Dear reader,
“Book-u, book-u,” used to be my mother’s choice words while scolding me. Whenever she called me to do a chore, I used to be in some corner with a book. I don’t know how or when this habit of reading started, but I am so glad it did; even today, whenever life’s boat capsizes into the valley of tears, I hold on to my book-shaped raft.
Apparently, reading is unnatural. There are no circuits in the brain labelled, ‘for reading’. As we read, there are new circuits formed, as our brain is maha-adapatable, or plastic, as they say. I heard a researcher, Marryanne Wolf, who studies how we read and what it does to our brains, talk about this, and some of what she said struck me. For starters, she spoke of something called ‘deep reading’, a state when the brain not just absorbs information, but also ends up making connections to others things that you know. Skimming the net and reading through the infinite scroll just lets you absorb a lot of information, without making those other cross connections spark. She also said that her research tries to understand the mediums through which we read; and a book allows more for that kind of deep reading state.
Then, she spoke of an anecdote. Apparently, before getting into brain research, she studied literature and loved Herman Hesse, especially The Glass Bead Game. Sometime during her brain research life, she decided to go back and read it, as she advocates deep reading, a sort of do what you preach test. And she found that she could not read it; it was boring. She had to retrain her brain for a few weeks, by being at it, to then start enjoying that book again the way she did before.
This anecdote made me think of so many of my friends who say they don’t or can’t read anymore; perhaps, all that skimming has rewired brains, and now you need to literally build those pathways again?
I also think that the skmming and deep reading are perhaps two approaches to knowledge; one more encouraged by the powers that be. Skimming is more transactional; knowledge becomes a commodity to acquire, whereas in deep reading, it is like a relationship, you discover something and are also willing to be changed by it, and be discomfited in the process.
As I was wondering about what’s next for the letters from the middle ages, I realised this non-transactional way of being is something that deeply interests me; how do we form a human bond with art, with those around us, and the larger world? What is fascinating is that there is no ‘natural’ way of making our way into this world of our own making (I use our loosely, as a way to talk of humanity). And so, there isn’t a fixed definition of what it is to be a human. What we then have are three entities, us, the world, and our relationship with it, and none of these entities have a fixed definition, and it all pulses with some possibility, within which we seek to make sense, love, and life.
In the meanwhile, if you choose to, for deep reading experiments, here are some books that over the past year have given me some refuge. N. asked me for book recommendations, and as I thought about the kind of books I encountered, this feels more like sharing gossip than gyaan.
An intimate history of humanity
How did people flirt with each other? How has this amorphous thing called culture shaped loneliness we experience over time? How have we cooked? How has sex changed? I have never seen such intimate activities carefully examined, except maybe in restaurant menus that suddenly tell you about how cotton from India went to Japan and people in Japan dressed themselves with ‘sarasa’, a sort of kalmakari cloth. In this book, Theodore Zeldin looks at ‘an intimate history of humanity’, very much from a Euro-centric eye. He does draw here and there from the Asian contexts, but, the perspective remains clear. I didn’t mind it, for he interviews women (giving some convoluted reason in the beginning, which I wasn’t too convinced by ), and the stories of the women he speaks to leavens the commentary in a lovely way. I especially love the story of a woman in France who chooses to live a life that’s saturated with aesthetics; she runs a restaurant where she conjures themes for the patrons and everyone comes there dressed, the space is designed just so; all to give a specific experience to those who come. As opposed to ‘immersive experiences’ that seem at best a marketing ploy and at worse a code for we shall drown you in the light of Edison lamps, her commitment to that sort of aesthetic seems genuine given her complete surrender to it. In a way, it feels like an artistic quest.
Shape
How many holes does a straw have? Apparently at some point the internet was besotted with this question. In the book ‘Shape’, Jordan Ellenberg not just tells you how to count holes on various surfaces (said with a straight face), but also how geometry is again making a comeback in different contemporary fields.
When I read about eleven dimensions of the universe and what nots, I used to always wonder about how do you understand a reality you cannot visually imagine? Of course, you use mathematics for that sort of wizardry, but there’s something very appealing about thinking about the world in a way we can visualise, map, and come up with axioms and theorems for. There’s a certitude that is very comforting, in a world where probability and statistics rule the roost.
Be warned — how much ever Jordan tries to put enthu for geometry, it is still stuff that requires you to pay attention and go back and re-read.
The hundred years war on Palestine
“I have only read Exodus. What can I read to understand what’s going on?” M. asked me, and that question spiralled into weeks of reading different books. My first answer was going to be ‘Fateful triangle’ by Noam Chomsky, the book I read almost two decades ago, but I hesitated and asked M. to give me a couple of days.
M. is not unique, for Leon Uris’ Exodus was a bestseller and shaped the imagination of millions when it came to Israel. It is a book of fiction, and many historical facts have been shaped to give the book its narrative heft. There are many articles that give you details about the inaccuracies. What struck me is how a story managed to shape attitude and imagination, which is critical when it comes to politics, very evident given the continuing horror in Gaza.
The book I told M to read finally was ‘The Hundred years war on Palestine’ by Rashid Khalidi. He is a Palestinian-American historian and belongs to an elite family, whose history he intertwines with the history of Palestine. Somehow, that makes the book incredibly powerful; you are seeing history not just as events, mishaps, and betrayals, but you keep thinking of the people involved. There is also the careful detailing of the scholar, the promise that academic rigor makes; you know where my sympathies lie but my sympathies will not let me lie.
It is not an easy read; as in, it doesn’t give you that sort of black and white understanding of what is going on that can be summarised in a tweet, and I think that’s where the book’s power is. This is perhaps the sort of complex and complicated understanding that’s needed for any kind of truth and reconcilliation, any kind of lasting peace to happen.
Nora goes off script
I think there should be a genre called romance for the tired soul, and I invented this genre after reading Nora goes off script. There is a woman who isn’t unhappy that her husband has moved out. As she says, it is a ‘self-correcting problem’ — they don’t want to be with you, it is best they leave. She seems sorted, with detailed schedules, and a tea house where she writes, and then comes a hero; literally, the leading guy of the movies, and an escapist romance begins, but with the sensibility of someone who has been hurt, and yet cannot let go of hope, i.e., the romance for the tired soul. She has a dry sense of humour, and as with all the best romances, you like the other side characters, who are drawn with flesh and bone and all the gore inside.
The cheatsheet
Of course, I can’t tell you one last book and then let you go, because I could not decide what the final book in this series will be. And so, here goes — a list of books you can read in one sitting, as I did.
The Last Courtesan by Manish Gaekwad was released this year, and tells the story of Rekhabai, a spunky and dildaar woman in her own voice. Qabar is one of those books that do things to your insides; it layers a tired heart, magic, politics, and a dry sense of humour. And then there is Claire Keeghan’s Small things like these, a book whose lines you know will linger on you like those on your palm.
Middle aged 