Prelude: Of the 600+ books I have, in the library I plan to read atleast 1 book each weekend / week and write my opinion of what I read. I want to keep doing this till I have exhausted all the books in my library. In the weekend of 27th & 28th July - 2013, I read the novel 'Chaos Theory' by Anuvab Pal. Here is my opinion of this book:
- Book: CHAOS THEORY
- Author: Anuvab Pal
- Publisher: PICADOR INDIA
- Edition: 2012
- Price: Rs.499/-
- Genre: Fiction
- GD_Read: 27th & 28th July-2013
Chaos Theory, I first
heard of something like this, few weeks back when Swami Sukhabodhananda the
spiritual guru made a mention of such a book, in his discourse on TV. I was
awestruck with the narration he had made and was looking around bookstores to
find such a book. I came across a book that sounded like what the spiritual
guru had mentioned on Television few weeks back. I saw the book ‘Chaos Theory’
at Sapna Book House and believed I could get to the core plot of what made it
to be interesting.
I bought the
book and after couple of weeks I decided I should give it a read. It was having
an attractive cover, while the official review of the book also sounded
interesting, but hardly made any mention of the story I was anticipating the
book would have in store as noted by the spiritual guru on TV. To my surprise,
the story I heard was not to be found in this book. I guess my quest of that
book would continue.
However, since I
bought the book, I made an earnest attempt to read through it. In fact it
turned out to be an interesting read. At many instances, I found the male protagonist
of the book Mr Mukesh Singh. A lazy sort of English professor who reaches to
the level of being an associate professor at the Harvard and always has the
tendency to hang around the female protagonist Sunita Sen who is also a
professor of English, the irony is both of them are attracted to each other but
never get to express it mutually. This behaviour of them is associated to the
physics terminology of ‘Chaos Theory’ which actually talks about how 2
particles, though strongly attracted to one other, can revolve around each
other forever, in a pattern that can never be determined, in random chaos,
coming closer or going further apart, into infinity, without ever actually
connecting.
They play a game
of guessing the Shakespearean plays by riddling each other with quotes. This
game they play on the Thursday and it goes on from the time they met in the 60’s
till the last moment of death meeting with the male protagonist. This makes it
even more interesting for those who have read Shakespeare and to certain
invokes a primitive interest for those who haven't, to read it.
The book read
quite well and I got to know quite a few English words which were rather tough
to pronounce. However there was a mix of humor and sametime worthwhile
messages hidden within. The New York Times has aptly tagged this book on its
cover as “Clever, funny, fresh and
intelligent”.
I would want to
quote just about 2 texts from the book, which would give a decent picture of
the 2 protagonists of this book:
Mr Mukesh Singh
says, after wishing good-bye to the only woman he knew up close:
“People say life should be a gradual ascent. Of accumulation. People,
money, land, experience, ambitions. I never believed that, I believed life
should be whatever made one comfortable, and then time would pass. Sunita made
me comfortable. I followed her around the world. Time passed. The rest was just
space to fill in.”
One must to read
and re-read this text and ponder over it, to get a hold of the male protagonist
and his perception of life and the way he lived it.
Mrs Sunita Sen
says after attending the funeral of the only man she wanted to be with, but
could never say it out:
“Then it struck me. Perhaps he’d played an elaborate heist I didn’t
understand. He was with me at the most important moments in my life.
Everywhere. Maybe that’s what mattered. Every other day was just ordinary, anyone
could have done that. He showed up when it counted. Maybe loving something was
not the hard negotiation of the everyday but being there, the times you are
missed the most. Departures, arrivals, deaths, emergencies, proud moments,
failures, new people entering one’s life, existing ones leaving.
99 per cent of success is showing up, some wit once said. Maybe it’s
true for love. In which case, we’d had a great love affair.”
It is
fascinating to know that this book was originally a Play and has been performed
more than 50 times in India as well as in other cities in Asia. The book has 17
chapters spread just over 200 pages and it was hard to make out who the
narrator was in each chapter till it struck a particular cord, however I could
to a certain extent visualize the entire narration and thus it makes me wonder
why is this book just been performed as a play? Why not a movie? It can be a
very good art – movie, something of the sorts the Mira Nair / Shyam Benegal
types….
Wonder what’s in
store for the next weekend read, till then just ponder over Chaos Theory!
