December approaches and Guitar Prasanna is already in Chennai. Usually he comes over with an agenda. Last time he played in the IIT Saarang and what a pleasure it was to listen to his performance. I did missed writing about his show last last year and this year if he performs again in IIT Saarang, I will be missing it.

This Take Two feature in Hindu, alongwith another guitar artist Pandit Bhatt, announces his arrival. This time he has a special news for his fans. Two of his albums are releasing in span of two months. Raa Rama, a carnatic album is releasing by December 2005. Electric Ganesha Land, a tribute to Jimi Hendrix is releasing by Jan 2006.

I am hoping these albums would be as classy as his previous albums. And yeah, I am expecting to listen to them as before. If you miss to read the Hindu feature, he is in Chennai to record for an ‘untitled’ film of Shankar. Are you guessing it is Rajini’s Sivaji ? Me too.

P.S – Don’t miss listening to the samples especially the number Snake in Electric Ganesha Land. Was surprised to hear Aadu Paambe tune in the end of it. Super Cool.

It’s a biggest shame on the newspaper which people from Chennai, like to read. Its not shame on the man who wrote it. It’s shame on Hindu to publish it without validating it’s writer’s abilities.

The review of the hollywood movie Alexander appeared on The Hindu dt Friday, Feb 11, 2005. This was written by Gautaman Bhaskaran. The ending note aka last passage of the review reads this –

Stone has always made stories about men for whom ordinary life is impossible by accident or by choice. As a storyteller he has long made a habit out of extreme personalities, a preoccupation that during the 1990s was matched by one of the most playfully expressive styles in American mainstream pictures.

Read this movie review written by Manohla Dargis for The New York Times dated November 24, 2004. Try to locate the passage given above. It’s there. In Verbatim. I’m planning to send this note to The Hindu and I hope they invalidate this review. We have seen plagiarism of movie reviews between blogs or even just plagiarism in the Mainstream Media during the recent times. Though it’s little late find, I think this is a question on the newspaper’s credibility.

This was intially exposed by Nina and here is the URL to that post. She has also written about other plagiarisms of the same author. Brilliant find, Nina. Ofcourse, I caught this via Desi Pundit.

Sujatha in the preface of Eppothum Penn says that much of what he wrote about women in this book was by reading Simone De Beauvoir‘s The Second Sex. De Beauvoir’s famous book deals in depth about the women from biology to history and civics of women. Not only it holds you spellbound but also it’s insights are straight from a woman herself. De Beauvoir details with sheer skill as to how a woman isn’t born but she is made.

If you fit the analogy of a woman as described by De Beauvoir into a tamil girl, what happens ? Sujatha’s Eppothum Penn. This marvelously written book not only provide depths into the species called woman but also makes you live through the life of a woman as you read through it. Eppothum Penn was written as series for a women’s monthly Mangayar Malar. And Sujatha accepts that there are continuity issues when writing a montly series. Still, the crux of the story remains intact and the pace is kept till the final full stop.

Eppothum Penn is one of Sujatha’s finest novels. While there are other sensitive issues which Sujatha has dealt in his novels, Eppothum Penn represents the top of the them. The Woman. And whats so special about being a woman ? Nothing. Just about Nothing. But if you follow the life of Chinnu from the time she gets formed in her mother’s womb, you would agree with Sujatha as to why a woman is a little bit of magic. EP has one of the devastating continuity issues unlike many other Sujatha’s novels. The growth of Chinnu from being a kid to a thavani clad girl is pretty fast paced. And if you are the one to finish the book in a single breath, this is one book that needs such a treatment.

From a unbelivably voyeuristic start to the absolute ending this book will make you sit up and re-think all your notions about a woman. And even if you are those cold-hearted types, you just couldn’t resist the single drop of tear rolling down as Sujatha enables us through the mind of a woman. All this and more without hype and any unnecessary comparisons of a woman to the embodiment of shakti. Sujatha Rocks !!