The word “playwright” has always evoked for me one name: George Bernard Shaw. I discovered Shaw, or GBS as most Brits would call him, in 1975, after borrowing his Collected Works from the British Council Library. I would pull a … Continue reading
Ok. I will fess up to the truth. I have been watching The Sopranos. Ironically, the show hardly entered my consciousness during its run because I refused to pay for HBO and because I do not watch crime dramas. But … Continue reading
There is a Marathi saying, “kelyane deshatana, pandita maitri, sabheta sanchar …” I can’t quite remember the second half, but the first part can be roughly translated as follows: Traveling abroad, the company of learned people, and attendance at intellectual … Continue reading
When I was in high school, my best friend Chitra and I won a debating trophy. We had traveled by cycle rickshaw to a vernacular school in the old part of Nagpur, dressed in uniforms of navy blue skirts and … Continue reading
I have always thought of Vegas as a place to avoid. Until recently, Las Vegas was stuck in my mind as a slightly bigger version of Reno; not today’s Reno, mind you, but the Reno I remember from 30 years … Continue reading
If I were to characterize the year 2006 in a singular fashion, I would have to say it was the year that I got addicted to crossword puzzles. It was the year I went over to the other side. It … Continue reading
I vividly remember my first encounter with American tea. It was at a diner. I asked for tea and was served a freezing, brown liquid in a tall glass into which a straw was immersed. Watching my mystified look, a … Continue reading
I don’t know why people have such a need for forming cliques. Perhaps it is human to want to belong to a group. Perhaps some of us can’t shed our tribal heritage. Unfortunately, in the modern world, the tribe thrives, … Continue reading
At the outset, I must confess one thing; I love mysteries. Many of my literary friends consider mystery a genre deserving the label of trash. But I love a good whodunit. I love the suspense, the passion gone awry, the … Continue reading
Many immigrants like me find it hard to believe that America, home to some of the world’s greatest scientists like Albert Einstein and Linus Pauling, has once again been questioning the science of evolution. Like most Indian children of the … Continue reading