(Author’s Note: Here’s a poem about US—and much of the world’s–politics in this “modern age,” in which the emphasis of our “hidden persuaders” (and, often, blatant manipulators) is not so much on what we think as on how we think—i.e., shallow thinking. Those who dare to chart their own course, probe deeply, think for themselves,draw their own conclusions, are too[Read More...]
Co-Written by Wenceslaus Mendes and Anupam Chakravarty Torrential rains, this monsoon like every other has worsened the flood situation in Assam. This year already around 1.1 million people have been affected in 23 districts and the fatalities due to flood this year has gone up to 24 and counting. While the state administration is doing its best to tackle the[Read More...]
Let me start with a real life incident of a Woman in the contemporay India.She has a habit of excessive reading from history,political science,literature and all that subjects that help her in evolution to a ‘true human being’.With the emergent field of Dalit studies she has started to read about ‘Dalit paradigms’ and learning about the instances helped her analyse[Read More...]
In 1963, Satyajit Ray directed Mahanagar, commonly considered to be his first ‘Calcutta film’. True, there is a little of the ‘Big City’ in Apur Sansar (1959). Equally true, Parash Pathar (1958) is about an elderly Calcutta clerk who comes into a sudden fortune, only to lose it in no time. But Parash Pathar is a fantasy film, can perhaps[Read More...]
My rendezvous with ‘Walking over Water’ created a fresh gush of energy outpouring inside. Here Joshy unfolds a tale about something which has no story in the conventional sense. He weaves the tapestry in the frame of a fictional game of visual discourse. The vivacity of his film and its internal design of image and sound stimulate a sense of[Read More...]
Human civilization is confronting illness in a way unprecedented in the recent past. Brings back the image of the little girl Sita in Ritwit Ghatak’s movie Subarnarekha, who was singing in an abandoned air-strip, and all of a sudden, Kali the mother-destroyer appeared before her. The frightened little girl realized that it is only a poor man wearing the mask[Read More...]
At my teens from Sunday church I wandered in old small town looking birds listening old band near traditional coffin workshop where many variety coffins stacked When grown up as a student Study of funerals were my interest as it was rituals and traditions show the drama of true life on earth our real live theater Witnessed looked heard read[Read More...]
On 24 March 2020, the Prime Minister of India ordered a nationwide lockdown for 21 days, suddenly limiting the movement of 1.3 billion Indians as a preventive measure against the COVID-19 pandemic. Millions of urban migrant workers lost their livelihoods and were trapped thousands of miles away from their native villages. Due to the lockdown, more than 350 deaths were[Read More...]
1. “Girasole,” Italians say, accent on soul, “g” as in gyro, the last syllable, lay–a medieval song. In my uncle’s garden there were many (heads taller than I, taller even than the tomato plants he trained to staves heading towards trellises of overhead vines from which he squeezed–sweet!– grapes’ wine-dark blood). But these were different— golden, star-petaled…serene; yet…eerie how they[Read More...]
“In the dark times Will there also be singing? Yes, there will also be singing. About the dark times.” -Bertolt Brecht These historic lines are prophetically relevant today as we witness the forward march of right wing and reactionary forces in India and UK. These forces are destroying the multicultural mosaic of our society and all other progressive achievements of[Read More...]
