Short Story Reads: Mrs. Packletide's Tiger by Saki

Saki was the pen name under which British writer Hector Hugh Munro wrote before his life was tragically cut short at 45 in France, along with millions of others during World War I. By then Saki had left behind hundreds of short stories - all noted for their ready wit, black humor and macabre.

Especially readable are his stories involving Clovis.

Now in these stories, Clovis need not play the central character, many times he would be the one passing a sole comment on having overheard the proceedings. Of a similar template is the satire and irony of Mrs. Packletide's Tiger.

Now, it is a writer's dilemma to decide whether to give you the full synopsis and thus depriving you of the joy of reading the story for yourself.

Here's how the solution has been reached, as the story is now out of the clutches of copyright, here is the story link: Mrs. Packletide's Tiger.

Happy reading.


(Article by Snehith Kumbla)   

Short Story Reads: Salvatore by Somerset Maugham

One of the reasons Somerset Maugham was never considered among the greatest novel writers of his lifetime, much to his disappointment, was his dry, satirical approach to novel writing. Maugham was a keen observer of life but with a distant, aloof, often blunted involvement.

The Novels
Though a very successful writer of his times, Maugham's novels like Of Human Bondage, The Moon and Sixpence and Cakes and Ale are not considered among the greatest novels of any time today. His novels seldom make the top 100 list of books ever written.

Often, Maugham with his steely, unblinking eye has given us lengthy descriptions of a time and era gone by. These prose sections are not as engaging to read now.

At the time of writing, I have been rereading Cakes and Ale. The descriptive passages now seem dated, though, in parts, the well-sketched characters and story still hold my attention.

The Master 
In contrast, fifty years after his death, Somerset Maugham's reputation as a short story writer remains untarnished. In this writing medium, Maugham finds unparalleled touch, telling all kinds of tales with a fluidity and verve that his novels momentarily radiate. Fortunately, the writer himself compiled The Complete Short Stories in four volumes, arranging them according to the local setting of the stories.

Salvatore by Somerset Maugham 
My faith as a reader was reaffirmed recently in Salvatore, a short story that only Maugham could pull off with such finesse, heart, and flair.

I wonder if I can do it. 

Maugham begins the story with that enigmatic first sentence and goes on tell us the story of Salvatore, first as a carefree boy of 15 effortlessly swimming in the sea.

Salvatore lives on an island around present Malaysia with his fisherman father and two younger brothers. Time flies and soon Salvatore falls for a beautiful girl on the island. The couple is engaged but the boy has to leave the island for the first time in his life to serve the mandatory military service term.

It is hard for Salvatore to bear this separation. Even as he is sent to Venice, Bari, and China, he writes long, ill-spelled letters to his love.

After falling severally ill with rheumatism, Salvatore is declared unfit for further service, much to his relief and happiness. He can now go home. Little does he know that tragedy, hardship, and heartbreak await him.

Among the briefest, most moving and beautiful stories ever written by Maugham, Salvatore is a short story masterpiece from start to finish.

What did the writer imply with that enigmatic first line?

Read Salvatore by Somerset Maugham at this link to unveil the secret. 



(Article by Snehith Kumbla)   

Fantasy Reads: The Hobbit by JRR Tolkien

The first edition cover of  The Hobbit

To put it simply, I haven't read a fantasy as satisfying and sumptuous as The Hobbit.

In its best moments (and there are innumerable), Tolkien makes us believe that he was there, seeing it all, in another place, another time, eons ago.

First published in 1937, Tolkien wrote this fantasy tale supposedly for children, which is hard to believe. For apart from its epic scale, the book is fascinating in providing varied, delightful shades to the various creatures that inhabit it - hobbits, dwarves,wizards, dragons and humans.

Full of surprises, the book tells the tale of a hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, who finds his peaceful, sleepy life disrupted by the arrival of the wizard Gandalf, Thorin and his band of twelve dwarves at his cosy home in the Shire. Gandalf cunningly makes Bilbo part of this treasure-hunting group.

The dwarves mean to regain their treasure, stolen from them years ago by the fierce dragon Smaug, who still guards it. Suddenly, Bilbo's placid life turns into a series of adventures, he almost gets killed by trolls, and with the other dwarves - gets captured by goblins.

One of Tolkien's illustrations from the book  

Then there is the significant part about Gollum, a mysterious creature who tries to trap Bilbo, as depicted in the chapter 'Riddles in the Dark'. It is here that a mysterious ring makes its first appearance, a strand expanded into epic storytelling in the writer's three-book The Lord of the Rings, published between 1953-1954.

Underneath the simplistic main plot, there are several webs of  intricacies that make The Hobbit more than a mere fairy tale. Just when you may think that the story has reached its zenith, the real fun begins.

There is no morality involved here, everybody is after the treasure, some want a share of it, others won't part with it. A treat for teenagers and adults and not as intimidatingly (for some readers) spread as The Lord of the Rings, The Hobbit started the fire that became the bigger, grander trilogy.

Thing is, Tolkien's writing still illuminates with immense detailing, wit and life that remains, almost eight decades later - unsurpassed. A classic.

Caution: Don't go by Peter Jackson's underwhelming movie trilogy adaptation of The Hobbit, the book is a gem. 

(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

One of Tolkien's illustrations from the book  

Manga Reads: Old Boy by Garon Tsuchiya | Nobuaki Minegishi

This eight-volume manga comic series starts with a bang. 

Believability reigns until the last volume before several revelations make the plot almost inedible. 

The story does conclude with an unexpected ominous tone.

A man is kidnapped, locked up in a room for ten years, and as inexplicably, released. A quiet tinge of revenge and the confounding question fills the man - Who the hell did this to him and why?

Determined to get his revenge barehanded, our man straddles around bustling Tokyo looking for clues.

Bit by bit, even as his detection begins to pay off, voila, the nemesis shows himself, leading to a tense, psychological encounter that ends with a death. If you are looking for a genre, this is a manga of suspense.

Excellent story and illustrations, Old Boy is superlative stuff if not an immediate manga classic.

More on manga

A manga has illustrations and dialogues that resemble detailed storyboards. From its 1950s origins in Japan, manga has sprawled into the English reading world.

The traditional Japanese manga book format is usually replicated in English editions - a manga is read from the back page, right to left.

A sword slash could extend to pages, the immense detailing adds an intricate atmosphere to the telling, sinking us deeper into the tale. Thus a singular story of manga extends into volumes, seldom do they end in a single book.

Action-adventure is a popular genre, as are romance, comedy, science fiction, and murder mysteries.

Violence and sex are recurring features in most manga works. 

Many manga book covers carry the PARENTAL ADVISORY tag for EXPLICIT CONTENT.

Endnote 

The Old Boy manga inspired the 2003 South Korean film of the same name and Spike Lee's Oldboy (2013), a Josh Brolin-starring official remake.

The 2006 Hindi film Zinda, starring Sanjay Dutt and John Abraham was inspired by the 2003 film rather than the book.

(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

Book Excerpt: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

Tom Sawyer is no stranger to most bookworms, the epitome of mischief and loafing as he is, Sawyer's enduring evergreen appeal that has lasted over a century can be attributed to his indomitable spirit. In the following lines from the first few pages of the book, Mark Twain kind of sums up the essential Tom Sawyer character for us:

He was not the Model Boy of the village. He knew the model boy very well though — and loathed him.

Within two minutes, or even less, he had forgotten all his troubles. Not because his troubles were one whit less heavy and bitter to him than a man’s are to a man, but because a new and powerful interest bore them down and drove them out of his mind for the time — just as men’s misfortunes are forgotten in the excitement of new enterprises.


(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

Fiction Reads: A Tiger for Malgudi by RK Narayan

RK Narayan (1906 - 2001)

Most of RK Narayan's novels and short stories are set in the fictional, sleepy town of Malgudi, somewhere in south India. A Tiger for Malgudi is no exception. Even as an aging zoo tiger narrates its life history, the story's climatic moments inevitably occur in the small town. Instead of its usual full-fledged role, Malgudi makes a guest appearance here. But more of that later, sample an excerpt from the first chapter: 

You are not likely to understand that I am different from the tiger next door, that I possess a soul within this forbidding exterior. I can think, analyse, judge, remember and do everything that you do, perhaps with greater subtlety and sense. I lack only the faculty of speech. 

But if you could read my thoughts, you would be welcome to come in and listen to the story of my life. At least, you could slip your arm through the bars and touch me and I will hold out my forepaw to greet you, after retracting my claws, of course.      

A common thread runs through most of Narayan's works, the flow persists here. The storytelling is simple, the characters well-defined, there are no complexities in the plot. Time is an invisible character in all Malgudi tales, it is as if time lingers on a park bench, or stands still as a statue while passing Malgudi. 

Many times I have found this lingering pace a bother in Narayan's novels. This despite the fact that none of Narayan's novels extend beyond 300 pages. But A Tiger for Malgudi is one Narayan novel I love returning to. The 176-page length works for the book. It has the charm of a fable, old world wisdom, incidental humour and at its best moments, a leisurely, enjoyable aroma of a much-repeated (and thus polished) grandmother's tale.


(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

Poetry Reads: Jejuri by Arun Kolatkar

  

Arun Kolatkar (1932-2004) was reclusive (didn't own a telephone: ever), bilingual poet with rare gifts.  A clear demarcation of style and substance is evident in his Marathi and English works.

Apart from wit, satire, and humour, Kolatkar's English poetry has its unique punchlines, dream-scraping, and exaggerated comic imagery. A Sir J.J School of Art pass out who went on to be a professional graphic designer - the copyrighting sprinkle certainly shows in the English poems. Keen observation is another noticeable endowment.    

Barely Published 

The degree of reluctance in publishing his work was such that for years, Jejuri was the only English poetry collection available. Two English poetry collections Kala Ghoda Poems and Sarpasatra were released on July 14, 2004, at an event in Mumbai. Terminally ill with stomach cancer, Arun Kolatkar was in the audience as poets read from the two books.

Posthumously, came the beautifully compiled The Boatride and other Poems, edited by his close friend and fellow poet Arvind Krishna Mehrotra. The latter's introduction duly documents Kolatkar's last days, under the title - Death of a Poet. Kolatkar passed away on September 25, 2004 in Pune.

Thus was Kolatkar - of leonine hair, razor-blade eyes, and drooping moustache. We now delve into Jejuri, first published in 1974.

Destinations, Inspirations

Jejuri is an hour's drive from Pune. Much has changed since the poet visited this small-town nearly four decades ago. This was no pilgrimage that Kolatkar undertook, that much is clear. A leisurely trip with no particular purpose seems more like it.  The first of the 31 poems swings in the surrealism of a bus ride. Another walks into the world of an eager priest. An excerpt:

The bus goes round in a circle. 

Stops inside the bus station and stands 

purring softly in front of the priest. 

A catgrin on its face

and a live, ready to eat pilgrim   

held between its teeth.                                           

We also get a striking description of a temple's ruined state and an unlikely epitaph in another. The extract follows:

No more a place of worship this place

is nothing less than the house of god.    

Kolatkar misses little - be it the haphazard zigzag journey of a conduit pipe, a medieval door or temple legends:

these five hills 

are the five demons 

that khandoba killed 

says the priest's son 

a young boy 

who comes along as your guide 

as the schools have vacations 

do you really believe that story

you ask him 

he doesn't reply 

but merely looks uncomfortable

shrugs and looks away               

The collection flows chronologically. For instance, the priest's son chances his eyes upon a:

look

there's a butterfly 

there   

The Butterfly is the poem that follows. (Click the following link to read The Butterfly in its entirety.)

Some of the most profound lines in the book can be found in the poem, A Scratch. Another excerpt:

what is god 

and what is stone 

the dividing line 

if it exists 

is very thin 

at jejuri    

and every other stone 

is god or his cousin

Kolatkar finishes it with a signature:

scratch a rock 

and a legend springs

Apart from this dry comment on idol worship, Kolatkar cites his indifference to rituals in a quiet smoky rebellion in another. Here's Makarand - the whole poem :

Take my shirt off 

and go in there to do pooja? 

No thanks. 

Not me. 

But you go right ahead

if that's what you want to do. 

Give me the matchbox

before you go

will you? 

I will be out on the courtyard

where no one will mind 

if I smoke. 

A timeless frozen aura of words, spacing, and arrangement, Jejuri is a poetry travelogue worth lingering in. I would go on and call it a classic, not a popular, accepted work yet, but the sheen is unmistakable. As for you poetry lovers, the Wolf suggests you experience it for yourself, devoid of any fixed notion.


(Article by Snehith Kumbla) 

Arun Kolatkar