Nov-Dec 2014 Vol 4 Issue 6 64 pages
Editorial
short fiction essays verse reviews And so to the end of another year... Reading Hour has, in its four years of existence, published more than 200 writers, if our database is to be believed! Several of these were first-time writers, many were published writers and of course, several wrote multiple times for us. We thank all of them for being part of the Reading Hour family. This past year, we launched a monthly event at a friendly neighbourhood bookstore in Bangalore, wherein we invite a 2 or 3 member panel to chat about a particular theme connected with the writing craft, or a genre. The events have been quite lively. We’ve had a crime special, a mythology special, a discussion on writing, literary and otherwise, on unforgettable characterisation… we even had a panel with a humour writer and a psychiatrist-cum-standup comedian, which threw up questions of whether psychology training can help writing! Questions that are also raised in our interview this time, with Vijay Padaki, a theatre old-timer who has done ‘very many different things’ in his 5 decades of active involvement. Being a somewhat reluctant traveller myself I am amazed at how some people zip blithely about the world... take the case of G Karunakar, a retired advocate, who has visited more than a hundred countries! And solo. He recounts an unforgettable visit to Abu Simbel, Egypt in this issue. And yet another veteran traveller, Sreelata Menon, who is as passionate about history as about writing, describes a ‘feel-good’ sojourn in Sri Lanka, by all accounts a jewel of an island, and fast becoming a popular wedding destination. There are some wonderful stories on offer, as there always are. Barnali Saha’s ‘The Other Man’ is delightful, with its suspense of will-she won’t-she. Smitha Sehgal’s ‘Ice Cream’ is ruminative, and evocative, harking back to a foetal memory so strong and so impactful that it shadows every waking instant. Padma Prasad‘s ‘Where The Grass Grows’ is the story of a doctor, well settled in his adopted country and his practice, who is disoriented by a visit to his native country and consequently possessed of a great desire for a lawn. Adreyo Sen’s ‘The Angel Of Death’ is a touching parable. We await your feedback on the issue. Happy reading. ~ Editor
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CONTENTS FICTION 3
Ice Cream
6
Payoff
ESSAY
Smitha Sehgal Jyothi Vinod
18 Angel Of Death Adreyo Sen
22 Where Fish Sleep Harish Muralidhar
33 The Other Man Barnali Saha
51 Umbrella In The Train Kaartikeya Bajpai
Abu Simbel
12
Sri Lanka
45
G Karunakar
54 Where The Grass Grows Padma Prasad
POETRY 5
The Ways Of Men To God A P Govindankutty
See Why 11 INeera Kashyap
17 IGeetanjali Joshi Cakes 21 Chocolate Aman Chougle Tree Obituary 30 Bo Ashok Niyogi Showers 60 Mango Salini Johnson
Sreelata Menon
INTERVIEW
31 LIGHT STUFF 42 REVIEWS
Cover Design: M P Mohan Illustrations: Raghupathi Sringeri
Vijay Padaki
26
FICTION Smitha is a legal professional and writer. She has been published by Kritya, Muse India, The Brown Critique, and featured in ‘The Dance of the Peacock - An anthology of English Poetry’ and ‘Suvarnarekha - An Anthology of Indian Women Poets’
M
emory was an unruly child. It twisted at the edges of your sari pallu, pulling it fast, hiding behind you, while you turned around trying unsuccessfully to catch it. It then ran off to hide underneath the cool dark wooden cot. The shadows conspired in those corners where an intricate web or two were woven in silence. You would not reach your long delicate fingers out there, no; memory smirked at its secret knowledge of the inheritance from your mother’s womb. Low-slung, under red tiled roofing, and a good three minutes’ walk away from the main house of Rani Hall, the twin toilet structure in the northwest corner of the compound looked more like an outhouse. It had black wooden doors framed on
ice cream Smitha Sehgal
whitewashed walls that threw off a bluish tinged light. Bright red hibiscus flowers bloomed on the over grown, cactus lined hedge, displaying the unbiased bounty of nature. Mother’s round belly swelled into the eighth month of pregnancy, heavy and tired. Echoes of her screams pierced the whitewashed walls and red tiled roof before the wind carried them away. A tarantula stood upon the edge of the black door, staring down at Mother. Equally heavy and rotund; her white egg perched above her stomach. Large legs, eagle spread, hairy and firm, her eyes gleamed like miniscule jewels. You, a foetus, shuddered. A memory imprinted itself upon you even before your birth and followed you like a shadow thereafter.
FICTION payoff Jyothi Vinod
V
asudha stopped short on the last stair, transfixed by the scene. A woman in her sixties was stealing behind a younger woman engrossed in stirring a pot on the stove. For heaven’s sake, was she really going to hold the lighted matchstick to the sari of the unsuspecting cook? Loud music played in the background. Suddenly a young woman in a bikini dived into a blue ocean, and the jingle of a cold drink advertisement flung Vasudha back into her living room, and she watched her mother-in-law heave out of her cosy armchair to get a drink of cold water. “That Sona brought no dowry and can’t have children either, but she is a beautiful and hardworking girl. Her mother– in–law is trying to get rid of her for a more promising alliance,” she informed Vasudha, who was always too busy to watch the
After a 10 year stint teaching Electronics, Jyothi is pursuing full-time, her love of reading and writing, and loving it.
daily soaps. Averting her eyes from the television Vasudha said, “Ma, I’ll be going to the Valli Silk House to pay the monthly instalment. I’ll take the spare key with me. Have your lunch if I am late. Do we need anything else?” No reply was forthcoming as Ma was back in Sona’s kitchen watching the gory progress of flames. Vasudha slipped out silently and latched the gate behind her, grateful for the quiet afternoon and the red carpet of Gulmohar flowers on the street that gave it a festive look.
ESSAY abu simbel G Karunakar
I
n September 2012, I made an extensive tour of Egypt with an intent to tread in the footsteps of a great ancient civilization and to visit all the existing preserved monuments in a leisurely manner. In a trip that was more historical pursuit than pleasure jaunt, I visited all the popular historic sites from Alexandria in the North to Abu Simbel in the South in a span of two weeks. Any tourist who loves Egyptology must extend his horizons beyond the great Pyramids of Giza and the Sphinx of Lower Egypt to the exciting land
Karunakar is a world traveller, who enjoys chronicling his experiences of different countries.
of Luxor and Aswan in Upper Egypt. Abu Simbel, located 300 kms Southwest of Aswan near the Sudan border is a must-visit location for its sheer magnificence and jaw-dropping beauty.
God Amun Ra and Ramses
FICTION angel of death Adreyo Sen
I
n the valley of children, the beautiful valley that wakes to the sight of the mountains, there lived a sad, silent girl whose eyes had a strange and haunting beauty. She went her quiet way down solitary paths, unnoticed by the other girls. And yet, when they fell on the hockey field, or caught a cold, or were suddenly vexed by the troublesome qualities of that strange creature called Life, she would appear silently at their side. She would sing to them and bring them wild flowers and tuck solemn little dolls by their pillows. And the girls would close their exhausted eyes and fall into a happy sleep. In all the valley of the children, the little girl had only one friend, her headmistress. The headmistress longed to hold the girl in her lap and kiss her
Adreyo resides in Kolkata. He is an MFA student at Stony Brook, Southampton.
gentle, pained face. The girl only maintained her strange silence and wandered away to lie on the dewy grass and spin gypsy shawls out of the stirred firmament of the sky. But she always came back, with palaces made of stalks and sceptres that were once branches of hidden oak trees. Sometimes she brought back a child, squat and blankly terrified, who would gape at the headmistress in perplexed wonder. These children learnt to love the headmistress with a steady affection and went away to become beautiful women who parcelled their daughters with anxious eyes and sent them to the only home they had ever known. Your mother was one of them.
FICTION where fish sleep Harish Muralidhar
T
he next thing I see is the mirror looking at me, showing me the colour suffusing my skin. And my wife with her palm to one side of her face, staring at the ground and breathing as heavily as I. A tear trails down the other side and drops off to the dust floor. It takes me a while to recollect why it all happened; then it comes to me, yes, she refused to come fishing. Where was the fish, she asked, where was the money that the fish fetched and where was the alcohol that the money fetched? Did she not know that I hadn’t drunk in three days? And she thought she could get away with feigning illness! It isn’t hard for me to figure out if my wife is unwell or not, and she bloody wasn’t. She can shed tears now, where do they come from? Same damn food she has been feeding me ever since the elders pushed us into one well with claps and jeers and chants. Have I ever
Harish is a consultant by profession obsessed with classical music, photography and writing for post work getaways.
once asked her to do something for me, no, all I ever wanted was that she take care of me. But she would start playing her favourite records: ‘why don’t you earn properly’, ‘why don’t you stop drinking’, and so on, which only pushed my temper over the edge, and I sent swinging whatever lay within grasp. It was just a week ago that a lantern missed her head for telling me what to do with my life, and it would have burned down the hut had I not poured a jug of water over it. She still won’t learn, she is like a fish. Fish sleep with their eyes open and swim with their eyes open but never see where they are headed. Despite their fellows being caught in the same damn net in the same damn spot, they dimwittedly swim into it, concerns abandoned like their eyelids. Is my wife any different? No, she walks with her eyes open yet fails to see what they see.
INTERVIEW vijay padaki Vijay Padaki is a psychologist and behavioural scientist by training, and founder-director of The P&P Group, a management resource and consultancy centre. In earlier years, he headed the Human Resource Department of India’s oldest co-operative R&D institution, Ahmedabad Textile Industry’s Research Association (ATIRA), which also helped set up the first Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad. Vijay has been active in theatre for fifty years. He joined Bangalore Little Theatre (BLT), where he is currently President, in the year of its inception (1960), and served in many capacities over the years. He has written over 40 original plays, besides adapting or translating several other scripts. In 1993 he won the award for the best contemporary play script instituted by The Hindu for his play ‘Credit Titles’.
Actor, director, writer, trainer, over decades in theatre… any moments of vindication to share? I have not tried to prove anything to anybody, so there was no vindication… I feel genuinely satisfied that anything (and everything) I have done in theatre has been for the joy of it, never for wanting to be seen as a theatre person. You’ve switched from writing plays to short stories… how do you compare the experiences? Hold on, I have not switched! I just finished my 41st play – an
English language adaptation of the classic Kannada novella Chomana Dudi. I had the blessings of Shivarama Karanth himself for the project. It took me many years to complete. I don’t know if I will ever stop writing plays. I took to short stories simply to extend my range, to learn another craft. I am enjoying it too.
FICTION Barnali is a Bengali currently living in New Delhi. She enjoys writing short fiction and poetry, and has been published in several magazines and newspapers in India, and in various electronic journals in USA.
O
n a hot Saturday morning in late June when the joys of summer had been drained out from the season’s system, and all that remained was a pulpy mess of humidity and skin-scorching warmth, Mrignayani Mukherjee, young, newly married, wearing a scarlet-coloured salwaar suit, sat next to her husband inside a first class compartment of the DelhiAgra Shatabdi Express leafing through the pages of Rail Bandhu, the magazine of the Indian Railways,
the other man Barnali Saha
and wondering when the train would commence its journey. It was ten minutes past the scheduled time of departure and yet the train stood still. Mrignayani sighed, put the magazine down and looked out. The platform was crowded with briskly moving feet. Stray dogs licked discarded packages of potato chips; red-kurta clad coolies with numbered brass badges for amulets carried massive loads on their heads. Coin operated weighing machines with dazzling disco lights nictitated at pedestrians. Presently, the train woke up from its state of dormancy with a jolt and began to move.
ESSAY A widely travelled freelance writer, Sreelata is also the author of books ranging from ‘Freelance Writing for the Newbie Writer’ to ‘Guru Nanak’ and ‘Indira Gandhi’ for Penguin-Puffin.
W
e were going to Colombo. For a family destination wedding. A ‘destination wedding’ in Sri Lanka, really? That’s what we thought too. Bali, Bangkok, even Jamaica, are usually topof-the-list for the type of surreal celebration experiences likely to augur marital conjugality. But
SRI LANKA Sreelata Menon
surely not Sri Lanka, a country known more for its impossibly long civil war, ethnic strife and human rights violations? We landed in Colombo well past midnight. Passing through Sri Lankan immigration, we were immediately struck by the friendliness of people. Every official wore a smile and a welcome. The terminal was not too large but efficiently managed; we were able to collect our baggage, buy duty free, get a local Airtel sim card (Rs. 500) and a prepaid taxi, all within the main hall and within the hour. The cab driver winging us through the quietness of the night, cheerfully helped us navigate the new sim. And as we peppered him with questions – where is the violence, where is the strife – went so far as to give us a potted history of the country that was going to host us for the next fifteen days.
FICTION Kaartikeya is a journalism student and the author of ‘Before I Switched to Pens : Collected Writings’, which was independently published in USA. He works part time as features writer with Pune Mirror.
I
t is not an umbrella that shields me from the fury of either the Rain God or the Sun God. It is precious, to be used only during train journeys. The umbrella, from a British company called Ptolemy, has been my companion for almost half a century now. It has witnessed some of the most interesting years of young India. In fact, our partnership was born the same year that India was born. The train journey is long, and my eyes have deserted me. I can’t read anymore. My granddaughter has her dolls. I have my memories. The year was 1947. India was seething with religious violence, while at the same time, becoming impatient for the Gora Sahib to leave. Those were dark days indeed. In the days that led up to the Partition, blood soaked the soil of India. We were young then, I remember I had just learnt how to fly kites. I might have been
umbrella in the train Kaartikeya Bajpai
fifteen years old, and that was considered to be s h am e f u l. My brother had been flying kites since he was seven. Somehow, flying kites had never interested me, though I enjoyed watching them soar across the sky and get lost among the clouds. Her name was Tapassun. Born to a rich family that aspired to be part of the new government after the British left, her house teemed with suavely dressed visionaries and politicians and Muslims. The last part worried me. Hope is a powerful deception… by then I was already thinking of a future together, and worried about the different religions.
FICTION where the grass grows Padma Prasad
D
r. Dwayne Palmer’s lawn was not green. It was black and brown and scabbed and bruised. At first, when he bought the house, he had not given any thought to the matter. Also, it was the last day of winter when he signed the house purchase agreement. He was preoccupied with the shifting and the settling down. Once that was taken care of, he had to go home to Jamaica. His last remaining and most favourite sister was getting married. As a rule, Dr. Dwayne did not attend weddings. This rule was created when his own wedding was warped and dented, actually rendered a non-event by his bride-to-be who decided at the last minute to become a nun. Had she left him for another man, Dr. Dwayne might have twisted the man’s head off. But the favoured entity being an unknown, Dr. Dwayne could only blink and
Padma lives in the USA. She is a writer and painter, and is working on a collection of short stories.
retreat behind his thick eyebrows. Eventually, he moved to Toronto and lived for a few years in an apartment in Scarborough. One day he realized he had too much money in the bank and the only way to manage it was to buy a house. So when he shifted his practice from Scarborough to Mississauga, and the commute grew longer and harder with each passing year, he finally bought the house, a fifteen year old house, just before he went to Jamaica. It was more than five or six years since he had been home. The family was overjoyed. They had not really expected him to turn up for the wedding. Even the breadfruit tree in front of the house decided to honour him with her bounty. The taste of those little roasted fleshlings of heaven sent him spinning back like a well spun cricket ball, back into the sweet innocence of his childhood.
POETRY The Ways Of Men To God
Chocolate Cakes
Govindankutty writes occasionally, in both Malayalam and English.
Aman works for Ascent Designs. He enjoys writing, making movies, messing around with media software, or playing the guitar. He has published his short stories in various online journals.
A P Govindankutty
Aman Chougle
I
I See Why
Geetanjali Joshi
Geetanjali works as a Product Manager. She loves stories - reading and writing.
Bo Tree Obituary
Neera Kashyap Neera has published short stories for children (Rupa, Children’s Book Trust). She interprets ancient literatures and spiritual texts for contemporary readers and writes fiction to understand social and political issues.
Ashok Niyogi
Ashok is a world traveller and writer. He has two books of poems to his credit ‘Reflections in the dark’ and ‘Tentatively’, apart from publications in journals worldwide. As Bhagirathananda, he has also written two books of essays, ‘Hence an enquiry into Brahman’ and ‘My Yajna’.
Mango Showers Salini Johnson
Salini is pursuing B.A.Hons. English at St.Stephen’s College, Delhi. She dreams quietly, cooks verses during lectures and dreads the day she might get caught.
Reviewed by Veena Prasad Veena writes fiction, creates crosswords and content for children and adults, makes compost at home, and completely fails to classify herself!
Reviewed by Suneetha Balakrishnan, writer-translator in both Malayalam and English.
REVIEWS
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