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This week at Fountainhead
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The Maid's Request
Michele Desbordes
Faber and Faber
Rs. 653
TRANSLATED FROM the French, this tale of a Sixteenth Century artist and his servant is as exquisite as any famed fresco, castle, garden or painting of that glorious period — full of magical lights and shadows that take away one's breath. At the end of a mere 150 pages, the reader has travelled in the life of a master artist as well as the times he worked in; his genius as well as the living tradition of art is almost a palpable presence in the book.
In European mode, the tone of the narration is sombre and slow, and everything, including the weather, the landscape and the emotions of the characters is grave, as if under the weight of life's sadness and frailty; the prose is literal and lyrical.
"Autumn passed, gray and warm; the first rains came in December with the west winds, from the horizon the clouds gathered over the town and all of a sudden burst on the rooftops, on the grey river where the waves ran. They thought of the winter to come, of the end of everything."
The narration is gripping, perfectly poised on an edge — revealing just that little bit, while hinting at much — and the plot-centered around a single moment when the faithful servant makes a request to her master — is a web going in and out, back and forth, taut to the last. And till the very end, the suspense remains; when the servant actually makes her request, we realise it could only have been that.
A wonderful read, timeless, perfect.
Ghaffar Khan
Nonviolent Badshah of the Pakhtuns
Rajmohan Gandhi
Rs. 325
A PENGUIN Lives series book, Ghaffar Khan, like its companion titles, is succinct but carefully inclusive, and, exciting — at least as far as any novice is concerned.
As one reads, one realises that the Frontier Gandhi played a larger role in a vaster arena than popular piturisation of him as a Gandhi chela show. The Pakhtuns' role in the freedom struggle and their sense of betrayal following Partition all come through and the book is deeply moving at times.
As far as the general reader is concerned there is plenty in this book to keep going, so many little anecdotes, comments, situations and their fall out, which might well be beyond reach in other sources. For instance, asked why Nehru accepted the Partition Plan, Ghaffar Khan offers two explanations: "the influence of Lord and Lady Mountbatten" and "more than that, keenness to receive power".
Fascinating behind-the scenes glimpses of those turbulent times appears on page after page and Rajmohan Gandhi looks at the life of Badshah Khan "with the spectacles of today rather than those of 1947" emphasising how the life of this man is inspiring for the 21st Century.
Like the others in the series, if you aren't an expert on the topic, a worth while buy.
The Madman's Tale
John Katzenbach
Bantam Press
Rs. 625
JOHN KATZENBACH used to be a criminal court reporter for The Miami Herald and Miami News and has authored several books. This one is a little lengthy and though its plot with a schizophrenic narrator, who witnessed a crime twenty years earlier and relives it in the present, haunted by hallucinations, fears and numbing anxiety, appears exciting, it often loses itself in the sea of words.
The Denver Post however, praises the book "The Madman's Tale is a book full of nicely rendered psychological twists..the challenge in any thriller is to create a cast that steps beyond two dimensions to capture reader interest and sympathy. Katzenbach.. accomplishes this goal."
Stiff
Mary Roach
Viking
Rs. 819
THE SUBTITLE of this book reads "The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers" and if you think it's symbolic or something, the joke's on you for it's in deadly earnest. In the 305 pages of this surprisingly entertaining book, Mary Roach, who "..adopts the Michael Moore approach to the unliving" is writing of things like surgery on the dead, body snatching, human decay, human crash test dummies, crucifixion experiments and more and much more to do with human cadavers.
Roach (oh boy, a "roach" writing about human cadavers!) has an immensely readable style and she instils dead bodies and death with a lightness and humour that could have been hard to work up. She not only describes corpses in segments - heads, hands, legs, and brains — with the most fascinating details but also tells you her reactions and others' reactions to all this business of leaving "no corpse unturned"!
A humanising book, a great investment. If you can afford to, buy it.
KALA KRISHNAN RAMESH
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