Frankly speaking I do not understand the hype surrounding Mr IIT Bhagat and his books. Plus there was the film fiasco.(The movie was far better than the book could ever aspire to be) The first one succeeded because he took advantage of the IIT craze that has overtaken the nation. The following books showed that not only was he a bad writer, but one with absolutely no imagination at all. I almost cried over the time I had lost reading one night at the call centre. So when two states came out, I refused to even consider reading it. But then one red coloured copy (i love red) lay on my library desk with no takers, so decided to give in. It was ok, like a blog written by an IIM (yes we know you went to all these prestigious colleges Mr Bhagat) friend. A masterpiece of literature or even a good novel it was not.
It talks about the love story of two people from different states as the imaginative title suggests. They fall in love, the family doesn't. To give him fair credit, he has shown faults of both communities equally and has brought in some interesting conflicts. Apart from that its just a glorified diary.
So I reached the conclusion, when it comes to recounting bits of his life with a little bit of masala added Mr Bhagat does a good enough job. Just as most of us with a working knowledge of English and some spare time can. When it comes to using his imagination, Mr IIT/IIM fails miserably. All said and done, he markets (or is marketed) aggressively and hopefully does not represent the young and upcoming writers of this generation in India. Because if he does, it falls into the same trap that our newspapers, tv channels etc are into - Dumbing down everything.
No comments:
Post a Comment