Love Uncle: I guess you would have to smear some butter on it and then microwave it for ten minutes.Scott and Wendy are a couple. One day Scott returns home while Wendy is watering the plants. They have sex. Daniel and Amanda are their neighbours. Amanda watches Scott and Wendy have it and then goes and has it with Daniel. Amanda and Wendy meet at a supermarket where they have some profound conversation, like how they can't have enough of it, for five minutes which ends in a lesbian dalliance. Scott has sex with Amanda; Wendy has sex with Daniel.
Finale: They all have sex together – except for Scott and Daniel.
| Anouncer: | And now it's time for Novel Writing, which today come from the west country on Dorset. |
| Commentator: | Hello, and welcome to Dorchester, where a very good crowd has turned out to watch local boy Thomas Hardy write his new novel "The Return Of The Native", on this very pleasant July morning. This will be his eleventh novel and the fifth of the very popular Wessex novels, and here he comes! Here comes Hardy, walking out towards his desk. He looks confident, he looks relaxed, very much the man in form, as he acknowledges this very good natured bank holliday crowd. And the crowd goes quiet now, as Hardy settles himself down at the desk, body straight, shoulders relaxed, pen held lightly but firmly in the right hand. He dips the pen...in the ink, and he's off! It's the first word, but it's not a word - oh, no! - it's a doodle. Way up on the top of the lefthand margin is a piece of meaningless scribble - and he's signed his name underneath it! Oh dear, what a disapointing start. But his off again - and here he goes - the first word of Thomas Hardy's new novel, at ten thirtyfive on this very lovely morning, it's three letters, it's the definite article, and it's "The". Dennis. |
| Dennis: | Well, this is true to form, no surprises there. He started five of his eleven novels to date with the definite article. We had two of them with "It", there's been one "But", two "At"s, one "On" and a "Dolores", but that of course was never published. |
| Commentator: | I'm sorry to interrupt you there, Dennis, but he's crossed it out. Thomas Hardy, here on the first day of his new novel, has crossed out the only word he has written so far, and he's gazing off into space. Oh, ohh, there he signed his name again. |
| Dennis: | It looks like "Tess of the D'Urbervilles" all over again. |
| Commentator: | But he's...no, he's down again and writting, Dennis, he's written "B" again, he's crossed it out again, and he has written "A" - and there is a second word coming up straight away, and it's "Sat" - "A Sat" - doesn't make sense - "A Satur" - "A Saturday" - it's "A Saturday", and the crowd are loving it, they are really enjoying this novel. And it's "afternoon", it's "Saturday afternoon", a comfortable beginning, and he's straight on to the next word - it's "in" - "A Saturday afternoon in" - "in" - "in" "in Nov" - "November" - November is spelled wrong, he's left out the second "E", but he's not going back, it looks like he's going for the sentence, and it's the first verb coming up - it's the first verb of the novel, and it's "was", and the crowd are going wild! "A Saturday afternoon in November was", and a long word here - "appro" - "appro" - is it a "approving"? - no, it's "approaching" - "approaching" - "A Saturday afternoon in November was approaching" - and he's done the definite article "but" again. And he's writing fluently, easily with flurring strokes of the pen, as he comes up to the middle of this first sentence. And with this eleventh novel well underway, and the prospects of a good days writing ahead, back to the studio. |
One of the things people like best about Jaipur is that we are completely egalitarian. There are no reserved spaces for grandees, no green room or specially roped enclosure for our authors – they mingle with the crowds and eat with them on a first-come, first-served basis. Salman Rushdie, who made his first public appearance in India since the publication of The Satanic Verses, as well as Bollywood stars such as Aamir Khan and Amitabh Bachchan, have all mixed in the crowds without bodyguards or VIP enclosures. In as hierarchical a country as India, this is all rather radical.
t is this egalitarian ethic that excites the Indian press much more than the literary aspect of the festival. Last year, there was a flurry of press when Vikram was seen eating on the ground as there was no space for him on any of the dining tables, and when one senior Indian literary editor found herself joining the queue for the ladies behind Tina Brown.
But the biggest excitement of the last year was when an Australian volunteer usher rather peremptorily asked two beautiful young women to move out of the aisle as they were blocking an exit, apparently unaware that the women in question were the adored Bollywood goddess Nandita Das and Julia Roberts. To their great credit, both women moved immediately and without complaint.
K leans over the balcony railing, watching something. ‘There are pigeons sleeping there’, he points to the top of the balcony down below. We watch them over cigarettes and he rolls his parathas in his hand and munches them thoughtfully. A clap of thunder follows a lightening tearing the dark sky like a thin old cloth. We stub our cigarettes and sign off for the day. I go to sleep, K to his book.
I wake up at three to a steady drumming noise outside – the slash of the rain on the glass door to the balcony. I heave myself from the bed and my feet find the slippers. I pull away the curtain, and pull the sliding glass-door slightly ajar – even at this height, I can smell the wet earth below. The curtain gently billows with the wind that sneaks in through the crack. I strip naked, leave the slippers inside, and walk into the balcony. I stand holding the railing, my eyes closed against the rain.
‘Why does it rain?’, I ask Ba looking at the dark clouds as we take shelter under the tin shed.
‘To make us wet, buddhoo! What else?’, she laughs.
I feel the water rise against my ankle. I gingerly move towards the switch on the balcony light, switch it on with a short jab from the finger and look towards the drain, and find a rag blocking it. I remove it and lay it over the railing, and the water level recedes. I switch the light off, go back to the railing, and close my eyes again to the warm rivulets tracing their streams from my hair to the hollow roundness around my eyes to the mounts of my cheeks to the nape of my neck to my torso to my legs.
‘We all have our own memories of the rain’, she tells me as we watch the rains sitting on the steps of the front door, our bare feet getting wet, ‘It’s like the moon – we don’t share it with everyone like we share the sun – it speaks to each of us differently.’ She pauses and the rain drums louder on the leaves. ‘Every monsoon which comes reawakens a joy in me. But it’s always a little sadder than before.’ The rains fall harder and we pull our feet in. She hugs her shins and rests her chin on the valley of her knees. ‘I wonder why’, she whispers.
The orange glow behind my eyelids from the sudden glare of the bulb darkens to a purple and slowly blacks out.
Because it reminds us of what we’ve lost.
