That Salty Air - A Review

So I had a chance to catch up on my graphic novel reading recently (I also discovered why so many people around me are starting sentences with 'so' nowadays). One thing I will truly miss about New York is being able to buy amazing comics from Top Shelf for dirt cheap+shipping. Unlike my usual book purchases, which are at least moderately researched (by which I mean at least 1 referring article+a bunch of amazon reviews deep) I essentially jump off the cliff with Top Shelf, doing no more than reading the blurb, checking out the price and then jumping into the sale. This is mainly because these people believe that comics dont have to be about underwearsofacushion people, pseudo-surreal absurdism (though that's mostly pretty ok with me) or slapstick humour to be an art form. Top Shelf publishes comics written by people who want to tell stories. Timeless stories about aspects of the human condition which ring true (which I miss reading because so many people are writing Human-Condition Porn for Booker Prize lists and other such junk that its so hard to sort through the dross).

So one such story was That Salty Air (If my opinion means anything to you, I would seriously encourage you to buy this book. If you're in the US, please buy direct from TopShelf. You'd be helping a wonderful publisher to grow. If you're in India, Flipkart amazingly has it. I love you Flipkart).



I dont know how many themes this story covers for me. Its a story about loss, irrationality, anthromorphism and the sea. Anyway, I was pretty moved by it, and I should issue a disclaimer at the outset: This is probably because I love the sea and most of my internal metaphors work water or the sea in somewhere. That said, I did have some thoughts on this story. They're pretty raw, as I typed them out on my qwertyphone while I was killing time waiting for something specific to happen, but I think they pretty accurately reflect what I think about the story, so here they are:

What is 'That Salty Air' about?

Its a modern day, magic-realist parable about the capacity of a man's hatred, and of the acceptance of change. its also a revenge story about a man who tries to rape/murder/defile the sea (the verb that actually flashed through my mind while I was reading it was 'to fuck' though not in the sexual sense rather than in the sense of defiling). The protoganist, Hugh, is a fisherman in love with the sea. The book tracks the souring of that relationship, its zenith and subsequent redemption.

Why was That Salty Air a beautiful work?

It immersed me emotionally. Granted, a kinship with the sea may be required to feel the same level of immersion, or, alternatively, some equivalent feeling of connection with your surroundings (I think the city lends itself to anthropomorphism as well as the sea).

Despite asking this premise of you, however, I still feel that the pace and story are beautifully proportioned and calculated to immerse you in its reality. Each portion of the book featuring Hugh and the sea strikes the exact note it seeks, and in doing so, adds to the poignancy of the others. For example, the simple love and reverence he shows to the ocean serves to enhance the horror and revulsion evoked by his subsequent hatred.

GYAAN ALERT - Was there a message?

At least, I thought there was. Besides the moderately obvious ones concerning loss and our relationship with the Fates, there was something in there about our relationship with our world which made me think. Watching Hughe's carnage, in the midst of the horror and revulsion, I couldn't help but think - man is the only creature capable of such wholesale destruction and brutality. All animals are capable of brutality, but only man can convert this into the urge to destroy his world. Our current attitude towards nature arises from our seeing it as an adversary; a jungle to be tamed, an ocean to be overcome; a river to be harnessed - one of the reasons we never think about our present relationship with Nature in this manner is because of our veils of perception, refusing to believe in that which does not conform to the established dogma and canon of reality. To that extent, this book is clearly a work of surrealism and magic realism, intertwining simple, mundane situations with the fantastic so that, in the midst of your emotional connection with the story, the veils are, for a time, drawn. And when they are drawn, I saw in Hugh a reflection of the present state of modern humankind, an adversarial, pugnacious creature, embittered by his dance with his environment, and seeking no more than to subjugate it entirely, to exact blind revenge for past wrongs. Hugh embittered is man at his ugliest.

Wait, isn't this a comic - why haven't you discussed the drawing yet?

For a number of reasons. Mainly, because I think that this is one of the rare stories where the story tells itself through the art. There's no need for evocative metaphors and photo-realistic adjectives because the artwork takes care of that, in spades. In that way, this is probably a bit like a Cormac McCarthy story in terms of its sparseness of dialogue, except without the need for abovementioned verbal cues. To put it another way, my entire rant so far has been about the artwork, because the artwork is the story. If you have to know about the artwork independent from the story, I think it covers some incredibly inked panels, with incredibly beautiful and surreal seascapes.





So should you buy this?

If you're reading this, you just managed to trudge through about 800 words of me gushing all over it, with an introduction encouraging you to buy it. You're probably at least moderately curious. If you like stories about the human condition, and you aren't averse to moderate quantities of magic realism, and are not automatically biased against comics because they are 'for kids', please buy this book (in fact, please buy it even if you're in the last of these categories, because you need to understand now).

Celebrating the return of the Precipice and musing on MBs

One of my favourite blogs is back again, with fascinating takes on life, literature and much randomness. I made the mistake of leaning over the Precipice into one of the places recommended here, and promptly lost an afternoon in hitherto-undiscovered poetry.
I also end up wasting way too much time commenting on the posts at the Precipice.

So I saw this post today on Indian MBs, the Kama Kahani series, apparently, and as usual, I couldn't help but respond. Before I realised it, what should have been a simple 3-line comment ballooned out of shape into a diatribe, an apt reflection on the distances I must travel before I consider myself an adequate writer. At any rate, I decided to pick up the scraps of my comments and post them over here (another apt reflection on my drive as a writer, the literary equivalent of serving leftovers instead of cooking a fresh meal).

I suppose I should provide you with some context. I'm specifically addressing the last paragraph of the post, which asks if we're making altogether too big a deal about the sexist cliches in MBs when all of television advertising is nothing more than a gigantic universe where scantily clad women lean at awkward angles over compression pumps and stare lustily at camera lenses. I can't help but agree more regarding TV advertising. However, I still think there is a massive difference over being exposed to stereotypes in books and on TV. The primary difference is that TV is a passive choice, where a person is bombarded in the middle of their favourite tv show with jokerfaced smiling Mas doling out kurkure. All this has to be endured by the viewer irrespective of their choice of show, or of its redeeming qualities, if any. A decision to purchase a book, on the other hand, is an active choice, where a person is choosing to put down money (or utilise human capital by loaning a book from a friend). When such books are MBs, however, this decision translates into an active choice to use money (or human capital) towards the ends of consuming formulaic writing about gender stereotypes in luuuurve.* This active decision-making usually implies a greater deal of openness to the ideas within the book, as opposed to the ideas presented on TV ads.** Of course, in the end, there's no denying that an MB is pulp, as is the whole 'Conan the Barbarian' series or the entire genre of noir fiction. But there's also no denying the impact of pulp fiction on our thought processes and our attitudes towards the world and its inhabitants. I could get into a whole other diatribe about this, but I should probably sum up because I'm beginning to lose your attention. Basically, it worries me that smart, progressive women who would rarely (if ever) snivel and give way to simple brute force (whether applied to the body or the mind) are choosing to read about smart progressive women who snivel and give way to charismatic, primal male stereotypes. It almost feels as if this is some sort of dark, repressed fantasy.

Of course, in the end, everyone has their guilty pleasures. Mine is probably reading comic books about anarchist revolutionaries who challenge the status quo.*** In the end, such literature allows the reader the illusion of revolt and non-conformism without all the fuss and muss of actually going out there and changing anything. I still love it though, and I cannot deny myself such escapist pleasures, guilty as they may be.

* - A side rant - I personally find the male stereotypes in the few MBs I have read about as offensive as the female ones. The totemization of physically and mentally aggressive men who believe in and practice force (whether physical or mental) as a means of achieving their ends is a problem that is not merely limited to MBs. In some ways, I believe that it lies at the root of the charisma that surrounds violent people throughout history.

** - A side note - I suppose this wouldn't apply to those people who decide to try out an MB for simple experimentation, or those who have one foisted upon them by a well-meaning friend. That may go without saying, but it was worth clearing up.

*** - More sidey-sidey - Consider V for Vendetta or Grant Morrisson's 'The Invisibles' series. In fact, it was the latter, in a brilliant twist of meta-commentary, which alerted me to this harsh reality, in Vol 2 Issue 13.

An Open Letter to DM Theatrics Regarding Two Gentlemen of Lebowski: Please Youtube This!

This is a letter to DM Theatrics, who are planning to put up a production of 2 Gentlemen of Lebowski sometime soon.

from: ViralFish
to: press@dm-theatrics.com
subject: An Open Letter to DM Theatrics Regarding Two Gentlemen of Lebowski: Please Youtube This!



Ok, this is clearly not a press request. However, its the only contact email I had for the fine gentlepeople who were magnanimous enough to stage a production of Two Gentlemen of Lebowski. Therefore, if you are one of these gentlepeople who are capable of making decisions about this, please consider my proposal. If you are not, and know one of these gentlepeople (whew, political correctness takes more effort to type), please forward this to them. Thank you.


Guys,

As a follower of the Dude and as an unabashed supporter of the Bard and all Bardly performances, I would so have loved to attend this event. My chagrin at being unable to attend is aggravated by the fact that I was in New York until a few months ago, and have returned recently to my native India. It is in this spirit that I present to you a modest proposal:

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE YOUTUBE THIS!!!

You may think there are a thousand reasons why you shouldn't do this but I have presented a brief analysis of those that I can fathom:

1. It will kill demand for seats in the actual theatre

No it wont. Under no circumstances will it do so. Nuh uh. Not a chance.

The Big Lebowski is a movie that has attained cult status (No, I'm not kidding at all, look it up on wikipedia). This means that its fanbase may not encompass the bloated ranks of your average 'Twilight' movie. In fact, to all appearances, its fans may not appear even half as fanatical as your average neo-vampire pseudogoth who applies fake blood on her wrists 'for Edward' every day. However, that is because the followers of the Dude are not fans. They are disciples. They have internalised the Dude in body and spirit.

For every moron who looks at a q-tip and says 'What is this?' there is a Dude waiting to say 'obviously you are not a golfer'.
For every tool who screams out at us: 'The bums lost! The bums will always lose!", there is a Dude who is willing to put his hands up, say 'fuck it' and saunter out with his pick of any rug in the house.
For every bigot, chauvinist, fanatic and fundamentalist, there is a Dude who will stand up to them and say 'That's just, like, your opinion man.'

These people will come. They will prefer to come because, for a follower of the Dude, watching an enactment of Two Gentlemen of Lebowski is the same experience as Christmas mass is to a practicing Catholic: You can try to watch it on tv, but thats just not the same as mouthing the lines together, enjoying a feeling of communal brotherhood with your fellow follower or enjoying tasty snacks mid-performance (ok that last one was in bad taste).

They may not try to pay, because, come on man, the Dude didn't teach us to pay (except in the form of dubious checks for sixty nine cents). You may find a few more followers trying to sneak in through backstage than through the front of the theater. You may even find a few people disguised as security men who suddenly attempt to sidle into an extra seat. However, you will fill your seats. And with a few intelligent ushers, I'm sure almost all of them will be paid for. So thats not something you have to worry about.


3. It will be a pain in the ass to do.

Oh come on man, it will not. Now you're just being plain lazy. Which is cool, and very understandable. But if you guys dont have the time and energy to do it, just ask around man. I will bet you that someone will do it, probably for a pretty nominal fee, possibly for free. And it will be worth it, for reasons that I am outlining below.

3. It will kill demand for a video
You may already have plans to record this show and sell it. If you do, I'm sure you'll make some cash. But lets look at this realistically. There's 2 reasons why you may not get to make much cash out of this if youre only going to put out a paid performance.

a. Your audience comprises followers of the Dude. Their preferred means of access to anything is 'free', after which comes 'cheap'. And if there's one other thing a follower of the Dude likes, its sticking it to the man, low risk style. Put these two factors together and for every 1 dvd you sell, there will be 10 Dudes watching a pixellated low-res bootleg video of your show. As a guy who is interested in intellectual property, I can tell you that that's actually not such a bad thing. In this day and age, for every 1 copy of a blockbusterr dvd sold, there's 1 copy being pirated. But pirated copies tend to build demand for the original, and in the long run, can actually feed sales for the original work. (I should probably link to something here but I'm on a roll. Just take my word for it.)

b. However, this model applies well to blockbusters and big-studio productions because they have the cash to publicise this stuff endlessly, so even if 1 million guys pirate their movies, another 1 million have heard enough about them to go buy the original on dvd. However, you guys do not have that luxury. You do not have big budgets and you do not have enough clout to publicise something like this by conventional means.
What you do have is the power of the followers.
The Dude is very much an internet icon, being the sort of person who appeals to people who spend a lot of time giggling-high on something in front of a computer. Put out a youtube clip of 2 Gentlemen, and these people will transmit that information online faster than 2 girls and 1 keyboard cat. After that, you've got eyeballs, which is the biggest currency in the world today, more so, I imagine, for a group of people whose revenues are dependent on people seeing and hearing them perform. Let your imagination run wild.

c. And you can be sure some of these guys will be youtubing this stuff anyway. Sure, you can try as hard as you can to make sure no one takes grainy, horrible, low-res cellphone videos of the show, but in the end, someones going to put that shit on youtube. And I am going to watch it. And feel terrible about the fact that I missed this wonderful performance and all I get is a minute and a half of some nutjob who decided to record the show in the middle of an epileptic fit.

On the other hand, if you put that stuff on youtube yourself, you will have instantaneous coverage. The Dude is beloved all over the world, and if you combine the love of the Dude with the love of the Bard, you have a recipe for viral success! People will watch, and while watching, they may actually love it enough to want to get a DVD of your performance.

Also, a theatrical performance is, by its nature, ephemeral. A moment of beauty, then gone forever, save in the minds of those fortunate enough to witness it. A youtube video is not usually considered beautiful. But it is a record, one that hopefully may be perused by generations after ours, in an effort to understand the creature that was early 21st century man. Please man, leave them with something better to see than '2 Girls 1 Cup'.

You may have reasons other than this, but I just ran out of energy. Let me just end this appeal to your higher (and lower) conscience by imploring you,

in the name of the Dude and the Bard,

to consider and act upon the reasons I have offered.

ViralFish

P.S. I call this an open request because I may post in on my blog, ViralFish. If you are concerned about this, worry not, as the 6 people who follow my blog will agree with me wholeheartedly, while at the same time supporting your noble endeavour 100%.

Stock Spec Fi and Farthana

Okay, I'm back. Found something far freakier from the place I just blogged to earlier. A "speculative" fiction site called strange horizons, which I haven't really checked out yet. What's really interesting is their list of stock plotlines which they will NOT accept from writers:

The original link to the site is here. However, I'm reproducing the same thing here cause I'm too lazy to paraphrase. However, as the legal maxim goes, res ipsa loquitor.

 

 

Strange Horizons

______________

Fiction Submission Guidelines: Stories We See Too Often

_____________________________________________

 

This is an attempt at classifying the kinds of non-horror plots and themes that we receive too frequently. We have a separate page for horror stories.

Main plot types are numbered; subspecies and variants receive letters.

Of course it's not impossible to write a good story with one of these plots or themes; it's not that these are inherently bad plots, merely that we see too many stories that use them.

1. Person is (metaphorically) at point A, wants to be at point B. Looks at point B, says "I want to be at point B." Walks to point B, encountering no meaningful obstacles or difficulties. The end. (A.k.a. the linear plot.)
2. Creative person is having trouble creating.
   1. Writer has writer's block.
   2. Painter can't seem to paint anything good.
   3. Sculptor can't seem to sculpt anything good.
   4. Creative person's work is reviled by critics who don't understand how brilliant it is.
   5. Creative person meets a muse (either one of the nine classical Muses or a more individual muse) and interacts with them, usually by keeping them captive.
3. Visitor to alien planet ignores information about local rules, inadvertantly violates them, is punished.
   1. New diplomat arrives on alien planet, ignores anthropologist's attempts to explain local rules, is punished.
4. Weird things happen, but it turns out they're not real.
   1. In the end, it turns out it was all a dream.
   2. In the end, it turns out it was all in virtual reality.
   3. In the end, it turns out the protagonist is insane.
   4. In the end, it turns out the protagonist is writing a novel and the events we've seen are part of the novel.
5. An A.I. gets loose on the Net despite the computer it was on not being connected to the Net.
   1. An A.I. gets loose on the Net but the author doesn't have a clear concept of what it means for software to be "loose on the Net." (Hint: the Net is currently a collection of individual computers, not some kind of big ubercomputer; software doesn't currently run in the wires between computers.)
6. The future is soulless.
   1. In the future, all learning is electronic, until kid is exposed to ancient wisdom in the form of a book.
   2. In the future, everything is electronic, until kid is exposed to ancient wisdom in the form of a wise old person who's lived a non-electronic life.
7. Protagonist is a bad person. (We don't object to this in a story; we merely object to it being the main point of the plot.)
   1. Bad person is told they'll get the reward that they deserve, which ends up being something bad.
   2. Terrorists (especially Osama bin Laden) discover that horrible things happen to them in the afterlife (or otherwise get their comeuppance).
   3. Protagonist is portrayed as really awful, but that portrayal is merely a setup for the ending, in which they see the error of their ways and are redeemed.
8. A place is described, with no plot or characters.
9. A surprise twist ending occurs. (Note that we do like endings that were unexpected as long as they derive naturally from character action.)
   1. The characters are described as if they are humans, but in the end it turns out they're not humans.
   2. Creatures are described as "vermin" or "pests" or "monsters," but in the end it turns out they're humans.
   3. The author conceals some essential piece of information from the reader that would be obvious if the reader were present at the scene. (This can be done well, but rarely is.)
   4. Person is floating in a formless void; in the end, they're born.
   5. Person uses time travel to achieve some particular result, but in the end something unexpected happens that thwarts their plan.
   6. The main point of the story is for the author to metaphorically tell the reader, "Ha, ha, I tricked you! You thought one thing was going on, but it was really something else! You sure are dumb!"
10. Someone calls technical support; wacky hijinx ensue.
    1. Someone calls technical support for a magical item.
    2. Someone calls technical support for a piece of advanced technology.
    3. The title of the story is 1-800-SOMETHING-CUTE.
11. Scientist uses himself or herself as test subject.
12. Evil unethical doctor performs medical experiments on unsuspecting patient.
13. Office life turns out to be soul-deadening, literally or metaphorically.
14. In the future, criminals are punished much more harshly than they are today.
    1. In the future, the punishment always fits the crime.
    2. In the future, the American constitutional amendment prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment has been repealed, or is interpreted very narrowly, or is just ignored by the author.
15. White protagonist is given wise and mystical advice by Holy Simple Native Folk.
16. A party of D&D characters (usually including a fighter, a magic-user, and a thief, one of whom is an elf and one a dwarf) enters a dungeon (or the wilderness, or a town, or a tavern) and fights monsters (usually including orcs).
    1. A group of real-world humans who like roleplaying find themselves transported to D&D world.
17. An alien observes and comments on the peculiar habits of humans, for allegedly comic effect.
    1. The alien is fluent in English and completely familiar with various English idioms, but is completely unfamiliar with human biology and/or with such concepts as sex or violence.
    2. The alien takes everything literally.
18. Space travel is wonderful and will solve all our problems. (We may agree that space travel is pretty cool, but we'd rather that weren't the whole point of the story.)
19. Man has an awful, shrewish wife; in the end he gets revenge on her, by (for example) killing her or leaving her.

That's a lot of stock writing. Though a few of these seem too generic to condemn straight off as stock, I can imagine myself tearing my hair out over the nteenth story about D&D characters named something like Bolar Ironbowels or something tearing bodyparts and loot out of an orc. However, I would be glad to see someone like Farthana the Pregnant Cow (apologies to Gaurav and Annie) wandering around...

Peanuts and Lovecraft?

Where on earth did someone think this up? Pretty fun combination, if you like your Peanuts laced with H P Lovecraft.

Mapping the Collective Literary Consciousness

The internet as a collective consciousness. An idea flung about so often its almost become dogma. But has anyone seen a way towards mapping this collective consciouness, of visually tracking the depth of this strange interconnected consciousness. Perhaps such an exercise is impossible, because a collective consciousness, just like any other consciousness, is infinetly multifaceted. However, it may be possible to map out one facet of this consciousness as a sample study, as a showpiece for interconnectedness...

Well, thats my take on gnod, anyway. Gnod is two things at once, an intuitive searchable database and a map. The searchable elements are a little limited: books, movies, music. Its supposed to work like a search engine for things you dont know about. Let me stick with explaining Gnod Books ( Gnooks!) for a start:

 

1. The intuitive database

Access the intuitive gnooks database and type in three of your favourite authors

Gnooks processes your query and throws back the names of some other authors that you may like, dislike or not know at all. Click accordingly.

The end process is a list of authors that are pretty much connected, on some level or the other, to the ones you just keyed in. In itself, no big deal, the database throws back authors who were liked by other people who keyed in authors similar to yours. Its a learning database, but then again, what isnt nowadays?

Now for the cool part.

 

2. The map

Access the literature map and key in the name of a random author (try to get it right, please). In about five seconds, the browser takes you to a page that explodes with words, names of authors, that scatter to the corners, or bunch around the center of the page, with your author's name at the epicenter. Slowly they settle into tentative positions, shifting ever so slightly now and then. This is the result of all your database entry creation: A collective map of all the authors who were liked by other users, placed in relation to the author you keyed in. Kurt Vonnegut, George Orwell, Ray Bradbury, and other satirical science fiction authors huddle together for warmth and comfort, surrounded by at least fifty other names, all placed in relation to Kurt Vonnegut (my search).

 

It need'nt be more than an exercise in coolness, or a place to find more authors like the ones youve loved, or to map the very idea of a genre as a spot within the landscape of literature... Its potential appears mind boggling, however, as it graphically displays the landscape of literary preferences. Check it out, see what you think. If your a bookie fan, this is some sort of psychedelic dream come true.

 

Or a totally new way of seeing and mapping the topography of literary preferences.

The sandman's journey to hell....the legions await. pay heed to the call. 

Preludes and Nocturnes

People. I've waited weeks for this. On my incredibly slow internet connection I have downloaded all 75 graphic novels of neil gaiman's "sandman". I've waited so long for this. Today, it completed download. I've spent all day at work thinking about this.

And its amazing.

I've got a quart of bacardi here to help me through it. And i'm freakingout. The personification of dreams. The embodiment of death. The melding of mythos, pathos and sad, coffee stain reality.

Im going to hav very strange dreams tonight. But i dont mind.

For those of you who want in, download a torrent streamer off the net (im using sharezea) and go to zcult fm. I dont know if the stream still flows, but if it does, flow along. oh, and dont forget to share your bandwidth. We in the world of pirate media must help each other...

sweet dreams....

Viva cheap books and darya ganj

"The Sexual Politics of Meat"
"The Use of Light and Shade in Close Combat"
"The Tongue- a Creative Tool" (Philosophy, i swear it.)
I pray that every major city in every country has its own version of darya ganj. As far as ive seen, every major city in India ive been to does. Delhi’s darya ganj needs little description for the dedicated book lover. Something of a 3 kilometer stretch of books stocked with books of all types, falling over each other… its too brilliant for words. As brilliant an area is koti and abids in hyderabad on Sundays. A whole lot more chaotic but all the more fun because of the infinitude of exploring you have to do. Madras’s Moore market is supposed to be pretty good too, but all I’ve seen of it is a desultory four or five shops selling old text books and pirated bestsellers. Bombay’s stretch of booksellers between churchgate and fountain is really good in terms of quality books but very OUCH pricey.. well, for a second hand book junkie at least. And its not as if the only fun part is the actual acquisition of the books.. that's pretty cool, no doubt, but the really amazing bit is in the major fast paced bargaining, the back and forth duel for the best price, the (usually) jocular exchanges of famous bargaining one liners ( try mentioning the quality of the book, the fact that its so old, look, see, someone’’s scribbled all over this page). Try doing this with the equivalent knowledge of hindi as an American who’s just done with an ISKCON conference and the fur’ll really fly. The best part is the fact that these areas are usually (with exception of Mumbai) located in the “proper” areas of their respective cities, the “old towns” so to speak. Happily divorced from any semblance of a Barristas or a Pizza Hut, you can munch on bread pakoras and kachoris all over darya ganj, or have lots and lots of chai and chaat in Koti and Abids (try looking for a place called, I think, Gokul’s Chaat Bhandar, if you can find it, you’ll know it by the AMAzing bhelpuri), and in Mumbai, ok, you can have lots of peanuts in Mumbai. Unfortunately, it’s also my belief that these places are starting to… somehow, sag. 3 years ago in darya ganj, the sellers were exploding with offers, deals, buy 1 kg of books for 10 bucks, buy 2 books for 15 etc. now it seems they’ve become a whole lot more, I don’t know, professional? Here, this book costs 50, take it or leave it. No saar, fixed rate. This time’s trip was a whole lot less productive thatn the last, but I still got hold of: the wilder shores of marx, 1 michael moorcock satire collection, l ron hubbard, aldous huxley’s a brave new world revisited and a full William blake reader for only total Rs 200. ok. Im cheap. I love books. What better combination could exist for me?

Viva La Free Book Revolutione

Long live the Free Access To Literature Through The Internet Movement! (I'm sure they have a shorter name for it, but what the hell...).
Viva la Revolutione!!

I'm really happy to see so many efforts at preserving works of literature and great books on the internet.I'm even really happier to see that they're doing it for FREE. I love the feeling of mentally flashing the "V" at the the checkout attendant at the local air conditioned-get-out-if-you-don't-have-more-than-300 bucks- flashy bookstore everytime I hit the download button for another Balzac classic.

It's really sad though, you don't get too much post war literature, or even very much immediately pre-war stuff, like George Orwell or Joseph Heller... DIE DIE Copyright Enforcement Pigs!

Anyways, check out these three fascinating places.
1. The Nalanda project (a bit of a pissoff, cause you have to be a member to access some of the cooler categories )
2. The Digital Library of India ( Kinda hard to browse)
3. The Gutenberg Project (So far THE most comprehensive site of this kind I've visited. But again, not so easy to browse.)

AAALeluiah, AALeluiah, Aleluiah, Aleluiah, AAAAALEEELULIAH...