Between the Assassinations: Aravind Adiga

In one of the early stories in Aravind Adiga's second book, a half-caste Hindu boy sets off a bomb at his Catholic boys' school. In the aftermath, he runs to the woods and sits under a statue of Jesus. "He sat at the foot of the dark Jesus, and the tension and thrill slowly left him. He always relaxed around images of Jesus. There was a time when he had thought about converting to Christianity; among Christians there were no castes. Every man was judged by what he had done with his own life. But after the way the Jesuit priests had treated him - caning him once on a Monday morning in the assembly grounds, in full view of the entire school - he had sworn never to become a Christian. There was no better institution to stop Hindus from converting to Christianity than the Catholic boys' school." In that little paragraph lie all the key themes of Between the Assassinations - caste, religion, violence, the loss of dignity.

With The White Tiger behind him, Adiga had set a high bar of expectations for his second book. Between the Assassinations puts up a game fight, but in the final analysis, doesn't come close to the brilliance of the Tiger. This collection of short stories starts with a boy who is proud to be a pathan, a low caste bookseller who is jailed for selling Satanic Verses, and the half-brahmin half-Hoyka boy bombing his classroom. Each story is set in a different part of the small South Indian town of Kittur, a town with a heady mix of castes and religions, India in miniature. The protagonist of each story is from a different community, speaks a different language, worships a different God.

There is one thing though that binds the fate of every character in the book - They are, inevitably, utterly, hopelessly, denied redemption. Always. Assassinations is not a book where you can look for silver linings. Which is one of the more dissatisfying things about it. Not that characters should always, or even often, meet happy endings. The dissatisfying thing is, in these tales of wretchedness, the dark endings are so inevitable (and fall into that pattern so quickly) that the narrative lacks any element of expectancy or tension. You know, as you read, that it is not going to end well. Doesn't matter what the 'it' is - it is not going to end well.

The darkness in Between the Assassinations is equal opportunity. Everyone - Hindu, Muslim, Christian, rich, poor, educated, illiterate - everyone, has overt darkness of character. The only people with squeaky clean characters - and this is the second reason I was annoyed by the book - are the white-skinned men and women of the western world that occassionally walk through these pages. In the midst of an otherwise dark book, this adulation of the purity of the white man strikes me as childish, sentimental, and most damningly, distracting from the character of the rest of the book.

Another nail in the coffin for me was the structure of the novel. Adiga clearly likes experimenting with narrative sructure and technique. In The White Tiger, there was the whole business of the letter to the Chinese Prime Minister. I must admit, that was one of the pieces of the book that resonated least with me. I couldn't quite see the Chinese PM thing fitting with the rest of the book. The problem is much worse with Between the Assassinations. Each story in the book is preceded by a page from a travel guide about Kittur, which tells you a little bit about the particular location this story is going to be set in, which is mildly interesting in bland sort of way. The overall structure is further, for some reason, set in terms of days spent in the city by a visitor - so there is a story for Day One, then Day Two ... and so on. I can honestly say that I didn't get it. I have no idea why the day structure makes any sense, or has any connection with the stories, or adds anything to our feel for Kittur.

And finally, there is the title of the book. Between the Assassinations is a reference to the 7 year period between the assassinations of Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi. If there is even a vague way in which these political bookends are relevant, it escaped me.

So there it is - another instance of an author coming up with a cracker of a first book, but not being able to quite keep his following on the second. Sometimes, the connection comes back in later works. I hope it does. Because this one, it just didn't click for me.

When reality is more advanced than science fiction

I am not much of a science fiction reader. There is much about it that I find too contrived. And at least one literary technique which annoys me no end. This is what I call the 'Universal Out'. When you are reading typical science fiction, there is never a situation where you feel like a character is in an inescapable bind. However tricky the situation, the author can always conjure up some magical mix of words, throw a technical sounding phrase at you, and change the rules of physics to get the character out of said bind. The author always reserves the right to use this Universal Out. That annoys me and feels like cheating.

So anyway, to get back to my original point, I don't usually read science fiction. Sometimes though, I go through a phase, and might read a couple. Currently, I am going through one such phase. As I wrote some time back, I have been listening to Douglas Adams' A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy for the last little while. Since I finished that book, I started listening to another masterpiece, Isaac Asimov's Foundation. As flippant and humorous as Hitchhiker was, Foundation is earnest and serious. I am only a third of the way through this classic of the genre. But it is already clear, Foundation deserves its place in the pantheon as one of the all time greats.

There is one interesting element that shows up in both these books, and is the subject of this post - the Encyclopedia Galactica. The Encyclopedia Galactica is a fictional encyclopedia that is supposed to contain all the knowledge of the universe. The idea (and this particular name) has been used in multiple books and by many authors, but was first introduced in Foundation by Asimov.

In Foundation, a whole tribe of people, the Encyclopedists, is set up by a great mathematician, to collate all the knowledge of the known universe. This collection of knowledge is to be called the Encyclopedia Galactica. To put this together, the mathematician, Hari Seldon, brings together 10,000 scientists and sends them to a remote planet to spend decades (maybe centuries) capturing and cataloguing the knowledge of the universe. Creating this mammoth work, the Enclyclopedia.

In Douglas Adams' version of the universe, The Encyclopedia Galactica has been supplanted by a more versatile book, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Adams mentions the EG in his tongue-in-cheek way early on in his book, on page 2 in fact. "In many of the more relaxed civilizations on the Outer Eastern Rim of the galaxy, The Hitchhiker's Guide has already supplanted the great Encyclopedia Galactica as the standard repository of all knowledge and wisdom, for though it has many omissions and contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate, it scores over the older, more pedestrian work in two important respects. First, it is slightly cheaper, and secondly, it has the words DON'T PANIC inscribed in large, friendly letters on its cover."

Cut to reality of today's world. When you hear 'one place for all the knowledge of the universe', what do you think of? Let me tell you what comes to my mind - the internet. And Wikipedia. This is the Encyclopedia Galactica of real life. Putting it together did not take centuries. It did not take 10,000 scientists on a remote planet. And it wasn't out of date by the time it was published. It is all the knowledge we have. It is live. It is current. And yes, it contains much that is apocryphal, or at least wildly inaccurate. But it scores over the older, more pedestrian versions in science fiction in one important respect - it is free.

Why don't men read fiction?

It is a commonly known fact that the reading habit in the US has not thrived in recent times. It is often bemoaned that reading anything beyond necessary schoolwork has declined noticably for many years. Particularly crushing has been the downward trend in literary reading, i.e. reading of novels, short stories, poems etc. This has decreased steadily from the early '80s till recent years. In the survey of literary reading habits among adults released earlier this year, the National Endowment for the Arts showed (for the first time) an increase in reading rates among adults, with 50.2% of the adult population reporting that they read something literary in the prior 12 months. This increase, while noteworthy, is still minor compared to the more steady decline we have seen over a longer period.

While this story is well known, what is somewhat less discussed is how big a gender gap exists in literary reading. In the most recent NEA survey, 58% of women reported having read something literary while the same number for men was 42%. Surveys on fiction book readers present an even starker picture. This NPR article speaks of surveys that indicate that only about 20% of the market for fiction books is comprised of men. (I must admit though, that after about a hour of googling, I gave up on finding the original source of that statistic.) This publishing blog (by a woman) asks bluntly - 'Men's Fiction - A Contradiction in Terms?'

It is not that men don't read at all. They do, though slightly less than women. They are just much more likely to read non-fiction. The whole fiction thing doesn't seem to work for us. As Ian McEwan memorably said, 'when women stop reading, the novel will be dead'.

Some academics have written full-fledged papers on this stuff. This paper by Steve Tepper for instance takes on a quantitative approach to study why women read more fiction than men, exploring factors like (pardon the bombast) 'the influence of childhood socialization and gender-role stereotypes, differences in cognition and prose literacy and differences in work status and available free time.'

A good (male) friend once visited me at home and was browsing through my bookshelves. When he came to the shelf with fiction books, he gave me an incomprehending stare, and said "why would you want to read fiction?". On seeing my extensive collection of Salman Rushdie, he said "The problem I have with magic realism is this - what is the point? So what?"

Now, this is an otherwise extremely well-read individual (and friend of Brick and Rope), so it was not a question I could readily dismiss as silly. I guess I read fiction because I love the English language. I couldn't tell you the 'so what' of the best stories. Maybe there is some deeper social commentary or acute psychological insight into humanity. Then again, maybe there isn't. To me, it doesn't matter. I read fiction because I like it. The story is an end in itself.

Clearly, the majority of us men is not where I am on this. And I have no original insights to offer on why they are not. Which is where I could use your help - what do you think? Why don't men read fiction?

The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism: John Bogle

The firmament of the financial services industry is brighttly lit with many brilliant stars. Most of these are stars because they made unimaginable amounts of money investing for themselves, or for their firms. There are very (very) few that are stars because they truly made the average investor richer. There are even fewer that can claim to have truly made a difference to the long term well being of the average investor. In my mind, John Bogle is one of these super stars.

Bogle's most direct contribution to the investing world of course is that he founded and was the CEO of Vanguard. In that capacity, he created the very first index mutual fund. If there was ever a competition for putting money in people's pockets, you could go ahead and retire the trophy after this one.

That said, the other equally valuable role Bogle has played in the world of investing is that of being the 'conscience of the industry'. With his unimpeachable personal code of conduct and integrity, an unrelenting moral compass, and the depth of knowledge to truly understand the inner workings of the industry, Bogle has long been the speaker of unpleasant truths about the financial industry. There are some that consider him too idealistic, pesky, grumpy and frankly a pain in the you-know-what. But in my mind, Bogle's moral stature is only further enhanced by such complaining.

The extravagantly named The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism was published on the heels of the dot com bust, and the corporate scandals of Enron, Worldcom, Anderson and the like. Much of the arguments put forth by Bogle in the book though, are equally pertinent today.

The central thesis of the book is this: Capitalism if a great system that has created inordinate wealth over the centuries. But in recent decades, the integrity of the capitalist system has been severely corrupted and compromised. With ever greater diffusion of corporate ownership, we have transitioned from "owners' capitalism" to "managers' capitalism". Managers, instead of being mere agents in their enterprise, are now running corporations primarily to optimize to their self-interest.

Bogle looks at three variants of the same problem - the corporate world, the financial world and the Mutual Fund world. He lays out his case for how in each of these, the managers have taken over control, and how decision making has moved fundamentally away from optimizing for the owners' long term interest.

In looking at the underlying reasons behind the changing face of capitalism, Bogle does not pull any punches. This isn't by any means a populist treatise that is out to tell you how the big gun in the corner office is to blame for all ills and the little guy down Main St is faultless. No sir! One of the major gripes Bogle has is against the owners of companies (the average shareholders) themselves, and their utter lack of concern about how their companies are run. Direct owners, claims Bogle, have moved far from the position of their predecessors, and are no longer long term owners but short term speculators. They couldn't care less if decisions being made by management are not in their long term interest. Then there is all the intermediation which diffuses ownership beyond recognition. 50 years ago, direct shareholders owned almost all of the shares in the US stock markets. Today financial institutions (MFs, Pension Funds, Hedge Funds etc) own close to two-thirds of the market cap. And even these institutions are being run more and more for short term speculative returns rather than true long term value creation. Finally, there are the other gatekeepers in the process of ownership (particularly company directors) who are supposed to represent the owners' interests. These directors, of late, have been smart enough to see which side of their bread is buttered. Net result - the company belongs to the owner only in name. It is actually run for the betterment of the management in charge. As Bogle states, 'When we have strong managers, weak directors, and passive owners, don't be surprised when the looting begins'.

Bogle meticulously (though somewhat repetitiously) lays out his case. He then lays out very specific solutions to solving the problems. The Battle for the Soul of Capitalism is a manifesto for enlightened ownership of companies. It is an expose of many of the ills of the current face of capitalism in America. It is a call to a moral higher ground by a man I consider to be an investment sage. Though slightly difficult and somewhat bombastic, I believe this book is a must read for investors and for anyone who hopes to be a truly value creating executive of a public company.

Aravind Adiga - Take 2

A quick note for those who liked The White Tiger: Aravind Adiga's second book 'Between the Assassinations' was released this Sunday. I have only read the first 25 pages so far, but thought I could share my first impressions.

The setting for Between the Assassinations is familiar - a dusty little south-western town called Kittur, with a ramshackle railway station; a little temple which is the 'first place everyone new goes to, because it is so close to the station'; no discernible sense of modernity; and an undercurrent of a disquietingly changing world.

What is different from The White Tiger is this: While Tiger was defiantly non-sentimental, I have already felt a sense of more traditional morality underlying Assassinations. Maybe that will change through the course of the rest of the book, but the story of illiterate chai-wallah - coolie Ziauddin (am I remembering the name right?) ends very differently than what I would have expected of Adiga. The language is also a little less tight than that of Balram Halwai, and that is something I certainly miss.

Fingers crossed for what I am going to find in the rest of the book. I hope it leans more towards Tiger than not though, to be honest.

Douglas Adams + Stephen Fry = Ecstasy

Since I last wrote about audiobooks (here and here), I have been continuing on that path, listening to more of these. At long last, I have hit upon a narrator-book combination that is absolutely explosive!

The book I am listening to is an old favorite - The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams. The book is narrated by the supremely multi-talented Stephen Fry. For those familiar with British comedy, Fry is half of the Laurie and Fry comedy duo, along with Hugh Laurie (or Dr. Gregory House). He is also star (with Laurie again) of the Jeeves and Wooster show where he plays Jeeves.

Now, I have long maintained that The Hitchhiker's Guide is one of the funniest books in the English speaking world. I can't go through a page without bursting out laughing. Having read it multiple times in the past, I also have favorite passages in the book, and sometimes just read those instead of the whole book again. So when I started listening to the book on audio, I was expecting the narrator to just do his job: narrate an all-time classic, don't try anything fancy, let me enjoy what I already love.

I changed my mind by the time Fry read the second sentence on the book. And by the time he got to the Vogon ship, I was in splits. Fry is uproariously funny, makes incredibly unselfconscious noises totally appropriate for The Hitchhiker's Guide, and by and large, made the book even better for me than I thought was possible. If you ever come across this version, take my word for it, pick it up! Listen to it, and if you aren't breaking up in minutes, get something checked.

Fry is also an audiobook narrator for the Harry Potter books. I can't wait to hear what he can do with that!