The Sunday Haul...

... and Other Book Talk


The Sunday turned out to quite a bright and sunny one without the threat of rain though it had rained the night before. When I set out for Abids I had in mind to buy a book that I had missed last Sunday- John Barth’s ‘The Friday Book- Essays and Other Non-fiction.’ The book was in the same place it had been last week and I picked up the hardcover, almost new book. I got it for only thirty rupees. Till date I haven’t read anything by John Barth though I have come across ‘The Sotweed Factor’ that runs into hundreds of pages. Inside ‘Friday Book’ were numerous essays on writing and various other subjects. A cursory glance revealed that the style would difficult for me to follow. It was mercurial writing with complex sentences hiding more ideas than I could find.

I had also seen an old copy of ‘New Yorker’ that had an essay by Bill Bryson that he later used in his book- I did not pick it up though I could have got it for only twenty rupees.

‘Literary Review’ in The Hindu had something I felt happy about. Navtej Sarna in an article wrote about John Steinbeck’s ‘The Journal of a Novel’ that is a sort of diary Steinbeck maintained while writing ‘East of Eden.’ I am reading the same book nowadays trying to learn something about writing a novel. Sarna mentions that it is a book every one aspiring to write a book must read. I cannot but agree with that observation. However, Steinbeck had written a similar journal while writing his magnum opus ‘The Grapes of Wrath’, that is titled ‘Working Days’ written during the period 1938-41. I have this book too with me. It would have been better had Sarna mentioned this book also. Interestingly while Steinbeck wrote ‘East of Eden’ with a pencil, he used a pen to write ‘Grapes of Wrath.’

On Saturday I had been to Crossword at City Center Mall and picked up Amit Verma’s ‘My Friend Sancho’ that I hope to read sometime soon. It is just 217 pages long and I might be able to finish it in one sitting. Since I am at work revising my own book MFS has to wait for some time.