Author: Dominique Lapierre
Publishers: Arrow Books
Pages: 505
The title of the book ‘City of Joy’ is derived from translation of the name of slum in Kolkata(then Calcutta), called ‘Anand Nagar’.
Lapierre’s book almost changed the landscape of Anand Nagar, and much of Kolkata. His first hand description of the slum, the terrible conditions they lived in, the little money they survived in and the days that people spent without knowing if they will have food tomorrow, touched the hearts of people all over the world, and aid poured in big amounts.
The book is about the lives of a few people in the slums of Kolkata where Lapierre himself spent two years researching on the book. He takes up the story of a few people living in the slum to explain how people end up arriving in there, and how the slum itself gets created and grows by including everyone who comes in. And then coming in are people full of love who want to help then and uplift their lives, such as Stephan Kovalski, a Polish priest and the American doctor Max Loeb. The book contains numerous incidences full of sacrifices of people, explains how the people of the slum are full of life, enthusiasm and love despite the difficult conditions they live in. Though things would have changed much in the few decades that have passed since the book has been written, it does an excellent job in bringing out the ground realities of the poorest in Kolkata.
However, the book doesn’t score too well when it comes to readability. Lapierre is often guilty of trying to glorify the mundane. The book is full of adjectives that are actually used to describe things ordinary. And at times he goes to long length to describe most simple things and incidences that can test the reader’s patience. An attempt has been made to write the book as a story, but the tone of the book in most places is as dry as a documentary of chronological events and description of geography. All that doesn’t stop the book from being a valuable read, but would have been far better if the book was reduced to half its size.
Author: William Dalrymple
Publishers: Penguin Books
Pages: 339
The most important thing that I felt after reading City of Djinns is that Delhi has so many worthwhile places to see, and I should some day be seeing them all. I was speaking to a friend and she expressed the same thing, and said it might takes months to see all those places just within Delhi. And another friend had a head start. He told me over the phone – ‘I have been going to Nizamuddin theses days, visiting those places in City of Djinns’.
That is the charm of the Dalrymple’s excellently written book. Sometimes it takes you right there where he is and in other times you will wish you were there. Dalrymple spends a year in Delhi researching its history and works it backwards from the days just after independence, continuing to the British era and then to Mughals. History doesn’t reveal about the days much before that and he gives up. He has done great research on the topic and the length of bibliography is a good proof of it. And in the process of his research he unearths many monuments still existing but unknown to most of us – like the Nizamuddin Darga, Tughlakh’s fort, Safdarjung’s tomb, Havelis of old Delhi to name a few. He mixes history remarkably well with current day Delhi while he describes his own experiences of living in Delhi as he does his research for the book. It succeeds in making its reader fall in love with the city and at the same time remain cautious about it. An excellent book, needless to say.
Author: Paul Brunton
Publishers: Rider Books
Pages: 188
This book is in continuation with earlier book from Paul Brunton – ‘A Search in Secret India’, where Brunton travels around the country looking for a spiritual master. Having found one and learned from him, he sets off to isolation, now to practice.
‘A Hermit in the Himalayas’ describes Brunton’s days living in a secluded place in the mountains of Himachal Pradesh, away from rest of the world trying to meditate and learn to calm the mind. The book is mostly written like journal of his days of living in the mountains besides his reflection and attempts to meditate. He is not completely isolated from the world though, but has a servant to help him in his everyday activities, receives his letters regularly and responds to them and has some uninvited visitors, in all of which he finds things to write about, besides focusing on keeping his mind calm.
It would be difficult for the reader to perceive how one could write much sitting in a place isolated, but as one starts reading, it is evident that Brunton has enough to catch the attention. Read this as a continuation to ‘A Search in Secret India’