A humming word

Farewell Song is a translation of Shesher Kobita by Rabindranath Tagore, set in the backdrop of Calcutta and Shillong.  Amit Rai, a city-bred boy, belongs to an aristocratic family. A polished man, Amit is well versed in the poetry of Robi Thakur and N. Choudhury. Labanya, whose home is the deodar trees and her house library at Shillong, has dedicated herself to learning and is sunk deep in philosophy, literature and her father’s wise words. Amit courts women and like a petals of flowers, he makes a pot pourri of the women he likes. While, like Arjuna, the Pandav price, Labanya doesn’t waver from her thoughts painted with her morals. She rejects advances of any kind from her father’s students, too. However, when Amit’s haughtiness brushes against Labanya’s simplicity, he is soaked in the hills and trees of Shillong, and she is painfully drawn to him.  They weave their love story with their conversations, rather, beads of literature, and that gravitates them...

Writer's fest Definition: an exhibition of art and artists of the written word where pearls of wisdom are strewn into discussions and panels. Women's Writer's Fest - First edition- was a fest focussing on women literature and feminism. Not the feminazi kind but the kind which is elegant and strong. The free for all event was hosted Ficci Flo and Shepeople.Tv at The Park, Somajiguda from 11 am to 4:30 pm, today. Albeit it stretched to an hour and a half, people were not complaining. I attended the session from 2 pm onwards. The fest was an amalgam of strength, simplicity, style, and panache. The physical strength was the session by Mickey Mehta, who hosted the session "Reverse your Universe" spoke about the myths about healthy eating. Should we really eat six eggs a day? Is industrialized milk really healthy? He is a solo-prenuer and his marketing skills prove that. His focus on fruit and vegetables than powders and pills was refreshing. Volga's session...

Remember those afternoons in the pre-Internet days when your head would sink in the lap of your grandmother and while stroking your hair, she would narrate tales of here-and-there to you. The stories would often be mundane but her animated telling and retelling would spice it up. Afternoon Raag is a story that has been narrated in books before – about lonely students studying in a faraway land and pining for their country, but what makes you turn the pages are its brevity, and his poetic and lurid narration. The 175-pages book, published by Penguin Books, with an aesthetic cover lures you to pick it up. Amit Chaudhuri is a classical singer from the North Indian Classical gharana and it shines through the book as he narrates about his affair with the quiet, pigeon-holed streets in London and with two different women—Mandira and Shehnaz. A student from Calcutta in Oxford, the narrator misses the call of the crows in the busy streets of London, where shops are shut and ope...