ISBN: 978-9390679447

Genre: Memoir

Length: 208 Pages

Publication Date: 27^th September 2021

Publisher: Westland

Book Editor: Deepthi Talwar and Kushalrani Gulab

Deepthi Talwar: Twitter - @deepthitalwar

Kushalrani Gulab: LinkedIn - @kushalrani-gulab-64673844

Cover Design: Saurabh Garge | Instagram: @garge_saurabh

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3HhkJbR

About the author:

Sidhartha Mallya is an American-born, British-raised actor of Indian descent. He was born in Los Angeles, California to Indian parents, who moved to England shortly before his first birthday. He attended Wellington College, and then Queen Mary, University of London, where he graduated with a BSc in Business Management. After a short career in the business world, Sidhartha made the switch to acting. He trained at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London, graduating with a Master of Arts in acting. He made his feature film debut in the Netflix Original Brahman Naman, which premiered at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival.

Aside from acting, Sidhartha’s main focus has been on the promotion of mental health amongst the youth. In 2020 he launched an online series called ConSIDer This, which talks about the mental issues he has struggled with over the years, and offers advice to the public on how to deal with such challenges. If I’m Honest is his first venture into the writing world.

Anisa Butt and Siddharth Mallya | A still from his Netflix movie 'Brahman Naman'

Instagram: @sidmallya

Twitter: @sidmallya

Disclaimer: This review is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

Here, I should add to the disclaimer that it is not always advisable to self-diagnose your mental health-related issues. If you have the resources like therapy, psychiatrist or even educational books (if you understand the scientific terminology) at hand then you should first give them a go. It is because, self-diagnosis may go extremely wrong considering how you approach, your relationship with yourself, your thought process, etc. To be honest, I haven’t self-diagnosed myself with these issues, rather I was able to recognise the patterns and identify them because of the several years of reflecting back on my life and getting to know myself, to which Sidhartha refers to as ‘Self-Work’ and ‘Self-Discovery’ journey. It is the best part of this book that the author has made it very easy to understand what he has undergone throughout his life and how he became aware of it all.

So, what do I mean when I say this book helped me identify some of the issues and showed me the way forward? One of the things that Sidhartha emphasized early in the book is that this is not a self-help book. It is rather a memoir of his life regarding what issues he had faced throughout his life and anything that has impacted his mental wellbeing. Truly, the book is an honest account, where he has shared a lot of personal and past traumas and what he is currently dealing with, without any filters; there’s something wrong he has done, he accepts it; something he thinks is wrong, he mentions it without the fear of being judged. At least that’s what I think. For instance, he chose to address the mindset that makes people believe that people who come from a life of perceived privilege or people having a certain financial, religious or ethnic background are immune to mental health issues. I know, some people reading this right now may think so, and will continue to do so. But that is exactly why I think mental health needs to be talked about, even if a greater part of society isn’t aware of it, even if an even greater part of society can’t afford it, even if an even greater part of society treats those having mental health-related issues with stigma and discrimination. We need to start taking care of our mental health just like we care for our physical health; we need to normalize seeking help while going through mental disorders, just like we do in the cases of other medical conditions like diabetes or injury. 

Alright, back to where I started—how did this book help me in any way? Sidhartha has mentioned this on the back cover itself, above the synopsis that ‘I felt like I had a dementor on my shoulder, sucking the life and happiness out of me…it was no way to live.’ It is this realization that something is wrong and you need to do something about it. You’ll know when something, a thought, fear or anything like that starts to get in the way of life, career, relationships, etc. For me, it was the year 2018 that I started daily journaling and I started taking into account that there were a lot of things that were and are putting me off the road I’m supposed to travel in order to fulfill my desires and dreams. Soon, I could recognise thinking patterns and could trace back my fears, anxieties, guilt, etc to their roots. It is not that hard to realize that this thought may have stemmed off the back of so and so reason; you just need the right resources and tools by your side to reflect on your life. After all, as we say, the person who knows you the best is yourself and getting to know yourself can incredibly help you. Sidhartha has mentioned ‘getting to know myself’ along with a set of resources/tools that you could put to use for your own self-work journey. However, these may or may not work for you, it’s completely subjective. Again, back to my point—what this book did for me is help me better express myself and my mental health-related issues. It also kind of identified a range of feelings and behaviour and actions for me that are most probably the result of some mental disorder. According to me, identifying and acknowledging an issue lifts up half of your baggage from your shoulders.  Now, you have a direction and you can start working on the issue without falling prey to the disorder. So, the next time you recognise a pattern as Sidhartha says, you can immediately identify, ‘Oh, that’s my perfectionism and I can let it pass without the automatic reaction of a compulsion.’

Just to give you context, I would share with you an example from my own life. I don’t like to do it but as Sidhartha says, therapy and self-discovery won’t be easy because rummaging through your past can be hurtful; you will have to put effort to see the result. This is similar to what Sidhartha had experienced regarding the Scrupulosity OCD. In my case, it’s not Scrupulosity OCD but something along the same lines. Touchwood, I have never had that fear-based relationship with God. I don’t know when this started, but I must be going through a lot of bad days among a few good ones. My offering of prayers to the deities in our small Pooja Mandir at home would start with burning incense stick and chanting of a specific verse. Seeking good days, I would ask God that if I finish the verse before the incense stick’s flame got extinguished, let it be a good day, otherwise, I accept the bad day. In other words, it was supposed to be an easy way to have a good day. This went on for a while; the day I get a ‘good day’ signal from God, I’d focus on only good things and when I get a ‘bad day’ signal, I’d focus only on bad things, reinforcing at the end of the day that I really had a bad day. In short, I started believing that it is actually working and that one verse and an incense stick started controlling my life. This continued for four fucking years. It took me four years to realize that it’s not God but my obsessive thoughts and compulsive behaviour. Just recently, a couple of months before I completely eliminated that verse from my prayers and still, sometimes I automatically switch to that verse, however, I have learned to not associate with it anything fear-based. The bad part is it’s just one of the many such examples.

The book is written in very simple language and is effectively structured to get the best output. The vocabulary used here makes it really easy for us to understand everything, what he had gone through mentally, how it had impacted him and his reaction to it. As for any other memoirs, there are plenty of things you can take away from this book as well. As you read Sidhartha’s journey, you’ll come to know that there are issues completely avoidable or could be handled better and are not worth it. For instance, a sentence said to you in your childhood can have a lasting impact. The most trivial of things at an early age would show through one’s adult life or maybe throughout the life in a form of mental disorder. Not stretching it further, I will mention some of the key takeaways from ‘If I’m Honest’:

• You could be depressed without you knowing and you can be ‘not-depressed’ even when you think you are depressed. The best way to know is to seek professional help. But if you cannot, seek help from your loved ones or just share it with the person you think would understand.

• In the last chapters where Sidhartha has listed some tools/techniques/resources which I consider as ‘the way forward’ after you acknowledge that there is something wrong. One thing that everyone should note is the ‘power of listening’. When someone is sharing with you their mental health issues, you just need to listen ‘with your whole body’. You don’t have to try to fix their problem or give your invaluable advice; just keep your mouth shut and be a better listener.

• Let go of the prejudices regarding mental health and issues.

• It is okay to feel what you feel. You don’t have to feel guilty about feeling the way you do. Do not beat yourself up for that. Never.

• Be careful about selecting the best alternatives for yourself. What works for Sidhartha may not work for you. And it’s okay. So, don’t hold on to things recommended by someone else and that is not working for you. It can be anything/anyone from a therapist to medication.

• Be careful about how you treat children around you and what you say in front of them. You may consider it negligible, but they will remember your words and how you made them feel for a lifetime.

There is just a lot of stuff that will remain untouched in this blog like details on depression, OCD, dealing with trolls, divorce, guilt, alcohol, etc. But you can always pick up this book if you want to know more. I will just end this discussion here with a few words of wisdom from Sid. 

If you are going through anything, then know that you are not alone. It is okay to seek help and lastly, no one is immune to mental health issues.

Happy Reading!

=========================

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Will see you in the next post. Till then buh-bye. Take Care. Peace. ☮

Sabarna Roy Materializes a Roller-coaster of Limitless Melancholic Illusions Using the Classical Tracks in a Hauntingly Creative Manner

 

Sabarna Roy Materializes a Roller-coaster of Limitless Melancholic Illusions Using the Classical Tracks in a Hauntingly Creative Manner

Book Review by Dhiraj Sindhi

Winter Poems by Sabarna Roy

Winter Poems by Sabarna Roy

Author: Sabarna Roy

ISBN: 978-9382473718

Genre: Poetry

Length: 60 Pages

Publication Date: 16^th July 2013

Publisher: Leadstart Publishing Private Limited

Book Editor: Surojit Mohan Gupta | LinkedIn: @surojit-mohan-gupta

Cover Background Painting: A Wet Afternoon in Kolkata by Arup Lodh

Painter: Instagram: @a.r.u.p.l.o.d.h

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3xzOWPm

About the author:

Sabarna Roy (46) is a qualified Civil Engineer from Jadavpur University, Kolkata. He works in a senior management position in a manufacturing and engineering construction company. He is widely travelled in India and lives in Kolkata with his family. He is an avid reader and a movie buff. He started writing during his university days, mostly English and Bengali poems. He stopped writing after he left university and took up employment. After a gap of 19 years, he started writing once again mostly to reconnect with himself. In the period of 19 years when he did not write, he spent his non-working hours reading, listening to music and watching world cinema. He loves reading Tolstoy, Chekhov, Rabindranath, Eliot, Manik Bandopadhyay Satyajit Ray, Kundera and Pamuk the most. He is hooked onto Mozart, Turkish and Egyptian music and M S Subbalaxmi. In cinema, his favourites are Aparajita, Pratidwandi, Rashomon, Eight and a Half, Breathless, Head-on, The Birds, The Godfather series, Vertigo, Sunset Boulevard, Sacrifice, Garam Hawa and Taare Zameen Par.

Celebrated Author Sabarna Roy bags Times Excellence Award 2021

Instagram: @authorsabarna

Website: www.sabarnaroy.com

Twitter: @authorsabarna

Disclaimer: This review is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

Winter Poems by Sabarna Roy is a collection of poetry divided into two parts, one of which comprises 12 long poems—Winter Poems 2010 and the other consists of 26 relatively shorter poems—Winter Poems 2012. As I often keep referring to Margaret Atwood’s words in my reviews, here too, I would say that once the book is out in the world, it’s the readers who decide the meaning of whatever is written. Sabarna Roy’s poetry in this collection has many layers to it. For some poems, I was able to peel off some layers of them. And for others, I wasn’t able to peel any layers of it, which, as a reader felt sort of frustrating that I couldn’t decode as in what hidden secrets or meanings I was missing on. In the following section, I have tried to convey what it felt like while reading this collection and I apologise already in case I get something wrong.

"This lake, mountain and moon are crumbling images inside a dream

Of another man - somebody else's dream - his last dream

Before he's dying drenched in a jelly of melancholy."

-From Winter Poems 2010 (no. 8, p-25)

I wouldn’t like to categorise these poems into distinct watertight compartments because the poems are spread across such a large canvas that it wouldn’t be fair to put tags on them. They each cater to many diverse and varied subjects or issues. Some of the many subjects that occur repeatedly are death, condemnation of industrialisation, impending war, love, being lost, childhood, games, loss, inequality, and the end of the world. 

For instance, the poet implicitly delivers the truth of death in a really creative way using figurative language and symbolism. ‘Shop in town…that sells your shadow’, ‘people are losing their shadows’, ‘a teenage girl hanging…in the air’ and ‘virus of light’—these are some of the usages of metaphorical and allegorical writing that add an unpleasant and poignant effect which helps depict the death. There is this amazing poem that I’d love to title ‘Love on the Road’ which powerfully defines a notion of home and what ‘home’ should be like. Which also simultaneously exudes emotions like loneliness, jealousy and challenges our decaying and cheap definitions of affection and sensuality. 

"You are the face of an ocean where I can drown endlessly

In my burning boats of thousand defeats."

-From Winter Poems 2012 (no. 1, p-35)

The one starting with ‘Glasses and utensils fell from the sky’ which is also the longest poem from the lot is my favourite too. Here, the poet uses poetic devices like hyperbole to create a dream-like world, giving it a dramatic effect and using an analogy, connecting it to the real world in a way that blurs the line between the two. The dreamy world is being inflicted with havoc as the narrator’s life is being destroyed. Another poem ‘Dream of a Dying Man’, is simply commendable. I am in awe of how magnificently Sabarna Roy has brought together surreal elements having nightmarish qualities.

The ‘Grassland Island’ poem challenges our notion of home again in a crooked manner. The poet uses allusion and symbolism to such an extent that it breaks its bond with reasoning; you just need to savour each line as you read while the narratives are turned and twisted at every other stanza. Moving onto the second part of relatively short poems, the poetic devices remain pretty much the same and the patterns continue. The poet has used the dreamy and illusory elements to their full potential. It feels as if the intensified emotions are being let out in a hauntingly creative and evocative manner. 

"Before I passed out and became sediment of ashes I saw a dream of billion coffins made of trees, metal and hydrocarbon fibres carrying unbundled skeletons of men, women, children and babies ballooning up in a smoke-filled sky."

-From Winter Poems 2010 (no.7, p-24)

There is gambling, there are ships, there is the writing of a book, there is the debris of a railway bridge, there are heaps of iron scrapings made out of crumbled ships and deluxe cars, there is a king travelling over the oceans on a speeding train and much more. Some of the poems followed this pattern (which I loved reading again and again) that made sense to me, while some of them did not make sense to me and felt absurd. As I mentioned earlier that once the book is out in the market, readers give it the meaning and here I just couldn’t do that. One thing that bothered me was that the poet chose vast canvases to paint his poetry that covered widely separated elements, which resulted in a disconnect with poetry and in itself. 

Happy Reading!

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Will see you in the next post. Till then buh-bye. Take Care. Peace. ☮

Numair Encapsulated Many Shades of Bangladesh in Bare Minimum Words Using Hair-raising, Allusive—His ‘Trademark' Narration

 

In His Short Stories, Numair had Encapsulated Many Shades of Bangladesh in Bare Minimum Words Using Hair-raising, Allusive—His ‘Trademark’ Narration 

Book Review by Dhiraj Sindhi

Taxi Wallah and Other Stories by Numair Atif Choudhury

Taxi Wallah and Other Stories by Numair Atif Choudhury

Author: Numair Atif Choudhury

ISBN: 978-9354892134

Genre: Collection of Short Stories

Length: 132 Pages

Publication Date: 17^th September 2021

Publisher: Fourth Estate India – An imprint of HarperCollins Publishers

Cover Art: Sarnath Banerjee

Cover Designer: Website: arts.mit.edu/ | Instagram: @sarnathbanerjee

Order your copy right now: https://amzn.to/3wxYOIX

About the author:

After studying creative writing at Oberlin College and the University of East Anglia, Dr. Numair Atif Choudhury did a Ph.D. from the University of Texas, Dallas. He had been working on Babu Bangladesh!, his epic first novel, for nearly fifteen years. Soon after completing the final draft, he passed away in an accident in 2018.

Numair Atif Choudhury

Disclaimer: This review is only intended for initiating discussions. The opinions and views presented in this article are my own and do not reflect anything about the book's author. 

REVIEW

Taxi Wallah and Other Stories is a collection of eleven short stories written by Late Numair Atif Choudhury that were published in different anthologies, print media and online forums throughout his writing career. The short stories are preceded by an introduction by his friend and another Bangladeshi-origin author—Nadeem Zaman. This introduction tells you how Numair’s first and only novel—Babu Bangladesh!—came to be published and a lot of other information about the author’s voice, language, the issues he chose to address and in which way, etc. The introduction also contains a sort of summary and a glimpse; a brief look into the study or the standard reading of each short story, which, in my opinion, was the best decision for the reasons you will come to know in the latter part of this review.

The introduction serves as the best review (not a critique) each story can have—what each story is trying to convey, what elements and devices are used, what characters are going through, why is it written, everything you could think of. That’s why I need not give you a summary of each story and review them separately for you. Instead, I will share my experience of reading this collection of short stories rather than a standard examination of different elements. 

(Note: You can read the Introduction by downloading the sample on your Kindle app or device. Introduction in the sample will introduce you to many of these short stories. Six out of eleven, to be precise.)

First of all, the writing style. The writing style for each story is unique with different narrators, language and narrative techniques. But there is something common in the output, which is—rubbing out paintings of day-to-day landscapes our eyes have become accustomed to and exposing the darkness of despairing and wretched reality behind those customary sights; faintly splattering the brightness of hope on this blackened canvas. This strand of hope can easily be seen in the stories titled ‘Crumble’ and ‘Chokra’. 

The second feature of his writing that I recognised is—dropping bombs of menace which creates a threatening effect amidst the serene and composed flow of writing, not breaking the flow, rather further paralysing the senses and stripping off readers of their beliefs and demystifying the crooked patterns of actual-world hidden behind the world of make-believe. Basically, the writer blurs the line between surrealism and realism to reveal a darker shade of reality as calmly as he could. ‘Different Eyes’ and ‘Asking Why’ are two such stories that epitomize this idea. 

The third and the last feature that we will be discussing in this review is—several stories in this collection are abstract on the face of it. You couldn’t start to imagine what message or moral this story is trying to implicitly convey, what is being concealed underneath all the devices, characters and conversations that we are reading. That is why I needed the help of the introduction to see the conclusion or the conceptualization that a particular story carries with it. ‘The Truth’ and ‘On the Way’ are those stories for which I had to get back to the introduction part. This is not bad at all, in fact, I propose every collection of short stories should start with such insightful an introduction.

Happy Reading!

=========================

Follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Don't forget to subscribe for more content. Thank you so much for reading!

Will see you in the next post. Till then buh-bye. Take Care. Peace. ☮