On Stephenie Meyer's Twilight

Here comes the declaration: Stephenie Meyer's Twilight is one of my favourite books!

To anybody who has a fair bit of idea of my likes and dislikes, my moods and sensibilities, my way of thinking and interpretation, my interests in reading and writing, this declaration might come as a  thorough surprise, if not a rude shock.

Twilight is supposedly an exaggerated love story between a human and a human-eating monster. On the face of it, it is a fairy tale for naive readers, who goad themselves with the idea that LOVE makes everything and anything possible and it’s an abomination for the other lot, who question the practicalities and possibilities.  For me, it stands somewhere between. Where and how, is what I intend to tell.

Before even getting into why I like a book in general and why this one, in particular, let’s talk about writer-reader relationship. A writer writes what he needs to write, badly and a reader reads what he wants to read, badly. Yes, the key word is “badly”. To tell the same, in my own way - the freaking way - what I mean is: I care a damn for who has written it. I care a damn on his / her need or urge to write it. I care a damn for the characters created - their moods, their sensibilities, their characteristics. I care a damn if the book is a success or not. I care a damn on how this book is perceived by the world and you, in particular. I care a damn if I've lost your respect as soon as you've read the first line of this post. What I care for, only and only, is how much of the book I could own, how much I could call it, mine.  

Twilight’s summary in my own words will NOT be: An impossible and implausible love story! To look at it that way, a vampire and human falling for each other, the human not stepping back even after knowing the truth about her love, the vampire under control when his prey is around, the love, the trust, the pain portrayed are too ridiculous to accept, forget about admiring.

I see it in a different way. For me, Edward Cullen isn’t a vampire. He is as human as anyone of us, but with a trait injurious to his gal. Bella isn’t a stupid gal who’s loving her man blindly, despite knowing he's inhuman, he's a vampire! She’s the one with complete understanding of her man, that she trusts him despite his trait, which is potentially lethal, only potentially! So, it’s not a vampire-human love story, for me. It is a potentially-harmful-guy and completely-trusting-gal deeply in love with each other. As human beings, we’re part angels and part demons. A twilight happens, when the demon in one is taken care by the angel in the other. A twilight is beautiful, not because demon-angel combination is intriguing. It is beautiful because, the angel doesn’t hesitate trusting the human being, despite the demon. In reciprocation, the demon is never let out of control within the human being.

I don’t belong to the rest of the herd, I’m supposed to, who expect their guys to be Edward Cullens. I belong to a special club (which has only me), because I see an Edward Cullen in each human being. Most of the times, we hid him from the world and unleash him only in solitude. Some times, we fall for those, who get scared by him and run away from us. Once in a life time - for only the lucky souls, of course -  a Bella enters our life, befriends the demon in us and turns our life into seeming fairy tale. 
( Ah! How dearly do I wish a Milan Kundera or Italo Calvino or Marquez, turning my interpretation into full fledged novel. Sigh!)

By the way, I was told, love is blind. I was further told, love is blind because the trust you end up putting in the person is blind. So, I took doubting one’s love to sin. No! The way it works is - at least for the single member club I’m in - the more you doubt a person, the more you understand the person and the more you put your trust in. Doubting is not sin. Letting the doubt win over you, without proper understanding IS. Deathly sin.

In case, the person whom you love the most, can’t even trust you as a human being and treats you as the demon... congratulations! You’re through with what human race dreads the most. Your last breath is a formality now. Of course, life until then, too.

Legal advice sought on the following:

1. Can Stephenie Mayer be sued, because I strongly feel, she trespassed my territory, understood my inner world and violated all copyright acts, to come up with following lines:

   
Sometimes I have a problem with my temper....
   
   
I was aware of the time slipping away so quickly, like the black road beneath us, and I was       hideously afraid that I would never have another chance to be with him like this again — openly, the walls between us gone for once. His words hinted at an end, and I recoiled from the idea. I couldn’t waste one minute I had with him.

I don’t want to be a monster.

I didn’t want to leave, but it was necessary. It’s a bit easier to be around you when I’m not thirsty.

Don’t you see, Bella? It’s one thing for me to make myself miserable, but a wholly other thing for you to be so involved.

You were right — I’m definitely fighting fate trying to keep you alive.

Yes, you are exactly my brand of heroin.

I’m stronger than I thought. It’s nice to know.

Mind over matter.

You don’t realize how incredibly breakable you are. I can never, never afford to lose any kind of control when I’m with you.

I infuriate myself. The way I can’t seem to keep from putting you in danger. My very existence puts you at risk. Sometimes I truly hate myself.

I love you. It’s a poor excuse for what I’m doing, but it’s still true.
   

2. Better, if I could sue God for his ineffectual scripts..Possible?

Life long deal.. for the first time ever.

Freaking out has always been my pastime. I freak out if there's nothing to freak out. I freak out that I'm not freaking out enough. The actual point to be made in this post, has nothing to do with freaking out, but still..

Now, I freak out when people come up with life long deals. Say, if a salesman is trying to sell me something on the basis of "Life Long Guarantee.", I'd bombard him with questions like, "Whose life does that Life refer to?", "Mine?", "Yours?", "The product's?", "The manufacturer's?", "The re-seller's?", "Whose bloody life is it, anyway?" If he doesn't freak out listening to this, I freak out because I wasn't able to freak him out enough.

Similar episode happens when somebody comes up with the theory of "Friend for Life." I freak out, because it scares me to death.. yes, death. What if I'm dying? Am I not breaking the bond? If not, why do you wanna term it using the word Life?

I'm a person in hurry. See me eat, talk, walk, work, read, worry - you'd know, I'm hurry! When I've chosen to read a book, I'm in hurry to complete it. Not finishing it off, is my way of insulting it. For me everything is like an ice cream, I gotta relish, lest it melts.

I've been reading Catch 22 for the past few months, yet lingering in page 130 or so. For the first time ever, I don't feel like rushing through..I don't want to finish it, I don't want it to finish. I act like a kindergarten - alright, pre-primary 1- kid who worries about the chocolate getting over. Catch 22 is the book, which is mirroring the greed in me. And yes, I took a liking to that image of mine in the mirror.

For a 4-line content, I gave 4-para introduction. If you're the one to worry about e-waste, please freak out.


It's time that my online book racks have two new shelves: Books-that-read-me and Makes-me-greedy-books.

aatm ghaat

Aatm ghaat - I'm unable to get this word out of my head. I came to know about this word, few days back, when I overheard a dialogue in one of the Hindi daily serials. I liked the word, almost instantly. It roughly translates to "a blow causing self destruction".  As I keep witnessing numerous instances of aatm-ghaat, I keep thinking more about it.

This post would be about some of the Hindi soaps, I get to know on a daily basis. I know. I know, it's crime to discuss about them. But just because I want to give samples of aatm-ghaat, I can't drag people whom I know onto a public forum. Can I? Should I? Wouldn't that be a bigger crime?

I don't remember the names of the soaps, too lengthy, too crappy. Names are, anyway, not that important.

There is this one soap about the medical interns in a prestigious hospital. The chief's daughter and an intern are neck deep in love. Parents on either side approve it. When all seems well, the guy meets with an accident and "disappears". The gal keeps pining for him. Here comes a new intern - junior to her - and plays such a dirty prank that whole of the hospital - including newly admitted patients - get to believe that there's something physical happened between the two. The gal's father - head of a prestigious hospital, himself a successful doctor, father of two successful doctors - comes up with spineless question,  "Who'll marry my daughter?".  "Meee!" says the junior, and turns from villain to hero, instantly.  This gal agrees to it, despite continuining to ache for her first love. The first instance of aatm-ghaat! She marries. Aatm-ghaat! Her first love returns, gets to know what has happened and goes nuts. This gal continues to watch him as an outsider, despite wanting to be with him. Aatm-ghaat! After six months of turmoil, she agrees to "re-marry" the same guy, now, without any enforcement. Aatm ghaat! Every single moment of her second marriage ceremony, she thinks of the first guy. Aatm ghaat!

The other day, I was talking to a friend about the movie Arya 2. He opines that it is one of the best flicks, in terms of projecting a guy's inconsistencies in actions  when he's in love. Going by the same theory, though the above serial is the crappiest you ever would get to watch, I still believe, it shows how a woman, who can't choose between alternatives can traumatize her men. Nothing can be more lethal than women, in such cases.

There's another serial, which let's us see the other side of the coin. It's about a lower middle class couple, now separated. They get together because of an arranged marriage. Thanks to a series of misunderstandings between the families and the couple, they head towards divorce. By the time, the processing of divorce happens, they fall for each other, so much so that, they can't imagine being separate. But they go ahead and get themselves divorced. Aatm-ghaat!

If first serial has this aatm-ghat because a gal couldn't stand for her guy, the second one is because they strive to be more divine than humanly possible.

May be, as Chuck says, "Self-improvement isn't the answer. Self-destruction is the answer." I don't know. May be, aatm-ghaat is inevitable to keep surviving.  Irony of life, you may call it: Keep killing yourself in bits, so that you can stay alive. 

Passions and Impressions

Today, I bought a copy of "Passions and Impressions" by Pablo Neruda. Two years back, when I started this blog, I just started exploring Pablo Neruda. I read a lot about this work, Passions and Impressions. I don't remember where exactly on internet, but I did read it in bits and pieces.

This work is not his usual poetry. It's prose, or better put, poetic prose about what can be called his musings. Here are few excerpts of what I read, in couple of hours.

"I have undertaken the greatest act of self-expression: creation, hoping to illuminate words. Ten years at a solitary task, ten years that make up exactly half my life, have generated in my writing diverse rhythms, opposing currents."

"To comment on passing events is to take on a certain tone. One rolls down the incline of a personal bias and presences begin to recur: the sentimental discovery, the heartrending aspects of departing or arriving; the comedian strikes sparks, the tragedian draws blood."

"It is night, a night that arrived energetically, decisively. This night wants to lie on the ocean, a bed with no gorges, no volcanoes, no passing trains. There it snores in its freedom, without pulling up its legs at frontiers, without shrinking back at peninsulas; it sleeps, the enemy of topography as it dreams of freedom."

"Poetry is song and fertility."

This book, just reminds me that I got take my Spanish a bit more seriously. "Book of Questions" might be my first book in Spanish.. I mean, if I get hold of a bilingual edition. :)

Real time Stack Overflow Exceptions

I guess, it's high time that I maintain notes about my readings. Given the erratic nature of what I read and my poor memory, it becomes a must that I scribble about them somewhere, somehow. This blog wouldn't be a bad idea either.. alongside my buzz.

It was two years back, that I read this story. I was asked to explore the genre called "magic realism". This was during my early stint with Telugu fiction - I tried out magic realism without knowing what it is.

http://www.angelfire.com/wa2/margin/Behrens.html

This is a too simple, yet sweet love story. I like the way in which feelings were projected. An exceptional way of showcasing real time Stack Overflow exceptions.

No wonder, I was dying to read it! ;)