Cakes and Ale

This is an old haphazardly written review, but I had to post here this one; because both the book and the Literary Society are dear to my heart.


Book: Cakes and Ale
Author: William Somerset Maugham.
First Published: 1930.


I must admit that any description of this novel I can think of will not do justice to it. Somerset Maugham's elegance in simplicity made the characters come alive in the busy city with it's mix and match of modern superficiality and a conservative heart. The characters criss-cross the life of the narrator William Ashenden, who starts idly looking back into the past when the second wife of a deceased well-known author's wife contacts him to write his biography. He looks back into the life of the author and thinks about the fascination and curiosity with which he, nay, everyone perceived his first wife, Rosie.


The story shifts seamlessly from the past and present here and then, tracing the layers of human characters effortlessly, so much so that one shall find a bit of oneself in someone or the other, even if uncomfortably so. Much like his other novels, he subtly points out the hypocritical mask that we all wear, rather vulnerably. The reality is only apparent in the last line that finishes off the novel with much grace. Of the little that I have read, this story has the best last line I have come across, one that not only gives one the inherent message in the novel, but also gives one some thoughts to reflect upon for the sake of growing up.

Posted by Sohini Chattopadhyay, Department of History, Presidency University

STEP 3- Towards Aanteldom- Either WILDE or DEXTER or NOTHING.

"It is awfully hard work doing nothing. However, I don't mind hard work where there is no definite object of any kind. -Algernon" — Oscar Wilde (The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays)
For any normal follower of this blog ( which we are sure there aren't too many :| ), it would be very normal to expect a post on Oscar Wilde, but at times one must keep in mind that we are not dealing with too many 'normal' people out here.

Oscar Wilde, had he been alive or if his soul is still 'looking down' upon us today, would want to embrace each one of us in EARNEST ecstasy, for in us he would find the reflection of countless Lord Henry-s and Algernon-s (and would throttle the one updating this blog for trying hard to be witty or humorous and failing extensively).


Perhaps we had chosen a date and time too obscure for people ( it was noon-time and it's real hard work for us lazy people to fight the impending sleep that slowly and steadily creeps into our eyes and tempts us towards a world of dreams - for Wilde himself says:
"The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it."
See Mr. Wilde, not only do we read you, we live you in our every breath.)

And therefore the discussions strayed from one topic to another- from how sunny the day was to what we watch on tv these days. And we discussed DEXTER, not the one with a lab. We discussed Dexter Morgan, we discussed the amazing story-board, we discussed the direction, the techniques used, and how cool it is of him to aesthetically murder his victims. And we discussed his hot girlfriends.

The session did not end up boring because a group of insane people always manage to fashion out one kind of insanity or the other. And in a way, we did extreme hard work. We did 'Nothing'.

So much for Oscar Wilde. Here's to living ahead of our times and to randomness, for "Consistency is the last refuge of the unimaginative." Cheers! :)

Step 2 -towards Aanteldom- HUMOUR

Disclaimer:  The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual members of the society and do not necessarily reflect the ideas of the one who is putting it up. The writer is a very harmless, innocent and vulnerable being, assigned the task of sharing with the public the discussions held during the sessions. Therefore any opinion for or against an individual or the aspects that establish the individual’s style of writing should not be read as offensive, but accepted, light-heartedly, as HUMOUR.

4^th February, 2011.

“Do you think that all aspects of humor are actually the same, or are there different sorts?” I was asked. “There are two types of humor”, I replied, “Aqueous humor and vitreous humor.” And I was the only one who laughed, while the others stared on, in silence. K

If you can not sympathize with my sentiments, you need not force yourself. If you want the day’s discussion, you know what to do.

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Just checking. K

What we understand by humour is that it is anything that makes us laugh.

Asking for terms related to humour? Fun, sarcasm, irony, weirdness, out-of-the-box ideas, sparkling vampires and Chetan Bhagat. K I hereby remind you about the Disclaimer again.

A friend began with how she finds humour in the profound satire concealed within the simple words and light spirit of ‘Alice in Wonderland’, and how she finds the people calling it a ‘kid’s book’ even more humorous.

While discussing a certain criticism which tagged P. G. Wodehouse to be pertinent to his times alone, we decided on his timelessness. The best thing that we like about Wodehouse is that the situations that he portrays and deals with is so much like one out of our normal lives. Reading into criticisms and the political scenario definitely highlights the satire contained in the works, but it is also plainly humorous even when we read them irrespective of the society and age. On this note, another friend of ours pointed out that the scene, from the Bengali movie ‘Hirok Rajar Deshe’ in which the statue of the tyrant king was being pulled down, had become politically controversial and the-then government had objected to the showcasing of the scene.

Another point that we all pondered on was the question that is it necessary to laugh AT somebody for making a situation humorous? A friend is of the opinion that whether we intend to do it or not, we usually end up laughing AT a person rather than laughing WITH him/ her. A second friend calls it the sadism inherent in human nature. And a third friend emphasized on the importance of subjecting oneself to being humoured and accepting it as a jest, and that is when the core of the individual is tested: laughing at others being a very easy job. Discussing if we knew any author who primarily humored situations than individuals, the name of Narayan Gangopadhyay’s Tenida and R. K. Narayan came up and lit up many faces.

The discussion traversed towards ‘dark humour’. The serious undertone of certain books was glanced at. We then decided that humour did not necessarily involve sarcasm, or satire or irony. While some of us favour the irony like that in the story of Oedipus or the satire as expressed by a Shakespearean fool or the Porter, many of us would rather like light-hearted fun.

A nobody popped a question on how many loved the series of Lucky Luke, particularly Calamity Jane, but realizing that people were more excited about Captain Haddock’s “blistering barnacles”, hushed down. K

A question arose. Like in some of the conventional Bollywood movies, do we find a Johnny Lever-like character in literature too, the ones who are there just to add some humour to the story, without necessarily interfering with the plot? The answer was in the affirmative. Just that we term it as ‘comic relief’ in drama.

One of us pointed out that the success of a humorous story lay in the optimism that it highlights. We find it humorous only when we come across a positive ending, when all the problems are solved.

The session was very difficult to be concluded. We had not even looked at Saki, or Raj Sekhar Bosu, and many others yet. But Narayan da was already knocking at the door. So we promised ourselves to hold another session on the same topic very soon. And all that we could conclude is that humour is one thing one does not need to take a break from.

As for the next session’s topic, we voted. And thereby, in the next session, the WILDE man behind The Picture of Dorian Gray  and MAUGHAM with The Razor's Edge would walk in together. If you know what we are talking about, join in! J

Step 1 -towards Aanteldom- GRAPHIC NOVELS.

Finally, we had our first session. The first official session of The Presidency University Literary Society. 18th January, 2011.

The topic, as it was supposed to be, remained ‘Graphic Novels’. But soon the discussion broke all boundaries, all definitions, all conventions that could have been set by the word ‘topic’ and flowed into an endless ocean of ideas, where opinions ebbed against one another, and then all the colours blended, and thirsts quenched…

If you tried to create an image in your head from all the words above and failed miserably, you might thank me. If you are reading this article for the discussions we had during the session, well, here they are.

When Wikipedia says, “A graphic novel is a narrative work in which the story is conveyed to the reader using sequential art in either an experimental design or in a traditional comics format”, we don’t really disagree :/. The discussion brought in the graphic novels named ‘Sin City’, ‘300’, ‘Arkham Asylum’, ‘Watchmen’, ‘Gears of War’, ‘Wolverine’, ‘Batman’, etc. – which are, to be technically precise, proper graphic novels. But the benign and liberal beings that we are, we didn’t mind when the day’s discussion extended to encompass the very well-loved ‘The Adventures of Tintin’ series, ‘Asterix and Obelix’, ‘Peanuts’, ‘Calvin and Hobbes’, ‘Garfield’, and even a few modern paintings, which do not really fall under the category of graphic novels.

A reason why most of us love graphic novels is the visual treat that they provide. In a comparison between words and graphics, we came across ideas how the novels act as a mirror to the author’s mind, and that, if the presentation is so mind-blowing, we do not even feel an urge to know who the author is. Debate on this point is, of course, unavoidable, since words provide a vacuum that images painted by our own imagination can very well fill up. An opinion surfaced, that the death scenes in graphic novels are much more explicit than what we can find through words. Another friend of ours came up with the point that it is not only the art that makes a graphic novel so attractive; it is also the words, the dialogues that pulls the reader through the experience. One of our friends enlightened us about the presentation of a certain graphic novel called ‘City of Glass’, in which all the pages consist of a single picture, the image being zoomed into as we turn the pages. And we discussed how every painting has a story to tell.

It was very interesting to know that graphics have crept in so much into our lives that two of our friends collect series of cartoon strips. One of us has a collection of 20 years of Garfield, and another has a collection of 12 years of Calvin and Hobbes. J

An hour is too small a span of time to wrap up a discussion on so vast a subject. But the session having been very satisfactory, we closed it with the usual poll, deciding upon the topic for the next session. All P. G. Wodehouse, Jerome K Jerome, Saki fans unite! Because, in the next session, a lot of fun awaits, the theme being- HUMOUR!! J

"Pilot".

...And this is what happens when we have too much enthusiasm which we can't possibly channelise towards the syllabus.


We wouldn't have minded a cheerleaders-dancing-fireworks-in-the-sky launch of the Society. But then, for all us aspiring intellectuals, quietness is often the chosen path to stardom. We took this too much to heart it seems, for it took many days to have an introductory post in the blog. So we are extremely sorry for our lethargy for lethargy's sake. Also, this post is to give you the idea that blogspot works fine with words. So this blog wouldn't mind some posts here and there.


Poor desi things that we are, we are perennially short of money, and if not, miserly spirit reigns supreme. Therefore we couldn't really afford a glittery website. So our heartiest thanks to Google for Blogspot.


Anyway, enough of introductory jargon. So, Here's looking at you kid, for some good work out here.


Cheers.