|
The divide and
aftermath
Himmat Singh Gill
The Partition Motif in Contemporary Conflicts Eds Smita Tewari Jassal
and Eyal Ben-Ari. Sage Publications. Pages 381. Rs 480.
Any
partition or the divide of people creates tremendous personal, social,
political and economic convulsions the likes of which no human society
should have the misfortune to go through. Whether it is the break-up of
India leading to Pakistan, the division of territory between Palestine
and Israel, the dismemberment of erstwhile Yugoslavia or a host of
similar politically-motivated societal surgeries, it is a genocide of a
memory and earlier way of life that has to be lamented and mourned by
those who care and understand that one class of people with their own
culture and identity can never be separated in the true sense of the
word.
In
pursuit of self-reliance
D.S. Cheema
India to be a Global Power: Issues and Challenges by Vasant Sathe.
Shubhi Publications, Gurgaon. Pages 322. Rs 395.
People write books for
different reasons, some write to satisfy the intrinsic compulsion, some
write to fulfill their creative urge, yet some others write to get
better connected with the outside world. But well-read politicians
generally write according to a specific agenda, either to push their
personal political ideology or to reassure themselves of their intellect
and scholarship. This book by Vasant Sathe, a former Union Energy
Minister, is a case in point.
OFf
the shelf
A
distinguished poet
V.N. Datta
0 City of Lights: Faiz Ahmed Faiz
selected and edited by Khalid Hasan.
Translations by Daud Kamal and Khalid Hasan.
Oxford University Press. Pages 291. £ 14.99.
Translation
from one language into another is rather a tricky and complicated
venture, especially when it comes to translation of Urdu into English,
as both the languages have little cultural and linguistic affinity with
each other. Translations are never a substitute for the original, though
they are indispensable for those who do not know the original. Some
noted writers have rendered Faiz’s poetry into English, and their
performance is admirable. In this volume, Daud Kamal and editor Khalid
Hasan have translated Faiz’s poetry into English, and some of his
poems have been translated into English for the first time.
The joy of
fatherhood
Mohit Goswami
Dear Dad by Rajat Mathur. Frog Books. Pages 116. Rs 145.
Motherhood is considered the
greatest experience a woman has, even compared to godliness. An
expectant woman is pampered, with every step being observed. But has
anyone spared a thought for fatherhood? Has anybody from among us ever
pondered what a father-to-be goes through? There is no fuss to be made
about it, we are tempted to exclaim. This book focuses on the
much-neglected aspect of fatherhood and the changes it brings about in a
man’s life.
Hope for young writers
S. Raghunath
I
suspect that every book
publisher or a newspaper editor receives a large volume of mail from
disappointed contributors whose last "piece" has been
brusquely turned down.
Good account of
governance
Pradeep Singh Kharola
Reinventing Public Administration: The Indian Experience by Bidyut
Chakrabarty. Orient Longman. Pages 368. Rs 325.
The book is a unique work, which combines
"summarisation of the vast body of conceptual knowledge of public
administration with the evolution of Indian Administration". The
dynamic nature of public administration has been very appropriately
brought out by the author in his Introduction: "`85Public
administration can never be static or stationary, but needs to be
constantly redefined".
Not-so-great
expectations
The first Dickens World theme
park recently opened in Kent to attract those on a literary pilgrimage.
John Walsh wonders if a ‘Haunted House of Ebeneezer Scrooge’ is
really needed.
Fans of Charles Dickens, the greatest-ever
British novelist, can stroll through picturesque approximations of his
London streets, alleys, courtyards and docks, visit an Old Curiosity
Shop, and take a "dark boat" ride past dingy wharves and the
clapboard houses of Victorian desperadoes. The `A362m park, built on a
71,000 sq ft site at Chatham Maritime in Kent by the Continuum company,
promises to let visitors "step back into Dickensian England"
to become "immersed in the urban streets, sounds and smells of the
19th century".
Rice not charmed
Unfazed by the rich baritone and charm of
Pakistan Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz, US secretary of state Condoleezza
Rice stared him down and by the end of a meeting held two years back, he
was "babbling" and "shifting uncomfortably",
according to a new biography of her.
|
