Growing up in India, one saw the image of Gandhi everywhere. Gandhi was Mahatma (“great soul”), whose aura soared above the martyrs of struggle for Independence. Gandhi’s bespectacled visage is still a universal presence on rural committees, on non-profit logos, in drawing competitions, and in children’s “fancy dress” parades on his birthday celebrations. He is etched on the Indian currency bills and sketched in collective memories, but always with the same imagery: the charkha (the wheel), the round spectacled bald head, the walking stick on which his spindly weight rested, the white khaddar fabric and time-piece, and the ever-present smile. Even as Gandhian lifestyle fades into the distant past, with memories being re-layered in celluloid hues of Kingsley’s face, Gandhi’s round spectacles…
Leave a CommentTag: Books
Where do temporary e-commerce workers come from? I noticed that Jessica Bruder’s Nomadland, a book I enjoyed reading earlier in November, was listed in the NYTimes 100 Notable Non-Fiction books of 2017. Well-deserved recognition for the book. I recommend the book review by the sociologist Arlie Hochschild, who has written several deeply informative books on the nature of work and life in America. Here is an excerpt from Dr. Hochschild’s review. Moving “like blood cells through the veins of the country,” Jessica Bruder writes, a growing number of older people, post-recession refugees from the middle and working class, are, like Linda, crossing the land in their Jeeps, campers and repurposed buses in search of work. … Other nomads “pick raspberries in Vermont, apples in…
Leave a CommentReview: Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad When I spent some time in South East Asia, I rather belatedly became aware of the diversity and the complexity of history and politics in the region, and the power exerted by the sea on the livelihoods of people. I picked Lord Jim — a book that I had always wanted to read — in part, due to the hope that it would offer a colonial perspective into the region at the turn of the last century. Compared to many writers of repute, Joseph Conrad’s prose is remote and difficult to read, just for delight. The writing is dense, “hard” and unforgiving. I trudged through every page; Several times, I retraced the pages that…
Leave a Comment