Beyond the first principles

IN THE MAKING (Three Essays, Rs 175) by Meeto is a study of “Identity formation in South Asia”. Kamaljit Bhasin-Malik, also known as Meeto, was a doctoral student at Balliol College, Oxford, before her untimely death last year. This volume puts together some of her essays on the origins of sectarian politics in south Asia. The excellence of Meeto’s work lies in the way she could lend distinction to well-worn theoretical approaches to south Asian history. For her, historiography was not just a useful tool for academic explorations. It became an enriching field providing clues into the origins of human identity — how rights, minorities, religious differences emerge out of shared pasts. The articles are concise — some even incomplete — and written crisply, informed as much by learning as by a humane intelligence. There are appendices at the end containing drafts of her research proposal and papers, and a warm tribute by her supervisor, Judith Brown.

 

SALAAM, PARIS (Penguin, Rs 225) by Kavita Daswani tells the story of Tanaya Shah’s exodus, from her traditional Muslim family to Paris in order to meet the man with whom her marriage has been arranged. Instead of fulfilling this mission, she surrenders to the charms of Paris, the beau monde with which she had been infatuated since she watched Audrey Hepburn in Sabrina. Her career, which begins as a stripper, eventually turns her into a supermodel. At this stage, she meets the man she was supposed to get married to, and her life changes yet again. The plot is neither original (remember Taslima Nasreen’s The French Lover?) nor exciting (notwithstanding poodles peeing on scantily-dressed models and bits of kink here and there). The prose is brisk, reminiscent of chick-lit, spiced up with quaint words (“slenderized figure”).

 

THE TRUTH ABOUT YOU (Pearson, Rs 225) by Mary M. Bauer is a typical self-help book making the mystifying claim to reveal “things you don’t know you know”. One of the many wellness manuals that America has given to the world, it asks you baffling questions (“What has the Infinite Creative Force done for you lately?”) and provides unconvincing answers (“You are not weak — you are powerful and strong. You do not have to put up with poverty, disease, abuse, crises, or mediocrity. Believe in you strength”). All this is said, of course, with a singular lack of irony.