Amazing Debut Novels

Recently, I completed reading "My Absolute Darling" by Gabriel Tallent. I found it wonderful, and found astounding the fact that this is the author's first novel (though, he has published stories before), and more so at such a young age. The quality of the debut novel set my thoughts on other debut novels which I have read and which have impressed me, and the experiences of which I still remember. I'll jot down here such as comes to me now. Note that the below list is of first "novel"s, and the authors might have had other forms of previous publications like stories, columns, etc..

The list excludes Bengali novels. Only those which I have read in English (meaning, originally English or English translations) were considered.

And initially, I started out writing a few lines against each item of below list, on the book or my experience of it, but since the words kept falling short of doing justice to either (or requiring much more effort to do so), I have removed any additional lines and just kept the names and authors.

• Wuthering Heights - by Emily Bronte.
• The God Of Small Things - by Arundhati Roy.
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - by J. K. Rowling.
• The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo - by Stieg Larsson.
• The Time Traveler's Wife - by Audrey Niffenegger.
• One Hundred Years of Solitude - by Gabriel García Márquez.
• The Time Machine - by H. G. Wells.
• The Catcher in the Rye - by J. D. Salinger.
• My Absolute Darling - by Gabriel Tallent.

Special Mentions:

• The Diary of a Young Girl - by Anne Frank. This is not a novel, but a journal. But it qualifies as literature and more. I already wrote about it earlier in posts About Anne Frank's Diary and "Intelligent" Authors.
• Mein Kampf - by Adolf Hitler. This again is not a novel, but an autobiography. I consider it amazing by the sheer intelligence portrayed in the observations made on human nature, and they way the views are articulated. A must read.

There are many other excellent debut novels I have read and really admired, but since I do not remember right now as vividly the experiences of reading them or the contents themselves, they do not figure in the above list. And this is strictly a personal take on the novels I have read, and should not be taken as a "ranking"or anything of the literatures (of course).

Parents: The most dangerous influence for a child

Parents can potentially be the worst evil a child can have in his or her life. Presence of parents, more often than not, leads to stunted growth, as an effect of the conflict between the vision and way of life of parents, and the natural instinct leading to an approach/attitude which is unique and true for the child himself/herself. This intrinsic conflict will always lead to a middle compromise, which is neither this nor that; along with a sense of (sub)conscious conflict and unsettlement, for the child, surfacing as s/he grows. Growth, the flourishing of a true character, can only happen in an environment without any such influencing effects. In the presence of such effects, for the child's own character to truly flourish, it now takes a vital part of the adulthood life, where a person has to unlearn the vast multitude of socially engineered feeds, and re-learn everything through his truly own unique senses, if that ever happens.

Everything we need to know about the world, we have already experienced them in our childhood, in our natural and unmoderated interactions with peers. Politics, trade, negotiations, power struggle, leading, following, being a hero, hero worshipping, espionage, counter-espionage, unionisation, success, failure, etc. - everything we say we 'learn from the world' in our adulthood, we would actually have had already gone through in our childhood. And the world has nothing new to offer or teach in the forms of these.

Today, we see an understanding prevailing that a child needs his/her parents. This is without grounds, I should say, beyond the age of six. Everything a parent can give to a child has already been given, through the genes, and through the initial survival and purely biological protection seeing past the stage of infancy and babyhood. Beyond that, there is nothing more a parent can ever hope to bestow his/her child with. Our ancient ways, like more than half a millennia ago, already addressed this - we had systems of "gurukool" prevailing, where a child would be sent away from home for further development and education. How many generations would we need to wake up again to our ancient wisdoms?

I have very rarely come across (through direct acquaintances or indirectly acquired knowledge), if at all, parents who in spite of staying with their child, have been able to overcome this negative effect.

The second most dangerous element in the growth of a child, I cannot say 'evil' here because it can be both a blessing or a curse, is peers of his/her own age. Even though, for natural growth, a necessary ingredient is leaving a child uninfluenced among his peers; yet, owing to the fact that children are among the most ruthless creatures that ever existed, this can also, at times, create negative effects. In having regular unmoderated time among peers, this is a risk the child is exposed to, but I would still say that the benefits outweigh the risks. In any case, observations, but un-influencing in effect within the time window of peer interactions, can be used towards follow up counsellings, thereby reducing the negative impacts and thereby reducing risk weightage. This is where you replenish needs of security, love and a 'safe' environment, in case they are depleted through unmoderated interactions. And of course, it is not necessary that the 'parents' play this part. Anyone properly equipped with the understanding is suitable; and more often than not, parents are not unbiasedly equipped.

The only learning we may not completely have as a child, and that because it requires a time window and feelings spanning beyond the years of childhood, is on that whose nearest understanding I can only seek to roughly convey by what present civilization attempts to define by the word 'love'.

On Education, Knowledge, Intellect and Instincts

"Education is the manifestation of perfection already in men." - by Swami Vivekananda.

How true the saying is! Yet, I am not in full synchronisation with the opening phrase "Education is the manifestation ..." - what I presently understand is more along the tunes of the initial wordings slightly rearranged - "Education leads to the manifestation of ...". The rest fully agrees with my present understanding.

However, my conclusion to the same opinion has been arrived at via different means. Through a hypothesis of genetic engineering (a premature understanding of GE, I acknowledge, and possibly more based on belief rather than scientific facts), neural networks, and the 'evolution' of these happening through maybe a million years. And through personal experiences of the process of learning and comprehensions, which always, with time, seems to be leading to forever changing assimilations of the same matter.

At this point, let me acknowledge, that not having gone through any other texts/explanations on Swami Vivekananda's views on the matters of the quote, what I'm expressing here might not be in line with Swamij's views. Instead, they reflect just my current thoughts on the subjects.

First, I'll say a few words on my present take on 'knowledge' and the means to attain it.

The knowledge we seek, of understanding the world around us, and why things - including our own selves and minds - are the way they are, is so complicated and intricate that it is impossible to grasp by a human mind in a lifetime, even if one lives for a thousand years. Attempts to master this through rationalised and institutionalised process is juvenile. Yet nature has assimilated this knowledge in our biological constitution through the millions of years of evolution. Even if we are not consciously aware, it is present within our neural and genetic setup.

True understanding of anything can never be arrived at through rational thinking, because no matter how deep you understand, there will always be a level of understanding deeper than your present one. (And as long as your mind is open and receptive, and have not turned stale, you will keep learning and your philosophies changing.) Also, there will always be the open question of why you are thinking the way you are thinking, which in itself, is what we call, in terms of computer science, an open loop of infinite recursion.

Instinct, however, is far more potent, arising from subconscious depths of understandings fortified by evolution through the ages. It is not the intellect, but instinct, which is the true enabler of progress of human civilisation. In very simple to understand words, let us consider the process of new inventions. No rationally engineered thought process, i.e., intellect, would ever justify pursual for something completely unfathomable and unknown, a pursual in complete darkness without having the slightest clue if something would turn up or not. Yet, men's instincts have led them on, and the one such pursual which yields fruit justifies the other thousand which fail. Also, many of what we learn of the world around us happen through sudden realisations originating from depths of instincts, only stimulated or awakened by some external stimulus.

Coming back to education system, the whole purpose of any education system, for me, should be not to 'teach' an individual anything, but to equip him with the foundation and tools such that he/she is actually able to learn when the true learning starts, or catches him unawares. True learning happens only through an individual's own assimilation of any matter or experience, using his very own instincts, aided with rational tools, to arrive at his own conclusions (*1). Our present day education system, unfortunately, has got very diluted and does very little towards this holistic objective. An education system should seek to equip the individual's mind to learn, and more importantly, to unlearn when faced with a new experience or understanding. Education should seek to make the mind forever open and receptive, and instil courage and faith in one's own self, such that an individual can accept what both his own mind and instincts are telling him anew, and can discard what hitherto had been believed in, even at the great cost of a shattered belief system resulting in being exposed and defenceless. Education is to equip an individual for this forever voyage of discovery, of a series of understandings and comprehensions awakened within him, by his own instincts, only aided by external stimulus.

(This writing is promoted from my paper journal. Originally written on 06-Apr-2017.)

P.S.:
1. "True learning happens only through an individual's own assimilation of any matter or experience, using his very own instincts, aided with rational tools, to arrive at his own conclusions." - Meaning, same experiences will lead to different conclusions in different beings. Though seemingly contradicting 'scientific' thought process, it has no contradictions when we do away with some approximations, and seek a more empirical formula.
 

Purpose of Art?

Often, I have come across statements, written or verbal, discoursing on the purpose and usefulness of art. To me, from point of view of consumer of the art, art has one and only one objective - experience of beauty, and of the joy which naturally comes out of it.

In assessment of an object of art, it is only this criteria - of creating something beautiful - which we should consider. Nothing else. That art which we often say as serving towards some kind of "education" or "message", etc. should be considered as no art at all, unless it stays uncompromisingly true to its primary purpose - beauty. At best, such items can be called a sophisticated tool of the same purpose.

Using as its foundation 'truths', truths which otherwise might even be constructed as undesirable or gross when seen through the filters of thousands of years of human civilization, art transcends them into something beautiful. It shows us beauty where we never might have perceived it. This sense of beauty and truth is perceived not through our knowledge, but through a sense very primitive, a sense we might not understand, a sense awakened by the object of the art. This awakened sense, encompassing among its ingredients both the basic human instincts and our own comprehension of the world around us, born from our life experiences, is independent and particular to individuals, allowing each of us to perceive the beauty and the truth in sublimely different ways suitable to our own psychs.

Even that art which is just a fanciful picture draws from something true - even though the truth may only be the feelings which we might have experienced.

The feelings and realisations we take away from the experience of an object of art are capable of transcending the layers of thousands of years of social engineering. That which we learn through the astonished experience of beauty, even though we might not rationally be able to articulate it, it stays within, deep rooted, forever.

Maybe it is only art which is capable of fighting the social engineering depicted in 'Brave New World'?

A New Class Divide - 'Knowledge is Power'

A new and wonderful mode of human subjugation and domination is on the anvil. Forget about the age old ways of muscle power or capital power. Forget about the widening gap between haves and have-nots, between third world and first world, forget about the hypocritical nature and world domination whims of the some governments! These are matters of the past. The information age is empowered with a mean much more sophisticated and powerful.

Let us see why and how.

We live in a web today. Literally. A web of connectivity - of 'connected devices'. What is it about this web which is making life easier for us? Every little thing happening on this web, every occurrence, anywhere and everywhere, is available and traceable everywhere else on the web. Leveraging this core principle, we translate the information available towards various services making life easier for us.

Let us now consider that all the information which is traceable about an individual is made available for study. This would include everything a person has ever done on his/her mobile, credit cards, bank accounts, internet, tv,  etc. What programs he watches, what articles he read on the net, what sites interest him, how much time he spends in his activities - everything is captured somewhere. Now, some expert, studying all these data spanning across a length of some years on an individual, would be able to formulate a very accurate psychological footprint of the person, complete with his strengths, weaknesses, seduction points, etc. Using these, the individual's reactions to the external world or any external stimuli can be predicted with considerable accuracy. He, henceforth, can be totally socially engineered to act as a puppet. In short, he can be 'mapped'. This is no science fiction or fantasy.

Till the present information age, neither the data, nor the expertise had been available in adequate scale to make such a social engineering really feasible. Today, the data is there. The technique is partially there - and it is only a matter of time until the full expertise spectrum gets developed.

This staggering information - constituting the footprint of individuals - is currently getting accumulated everyday, every hour, every second. As for the techniques, sophisticated data mining techniques are already in place. Identification of characteristics and patterns are happening everywhere - currently, for example, in targeting advertisements, assessing reliability or credit ratings, etc. From the social engineering perspective, the only things probably not yet fully matured are the exact techniques of leveraging this mined information towards social manipulations. But it remains only a mater of time until these become a reality.

A class divide - one of the most foul, but one which also had perhaps always existed in this world, yet never in such staggering proportions - is shaping up. The divide between the ones who have access to this information (with the capacity to use them), and the ones who do not. 'Knowledge is power' will assert itself in the coldest and truest way possible.

Going by present trends, this data availability will get concentrated on a handful of individuals. The likes of Google, (or Facebook?) for instance. If the corporates decide to pool and mine this information, and can come up with the expertise to leverage this towards social engineering, can one imagine the staggering power over human beings they would yield? People would be puppets without even being aware of the same!

Brave new world?

Self depreciative comments on news articles...!?

I was reading the comments at a new article posted on one of our leading sites. As always, the comments depressed me, somehow enough to trigger this article musing on the cause of this discomfiture.

What would you expect in the discussion following a news article of political relevance? Well articulated relevant facts, opinions, discussions and debates? But here are snippets of the flavour you get, consisting an overwhelming majority of the comments:
"feku, tu mard nahi hai" (at a fellow commenter), "Terrorist by heart..." (at a Lok Sabha contestant), "Muslims are taught to lie and cheat", "bloody traitors, her ancestors are congressi dogs"... and the list goes on.

This is not an one-off incident. Most comments (unmoderated ones, I guess) on news articles from many popular Indian houses show the same trend.

What is wrong here? The very fact that a person is able to log in using a connected device and post comments on a news article assures a minimum level of education. Why, then, this kind of self depreciative displays?

Venting of anger? But this is not a vocal exchange - and the time taken to type and publish a comment skims off the edge of possible instantaneous temper flares. Venting of frustrations? What frustration - against whom, and venting it where towards what effects? It does not really take an Einstein to comprehend that it is only the self, the commenter himself, who stands debased through such renditions!

Edit: I just realised that this is a post I'm doing a gap of more than 16 months! Long time!

18th Kolkata International Film Festival

The 18th Kolkata International Film Festival (10-17 Nov, 2012) has, as of today - after 6 running days and 11 watched films, already proved a success to me. Let me jot down briefly my experiences so far - before the memories turn stale.

1. Pogodak u glavu (Headshot) [Dir:  Pen-Ek Ratanaruang; Country: Thailand/France; Lang: Thai]:
This was a good experience - one of those which numbs your thoughts so that at the end of the movie, you have to force yourself with all your will to clap, and which leaves you walking like a zombie as you come out of the hall. I myself was haunted for quiet 20-30 minutes - and I was thankful that the next movie on my schedule had about 2 hours gap. The movie walks us through the mind of a cop turning into something like a hitman to do justice for cases where law fails owing to its stringent procedures, and finally turning a Buddhist monk towards salvation. After a headshot in such a hitman endeavour, which he survives with difficulty, the protagonist sees everything with his eyes upside down. This is a dark theme - but the movie is not fully dark in that sense - it is treated quiet gracefully and accommodating some beautiful sequences.

2. Tot Altijd (Time of My Life) [Dir: Nic Balthazar; Country: Belgium; Lang: Dutch]:
This, I should say, was a mediocre experience as per my Film Festival Expectations. This was a real life story about a man who legalised euthanasia in Belgium, himself fighting his own battle for the cause. Of course the film was good, but somehow it did not appear that 'fresh' - which it should have been given the number of films already made on the issue. My experience of 'Mar Adrento' obviously came in comparison, thereby rating this one down. Oh - I must mention that the opening 10-15 minutes of the film were absolutely great - rendering an utopia of youth in a group of friends.

3. Nocni Brodovi (Night Boats) [Dir: Igor Mirkovic; Country: Croatia; Lang: Croatian]:
This was a more pleasant experience. The storyline involved two elderly people, staying in elderly homes, re-discovering love, and then re-living their youthful spirits through an adventure of running away together from the the home and reliving their absolutely juvenile and carefree instincts. This was a nice happy film.

4. Melancholia [Dir: Lars Von Trier; Country: Denmark; Lang: English]:
I loved the experience of this one. The film had an opening musical 'prelude' of about 10 minutes, showing videos (with a lot of special effects) primarily in slow motion with an excellent background score, which really enthralled me and the audience. The movie used a 'story' of a planet called 'Melancholia' on its course to crash with earth, and showing the events of a family as they become aware of the impending destruction. This is not a science/action movie - the focus is entirely on how the family members go through these days. The name of the movie has been very adeptly prevailed throughout the movie in its screenplay and characters. The experience of this film will be remembered for a long time.

5. Polvo (Dust) [Dir: Julio Hernandez Cordon; Country: Guatemala; Lang: ?]:
I have nothing to say for this except that the start was somewhat boring and slow, as a result of which I fell asleep, and as a result of which I don't really know what happened thereafter.

6. Narenji Poush (The Orange Suit) [Dir: Dariush Mehrjui; Country: Iran; Lang: Persian]:
This one I'd rate as the best experience so far. The theme/story is simple and light - environment awareness - social responsibility of not littering the environment with trash and disposing them as they should be, and a father-son relationship with a mother whose commitment to her career goes against to that to her family. But the way the story was developed provided an excellent experience - containing humour enough to send the audience laughing out loud multiple times, and sentiments enough to bring them to tears. This is one of the movies which you come out of feeling all good positive and happy about it.

7. B A Pass [Dir: Ajay Bahl; Country: India: Lang: Hindi]:
The director came before the audience and made a speech in which he mentioned that this film was a defiance against the Indian Censor Board. That indeed it was - by virtue of the plot which basically rests on a college youth's adulterous relation with a elder married woman, and his subsequent foray in being a male prostitute with the woman filling in for the pimp. The movie had ample sleazy scenes - though not full exposure. The plot and the scenes perhaps do justice to what the director said, but the movie fails totally to do any kind of justice at all to the audience. This one had nothing to make it eligible for any kind of film festival!

8. Gibier d'élevage (Shiiku, the Catch) [Dir: Rithy Panh; Country: Cambodia; Lang: Central Khmer]:
[To be updated...]

9. La mer à l'aube (Calm at Sea) [Dir: Volker Schlondorff; Country: Germany; Lang: German/French]:
[To be updated...]

10. Where the Road Meets the Sun [Dir: Yong Mun Chee; Country:Singapore ; Lang: English/Japanese/Spanish]:
This movie showed a set of people coping their own situations, connected together by the same lodging hotel they are staying at. There is a bit of guns and bloodshed towards the end, culminating from mental tension. Overall, a below expectation experience.


11. Wo 11 (Eleven Flowers) [Dir: Wangxiao Shuai, Country: China; Lang: Mandarin]:
This was a better experience. The protagonist is a 11 year old boy walking the audience through his experiences - involving his fight to get and keep a new shirt, his confrontation with a murderer, his dynamics with his friends all through these, etc. This had a strong direction and adept screenplay keeping the audience hooked in rapt attention even without too much complex plot or drama.

More films will be added as they get consumed....