"Then a little before noon, she walked out, taking her hat and her walking stick and her overcoat, in the pocket of which she placed a large stone, and drowned herself in the River Ouse, near their home in Sussex."
it was seventy years ago that she killed herself, unable to continue her struggle with a restricted life. she has left a legacy of unparalleled works, that i feel should be read to understand life that little bit more passionately than we normally do. in her memory today, i'll start reading Mrs. Dalloway. have tried reading it before, but every time i come to the second page, describing the day of June Classisa finds herself in, i put the book down with a sigh.
"life; London; this moment of June."
which work of hers would you recommend most to a friend :)
in the outer reaches of the universe, it is just another morning in an advanced world. an advertising agency writer is having his morning stimulant beverage and thinking about a news clip he saw last night at office.
not that he goes anywhere physically for work, his pad turns into a workplace, home, hangout zone at the flick of a button. in his world, traveling is limited only to the discovery of exoplanets in the far reaches of the known universe. and this is exactly what the video was about.
just when they thought that the whole world was known and conquered, in a distant and minor spiral galaxy millions of light years away, a tiny blue planet has been recently discovered. and it is teeming with primitive bipedal life forms!
"the last free people in the universe" their discoverer said about them. he wonders for how long they'll remain free. soon his civilization's vast machinery will move-in to claim its right on their lands, their resources and even their lives. many reasons will be given for this, that 'they' are primitive and must be civilized, that they will go extinct if we don't go and help them out, that their mineral wealth (if any) is needed for the continuation for his own civilization.... but underlying all of them will be the notion that his is a superior race and being superior, it can do anything with an inferior race.
he ponders what being civilized and advanced really means? meanwhile, as he's getting late for that urgent campaign he was supposed to deliver last night, he flicks the button and enters his office. as he starts typing, a thought sneaks into his mind, what if his own world was some other world's primitive world?
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ a fictionalized account inspired by this video featured on BBC's YouTube channel. the questions it generated in my mind are not fictional though.
"SC pulls up Centre for slacking on money launderers", says a headline. A guy who is alleged to have stashed around USD 8 billion in foreign banks, was served a notice for a tax demand for about Rs 50,000 crore!!! Our government is not bothered about where and how he got this huge amount of money, whether he has anti-national connections, nothing, as if he is just a tax offender! No wonder the honorable court had to show its exasperation!!!
Another order by the Supreme Court today, quashed the appointment of P J Thomas as CVC, slamming the Prime Minister-headed High-Powered Committee for the appointment of a person facing a criminal case. Just think about the sheer brazenness of our government. Here is a post which is supposed to upheld the highest standards of probity in the country, and the person you are appointing for it is already facing a corruption case against him! Still he was chosen by the three member HPC in which the leader of the opposition was vehemently against this appointment! And now our PM will say that we looked only at his bio-data!!! C'mon guys, even in a normal corporate job, a thorough background check is done to see whether the person you are hiring is good for the post or not. Even for a housemaid the police advices us to check her background and credentials! Who are these guys trying to fool?
And these two are amongst the few issues in the news. I shudder to think of the many more future headlines still under wraps, waiting for a whistle-blower or diligent media person to uncover, like in the case of 2G scam.
How in the world can our so-called 'honest' PM be ignorant of these things happening right under his nose? Ignorant will be the wrong word, actually he and his party are just dismissive of these things now.
I wonder what the Indian voter is thinking or doing. I'm asking the same question as the honorable judges asked, "What the hell is going on in this country?" Are you too?
