मेघदूत: "नीचैर्गच्छत्युपरि दशा चक्रनेमिक्रमेण"

समर्थ शिष्या अक्का : "स्वामीच्या कृपाप्रसादे हे सर्व नश्वर आहे असे समजले. पण या नश्वरात तमाशा बहुत आहे."

G C Lichtenberg: “It is as if our languages were confounded: when we want a thought, they bring us a word; when we ask for a word, they give us a dash; and when we expect a dash, there comes a piece of bawdy.”

C. P. Cavafy: "I’d rather look at things than speak about them."

Martin Amis: “Gogol is funny, Tolstoy in his merciless clarity is funny, and Dostoyevsky, funnily enough, is very funny indeed; moreover, the final generation of Russian literature, before it was destroyed by Lenin and Stalin, remained emphatically comic — Bunin, Bely, Bulgakov, Zamyatin. The novel is comic because life is comic (until the inevitable tragedy of the fifth act);...”

सदानंद रेगे: "... पण तुकारामाची गाथा ज्या धुंदीनं आजपर्यंत वाचली जात होती ती धुंदी माझ्याकडे नाहीय. ती मला येऊच शकत नाही याचं कारण स्वभावतःच मी नास्तिक आहे."

".. त्यामुळं आपण त्या दारिद्र्याच्या अनुभवापलीकडे जाऊच शकत नाही. तुम्ही जर अलीकडची सगळी पुस्तके पाहिलीत...तर त्यांच्यामध्ये त्याच्याखेरीज दुसरं काही नाहीच आहे. म्हणजे माणसांच्या नात्यानात्यांतील जी सूक्ष्मता आहे ती क्वचित चितारलेली तुम्हाला दिसेल. कारण हा जो अनुभव आहे... आपले जे अनुभव आहेत ते ढोबळ प्रकारचे आहेत....."

Kenneth Goldsmith: "In 1969 the conceptual artist Douglas Huebler wrote, “The world is full of objects, more or less interesting; I do not wish to add any more.”1 I’ve come to embrace Huebler’s ideas, though it might be retooled as “The world is full of texts, more or less interesting; I do not wish to add any more.” It seems an appropriate response to a new condition in writing today: faced with an unprecedented amount of available text, the problem is not needing to write more of it; instead, we must learn to negotiate the vast quantity that exists. How I make my way through this thicket of information—how I manage it, how I parse it, how I organize and distribute it—is what distinguishes my writing from yours."

Tom Wolfe: "The first line of the doctors’ Hippocratic oath is ‘First, do no harm.’ And I think for the writers it would be: ‘First, entertain.’"

विलास सारंग: "… . . 1000 नंतर ज्या प्रकारची संस्कृती रुढ झाली , त्यामध्ये साधारणत्व विश्वात्मकता हे गुण प्राय: लुप्त झाले...आपली संस्कृती अकाली विश्वात्मक साधारणतेला मुकली आहे."

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Can one remove the picture of Jew and put in the picture of Muslim?

The Times of India October 21 2009: 'Maharashtra fast turning into a right-wing terror hub'

In March 2009, it was reported: The Tokyo publisher East Press is launching a series of 28 manga versions of important European and Japanese literature. Dostoyevsky is among the bestsellers, along with Dante, Kafka and Hitler’s Mein Kampf.

From time to time, many prominent people in Maharashtra espouse the cause of dictatorship. They want a blank slate once again.

Therefore, it's no surprise that Adolf Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' sells well in Maharashtra. In most book exhibitions at Pune, I find it displayed.

My father's maternal uncle was a big fan of the Führer. Apparently he had a large picture of Hitler hung in his room at his Sadashiv Peth, Pune home during the World War II.

The Times of India reported on February 1 2009:

"...The Fuhrer's political manifesto, Mein Kampf (My Struggle) is a well-thumbed book in India even though it is banned in many European countries...

...It's well-documented that early Hindu nationalists such as Vinayak Savarkar and Madhav Sadashiv Golwalkar were deeply impressed by Nazi ideology.

Their political descendants, including the BJP's L K Advani and the Shiv Sena's Bal Thackeray, have publicly referred to Hitler's ideas and strategy...

'If they grow stronger they can play the part of Sudeten Germans, alright. But if we Hindus in India grow stronger, in time these Muslim friends of the league type will have to play the part of German-Jews instead. We Hindus have taught the Shakas and the Huns already to play that part pretty well. So, it is no use bandying words till the test comes. The taste of the pudding is in its eating.': V D Savarkar, Hindutva ideologue, in Hindu Rashtra Darshan, 1949

'If you take Mein Kampf and if you remove the word Jew and put in the word Muslim, that is what I believe in.': Bal Thackeray, Shiv Sena leader, quoted by Mumbai newspapers before the 1992 riots

L K Advani's prison diary, based on his days of confinement during the Emergency, has frequent references to Hitler's Mein Kampf. He compares fascism with the 'draconian laws' that Indira Gandhi had imposed on the nation during the Emergency in 1975. Advani's book has a specific section titled 'Anatomy of Fascism'. The book also has references to other fascists like Mussolini of Italy and Franco of Spain."

The Times of India reported on October 2, 2009:

"...a comic version of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler's notorious political manifesto has become a hit in Japan - with sales of 45,000 copies since last November.

The manga book describes both Hitler's autobiography and his infamous Nazi manifesto in the unlikely form of easy-to-read comic pictures and captions..."

Bal Thackeray was a cartoonist first before he became a politician. Therefore, he may appreciate Manga Mein Kampf even more.

For an accomplished graphic artist like him, it may be even easy to substitute the pictures of Jews with Muslims!