My latest book is The One Who Swam With The Fishes.

"A mesmerizing account of the well-known story of Matsyagandha ... and her transformation from fisherman’s daughter to Satyavati, Santanu’s royal consort and the Mother/Progenitor of the Kuru clan." - Hindustan Times

"Themes of fate, morality and power overlay a subtle and essential feminism to make this lyrical book a must-read. If this is Madhavan’s first book in the Girls from the Mahabharata series, there is much to look forward to in the months to come." - Open Magazine

"A gleeful dollop of Blytonian magic ... Reddy Madhavan is also able to tackle some fairly sensitive subjects such as identity, the love of and karmic ties with parents, adoption, the first sexual encounter, loneliness, and my favourite, feminist rage." - Scroll



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24 February 2005

It's late, I'm home from TC and I want to go to bed. Some really, really, REALLY random thoughts for your general edification

Happy Moment: Tra-la. Finally saw Black which was good, but not great. A little overdone, I thought, but nevertheless, for a Bollywood movie it was good. I have a feeling it's going to be India's entry for the Oscars next year. Though I'm not raving about it like so many people I know are, I'm glad to have seen it, because now I can have an opinion! :)
Things up on my pinboard right now:
1)
A lovely photograph of me, Nitya, Leela and Ginny. I love this picture because we look like we're posing for a cigarette ad. All of us are laughing very hard, the light is bouncing off our hair and we just generally look like we're having a good time.
2) A film postcard of The Passion Of The Christ. Originally, I got that postcard for K, but I liked the movie so I decided to keep it. That movie was so dark though and so gory--a little too much, I thought, especially the flagellations where you can see the teeth of the whip actually going into his flesh... shudder.
3) The PETA calendar. I've had one from somewhere or the other every year for the past three years and I love them. Each month has a picture of an animal they've rescued with a little bio about it. This month it's Buckey, a fat orange cat who was thrown out of a car in a garbage bag before he was rescued. This acquaintance of mine rescued a kitten from Chennai when she was there volunteering for the Tsunami relief. That kitten is adorable, she's called T.K (for Tsunami Kitten) and she has this way of climbing into your lap and rumbling purrs at you that makes you (or me in this case) feel all broody.
4) One of those Amul ads that comes in HT City. I love the way they reflect the current situation. Like yesterday's ad had a cartoon of Amir Khan just after he cut off his Mangal Pandey locks and it said "Baal, baal dekho"! The ad I have on my board has a cartoon of the Ambani's fighting and their mother is saying, "Share the bread equally". And beneath that it says: Amul Butter. Rely on it. (Rely like Reliance, y'know). I heart clever advertising.
5) A brochure from NSD, cut to resemble their mask--y'know the half-happy, half sad one that is the symbol for theatre? I pinned that up in a fit of sentimentality singing "There's no business like show business, like no business I knooooooooow."
6) A poem by Maya Angelou, which is so old now the notebook paper has yellowed and is crinkling at the edges. When I found it I thought it said so much about my life that I should write it down, and even now when I re-read it, I think it holds true. Here's the poem, by the way, you'll see what I mean.
Reverses
-- Maya Angelou
How often must we
butt to head,
mind to ass,
flank to nuts,
cock to elbow,
hip to toe,
soul to shoulder
confront ourselves
in our past.
7) Two more photographs-- one of me, Pieces and Iggy taken in our second or third year. We all bought identical jackets without knowing it--red zip-ups with hoods and we wound up wearing them on the same day. The picture has all of us, jackets zipped and hoodies up looking like identical elves, except our faces. Actually I think this was third year after all, because we're doing the smiling but not really smiling that we started doing for photographs after Puja---the fourth in our foursome--died.
The second photograph has me with Devyani and Nitya, my neighbours and East Delhi compatriots on either side. It's one of the few pictures I have of the three of us together, which is why I have it up in the first place, even though we've got big fake smiles on and are looking rather stiff.

Random observation of the day: Why is it that all editors or bigwigs of the media industry are always referred to by their first and last name? I mean, really, think about it: Shekhar Gupta, Arun Purie, MJ Akbar, Vir Sanghvi, Vinod Mehta.. etc. I can’t imagine calling any of them by just a first name, like "Wotcher, Vir, old chap?" Nope, it can’t be done, and I bet you couldn’t do it either unless you were being irreverant.

The Intrepid Reporter: I’ve been meeting this weird assortment of people lately. On Saturday, I met Mumait Khan, who is very young and very pierced. Today, I met Bapsi Sidhwa, who is not. Both were very nice women though, Mumait was all, "Oh stay and have a drink with me" and Bapsi was all, "Oh do have a cup of coffee." I declined the former though I accepted the latter with an alacrity that astounded me. I’m becoming quite the coffee slut, if Satan was to hover over me and give me a choice between saving my soul and drinking all the cups of coffee I wanted, I’d take the coffee. Hell, at least I’m not alcoholic.

People I met at TC tonight: This very nice 30-year-old woman I was sharing a table with. She works in Women’s Development and wants to move to CR Park and go dancing. I told her where to go dancing, though I was a little clueless about the whole moving-to-CR-Park thing. Our interactions with strangers really reflect our state of mind though, either that or this woman was very nice, because both the Iggy and I gave her our numbers and promised to take her out on our next "Girl’s Night" which should be pretty soon coz yay! Pieces arrives tomorrow. Lovely, lovely Pieces, with her lovely, lovely clarity of thought, will be able to put both Iggy and my lives in perspective, we’re hoping. Quite a tall order, but I think she’ll be able to handle it.

Puzzlements: What's with this sudden lack of commenting, people? Even other blogs that I visit have barely 3 or 4 comments. Worse, some blogs haven't been updated in ages. I propose a Bring Back the Blog movement, which will have as an important subsection: Bring Back The Comment. I'm going to click 'Next Blog' on every blog I see and leave a goddamn comment! And you know, you (yes I'm talking to you, you know who you are), it wouldn't hurt if you left a little hello here every now and then just so I know I'm not wittering away into empty cyberspace.

The song that's making me do little pelvic thrusts in front of my mirror every morning: I Love Rock And Roll by Joan Jett. It's a reallyyyyyyy good song, specially when there's this little guitar riff and you feel totally hot! I do these things, okay, don't judge me! I once did a whole striptease to Lady Marmalade, which made K give me these lecherous looks every time it came on. Everyone should do a striptease once in their lives.

How much wood can a woodchuck chuck, I ask you?

~Drunken eM is going to bed now~

16 comments:

  1. I will point out that to a regular comic book reader, TK is TeleKinesis which is a pretty standard superpower.

    Not much of a comment really, just getting the commenting urge.

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  2. Haha...a very amusing post eM. I loved Black by the way. And I do agree with, Bring Back the Blog movement.

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  3. Hello M.

    I love your writing style. Very fluid movement from sentence to sentence, and your choice of words is impeccable. Good going.

    As for Black, I do sometimes get the urge to go watch it but my wife maintains that SLB is not that great a director which totally makes sense if you watch Devdaas. He is very over the top, melodramatic and completely lacks any genes inducing subtlety. Outcome - Black is not on our must watch list. We did watch Roman Polanskii's "Chinatown" yesterday at NFAI (National Film Archival Instt.) which I found very engrossing. Lovely storytelling.

    As for being irreverent and calling people by their first names, I'll do it for you. If you look up irreverence in dictionary, my name will be out there somewhere.

    OK.

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  4. Ooh yay! Three whole comments!

    Gamesmaster: I don't think TK the kitten HAS any superpowers just yet, but I will let her owner know about the whole telekinesis thing... I can see it now, TK the Telekinetic Kitten! Very cool.

    Anonymous: thanks for coming by and commenting and agreeing with the Bring Back The Blog Movement. I think our slogan should be "We Blog Because We Dare"

    Anurag: Yeah, I agree that SLB DOES overdo things. Thankfully, though, Black is the only one of his movies I've seen, and my friends tell me it is the most subdued of all his films.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Hey,
    I hv read ur blog a few times earlier, and may be i might hv a put a comment too.

    What i like bout ur blog is that it is very much 'Bang-in-the-face' (in a good way). Its amusing!

    Black is a gud movie, and it may get an entry to Oscar, provided they consider it as a forign language movie, given the fact that 70% of the movie is in english.

    Amul, yeah i love those ads too, and also i find Fevicol ads so cool.

    Okey, now i know why i cant become a bigshot editor :))

    Hehe ... ur dancing in front of the mirror reminded me about a guy in my prev organization at Bombay, he was often caught dancing in front of washroom mirror in office. I am so relieved he never thought of doing a striptease in office washroom. :)

    Now that was a good enuf comment, was it? catch ya later again.. u r most welcome to visit my bolg n comment....

    Ah! Comments... we all need them, right!

    "We blog because we Dare" .. Yo!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. have been promoting this blog to a lot of people...actually "The Confessor" will be surprised who all might be reading the post and finding the style very good ! (besides the usual Blogging people )
    could be a lot of people who know the OJ s.( hah! that shall make u think !)
    but everyone loves it.

    ReplyDelete
  7. AmitKen: Thank you for your sweet and looooooooooong comment! The movement needs people like you for sure! So what did the guy caught dancing in the washroom say after he was caught? I didn't think guys did the whole dance thing.

    Anonymous: Okay, you're scaring me at the idea that people I know professionally may be reading this! And people who know the OJ, ohmygod, ohmygod! But thanks for the blog promotion! :) Won't you tell me who you are?

    ReplyDelete
  8. so what if people u know professionally read this...do u care a "..k"?
    and even if OJ and friends do...what really matters is that u write well!

    ReplyDelete
  9. BTW, my blog could use some return comments (hint). :))

    For some reason, my profile shows I have 0 entries in my blog. Why? In a spurt of creativity I actually polished off three entries in two days (actually one of them is a picture, and thanks for not bringing that up).

    Go check it.

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  10. hey...i should have probably left a comment here a long, long time ago. read your blog all the time.

    my favourite amul ads-

    1. the one after johnny walker died- johnny kahan gaye woh din.
    2. devegowda won elections- lambi race ka gowda.
    3. sonia won- you are my sonia.
    4. earlier when sonia lost- sonia yet so far.

    i hate harvest gold ads that sort of try to do the same thing in horrific pinglish verses. suhel seth makes my blood boil anyway.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Okay.. can I just say wow? Who knew that a post about no comments would elicit TEN.. count 'em Tee-ee-en comments!
    Anonymous: Though I really DON'T care who reads this, I would still like to know who you are! C'mon, I'm reaaaaaallllllyyyy curious
    Anurag: Of course.. return comments are on their way...:)
    Eesh: Thanks for stopping by, and I love 'Sonia yet so far"! I can't believe I missed that one. I've been on your blog too, lurking quietly!

    Bring on the Bloggers Movement!

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  12. a few of the Mallu writing fraternity were impressed by your Blog..though not all were aware of YJOJ !
    even i was'nt!(not that it really mattered!) but when i glanced through certain archives (sorry about the voyeristic desire!...but the writing was worth the time.)the person became clear.
    we met maybe once, (and puhleez.... not @ TC...hah!), at the khan market residence (won't be more specific) but for a very different REASON ..that's about it ..then I happened to come accross the Confessor.
    2+2 became 3.5.....later on a google search and a newspaper article made the result 4.
    And as for who I am...i leave it to your journalistic capabilities! .....and I have left some footprints but the question doesnt sound NICE!)or,..... do u really dare??? hah!THAT SOUNDS BETTER!
    this sounds like my own blog...not like a comment ANY MORE!
    BTW all my email addresses have my name..so leaving a mail address is not good.
    a HINT on who i am:

    i am the person who was digging his nose @ ITO red light sitting in a black car.But u did not know whether to say Yuck! or cross your fingers and make a wish.

    but for sure AM NOT A MALAYALEE.

    ReplyDelete
  13. What exactly does TC mean.....to a regular gamer, TC stands for town centre.....

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  14. Okay I'm losing track of which Anonymous is which.
    Anon 1: Still no clue who you are!
    Anon 2: TC is Turquiose Cottage, a nightclub I frequent.

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  15. anon1 to eM: what's with these p3p journalists? does no one snoop around to do research ?
    it was a DARE? i was leaving clues...find out ..Wer bin ich?
    but, NO you dont know me or seen me before.
    and now that the haltertops are being dusted from cupboards and made ready for use..one final question: why is the journalist still @ her desk and replying to comments left by unknown creatures @ 1500 hrs?

    ReplyDelete
  16. I did a random search for TK, landed up here and guess what - she's with me now! Is all grown up now (is still puny though) and has some ardent tabby suitors too who frequent the lawn.

    ReplyDelete

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