Category: Philosophy & Worldview

  • Chasing the Monk’s Shadow

    Mishi Saran

    There are some books that one wishes went on forever, for the vicarious experience offered is incredible. This is one of those. Long after the pages have been completed, the journey promises to stay in my mind.

    It is now exactly a decade since Mishi Saran started on her journey – to follow a monk who had himself made a journey of over 10000 miles, 14 centuries before her time. Xuanzang, who I last met in my history text from school, the monk with the neat backpack.

    The book hooked me right from the time the author described how she found a purpose – “an Indian woman with a Chinese craze, a Chinese monk with an Indian obsession, we had the same schizophrenia, the monk and I. It seemed logical to take the same road.”

    The best journeys are those which traverse time and space in one stroke, and that’s exactly what this book does. Though in many ways, it could be described as a travelogue too, that would be utterly unfair. It is very much a personal journey for the author, a search for her roots, and identity.

    As Mishi Saran travels across China and Central Asia, following Xuanzang’s path, her vivid prose blurs the boundaries that have been created in the modern era, and its easy to see the influence of ancient civilisations and regimes influence art, architecture, language, customs and thus life itself. And at the edges, where its not just cultures that collide, but religions too, as they are reshaped or recast in different moulds – Islam, Buddhism, Sufism…

    The writing style forces one to make the journey with her, and I could see that there were actually three journeys unraveling simultaneously – the author, the monk, and the Buddha himself. All of them journeys with a purpose.

    And amidst all the eloquence, it has obviously been a journey that required grit and courage.. And luck, which many a time failed the author. From places where children going to school needed visas and permits, to the posturing of a few contemporary students of Buddhism, to the origins of words that are still used in common parlance, and characters which seem to leap out of history pages – Ashoka, Kanishka, Chandragupta, the pages hold in them, tangential journeys for the reader.

    The last part of the book, where the author gets to (almost) finally visit the territories crossed by Xuanzang in Afghanistan, is written a month before 9/11, and gives us a gripping account of Afghanistan under the Taliban, with glimpses of people who have perhaps yet to find peace. “I believed him. It was hard not to believe a man when you were standing in front of his blown-up home and staring at the ruins of his life. Whatever the story was, this was his truth.” Unlike fiction, one cannot console the self that the person and his story are imaginary. The last part of the journey does not add a lot with respect to the purpose of the book, but it’s a part that I’m glad the author chose to add here.

    As a reader, I could relate to the author’s words in the last page “…I understood less, not more…. I had acquired this sadness”, and that is what makes this book one of the best I’ve read.

  • Siddhartha

    Herman Hesse

    Somewhere in Pankaj Mishra’s ‘The Romantics’, there’s a conversation about ‘Siddhartha’ and it being a reason for a Westerner’s interest in Buddhism and India. A conversation, not my view 🙂 That, and the fact that it also finds mention in Mishra’s other book ‘An End to suffering’ is primarily what led me to the book.
    The book is best described as the story of an alternate version of the Buddha, and the Buddha features in the story too, including a conversation.
    The message is perhaps like a quote I read somewhere, which amounts to “There are many ways to the top of the mountain, but once there, the view is the same”
    The arguments are compelling, and makes you think, not just about the end, but also about the ways in which you get there. I especially liked the thoughts on the concept of time, the ‘goal vision’ obscuring everything else, and ‘the opposite of every truth is also true’.
    Forget Buddhism, it is an excellent read on life, what we strive for, and my favourite paradox – the meaningfulness and the meaninglessness of our existence.

  • An End to Suffering

    Pankaj Mishra

    I’ve always been a fan of Pankaj Mishra’s melancholic way of writing, which just borders on cynicism. This book, while a study on the evolution of Buddhism, is also a travelogue of sorts. It even manages to touch upon the author’s personal growth – material and spiritual, and the gradual growth in his confidence, which was necessary for the book to be written.
    It focuses a lot on Buddha’s teachings, the way it has been transformed in various regions and times in which it has been practised, and also manages an analysis of how it could still be pertinent in a world that has changed much, since the time he lived in. The book simplifies Buddhism to an extent, and while it cannot be a complete guide to the Buddha (that wasn’t the idea anyway), it does manage to chronicle the times that the Buddha lived in, and makes you curious enough not only to read up more on the subject, but also check out the works of David Hume, and Nietzsche, who have been extensively quoted.
    A good start for those who seek to understand themselves.