Erm. I'm a Gujju, not a TamBram..... more seriously, there are several
problems with her writing. "Why don't I love thee? Let me count the
ways..."
Salil, you are clearly very well-read and I don't mean that in a
snarky way-- my Dad's an English prof. so I have a great deal of
respect for literature even if I shirk it. And I happen to love
Barrett Browning. And as you know, she said, "How do I love thee?"
so the quotes are wrong. Sorry, couldn't resist. But I had to look
that up unlike you who probably said it from memory.
The TamBrahm analogy was because I know so many men who hate Roy and
they always describe their dislike of her with this dispassionate,
rational, logical, arguing-equations-in-IIT tone that bugs the shit
out of me. As if it was self-evident that Roy is an inferior writer
and a hypocrite activist... when in fact this dislike goes deeper and
more visceral than that...and I am curious why.
Her causes aren't original
So now we are back at the causes...not the writing.
- she gatecrashes as a latecomer, and moves
on when the next crisis beckons her (does anyone remember her struggle
against Narmada anymore?
I think all of us do remember Narmada. But Salil, again, I would
argue the counter. If you are a celebrity-- like Roy or Angelina or
even apna Aamir, you ought to lend your name and move from cause to
cause. Roy never claimed monogamy for her causes. So why aren't you
outraged by Madonna changing religions or Aamir forgetting dyslexia
once he moved films. Why hold Roy to a different standard?
Medha Patkar doesn't fly from one cause to
another like a butterfly). Two, she connects the farthest dots to
create a scary Rorschach image, when Occam's Razor would've provided a
simpler explanation (OK, too many metaphors, but you get the drift).
I've heard this one many times. And funnily enough I agree that he
connects the farthest dots. There are two ways to look at this. Roy
uses revolutionary-tactics. Extremism is her forte and her choice.
You can say that she does this because it is self serving or (if you
want to be charitable) because it draws attention to her cause in a
more-bang-for-the-buck way. If I were Roy, I would do exactly what
she does. If my forte was this kind of polemic writing and I find
that it works-- draws attention to the things I want to highlight --
that's what I would do. I would stick to extremist polemics. There
are enough dispassionate, logical, objective, on-the-one-hand type
writers. There are very few Roys.
So she's terrific for conspiracy theorists, but not of much value
besides. And three, there's nihilism in her writing, valorizing of
certain folks over others, and a congenital failure to see nuances -
witness her churlish, childish responses to BG Verghese on dams, her
shrill outburst against Ram Guha (who called her Arun Shourie of the
Left), and her ignoring the more serious criticism from Gail Omvedt.
What about Ram Guha's shrill outburst against Roy? He has done it
before to Vir Sanghvi and that was called "excoriation." When Roy
retaliates, it is an outburst?
That, and her hypocrisy: she has a home in a forest land in violation
of the Forest Act,
This to me is terrible. And Salil, you should know that I am not so
much in love with Roy. Part of this is the pleasure of a good
argument!!
and she did a huge song and dance about the
judiciary vis-a-vis Narmada, though she was warned she'd be jailed
under contempt of court laws (I don't like those laws, but that's a
different matter). She went to jail for one night, probably didn't
like the dal, and next day paid the fine and got out. She ain't no
Gandhi (the real one, not the pretenders).
I think Abhijit Menon-Sen has addressed this. Menon-Sen-- what a
name! I can only imagine the inherited genetic capital.
I could go on.
So could I. But my feminist colors are showing.
