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Portrait of a Critic
The angle, it makes all the difference. Subtracting depth, magnifying dominance. I paraphrase, leading you through this maze. ‘I am the North, the South, the East, the West. The Monday week and the Sunday rest.’ Sharp, incisive like a rapier. Objects in my mirror are smaller than they appear. From up here, I rule the world. Sitting in judgment of all I behold. The air is dry, my horse is high, the halo round my head holier than thine. I cast these stones for I’ve never sinned. I judge because I’ve never erred.
So, there he is, this guy called A. Fevered, feverish, yet light as day. He soars vertical, adorns the sky. Back here, there’s just my article and I. His heart, they say, bleeds onto the paper, blubbery breaths of joyful vapour. Who the hell does he think he is? Master, monarch of all he sees? He asks me to ‘play this little game’, tells me to ‘crawl back in my brain’. Reminds me that no one even knows my name. I stamp and stew in righteous rage. Overflowing, it fills an entire page. Tomorrow’s edition. His damnation. Revenge is deliciously sweet. Oh yes, he’s well and truly beat.
Why can’t he be more like C? Now here’s someone I’d like to be. His mind is no mystery, his thoughts have a history. He explores the dark in riotous colour. Mercifully, he stays away from squalour. He speaks loud enough, so I can hear. Doesn’t burden me more than I can bear. There’s truth in his lies that I want to believe. Laughter and music and moments to relive. There’s no confusion, no dilemma. He’s the great white hope of our cinema. A story that won’t remain untold. He will wear his crown of gold.
Between the two lies one sad B. A sprite, a fright, born to the endless night. Neither acute as A, nor clever like C. ‘Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse.’ Dreaming of slipping into gravity-defying shoes. Unbelonging, amorphous, a gentle Anonymous. Neither theirs, nor ours, she still is in the game. ‘I mean the game called ‘go insane’. Easy to wish away, this one is an easy prey. What do you know, she loves the color grey. Grab her by the hair, and heave her through the air. Leave her lying there in her paper pool. ‘At times, indeed, almost ridiculous – Almost, at times, the Fool’.
I need my superior world, need to seek comfort in the known, the familiar. The understandable, the linear. So I hurry to get back where I belong. Where everyone knows the popular song. We look down at those struggling people. Singing ‘We’ll erect a different steeple.’ What they feel, what they want to be, I can’t see for the life of me. Pariahs without a prayer. Like a one-eyed player.
Toe the line, brother, sip the wine. Don’t struggle, don’t fight the mire. Burn like us, with artificial fire. Where you stand, there is no resurrection. Not even room for correction. May your mind sink in legendary decay. Tomorrow is just another day.
(All the alphabets in the post are purely fictitious, progeny of the author’s fertile albeit mediocre imagination and have no resemblance to any person, living or dead!)
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loved reading ‘white’. this one was good too.
(how about mailing me the unpublished book you’ve written? my id is: vaibhav.suman@gmail.com)
Bests!
ha ha ha,
I loved the last two lines… Superb!!!
What? Come again please. Didn’t get it… Guess it’s too deep…
A,B,C….looks like i dont belong to this place. will figure out my O,P,Q. But the game called “go insane”…all for that, always for that. Nice post.
[editor note: marked troll for violating PFC's comment policy]
Took me two readings to understand, too. After which, sadly, my reaction was, “For this I read it twice???”
u suck, u know that?!!!
u r just gonna keep coming up with these masterpieces, so totally insensitive to the inferiority complex ppl like me suffer from. white was bad enuf. but this was just brutal. so why dont u deliver the killer blow quickly?! one more of your gems and ill commit suicide. pleeeze!! end my suffering!!!!!!
[admin note: we apologize for the initial troll cap]
Aditya:
friend, why you should show such hyper attitude . you may dislike some writings but you or anybody has no right to discourage any writer and for that matter any creative person because for them you are hitting their sensitive nature. Some things and especially good things, mostly can not be understood in first go. Everybody has its own style and Bhavani has her own style of writing a blog.
Its a pleasure to see that authors of such calibre and that too so young have joined hindi cinema. Such people will carry standard to the writings in the films.
Dont you think if you cant praise a good work then you should not try to kill the courage of creative people.
Just a reaction to your violent comment! Sorry buddy.
Is it because Bhavani is a woman or that she is a writer with not much of a success tagged to her credit that many of the Indian readers above think it is alright to toss muck at her?
This attitude is a classic case of killing the writer and any creativity that an individual may try to bring on a public platform… why? Because they couldn’t understand it or digest it?
Why kill creativity if one can’t hold it in his/her palms and be unable to sit on it… Of course many of the comments above come from vested interests who have known the author in the past perhaps or maybe those anti-PFC sites may have their own selfish motivations to publish such biased negative comments…
The question is should we continue running PFC for such bastards to come, kill and piss off?
run PFC and kick them out as and when they appear.
Thats a problem with internet. People want to understand everything in 1 minute time while such high standard post needs atleast 2 readings.
Some people criticise that good films are not made but when they dont appreciate good writings then what and why to talk about good films? Films need good writing in their background.
and then there is facility of anonymity, and distance between writer and commentator. Those who personally dont like a particular writer may settle the score in this way by posting venomous comments under any name.
This is a pity. and surely many cant digest that a woman can write in such a way.
Re: achievements, everybody starts with less achievements and in creative field it has to come slowly. Her talent is a guarantee of major achievements in future. How many can write a film at that age in which Amitabh Bachchan is acting?
Is it a less achievement. Though many may feel jealous about this achievement.
This is so strange that same “aditya_iyengar”
had written a comment (no 59) full of praises on Bhavani’s first post “White”. and today he wrote such poisoneous comment and complained about first post also.
Does commentator suffer from Schizophrania.
Authors should not take such comments seriously. Aditya might have a bad day today which made him destructive and he started spreading destruction all over. Why to give importance to such negative comments when so valuable commentators who are regular readers of PFC shower their profound knowledge.
yes i am agree with RK that we all want to understand everything in only 1 minute.
I also got some problem to understand this post on first time but at the end it was nice read. (any way i read jaishankar prasad ‘Kamayani’ 5 times then now i am starting to understand it :( )
Shatrughan:
It will happen with many readers with this post. when will read attentively will see a great humour and will praise the style a lot. Its so feminine and subtle way in this post that things are obvious and yet said in so hidden way.
friend I am sure, you might have understood those lines of Kamayani in even half read
” Neel Paridhan beech ……” :d
@RK ,As always you are right.:d:d:d
[admin note: comment has been marked as troll.]
I don’t know why guys who are defending Bhavani are stressing so much about her being a woman. More so than people critisizing her. Strange. Since you guys agree that it should be a non issue then the best way is to not even mention it. And only mostly women write such stuff. Most men are too busy making a living for themselve :) Just kidding!:)
Bhavaniji, agar kachhchi sabji hi khane ko mil jaaye to kya majaa aaye? kuchh masala, garnishing hona chahiye tabhi khane ka taste aayega. varna 1st standard ke bachche ki books aur literature ki books me kya farq reh jaayega? though i could not understand the post in first read, i appreciate your writing skill.
hi bhavani,
methinks this post would have read better with line breaks. why turn the lyrical into prose.
ah, the first two lines. they are a killer.
keep burning, flame.
The first time, I read it not paying much attention to the title.
After reading your first post I was trying to see similar subject in your next post. so When I read it it seemed to go above my head and kind of abstract.
However when I read the second time and after noting the title in particular, those flowing and indirect words did point out the players you were trying to mention. Those stereotypes whom the critics love to bring up or push down. In the process they too have become stereotypes. An ilk designed to keep stereotypes in place, to keep mediocrity in business and brilliance under the reins.
I found that no amount of lengthy invectives against those who roam around with tar tins in their hands would have exposed them in a gentle and subtle way than this allegory that you have painted here.
Keep these coming! will we have a portrait of a writer too soon?
lately made comments are real proof of the lacking in the reading rather than in the post. Good writing often get this treatment because people understand it bit later and mostly after 2-3 readings.
But this is really a mistake that good things are not praised at right time because then majority consists of people who either did not read the articles with proper attention or could not understand in that single attempt of reading and thus made negative comment about the post.
Foolishly we sometimes show misery in praising good things at right time and we wait that ok we will do it later. thats why bad looks win over good all the time because good feels shy to express.
mam,
Nice post..well written..but what is the intention of this post? just curious..:-?
Such Criticism shouldn’t exist…stereotypes can be exposed like that alone..does that mean the critic is stereotyped? what is this?
:o
Bhavani,
Neatly written. :) Forget the trolls and keep writing with passion.
Oz,
“This attitude is a classic case of killing the writer and any creativity that an individual may try to bring on a public platform
Last line above,
read it as, No one can kill our passionforcinema! ^:)^
Bhavani,
Great post. I just wish I could write like you. I would deem my life successful if only I could do that.
Brilliant lines: “The air is dry, my horse is high, the halo round my head holier than thine. I cast these stones for I
Hey bhavani
beautiful once again…. waiting for more
The words you write, on white, in black
I once again stop time in its track
As those words take me over and above
With your words, I cant help falling in love.
Bhavani, a bit late to reply to your post which I just managed to read and reread to grasp the intricacies. In one word BRILLIANT!!!! would love to read your book. Pls do Keep us posted about it.
Well, I never commented on any of your articles before as I felt like a rat in front of an elephant, got a inferiority complex reading your hi-funda english…
but memsaab, aap thoda common man like me ke liye bhi likhenge? so we can also get some knowledge that is now only going to the “upper” class?
kyaaa machchar bhai….
sab log aise aapke standard mein aake likenge tho kya hoga??
waise..
aisi hi soch ki wajah se bollywood ka haalat aisa hai..
:d
DPac bhai, I am a common man with some very common and normal brain. I guess I am not the target audience for Ms.Iyer’s posts so no complaints on that part…my only request was to give us some posts where some aam junta can also get an insight into her wonderful world. Knowledge has to be spread into slums too apart from high rises right? :)
BTW, bollywood ka haalat issein kya lena dena…A film like Munnabhai MBBS, which talks in the common man’s language is a bigger hit than Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna’s and Black, the so called (pseudo)-intelligent movies. I any day prefer a movie which talks to me in a language that I understand than something which is way over my head.
ab that is asking too much machchar bhai…
jisko jaise likhnaho likhein..
how can u ask somebody to dumbed down or water down their writing so that you can understand easily??
thats really not the purpose of someones blog..
knowledge spread karne ke liye do tareeke hain, you mentioned only one way though. the other way is for the slums to rise up and look the high rise in the eye rather than wait for some spoon feeding from up above..
if you think a bit more you will understand what i said about the bollywood haalat..
mein success ki baat hi nahin ar raha tha
but then again even that might go a bit above your head :-)
Well, frankly speaking…I don’t see anything wrong in “Bollywood’s” haalat. There are new opportunities now for everyone, people are getting the chance to make the films they want to and there is a lot of young blood now. So don’t give me that shit about Bollywood’s halat.
Coming back to my comment, I definitely did not ask Ms.Iyer to dumb down her writings…All I wanted was to write some of her experiences that she can share with US in a language we understand. She has all the right to write for herself and whoever understands it or not is not her problem. But my point of view was that it would be great to hear something from her which “everyone” could get the grasp of. Not everyone is endowed with a “hard on” brain like yours DPac, and we might never rise up too….Yeah..I admit it…gotta face some realities buddy…
I repeat,No where in my comment I meant disrespect for Ms.Iyer’s writing and when I actually read her posts, was awed with the fluency and control of the language she had and the joy she was going through by writing down those words. She obviously is a knowledgeable woman.
For me, I felt that it would be great to hear such learned woman’s thoughts and experiences in a language I could understand. So I did not commit any sin by asking this?
wah machchar wah…
tho aise bolna…
seedha crisp and clear:)>-
WOW!!! I loved the naughty rhyme in this one. You should defniately collect these blog posts and publish a book someday.
And please don’t listen to people who want you to make it dumb it down for the aam aadmi. It will just ruin the spontaneity, which makes it so awesome.
On a side note:
Writers and Filmakers complain about critics, but forget that they themselves are social critics. If a similar standard was applied to them only politicians will be eligible to write about society.