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  • The power of absence to shape the world

    The power of absence to shape the world
    2025/02/20
    "You find fasting in every culture, across the millennia. We carry within us the ability to hold back. Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism and Judeaism vary in specifics about fasting but the idea is the same. You step back from something that you normally enjoy - it doesn't have to be a luxury - and then you hold off partaking of it. That holding back is, for me, at the heart of fasting. It is such a powerful realization that this power of absence is real, that we can shape our world by stepping back, by refraining from doing things. Then, in the 20th century and earlier too this manifested itself politically in the form of boycotts and hunger strikes. In many ways fasting is close to meditation. You pull yourself out of the daily stream of things, you step aside, you contemplate how you have been living, and then you go back into it" - John Oakes, author, 'The Fast; The History, Science , Philosophy, and Promise of Doing Without talks to Manjula Narayan about the spiritual aspects of fasting, its use as an effective form of protest by the disenfranchised, the great role it played in the independence struggles of Ireland and India, political prisoners fasting in imperial Russia, its darker side seen in anorexia nervosa, and how fasting can perhaps contribute to well-being and longevity in intensely consumerist societies.
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    46 分
  • Breaking up is hard to do

    Breaking up is hard to do
    2025/02/15
    "On the one hand we are proud of the fact that India has one of the lowest rates of divorce, globally. It's about 1.1 percent annually. However, UN reports indicate that the number of divorces has multiplied twofold since the advent of the millennium. Why is this happening? The answers are many and this was the premise for writing this book. This book has taught me that education, class, financial independence and status are not necessarily protection against domination and toxic equations. I have tried not to demonise either of the sexes because men and women are not each other's enemies. As the saying goes, a generation was spent empowering women to lead their lives with as much independence and dignity as they could muster. Sadly, we forgot to teach men how to live with these empowered women. It's not as if these men did not wish to do better or did not wish to do right by the women. They did not know how; they did not have the role models. I do have some sympathy for that. Indian women's expectations and aspirations have changed and it's genuinely puzzling to quite a few men. Some women do misuse the law but in percentage terms, they are very few. Atrocities against women, cases of violence and dowry continue to be far higher. We need to have more conversations on marriage. It's a very private business which affects society at large. Abroad, the top reasons for divorce are finances and infidelity. Here, the top reasons are finances and parental expectations and interference. This book is meant to be a relationship guide with the law as the cornerstone" - Kalyani Sardesai, author, 'When Love is Lost' talks to Manjula Narayan about divorce in contemporary India.
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    49 分
  • Breaking up is hard to do

    Breaking up is hard to do
    2025/02/13
    On the one hand we are proud of the fact that India has one of the lowest rates of divorce, globally. It's about 1.1 percent annually. However, UN reports indicate that the number of divorces has multiplied twofold since the advent of the millennium. Why is this happening? The answers are many and this was the premise for writing this book. This book has taught me that education, class, financial independence and status are not necessarily protection against domination and toxic equations. I have tried not to demonise either of the sexes because men and women are not each other's enemies. As the saying goes, a generation was spent empowering women to lead their lives with as much independence and dignity as they could muster. Sadly, we forgot to teach men how to live with these empowered women. It's not as if these men did not wish to do better or did not wish to do right by the women. They did not know how; they did not have the role models. I do have some sympathy for that. Indian women's expectations and aspirations have changed and it's genuinely puzzling to quite a few men. Some women do misuse the law but in percentage terms, they are very few. Atrocities against women, cases of violence and dowry continue to be far higher. We need to have more conversations on marriage. It's a very private business which affects society at large. Abroad, the top reasons for divorce are finances and infidelity. Here, the top reasons are finances and parental expectations and interference. This book is meant to be a relationship guide with the law as the cornerstone" - Kalyani Sardesai, author, 'When Love is Lost' talks to Manjula Narayan about divorce in contemporary India.
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    49 分
  • The power and the glory

    The power and the glory
    2025/02/07
    "Because of the wealth of inscriptions that they have left behind, it is really possible to understand the Cholas as political figures. Not only are they masters of media strategy, they are brilliantly charismatic. They are innovators capable of mobilising vaster armies than ever before . They are capable of thinking out of the box about bureaucracy, administration, diplomacy, and logistics in ways that had not been seen in medieval India. But the reason the Cholas were able to strike with such speed at such distance [as they did in their campaign to Bengal and in South East Asia] is because of the partnership they had with Tamil merchant corporations. The merchants of medieval Tamil Nadu were some of the most remarkable commercial minds of South Asia. There is mention of these merchants in Thailand around the 9th century. When the Chola state was emerging, these merchants were already trading at the other side of the Indian ocean." - Anirudh Kanisetti, author, 'Lords of Earth and Sea' talks to Manjula Narayan about the vast Chola empire based in coastal south India that was the dominant power in the subcontinent in the early medieval period, about it's great monarchs like Rajaraja Chola, the dowager queen Sembian Mahadevi and the part she played in fashioning the dynasty as the foremost devotees of Shiva, the most popular of Tamil gods, and the many little people who played a part in the Chola story.
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    55 分
  • Battling alternate reality

    Battling alternate reality
    2025/01/31
    "Savarkar was a great rationalist. The surprising thing is how such a rationalist went completely off the rails in regard to other matters. His writing is full of villains and among the villains are the Buddha, all Buddhists, whom he considered hereditary traitors, Ashoka, Akbar, Tipu Sultan, and then Gandhiji. On the question of Godse and Apte there was no doubt that they were his acolytes, they were his worshippers. Sardar Patel said the problem was that once you create an atmosphere then you don't have to tell anybody to go and assassinate; he reads your lips. You just have to see the publications Savarkar was patronizing... They were only penning hatred and it was all centered on one man -- Gandhiji. Savarkar felt that the Marathas were the real legatees of the Mughal empire and then the damn outsiders, the British, slyly took over. The same thing happens in his own life . He thinks he is the heir to Lokmanya Tilak and then this outsider Gujrati comes and takes the whole prize away. This great disappointment in his life gets centered on one man and becomes hatred. Today, Gandhiji is a great inconvenience because he embodies Hinduism, the collective memory of our people. If Savarkar's line is pursued, then India will become a dismembered nation like Pakistan; society will be riven by hate. This eternal search for purity always ends in that. The difference between Indic religions like Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism from Semitic religions is that ours is an inner-directed search. Everything - pilgrimages, idol worship, mantras etc. is to aid this inner search. When you marry it to the State, religion becomes an instrument of the State. You only have to look at the Jewish religion when Gaza is to be bombed - it just becomes an instrument. Secularism is a way of keeping the purity of religion. It's not anti-religion. Keep religion and the State separate. That is why my book ends with this appeal - Save Hinduism from Hindutva" - Arun Shourie, author, 'The New Icon; Savarkar and the Facts' talks to Manjula Narayan on the Books & Authors podcast.
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    53 分
  • Of flying yoginis, Trojan elephants, and kings who ghost their girlfriends

    Of flying yoginis, Trojan elephants, and kings who ghost their girlfriends
    2025/01/23
    "I do believe that literature is a very important source of knowledge complementary to history, epigraphy and archaeology. It is not easy to read drama at the best of times. It is even more difficult to read Sanskrit drama because it is quite out of the ordinary! But there is a lot of timelessness in these plays, however strange they may seem with their tigers, elephants and tantriks! The human elements are the ones we still completely recognize - love, jealousy and ambition. We haven't changed; we are laughing at the same things that people 2000 years ago were laughing at! One of the criteria for choosing the plays was that all the great playwrights had to be represented. And I didn't want to use plays based on the Ramayana and the Mahabharata because we already know those stories. This is a book about introducing different narratives to a lay public. Also, I wanted people to be aware that the millennium of classical Sanskrit drama does not come out of a Hindu universe alone. It comes out of a universe of political diversity, cultural diversity, religious diversity. But it's true that it is also a common universe however much people might have different ideologies and different religions; there are social mores that hold them all together" - Arshia Sattar, author, Vasanta; Stories from Sanskrit Plays talks to Manjula Narayan on the Books & Authors podcast about ancient plays like Shudraka's Mricchakatika ( The Little Clay Cart), Mahendravarman's The Holy Man and the Courtesan, and Harsha's Nagananda, among others, that continue to appeal to us
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    57 分
  • Tibetans: From Lhasa to Dharamsala and the wider world

    Tibetans: From Lhasa to Dharamsala and the wider world
    2025/01/16
    "Somehow, miraculously, Tibetans have managed to preserve their identity. They have actually transplanted the Tibet they left behind and have created a whole new little Tibet in India. This is a huge success story, which should be celebrated. Now we are in the third generation and Tibetan culture is very much alive" - Tsering Namgyal Khortsa, author, 'Little Lhasa; Reflections in Exiled Tibet' talks to Manjula Narayan about the vibrant arts and cultural scene of Dharamsala, which is the seat of the Tibetan government in exile, the pull of Tibetan Buddhism and the Dalai Lama to a range of seekers from across the world, and the exiled people's shift to becoming a diasporic community.
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    49 分
  • In the land of the lotus eaters

    In the land of the lotus eaters
    2025/01/10
    Bhang has been mentioned in the Vedas; the use of cannabis as a medicinal boon has been mentioned in a lot of Indian scriptures for thousands of years, and it has been used in Ayurveda. During the British era, the colonisers looked down upon cannabis usage among Indians. They were familiar with alcohol but not with ganja and they considered it beneath them. So, it is the recent history of cannabis in India that has made it taboo. But it is still the most used "illicit" narcotic in the country. In India, with even something that's illegal, if it's culturally appropriate, a lot of people will tun a blind eye. This is so especially in the north of the country. India is very complex and its perspectives towards this plant are also very complex and divisive. In places like Uttarakhand and Himachal, the attitude to cannabis is different; in the south, in Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Kerala, even openly talking about using it is a big no-no" Karan Madhok, author, 'Ananda; An Exploration of Cannabis in India' talks to Manjula Narayan about everything from Lord Shiva and the availability of bhang in Banaras, Manipur's Satjal and Kawariyas to the immense economic potential of the plant, its medicinal uses, the movement for its decriminalization, and the road ahead for this ancient Indian weed
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    53 分