Tomichan Matheikal's blog

We live in an inverted world.   What Yeats said in his apocalyptic poem ‘ The Second Coming ’ is truer today than ever: “The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity.” That’s why I picked up D B C Pierre’s 2003 Booker winning novel Vernon God Little for a second reading.   It’s the story of fifteen year-old Vernon Gregory Little who has been accused of murdering his friend Jesus.   Eventually he becomes a serial killer who has murdered sixteen of his schoolmates as well as many others in the town. One of his teachers, his psychiatric counsellor, his girlfriend and the media, all play cynical roles in making him a serial killer though he is innocent. All of them have purely selfish motives in making Vernon the killer.   Taylor Figueroa, the girlfriend, sees her opportunity to become a media star by doing a sting operation on Vernon. She seduces him into admitting that he killed all those people for her sake, for her love.   The no

Fiction Weird spectres haunted Sreelakshmi’s dreams night after night.   They had the shapes of the rapists whose images she had seen in newspapers day after day. Sabka Saath, Sabka Balaatkar has become the motto of the country, it seems, Sreelakshmi muttered to herself as she walked into grandma’s room. “Grandma,” Sreelakshmi said more affectionately than ever. Grandma smiled.   She was familiar with the various shades of her granddaughter’s affection.   She put aside her rudraksha mala and said, “What brings my beloved here now?   Isn’t it time to get ready for school?” “Holiday today,” Sreelakshmi said without the cheer that is usually associated with holidays.   “ Hartal . Some political party is observing hartal today because some of their members were prevented by the police from beating up members of some other party.” Grandma smiled her toothless smile.   Her gums grinned and Sreelakshmi was not frightened because she was familiar with the gri

The following is a translation of the short story by bilingual writer Madhavikutty (Kamala Das).   This story was written half a century ago, much before the cow became a bone of contention in the country.   Was the author prophetic? One day a little boy picked up a banana peel from a garbage bin on the road. While he was eating it, a cow snatched it from his hands. The boy felt sad; he pushed the beast away. The cow ran along the street, mooing aloud. Some mendicants suddenly turned up from nowhere. “Did you hurt the holy cow?” they asked the boy. “I didn’t. I only chased it away because it snatched the banana peel I was eating.” “What is your religion?” asked the mendicants. “Religion? What’s that?” asked the boy. “Are you Hindu or Muslim? Or Christian? Do you go to the temple or to the mosque?” “I don’t go to any of them,” the boy replied. “So you don’t believe in prayer?” “I don’t go anywhere. I have no shirt. My trousers are torn at th