College Jolt

In the ’80s, TV critic Neil Postman claimed that the invention of television had zapped the national print culture –– that our generation had stopped reading, that we couldn’t write for beans, and that to top it off, this made us “lousy citizens.” Harsh. I may be all for TV, but I am also all for books, and I believe many people are. In particular, I am for the books that show up in this blog –– and you should be too! So let’s prove the Postman wrong, eh?

Full confession: this post is influenced by a class I’m taking this semester –– on Indian film adaptations, and so far it’s really awesome –– we just read the inspiration for Slumdog Millionaire, the “underdog” multi-culti phenomenon film that won all the Oscars it was nominated for last year. Also known as the film that put Dev Patel and Freida Pinto on the map. And as I was reading the novel it’s based on –– which we’ll get to in a second –– I thought about how rare, and how almost surprising, Slumdog’s mass success was. But why? Why’ is  it so rare, I ask you, for something centered on non-American culture to become popular in America? There’s no reason we should be so insular. (Because it can’t just be me, right? I can’t be the only sheltered American, am I?)

So here are some novels that take you to a different place.

Q&A, Vikas Swarup. The aforementioned basis for a little film called Slumdog Millionaire. But don’t go into this novel expecting a transcription of Jamal Malik and Latika; you won’t get it, not really. Ram Mohammad Thomas is the name of the protagonist here, and while his primary dilemma –– being arrested and interrogated for winning a quiz show –– is the same as the movie, the flashbacks of his life that make up the story’s backbone are pretty different than what you see onscreen. There’s Ram’s stint at the Taj Mahal and the orphan-exploitation by Maman, but those are really the only chapters that remained largely intact in the film.

The rest is almost all new to Slumdog fans: two episodes where Ram works as a servant (first to an Australian colonel and family, then to a retired Bollywood actress), a love story (but not the one you might expect), and a character named Salim who’s as far from movie-Salim as you can get. Because of these differences, the story of Ram becomes easier and easier to separate from the story of Slumdog’s Jamal; even if you’ve seen the film, like I have, a sense of suspense keeps you turning pages (even without M.I.A. and A.R. Rahman’s crazy-awesome score). It reads like a movie, actually –– Swarup’s prose is very visual, prone to describing outward things like faces and gestures rather than inner monologue or emotions, and as such, he has the ability to shock you whenever he finally reveals a character’s intentions. A twist at the very end literally made my jaw drop.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz. Winner of the 2007 Pulitzer, this one’s gotten a lot of buzz as well. As it should, because it’s freaking awesome. The book’s story is more like four stories. Ostensibly the book centers on Oscar himself, a lonely Dominican nerd obsessed with sci-fi/fantasy and girls as he goes through elementary school to college and postgrad life.

Other parts of the book focus on different members of Oscar’s family. The narrator (Oscar’s ex-roommate/sister’s boyfriend) tells the individual stories of Oscar’s sister, mother and grandfather in between chapters of Oscar’s own life in an attempt to explain Oscar’s life and fate. Why did what happened to Oscar, happen to Oscar? What actually happens to Oscar in the end, you won’t know until the end –– but the shocks, sadnesses, humor, and small triumphs in the narrative will hook you until then. A bit like Q&A, now I think about it.

Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi. All right, so this is a graphic novel in two volumes! But don’t you try and tell me that it’s not “real” literature. The first part of this memoir recounts Satrapi’s childhood growing up in war-torn Iran, ending when her parents decide to send her away to a Viennese high school in order to spare her from the extremes of the new regime. The second volume tells of high school, college and her first marriage.

In between building a complex, scary portrait of the war and militant developing regime in Iran, you get to see details of how daily life goes on in such an environment: like having to buy American records (e.g. Michael Jackson, AC/DC) from black-market sellers in trenchcoats and sunglasses, for example.  Despite the political background, Persepolis is as much a coming-of-age story as it is a historical account.  You see Satrapi grow up, grow independent, fall in love, fall out of it and eventually return home to where she began.  It’s a cliche, but reading this really does feel like you’re on a journey.  And isn’t that what reading’s all about?

What do you think?  Got any favorite books?  Hit me up!

(Photos courtesy of Threadless, Christy Bharath, audiobooksonline, and trcs.wikispaces.com. Thanks, dudes and dudettes!)