Bookwatch
BY ANITA JOSHUA
Rabble-Rouser for Peace: The Authorised Biography of Desmond Tutu, John Allen, Random House, price not stated.
"TUTU continued to crave more time for meditation and prayer. But this longing conflicted with many other impulses... the attractions of the money to be earned on the speaking circuit; ...his enjoyment of the limelight..." Would a comment like this have made it into a biography of South African leader and Nobel Laureate Desmond Tutu had the biographer been an Indian?
Unlikely. For, Indians tend to eulogise and turn biographies of even living persons into obituaries; whitewashing the warts that make up any human being. But, John Allen — while obviously being in awe of the man he is chronicling — is candid enough to portray him as he is: a mortal with his fair share of weaknesses.
In Rabble-Rouser for Peace, Allen brings to the book inside information gathered during his long association with Tutu; first as his press secretary and then as Communications Director of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Add to this the fact that Allen was for long the religion correspondent for a major South African daily and was, therefore, familiar with the church politics including "intrigue behind his [Tutu's] rise through the hierarchy of the Church".
Tracing the life of Tutu from South Africa's poverty-stricken black township on to the world's centre stage, the biography also doubles up as an account of the struggle against apartheid as the bishop's life was co-terminus with the movement. And, unlike the two other great 20th Century catalysts for social change — Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. — Tutu and Nelson Mandela not only got a chance to usher in a new era, but also live long enough to see it evolve; faults et al.
Ode to 'Singledom'
Chasing the Good Life: On Being Single, edited by Bhaichand Patel, Viking, Rs. 325.
IT is a club that's growing, but one that society is yet to come to terms with. Though there is a growing acceptance of personal choice and the decision of individuals to live outside the fixed parameters of society, being unattached is a status that evokes mixed response; ranging from pity to comments about the singleton's morals.
Be that as it may, this is a "phenomenon" that cannot be wished away however much it may challenge social mores. And, now it's a reality worthy enough to be written about, not just as features in lifestyle sections of newspapers but in the book format that has a longer shelf life.
The experiences of 28 singles — a large number of them Delhi-based — have been put together by the once-married-but-now-single Bhaichand Patel in Chasing the Good Life: On Being Single. If anything, this book reveals that the definition of `single' is not confined to the unmarried.
Featured here are Khushwant Singh — whose wife died some time back — Sheela Reddy who lives in Delhi with her daughter as her husband is on a government posting elsewhere, divorcee Humra Quraishi... Each has narrated personal encounters with questioning glances and piercing queries, some have conceded the challenges without being apologetic, and together they present "singledom" as a happy station of life.
Reality bytes
Midway Station: Real-life Stories of Homeless Children, Lara Shankar, Penguin, Rs. 150. >Midway Station: Real-life Stories of Homeless Children, Lara Shankar, Penguin, Rs. 150.
BABY HALDER appears to be spawning a new genre of writing. Or, lets put it this way: The success tasted by her book has given publishers enough reason to invest some money in stories of people like Baby Halder who barely exist on the periphery of society.
For, each hapless destitute child working as a domestic servant or an assistant in a tea stall/ tyre repair shop — the seemingly omnipresent Raju/ Chhottu/ Bahadur — has a heart-rending story to narrate. Still, no one ever took note. Not that things are going to change overnight; now that some of these stories are finding their way into books; the latest being Midway Station by child rights activist Lara Shankar.
In this book, Shankar documents the stories of 11 destitute children living in shelters run by either the Government or Non-Government Organisations in the Capital. None of these stories tell anything new, but hopefully they will make people stop turning a Nelson's eye to their plight. What adds impact to the narrative is that Shankar has recorded the stories of the 11 children as it was narrated to her. Except for putting the narrative in English, the author does not seem to have tinkered much with the stories, thereby retaining their stark detail.
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