The Man who Never was

The Wild Swans At Coole by W.B. Yeats My rating: 3 of 5 stars Poetry is not of the genre which I can claim I have read extensively, or heck even decently. The most memorable poem in my head, is The Solitary Reader by William Wordsworth . That too because of a passionate 10th grade English Tutor. Then there was Gitanjali , the collection of works by Rabindranath Tagore . But those were more spiritual in nature, one's appreciation is more towards the depth of the lyrics rather than its flow. This year, I've been trying to rectify that shortcoming, but Gods it's not as easy as reading prose. With literary fiction, you can usually get hooked on the narration. The premise, the characters, what they do, how they do it, what doing it does to them, does to the story, the twists, the turns, the parables, the subtext, the works. With Poetry, I'm drawing a blank. There is also the case that I might not have chosen necessarily the best work to ...

ചിദംബര സ്മരണ | Chidambara Smarana by Balachandran Chullikkad My rating: 4 of 5 stars Balachandran Chullikkad is someone who is intimately familiar to Keralites; at least those who were born in the 90s and 2000s. Well known for being a gifted poet, whose verses are capable of creating embers in your mind, he was also a mainstay on the film scene, often doing small supporting characters in motion pictures. This was something for which he was ridiculed and judged, both by the general public as well as some of his intelligentsia cohorts. Balan, of course, in his typical irreverent and piercing nature, didn’t bow down or apologize, for consorting with the capitalist machinery, a group viewed as the ideological rivals of the intellectuals. While growing up, I too had some amount of reservation, as to why a respected, erudite literary agent would stoop low and star in soaps and commercial ventures like this. As an adult, the reasons are clear enough; very...

Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came by Robert Browning My rating: 5 of 5 stars View all my reviews Readers find different meanings in the books that they indulge in. You, me and the average joe, would chance upon Robert Browning ode to a hero's tale, and take away from it the determination of our protagonist Roland to undertake the perilous and insurmountable quest, his perseverance in face of ever dangerous obstacles, his resilience at the prospect of failure and ultimate death, as well as the burning sense of duty as well as loyalty to his fallen comrades which drives him forwards, whatever the end might hold.   Stephen King read the work, took away that, and much more, using it as the template to craft the rich and enthralling world of Roland Deschain and the Dark Tower.  Like most general readers, the reason I picked up this poem was upon learning how it served as inspiration to Mr. King's acclaimed series. Yet even the...