Literature. 12 notes.

This is pretty cool:

What an inspiring man and what an inspiring story:

“I was facing this issue for a long time. The elephants were getting more aggressive. I lived in fear of them attacking the library. Finally, I decided that if I shifted it, I would also move my house. Protecting the knowledge the library gave was important.” He did not want the learning it stood for to be disrupted.

So he shifted the library a few kilometres, though still within the forested region of Edamalakudi. “The very week I left,” he says, tuskers “demolished the whole old structure in minutes.” But, he adds proudly, “I’d moved all the books out of there.” Being a forest dweller, he understood that something was going on with the great beasts. And bears no bitterness towards them. Moving, though, was a wise decision as they ravaged the entire structure. And Chinnathambi had no wish to literally discover the elephant in the room.

Zena Hitz on great books.

From Olga Tokarczuk’s Nobel biography: I was an untroublesome child who looked after herself. For a short time I went to the village kindergarten, but I didn’t feel too good there. My strongest memory of the place is of being made to have a lie-down in the middle of the day and of sitting in a tree when I didn’t want…

A good post on what does it mean to translate a literary work.

Rachel Christine on whether books can teach you anything:

This is perhaps tangential, but I think the “books can’t teach you anything” argument comes from the accurate observation that most modern novels honestly can’t teach you anything. Classic literature was consumed with the struggle between good and evil; it obsessed over the question of humanity and its greater purpose; it scrutinized what it means to find true happiness. It was philosophy wrapped in the glory of a very human story. George Eliot knew that. Many modern writers do not. I know some who do, but they’re bound by the market and feel forced to write what sells. It’s time to repopularize excellent literature.

Sonora Jha on writing:

I have come to see that writing has become a way for me to be in the deepest conversation with myself while also sensing the hovering presence of another. I don’t know who that other is – perhaps a gentle future reader. This personal conversation feels forbidden, in a way, given my work in journalism. But I find treasures in my thoughts and feelings, and I rush to put them on the page. Then a story takes shape and tells me something about life, about ideas, about the world. Yes, it’s cathartic and yes, it’s also an outward conversation.

Sad but true. It was P.B. Shelley who once framed this faith with prophetic clarity: “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” Literature, to him, was a subversive parliament of feeling — moving hearts, unsettling moral certainties, giving form to what was yet to be imagined. Today, that vision lies…

From: It would be wrong to apply Western theories of folk literature to India’s oral traditions, Kumar cautions readers. Local beliefs and worldviews seep into the songs and tales that evolve in any particular community. Moreover, in the telling of the tales and in the mode of singing as well, the local forms and…

Built a small site to collect links to Indian literary and historical works in the public domain. While looking for books, I realized the sheer extent of our cultural apathy. Also, there are some amazing books just waiting to be read.

Visit https://dhwani.ink

Banger. The ‘Instagram Generation’ now experiences the present as an anticipated memory. - Daniel Kahneman This wonderful article touches on several themes close to my heart — living an intellectual life, what it means to pursue knowledge, the value of solitude and silence, the culture of optimization, and more. I kept…

Reflections on Harold Bloom’s interview with Charlie Rose on why should one read.