Bla Bla

Continued from Day 4 . Day 5: 25 th January 2011 So I got ready and went to attend the last day of the festival. I was already very upset about the fact that I had missed on the first two days, and then on 25 th I was standing at the venue for what seemed to me like the last day of fun! 10a.m. -11a.m. - The Reluctant Fundamentalist - Mohsin Hamid in conversation with Chandrahas Choudhury Mohsin Hamid is a Pakistani author who is known to have created characters in his novels which very shrewdly oppose the reader's stereotypes about a Pakistani national. The Reluctant Fundamentalist is his second novel with one such protagonist. Mohsin shared his difficulty of getting the approval of his editor on the first draft of this novel. His editor thought that the reader won't buy a story of a successful Muslim guy, feeling a strange tension in his life in America. A couple of months later after September 11 he said, "By the way, Mohsin , this book yo...

Continued from Day 3 . Day 4: 24th January 2011 11a.m. -12p.m.. - Indian Summer - Alex Von Tunzelmann in conversation with Karan Thapar Alex van Tunzelmann was interviewed by Karan Thapar about her book Indian Summer. This book is about partition and the end of British Empire in India and Pakistan. But it is more famous for it's insights into the affair of Edwina Mountbatten and Jawahar Lal Nehru. A movie is in production based on this book with the same title. Alex spoke at length about her research that went behind this particular case. She told us that there is no doubt that Edwina and Nehru were romantically involved and that at least Mountbatten family admits to it. She also talked about the letters that were exchanged between the two and are still held by the Mountbatten family. But she believes that Mountbatten family might soon make those letters public. Then Karan Thapar touched upon the most debated and sensitive aspect of the story, about which Alex wrote in her book as...

21st January to 25 th January was the week of literature at Jaipur. The city was overflowed by the who's who of the literature world irrespective of the language. But due to my personal commitments I had to miss on the first two days of the festival. The days which were pretty much marked by the presence of Javed Akhtar , Gulzar and Prasoon Joshi . I will here present my experience at the festival from Day 3 to Day 5. Day 3: 23rd January 2011 10a.m. -11a.m. - Boys will be Boys - Ruskin Bond I reached Diggi Palace sharp at 10a.m. to start my adventure of 3 days into the universe of books. The first session I chose to attend was of Ruskin Bond. He read a rare 'adult' passage from his book, Boys will be Boys. He had listeners in splits by read ing about a young boy being seduced by an older lady. Later he shared his experience of living in Mussoorie in the company of nature. He then asked the audience if they would be interested to hear his ...