Taamul

Compiling a list of favourite books is not as easy as it seemed when Chitra nominated me. Perhaps because our expectations and experiences from a book changes as we change. Thus as I reflected about those books which left a great deal of impression on me, I realised that they varied with the distinct phases of my life, which at the risk of oversimplification, I have categorised into- school, college-university and working life. Below are my top 10 books from my school life- the volume 1. School life - “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness.” I didn’t inherit a reading library from my family. And the among the gifts that I got during my birthdays which could be read were brass vessels  embedded  with my name. As kids, buying a book, apart from what was prescribed in our school curriculum was a luxury my father couldn’t afford. But what they did, clearly beyond their financial bounds, was to put us in t

Deciding on movies to watch and movies to ditch (in the theatre) is not a difficult job. Particularly when you are a married person living in India on a student allowance. With Hindi language films made in India, it’s even simpler. Do not watch anything unless it is directed by one of them four directors whose work I absolutely adore. One Sunday (supposed to be last Sunday but for my lazy ass), I broke this rule. There were two main reasons: 1. It came heavily recommended by a friend. 2. The film was produced by one of ‘the’ 4 directors. And while I wasn’t disappointed, it didn’t blew me off either. However, my wife absolutely loved it and later argued that it would be impossible to find an Indian woman or a girl who would not love this movie. And till now her theory has held as water-tight as Newtons’ theory of gravity. The movie in the question is Queen directed by Vikas Bahl, who co-owns Phantom Films with Vikramaditya Motwane (see Udaan ) and Anurag Kashyap (see Black F