The fact that this was to be made into a movie with Johny Depp playing the lead and Mira Nair directing was the sole inspiration to go through this one.The Gregory David Roberts saga is very "filmy" with all its very predictable "twists" and aptly based in the city of bombay!
"A literary masterpiece.......... it has the grit and pace of a thriller" screams the cover.
Trust me, it isn't even close to being any of those.
He of course does his bit to promote two already well established notions. "India, the city of cows and slums" and "Indians, a heart of gold" which we know to be false.
So heres Lin(short for LING(dick for the uninitiated))
playing lover,fugitive, drug addict, actor, doctor(yes!), mujahid(huh!) one after the other and u wonder if it is the same book! A bizarre hotch-potch story results.
"True story of 8 years of the bombay underworld" says another screamer.
hah! yes i trust that!!!!
I went to the Leopolds in Bombay. Wasnt even close to the description in the book.
hardly any foreigners. a few guys drinking. no banter. no crowd. all this in the evening at 5, not even a white lady (he speaks of white prostitutes and in numbers!!).
The leopolds guy though was making his buck from the book. He was selling hard bound copies of Shantaram inside!!!!
A very very overrated book. All books that get popular these days get a rave. Thats probably because they are all found on shopping portals. Unfortunately, it does not work the other way.
2 comments:
pyar par bas to nahin hai.
waah! superb. good music
Haven't yet read the complete thing. Just read the part about "it's all good yaar". DUDE!!! Sounds like you are really cracking it!!! You are enjoying your classes (that too Quantum), you can do assignments without help from books (well, that you could do at college also.....at times), you can cook (if something is "improving", it must exist. Poor me is still stuck at coffee making skills), and you have a room to yourself. I AM jealous of you!!! Regarding the "thing", let me tell you, that will always be there. Nowehere on earth is everything going fine, so stop thinking about that. As in, stop feeling that there is something missing because it is not there. It is not supposed to be. I am seriously telling you this Sridhar, not only am I jealous, but I am also happy for you. For the first time I am hearing positive things from you.....
Anyway, thanks a lot for commenting on my blog. I never expected that my blog will some day go beyond the community of people whose mother tongue is Bengali!!! Thanks for the honor. Regarding the "tough bong".......well.....sorry about that, but I am sure very soon you will pick up enough to get that :-)
Post a Comment