“There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight.” Did you like what you just read? I did, and how! Continue reading ““The art and craft of writing””
Tag: Authors
We had a wonderful time up at Lovedale earlier this month. As part of the 154th Founder’s Day celebrations at The Lawrence School, Lovedale ( where I studied between 1959 and 1967), a Book Reading Festival was organized for the first time for Old Lawrencians who had published books in recent years.
I was delighted to hear that the 154th Founder’s Day celebrations of my alma mater, The Lawrence School, Lovedale,would have a unique event this year. A Book Reading Festival has been organized in which Old Lawrencians who have written books in recent years would get an opportunity to show case their writing. On May 2 and May 3, five authors , including yours truly, will participate in this event which culminates in our formally presenting our books to the School Library.
In an earlier post, I wrote about an anthology of short stories from Unisun Publications called ” Only Men Please.” The book was formally launched on March 31, at a very well-attended function at The British Library at Bangalore. Annie Chandy Mathew and Meenakshi Varma, the people behind Unisun did a splendid job in arranging the function. Jagdish Raja, Shreekumar Varma , Mathew Vincent Menacherry and Jyoti Makhija read out extracts from some of the 35 short stories that make up this book.
After the book launch, we had an interesting debate. The topic being: “Do Men and Women Differ From Each Other In Their Writing?” Three writers whose short stories appear in the anthology represented the male viewpoint. They were Bangalore’s eminent theater personality, Jagdish Raja, the well-known Chennai -based writer Shreekumar Varma and Mathew Vincent Menacherry, co-founder and director of the Anthea Group. The women’s viewpoint was presented by a strong team of talented writers: Jahnavi Barua, Shinie Antony and Malathi Ramachandran. The content of the debate was interesting. Eminent writers, Shashi Deshpande and K R Usha contributed to the debate too, as did many enthusiastic members of the audience.
In my view, the choice of topics and the writing style, to some extent does differ but the hallmark of a great writer is being able to empathize and write from all points of view. If a male writer can describe the feelings and emotions of a female in a story just as well as a woman could, he would have done a great job. The same would be the case if a woman writer could do this about a male character in a story. There are many other aspects to be considered but I guess these very differences make for a wide variety of writing- and debate!
I first met T.G.C. Prasad more than twenty years ago when I was responsible for Corporate Human Resource Development in Wipro Corporation. It was my responsibility to manage the recruitment of freshly minted MBAs from the different graduate schools of business in India. He joined us as a topper from Mumbai’s prestigious Tata Institute of Social Sciences. I was delighted to read his book ” Unusual People Do Things Differently.” A disclaimer. No, he didn’t send me a copy for old times sake. I bought a copy like anyone else! Continue reading “Congratulations, T.G.C.Prasad!”
I owe this post to Musab bin Noor, a member of the “Fans of P.G.Wodehouse”, a group on Facebook. He posted this link to an awesome documentary from the BBC on the Life and Works of P.G.Wodehouse.
The documentary with a commentary by Sir Terry Wogan brought back innumerable happy memories, being a Wodehouse fan for nearly fifty years. The old names, the old books, the old stories, they were all there and more! I think this is a well-balanced documentary which makes for interesting viewing. yes, it’s rather long, lasting almost an hour but like many pieces of Wodehouse, you don’t have to relish it at one go. You could dip into it once in a while when you have the time to do so.
Many have called Wodehouse an unparalleled master of his craft. I couldn’t but agree more. His use of words and language, even more than the plots, made his stories such a pleasure to read.
What do authors do? Apart from writing, of course? Do they espouse causes? Do they have time for their non-literary interests? These questions came to me mind recently. By sheer co-incidence, I chanced upon this article in the Wall Street Journal about author, Steve Berry. Continue reading “Great work, Steve Berry”
Article first published as “P.G.Wodehouse-A Life In Letters” Edited by Sophie Ratcliffe on Technorati. I am eagerly awaiting this new book, based on letters written by P.G.Wodehouse, edited by Sophie Ratcliffe.
Article first published as Booker Prize 2011 Goes To Julian Barnes on Technorati. There was a lot of debate this year about the criteria for judging the winner of the coveted Booker Prize. The results are out and the Booker Prize for 2011 goes to Julian Barnes.
Just because I love Words…
Words are particularly difficult little creatures to organise. They have minds of their own and will misbehave if not treated with respect. Some of them have inferiority complexes! Usually, the large words engage the writer’s efforts. Then the little words feel ignored. Out of spite they will change the sense of something so subtly. This is why, out of politeness, I try to court them by avoiding the larger and more impressive words that strut across the page creating the illusion of self-importance. Continue reading ““Words” : Guest Post by Dr. Niamh Clune”
Prem Rao : Stories from a Story Teller 