Column: The Good Life: for Mint Lounge
Mendelssohn Violin Concerto
I like music I can hum to. I first heard this piece in Boston and have been humming it ever since. It is Mendelssohn's Violin Concerto and to my mind, one of the most beautiful works of music...ever. Listening to something like this and the chords it touches inside your heart and soul makes the wordsmith in me despair. How can mere words touch the soul like the way this music can? The opening piercing strains of the solo violin can make you weep, if you are open to it. So many soloists have attempted it, but here is a current [...]
It’s never too late to get your hands on wet clay: for Mint Lounge
I loved writing this piece because I love clay and pots and ceramic arts It’s never too late to get your hands on wet clay Working with your hands in wet clay is a sensual experience Shoba Narayan First Published: Fri, Sep 14 2012. 07 14 PM IST An artist at Pottery Town, where 45 families make a living out of clay. Photo: Aniruddha Chowdhury/Mint RELATED Excerpt | The ‘desi’ mutation Mastering the art of giving Mastering the art of giving In the words of the daughter-in-law Clad in a blue housecoat—what else—Nethra, the artist, is painting a 2ft-tall clay [...]
Times of India coverage
In the September 10th issue 2012
Deccan Chronicle: about the launch
Story and photo on 9th September 2012
Are Foundations neccessary?
Mastering the art of giving The hundi model - or writing significant cheques in an ad hoc and anonymous fashion - is the worst way to donate your money Shoba Narayan Posted: Thu, Sep 6 2012. 8:47 PM IST I blame it on the hundi; and the Bible. “But when thou doest alms,” says the Bible in Matthew 6:3, “let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth.” This was before the Indian Revenue Service invented the 80G tax exemption; incentivising donors not just to give with both hands but also announce the size of their [...]
Mom and Dad on Facebook
For The National Surrounded by teenagers as my parents take to Facebook Shoba Narayan Sep 5, 2012 A week ago, my 80-year old father joined Facebook. He quickly acquired three friends: my brother, me and my mum (who had joined Facebook the week before). Here is my issue: I am not sure I want to be “friends” with my parents. They live around the corner from me and I see them almost every day. They drop in to check out what’s happening in my household and I do the same with them. They know when my bathroom tap leaks, when the [...]
Epic marriage proposal
It's never too late for an insincere declaration of love Shoba Narayan Aug 26, 2012 Two weeks ago, David Pogue, the technology columnist for The New York Times, created an "epic marriage proposal" for his girlfriend, which he later uploaded to Vimeo. As I watched the seven-minute video, a bitter taste rose in my throat. Here is how Pogue describes his proposal: "On August 15, 2012, I proposed to the love of my life. I made a fake movie trailer - a thinly veiled version of our love story. I persuaded the movie theatre at a summer resort to play [...]
Meeting Mr. Murthy
Some things you remember because they are dramatic. Some things you remember because of circumstance. I remember Mr. N.R. Narayana Murthy phoning me up to tell me how much he liked my first book, Monsoon Diary. I had interviewed Mr. Murthy a couple of times and had exchanged emails and phone calls with him in that context. One day, a year after our last encounter, I was in Chitradurga with my niece, Nithya, as part of her Indicorps fellowship. We were having breakfast in a dhaba on the highway when my mobile rings. It is Pandu, Mr. Murthy's assistant, telling [...]
Memories and cupcakes for Mint Lounge
Customized cupcakes and south Indian tiffins The old and the new coexist in Chennai today in a way that warms the cockles of its erstwhile inhabitants. Madrasis have turned cosmopolitan but still retain their mordant wit The Good Life | Shoba Narayan In the early 1980s, if you said “cupcake” in Chennai, guys would have assumed you were talking about a pretty girl, possibly a voluptuous one—like Helen, Jayamalini or Silk Smitha. As for cups, in my household, they were kept aside for servants who sipped their coffee rather than poured it down their throat without touching the lips using [...]
Marketing a book
Rupa told me today that my book has reached the Bangalore office and was being shipped to bookstores. We are planning a launch and I confront the whole marketing question. Here's the thing though: I truly and deeply believe that a work of art (or a book for that matter) has to fly on its own merit. It takes a life of its own with its own destiny. This I believe. On the flip side, if a book doesn't sell, does that mean it just wasn't good enough? This is the question I have to confront as I prepare for [...]