Books of the Week - Saturday, 4th September, 2021

Star Gazing: The Players in My Life  

by Ravi Shastri

About the Book

From being Champion of Champions to one of the world's top cricket commentators to Team India's head coach, Ravi Shastri has an incomparable perspective when it comes to the game of cricket. In Stargazing: The Players in My Life, the legendary all-rounder looks back at the extraordinary talent he has encountered over the years.

Who is the former Indian captain who didn't do full justice to his talent? Or that bruising bowler who went on to become a best friend? What was the most important lesson the legendary Clive Llyod taught him? How does Shastri set aside his personal bond with Virat Kohli in his role as coach?

Full of never-before-revealed anecdotes, Stargazing, co-written with Ayaz Memon and featuring illustrations by Shiva Rao, offers a glimpse into how champions from across the globe have inspired one of the world's greatest ODI players and Team India's most successful Test cricket coach.

About the Author

Ravishankar Jayadritha Shastri is an Indian cricket coach, former commentator, cricketer and current head coach of the India’s national cricket team. As a player, he played for the India national cricket team between 1981 and 1992 in both Tests and ODIs.

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK - SATURDAY, 31ST, AUGUST, 2019

The Hindu Way

An Introduction to Hinduism

By -   Shashi Tharoor 

ISBN : 9789388292856   

Price : Rs. 799.00

About the Book : 

The Hindu Way: An Introduction to Hinduism, the new book by bestselling author Shashi Tharoor, whose last three books have sold over a quarter of a million copies in hardback, is the perfect introduction to one of the world’s oldest, largest and most complex religions. Although there are hundreds of books on Hinduism, there are only a few which provide a lucid, accessible, yet deeply layered account of the religion’s numerous belief systems, schools of thought, sects, tenets, scriptures, deities, rituals, customs, festivals and philosophies. This book is one of them. In the tradition of classics of the genre like K. M. Sen’s Hinduism and Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan’s The Hindu View of Life, this book captures the essence of Hinduism with brevity, insight and an enviable grasp of the myriad layers and intricacies of one of the world’s greatest religions.

It is a book that is especially timely given the rather controversial role that religion has played in countries around the world. The author tells us why Hinduism is a religion that is well-suited to the needs of the world today: ‘In the twenty-first century, Hinduism has many of the attributes of a universal religion—a religion that is personal and individualistic, privileges the individual and does not subordinate one to a collectivity; a religion that grants and respects complete freedom to the believer to find his or her own answers to the true meaning of life; a religion that offers a wide range of choice in religious practice, even in regard to the nature and form of the formless God; a religion that places great emphasis on one’s mind, and values one’s capacity for reflection, intellectual enquiry, and self-study; a religion that distances itself from dogma and holy writ, that is minimally prescriptive and yet offers an abundance of options, spiritual and philosophical texts and social and cultural practices to choose from. In a world where resistance to authority is growing, Hinduism imposes no authorities; in a world of networked individuals, Hinduism proposes no institutional hierarchies; in a world of open-source information-sharing, Hinduism accepts all paths as equally valid; in a world of rapid transformations and accelerating change, Hinduism is adaptable and flexible, which is why it has survived for nearly 4,000 years.’

The text of The Hindu Way is embellished with over a hundred photographs and illustrations, many of them in colour, on various aspects of the religion. Based on Dr Tharoor’s extensive writing on the subject, including the bestselling Why I Am a Hindu, this book gives the reader an unrivalled understanding of Hinduism.

About the Author :

SHASHI THAROOR is the bestselling author of eighteen books, both fiction and non-fiction, besides being a noted critic and columnist. His books include the pathbreaking satire The Great Indian Novel (1989), the classic India: From Midnight to the Millennium (1997), the bestselling An Era of Darkness: The British Empire in India, for which he won the Ramnath Goenka Award for Excellence in Journalism, 2016, for Books (Non-Fiction), and most recently, The Paradoxical Prime Minister: Narendra Modi and His India. He was a former Under Secretary-General of the United Nations and a former Minister of State for Human Resource Development and Minister of State for External Affairs in the Government of India. He is a three-time member of the Lok Sabha from Thiruvananthapuram and chairs Parliament’s External Affairs committee. He has won numerous literary awards, including a Commonwealth Writers’ Prize, and was honoured as New Age Politician of the Year (2010) by NDTV. He was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman, India’s highest honour for overseas Indians. He was given the Crossword Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018.

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK - 27TH JULY, 2019

My Seditious Heart

By - Arundhati Roy

ISBN : 9780670092499 

Price : Rs. 999.00

About the Book  

Seditious Heart collects the work of a two-decade period when Arundhati Roy devoted herself to the political essay as a way of opening up space for justice, rights and freedoms in an increasingly hostile environment. Taken together, these essays trace her twenty year journey from the Booker Prize-winning The God of Small Things to the extraordinary The Ministry of Utmost Happiness: a journey marked by compassion, clarity and courage. Radical and readable, they speak always in defence of the collective, of the individual and of the land, in the face of the destructive logic of financial, social, religious, military and governmental elites.

In constant conversation with the themes and settings of her novels, the essays form a near-unbroken memoir of Arundhati Roy's journey as both a writer and a citizen, of both India and the world, from 'The End of Imagination', which begins this book, to 'My Seditious Heart', with which it ends.

About the Author

Arundhati Roy is the author of The God of Small Things, which won the Booker Prize in 1997, and The Ministry of Utmost Happiness, which was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize in 2017. Both novels have been translated into more than forty languages. My Seditious Heart is a collection of her non-fiction.

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK - SATURDAY, 4TH MAY, 2019

Hilal Ahmed 

By - Hilal Ahmed

About the Book  

How do we make sense of the Muslims of India?

Do they form a political community?

Does the imagined conflict between Islam and modernity affect the Muslims' political behaviour in this country?

Are Muslim religious institutions-mosques and madrasas-directly involved in politics?

Do they instruct the community to vote strategically in all elections?

What are 'Muslim issues'?

Is it only about triple talaq?

Are Muslims truly nationalists? Or do they continue to remain just an 'other' in India?

While these questions intrigue us, we seldom debate to find pragmatic answers to these queries. Examining the everydayness of Muslims in contemporary India, Hilal Ahmed offers an evocative story of politics and Islam in India, which goes beyond the given narratives of Muslim victimhood and Islamic separation.

About the Author

Hilal Ahmed, associate professor, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), New Delhi, writes regularly on the nature of Muslim political discourse. He is the associate editor, South Asian Studies, journal of the British Association of South Asian Studies.

ISBN : 9780670091409     Price : Rs.599.00

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK - 27TH JANUARY, 2017

Khullam Khulla: Rishi Kapoor Uncensored

by - Rishi Kapoor and Meena Iyer 

                    About the Book :                     

Son of a famous father. Father of a famous son. I am the hyphen between them.

Only, Rishi Kapoor was and is so much more. Few actors in Hindi cinema have had this sort of a career arc: from the gawky adolescent pining for his schoolteacher (Mera Naam Joker, 1970) to the naughty ninety-year-old (Kapoor and Sons, 2016), Rishi Kapoor has regaled audiences for close to fifty years. He won a National Award for his debut, became an overnight sensation with his first film as a leading man (Bobby, 1973), and carved a niche for himself with a string of romantic musical blockbusters in an era known for its angst-ridden films. He was the youth icon that is still the toast of the satellite TV circuit. The songs he 

lip-synced are the bread and butter of all radio stations even today. Then there was the second coming after a brief hiatus in the 1990s – as one of the finest actors in mainstream Hindi cinema with powerhouse performances in films like Do Dooni Chaar, D-Day, Agneepath and others.

Characteristically candid, Rishi Kapoor brings Punjabi brio to the writing of Khullam Khulla. This is as up close and personal a biography as any fan could have hoped for. He writes about growing up in the shadow of a legendary father, skipping school to act in Mera Naam Joker, the workings of the musical hits of the era, his streak of rotten luck with awards, an encounter with Dawood Ibrahim, his heroines (their working relationship, the gossip and the frisson that was sometimes real), his approach to his craft, his tryst with clinical depression, and more. A heart-warming afterword by Neetu Singh rounds off the warmest, most dil se biography an Indian star has ever penned.

                    About the Author :                     

Rishi Kapoor is one of India’s most popular film stars. He debuted as a child artiste in his father Raj Kapoor’s magnum opus Mera Naam Joker, winning a National Award for his performance. His first role in the lead came with Bobby, a blockbuster that established a new template for the teeny-bopper romance in Hindi cinema. In the 1970s, Rishi Kapoor delivered a series of musical hits like Khel Khel Mein, Laila Majnu, Hum Kisise Kum Naheen, Sargam and Karz. He was also the perfect foil to Bachchan in some of the most celebrated hits of the era like Kabhi Kabhie, Amar Akbar Anthony, Naseeb and Coolie. Over the last decade, Rishi Kapoor has delivered some of the finest performances of his career in a diverse array of roles – a middle-class school teacher in Do Dooni Chaar, a dreaded don in D-Day, a pimp in Agneepath and a naughty patriarch in Kapoor and Sons – far removed from the chocolate-boy romantic hero of the ’70s.

                  ISBN : 978-9352643028             Price : Rs. 599.00                  

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BOOKS OF THE WEEK

The Struggle for Pakistan

BY - Ayesha Jalal 
About the Book : 
Established as a homeland for India’s Muslims in 1947, Pakistan has had a tumultuous history that has unfolded in the vortex of dire regional and international conflicts. Beset by assassinations, coups, ethnic strife, and the breakaway of Bangladesh in 1971, the country has found itself too often contending with religious extremism and military authoritarianism. Now, in a probing biography of her native land amid the throes of global change, Ayesha Jalal provides an insider’s assessment of how this nuclear-armed Muslim nation evolved as it did and explains why its dilemmas weigh so heavily on prospects for peace in the region.
Attentive to Pakistan’s external relations as well as its internal dynamics, Jalal shows how the vexed relationship with the United States, border disputes with Afghanistan in the west, and the conflict with India over Kashmir in the east have played into the hands of the generals who purchased security at the cost of strong democratic institutions. Combined with domestic ethnic and regional rivalries, such pressures have created a siege mentality that encourages military domination and militant extremism.
Since 9/11, the country has been widely portrayed as a breeding ground for Islamic terrorism. Assessing the threats posed by Al-Qaeda and the Taliban as American troops withdraw from Afghanistan, Jalal contends that the battle for Pakistan’s soul is far from over. Her definitive biography reveals how pluralism and democracy continue to struggle for a place in this Muslim homeland, where they are so essential to its future.

 ISBN : 9780674052895       Price : Rs. 995.00 

BOOKS OF THE WEEK

The Architect's Apprentice

BY - Elif Shafak

About the Book : 

'When Jahan travels to 16th-century Istanbul as a stowaway carrying the gift of a white elephant for the sultan, little does he know the journey on which he is about to embark.

As he settles into life in Istanbul, Jahan's fortunes are shaped by chance encounters. In the palace gardens he meets Mihrimah, the beautiful and mischievous princess, and loses his heart in an instant. Later he catches the eye of Grand Architect Sinan, who chooses Jahan as his apprentice and changes the young boy's destiny forever. 

Full of magic, colour and societal upheaval in the architectural renaissance of Turkey, this is the sweeping tale of plagues, wars, forbidden romance and the simple love between a boy and his elephant.

About the Author :

Elif Shafak was born in Strasbourg, France, in 1971. She is an award-winning novelist and the most widely read female writer in Turkey. Critics have acclaimed her as one of the most distinctive voices in contemporary literature in both Turkish and English. Her novels include The Bastard of Istanbul which was longlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction. Her books have been translated into more than thirty languages. She is married with two children, and divides her time between London and Istanbul.

  ISBN : 9780241004920       Price : Rs. 599.00