I had emailed this review in October 2009.

http://www.amazon.com/Arafat-Dream-Palestine-Insiders-Account/dp/0230608019/  

Other than “Oh Jerusalem!” (which is another great book and a must read!) I have never read much on the Israel/Palestine conflict. I was largely ignorant about what happened between “The seven day war” (which I think lasted for only six days) and today. This book helped me to fill in a lot of gaps.

The author of this book was once known as the “face of terror”. There was an attempt to assassinate him using a bomb hidden in a book. As a result of this bomb the author lost one of his eye (and the other was ripped out), a large part of the face was gone and he received other numerous injuries. It is a matter of surprise that the author lived and in fact after a few years was known as the man of peace.

I have no doubt that the author has received a lot of professional help. Though the author was the editor of a magazine published in middle-east, one can easily spot a certain style of writing that makes it easy for the US reader to digest this book. One need not go further than first chapter for the proof. The prologue of the book that described the plane crash of Yasar Arafat is a very typical US style that attempts to capture the reader’s attention with a thrilling episode in the beginning. Usually I do not find such openings in books written by non-US authors.

Other than the fact that author seems to have made convenient omissions, another thing that I found annoying is that after about 3/4 of the book, the narrative starts travelling at the speed of light. Especially there is not much of an information about what really happened after 1990 and I was surprised to find myself quickly in 2004 with Yasar Arafat in his dying days.

Despite the above short-comings and keeping in mind that this is history written with a perspective, I still liked this book. It is well-written and very enjoyable and not a dry account of some wars.

I always thought that the Yasar Arafat was thrust into lime-light as a mistake and was not really relevant to any important events in the middle east. After reading this book I realized that he was a bigger man and was very relevant at least prior to 1990.

This is a sensitive topic and I have drafted and redrafted this email to stick to the book but I must mention one thing that I have realized after reading this book. The conflict in middle-east at least initially was more of an ethnic conflict rather than religious one and a lot of central characters prior to 1990 did not have strong religious outlook (though they had strong nationalistic beliefs).

(I had emailed this review in November 2009)

http://www.amazon.com/White-Tiger-Novel-Booker-Prize/dp/1416562605

This is a booker prize winning novel and obviously it has to be good.

White tiger is not really about tigers or wild-life in India, this is a story about class-conflict and one will have to read “white tiger” in this context.

The story line is exclusively developed by the central character’s lengthy letters written to Chairman Mao of China which is again (I think) a reference to the class conflict.

This is a highly symbolic story and I have no doubts that it has been discussed thoroughly in other online reviews.  I guess there is no need to interpret every obvious symbol and I will stick to some unusual aspects of the book.

The great (corrupt) socialist is obviously a famous Indian politician; Lalu Prasad Yadav

The central character, Balaram Halwai though depicted as lower caste, belongs to what may be called “middle caste’ or OBC in India. Majority population in India falls in this category.

A lot of Indians will also identify themselves with the emotional turmoil and eventual corruption of Ashok who has recently returned from USA and finds it very hard to adjust back to reality of life in India. (Incidentally a similar narrative can be found in the latest National Geographic Magazine about Syrian President Assad)

Another noteworthy undercurrent that I noticed in this book is the influence of USA on the caste system in India. A few friends of mine (who belong to the so called ‘lower caste’) have made this comment that they see significant change in attitude of Indians returning from USA. (Dr Ambedkar the person who brought caste revolution to India was primarily influenced by USA). Of course class conflict does not recognize caste and hence this book retains this phenomenon as a barely visible undercurrent but I thought that this is certainly noteworthy since this is the first book (that I have read) mentions such influence.

Ram Prasad explained. The spittoon was from the Stork, who lined to chew paan. If he spat the paan out of the window the paan might streak the sides of the car, so he spat near his feet, into the spittoon, which the driver washed and cleaned at the end of every ride.

“Disgusting,” Mr. Ashok said.

http://www.amazon.com/Fountainhead-Centennial-Hardcover-Ayn-Rand/dp/0452286751

I remember reading Ayn Rand when I was in high school. It was a translation (in Marathi my mother tongue)  that I read since I did not speak or write much English back then.

I do not remember whether it was Atlas Shrugged or Fountain head but I certainly remember what I came back with. When a friend of mine asked what the book was about, I remember providing the synopsis “It takes a lot of words to fool the world”. Clearly it was not my age to understand the underlying philosophy J

A few months back I noticed and bought Ayn Rand Box Set on Amazon and thought it would be fun to read the books again and hence started with Fountain Head.

Before picking up this author one needs to be comfortable with libertarian philosophy. This is not an post to debate on the merits of this philosophy, however the reason I am mentioning this is that it is a pre-requisite for enjoying this book.  

To give an example:  “I don’t work with collectives. I don’t consult. I don’t co-operate. I don’t collaborate ”  When the main character (Howard Roark) refuses a commission with these words, it does not make sense to ask yourself whether you will be happy being such a person, when you would want to work next to such a person. Never ask yourself whether such a person will be able to conduct any complicated organization tasks and whether earth would be a better place if everyone starts behaving like this.

This is why I am saying one must believe in the underlying philosophy in order to enjoy this book.

This book primarily revolves around Howard Roark whether he is on the scene or not.

The characters are mostly clear cut, black and white, they always do what is expected of them, there is no shade of grey involved. There are a few exceptions though but the exceptions are to the downside. It is difficult to accept that Hopton Stoddard who was an investing genius would follow Toohey so blindly and to subscribe to his barely concealed illogical reasoning so eagerly.

Another example would be all appearances to intellectualism by Dominique Francon are lost when she stays in a low income housing society and basically states that the people deserve the low standard of living because they are lazy enough. Of course this contradicts in a sense when Roark builds a housing project for low income group. Let us just say that it is difficult to remember what has been said previously if someone is writing a book that is six hundred pages long.

The problem with six hundred pages becomes apparent in other places as well. When Gail Waynand character enters the stage, there is a lot of talk how he owns multiple newspapers and magazines across the country. The all of sudden the references to multiple magazines are completely lost and the story is told as if he owns a single newspaper, Banner, only to see that references to his large empire come back in the end of the book. And incidentally I do not have a clue why Gail and Dominique did some of the things that they did, it completely defies logic but this may be the result of completely low EQ on my part rather than any problem with the author. Another such example would be there are references to how Waynand does not read his own newspaper as well as references to how he proactively manages the running of Banner.

One thing I was looking forward to in this book was intellectual encounters. However, the author has stayed clear of argument between equals, the plot is weave and dialogues constructed in such a way that libertarian character walk the high moral ground and everyone else is wimpy, old fashioned and against progress. I cannot help but think that interaction between Ellesworth Toohey and Dominique could have been made much more interesting and enlightening, had the author not been so intent on spreading the message.

This does not mean that the author lacks style. Writing such as below is scattered all over the book, I mean this is beautiful

Walking the soil of a desert island holds one anchored to the rest of the earth; but in their penthouse, with the telephone dis-connected, Waynand and Dominique had no feeling of the fifty-seven floors below them, of steel grafts braced against granite – and it seemed to them that their home was anchored in space, not an island, but a planet.

Thus we come to the end of the book when all of a sudden everything becomes highly symbolic. The destruction of the housing project and the resulting court case are highly symbolic. I can understand the symbolism behind the court case but I do not have a clue about what the destruction of the housing project stands for and how it can be justified under any interpretation.

In all I found this book very entertaining at emotional level and very disappointing at intellectual level.

Regards

Harry