Missed by a whisker :P

I was thinking of posting the following, originally:

"Death, though blamed as merciless, is balmy enough because it leaves no choice except dying. But life, though regarded as more clement as it gives too many options to overcome a situation. The freedom of choice is the biggest burden that life ever imposes."

And then, I happened to read an essay in Telugu on Jean Paul Sartre by Nandoori Rammohan, which finally ended my quest for understanding the philosophy of Existentialism. Reading it, I've realized that my mind works as hard core existentialist these days, without having read much stuff about it. I was also misled by enough people that Existentialism means pessimism in one or the other ways. But, from what I've read in the article and what I've been thinking hard these days, actually doesn't have much pessimism except accepting reality.

Well, it was a mixed feeling. To know that I've been thinking in the lines similar to one of the greatest philosophers on earth. At the same time, there's also feeling '0h-i-missed-it-by-whisker' - he was born a li'l too early than me. Otherwise and all, you see.. :P

Books can shed light on many a things about life. But nothing teaches life, like life itself. Don't google for the definitions or philosophies of existentialism, life will let you know that at some point or other. Also, knowing what is what isn't the deal. Sustaining them and moving ahead is!

మనసు

లేనిదాన్ని ఉందనుకొని
ఉన్నవీ లేనివీ ఊహించుకొని
ఊసులన్నింటినీ ఊహల్లో ఊరబెట్టి
లేనిది లేదనే ఉన్న నిజం తెల్సాక
ఊసురోమంటుంది - ఉరేసుకుంటానంటుంది

Deathly love

Loving him was like loving death - to be requited, could only mean my end. The logical equation of love, over the ages, has been in terms of give and take of hearts, leaving the worst possible result of ending up with a broken heart, most probably your own. Broken heart means shattering of something that never existed. Tattered dreams is to know that what doesn't exist, continues not to exist. If reality obliterating the delicately woven dreams and fantasized future results a broken heart, imagine what it means to have a wounded soul. To love, could also mean the end of a person you were thus far, it could also question your integrity, your way of life. You continue to exist, but with a marred soul.

(This world knows other torments than love and other happiness than a fond embrace. Love, do not ask for my old love again"-Wishmaker)

No retakes.. thanks for that..

They say, in a very sorry tone, that unlike cinema, life doesn't give a chance for retake. There isn't a possibility of either journeying back into time, or the time in the captivity of past reappearing again.

Life doesn't offer second chances, retakes, reconquers. Thankfully.

For if it even cares to give we'll only mess it up more. What to do with a second opportunity, while the reasons to falter in first place were unfathomable? When there is no methodical approach to play your cards, or even if there is a theory that's incomprehensible, a second chance would only mean attempting to bring method into madness. When lessons are unlearned, what's the advantage even if the question paper is leaked?

Life is not just a game. It is like those computer games where your game should be planned and executed against an unknown, whose moves or movements can't be guessed. What difference does it make if you're playing first or second time, when you're blindfolded, deafened? Life is a game, it is a gamble.

Thanks to life that it gives second chances, for that only means more disarray, more disappointment and more indignation.

నీడ

నా నీడ..
నేను నడిస్తే నడుస్తుంది.
నేను ఆగితే ఆగుతుంది.
నేను నవ్వితే నవ్వుతుంది.
నన్ను నాకు అరుదైన విచిత్రంలా చూపుతుంది.

నన్ను వీడి ఓ క్షణం కూడా ఉండలేదేమోనన్నంత భ్రమ కలిగించి, నేను చీకటిలో దాగగానే మాత్రం చిట్టుక్కున్న మాయం అవుతుంది. అచ్చు.. నీలా..

నీడ తోడు కావాలనుకుంటే వెలుతురు తప్పనిసరి!

Awesome.. Awesome..

That is what I've been doing for the past two hours.. I've been reading Mullapudi for the past two hours. AWESOME!

And also, I met Chandrahas Choudhary, one of my very favourite bloggers today.

So I've loads and loads to talk about.. but everything stops because, Mullapudi is with me. :)

The Solitude of Prime Numbers - Paolo Giordano

The title was fascinating enough for me to take the book in hands. The backdrop was sufficiently intriguing to buy it. The engrossing prose of the first few pages was enough to hook to the book till I completed it. This is one of those books, which isn't part of my favourites list, but still has tugged my heart's strings.

Any story, in particular love story, has to have enough stuff in it to engross the readers. At rare instances though, the story in itself has nothing great to offer, if not for the narration and presentation of it. Two lines about the plot of this book would only have that this a story of two not-so-normal people getting involved with each other right from their teenage, yet can't express themselves clearly to the other and in the bargain lose the love of their lives while having them in proximity.

As I was reading through, I was completely engulfed by the prose used for narration and characterization of the lprotagonists. It was hard to stop by. The real beauty of the work though, is the conceptualization of an idea and the execution of it.

The uniqueness of Prime numbers is their specialty not (or inability?) to be divisible by another number, except for themselves and one. Co-existing with a whole lot of other numbers, prime numbers still remain distinctively different. There isn't chance of two prime numbers next to each other.Twin primes, like 17 and 19, 41 and 43 - which are belonging to the same category are so close by, but are never next-to-next. They've just a single number between them (very near), but they still have a number between them (yet very far). For a moment, let's assume that there are two souls metamorphic to prime numbers, in the sense that they stand out from the usual crowd because of their genius or unusual traits or inabilities or whatever. A series of incidents happen with them individually and in togetherness, that despite the proximity they share they end of being distanced by an eternity. And through that distance runs a delicate string that still bonds them together. Though I wouldn't be carried away to call this piece of work a masterpiece, I'd still say, the attempt and the execution was laudable.

I found the choice of narrating the story in third person, very interesting! While the story is not about too many things happening around, but instead how one wrestles with the inner self with very happening, the author doesn't get into too much introspection of the characters and their mind. Say, for instance, the guy has the gal next to him with the scene aptly suitable to express his love for her. There is neither melodrama nor prolix detailing. All it has is - the guy knowing what to do and the guy not able to do it. Simple and elegant! Even the climax of the story has impressed me. Over all, I was looking for bit more mathematics involved in the story, I was let down.

This book isn't for people who can look / feel and sense love only in the bollywood boisterous ways. This book is for people who are or who can empathize that love can happen to the not-so-normal people and expressing it can also be in not-so-normal ways. (not-so-normal only means that anything / anyone not belonging to the most conventional ways, not that they are aliens, though are treated that way.)

When every single step taken towards someone draws you away from them and that very withdrawal pushes you closer to them, the distance between always remaining the same, the other earthly matters really don't matter. If you wanna know such a story, read this book.

"The Solitude of Prime Numbers asks, can we ever be whole when we’re in love with another? And how much of ourselves do we give away?"

I've got my answer. You find out yours. :)

(Googling for this book after I had read through the initial chapters, I came across an interesting blog, which categorizes book musings into fore-thoughts (musings after knowing the book and before reading) and after-thoughts (once done with the book). I liked the idea, that I'm tempted to write that way. Would give it a try, soon!)

Waiting and waiting and..

It's been almost 3 weeks that I've ordered the book, "Too loud a solitude", in Landmark. "It would be surely available. It would take little time." was an assuring answer with a temporary effect. Today, from nowhere, I've started thinking about the book and digging all information about it. I was introduced to this book through this blog, the elegant way of introducing the book had its mark on me.

While I still await the book, here's another wonderful article about the author Bohumil Hrabal.

I've hardly come out of the magic of Milan Kundera. Seems like, I'm all set to have a great with this author too. Every single time, I think its time to move to complete non-fiction reading, I happen to stumble upon a mesmerizer. Hmmm.. for now the news is, I'm waiting!

The reading life..

I've always liked being in the company of books. Many a people who are eye witness to my passion for books, keep asking the very old tiring question, "Why do you read so much?" and the "so much" part of the question doesn't actually highlight the quantity of my reading, it is their mere disgust.

"Why do you read?" - is a question that irks me to the core. "Why?" is possibly the simplest ever question to put and the toughest to answer, the tougher when its about something you love. When the answer doesn't seem to match the fervor we know we have, we tend to give exaggerated answers, "I can't live without them", "I can't imagine my life without them", "I'm nothing without them". Not questioning the enormous benefits of book reading, I still dare to suggest that books are always secondary. No matter what kind of subject and what beauty the prose has, the basic needs of human body can't be satisfied by book reading. (All the folks who put up their hands and interrupt, "Hey, I do forgo food and sleep to complete a book, you know?"- my answer would be, "You can afford that. There is a huge difference when you can forgo something and when there is nothing to forgo.") 

"Why do I read?" - Well, I was trying to find out an answer to this for a while now. The immediate advantage of reading lot of books,that the language improves has always abandoned me. Irrespective of the language, reading has hardly helped me in bettering my vocabulary. I don't read to write! I'm not one of those lucky souls who in worse of moods, open a book and get lost in a new magical fictional world and conveniently and  comfortably forget the real world.

For me, reading books can be metamorphical only two acts. When it is fiction, the act is that of sleeping. When it is non-fiction, the act is that of listening to another soul, completely engrossed. All fictional books I'd read thus far, left with the taste of sleeping experiences, say, a profound sleep, a nightmare, a disturbed sleep, incredibly beautiful dream and so on. And when it comes to non-fiction, it is like meeting a stranger on a train and listening to him with undivided attention. I don't know the person and would never have a chance again. Whatever has to happen, happens in that little window of time and then all I have is his memories. I read books for the exclusive bliss of dreaming without sleeping and listening without the compulsion to talk back.

I quite seriously intend to make notes of my readings on a regular basis in this blog. So, all you bookworms out there can take the pain to visit this blog. You'll find something or the other. The others, don't worry! There are many other things to share apart from books. :)