His birth-star glittered in the night sky. That day again.
The sell-sword felt his years. Every one of them. They had removed the arrows and dressed the wounds. Yet they still burned his flesh, more deeply tonight than on any other. As an old crone once said “A warrior carries his battles with him.”
He did.
Each scar. Each blow.
Continue reading ‘The Birthday Post’
Share
Potol Babu Filmstar is one of Satyajit Ray’s greatest short-stories.
Its main thesis is that in theater or in cinema, there is nothing like an insignificant role; a truly skilled artist, even if given one word of dialog, can make it memorable.
Sanjay Kapoor is one of our greatest actors. His main thesis is similar.
“Only Indians are bothered about the length of a role instead of its impact,” complains Sanjay Kapoor. [Link]
Very right. As in movies and as in life length does not matter. What matters is whether you can hit, with searing impact that spot which is the nerve-center of all pleasure.
Yes I am talking about the heart.
ShareYes it can’t get more blatant than that. My next novel “The Mine” (publisher: Westland, 290 pages) is now available for pre-order. (Links to some fine stores on the left-hand-side). For those of you too lazy emm too tired to move your eyes a few pixels to the left, here is a link to the Flipkart order-page.
For those who do not yet know that I have written a second book, I have. After my first novel “May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss”, I felt the need to move as much away as the MIHYAP-RTDM world as possible and try something different. Which is why I put on weight like Vidya Balan did for “Dirty Picture” and explored something totally out of, to use a phrase made popular by Guru Greg, my comfort zone. Thus was born “The Mine”, a psychological-horror thriller, based on an idea I have had for years.
Continue reading ‘The Mine Now Available For Preorder’
Share
Like love, it is difficult to define wannabeness. You just know when you see it. Like when beefcake Akashdeep Saigal, of Big Boss, insists that he be called SkyWalkR. Like when Sreesanth speaks with an accent on Love2HateU but another, the real one, comes out from time to time, like a torn Lux baniyaan strap peeping out from behind that Louis Vuitton.
This brainless, thoughtless me-too-ness with aspersions of coolness—-ooh the humanity.
Yes I know I am sounding like one of those old men who sit on park benches and rail against the world.
I understand that perhaps wearing trousers in place of dhotis was considered wannabeness once upon a time.
I also remember that when I was in high school, the legendary Anjan-Babu of South Point High School made me rap in the staff-room, dubbing me “The Baba” because I had publicly announced my admiration for Baba Sehgal, something considered then to be the height of wannabeness.
And finally I consider myself a progressive person who understands the inevitability of the proverbial generation gap.
But despite it all, some things, some things, just still keep grating away at me like nails on chalk.
So here they are—the wannabe, most infuriating trends of the year. Agree with me. Or I will poke you in the eye with my Mahendra Lal Dutt black umbrella.
Cause you are in my corner of the park.
Continue reading ‘The Wannabe Trends of 2011′
Share
India has been blessed with great talents in the 90s, pace bowlers breathing hell, fire and brimstone. There was Srinath, of the whippy action, who would throw his hands up in the air whenever the ball was creamed past point with a “I would have caught that you slow-moving fielder” and seemed to be still grumbling about it, as he round-armed his throws from the deep. There was Prasad with his slow and slower ball about whom it has been said that many of his deliveries, like light from distant stars, have not yet reached the batsman many years after he released them from his fingers. There was Debashish Mohanty, all gangly arms and legs, Harvinder Singh, Abey Kuruvilla, Doda Ganesh, David Johnson, Thiru Kumaran—a line of carving stations at a sumptuous Vegas buffet, that would get batsmen from across the world melting in their own saliva.
And yet above of all them was this one man. A colossus. A legend. My personal favorite.
Sir Aggie.
Continue reading ‘The Legend of Sir Aggie’
Share
This means you are not allowed to copy, in part or in its entirety, any part of this blog and use it in your blog, article, "email forward" or any other non-commercial creative work unless you give me credit and provide the original URL. Any use of material in this blog for commercial purposes requires my explicit permission. If in doubt as to what constitutes fair use, please contact me
R