The complete text of the Kishuri Mohan Ganguli version (5502 pages) of the Mahabharata available online here.
To buy or not to buy, that is the question.
Update: Bought. To read, and when to read, that is the question.
Updates.
After a lot of soul-searching, I bought the three Bone trade paperbacks that had been available for quite sometime in MR book stall. And also a book called Movie-made America ( subtitled “A Cultural History of American Movies”) which the guy suggested I try out and that I can pay him later, if I liked it.
While browsing through the newspaper at night, I came across this stunning bit of information – The Beatles Anthology, currently priced at 2045 Rupees, is selling for 1015 at a book exhibition in YMCA Secunderabad. Half the price. Which set my heart aflutter, because that meant more money being spent this month, and that wasn’t really what I wanted, inspite of my lust for the tome.
So this fine morning, Chandru and I went to YMCA. And the guy there tells me that all copies of The Beatles Anthology have been sold out, and no new copies were forthcoming. I didn’t know whether to sob or be relieved, so I just came back and tried to work for sometime.
The guard just came in and gave me a package, which, as I had guessed correctly, were the game-cds from Sam. Which kind of Makes Up for it All.
Besides, Bone was just too good. Jeff Smith, you rule!
La-di-la
I wish it would rain, so I could go out and sing “Singin’ In the Rain”. D-uh, I am happy! My deadline just got postponed by a week, so I can calmly write all the stuff and go ahead with actually testing it all before committing any of it. Trust me, that’s so comforting, I can think of other things right now.
Like going to the Book Fair tonight. Or of kicking some alien poo-poo in Halo. Getting a cable connection at home. Thinking of things to buy with my up-and-coming credit card. And not thinking about the seven things I gotta do. Heh.
I got into this semi-argument with Navs today morning, on YM. He has been reading Stardust, not the film rag, but the Gaiman novel, and in the first chapter or thereabouts, there is this love-making episode. Pretty innocuous one, too. But Navs felt that it was Out Of Place. “An adult comic book with a love-making scene? What is this – Harold Robbins or something?” , and “It’s ok if the story merits it, but a scene out of the blue! I wasn’t expecting it.” and “If I wanted a sex scene, I would rather read Playboy or Nancy Friday.” and “Ian Fleming never wrote more than a line whem it came to Bond’s sexcapades.” and words to that effect.
Hmm. Now I had a slight problem with that. Frankly, I just couldn’t see why he had a problem with it. I mean, look at this, this is the scene in its entirety.
She said nothing. Dunstan pulled her toward him, wiping ineffectually at her face with his big hand; and then he leaned into her sobbing face and, tentatively, uncertain of whether or not he was doing the correct thing given the circumstances, he kissed her, full upon her burning lips.
There was a moment of hesitation, and then her mouth opened against his, and her tongue slid into his mouth, and he was, under the strange stars, utterly, irrevocably, lost.
He had kissed before, with the girls of the village, but he had gone no further.
His hand felt her small breasts through the silk of her dress, touched the hard nubs of her nipples. She clung to him, hard, as if she were drowning, fumbling with his shirt, with his britches.
She was so small; he was scared he would hurt her and break her. He did not. She wriggled and writhed beneath him, gasping and kicking, and guiding him with her hand.
She placed a hundred burning kisses on his face and chest, and then she was above him, straddling him, gasping and laughing, sweating and slippery as a minnow, and he was arch-ing and pushing and exulting, his head full of her and only her, and had he known her name he would have called it out aloud.
At the end, he would have pulled out, but she held him inside her, wrapped her legs around him, pushed against him so hard that he felt that the two of them occupied the same place in the universe. As if, for one powerful, engulfing mo-ment, they were the same person, giving and receiving, as the stars faded into the predawn sky.
They lay together, side by side.
The faerie woman adjusted her silk robe and was once more decorously covered. Dunstan pulled his britches back up, with regret. He squeezed her small hand in his.
The sweat dried on his skin, and he felt chilled and lonely.
(c) Neil Gaiman . Reprinted without permission, but I am sure he wouldn’t disapprove.
I found this very descriptive, yes, and also very “literary”. Nothing titillating or vulgar about the whole thing. And yes, isn’t it infinitely better than saying – “Dunstan kissed her full on her burning lips. They made tender love in the moonlight. And as the stars faded in the predawn sky, they lay side by side.” ???
Again, I don’t see why it’s wrong to have a love scene in a fairytale, adult or otherwise. (try reading Anne Rice’s Sleeping Beauty series, with its graphic s&m scenes and you will know what I mean) Besides, it’s hardly plausible to see characters in any book behave like Disneyfied nincompoops – or to read an author who is descriptive when it comes to explaining the internal working of a Walther PPK, but coughs away certain aspects of a character’s daily(????) life because he wants to preserve the sanctity of Holy Humanity as laid down by Her Late Royal Highness Empress Victoria.
Hmm, or was it Navs pulling my leg?
Things to do.
I am lazy.
Just for the record, let me repeat that. I am lazy.
There is a lot of difference between being lazy and letting things be and being lazy and acknowledging it and then letting things be. It makes one feel more self-righteous. Stop feeling self-rigteous, beatzo.
Things I really really need to do:
1) Get my synth fixed.
2) Fix a computer. ( not mine, mine works perfectly)
3) Apply for a PAN card.
4) Apply for my College Pass Certificate.
5) Apply for a No-Objection letter from my office in order to apply for a passport.
6) After (4) and (5) are over, apply for a passport.
7) Order for a new gas-connection at home. Buy a burner.
The list goes on. Of course there’s work to be done in the office. Loads of code to be written and QAed. There are a ton of things to do, and I remain blissfully stuck in this stasis-field that’s my current life.
My synth cannot be fixed because there was a blowup, it seems some IC got crisped and now it’s tough to find a substitute. At least, that’s what the electrician with whom I had left it for three months had to say. The only shop I know that sells musical instruments says that their resident synth-meister is off recording in some city and won’t be available for the next week. The “next week” has been continuing since January and I am too tired to go argue.
The computer: It’s an antiquated Cyrix machine. It’s got 1 MB VGA memory, and when I try to play movies on it, the actors seem to move in a stroboscopic dance that assaults the senses. I tried to change the card to a 4 MB one, heck, I changed the motherboard. and now the darn thing has a loose slot. You literally need to open it up four times and shake the darn thing to get it started. Plus, the OS needs to be reinstalled.
PAN card – when I needed to get it done, there were no passport-size photographs of mine to be found. Loads of work, so no getting a couple of new copies made either.
Pass Certificate – I will have to go to Warangal. I can do so only over the weekend, when all the College offices are closed. No chance of getting a leave and going there on a normal weekday, No chance.
No-Objection Letter – Of course, no one in the office has an objection. Not even the HR, and I am pretty sure I will get one done in a jiff. But I need the Pass Certificate first.
Passport – The Problemo: My father’s got “connections”. He says he can get it done at Guwahati, so long as I send him the NOL and the CPC. I have neither, and I am worried about the ethics of getting it done that way. Deadlock!
Gas connection: My ex-roomie scalped the lot of us. He took the gas cylinder and the burner and none of us complained. Actually I didn’t complain because I was away in Guwahati. But still. Now I can’t make popcorn at home, and none of us have had a home-made breakfast in a month.
I will go get the gas-connection done today at lunch.
Hey, this lj-thingie can be pretty thereupatic.