Reading Weekly 2.0

I told you about the MATRIX reading club in my post Reading Weekly. I had mentioned that Art of War, Zahir and Bourne Series would be discussed next week. Sarthak has done a nice writeup of that meeting. You can check it out at his blog, The Difference.

Solid Words

People are unreasonable, illogical and self-centred.
Love them anyway.
If you do good, people may accuse you of selfish motives.
Do good anyway.
If you are successful, you may win false friends and true enemies.
Succeed anyway.
The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow.
Do good anyway.
Honesty and transparency make you vulnerable.
Be honest and transparent anyway.
What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight.
Build anyway.
People who really want help may attack you if you help them.
Help them anyway.
Give the world the best you have and you may get hurt.
Give the world your best anyway.

Taken from "Meditations from a Simple Path" by Mother Teresa

Reading Weekly

A new activity got added to this semester besides 8 courses, GRE classes and Wall Street Club – MATRIX Reading Club. The club is an attempt to bring together people who are passionate about reading. It seeks to broaden horizons and light sparks of interest. A meeting could be loosely structured around a few books, the talk could veer around to an interesting article in the newspaper or to the world of books and authors galore. I got the idea last sem but was too busy to implement. So, this sem delving into it.

Yesterday's meeting went as follows:

In the last meeting, we had decided to discuss Bourne series by Robert Ludlum, The White Tiger by Arvind Adiga and India After Gandhi by Ramachandra Guha. We started with a talk between Ankit and Neha about the historian. When Ankit mentioned Jayprakash Narayan, Syam took over with an analysis of Indira Gandhi and her rule. That was followed by feudalism and communism in Kerala. I came to know Kerala has 140 Vidhan Sabha and 19 Lok Sabha seats. Somewhere in between there was Ayn Rand and not believing in her philosophy thrown in. Syam was talking about objectivism, the philosophy that she propagated. I've never read her and took it as objectivism i.e. sticking to truth. Talked about how every author, unless they are a historian writing in black and white, is unobjective. The authors views do seep in. Gave an example of Gone With The Wind, where Margaret Mitchell paints blacks as an integral part of the family in South America. That led to the etymology of the word lynching, traced to Willie Lynch's methods by Achal. There was another digression on objectivism as Achal tried to reason that unless reader believes in the work, it can't be objectified. These three meanings make me appreciate why people mug up word lists for GRE :D

Science fiction also found a way in with Neha talking about The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin and The Foundation by Issac Asimov. While I was getting cold coffees, there was a discussion on Ghost In The Shell series. Benefit of organising meetings in night canteen, we get to talk over coffee and bournvita. We didn't much get to Arvind Adiga except that the book begins with a village in Gaya.

To participate in a stimulating discussion like this wasn't just nice, it was fun. Next week, we have on the table, Zahir by Paulo Coelho, Art of War by Sun Tzu and Bourne series again. A classic e.g. Wuthering Heights is also in queue.