Bernard Schlink – The Reader Mar 27, 2020

First edition of the novel in English

This novel has the distinction of being the first we have ever read under a lockdown, therefore we were forced by the threat of the novel coronavirus to share our readings and comments remotely, without coming together physically.

Geetha & Thommo at home during the corona virus lockdown

We sorely missed the warmth of being with one another, an island of literary calm and detachment amidst our quotidian lives – provoking one another to insights and sharing our enthusiasms. We had to think ahead and write out our thoughts on the characters and their predicament in the novel, as well as the issues raised by the author, and the overarching theme of the communal guilt of a nation.

The novel begins with the sexual abuse of a young 15-year old, Michael  Berg, whose overhang persists until the end.  He writes the book – hoping the telling will assuage multiple feelings of guilt: for his juvenile seduction, for his act of omission during the trial of Hanna, and for not being able to save Hanna in the end. Hanna addresses him as ‘Juengchen’ in the German text, translated as ‘kid’ by the American translator. The diminutive noun has a hint of endearment in the German; therefore it needed something more intimate than ‘kid’ to convey the sense. 

Michael Berg & Hanna

It would strike any reader of the novel that Michael is left to his own devices to a great extent, and there is hardly any interaction with his own family. Not only is  family life lacking, but there seems to be no community to notice the comings and goings of Michael Berg, and what’s happening to him.

The illiteracy of Hanna escapes notice throughout the first part; we take the oral readings as just the expression of Hanna’s eagerness to hear stories through the voice of a dear person. Gradually Michael and we realise a number of events in the narrative stem from Hanna’s inability to read or write – we are incredulous. How could there be illiterates in Germany? – Europe's most cultivated, certainly its best-educated country, with the world's finest elementary school system, the highest literacy rate, and the best universities.

Michael Berg reading to Hanna

The first part is a ritual of Reading Aloud, Showering, Making Love, and Lying Down Beside each Other. And then it ends. Hanna disappears. Michael makes remarkable progress in his profession of law, which leads to the second part where he joins an ongoing criminal prosecution in 1966 in Heidelberg as part of a university-led observer team. The female guards had put concentration camp prisoners on a forced march (to escape approaching Red Army liberators in Jan 1945). En route the prisoners were sheltering locked in a church when it was bombed. The church burst into flames but the guards did not unlock the doors, and allowed the prisoners to perish in the burning church.

This was the charge and Hanna who is one of the guards self-indicts herself by admitting to writing the report that validated the act subsequently. But she could not have written the report, for she was illiterate. Michael as a trained law-student could have intervened to prevent a miscarriage of justice, but he does not, figuring that Hanna's loss of dignity at being exposed for illiteracy outweighed in her mind the pain of the penal servitude she would undergo.

The trial brings home the guilt of the German nation and its complicity in what had been going on since the early thirties when Hitler took power. After the War, Nazis survived in Germany and other countries like Argentina, with assumed lives and identities. Generations grew up in Germany learning of things their parents preferred to forget. The author in an interview is at pains to point out that this novel is not about the Holocaust, it is about post-war Germany, and the impact of past events on 1960's Germany and on Michael’s life. It is also unique in not being about the victims, but having a perpetrator as the protagonist. In a short talk Bernard Schlink observes that even forgetting something painful, is painful. He goes on to say, “The danger of evil is that very banal, very normal, people once they make this decisive step to cross the line, they just go down, and all the rest are just numbers. That is frightening, the banality.”

In 2008 a film was made of the novel. Kate Winslet played Hanna; David Kross the young Michael Berg, and Ralph Fiennes, Berg when older. Winslet won the Academy Award for Best Actress.

Hanna in the bath

At a press conference with the cast of The Reader during the 2009 Berlin Film Festival, Kate Winslet commented on her acting role: 
“The illiteracy informs us as an audience about who Hanna is in every thing, and this shame, an unbelievable shame. She first learns about her own guilt during the trial, but most certainly while she is in prison.  …  I knew I had to make her a human being. I had to make her a woman who was capable of great love and affection and warmth, as well as show the vulnerability and the shame that she feels. And she also had to be a woman who had some level of courage, certainly from the moment she starts serving her prison sentence.”

Press conference with the cast of The Reader during the 2009 Berlin Film Festival

It is illuminating to hear the entire half hour interview with the cast, the director, scriptwriter, and the author at 
https://www.imdb.com/video/vi2133000985?playlistId=tt0976051

The author Bernard Schlink was asked at one point if the book was based on personal experience. He replied: “Every book is based on personal experience, this one as well.”

Poetry Session – Feb 21, 2020

Readers have great expectations of the Poetry Sessions because these often reveal new poets not read before. Since we did away with paper and started circulating the poems as PDF files in advance there is an opportunity to get acquainted with the text and linger over the words.

Eleven of us gathered to read poets from all over the globe, four women poets and eight men. Rumi and Neruda were artfully translated from the original Farsi and Spanish; the others wrote in English. The texts are gathered at the end.

Priya, Joe, Thommo, Geetha, Thommo, Shoba, Pamela, Devika

Zakia was returning from the hajj and brought a packet of fine dates for us along with date cake. Some were left over when the session was done and Joe wrote that he was lucky to return home with six abandoned dates: 

Six dates in cluster
From the sands of Araby –
A toothsome muster!

The World T20 Women's Cricket Tournament had its inaugural match on the same day, and India making 132, bowled out Australia, the current holders for 119. That victory gave an air of lightness to the proceedings. India remains undefeated after the four matches in Group A, and plays the semifinals against South Africa or England on March 5 in Sydney.

India squad for ICC Women’s T20 World Cup 2020

Cricket has given rise to more poetry than any other game, perhaps because of those balletic moments at the end of a fluid stroke when the batter holds the pose frozen in time; or the grace with which a fielder running backwards grasps a ball high above, plucking it from the air with one hand! Sometimes it's the sheer pleasure of seeing a master at work, playing a practiced stroke with singular ease. Thus Harold Pinter, the playwright, who held England’s opening batsman Len Hutton in high regard, wrote once to his friend, the writer Simon Gray: 

I saw Len Hutton in his prime. 
Another time, another time.

Len Hutton in 1946, one of England's greatest opening batsmen

Gray said Pinter hadn't had time to finish the poem! Cricket has also given rise to humorous poems such as this one titled Strange Dismissal by an Australian poet, Damian Balassone:

It sounds silly
but it’s harsh
to be caught Lillee
bowled Marsh,
but that’s what happened to me
the over prior to tea.

The group were all there (except Kavita) at the end for the rounding off:

Pamela, Geetha, Devika, Shoba, KumKum, Gopa, Geeta, Priya

(seated) Thommo, Joe

Requiem for a Reader

“Hemjit passed away just now,” his aunt Presna Anish wrote at 6-17 pm on Feb 23. Priya who introduced him to our group conveyed the news a little later to KRG readers.

I remember the earliest message on Feb 5 when he wrote from Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences about his affliction: 
“Hello dear KRG members, Sorry for not being in touch. I am still at Amritha. Nothing looks positive or rosy. Feeling the full force the frustration and pain brought about by Cancer. I am undergoing blood and platelet transfusion every alternate day … one of the doctors I saw informed me that I have only six months more. But you can never say. I want to be discharged soon and go to my new home. But I need 24 hours monitoring. So I will be hiring a qualified nurse. Yet I feel I can fight back, overcome it and lead a beautiful life.”

We all encouraged him but feared for his life when he told us his platelet count kept dropping, in spite of transfusions. He was experiencing the deep pain of cancer; the solace is pain management is practiced scrupulously in Kerala without shying away from opioids. He did suffer, though, knowing his life was ending sooner than he hoped and sooner than he wanted to leave his dear wife, Sugandhi – she who loved him as no other, and now must bear the loss of her life’s companion.

Some time back Hemjit recited Veenapoovu or Fallen Flower (വീണപൂവ്‌) by Kumaran Asan which has these lines:
The lustre of your lovely limbs 
Grew faint and fled, 
And o'er your shining visage sweet 
A pallor spread; 
Life's oil dried, and fast wither'd 
Life's flame in you flicker'd and died. 

We are now the observers left to mourn the fate of our well-loved reader, sweet Hemjit, whose enthusiasm for our group abounded. He anticipated more than anyone the pleasure of coming to our readings, and if ever he missed a session it was on account of ill-health – hoping even to the last moment he would be well-enough to attend. He spent a lot of time preparing and wanted to do justice to the other readers and fully reward their attention.

He had an early association with the late Mr. Manjoo Menon, who was instrumental in setting up Raksha, the Society for the Care of Children with Special Needs, in Mattancherry. Mr Menon’s sympathy and determination to change the lives of the children and enrich them, extended to Hemjit also, who drew inspiration from this association to think of himself as capable to accomplish things. He credited Mr. Menon for changing him. As a footnote, Mr. Menon was one of those who attended early KRG readings and gave it a fillip at birth.

When Hemjit told us on Feb 5 of the blood cancer that had been diagnosed, I was reminded of a grim, but beautiful poem by Vikram Seth titled Soon, which begins:
I shall die soon, I know.
This thing is in my blood.
It will not let me go.
It saps my cells for food.

The poem ends with a cry which could be Hemjit’s:
Stay by my steel ward bed
And hold me where I lie.
Love me when I am dead
And do not let me die.

We can do this for one who bore the pain, and the state of living without the hope of living much longer. Rest in Peace, dear Hemjit.

Devika writes:

I'm so glad that I knew this amazing person, Hemjit. A rather short association of a year and a half.

There was so much one had to learn from him. His indefatigable spirit, never say die attitude, always smiling.....

And the same must be said for Sugandhi too with her charming smile, never showing outwardly her worries about her dear husband....and there must have been plenty of worries with Hemjit's health going through ups and downs.

They were so close, loved the way they used to take off on their birthdays and anniversary – the last trip to Athirapally in January was to celebrate his birthday.

He was so looking forward to living in his new apartment. Unfortunately, his life was cut short with the cancer that descended on him less than a month ago. The only relief is that he didn't suffer for too long.

Rest in peace, dear Hemjit....you will be missed! 

Zakia:
I am saddened by the news of dear Hemjit passing away.

I was fortunate to have known him as an acquaintance ever since I moved to Kochi as a new bride. I always liked to read his columns in the papers and admired his journalistic skills. When he came into the KRG fold he became a dear friend too, with whom I shared my birthday month. His soft-spoken and caring nature touched the very core of my heart. He had immense courage and a terrific attitude towards life. May his soul rest in peace! My heart goes out to dear Sugandhi, and to his extended family. His end came too soon – he was a wonderful, kind, and gentle human being. I am grateful to have been touched by his life.

Thommo:
I got to know Hemjit through the KRG, but it was a common friend Manoj Kumar Menon, who had studied with him in Chennai, who brought us closer. Also his uncle Anish and his mentor Manjoo Menon were among the first friends we made when we moved to Cochin in 1981.
Geetha and I travelled with Hemjit and Sugandhi to Kavita's estate and will not forget the time we spent together that day in Jan 2019.
Hemjit was the most ardent member of KRG and fought his disability and pain with a cheerfulness that amazed all of us at the KRG, and I am sure everyone else who knew him. Except for the slight grimace every time he started to stand up after a KRG session, I have never seen him without a smile on his face. It is a great pity that the cancer, which he in his indefatigable style was all prepared to fight, has taken him away from us.
We will miss him a great deal and can only take comfort in Kahlil Gibran's words: For life and death are one, even as the river and the sea are one.

Geeta:
Dear Hemjit, you were so cheerful and courageous. Such an inspiration for me. Will always miss you. 

Shoba:
We are going to miss you Hemjit. Your gentle ways have formed a space in each one’s heart. It was much more of an effort for you to attend our sessions, but except when illness forced you to stay home, you were sure to be there, always early. It was a privilege to have known you. You taught us to endure infirmity with calmness, gentleness and good cheer.

Until we meet again, good friend!

KumKum
Hemjit left us on the 23rd of February. A week has passed since then. The tragedy is still fresh in our minds, and we are just learning to accept the permanence of his absence. 

I was very fond of him because he was devoted to KRG’s passion: to read. Although he had to overcome many hurdles to attend our monthly sessions, he felt at ease when he was participating. He was caring and appreciative, and a very happy person. He was as fond of us as we were of him.

Living with many disabilities, he learned to accept them with composure. His wife, Sugandhi, his wonderful family, friends, and his trusted driver, all lent their helping hands to this amazing man during his journey through life. His disabilities did not interfere with his enjoyment of life. He was a positive thinker, and always hoped for more out of life.

When he told us about his blood cancer, he was very hopeful of conquering it, just as he did so many other setbacks in his life. He kept his hopes up until the end, coming away from the grim surroundings of a hospital to his beautiful, new, apartment. His family boosted his spirits, and welcomed Hemjit to his new apartment, all done up by the contributions of members of his loving family. He spent the last few days of his life in these peaceful surroundings, while the insidious cancer was tightening its grip on his mortal life. 

Thank God, Hemjit did not have to live through the pain of a long-drawn fight. May God bless his soul. 

We will always cherish the memory of our beloved friend and fellow reader, Hemjit. He taught us how to be happy and cheerful when things around you are far from ideal. And, to enjoy life to one’s best with whatever is given.

I salute you, dear friend!

Priya
I don’t recall how or where I met Hemjit. Was it when he lived in Fort Cochin and had the cute Village Shop at the corner of Parade Ground? Or was it at Raksha School for children with special needs; or even before that when he worked with Tata Tetley? Suffice it to say that I grew richer after meeting him. His death has been a great loss. 

Hemjit was very generous with his words, making me feel exceptional; as if I had done something extraordinary by introducing him to KRG. When I saw how he blossomed in the group I realised that this is what he was seeking — a warm circle of friends who shared common interests.

Initially when he joined he was unsure, a bit nervous about his physical disability and speech impairment; he often asked if he was doing okay. He adjusted remarkably well and KRG took him in.

From then on he sailed along with us through so many authors and books, enjoying the debates and discussions. I noticed he loved reading poetic or romantic passages. I would tease him when he chose “moralistic or didactic passages” and he would retort that his naughty side would be too much for the group.

There are two incidents that stand out. Hemjit had started contributing as a freelance writer to The Hindu in 2012. Once I could not attend a lunch at his place on account of work, but his lovely wife Sugandhi sent a tiffin carrier full of food to the office through him. He was thoughtful, caring and extremely kind, qualities he shared with his wife.

On another occasion after completing an interview for a story I had commissioned, he called excitedly, “Priya, you wont believe this. Here I was talking with this decorated soldier about his bravery in battle and at the end of the interview, he stood up and saluted me. He said I was braver than him as I battled life on a daily basis and came up trumps."


Yes, dear Hemjit, you shone, and always had a smile. You will remain forever my cherished good friend, a good human being and as the officer said, a model of bravery. 

Toni Morrison – Beloved Jan31, 2020

Beloved, first edition, signed by Toni Morrison

Toni Morrison treats this novel as a vehicle for the story of slavery in America. To get her message across about the unusual brutalising of a group of people torn from their homelands in West Africa and transported in horrific conditions on slave ships, and then made to work as slaves in the fields of white masters of farms and plantations – she uses every novelistic means at her disposal. 

Slave ship, each carrying ~400 slaves, shackled to one another. Diseases were common; ~15% perished during the voyage

Arundhaty, Pamela, Devika

It is not an easy read. Often the text goes on for pages without paragraphs; the tale is told in non-linear fashion; there is a ghost who inhabits the story by the name of ‘Beloved’; there are plenty of inexplicable events and actions – the reader just has to go along.

Devika, Saras, Geetha

It happens in the early 1870s, soon after the the US Civil War. Sethe and Denver live with the ghost until the arrival of Paul D, one of the slaves at the plantation where she worked in Kentucky. Paul gets rid of the ghost. Soon a female appears, 20 years old and strangely unmarked (no lines in her palms and her feet). She calls herself ‘Beloved’. Sethe and Denver welcome her.

Readers around the table

The novel alternates between two stories: Sethe and Beloved in conflict; and Sethe's life on the plantation, her escape, and the traumatic events that followed her crossing of the Ohio River and showing up at the home of her mother-in-law, Baby Suggs.

The Group discussing

Toward the middle Sethe’s plantation owner shows up with others to recapture the escapees, and Sethe tries to kill her children. Two boys and the newborn survive, but she slits the throat of her two-year-old.

KumKum, Thommo, Arundhaty, Pamela, Devika

It is a very dense novel with very few light or cheerful sections; the grimness that drenches the story is Toni Morrison's attempt to recreate in fictional form the suffering her ancestors experienced.

Saras, Geetha, Gopa

Here are the ten readers who survived the session –

Thommo, KumKum, Joe

Saras, Gopa, Geetha

Arundhaty, Pamela, Devika

Priya

Humorous Poems – Dec 16, 2019

Our readers look forward to the last session of the year because it is tinged with levity, and uplifted by the effervescence of the holiday season to come. We deliberately choose poems that evoke absurdity and a sense of childhood fun.

Saras, Pamela, KumKum arriving at Arundhaty’s home

Arundhaty & Pamela

The occasion was combined with the birthday celebration of Arundhaty, and she kindly invited us to be guests in her home for the event and recite by the Chillavanoor river bank. As before we were expected to attend in droll costumes and wear incongruity as a badge. Spurred on by reminders, the readers turned out in great splashes of colour, the men rivalling the women. The photos will attest to their uninhibited display. 

Thommo, Pamela, & Devika

Pamela, Devika, Geetha, Shoba, Saras

The poets included famous names like T. S. Eliot and Edward Lear, children's poets such as Dr. Seuss and Roald Dahl, and much less known poets, for example, Edgar Albert Guest, who wrote an incredible 11,000 poems in his lifetime! We become familiar with the full range of poetry only when we include sessions such as this that give a special place to poems that display wit and audacious rhymes to delight the reader – as Ogden Nash does.

Arundhaty, KumKum

Thommo, Pamela

After the session Arundhaty and her sister-in-law, Suvarna, laid out a feast of eats very artistically showcased: conical veg sandwiches, micro idlis spiced, gulab jamun, home-baked chocolate cake, murukku, banana chips, etc. We went away satiated, wishing each other for the Christmas season but still in awe of the wonderful poetry we had listened to.  

Thommo, Geetha, Pamela, KumKum, Devika, Shoba, Saras, Arundhaty, Geeta

Geetha

Here we are outside the house on Arundhaty's lawn for the obligatory group shot to round off the reading:

Fyodor Dostoyevsky – Crime and Punishment, Nov 22, 2019

Fyodor Dostoevsky – Crime and Punishment. A Russian Realistic Novel. First English edition 1886, translated by Fred Whishaw

The 19th century set off a tremendous creative spark in Russian literature. It heralded an era that made the rest of the world aware of the riches that were being created by writers such as the novelists Leo Tolstoy (author of War and Peace), Fyodor Dostoyevsky (author of Crime and Punishment), and Anton Chekhov, whose short stories and plays have become a part of the standard repertoire worldwide. Other notable writers included the poet Mikhail Lermontov, and the novelists Ivan Tugenev and Nikolay Gogol. The figure that towers over all these in the hearts of Russians is the poet Alexander Pushkin.

KumKum presenting a copy of the novel ‘Disgrace’ by Coetzee

Yet as Malcolm Muggeridge, the English journalist, diarist and satirist, points out in his penetrating video biography of Dostoyevsky in 1975, Russia’s literacy rate at the time was ten percent. How did such a superb story teller, who could plumb the psychological depths of the characters he created, survive and thrive in such a parched soil of readers? It was not until the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 that literacy rapidly rose to 100%, and from a nation of serfs who were slaves to a landed gentry, a vast intelligentsia arose.

Arundhaty, Saras, Shoba, Geeta, Devika

Though Dostoevsky trained as a military engineer following the wishes of his father, his heart was set on becoming a writer and at the age of twenty three he took the plunge and wrote his first novel, Poor Folk, telling the stories of impoverished people in St Petersburg. That set him on course for a career in which there were ups and downs. Ultimately, he wrote not only the present novel, but his even more celebrated work, The Brothers Karamazov.

Saras, Shoba, Geeta

At 200,000 words it was our longest novel of the year. It takes a while to get going and lends itself to judicious skipping, as do all Russian novels. A note on Russian names. They generally consist three parts: the first or given name, the second is the patronymic derived from the father, and the last is the family name. The patronymic is created by taking the given name of a person’s father and adding a suffix to it. ... The most common men’s suffixes are -ovich or -evich (meaning son of) while for a woman they are -ovna or -evna which stands for daughter of. Thus, Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov is the name of the famous author (his father was also Vladimir). People also have affectionate names, in this case, Volodya. When you address a person formally you have to use the first two names, here, Vladimir Vladimirovich.

Hemjit, Priya, KumKum

The avid readers, all of whom had dedicated themselves to finishing the novel in time for the reading are gathered here at the end:

(Seated) Gopa, Hemjit, Geetha (Standing) Joe, Pamela, Geeta, Devika, KumKum, Shoba, Arundhaty, Zakia, Saras, Priya

Poetry in Translation – Oct 25, 2019

Saras, Priya, KumKum

The Poetry in Translation session refreshes us with the words of a range of poets who have given voice to their inspiration in many languages. This year the languages of India, and its union of diverse tongues and cultures, were in the foreground. The original languages featured were Odia, Tamil (or Tamizh), Sanskrit, and Bengali with one poet each; Urdu with three poets and Malayalam with two; Spanish and French, besides, with one each. 

Devika, Pamela, Saras

Significantly, several of the poets were recited in the original with an English gloss provided for understanding. Delving into the poetry of the world in this manner yields an intimate feeling for the images couched in the lovely words of another tongue. They can penetrate our understanding because it is poetry; indeed, the love for another language can be fostered by poetry.

October was the month of three birthdays of our readers: Kavita, Devika, and Joe, the last two falling on the same day. How unlikely is that! Devika invited us all over to her place with spouses to enjoy a lunch next day. Devika and Achu hosted the lively afternoon of conversation and food;  the Samsung S8 mobile of Abbas has captured bright group pictures. These and some others will be added in another post.

Arundhaty, Geeta, Pamela, Saras, Devika

November is the month to announce the novels for the coming year and readers are casting around among the rich possibilities to excite our reading hunger. One of our readers is on a private mission with a couple of others to conquer Ulysses by James Joyce in an edition where the text is 552 pages of small font, and the explanatory notes are half as long again. No doubt a novel like that is beyond the pale of our reading group to handle in a single session. 

Priya, Hemjit, KumKum, Kavita, Thommo

In this connection it is worth noting how the obscenity charge against the novel got over-ruled by Judge John Woolsey in 1933 in New York. He said:
“Whilst in many places the effect of Ulysses on the reader undoubtedly is somewhat emetic, nowhere does it tend to be an aphrodisiac.”

Amen. How can one evade an author who writes like this (p. 251 of Ulysses):
The summer evening had begun to fold the world in its mysterious embrace. Far away in the west the sun was setting and the last glow of all too fleeting day lingered lovingly on sea and strand, on the proud promontory of dear old Howth guarding as ever the waters of the bay, on the weedgrown rocks along Sandymount shore and, last but not least, on the quiet church whence there streamed forth at times upon the stillness the voice of prayer to her who is in her pure radiance a beacon ever to the stormtossed heart of man, Mary, star of the sea.

(Photo: courtesy KumKum)

The group photo at the end of the session was diminished by a couple of readers, who had to leave for Diwali functions elsewhere. The birthday people (Devika, Kavita, and Joe) are holding giant anthurium flowers.

Devika, Pamela, Kavita, Saras, Geeta, Shoba, KumKum (standing) Joe, Hemjit (sitting)