Book Review Title: The Covenant of Water Author: Abraham Verghese Publisher: Grove Press UK, 2023 Pages: 724 “What defines a family isn’t blood but the secrets they share.” This massive book explores the intricacies of human relationships with a plot that spans almost a century. The story begins in 1900 with 12-year-old Mariamma being wedded to a 40-year-old widower in whose family runs a curse: death by drowning. The story ends in 1977 with another Mariamma, the granddaughter of Mariamma the First who becomes Big Ammachi [grandmother]. A lot of things happen in the 700+ pages of the novel which has everything that one may expect from a popular novel: suspense, mystery, love, passion, power, vulnerability, and also some social and religious issues. The only setback, if it can be called that at all, is that too many people die in this novel. But then, when death by drowning is a curse in the family, we have to be prepared for many a burial. The Kerala of the pre-Independ...
Yes.. this new year is to make mistakes and learn from it. :)
ReplyDeleteNice one :)
Only those who don't try anything new can save themselves from mistakes.
Delete"Falling into new traps and ditches.... Writing new stories, Discovering new voices"
ReplyDeleteso true Sir .. will stay away from new traps and ditches,but by the year end the traps will turn out as lost opportunities and the welcoming garden as ditches ! But then let's leave it for the next new year :)
Traps and ditches are inevitable to some extent. They can be seen as opportunities, however.
DeleteHappy new year.
How do you do that Sir? 'Language too renews itself like the proverbial phoenix' - and the ashes of meanings lost, re-interpreted, twisted create a fire in which it will burn and will be re-born.
ReplyDeleteI don't do it, Sunaina. It happens - that's the plain truth. Elsewhere you mentioned the dedication of my book to RSSB. I dedicated the book to them just because it is they who made me write those stories - most of them, at least. It is they who changed my way of looking at life. It is they who killed my old language and made me create the new language.
DeleteOur experiences can be tremendously transforming forces. RSSB transformed me so much that I had no choice but reinvent my language, the narrative of my life....
A beautiful poem :)
ReplyDeleteThank you.
DeleteFalling in ditches, learning from our mistakes and then committing new one... That's what proves that we are still alive. When we are dead, we don't commit anymore mistakes.
ReplyDeleteSo very apt, sir! Wish you a very prosperous New Year! :)
Exactly, Rakesh. When we are really alive, when we venture out in new ways, mistakes are bound to happen. Sometimes other people too will dig ditches for us, especially if we are on the path of success...
Deletehappy new year pictures 2016
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