In the end of the Book I of PS, Adithya Karikalan praises the wonderful work of Mammallar and Mahindra Pallavar to his friend and Pallava ally Parthibendran. Although Parthibendran said that the interest in creating art on the rocks brought down the Pallava dynasty, Adhitya Karikalan was so sincere in his praise and so deeply humble in the admiration of the by-gone Pallavas.
PS Rocks anyday! I have started reading PS again (my second time actually) after a gap of 5 years and I am so so angry that I need to be at work and cannot keep reading. This was exactly the way I felt the first time when I started reading it. And I still feel the same.
It transports you to another level within the frist few chapters and the Kalki writes, he makes you visualize the whole thing in front of your eyes!
Hats off to him and to my parents who introduced me to Kalki!
Hi: PS rocks bigtime. I too feel bad that Saturday evenings is the only time I get to read for pleasure and the rest of the week in the lab I miss bieng in the PS Time Space -Deeps
hmmmmm I doubt if I would want to live in those times. Wars all around... the kings and chieftains mobilizing all the time... pestilence, famine (inevitable effects of war). I think if we take off our rose tinted glasses, the current day and age is much better than the chola times :)
Doc Arun, you said it. I've often daydreamed about being magically transported to the life and times of Raja Raja Chozhan - only to decide, unwillingly, that it wouldn't really be a nice thing at all.
Worst of all would be the fact if I could actually see our favourite prince - it would destroy the illusion of Ponniyin Selvan. He might turn out to be a perfectly normal guy (gods!), or I might see him parading about with 15 wives. The fact remains that he was a hard-headed ruler with all the tricks of raja thanthiram up his sleeve. :)
That's why Kalki is such a freaking genius. Instead of taking up the adult Raja Raja Chozhan and idolizing him, he chose the young, impressionable and still idealistic Arulmozhi Varman for his hero.
your observation maybe correct (am saying 'maybe' because we have no idea of the exact lifestyle of commoners of those times), Arun, and I doubt thats exactly what people thousand years from now would say about us.
Am anyways a city guy, and cities are generally the last to be touched by such problems (especially the capital cities). If you doubt my words, please travel a 100 kms on kanakpura road from Bangalore. Within 20-30kms, the dust of the city would settle and you would get dusty mud roads and smaller houses - not quite what one would expect just 20-30 kms away.
So, in most probability, I would have settled in Thanjavur or pazhaiarai (as a spy? ;)
Anyways, am not only talking of the glory of our kings and cities, but also the much healthier lifestyle - much closer to nature. Life was tougher no doubt, but much healthier too. ( I do know the statistics about how life-spans have increased from the time of independence, but I also think lifespan is such a difficult thing nowadays, because of the unhealthy, unnatural lifestyle we are leading.)
Why am I so passionate? Well, you should visit the marundheeswarar temple in thiruvanmaiyoor... where they have tried to preserve the old carvings as is, they also have modern amenities like electric bulbs and varnish painted stones. Every time I go there, there is some concert happening (with at least a 100 people listening), in front of the thiagaraya sannidhi - which stands testimony to the blending of the old with new and brings the whole place back to life.
But the 'pullarichifying' feeling an old stone with intricate carvings gives me is not matched when I see the unartfully lit praharams. Just shows how much less care we are taking in the maintainance. Am sure we could light up our temples much more aesthetically, than just a dozen tubelights running the length of the praharams. Same is the case with the lack of attention to where the speakers are placed for the concert. We have more power, and more speakers, so fit them wherever... not really acoustic.
Thats where I feel the lack of impressiveness in today's work. We are all running around chasing the evasive happiness, which we could get just if we live in the now and here and do the work we are doing with full dedication. I find this generally missing in today's work environment.
Sorrry about the rant... just what my heart yearns to do.
I enjoy being transported when reading the book in my imagination, but in reality, I would very much prefer to be buried in the cozy furniture of my room when I look out of the book. The present is very much the place where I want to br grounded for live with some short imaginary visits to exotic places like our 12th century choza nadu that is made possible by writers like kalki.
If any of you have read Timeline by Michael Crichton you may be able to relate how one of the characters of the novel--I do not remember his name--likes the middle ages and remains there in their sojurn that they take to have a real life experience of France during the middle ages.
Looks like some of you want to do that--for those who want to and havent read Timeline, try reading that first (am sure you will have real fun)--While others are happy with the imaginary visits that they get like me :)
Hi Madan, Your thoughts are most interesting. We are all so facinated by the royality that often we forget the common man. In Parthiban Kanavu, the commoner (Boatman) Ponna and his wife did seem to live a comfortable life, food to eat, a home to live in.............
My friend is the niece of the Mysore maharaja. Her Mom, was telling me, that in the yesteryears....food was distributed free from the kovils. So no person goes hungry. I wouldn't be a feast but a basic pullisadam thirsadam to keep body and soul together.
The food the royalty ate was AWSOME. My friend still cooks the old mysore dishes at home.....drooling just thinking of the lovely colors and flavors which are prescribed to suit the eater in harmony with the climate and stress:)
But life's like that....impressions created in a positive way makes us love the person we are reading/hearing about even without knowing that person.
Ideal example in all our lives....we all as children (pre-school age) would have not met our entire family but an older person at home (A patti, thatha or amma and appa) would talk with love and positivity about som e relative and viola when the kid meets that person, there is immediate happiness and connectivity.
Kalki rocks big time. He has penned a lovely book making us love RRC and his people and also Kalki has brought this group of complete strangers together in a happy harmonious discussion of his book and other things.
Lovely don't you think?
I don't even know who are the people I communicate with, or what they do:) But it feels like "Family PS" now.
your mails have really become fun to read and it is becoming infectious. to be specific your use of phrases like "rocks big time", "cool dude", i think would have been used for the first time in this mailing list.
Hi Siva, Thanks for your kind email. I have been off late working with a lot of adoloscent kids and their venacular has seeped in :) :) Have a great week-end Sir, Deeps
Dear Srividya interesting you should mention timeline...I have just read its a good read the Charector you are talking about is Andre Marek....
I m sure it would be fun to go back in time as lomng as you settle with Poonguzhali or Nandhini like Andre...
Coming to the life in those times..we are basing most of our idea of yesteryears based on the recent history written by the British when we have been victims of newer diseases brought by the european travellers...
The Aztecs did not loose to cortez they lost to smallpox
Our ancients had a very good medical and surgical system so I dont think life would have been that bad...
but can we live in that SILENCE.....Srividya will know what I am talking about
With reference to the medical system, the ancients were very adept with the priciples of Ayurveda and Ayurvedic nutrition. This in combination with Yoga helped keep the ancient jantha healthy :) Deeps
Ok i must confess to being the heretic here then. I still believe that our Age is the most peaceful. Wars were a fact of life during those times... We read all these romanticized novels.. and assume people were all healthy, wealthy and wise! Come on... wars imply lots of problems for the common folks. Gangs of marauding murderers bent on mayhem rape, loot. Now don't tell me our glorious tamizh brethren didn't go in for that sort of a thing. Human character hasn't changed all that much. Taking a look at some of the rather unsavory characters infesting our political landscape, what makes one believe that things were any different back then? Assuming that Raja Raja Chozhan was a saint, that doesnt imply that the coterie around him would have been any different from the political hangers on these days. Yes, there would have been some great guys.. but there would also have been enough lumpen elements. All in all, I do believe the current era we live in is the most peaceful.
Hi Arun, Your mail has an interesting line of thought. I would however like to add a few of my own here. War and Peace co-exisist in the world. We may be at peace in a community, an area where we reside, at work but one can never be too sure when something bad is going to happen.
Bad: Not really just natural calamities but problems caused by man-kind. I have been travelling to Mysore from Bangalore for 8 years now for my academic endevors, some years ago we just hopped on to the Shatabdi express and landed in Mysore. Now in either station there are sniffer dogs and anxious cops trying to look for possible bombs....this is far from being peaceful. There are many instances, I am quoting just one here.
War: According to my Boss, war is one of the major reasons for Technical advancement. Margerine in lieu of butter, canned foods etc.
The good exisists with the bad in this world. Looting and the rest may not happen openly today. But it's not that bad things have ceased to happen.
:)As my Patti used to say, her 2 hours of sincere prayer is to request God to minimize the sufferings and to give us the strength to brave the trials and tribulations of life.
Sorry for having rambled on like this....but hey!! it was FUN
Okay, to be fair, you are right. But consider this...
Even in this day, if given a choice, would you live in the US or in Afghanistan? Am talking about the glory days of my land, where my beloved kings were the invaders... I would make a killing selling swords and spears!
The point is that there never was any long term security. Even the Chozhas in their time lost wars. THe problem is that if a kingdom is always on the go (war oriented), then the populace has to suffer from more taxes etc. Not really the ideal place to be. I suspect that the reason some of the oldies wax eloquent about the British rule is that, yes, after all the turmoil of petty chieftains over the past centuries, there was a measure of relative calm and safety for the common man.
Glory days (IMO) - when the people are not denied of their basic rights, - Rulers concentrating on improving their country rather than exploiting, waging war againt the other counties around.
Current era or every era in the human history has been peaceful for some and always a struggle for some. Those who are fortunate enough would claim glory days and those on the other side will claim otherwise. Even in US everybody is not living the so called american dream.
Exactly! Arun has the hit the nail! Peace makes a major difference in lives. To me any era that's been really peaceful with a lot of free time at the hands of the able bodied people and as a result, arts flourished. Such is a time that can be called a time of peace. Those are glorious days for any civilization or dynasty or whatever we call it.
As Madan rightly asked, given a choice of living between Afghanistan and India, where would you want to be? Let's put two foreign places which many of us may not know much. Between Afghanistan and China, where would you want to be? We would still prefer China or for that matter even the cold Siberian Russia to Afghanistan. The reason PEACE! The present is any day peaceful times to live than the past.
Also, the reason, I brought in Timeline was to show this contrast and not diseases. Guess that sent another track of thought to MEDICINE. With all due respect to then golden era of the Chozhas, I would prefer to have it as my history and roots and read about the lovely times in the present day living room where I enjoy reading my books drinking a cup of tea and live very much in the present and do the kind of discussions that I am doing right now. (he he he -- selfish me)
Madan do not lose heart. The kings you love are the kings we love too. And that's the reason we are all here together in this group. If I am to live during the 13th century and am given a choice of where I want to live, I would want to live in any one or all the four of our four nadus, the Thondai, Chozha, Pandiya or Chera. That was the best place on earth to live then for the way and standard of lives of the common man were. As Deepa said, its the life of the common man that we do not have in detail.
And yes Sridhar thank you, it was Andre Marek. I saw the movie for first time this weekend. Only when I mentioned about the book it in that mail, did I realize that I had missed seeing the movie after reading the book. The movie was really good. (Successfully made my husband watch it—what an achievement) They had done justice to the book. You do feel transported to the 100 years war that the book talks about. Also, as you said, if you get a Lady Claire, then its cool to live in that war mongering pestilence ridden past or may be in my case, get a Vandhiyathevan or an Arul Mozhi Varmar, if not its not worth it -- but even with that, I some how personally feel its not worth when you have the choice of living in the present.
> but can we live in that SILENCE.....Srividya > will know what I am talking about