Book review(s): Empire of the Moghul and Taj Trilogy

I’ve been reading a lot of historical fiction lately – in the last few months, I’ve read six novels about the Mughals, so I thought it would be fun to do a comparative review of all six together.

On the one hand, there are the first three books of the six-part Empire of the Moghul series by Alex Rutherford (though it’s the collective pen name of Michael and Diana Preston, I will treat them as this one entity for my review). Each book tells the story of a Mughal ruler – Babur, Humayun, and Akbar –respectively. From the time young Babur becomes the king of Ferghana to how, through multiple raids and failed attempts, and seemingly endless hardships, he finally establishes the Mughal empire; from Humayun’s obsession with astrology to Jahangir’s attempts to claim the throne even while Akbar rules, Rutherford’s books provide a compelling account of court politics and conquest.

On the other hand, Indu Sundaresan’s Taj Trilogy – consisting of The Twentieth Wife, The Feast of Roses, and Shadow Princess – takes the reader beyond the battlefield and court, straight into the heart of the empire – the zenana. The first two books centre around Mehrunnisa, from her childhood as the daughter of one of Akbar’s courtiers to how she negotiates her position as Empress Nur Jahan, the most powerful woman in Mughal history. Shadow Princess, set in the period just after Mumtaz Mahal’s death, simultaneously tells of the sudden change in Jahanara’s life as she shoulders the responsibility of her father Shah Jahan’s zenana; Aurangzeb’s hunger for power; and the building of the Taj Mahal. 

By writing Mughal history from the perspective of its women, Sundaresan’s books seem to follow a simple, powerful idea: harem politics drive court politics. While the first two are pretty gripping accounts of Mehrunnisa’s rise to power and her equally stunning fall, the third book, somehow, failed to match up to them. To my mind, a story must have at least one character worth loving and supporting, and here, there are none. Jahanara’s inflated sense of self and her constant bemoaning of a fate that she brought on herself are tiresome. Her siblings, too, come across as variations of selfish, weak, bratty, or rigid. Then, the equations, both personal and political, are not explained convincingly enough – for example, why, after Mumtaz’s death, power is transferred, unquestioned, to Jahanara instead of another empress; and the slight hint of an incestuous relationship between Jahanara and her father, which is never fully explored. Also, the constant evocation of “The Luminous Tomb” and repeated descriptions of its construction and architecture are often dry and wearying.

Why Sundaresan’s books still score over Rutherford’s is because, in dealing more with personal relationships, they often provide a clearer understanding of why certain events unfold the way they do (see note). For example, the reason for Akbar’s decision to give Khurram to his wife Ruqayya is clearly outlined – Ruqayya wants to reduce Jagat Gosini’s power by taking away her son and the future heir to the throne. In Rutherford’s series, the episode is skimmed over with no convincing explanation. Another problem with Rutherford’s books is that they are often long-winded, peppered with irrelevant anecdotes – such as the attack on Salim’s entourage to Kabul after the Anarkali episode – that have no bearing on future events.

Both series suffer from over-Anglicization of language, which often results in jerky, stilted, and sometimes incredibly jarring conversation. This is especially true of Rutherford’s books, in which the use of "Moghul" instead of "Mughal", the first-person use of “Mother”, “Father”, “Aunt” etc, and Baburi telling Babur that he has fallen for the Persian Shah’s “pwetty pwetty” words, were just ridiculous and left me thoroughly unimpressed.

Overall, though I’m still looking forward to rest of Empire of the Moghul, it’s Sundaresan’s novels that I’ll go back to for a good story.

Note: One of the challenges of writing historical fiction is deciding what to fictionalize and how factually accurate to be. Of course, both writers have taken their own liberties with history, often ending up with different accounts of the same incident, so my review is based on which is more convincing and fits in better with the rest of the story.

I'm offended you're offended

Dear Boss,

I hope this letter finds you well. I would like to inform you that due to personal and professional reasons, I will be unable to continue in my current job, and would like you to accept my resignation letter. As you have been my boss for so long, I feel I owe you an explanation. While I am honoured that you trot out my example at every given (and sometimes snatched) opportunity, thus giving me so much visibility and so many opportunities to shine, I do feel burdened by the workload. I find it mentally and physically exhausting to keep up this pretence of being offended when I am not. Also, what does offend me is that you tell everyone that I am offended by things such as books, movies, paintings, essays, jokes, and other intellectual and cultural activities. It makes me look foolish and uneducated, and as though I have nothing better to do with my time than look for things to feel offended by, even though these are things that I secretly enjoy. When I started out in this line of work, my job role was very different. However, after the alterations, I feel ethically and morally unable to continue working here and would like to quit this post with immediate effect.

Yours sincerely,

Religious Sentiment.

Speak up! Or at least allow me to.

Panchhi nadiyaan pavan ke jhonke

Koi sarhad na inhe roke

Sarhad insaanon ke liye hain

Socho tumne aur maine

Kya paaya insaan ho ke

This beautiful song written by Javed Akhtar for the film Refugee (2000) asks what we have gained by being humans, when birds, rivers, and the breeze can roam free while we have to live within borders. Sure, it’s a flight (pun intended) of fancy to say we’d be better off as birds, but the essential idea of the song is increasingly, frighteningly, becoming true. It’s no coincidence that I’m writing this on the day that Wikipedia has blacked out its English language web page in protest against the US government-proposed SOPA (thankfully, I remembered that Refugee was released in 2000!); in the wake of the Indian government’s shocking statement of intent to screen content before it goes up on the web – to negate chances of communal tension, of course; and in the week that has seen the Jaipur Lit Fest embroiled in controversy over the attendance of one of its star speakers, Salman Rushdie, due to threats by certain religious groups.

Let’s take a closer look at these incidents. First, the Internet. That gateway to the world, that free and open well of information and ideas that one may or may not agree with. In the real world, how do we deal with views we dislike or find offensive? We might argue, debate, have it out with the people whose views these are, and eventually, if nothing else works, we just dissociate ourselves from those people. We don’t report them to the cops because they’re just verbal views and we can switch off from them if we choose to. In that case, I would assume that the government would see the Internet as a good thing, because it actually has mechanisms in place to report genuinely offensive content. I have, myself, reported two Facebook groups for racist, sexist content, and both groups were removed from the networking website within five minutes. I doubt Mr. Sibal himself could have done a quicker job. 

In its haste to prevent communal tension from flaring up, the government seems to have given in to a quick-fix, kneejerk solution – prevent content from being uploaded online at all. There's a logical, far-thinking solution if I ever heard one. Also, while I’m touched that our government takes its mai-baap role so seriously and wants only to protect us from evil, I wish they would remember that we were brought into this world by parents of our own, and we are mature enough to deal with people who offend our religion, our parents, our country, our food, our anything. Sometimes, we even like to hear views that are different from our own (this shocking idea will be discussed later in the post, while on Rushdie). It’s called education. Look it up on Wikip– oh. Right.

As for the Salman Rushdie controversy, it is just such a crying shame that even literature, that supposed bastion of free expression and thought, ultimately fell victim to political posturing and bullying. What a hollow democracy we live in, when a major literary figure, who happens to be a Person of Indian Origin card-holder and doesn’t even need a visa to come to India, is dragged into a backroom chat with the government and his visit for the country's largest literary event is now in question. All because a certain hardline religious group feels that a book he wrote 24 years ago, one that played a major role in putting India on the literary map, offends their religion. Why? Because it gives a different spin on Islam? And what about the millions of readers who loved the book because it made them think, question, doubt? Did we learn nothing from the tragedy of MF Husain dying without the joy and comfort of being able to return to his homeland?

It’s bad enough that the book was banned and there was a fatwa issued on Rushdie. But really, the man has visited India (even the JLF) since then, and without incident. Why create a fuss now? And for our government to fall for such ridiculous threats is just laughable. I’m not saying that the government should allow riots to happen, but this is tantamount to throwing the baby out with the bathwater! And ultimately, there is only one loser: the hopeful Lit nerd who just wanted to hear a favourite author speak, and maybe get him to autograph a copy of one of his books.

Maybe we would be better off as birds. Maybe it’s not such a flight of fancy after all.

Update: It is now confirmed that Rushdie will not be attending the Lit Fest. Understandably worried for his safety (given that he was not offered any special protection by either the government or the festival organizers), he stated that it would be irresponsible – to his family, to the audience at the festival, and to other writers – of him to attend the festival, in view of alleged Intelligence inputs of underworld assassination attempts. Whether he chose not to attend or was asked not to, the point is that this should not have happened. And our government should not have allowed it to happen.

Movie Review: The Dirty Picture

By now, most of you would have already seen this movie, or would have read reams and reams about it. I will be able to say very little about it that’s new. Still, I think it’s worthy of being my first official (read non-Facebook/Twitter) movie review. Why? Because it emerged as the Hindi film industry’s strongest, most hard-hitting FUN film of 2011. No One Killed Jessica and Shaitan were good but not exactly fun entertainers. The other good films of 2011 – Delhi Belly, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara – were good in a different way, not gut-wrenching. Stanley Ka Dabba was bittersweet and lovely but lacked punch.

The other reason for bestowing this honour on TDP was Vidya Balan. What a brave, brave move by someone whom the industry and audiences had not exactly loved. Few female actors in Bollywood would have dared to look so unattractive on screen. She has single-handedly raised the bar for giving one’s all to the role and really going for gold in a film that reached for the stars but somehow, fell short. Major overarching flaw – too many concessions to “Bollywood”. For one, there was nothing Tam about it (barring the token gajras in all the women’s hair) so it really could have been set in any other city, or should have been made in Tamil or English, if Madras was so essential to the story. Secondly, I find it difficult to believe that women in Madras could run around on the street wearing next to nothing, and no one said a word. That too, thirty years ago.

But let’s get back to plot. Loosely taking elements from the life of soft-porn star Silk Smitha (though producer Ekta Kapoor claims the film is not based on her and is more about the industry and the times), the film follows Reshma, a village girl with stars in her eyes. She makes it to Madras (though it is unclear what she does for a living while going for auditions). Through sheer perseverance, she manages to get a toe-hold in the film industry and suddenly, a star is born. She is groomed, plucked, styled, faired up, and presented to the world as Silk, a name chosen for her by producer and Reshma’s mentor, Selva Ganesh a.k.a. Keeda Das (Rajesh Sharma, absolutely fantastic). She proceeds to take the industry and audiences by storm, with fans and foes in equal measure. There’s eighties’ cinema in all its gaudy glory and it’s so much fun! Ooh La La is an absolute treat and Vidya revels in the OTTness of it all.

Silk gets involved with married superstar Suryakanth (Naseer, brilliant as always), but soon realizes that for him, as for most other people around, she’s fun to be in bed with, but not appropriate to be seen with. From the object of everyone’s lust on screen, she is reduced to hiding for hours in Suryakanth’s bathroom when his wife returns home unexpectedly. She then embarks on an affair with Surya’s younger brother Ramakanth (Tusshar Kapoor, in the only weak performance in the film) but he is no match for her and the relationship never quite takes off. Watch the scene where she uses an awards ceremony as a platform to lash out at the hypocrisy of a world in which directors, producers, writers, and male actors of “sexy” films are lauded, but the female lead is ridiculed, judged as loose-moralled, a “dirty secret” unfit for polite company. It is an incredible scene and Vidya makes you want to roar your support for her (I confess, I clapped in the movie theatre). And this is just at interval, making the viewer think there’s more awesomeness in store. And there is, but not quite as punchy. The second half loses steam, when Silk’s downfall results in her making a friend of the one person who’s hated her guts all this while – director Abraham (Emraan Hashmi, competent and pleasant) who believes film is an intellectual art and people like Silk make it cheap and tawdry. It’s an interesting equation the two share, but it drags on for too long, even giving Emraan some token hero time with the song Ishq Sufiana (lovely, but completely irrelevant and inappropriate here). Silk, meanwhile, has let fame go to her head and become completely full of herself, resulting an odd, but entirely believable mix of brash arrogance, unprofessional behaviour, and vulnerability. Her smoking and drinking are by now completely out of control and suddenly, producers and directors don’t want her anymore, preferring new and upcoming star, Shakeela (shown as a trim, fit, sleek girl in a minidress and high boots – yet another concession to Bollywood that I have a problem with).

From struggle to success to complete and utter disgrace, the film follows Silk through it all, and gives us a character worth rooting for, despite, or maybe because of, her flaws. She is human, the film reminds us. And she makes us question our views with every thrust of her heaving bosom.

Will this movie be the game-changer for woman-oriented films to really become big in Bollywood? I don’t know. All I know is that for days after I watched it, I could not get it out of my head. That, for me, is a true measure of its worth.

Baby steps

The idea of starting a blog struck me yesterday during lunch break. I've been an editor almost all my professional life, and, well, writing just seemed like a natural extension. I love literature, Hindi cinema, food, the performing arts, and my country. Also, I have a LOT of thoughts and strong opinions on most things, which can't be compressed to 140 characters!

So. Hello world!