If you want to understand how to become better allies to people with disabilities, then join us at Embracing All Abilities: Including People with Disabilities at Work.
Anjum Hasan’s Difficult Pleasures is a collection of short stories that deal with the sheer essence of human life – emotion
Anjum Hasan’s Difficult Pleasures
Anjum Hasan’s Difficult Pleasures is a collection of short stories that deal with the sheer essence of human life – emotion.
Review by Rashi Goel
Difficult Pleasures is a compilation of 13 short stories – each about different people feeling completely different emotions as they live out 13 absolutely different situations and lives. But they have two emotions constant – anger and sadness that go deep but are visible starkly on almost every page of this book.
The emotions of married couples – each one’s anger and bitterness at war with their great love and caring; the innocent yet adult and coherent thoughts of children with respect to parents; the struggles of a young photographer and the triumphs of an old artist; the dreams of a village boy and the ideals of a philosophy professor – Hasan takes us up and down not just through various parts of the world, but also through various parts of our minds. As you read, you feel contradicting emotions – at times you want to support the protagonist and at times despise them. This is what makes this book so special.
Anjum Hasan’s characters are ordinary people and yet far from ordinary – the antipodes. Most of them have a simultaneous fullness and emptiness in their lives – they take the simple situations they’re in and turn them into a complex mess. They are us. They could be any one of us. They are strong. While the normal tendency is to head for the familiar and the known, these characters want to be lost for a while and then perhaps head towards uncharted territory. We can learn a thing or two from them. These characters breathe life into their stories not through their words but through their thoughts and subtle actions thereby leaving a lot to the readers’ imagination.
Personally I’m not a fan of open ended conclusions – they leave me feeling nervous and unsettled but Hasan has a way of lending a hopeful note to the ends of her stories. The kind of writing present in this book is rare – subtle yet hard hitting entwined with irony and humour. The ‘open end’ of the stories leaves you to ‘complete’ it in your head. For this reason, it took some time for me to let Hasan’s writing style grow on me.
I would have to say my favourite stories in this book are ‘Hanging On Like Death’ and ‘Birds’. Both stories depict a child’s emotions towards a parent. While one little boy Neel desperately seeks the approval of his father, the other little boy Samir tries to deal with the death of his mother. The author has portrayed the emotions of these children beautifully. Neel, his maturity, his strength and this last line of the story – “Looking up at her with an eight year old’s solemn pride, he says ‘My Father’.’”- all moved me to tears.
In certain places Hasan’s writing style is so crisp that she expresses the most complex and confusing emotions with such ease in a single line. She is most definitely an author who has taken the time to study people and understand them as one would understand family – “…our habitual wanderings create grooves that we can comfortably slip into” is a line from ‘The Big Picture’ which is so small and simple yet so profound and full of wisdom.
While I wouldn’t put Difficult Pleasures down in my list of ‘Favourite Reads’, I would recommend it to those who don’t mind a slow read with open endings. If you’re okay with letting the book grow on you and building a fantasy at the end of each story, then this one is for you.
Publishers: Viking
If you’re planning to purchase Anjum Hasan’s Difficult Pleasures do consider buying it through this Women’s Web affiliate link at Flipkart. We get a small share of the proceeds – every little bit will help us continue bringing you the content you like!
Women's Web is a vibrant community for Indian women, an authentic space for us to be ourselves and talk about all things that matter to us. Follow us via the read more...
Women's Web is an open platform that publishes a diversity of views, individual posts do not necessarily represent the platform's views and opinions at all times.
Stay updated with our Weekly Newsletter or Daily Summary - or both!
Rajshri Deshpande, who played the fiery protagonist in Trial by Fire along with Abhay Deol speaks of her journey and her social work.
Rajshri Deshpande as the protagonist in ‘Trial by Fire’, the recent Netflix show has received raving reviews along with the show itself for its sensitive portrayal of the Uphaar Cinema Hall fire tragedy, 1997 and its aftermath.
The limited series is based on the book by the same name written by Neelam and Shekhar Krishnamoorthy, who lost both their children in the tragedy. We got an opportunity to interview Rajshri Deshpande who played Neelam Krishnamoorthy, the woman who has been relentlessly crusading in the court for holding the owners responsible for the sheer negligence.
Rajshri Deshpande is more than an actor. She is also a social warrior, the rare celebrity from the film industry who has also gone back to her roots to give to poverty struck farming villages in her native Marathwada, with her NGO Nabhangan Foundation. Of course a chance to speak with her one on one was a must!
“What is a woman’s job, Ramesh? Taking care of parents-in-law, husband, children, home and things at work—all at the same time? She isn’t God or a superhuman."
The arrays of workstations were occupied by people peering into their computer screens. The clicks of keyboard keys were punctuated by the occasional footsteps moving around to brainstorm or collaborate with colleagues in their cubicles. Most employees went about their tasks without looking at the person seated on either side of their workstation. Meenakshi was one of them.
The thirty-one-year-old marketing manager in a leading eCommerce company in India sat straight in her seat, her eyes on the screen, her fingers punching furiously into the keys. She was in a flow and wanted to finish the report while the thoughts and words were coming effortlessly into her mind.
Natu-Natu. The mellifluous ringtone interrupted her thoughts. She frowned at her mobile phone with half a mind to keep it ringing until she noticed the caller’s name on the screen, making her pick up the phone immediately.
Please enter your email address