Sudeshna Bora > Recent Status Updates

Starting the 1900s with Lord Curzon and partition of Bengal.It was nice to see Assam featuring for the first time.Though,the reason for it is sad(merging of bengal royalty,silchar) with Assam,which still is a thorn to homogeneity.It was interesting to see the full fledged "paper revolution",though not surprising that the British could bribe and control the narrative.
Also, his bengal focus will be a problem, I feel.

The struggle for this book continues.
Though I want to finish it , I don't think I will appreciate it.
Mrs. Schmidt's divaness and how everyone reacted to it was interesting.
I can't wait for Irimias to finally enter the scene.

Surprised by how high the ratings are, using it as a palette cleanser as stuck in the other books.

Very difficult language. Really struggling to read past chapter 4.

Did I expect this?No.I wanted to know how she thinks.A woman who captures nuances so beautifully, does not dwell in grayness at all and maybe that makes me lonely.
She also seems mum about the gossip of her love interest.It is amusing to see how she makes her life,her brothers and her parents life open book but shrouds her lovers into secrecy(only the part related to her is shown).In this way, she is like me.

It actually amuses me how much her "immoral" behaviour affects me. I see she refusing to address her trauma as someone who is less evolved than I am, and that unnerves me. I find her affairs to be too jarring and that makes her inferior to me. Nonetheless, I stand corrected. She does have insight , she has introspected and healed. She just chooses to keep her emotion distant from what she is narrating.

I am struggling again.Not struggling to go through the pages of the book (like all the other 7 books) but struggling to accept how broken my hero is. She has an affair with the husband of her boss. She does not seem sad, she seems detached, emotionless as well. The oone before this I struggled was how horrible her mother was and how okay she was with it .

I have accepted that this is more of Arundhati's memoir than her mother. What a hustler she is. It is first time I am reading the real life struggle of a lower class working class woman in India.

Some books just pull you in and Arundhati does it once again. I have had be struggling with reading for years now and just find this book irresistible. Arundhati is messy, confused but she has lived life and now I know why she is what she is. What a life and she is not even 25 yet.

By the time I reached this page,I was sure I hated Mrs. Roy,the horrible mother. She has been eclipsed by her horridness. But, Arundhati continues loving her,being grateful to her. I cheered when Arundhati broke free when she became her and no longer an organ-child. Though I feel this book is slowly turning into her memoir, which makes me sad. I don't want my favourite author to have a memoir already. Page turner.

As much as I appreciate the information , the timeline and even his opinion. The extreme glorification of Bengal and bashing of INC is becoming a bit boring. Don't get me wrong, I truly believe Bengal played humongous role but to completely keep on nullifying INC role and super highlighting the negative (and then not acknowledging that the reaction to INC led to nationalism movement) is very annoying.

I wonder how it must feel to friends with a writer and to see your shadow in the characters of her book.
Also, her family was very very affluent by that life's standard.

You start chapter 3 and you are transported to the world of The God of Small Things - the same greenery, the same chaos among the family, and Velutha. But you realise though she has used her life to create the world of God of Small Things; the story is fiction (not caste based violence she lived through, no murder of velutha and no incest).

Chapter 2: But at the same time, I am annoyed by how dismissive Arundhati is about the abuse she endured. I do understand why , as she said "Her life is a footnote to the world" ; what she has gone through is insignificant but is that the truth ? Anyway, I am ready for the ride that Arundhati is promising.

Chapter 2: I seem to have moved on from being amazed by Mary , to being shocked at her "abuse". Is it abuse if the victim don't consider it such . I love their journey , her hustle but I wonder do I like her journey cause it is a "supposed trainwreck" that didnot wreck or cause I genuinely appreciate such chaotic people. Nonetheless, the more I read about her, the more I realise why Arundhati is ok with the chaos .

Chapter 1: I didnot know Mary was such a path breaker reformist and the moment I knew, it all made sense. The coin dropped or was it the other shoe dropped and it all made sense. For me Mary is the blazing light whereas Arundhati is the firefly.

Chapter 1 : I am a fan of the way Arundhati writes, more so her fiction than are non fiction. She is this firecracker person who weaves stories out of nothingness. But for me, Arundhati was this crazy woman , I never cared to think was it "nurture" or "nature". Till I met Mary. Mary eclipses Arundhati and at the same time explains why Arundhati is the way she is. This first chapter introduces me to Mary ,her success.

So we know were we are. In an absurd village, people are confused, some are slimy on top of that. 2 people presumed dead (who acted very slavish in the office and hero in here are back).

Chapter 3 took me back to where I was in Chapter 1. First, I am happy that the bell ringing was not a hallucination. The doctor heard it as well. The atmosphere of rot, confusion, being stuck, ugliness continues in this chapter. The doctor is a very unique character. I was blown away by the idea that to be able to capture things perfectly, we cannot live. We need to be frozen, not introducing any randomnesss.

I am curious if he would continue using communism throughout or it was just a very ill placed beginning of the book.
If former, I wonder what the narrative he wants to set.
He did use simple clear words for RSS whereas shrouded Communism in fractions, abstract words etc.

Coming to the preface, the writing seemed impersonal . I would have liked to see a bit of the motivation of the author, his journey to gather information etc (used to see the passion behind the authors of such books). Additionally, he has mentioned it is not going to be exhaustive but would pick and choose certain events without informing the readers the criteria for it.

Preface : Very surprised that the author somehow picked up Indian Communism to draw a parallel. I don't understand the need for this and it seemed sudden. Additionally, he tried to use communism and its state as a way to highlight how more successful RSS became without giving Communism a fair shot.

The second part ties this chapter with the first one. What surprised me is how different the personality of Petrina and Irimias were in the outside world compared to the office. Here, they are prone to anger, prone to violent threats. Also, finally these people are the people who the villagers were talking about. I also was surprised the disdain they felt towards the villagers.

This chapter is divided into two parts. The first part is a Kafka-esque bureaucratic nightmare of two characters. What struck out for me was the attitude of the characters (more on it later) and how no one knew what they were doing but were full of jargons. I really struggled with this part cause I just don't know where it was going. The sentence structure is also absurd, it goes on and on.

The first chapter shows a bunch of poor people(?) stuck in a dead city. There is a merging of reality and fiction. I guess the landowner is back and they know they are caught and so are hopeless. Weirdly even though the city is dead, apparantly there are people coming her to settle.
Very confused , and feel like missing out on the core.

Reading this after he has been presented with the nobel prize. Sky high expectation but feel very foolish reading this book. I feel like , I am not getting the beauty of the book. Every page seems to mean more than most probably it is. I don't want to miss out.

I liked how oblivious to social repercussions , Nirmal was.

On second thought, I think Souroshi will grow into me. Maybe I will start seeing her as a strong lady, who strength is not how Kamal was or I wanted her to be.

Nonetheless, I am enjoying the book. It is written like a simple nice story. It highlights the hypocrisy and the selfishness of the bengali society.
The zamindar is fun. I know it is his redemption arc story so let's enjoy.
A very simple sweet story that is not pathbreaking for me. Maybe it would have been if I read it as a teen.
Heim's character was the quintessential sarat female character though.

There was only 1 moment where I really appreicated her. Where she was firm in her opinion that she is not letting go off the sourashi position even if she has let her house.
I don't like her, she seems the sacrificial, quiet lady. Also being moved the moment she saw her husband was very annoying.

Sarat Chandra is the author that introduced me to the feminist or women's pov in literature. Kamal is still the strongest character I have seen so , forgive me, if I say I am really struggling with Souroshi.

I am not sure what to make of her. She is the typical, keep quiet, emotional woman who is so driven by her emotion that she does not think of consequences but then looses her head over the said consequence.