Me and Shantaram:
Who is Shantaram?? A real or fictitious character...?? I had nice fun time with my friends in last two weeks when I was spending time with Shantaram…! One day evening I was having tea with my friends, few minutes after finishing tea I told them I would like to make a move as I am missing my Shantaram and he is calling me…!! They all got all kind of ideas, and asked me who is he or I have kept new name for someone? The curious expression on their faces was really exhilarating for me…By this time they all know who is Shantaram, breaking the ice of silence it’s a book about a real person and written by real person himself named Gregory David Roberts…!!
Someone strongly recommended this book to me, I read the review about this book knowing it’s not the kind of book which I generally pick… even though I picked the book soon as I wanted to go back to all kind of reading instead of confining myself to peculiar choice. And it’s always nice to read beyond the text and read between the lines… isn’t it? And how wonderful is to read people’s mind …!! This ecstasy doesn’t cost unlike, consuming charas, hashish, heroin which most of the major characters of this book cherishes…!!
Explicit:
Well written with simplistic style which makes reader to float freely along with the pace of story and authors mind. Realistic and honest story with self portrayal written with feelings in extraordinarily reality, pain, joy, suffering, love, hatreds makes it literary masterpiece. Intensity of author’s emotions and feeling can be measured in terms of number of pages description goes on….! Authors arrival to Bombay, entry into new world with new language, knowing good people at face value, entering into slum, touching life of people with affection, getting in touch with mafia and his people and developing strong bond by giving name to relationship, going to jail, coming out from jail, getting indulge into underworld, learning all the intricacies, experiencing into drugs and coming out of it, mission Afghanistan, revelation of mist, and back to Bombay with warm welcome to underworld and people…that’s the flow of story…
Implicit:
Once someone told me “What we see around us is manifestation of our inner world”…!! I trusted fully in this statement because it was made by someone whom I respect a lot and consider much much higher than normal person. But I had not really experienced it ever till the time I read this book Shantaram and correlated and pondered upon the story.Author being come from a background where he escaped and lost his original identity, lacking family support and relationship with his own people, proclaims that he was totally divested with love. That is pretty obvious in the book as the main female character that he liked in first sight appears in very beginning of the story and it takes him around three hundred odd pages or you can say one year to tell that lady that he likes her…!! And description gets over in just two three pages when he reveals his feeling for her, whereas he has elaborated all the aspects of his life in slum, jail and crime with all minute detail in couple of hundred pages..!Book emphasis on Darker side of life in major, only 10% text one can find about brighter side of life. Content and substance of Lin’s mind as he commits crime for which he got 23 years long sentence in Australian jail but he managed to escape from there, and lands up in India with new identity. That’s absolutely perfect to adopt a new land and new identity if one realizes his mistake and willing to change. BUT realization is one important part which is useless if not backed by actual act. REPEATING the same mistake again, indulge with lower self by entering into darker life of crime world is totally unacceptable … But after reading the whole text one can say ‘warmth’ is needed in the blood and we all have quest for that…. Given an option between choosing cold or boiling blood its always better to let your blood boil..! Lin lacks feeling and sense of being ‘Contented’ in almost 98% of the story… and in turn indulges himself with people around him who are from underworld; where as he himself know what the impact gone be.That feeling of loneliness is pervasive among people, I was also not the exception, but a statement made radical change in me. One of my very dear friend once said to me, "Deepali you know when women’s are pregnant they take care of themselves a lot because they are always concerned about their baby. But even though if someone is not pregnant her soul is always there, and one should be concerned about it and take care"..!!
Who is Shantaram?? A real or fictitious character...?? I had nice fun time with my friends in last two weeks when I was spending time with Shantaram…! One day evening I was having tea with my friends, few minutes after finishing tea I told them I would like to make a move as I am missing my Shantaram and he is calling me…!! They all got all kind of ideas, and asked me who is he or I have kept new name for someone? The curious expression on their faces was really exhilarating for me…By this time they all know who is Shantaram, breaking the ice of silence it’s a book about a real person and written by real person himself named Gregory David Roberts…!!
Someone strongly recommended this book to me, I read the review about this book knowing it’s not the kind of book which I generally pick… even though I picked the book soon as I wanted to go back to all kind of reading instead of confining myself to peculiar choice. And it’s always nice to read beyond the text and read between the lines… isn’t it? And how wonderful is to read people’s mind …!! This ecstasy doesn’t cost unlike, consuming charas, hashish, heroin which most of the major characters of this book cherishes…!!
Explicit:
Well written with simplistic style which makes reader to float freely along with the pace of story and authors mind. Realistic and honest story with self portrayal written with feelings in extraordinarily reality, pain, joy, suffering, love, hatreds makes it literary masterpiece. Intensity of author’s emotions and feeling can be measured in terms of number of pages description goes on….! Authors arrival to Bombay, entry into new world with new language, knowing good people at face value, entering into slum, touching life of people with affection, getting in touch with mafia and his people and developing strong bond by giving name to relationship, going to jail, coming out from jail, getting indulge into underworld, learning all the intricacies, experiencing into drugs and coming out of it, mission Afghanistan, revelation of mist, and back to Bombay with warm welcome to underworld and people…that’s the flow of story…
Implicit:
Once someone told me “What we see around us is manifestation of our inner world”…!! I trusted fully in this statement because it was made by someone whom I respect a lot and consider much much higher than normal person. But I had not really experienced it ever till the time I read this book Shantaram and correlated and pondered upon the story.Author being come from a background where he escaped and lost his original identity, lacking family support and relationship with his own people, proclaims that he was totally divested with love. That is pretty obvious in the book as the main female character that he liked in first sight appears in very beginning of the story and it takes him around three hundred odd pages or you can say one year to tell that lady that he likes her…!! And description gets over in just two three pages when he reveals his feeling for her, whereas he has elaborated all the aspects of his life in slum, jail and crime with all minute detail in couple of hundred pages..!Book emphasis on Darker side of life in major, only 10% text one can find about brighter side of life. Content and substance of Lin’s mind as he commits crime for which he got 23 years long sentence in Australian jail but he managed to escape from there, and lands up in India with new identity. That’s absolutely perfect to adopt a new land and new identity if one realizes his mistake and willing to change. BUT realization is one important part which is useless if not backed by actual act. REPEATING the same mistake again, indulge with lower self by entering into darker life of crime world is totally unacceptable … But after reading the whole text one can say ‘warmth’ is needed in the blood and we all have quest for that…. Given an option between choosing cold or boiling blood its always better to let your blood boil..! Lin lacks feeling and sense of being ‘Contented’ in almost 98% of the story… and in turn indulges himself with people around him who are from underworld; where as he himself know what the impact gone be.That feeling of loneliness is pervasive among people, I was also not the exception, but a statement made radical change in me. One of my very dear friend once said to me, "Deepali you know when women’s are pregnant they take care of themselves a lot because they are always concerned about their baby. But even though if someone is not pregnant her soul is always there, and one should be concerned about it and take care"..!!
Delights:
1- Naming ceremony: How name of author as per the fake passport changes from Mr. Lindsay to Lin is hilarious from the core by his tour guide Prabakar/ Prabu. Later in Parbu’s village his mother names Lin as 'Shantaram Kisan Kharre'… very nice again. Indeed all the conversations between them are extraordinarily fantastic…Over under pant…Story begins with Lin and Prabhu and ends also with them….
2- Kisaan Mango Kharre: Never heard such a delicious Indian name… just loved it, and very very cute character of the book, he is father of Parbu.
3- Baer/ bare Hug: Its just wow wow and woooooooow… imagine someone giving you hug whom you never liked but feeling the warmth you are uttering with kind gesture and affection “its Baer hug”.... !! And other person, interpreting it as “bare hug”…!! And asking you, Shall I remove my shirt and hug you……..!! ha ha ha ha ha … This scene was between Lin (Author) and Abdullah (Star of underworld)… Later Abdullah missing Lin, to the biggest amazement and sitting on pinnacle of his senses actually sent a real Bear (Kano) with small note with three people to hug Lin…!! And this bear is not ordinary one… He is real pampered one and goes to jail twice… Believe me Kano demonstrates one of the cutest parts of the whole story…. now you need to scan pages of book to have more fun…
4- Stay in slum: Major chunk of book and marvelous narration of life of less privileged ones. Lin comes up as natural leader and dear one of slum people, very kind, generous selfless….. A person from foreign origin learns local language, and interacting in hindi and marathi…. It’s a panacea... One needs to have big heart and good vision to move in such direction….at this place author actually lives his life with meaning…
5- Suffering: Who ever knows me must have noticed me saying,” We all have to suffer, who ever has come to this world has to suffer”…!! This word always resides in my consciousness and was first encounter with brighter side of life in the book when big mafias have discussion on topic of suffering. Beautifully mentioned in book “The burden of happiness can only be relieved by the balm of suffering”….!! I simply loved the expression…
6- Stay in jail: Believe me its horrifying, please do feel that you are blessed that taking breathes freely at this moment. If anything called Hell exists, no doubts is non-other-than ‘life in a jail’, which was narrated by author… After long time I found tears in my eyes while reading a book not because I was feeling pity on Lin's situation but was thinking about myself that I can never face life in jail, cant even suicide, cant live, cant breathe…….ooooooooh God!! can days be like that..!! I wish neither in my most horrible dreams nor to any of my enemy does our Heavenly father grant this kind of punished day… Hope grace of heaven will continue on all of us… Amen
7- Karla: Main female character of the book, who has made great impact on authors mind by shaking all the fundamental concept upside down….She believes “Power is the best thing in this world and love is opposite of power”..!! But it’s nice to read and observe how her heart changes, how her belief changes and very nice to see when love beckons her how well she embraces it..
1 comment:
hardly come across blogs which I read from top to the bottom.
Keep up the good work. I am a new blogger in the block. Looking forward to share some of your suggestions and views about some more topics.
Address of my blog - www.loveparadiseforyou.com
Pooja Brahmi
Post a Comment