My review of 2012

So another year is coming to an end. Every year I look back on the past 12 months, to review my cultural and intellectual activities. It is a useful exercise to reflect on all that one has done and to relate it to other real-time happenings during the year; a rite of passage in the form of taking stock of one`s life at the turn of the year. As usual, let me start with the books:

Books

1) The London Train by Tessa Hadley – ISBN 9780099552260 – Vintage p/b 2012 – © T H 2011 – 324 pp = an unhappy young middle class woman, a teacher turned library assistant married to a high ranking Home Office civil servant in charge of immigration (a lot of interesting detail about the working of the system and contemporary British society) takes up with a middle-aged man with the sexual appetite and morals of the 1960s generation going through a menopausal phase, who is having domestic and family problems of his own and who finds himself involved with his pregnant daughter`s Polish boyfriend and his sister – (note: during this period (Jan-Feb), I went through a whole collection of books by way of research for my paper on Naipaul & Theroux and so the first two books provided some light reading).

2) Before I go to Sleep by S J Watson – ISBN 9780552164122 – Black Swan p/b 2011 – © Lola Communications 2011 – 372 pp = much hyped best seller but hugely disappointing.

3) Our Lady of Alice Bhatti by Mohammed Hanif – ISBN 9780224082051 h/b – Jonathan Cape 2011 – © M Haniff 2011 – 231 pp = satirical tale of the eponymous lady`s rise and fall from her lowly status of Pakistan`s `untouchable` Christian minority `chhoora` community in Karachi, through her struggles to stay true to her professional training as a nurse in the male dominated environment of her work place and of the wider society, with a sharply observed insight into the workings of the police and the criminal world.

4) The Kindness of Women by J G Ballard – ISBN 0 00 654701 X – `The Sequel to the Empire of The Sun`- Flamingo p/b 1994 – first published by Harper-Collins – © JGB1991 – 348 pp = a frank fictionalized account of his turbulent life, much of which formed the basis of his earlier Empire epic.

5) The Finkler Question by Howard Jacobson – ISBN 978 1 4088 0993 8 – Bloomsbury p/b 2011 - © HJ 2010 – 370 pp = on being Jewish in Britain, warts and all – narrowly focused but very revelatory and entertaining even if a bit too long with too much dialogue; proof of what I have always believed, that one should be able to judge a work of literature on its merit without having to like the author!

6) Britain etc: The Way We Live and How We Got There by Mark Easton – © M E 2012 – ISBN 978-0-85720-142-3 – Simon & Shuster p/b – 328 pp = an encyclopaedic journey across British society grounded in historical perspectives and factual information – an easy reference tool.

7) Mrs Robinson`s Disgrace: The Private Diary of a Victorian Lady by Kate Summerscale – ISBN 978 1 4088 1241 9 – Bloomsbury h/b – © K S 2012 – 303 pp = by the author of The Suspicions of Mr Whicher which I had thoroughly enjoyed in 2009; this is also a forensic study - of the downfall of a middle-class woman in mid-19th century Victorian Britain by the evidence of her own diary played out in one of the early divorce cases heard in the English High Court – with a mass of factual and historical detail about the social and cultural mores of the period – not as gripping as Mr Whicher but full of anticipatory excitement nevertheless.

8) The Lower River by Paul Theroux – ISBN 978-0-241-14532-6 (h/b) – Hamish Hamilton – © PT 2012 – 323 pp = powerful narrative, full of despondency and despair, of a journey of self-discovery into the past represented by the present of a Central African nation steeped in the culture of corruption, hunger and dependency (separately reviewed below on this blog and at http://www.nilejournal.net/archive/all/2012/8)

9) Light on Snow by Anita Shreve – ISBN 0-316-00103-1 (p/b) – BlackBayBooks – © AS 2004 – 305 pp = an emotionally engaging, absorbing family and rite-of-passage novel narrated by a precocious 12-year-old on the verge of early womanhood who is left to look after her widowed father following the tragic death of her mother (his wife) and baby sister in a car accident in NYC; the two of them move to the isolation of a New Hampshire village and in the wintry landscape discover an abandoned freshly born baby whom they rescue but then find themselves in a quandary when the mother turns up and all kinds of moral, legal and personal dilemmas and issues arise – the author unfolds and navigates this plot with deftness, sympathy and minute detail – a good, light read.

10) The Man Within My Head by Pico Iyer – ISBN 978 1 4088 2875 5 – Bloomsbury h/b – © P I 2012 – 238 pp = its subtitle Graham Greene, My Father and Me is the giveaway theme and focus of the book: a mix of personal memoir and history tracing an extraordinary literary journey across time and space, charting the connection between his real father and the eponymous one in his head, and his own creative flowering - born and raised in Oxford where his father was in situ as a distinguished academic figure and where Greene`s presence was a background reality that he imbibed and couldn`t shake off even as the family moved to California - that continued through his teenage years of schooling as a boarder at Eton and commuting across the Atlantic, which no doubt gave him the travel bug that has lasted to this day - he is not shy about name-dropping, of people and places (except Eton, which he only identifies by name much later in the narrative) he has encountered across the world in the last 3 to 4 decades - above all, it is an exploration of Greene`s life and works. Iyer `s own early work `Video Nights in Khatmandu` had made a huge impression on me in 1990.

11) The Summons by John Grisham – ISBN 9780099406136 – Arrow Books p/b – 391pp – © Bodfrey Holdings Inc 2002 = a holiday read on the trip to Canada/USA; being there made a lot of sense of the physical details and social environment – an inconclusive and ambivalent ending nevertheless, with a possible sequel to follow!

12) So Much For That by Lionel Shriver – ISBN 978-0-00-727108-5 – Harper p/b – 531pp – © LS 2010 - began reading this while in US (finishing it back here) which made immediate sense there - staying with physician friend had lots of conversations about the American health care system, about insurance and lack of it, about the soaring costs of treatment, about doctors, lawyers and pharmaceuticals and their practices and ethics etc – the central character in the novel is a well-to-do utility engineer who is suddenly confronted with the news that his wife has cancer and all his carefully planned retirement plans are put in jeopardy - a very gripping narrative; instructive and informative. Shriver is the prize-winning author of We need to talk about Kevin. She does not spare her reader: all the turmoil created by the wife`s condition is examined in depth, but more than that we discover how the American way of life is dominated by health-related concerns. There is a lot more in the book - a great deal of medical and other technical detail (eg. about the `handyman` trade) and also about the man`s finances - how, with all the add-ons and co-payments, his nest-egg of investments shrinks from some $731,000+ to $3,500 in a year, despite having the benefit of his employers` insurance. Right at the beginning we learn of his plans to retire to what he considers to be an idyllic existence on the island of Pemba, which of course then go awry. The book is a bit difficult to get into, but after the first 30 pages it gets better. Shriver too is a writer whose politics and personality I dislike thoroughly, but as observed in relation to Jacobson (see 5 above), this was another test of my view that the work of an author should be judged on its own merit regardless of such other factors.

13) The Masque of Africa: Glimpses of African Belief by V S Naipaul – ISBN 978-330-47205-0 HB – Picador – © VSN 2010 – 325 pp = an ageing genius`s return to the `dark` continent; sharply observant, questioning, analysing, discursive; he engages, informs and shocks the reader with what he finds - basically that Christianity and Islam and European imperialism and its post-colonial legacy have not wiped out African prehistory, only conflated together to produce another culture as yet in the making – during his travels through Uganda, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Gabon and South Africa – while some preconceptions are strengthened, others are laid bare – this is travel writing with a mission!

14) Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan - ISBN 9780224097376 (h/b) – Jonathan Cape – © IM 2012 – 320 pp = an engaging trip into the world of spies and spinsters of the 1970s – a lot of period and political detail with several plotlines cleverly woven together to form a credible narrative.

15) Joseph Anton by +Salman Rushdie – ISBN 9780224093972 (h/b) – Jonathan Cape – © SR 2012 – 636 pp – separately reviewed below on this blog.

16) The Casual Vacancy by J K Rowling – ISBN 978-1-4087-0420-2 – Little Brown h/b – © JKR 2012 – 503 pp = Rowling`s first adult novel, after her immensely successful Harry Potter run, described in the blurb as a `big novel about a small town` - one is indeed instantly drawn into the fictional setting of a provincial community somewhere in the west country – the plot `Peyton Place` like, with a whole lot of characters whose lives are intimately connected with each other and are revealed in their rawness as events unfold. The critics made heavy weather of Rowling`s use of explicit language but it fits well into the narrative, though at times one is reminded that her prime appeal as the creator of Harry Potter has been to the adolescent reader - a gripping tale that wears off as she tries to round it off on a positive note.

Again, as usual, this is an eclectic collection. All of it represents my bedtime leisure and travel/or holiday reading that also includes the London Review of Books which remains part of my nightly routine. I have not included books unfinished or abandoned. Currently, I am reading `The Taliban Cricket Club` by T N Murari; more about it next year!

Films, Plays, Concerts etc

Jan – Odeon KT1 - `The Iron Lady` - aka Margaret Thatcher – moving bio-pic of her in old age

Jan – Vaudeville Th`tr, Strand – `Masterclass` - (Tyne Daly as Maria Callas) fine acting; great drama

Jan – RFH – Philharmonia Orchestra (cond: Esa-Pekka Salonen) Beethoven: Symphony No.5 +

Feb – Odeon KT1 - `The Artist` - this was the night of the Oscars; it won, and rightly so!

Mar - Epsom P/h - `The Help` - enchanting, gripping, evocative of 1950s US

Apr - ICA – `This is not a film` Dir: Jafar Panahi and Mojtaba Mirtahmasb (Iranian) - great

Apr – ICA - `This Must Be The Place` - (starring Sean Penn) rubbish, left after an hour!

Apr - South Bank Purcell Rm – “Shiraz & The Sabri Ensemble” – separately reviewed on this blog

Apr – South Bank QEH – “World Book Night” hosted by Hardeep Singh Kohli – enjoyable

May – Dorking Halls – City of London Freemen`s `Class Act 3` Music Concert – enjoyable – 7/10

May – Harold Pinter Th`tr – “South Downs/The Browning Version” (D Hare/T Rattigan double bill)- brilliant - 9/10

June – ICA – “Abosheshey = At the End of it All” (Dir: Aditi Roy; Bengali-English subtitles) – 4/10

July – Haymarket Cine – “Baishay Srabon = Seventh August” (Dir: Srijit Mukherji; - 3/10

(note: both the above, from the London Indian Film Festival, were rather disappointing)

July – The Barbican - `Desdemona` by Toni Morrison, Peter Sellars and Raka Traore` (with Tina Benko as Desdemona) – a musical masterpiece of a rendering, of an imaginative version of Shakespeare`s Othello with Morrison`s critical and literary gloss on it, beautifully performed by Rika Traore` and Tina Benko (+ supporting singers) with a huge emotional & conceptual depth – 9/10

Sep – Odeon KT1 - `Anna Karenina` (Keira Knightley, Dir: Joe Wright) – good - 7/10

Sep – RFH – Philharmonia O – con:E-P Salonen – incl B/hoven 1st PianoC + 9th Symphony – 8/10

Oct – OWE2 - “The Hunt” – a brilliant, gripping Danish film - London Film Festival – 8/10

Oct – OWE2 “Midnight`s Children” – simply great – London Film Festival – 9/10

Nov – Odeon KT1 – “Skyfall” – (the latest James Bond) – neither stirred, nor shaken! - 4/10

Nov – S/B Purcell Rm - `Undiscovered India` - Alif Laila (sitar) + Kousik Sen (tabla) –good - 7/10

Dec – ICA - `False Trail` Swedish, English subtitles, Dir by Kjell Sundvall. Starring Rolf Lassgård, Peter Stormare – detective drama, starts well but goes off the rails two-thirds way down – too violent at the end – disappointing – 5/10

Lectures, Talks, Events etc

1) 15/16 Feb – Dubai – 4th Biennial GSA Conference – presenting, participating, interacting - Q&A

2) 06 Mar – SOAS – MG Vassanji: “Burton, Speke and the Cutchi Bhatias” – Ch: Itesh Sachdev - Q&A

3) 15 Mar – RSA – Mark Easton on `Britain Etc` (ch: John Kampfner) - Q&A

4) 22 Mar – RSA – Adrienne Russell - `Networked: The news in transition`- Ch: Charlie Beckett - Q&A

5) 28 Mar – Senate Ho, London U – Dr Vijaya Teelock: `Reporting on The Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Mauritius (Ch: Dr Howard Jones, Inst of Com` Studies) - Q&A

6) 21 May – S/B Purcell Rm – Kate Sumerscale in conversation with Kathryn Hughes – Q&A

7) 06 Jun - RFH – Harry Belafonte (in conversation with Kirsty Lang) - simply superb

8) 14 Jun – Friends Ho, Euston – Mau Mau Justice Network mtg (noted in AwaaZ) - Q&A

9) 06 Jul – S/B: Spirit Level - `The Art of War` (panel: Michela Wrong + 2 others; ch: Bidisha) – Q&A

10) 10 Jul – S/B QEH – John Pilger (ch: Robin Denselow)– superb, riveting, informative!

11) 24 Jul – RSA – BBC “The Forum - The Big Five: Inequality” (Ch: Mary Robinson –
Panel: Prof Sir John Sulston, Tahmima Anam and Prof Lawrence Goldman)

12) 06 Sep – RSA – Gavin Esler: “Lessons from the Top” (ch: Joe Hallgarten) - Q&A

13) 20 Sep – RSA – “The Olympic Review: One man`s struggle against sporting hysteria” –Nicholas Lezard (Guardian critic – chair: Sam Leith, Lit Ed. Daily Telegraph) - Q&A

14) 03 Oct – Asia Ho – “London`s Radical South Asian Writers` - Retro Style” (Wasafiri Event - Ch: Sushila Nasta; panel: Bidisha, Daljit Nagra, Shyama Perera) - 2/10

15) 11 Oct – RSA 1 pm – “How to De-Spin a Party Conference” Eliane Glaser (ch: S Tall)

16) 15 Oct – RFH - “Man Booker Prize Readings” (ch: Jim Naughtie) – great – 9/10 - Q&A

17) 5 Nov – Br Lib Sth Asian Lit Festival – “Exploring India: The Story of a Nation” – panel: Michael Wood, Patrick French, Roy Moxham, Alex von Tunzelmann; ch: Salil Tripathi - 8/10 - Q&A

18) 6 Nov – Royal Com`Soc – “Exodus 40: Ugandan Asians in Britain Symposium” – panel:
Giles Foden, Kamlesh Madhvani, Yasmin A-Brown, Tarique Ghaffur (intro: Bhavik Mehta) – 7/10 - Q&A

19) 9 Nov - Br Lib SALF – “Making of an Empire: Mark of the Mughals on South Asia” – panel: John Keay, Timeri Murari, Susan Stronge, ch: Fergus Nicoll - 8/10 - Q&A

20) 26 Nov – Br Lib SALF - `From The Ruins of Empire` - Pankaj Mishra / Michael Wood

21) 28 Dec – Br Lib Exhb: `Mughal India-Art, Culture and Empire` – nothing new - 6/10

Foreign Travel

Out of the three trips abroad this year, the first was to Dubai for the GSA Conference, followed by a couple of days in Muscat – all a rather pleasant introduction to that part of the world – see also my write-up on that further down in this blog.

In August we visited Canada and the US, spending quality time with friends in Calgary and Milwaukee. From Calgary we also drove out to Edmonton and return via a couple of days in the Rockies which made a pleasant interlude. Likewise from Milwaukee we took day trips out to nearby places, including one to Madison, a pleasant university town.

In October, I made a short trip to Kenya – a couple of days in Mombasa and six in Nairobi – a very enjoyable return to the country of my birth on the occasion of a family wedding, meeting up with old friends and professional colleagues.

General

This year then is a continuation of the past eight, since my retirement. It has been fairly good and productive. I was particularly pleased with my paper on Naipaul and Theroux`s writings on India (Paul T liked it too!). My other researches and writings have also kept me busy throughout the year. This pattern may of course change as the ageing process takes its toll. Even so, 2012 has had a nice sound-feel; 2013 will be a little harder! For now however a happy new year to all!

RAMNIK SHAH
(c) 2012
Surrey, UK

Salman Rushdie aka Joseph Anton

Joseph Anton by Salman Rushdie – ISBN 9780224093972 (h/b) – Jonathan Cape – © SR 2012 – 636 pp

I remember vividly the day the Ayatollah Khomeini pronounced his death sentence, the `fatwa`, on Salman Rushdie on 14 February 1989, because on that day I was actually reading The Satanic Verses while lying on my hospital bed, undergoing tests for a suspected heart attack. Verses had been published in late 1988 with a fanfare of publicity and a spate of reviews, many of them quite hostile. When the fatwa was announced, there was a flurry of activity at all levels, and Rushdie was rushed into hiding by Scotland Yard`s special branch team (the prot) assigned to protect him from Iranian state sponsored assassins. One of the very first demands they made of him was to find a pseudonym for himself, `pretty pronto` with the advice `not make it an Asian name`! And so he came up with an amalgam of Conrad`s and Chekhov`s first names: Joseph Anton, now adopted by him as the title of his memoir of those years of his wilderness following the fatwa.

And so Joseph Anton (JA) became Salman Rushdie`s alter ego in very special circumstances. The standard catchphrase or acronym aka (also known as) may not therefore be quite apt, because JA was not `known` to be Rushdie`s other name - the world did not know of the connection between the two - rather it was an imaginative creation of Rushdie`s fertile mind. But the net result was the same: Rushdie adopted the name JA to shield his real identity – it was a masquerade. One of his early discoveries was that as a throwback to the adverse publicity about the book, he `was no longer the Salman his friends knew but the Rushdie who was the author of Satanic Verses, a title subtly distorted by the omission of the initial The. The Satanic Verses was a novel. Satanic Verses were verses that were satanic, and he was their satanic author`.

At 636 pages then, this is the longest book, as well as the weightiest (and, for 5 weeks of bedtime reading, physically the awkwardest to handle) I have read this year. It is also the most gripping and reads like a thriller, even though you know it is not a work of fiction and what the ending is. Beginning with the fateful events of Valentine`s Day 1989, Rushdie recounts everything that followed in meticulous slow motion, interspersed with reflections on his life back and forth across time and space - his family background and childhood in India, his unhappy years at Rugby and the more relaxed and fulfilling time at Cambridge, and his emergence as a writer of eminence and controversy. He is brutally frank about his past, his parents and siblings, his marriages and affairs, his relationships with his children, his literary friends and publishers, his `prot` team, and indeed all and sundry (with a lot of name-dropping) with whom he interacted during the period covered in the book.

It is not thus just a memoir but also a work of autobiography. We learn a great deal about him, his inner self, of course, but also about the politics of publishing and diplomacy, about the intricacies and intrigues of state protection for high profile individuals, about the world of literature and literary giants and prizes, and about the genesis of each of his own masterpieces. So full marks for his long-awaited self-portrait. It is rich in colour, extraordinary in detail about places and events, utterly frank about people, and makes no apology for the book that was the cause of his travails. I shall leave it at this for now; more may follow later.

RAMNIK SHAH
(C) 2012
Surrey, UK