Almost live from JLF 2012 – Day 2
Looking at the schedule I knew that Day 2 was going to be busier. And it was. The first day at JLF 2012 had about 3000 visitors. The second day attracted near about 5000. The way the numbers are increasing every year at Jaipur Literature Festival, I wonder how long before it will stop being literary.
I meant to visit the very first session at Front Lawns – Creativity, Censorship and Dissent’ with the Kashmiri writer Siddharth Gigoo in it, but couldn’t make it. I was even late for the second and the most important session of the day – A Good Man in Africa – a panel discussion of four travel writers about Africa. Travel, writing and Africa… that’s the combination for me! Besides Tim Butcher, the author of Blood River and Chasing the Devil, it had Philip Marsden, Philip Gourevitch and Illja Trojanow. The discussion was moderated by Taiye Selasi.
I was late and the students had crammed every corner of Baithak, the venue where the discussion took place. And so I had to remain standing. The discussion was about foreign writers in Africa. Philip Gourevitch came out heavy on the charges of some of the Africans that outsiders can not know Africa well and will always write superficially. He said that if he is genuinely concerned about Africa, and spending time and effort to understand it then how is he an outsider? He also added that if they want to draw such lines of then it will mean that the Africans too will remain outsiders in the West.
Illja Trojanow said that if Africans are not going to write about themselves then somebody will. There really is no reason to complain. It was also mentioned that Africans have very good oral traditions. They are amazingly accurate in their descriptions, regarding time and place. but they do not have a written literary traditions and that is the gap which the authors like them are trying to fill.
Trojanow said that one problem in writing about Africa is that the colonial terminology has not yet been replaced. The writers, both African and non-African are using the terminology of their former colonial masters. He said that this needs to be broken.
Butcher said that often Europeans try to categorize African problems in very simple terms, like which tribe attacked which one? He said that the reality is much more complex, but it indeed is necessary to learn about this tribal structure in depth, as this is very the subtle details will surface.
In all, it was a very good session, at least to me. Though I had to stand, I enjoyed it thoroughly.
The 12:30 PM session – The Better Angels of Our Nature by Steven Pinker, was the highlight of the day. It was held in the Front Lawns and was jam packed. Again I had to stand. Pinker summed up his thesis in his new book by the same name as the session with a slide show.
His thesis is that contrary to the public perception, the evil tendencies of human nature have actually decreased in the modern times. He backed up his thesis with enormous amount of statistical data explained with colorful maps and graphs.
First he showed that evil tendencies are decreasing gradually and then he told about some of the plausible reasons behind the decrease. Education, democracy, and freedom of expression were some of the reasons behind the decrease, according to Dr. Pinker.
And guess what? The ubiquitous Barkha Dutt was there to interview him. Barkha, our very own Barkha, that poor girl who barely does anything other than grilling politicians in her life, asking questions from the foremost cognitive psychologist of the world? The galls they have!
At 2:30 PM, due to lack of options and because of the fatigue of standing in two continuous sessions I had to sit through the horrible session of ‘The Chutneyfication of English’ with Rita Kothari, Tarun Tejpal, Gurcharan Das and Ira Pande.
Tarun was late and the ladies started talking nonsense to the public from the first minute. Then Tarun dashed in with a ridiculously macho entry. The whole talk was hokum. I always get sick with the talks of the new brand of English in India, variously called as Indlish, Hinglish Inglish etc. Most of these so-called writers in India barely master Standard English, and they talk about making their own brand?
Sometimes I also feel that it is perhaps the inability to master a foreing language that is converted into desperate attempts at creating their own brand. That way mediocrity can pass as creativity.
Tarun read one chapter from his fiction (yes, he is a littérateur these days!) in which he told about the pain of an Indian boy studying English. Tarun invented a sort of gibberish for this character and while reading from his book, actually used the word for ass in Hindi. It was a disaster.
The next session – In Defense of Enlightenment was much more important with Steven Pinker and A C Grayling. As I haven’t read A C Grayling I could not relate with his talk but still it was an interesting session. Pinker stated some points from his books The Blank Slate and How the Mind Works. Based on his experimentation he said that race is an entirely a social construct and there are more differences between individuals of a same nation than between the average individual of one ‘race’ and that of the other ‘race’. Echoing the socio-biologists he said that humans are fallible; that brain is a system prone to error and to completely purge them of evil is impossible.
He said that to continue the course of Enlightenment it is necessary to continue with reason. He also made a very important point that sometimes not only our eyes, but our minds also perceive wrong things. He called them cognitive illusions and he asserted that it is necessary to penalize these cognitive illusions in order to save humankind from their consequences. I wonder whether it was a direct reference to the cognitive illusions in the limbic system.
When someone from the audience parroted the cliché that science and religion are just two ways of finding the truth, A C Grayling very politely brushed her argument away by saying that there are more fundamental differences between their approaches than there are any similarities.
I was expecting the last talk to be the most interesting as it was named Open Road – a discussion of travel writers and travel writing. Six travel authors were on the stage – Samanth Subramanian, Philip Marsden, William Dalrymple, Tim Butcher, Katie Hickman and Akash Kapur. The original plan was that every author will first read for five minutes from his book and then there will be general discussion with the audience. The authors took more time than stipualated (now why doesn’t that surprise me?) and at last there was no more time to ask questions. It was sad as this was the first session in which I was itching to ask a question. I had grabbed a third row seat with great personal cost as when I left the venue my bladder was about to burst.
Samanth read from his part memoir, part travelogue – a part about faith healing at his grandfather’s home. As is with modern Indian writers he was keen in the book and on the stage to show his skepticism about faith healing. I say, if one is so skeptical, then why take such an issue?
Marsden read from his book on Ethiopia and the Christian community there. Reading out from the passage of his travel to the remote mountain monasteries he held the audience in fascination for about five minutes.
William Dalrymple then boisterously read his piece from his From a Holy Mountain. It was a comic piece about the absurd literal beliefs of an Orthodox Christian priest in the Middle-East. Although the piece was very good, I wondered that how is it possible that an author travels to a country like Armenia and fails to focus on the overwhelming tragedy which befell over it?
Tim Butcher read from his book Chasing the Devil and read out a passage with his encounters with the good and the bad devils in Liberia – something about local lore and tradition.
Katie and Akash Kapur were boring at best, but at least Katie finished early!
That was it for me at the second day.
Almost Live from JLF 2012 – Day 1
ALMOST LIVE FROM JLF 2012!
At 09:38 AM I thought I was early at the first day of JLF 2012, but as I was frisked through hordes of policemen and the checking point, the crowd proved me wrong. The Front Lawn, the largest of the six venues at JLF was at least half full when I got there. I took a seat at the back and amused myself with the spectacle of painted old ladies hugging really painted and really old ladies, trying to pass themselves off as foreign, literary and chic.
Just then, the Queen of Bhutan waltzed in. In her books she comes off as one with a humble style, but it was really good to see her functioning as part of a large crowd. The ceremony began with Her Majesty’s lighting of the lamp. It now was time for the keynote addresses. But before that William Dalrymple and Namita Gokhale introduced the Festival to the audience. Dalrymple began with a surprisingly unsupportive stand about Salman Rushdie’s fatwa, saying that the audience should not focus on the author who is missing, but on those who were present. I guess silence would be more becoming of literature and for freedom of expression.
Purshottam Agrawal never fails to disappoint with his lack of novelty. I almost dozed as he read the primary school textbook chapter on Sufism to the crowd with all the necessary clichés such as Medieval Ages not being dark but actually the beginning of the golden period of philosophy; the Ancient Ages not being so brilliant; Sufism as the breaking of the feudal and elitist bonds of Sanskrit and Brahmanism; the Hindu society as a vague, fluffy ball with no apparent characteristic. He also used the minimum number of words from the Marxist lexicon compulsory for one to be invited to any event. Mercifully, he left soon.
A K Mehrotra read some good really good poems at first but not able to resist political correctness, went on a spiral about Sufism being the flame of oneness against the divisions of religion; about how Ram of Kabir is not the Ram of history; about how Kabir was an atheist; and at last justified at the behalf of JLF 2012 the invitation of Richard Dawkins by equating him with Kabir. But again, he was short too.
The first session I attended was ‘Tolstoy the Man’ at Durbar Hall. It was about the new biography of Tolstoy, Tolstoy: A Russian Life by Rosamund Bartlett. The session started with Chiki almost yelling at the audience. When people said they could not hear her, she quickly went, ‘It’s not really my fault!’ Talking about touchy! She spent the rest of the session with an irritated and bored look on her face.
Biographies are the last things I read. I find the details boring. The writer does not get to the subject until half-way through the book and we get to know more about the life of his parents, relatives and neighbors than him. Bartlett show went as expected. She read to the audience, completely without flair, a page from her book; then discussed the role of religion in the life of Tolstoy; and how he was a great personality. Her arguments ran in eight directions at once. No wonder she couldn’t stop writing before filling at least 600 pages. Only when Chiki Sarkar asked a question, did she remember that she has also written bad things about Tolstoy and called him ‘a bit of a narcissist’.
I had better expectations from the second session ‘The Disappointment of Obama’ – about the new book of David Remnick, the journalist and scholar on the psyche of the Russian society after the fall of the Soviet Union. Samanth Subramanian, the upcoming travel writer, grilled him at the stage and I have to confess that the session completely exceeded my expectations. That David Remnick is a hell of a writer, I knew from his books, but to hear him live proved that he is an even better speaker. Ready wits, short quips, sharp and definite answers – this is how he came out to the audience.
Listening to him, I realized the difference between an American and an Indian journalist. Remnick was very particular about the words he used; the meaning of those words; and about what he was really talking about. Talks in India tend to be general than specific, vague than concrete, with rounded-off meanings covering enough political ground to claim ten interpretations at once. Consequently words have lost their meaning, and debate its relevance.
When Samanth said that it can be inferred from his book that the American public is disappointed in Obama, he said that the public is not ‘disappointed’ but ‘wildly enraged’. He called Obama getting Nobel for peace as ridiculous. That he got it for just not being George Bush.
Considering Obama’s rise to Presidency as really remarkable he said that Obama was successful as a politician but fails as a President as he is not a man of deep and serious thinking. He called it the conceit of Obama to say that there are no conservative pockets in America, just United States pockets.
When someone from the audience came up with the cliché that its useless to worry over the fact that the Obama administration is lost without any clues as democracy is all about different view points and about discussion, Remnick quipped without batting an eyelid, ‘It’s also nice to get something done!’
In short, it was a very charming and informative session with no-nonsense approach of David Remnick. After the session I made my way through some truly ugly women ogling over Remnick and got my copy signed with a barely audible, ‘Would you please sir?’
The third session I attended was named after the ridiculous phrase – The Arab Spring – a rehashed term of the Prague Spring in 1956 in Czechoslovakia. The session was held in the Front Lawn again with Barkha Dutt interviewing Kamin Mohammadi from Iran, Navdeep Suri from India, Karima Khalil from Egypt, Raja Shehadeh from Palestine and Max Rodenbeck, the authoer of Cairo. It was an NDTV program transferred to JLF. The filming was also done by NDTV.
Barkha started by making common cause with ‘the plight of Palestinian Muslims’ to which Raja Shehadeh, an apologist of Palestinian terrorists, replied with the usual cliché of the bullying of America. While both the women from Iran and Egypt claimed how Islam is all about peace and love, Karima was a bit more outspoken on the plight of Coptic Christians in Egypt and actually related an incident of about 60 Christians who were recently brutally burned to death by Muslim mobs and how nobody cared about it. But Barkha being Barkha, diffused the informative piece by claiming that Karima actually meant that such an incident is not a result of the entrenched social attitudes but the recent politicizing of the public.
Raja went on to read from the How-to-save-the-face-of-the-terrorists manual and shamelessly made ridiculous claims that the Levant and the Islamic lands have always been more tolerant than other regions on earth!
Max Rodenbeck was the face saver of the session. He made some informative comments on the Egyptian, particularly the Cairo society. When Barkha asked him that aren’t the Western governments hypocritical and immoral in calling others as non-democratic, he replied that diplomacy is not about morality, it’s all about getting a job done. He said that the actual surprise is that America takes so many efforts to veil its diplomacy in the shroud of humanitarian and democratic concerns.
One more face-saver of this session was a very sharp and cutting question from someone in the audience: If secularism is an integral part of a democracy, then are not Islamic Middle-Eastern societies incompatible with secularism, as democracy will give power to Islamists who will deny secularism?
The last session I attended was Mohammed Hanif’s reading and discussing about his new book, Our Lady of Alice Bhatti, and it was the best session of the day. Hanif had already become one of my favorite with A Case of Exploding Mangoes, but it was great to see his dark humor and ready wit to come alive on stage.
When he was asked why he has changed from political story to a love story in his second book, he answered that he had been telling people that his first book was a love story and he did not know why but nobody quite believed him. He was constantly humorous even while telling how he researched about his first book, calling it a failed attempt at journalism. He said that half of the country didn’t care about the episode, with some of them even with the expressions of ‘who cares?’ The other half which actually knew something wouldn’t tell. So he finally thought that if nobody was telling him the true story, he would go on and make up a story of his own. The result was A Case for Exploding Mangoes.
When asked about how the idea of the second book came to him, he quipped that once a writer has written a book, he becomes habitual of wealth and literary festivals like JLF and has to come up with another one in a few years. Our Lady of Alice Bhatti is such an attempt. He was also surprised at the writers who are very clear about what ideas come to them and when they come. He claimed himself to be nothing like them.
When audience pointed out that his new book is in support of the minority community of Pakistan, he quipped that to write a book and make stuff up is a lousy way of supporting a community. Support is better given by actually doing something for them.
He also made light of the claims of literary impressions on him. He once read a comment in which he was said to be influenced by Philip Roth, while in fact he had never read him before. But after reading that comment, he went on to read Philip Roth and found him quite a genius and feeling that he himself was nothing compared to the genius of Philip Roth.
Talking more about the impressions on his art, he said that he has an impressionable mind and his reading makes a great and decisive influence on his work. Magical Realism is certainly an influence. Some of his favorite authors are Manto, Llosa, Chughtai and Kafka.
He was very outspoken on the plight of the Hindus, the Christians and the other minorities in Pakistan and said that though he was not in a position to do a lot about it, he was greatly ashamed of it.
In his books Hanif comes out as a witty author. In the talks he came out not only as witty, but also modest, realistic and liberal in true terms.
This was it for me at the first day at JLF 2012. I did enjoy myself. I hope it continues. Will keep writing.
Off to Jaipur – My agenda at this year’s Literary Festival!
This is the first time I am going to the Jaipur Literary Festival, touted as the greatest literary event in Asia and as one of the best in the world. I seriously doubted this claim earlier but every year as I followed it on Internet, I saw that many Nobel Prize winners came to the event and some other really good writers. Although there are some usual ubiquitous and irritating presences like that of Shabana Azmi and Javed Akhtar, but I guess if you are to meet the likes of Richard Dawkins, V S Naipaul, Umberto Eco and Orhan Pamuk you have to bear the unnecessary addendum too.
This year my agenda is as follows. Though I will attend the other speeches in free time too, but this is what I have previously in mind:
Day 1 – 20 Jan
From 12:30 – 01:30
7. ‘The Disappointment of Obama’
David Remnick in conversation with Samanth Subramanian.
From 02:30 – 03:30
13. ‘The Arab Spring: A Winter’s View’
Kamin Mohammadi Navdeep Suri, Karima Khalil, Raja Shehadeh, Max Rodenbeck in conversation with Barkha Dutt
From 03:45 to 04:45
16. ‘Our Lady of Alice Bhatti’
Mohammed Hanif in conversation with Shoma Chaudhury
For the second day, the targets will be:
10 AM to 11 AM
30. ‘Creativity, Censorship and Dissent’
Siddhartha Gigoo, Tahmima Anam, Prasoon Joshi, Charu Nivedita, Cheran moderated by Shoma Chaudhury
Special attraction will be Siddhartah Gigoo with his book on the plight of Kashmiri Pandits.
1:15AM to 12:15 PM
33. ‘A Good Man in Africa’
Tim Butcher, Philip Gourevitch, Philip Marsden and Ilija Trojanow moderated by Taiye Selasi.
Will be great to meet this intrepid journalist who braved the killing fields of Sierra Leone twice. Have just come out fresh from reading his book, so it will be more exhilarating.
12:30PM to 01:30 PM
38. ‘The Better Angels of Our Nature: A Decline of Violence in History’
Steven Pinker introduced by Barkha Dutt.
Will be marvelous tolisten to this great scientist, but the ignorant Barkha Dutt interveiwing him will be a downer.
02:30 PM to 03:30 PM
40. ‘In Defence of the Enlightenment’
A.C. Grayling, Steven Pinker introduced by Vijay Tankha.
Pinker again it is, and this time without the sour ingredient of Barkha Dutt! What a chance!
03:45 PM to 04:45 PM
44. ‘After Bin Laden’
Ayesha Jalal, Jason Burke, MJ Akbar, Max Rodenbeck, Mushirul Hasan moderated by Shoma Chaudhury.
I dropped Max Rodenbeck from my agenda this year, as it was too much JLF reading to do, but will be keeping a watch over him.
Day 3:
10:00AM to 11:00 AM
57. ‘The Superpowers of the 21st Century’
Geling Yan, Thant Myint-U, David Malone moderated by Shashi Tharoor.
One of the super highlights of the JLF 2012 for me. Listening to the great author Thant Myint-U. I have read both of his books of Burma and the international politics and love his straightforward, no-nonsense and no-ist style. Eagerly awaiting this.
11:15 AM to 12:15 PM
62. ‘The Question of Jerusalem’
Simon Sebag Montefiore, Sari Nusseibeh, moderated by Jonathan Shainin.
This is going to be a great day! First Thant Myint-U and then Montefiore? Being a student of the history of Communism, I have read both of his biographies of talin. Will be there with his books and perhaps a hope of a snap with him 
12:30 PM to 01:30 PM
64. ‘Aung San Suu Kyi and the Future of Myanmar’
Peter Popham and Thant Myint – U, in conversation with David Malone.
Either this, or the parallel one with Mohammed Hanif.
02:30 PM to 03:30 PM
68. ‘Public and Private Portraits: The Biographer’s Art’
Joseph Lelyveld, Sugata Bose, Peter Popham, David Remnick, Simon Sebag Montefiore.
Its like two of your best dreams coming true at once. Remnick and Montefiore at one stage! Its the heaven of scholarship on Communism!
05:15 PM to 06:15 PM
81. ‘The Art of the Playwright’
Tom Stoppard and David Hare in conversation with Neelam Mansingh.
This will be a light one. Will try to divide time.
06:30 PM to 07:30 PM
84. ‘Shehar aur Sapna: The City as a Dream’
Mohammed Hanif, Aman Sethi, Meenal Baghel, Rabi Thapa Moderated by Ashok Vajpeyi.
Finally some exclusive time to Mohammed Hanif.
23 Jan: Day 4
10:00 AM to 11:00 AM
85. ‘Writing and Resistance’
Raja Shehadeh, Thant Myint-U, Iftikhar Gilani, moderated by Fatima Bhutto.
While Javed Akhtar will be irritating people in the other tent, I will be enjoying Thant Myint-U’s conversations.
02:30 PM to 03:30 PM
98. ‘Nothing to Declare: Straight lines and History’
Fakrul Alam , Mohammed Hanif , Rabi Thapa, Siddhartha Gigoo, moderated by Urvashi Butalia.
Hanif and Gigoo together. Will be interesting!
03:45 PM to 04:45 PM
103. ‘Stalin’
Simon Sebag Montefiore. On my favorite subject, one of my favorite authors!
05:15 PM to 06:15 PM
110. ‘The Magic of Reality’
Richard Dawkins and Lalla Ward in coversation.
Dawkins finally!
24 Jan : Day 5 Last Day
11:15 Am to 12:15 PM
119. ‘Return of the King: A Preview‘
William Dalrymple in conversation with John Keay.
Keay, the champion on India and Dalrymple, the politically correct upstart. Let’s see what happens!
12:30 PM to 01:30 PM
125. ‘The Selfish Gene’
Richard Dawkins.
Joy again!
02:30 PM to 03:30 PM
127. ‘Between the Lines, Beyond the Headlines’
Mark Tully and Kuldip Nayar, moderated by Nidhi Razdan.
Will be a great pleasure to meet Tully… Have been long a fan of his works.
This will be it! I will keep posting and after the event will come out with complete details.
Slow Man – Post Nobel Gibberish
Slow Man is a tortuously slow book. It is about boredom and sexual fantasies of the aged mind of Coetzee. The story is of an old man who has lost his leg in an accident and is now lonely. Coetzee is experimenting in style in this late work. Like 
many other works of Coetzee it is hard to distinguish reality from fantasy in Slow Man. The old man reflects the feelings of Coetzee, but there is another character Elizabeth Costello who is an alter ego of the old man and the Coetzee.
The book is about the sexual ravings of a lunatic old man who is also suffering from the bug of literary desire. The inability to tell an honest story forces Coetzee to experiment with style, which makes the book even more unreadable and meaningless. Coetzee tries to compensate the dishonesty of content and style with making the narrative realistic in places most unwanted, like describing the sexual organs and the sexual act in most dirty and ugly details. It is strange to witness a writer giving such ugly details when he is so far from realism otherwise.
Slow Man is so unnecessary that it should not have been written at all. If Coetzee were not a Nobel Laureate, this work would not have been published.
Foe – Following Fashionable Nonsense
Foe is a play on the name of Defoe. The title is very suggestive. It tells us that Defoe told the story from the point of the view of the white colonial master. The story is a twist on the famous story of Robinson Crusoe. In this case the castaway is a woman, who meets Friday on the forsaken island. To her, Friday is not such a slave as he was to Crusoe. But Friday is not communicative and it is hard to know what he feels. It seems that he has almost no feelings and no reactions.
After they are rescued the heroine, Susan Barton goes to a writer Daniel Foe to write hers and Friday’s story. But Foe radically changes Susan’s version and the story which is finally published has no resemblance to the original one. Coetzee is making the charge that every story told by the Europeans is a lie.
But he goes further. He does not only doubt the intentions of European colonialists. He doubts the very process of story-telling. In his view, it is not possible to tell a story at the first place. The story is corrupted as it is told. Even more, reality is corrupted as it is witnessed. So the meaning which comes out of Foe is: the story of Robinson Crusoe and by extensions, the story of the European conquest of the world was distorted at three levels, first at the level of witnessing, then at the level of story-telling and at last as a willful distortion by the Christian, white European colonialists.
Here Coetzee misapplies some concepts of modern science disastrously. He falls prey to the fashionable nonsense as is expected of post-modernist writers. They hide their artistic incompetency by calling simple story-telling as old-fashioned and misapply some modern scientific concepts, which make their craft incomprehensible. At last they insert their leftist political agenda. This is what is done to Foe.
Although Coetzee does not believe in the art of story-telling but still he keeps writing to further his political agenda. After reading Foe, one is left with a confused story but with strong feelings against the Europeans.
Coetzee’s fiction can be divided into three periods: early, middle and late Coetzee. Early and late periods are similar in structure and orientation. They are abundant in traits dominant in Coetzee: despair, loneliness and boredom. In the Heart of the Country is one such early work.
Like Dusklands, its style is very obscure. Like most authors, Coetzee was more experimenting in his style at the beginning of his writing career. In IHC dreams blend into reality, making them highly indistinguishable. The themes are again colonialism, racism and sex. The story is told from the first person point of view of Magda, the daughter of a white colonialist. There is almost no story, which is not surprising. Whatever story is there, it is rendered meaningless by the obscure style. What the reader encounters is a 150 pages long succession of dreamy, meaningless sequences. Oh, but there is the quintessential Coetzee rape scene…
Andre Brink’s comment on the book is highly revealing:
“It says something about the loneliness, about the craving for love, about the relation between master and slave and between white and black, and about man’s earthly anguish and longing for salvation…”
As Brink observes, it says ‘something’. What is this something, nobody knows. Not even Coetzee. He was not able to find out what this something is, till the end of his career. And it would be highly disrespectful of a reader to ask him what this something was, as an artist does not have to explain his art; as an artist is not responsible for the stuff he creates.
A reader does not have to look for definite answers when he reads a work of art. But what if the writer makes highly spurious charges in an obscure style and then refuses to be accountable for his insupportable claims? In the Heart of the Country is such a case. Moreover the book is unreadable and unnecessary. Coetzee could have rewritten the novel in just a few lines by changing Brink’s comment a bit:
“I want to say something about the loneliness, about the craving for love, about the relation between master and slave and between white and black, and about man’s earthly anguish and longing for salvation…”
And if Coetzee were honest, he could have added:
“Actually I am very very confused about the subjects I have chosen to write about… but nevertheless I am an artist and so have written these lines…”
Elizabeth Costello marks the beginning of the late years of Coetzee, the period in which his narrative powers degenerate into an intellectual quagmire. In the story, Elizabeth Costello is the alter ego of Coetzee, representing his other womanly self. Cruelty of men over women, whites over blacks and masters over slaves and men over animals are some eternal themes of Coetzee and in this book we see them again.
All his life Coetzee has been busy, shrieking at the top of his voice that despite being a white European male, he neither shares the feelings of the whites nor of men. He thinks of vegetarianism and teetotalism as somewhat womanly qualities, and considers himself as an exception. Costello, the eponymous protagonist, opposes cruelty against animals and gives lectures on the topic all over the world. Here Coetzee is making a sharply political statement.
Although Costello is for animal rights, she does not support her stance with logic. Her speeches are meaningless rants which do not convince anyone. Her argument is consciously illogical as according to her nothing is logical; according to her logic does not exist. By this Coetzee fraternizes with other post-modernist authors for whom logic is an anathema to art. In their view, an artist has to be illogical. Anything logical is inartistic for them. For these post-modernists rationalism is old-fashioned.
This book is also a rejection of Australia, Coetzee’s new homeland. He fled from South Africa as he thought it to be cruel and violent. He could not choose America as he was involved in criminal activities there; although he haughtily claims that it is beneath his dignity to reside in a country involved in so many crimes. He finally rejects Australia too as he thinks that goodness is not possible; that everything is inherently evil and only he in his incomprehensible thoughts can construct a good reality.
I have never read a more miserable writer…
Herbology & Ayurveda
One of the subjects studied by the witches and wizards in Hogwarts is Herbology. As the name suggests, it is a study of herbs and shrubs and their use in medicine. The medical system of wizarding world derives primarily from the discipline of Herbology.
“Herbology is the study of plants and is taught at all good wizarding schools.”[1]
Witches have long been associated with herbs. As discussed above, women labeled as ‘witches’ were often expert doctors in the traditional disciplines of medicine, usually derived from the local herbs and shrubs. Similarly, Ayurveda, the medical science of India is also steeped in herbs.
Herbology of the wizarding world is not a random science. Rowling did not just think of a name and put some random, bizarre names to make it magical. Many of the herbs mentioned in the books really exist. Rowling has made a detailed study of the pagan mythology of Britain and Europe and has also studied the parallel disciplines of medicine. J K Rowling has researched the ancient and medieval annals of Europe in order to dig out the names and uses of these weeds, many of which are now a rarity for the modern world.
To dig out these references must be hard for another reason too. As discussed above, Christianity banned all kinds of traditional medicine, practiced by women, labeling this art of medicine as witchcraft and burned women doctors on stake.
Instead, all of this traditional wisdom was replaced by the barbarous and stupid practice of bleeding which resulted in the deaths of countless during the medieval ages.[2]
This is not the story of the medical system in India. In India, the traditional system of medicine, Ayurveda, was never 
banned. In fact, it was held in high esteem. This was due to the fact that India was Hindu and not Christian, and Hinduism did not hate traditional wisdom like Christianity did and still does.[3] Christianity had a reason to fear the traditional wisdom. It had a political aim. It wanted to convert everyone to Christianity. However, people had faith in the traditional wisdom of women doctors, who were pagan and hence resisted converting to Christianity. Moreover, Christianity had next to nothing, to sell to the populace. That is why it had to devise the plans to slander women doctors as witches. An ideology, as cut off from Nature as Christianity, can never comprehend the extent to which Nature and its various components affect the human body.
The home-made pagan remedies made health care decentralized. There was no need of a single Savior, let alone the last one. All these pagan practices of healthcare were generally the department of women, as they had a more intimate knowledge of their immediate environment than men, as women generally were gatherers and men, the hunters.
Hinduism, being a pagan religion, did not aim to convert people to any ideology and it incorporated the traditional wisdom into its system. This is the reason that Ayurveda is still a live branch of medicine in India and Ayurveda is undergoing a worldwide revival for the last few years.
Ayurveda, the science of life is a system of traditional medicine native to India. In Sanskrit, the word Ayurveda consists of the words āyus, meaning “longevity”, and Veda, meaning “related to knowledge” or “science”. The principles of Ayurveda are an invaluable link to understanding, in detail, naturally healthy living. In this system, one takes personal responsibility for one’s own well being.[4]
Ayurveda is a science of life. Life according to Ayurveda is a combination of senses – mind, body and soul. Ayurveda is not only limited to body or physical symptoms but takes into account the spiritual, mental and social aspects.
Herbology of the wizarding world and Ayurveda of Sanatana Dharma have many similarities. Both use herbs and shrubs. Both use animal parts in making various mixes and potions. Both believe in a holistic system where medicine works along with the daily habits of a person.
Herbology and Potions are given as much respect in the wizarding world as Ayurveda is given in the Hindu society. Instead of regarding the medicinal practices of medieval times as evil and castigating them as Satanic, Rowling has imparted them a place of glory. Rowling’s world of medicine reminds one of Ayurveda and its practices.
The importance of Potions is made clear by Severus Snape in a very famous paragraph in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone:
“I don’t expect you will really understand the beauty of the softly simmering cauldron with its shimmering fumes, the delicate power of liquids that creep through human veins, bewitching the mind, ensnaring the senses… I can teach you how to bottle fame, brew glory, even stopper death — if you aren’t as big a bunch of dunderheads as I usually have to teach…”[5]
There are many books concerning the subject as “One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi”, “Advanced Potion Making”, “Magical Drafts and Potions” etc. The books mock the vilification campaign of the Church in a very subtle manner, as in names of books such as “Holidays with Hags”.
Rowling has transformed the notoriety of the witches to fame. With great calm, Rowling returns us back to the pre-Christian notion of medicine.
[1] Stouffer, Tere. The Complete Idiot’s Guide to the World of Harry Potter. New York: Alpha. 2007. p. 133.
[2] Helen Ellerbe
[3] Svoboda, Robert E. Ayurveda: Life, Health and Longevity. Albuquerque: Penguin Books. 2004. p. viii.
[4] Ibid. p. ix.
[5] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. New York: Scholastic Inc. 1997. p. 137.
Tantra and Magic
Spells, charms and hexes pervade through the entire series of Harry Potter. One cannot read through twenty pages without encountering a spell. One of the first books recommended for the first years is ‘Spellman’s Syllabery’.
When Harry, Ron and Hermione try to open a locked door in the first book, Hermione says: “Alohamora”, which is a spell to open closed doors. The books are full of such spells. To make an object fly there is a spell, ‘Wingardiusm Leviosa’. To bind the tongue, there are spells like ‘Langlock’ and ‘Muffliato’. To repair something there is ‘Reparo’. To illuminate something, there is ‘Lumos’. To summon something there is ‘Accio’. There is also a reverse banishing spell. To disarm enemy there is ‘Expelliarmus’. For making sound louder there is ‘Sonorus’. For swelling something there is ‘Engorgio’.
But the spells are not just about saying them. There is a process to it. The spells will not have any effect if the caster does not say them in the proper way or does not feel the spell. Bellatrix Lestrange, the best and the wickedest supporter of Voldemort gives a little piece of advice to Harry after killing his godfather Sirius. Harry tries to use the torture curse on her but is unable to inflict a lot of pain.
“You need to mean them, Potter! You need to really want to cause pain.”[1]
During the fourth year of Harry at Hogwarts the Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher, Moody tells the class, about the Killing Curse Avada Kedavera,
“Avada Kedavera is a curse that needs a powerful bit of magic behind it – you could all get your wands out now and point them at me and say the words, and I doubt I’d get so much as an nose-bleed. But that doesn’t matter. I’m not here to teach you how to do it.”[2]
Performing Magic and casting spells is not a game for anyone. It is more than that. The art of casting spells has to be learned with heart and with intense concentration. Magic is like science in the wizarding world. In real life there is a complete discipline and methodology to science. In the wizarding world, magic is not just plain wand-waving. As is expressed in the first book of Harry Potter:
“There was a lot more to magic, as Harry quickly found out, than waving your wand and saying a few funny words.
They had to study the night skies through their telescopes every Wednesday at midnight and learn the names of different stars and the movements of the planets. Three times a week they went out to the greenhouses behind the castle to study Herbology, with a grumpy little witch called Professor Sprout, where they learnt how to take care of all the strange plants and fungi and found out what they were used for.”[3]
This system of casting spells is similar to Tantra in Hinduism. The general image of Tantra in the West is synonymous with sex. But unfortunately, both the sexophobic Church and sexophile modern West have taken from it, only what suited to them.
Tantric is a Shaivic discipline in which an individual tries to attain the Supreme Truth by repeating certain mantras in a 
certain way. The rhythm of mantras is matched with the inhaling and exhaling of breath and effort is made towards quieting the thoughts down and reaching a stage of thoughtlessness.[4] The root of the word Tantra is ‘tan’, ‘to stretch’. It means that by tantra one tries to attach the individual to the universal consciousness. For this, mantras are recited. Besides, gaining the Supreme truth, Tantra is also practiced for some other ends.[5]
According to Hindu Philosophy, words, letters and sounds have an independent existence. It is said that Sanskrit is not manufactured by man. The syllables, letters and other word combinations in Sanskrit exist in the Universe. Man has just tapped this source and has thus made it easy to connect himself to the Universal Consciousness.[6]
By reciting these mantras in the proper intonation, one can match his frequency to the Universal Consciousness, and thus in the end can attain the Supreme Truth.
There are many other tasks which can be accomplished by the proper recitation of these mantras; but if these mantras are not recited properly, then they may not have any effect, or even have adverse effect.
This is similar to the process of casting spells in Harry Potter. Casting wrong spells can have no or even adverse effect.
In the Half-blood Prince, Professor Twycross describes the method to apparate:
“The important things to remember when Apparating are the three D’s!” said Twycross. “Destination, Determination, Deliberation!
“Step one: Fix your mind firmly upon the desired destination,” said Twycross. “In this case, the interior of your hoop. Kindly concentrate upon that destination now.”
Everybody looked around furtively to check that everyone else was staring into their hoop, then hastily did as they were told. Harry gazed at the circular patch of dusty floor enclosed by his hoop and tried hard to think of nothing else. This proved impossible, as he couldn’t stop puzzling over what Malfoy was doing that needed lookouts.
“Step two,” said Twycross, “focus your determination to occupy the visualized space! Let your yearning to enter it flood from your mind to every particle of your body!”
Harry glanced around surreptitiously. A little way to his left, Ernie Macmillan was contemplating his hoop so hard that his face had turned pink; it looked as though he was straining to lay a Quaffle-sized egg. Harry bit back a laugh and hastily returned his gaze to his own hoop.
“Step three,” called Twycross, “and only when I give the command . . . Turn on the spot, feeling your way into nothingness, moving with deliberation! On my command, now . . . one —”[7]
It almost reads like a description of Yoga. However, if this is not done properly then Splinching occurs.
“Splinching or the separation of random body parts occurs when the mind is insufficiently determined. You must concentrate continuously upon your destination, and move without haste, but with liberation”.[8]
In Tantra, to invoke different deities, different mantras are recited. In the wizarding world, when sunlight is wanted, then the Sun-god is invoked. When light is wanted light-god is invoked and so on… just like Tantra.
This association of spells with a particular aspect of divinity brings Harry Potter nearer not only to Tantra, but to the whole ethos of Hinduism.
[1] Ibid. p. 810.
[2] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. New York: Scholastic Inc. 2000. p. 217.
[3] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. New York: Scholastic Inc. 1997. p. 133.
[4] Abhisheki, Janaki. Religion as Knowledge. New Delhi: Voice of India. 1998. p. 12-23.
[5] Swarup, Ram. The Word as Revelation: Names of Gods. New Delhi: Voice of India. 1980. p. 24.
[6] Ibid. 35.
[7] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince. New York: Scholastic Inc. 2005. p. 384-385.
[8] Ibid. 385-386.
Divination & Jyotish
Jyotish, the Indian branch of astrology has a central importance in Hinduism. It is believed that stars and planets have a great effect on the destinies of individuals. The time and place of one’s birth affects his destiny.[1]
In the wizarding world, Divination is a subject which aims at telling the future by using various methods such as palmistry, crystal balls and bird entrails. The third year of Harry at Hogwarts introduces the Divination teacher who predicts Harry’s death by reading his fortune in the tea-cups and in the crystal balls.[2]
Though, from the character of the Divination teacher, Sybil Trelawney, we do not get a very good image of the subject. She is often wrong in her predictions and keeps changing them. Other teachers also do not have a very good opinion of her abilities, as is demonstrated by the rare caustic remark from the usually stern and composed Professor McGonagall in the Prisoner of Azkaban;
“Divination is one of the most imprecise branches of magic. I shall not conceal from you that I have very little patience with it. True Seers are very rare, and Professor Trelawney —”[3]
Dumbledore has also never studied Divination. The only two times when the prophesy of Sybil Trelawney has come true is when she predicts the death of Harry’s parents at the hands of Lord Voldemort, and that Lord Voldemort will rise again, more powerful than ever,
“It will happen tonight… The Dark Lord lies alone and friendless, abandoned by his followers. His servant has been chained these twelve years. Tonight, before midnight . . . the servant will break free and set out to rejoin his master. The Dark Lord will rise again with his servant’s aid, greater and more terrible than ever he was. Tonight . . . before midnight . . . the servant . . . will set out . . . to rejoin . . . his master. . . .”[4]
This even drew a subtle humorous remark from Dumbledore. When Harry asked him whether she was right in her 
prediction, he says,
“Do you know, Harry, I think she might have been. Who would have thought it? That brings her total of real predictions up to two. I should offer her a pay rise…”[5]
But both of the times, when she gave these real predictions she was not herself. While predicating the second coming of the Dark Lord she fell into a trance. Her voice changed and she was everything but herself. She did not even remember what she said. When Harry asked her to explain herself after she fell out of her trance, she could not remember anything.
The idea here is that it is not the individual who is important when it comes to predict the future. Individuals are helpless in predicting anything, as is proved by the case of Sybil Trelawney. When Harry blames himself for the release of Peter Pettigrew, Dumbledore says;
“Hasn’t your experience with the Time-Turner taught you anything, Harry? The consequences of our actions are always so complicated, so diverse, that predicting the future is a very difficult business indeed… Professor Trelawney, bless her, is living proof of that….”[6]
The idea of prophesies rather implies that individuals cannot discern the future by themselves. The helplessness of an individual in predicting the future becomes evident by the method of the new Divination teacher, Firenze, the centaur, in the fifth book of Harry Potter,
“His priority did not seem to be to teach them what he knew, but rather to impress upon them that nothing, not even centaurs’ knowledge was foolproof.”[7]
It is also stressed that this art cannot be learned. It is innate. Though Sybil was not herself a good fortune-teller, her grandfather was told to be a great seer. Fortune-telling is a gift which is bestowed upon some individuals rather than being developed by them.
The method is less important than the seer in the business of future prediction, which takes us again to similarities between Divination and Jyotish and subsequently between the wizarding world of Harry Potter and Sanatana Dharma.
[1] Abhisheki, Janaki. Religion as Knowledge. New Delhi: Voice of India. 1998. p. 358.
[2] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. New York: Scholastic Inc. 1999. p. 107.
[4] Ibid. 324.
[5] Ibid. 426.
[6] Ibid. 426.
[7] Rowling, J K. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. New York: Scholastic Inc. 2003. P. 604.
