Interview: The Asian Age 6 Sep 08

MARRIED BUT AVAILABLE is being launched on 20 Sep 2008 at 6pm at CROSSWORD at the CitySelect Mall in Saket, New Delhi. Pramita Bose of The Asian Age asked me about my favorite books. That’s a tough question. It is a bit like asking which one is your favorite movie or favorite city to live in. The answer to most of these questions changes or gets updated frequently. The latest book that one falls in love with often features in a list like this. Some books remain eternal favorites. They linger on. They haunt me. On a lonely evening those phrases and dilemmas set me thinking. Viktor Frankl’s book Man’s Search for Meaning is one such awesome book. Spike Milligan certainly remains a benchmark when it comes to writing humor. Here is Pramita’s take on the dicussion.

” I believe in the adage – don’t judge a book by its cover. When a book lies among a hundred others on the shelf, it is the cover that first catches the eye of a reader and then he or she goes onto read the blurb at the back and browses the pages for the contents. But again, all that glitters is not gold

Sometimes, you end up reading an entire volume, only to realise its superficiality. However, a book is essentially a man’s best friend at leisure and in his loneliness. And the one that has influenced me is the Holocaust survivor and psychoanalyst Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning.

It hinges on the premise – “he who has a ‘why’ to live for can survive any how.” It taught me a lesson of life to look at the short-term setbacks or choices in perspective. It enlightened me about the fact that even in most absurd, painful, heart-wrenching and dehumanised situations, the human existence has a potential meaning to hope against hope. I have read Frankl over the years and it taught me never to despair even when enmeshed in the bleakest of scenarios. That is probably, why I am a perpetual optimist.

This apart, British comedian and humour writer Spike Milligan has remained an eternal favourite. By the way, this Englishman was born in India. He wrote Small Dreams of a Scorpion – a very sensitive book of poems that subtly touches a chord in the heartstrings and impels the mind to think and analyse.

My list of favourites also includes his war trilogy Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall, followed by the second edition Rommel? Gunner Who? and the last but not least of the memoir, Monty: His Part in My Victory. Thereafter, he penned another title called Mussolini: His Part in My Downfall.

In Bengali literature, I love author Sunil Gangopadhyay’s style and his rich repertoire.

Being a quintessential Bengalee bhadralok at heart, I guess, all of us back in our prime have fantasised ourselves in the image of Nillohit, his pseudonym and romanticised his muse, Nira.

Author Abhijit Bhaduri shot to fame with his debut novel Mediocre But Arrogant that narrates a story of love and life in a business school. He has also illustrated several books and is an accomplished cartoonist. His next novel Married But Available is ready for release this September.

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