Marcel Proust - insight through quotes

"A book is the product of a different self from the one we manifest in our habits, our social life and our vices."

"It seems that the taste for books grows with intelligence, a little below it but on the same stem, as every passion is accomplished by a predilection for that which surrounds its object, which has an affinity for it, which in its absence still speaks of it. So, the great writers, during those hours when they are not in direct communication with their thought, delight in the society of books. Besides, is it not chiefly for them that they have been written; do they not disclose to them a thousand beauties, which remain hidden to the masses?" (Proust in Reading in Bed)

"For a long time I used to go to bed early. Sometimes, when I had put out my candle, my eyes would close so quickly that I had not even time to say to myself: "I'm falling asleep. And half an hour later the thought that it was time to go to sleep would awaken me; I would make as if to put away the book which I imagined was still in my hands, and to blow out the light; I had gone on thinking, while I was asleep, about what I had just been reading, but these thoughts had taken a rather peculiar turn; it seemed to me that I myself was the immediate subject of my book: a church, a quartet, the rivalry between François I and Charles V."

Proust is generally considered a pioneer of the modern novel. He made a clear distinction between man and work. The writer is a man of intuition. - quoted from Books and Writers.

Connecting Speech and Iambic

Day before yesterday (1st Sept. 2005) we had an interesting talk. Krishna and I. Was actually glad when he took me aside during the break and told that which I had held holy all my life vis-a-vis theatre speech and had not shared with anyone.

I believe when an actor truly finds the impulse through emphasis on specific syllabic accents than on the entire word and combines it with his emotion, true theatre speech is born. And working on iambic pentameter for Midsummer Night's Dream, I was precisely trying to put it into actors' head. We had a break. Krishna took me aside and highlighted how am striving for that. I had not told him. I have always believed that theatre training should combine music.

Music is not always that which we learn to sing or play instruments. Speech rhythms.

I appreciate the good old Christian practice of sending kids to choir. We used to have it. Send kids to learn vedas and slokas. We have lost that. That instills the feel of music early in one's speech. As a creature of Sama Vedic origin, I can naturally impulse if not music, rhythm in speech... why sometimes even silences or the sounds of nature around us. I pride myself with that.

We value words and learn to value speech. On stage no word should come out if actors don't feel those words. But every word uttered should have belief; for which a realisation of the importance of the words is necessary. I hope Midsummer would highlight that at least partially. At the moment am not at all happy on that front. Porko comes close sometimes. Trupti gets most of the times. Neeta is a bundle of joyful energy and nerve to watch, but she belches out emotions in a squealish way than poetic. Else, Shyam and Srividya and Aditi get that feel for Iamb. But it is either Iamb or Emotion. Never both together. Things either sound poetry rendered or prosody of emotions. God help.

Synopsis Cover Page of my Ph.D Dissertation

The Following is the cover page reproduction of my Ph.D Dissertation. All these days, I hadn't felt like proclaiming my doctoral status to the world, because I had worked so much for it and thanks to the vagaries of the University administation, by the time I got my degree, it was of no use and I had wandered from academic scholastics to theatrical dramatics. I shall post my entire synopsis and thesis as well as my other scholarly (!) writings and publications elsewhere in a website that doesn't hog the blog bytes. Await the link! - KKTHEDOC

‘absurd, but Grotesque...’
An Analytical Study
of
Selected Stage Plays of Friedrich Dürrenmatt






A SYNOPSIS

of the thesis to be
submitted in partial fulfilment of
the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
of the
UNIVERSITY OF MADRAS



By

KRISHNA KUMAR S










DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
UNIVERSITY OF MADRAS
MADRAS - 600 005
AUGUST 1996

Giving... forgiving...

Ok... this is a question of flux. There are people who give and people who take. And then there are people who take and take and at some point you expect them to give and yet no sign. So do you stop giving? I thought and thought... and here goes: if you are a giving person, there is no way you are going to stop giving. Because giving is a voluntary thing. It does not give with a sense of returns. And forgiveness! What of it? No idea. I am the sort of person who gives a long rope and puts up with the elastic idea that the world is bad but not without hope. And there comes a point when you decide enough is enough. Then there is the point of no comebacks. There is no forgiveness beyond that. Just give-uppance. My thoughts for this weekend completed.

Stand Art - Standard Art - ART

I am faced with the following existential angst. How do I realise my visions of the kind of art and theatre I want to do in the current geographical set-up I live in? Would I have done justice to myself if I don't satisfy my needs as an artist? Should I pander to public tastes and commercial desires? Every artist's conundrum, this.

Anyway, these are the questions that specifically threaten me from my work.

What do you do when the existing vocabulary is not enough to express your vision?

Do you create vocabulary within the existing confines of grammar, what ever be the art, the tradition, the milieu?

How private does this vocabulary remain?

Does it / can it serve others of similar dilemma and angst, and hence become a public vocabulary?

If it goes on to do that, how much of the intensity remains in me the next time I use this vocabulary? Is it still mine any more?

Who draws the cutting standards to ratify, attest or authorise this derived vocabulary? Do we even - anarchically speaking - need an authorisation from others?

Some of the people who I would like to meet and ask these questions:

Wynton Marsalis, John Coltrane, Wassily Kandinsky, Paul Klee, Adam Gilchrist, Wolfgang Mozart, Christian Morgenstern, Marius von Meyenburg, Quentin Tarantino, Sarah Kane, George Lucas, John Williams, Ustad Allaudin Khan & Jesus Christ!

Am I mad? Feel free!