Is 'Existentialism' just about pessimism, hopelessness and despair?

"Existentialism is nothing else but an attempt to draw conclusions from a consistently atheistic position. Its intention is not in the least that of plunging men into despair. And if by despair one means--as the Christians do--any attitude of unbelief, the despair of the existentialists is something very different. Existentialism is not atheist in the sense that it would exhaust itself in demonstrations of the non-existence of God. It declares, rather, that even if God existed that would make no difference from its point of view. Not that we believe God does exist, but we think that the real problem is not that of His existence; what man needs is to find himself again and to understand that nothing can save him from himself, not even a valid proof of the existence of God. In this sense existentialism is optimistic, it is a doctrine of action and it is only by self-deception, by confusing their own despair with ours that Christians can describe us as without hope."
--“Existentialism and humanism” (1948), Jean-Paul Sartre

On roads and highways

Someone asked me what I think about, while driving long distances (across the highways)…

For eight days I had been scrapping my shoes on the stones of the roads…writes Rimbaud.
Road: a strip of ground over which one walks. A highway differs from a road not only because it is solely intended for vehicles, but also because it is merely a line that connects one point with another. A highway has no meaning in itself; its meaning derives entirely from the two points that it connects. A road is a tribute to space. Every stretch of road has meaning in itself and invites us to stop. A highway is the triumphant devaluation of space, which thanks to it has been reduced to a mere obstacle to human movement and waste of time.
Before roads and paths disappeared from the landscape, they had disappeared from the human soul: Man stopped wanting to walk, to walk on his own feet and to enjoy it. What’s more, he no longer saw his own life as a road but as a highway: a line that led from one point to another, from the rank of captain to the rank of general, from the role of wife to the role of widow. Time became a mere obstacle to life, an obstacle that has to be overcome by ever greater speed.
Road and highway; these are also two different conceptions of beauty. When Paul says that at a particular place the landscape is beautiful, that means: if you stopped the car at that place, you might see a beautiful fifteenth century castle surrounded by a park; or a lake reaching far into the distance, with swans floating on its brilliant surface.
In the world of highways, a beautiful landscape means: an island of beauty, connected by a long line with other islands of beauty.
In the world of roads and paths, beauty is continuous and constantly changing; it tells us at every step: “Stop!”
The world of roads was the world of fathers. The world of highways was the world of husbands. And Agnes’s story closes like a circle: from the world of road to that of highways, and now back again. For Agnes is moving to Switzerland. That decision has already been made, and this is the reason that throughout the last two weeks she has been feeling so continuously and madly happy.
---‘Immortality’ (1990), Milan Kundera

Where the blood became white

I have learnt in my high school biology that cockroaches and some other creatures have white blood. But let me tell you, human beings can also have white blood. What if a man is stabbed and the redness of the blood made white through some intelligent optical manipulation? If that is done on every person stabbed (and possibly announced in CNN or BBC) the world will slowly start believing that blood is white. Is it not?

And there was an emperor in India, the land known for its rich culture and heritage, who did the same and managed to become famous for the technique he did.

Ok, let me end this rhetoric here….That emperor was none else than Shah Jahan, who amputated the hands of some 20,000 workers, who constructed his ‘white building’, called the Taj Mahal. This is the monument which declared that human blood could be white. Some historians (probably the western historians who first elevated this white building with a criminal background, to one of the seven wonders of the world) advocate that Shah Jahan cut only the main mason’s hand(s) of; that too his right hand alone. Hmm…what an intelligent consolation!

Anyways, even I don’t know the truth. Regardless of the quantity of hands, I ought to believe this widely known fact. I can’t afford to make myself disbelieve this genocide just because the world around me cherishes the Taj as the ostentatious archetype of love.

For me, this is a brutal tragedy; a red-handed truth of human massacre; a totally unnecessary and very much avoidable killing, just executed for the sadistic advantage of petty human ego and selfishness. Added to that comes the colossal loss of the rich artistic and cultural heritage of that time, through the elimination of those artists. None of the history text books known to man might mention this; for the history is just a story written and publicized by the powerful and the successful.

The Taj is not the symbol of love; but of the vicious annihilation of love; for, love by any definition means, not the self centered love constrained to the familial boundaries comprising of one’s wife, children or to a few selected people within the limited range of one’s perception. To love a wife and to murder (yes cutting the hands is equivalent to murder, to me and I am sure that most of them would have just perished; because they wouldn’t have been able to work without their two hands to find enough food to keep themselves alive!!!) 20,000 others, for the selfish (which is often portrayed as the greatest and unique merit of Taj Mahal!!!) motive of maintaining the uniqueness of the Taj is the greatest atrocity in disguise, I can ever manage to find in the history of mankind, I have known about.

For me, Shah Jahan was just a brutal murderer and a cold-blooded perpetrator of human genocide, who doesn’t hold the minimal eligibility to be presented by the history as the magnanimous constructor of the marble monument epitomizing human love. It is one of the biggest faults of the Indian and the world history to have not demoted the name of that person to the notorious list comprising of Hitler, Idi Amin, Narendra Modi and the infinite others. And it is one of the biggest ironies in the behavioral history of human beings that, the world enjoys and glorifies the whiteness of this monument and consciously or ignorantly shut their eyes and heart towards the red-naked truth of the blood that would have covered the entire Agra, when the 40,000 hands, trembled with their last life and played the rhythm of the most horrible form of death. But the avalanche of their tears would have swept the lava of their blood away, facilitating the hands of power to imprint their euphoric stories about the Taj onto the minds of the insensitive and illiterate world outside; a world which can function only on the stories of the powerful and the successful; a world of human beings whose existence itself is a quintessential function of the gallons of blood shed since the advent of mankind. Yes, this ‘bloody’ Mahal will cast its cruel white glow forever to overshadow the periodic red bloodsheds on this planet...It was created to cheer at the great American genocide of the red Indians, the genocides in Armenia, Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, Nanking, Ukraine, Nandigram, Godhra and Iraq, the two big world wars, 2008 Olympics in China and whichever going to happen to sustain the future of mankind. It will exist forever to proclaim this ‘blood’y eternal truth about man and mankind.

Courtesy: To Amit, for an (lazy) afternoon discussion on this topic.

Individuality and Success

Is life a trade off between individuality and success? The ironies I have been experiencing and observing around me, have forced me come into terms with the fact that individuality and success don’t coexist, in the best of their degrees

I have come across several real-life and fictional characters with strong individuality and some other successful people with good individuality but often diplomatically comprising to the situations favoring their public acceptance or appreciation. History talks about several such heros, in music, in art forms, in literature, in research, and in other realms of life.

What I try to imply by the term, Success, is the general appreciation or the glory conferred upon a person by the system or the society of which he is a part of, since it’s a highly relativistic term.

I have often wondered why some people maintain their strong individuality in all occasions. Probably because they have a self appreciation and the strong feeling of satisfaction about their quality of being uncompromisingly individualistic. And for them they may be certainly the most successful and satisfied folks on the earth. Or sometimes they may not be even caring to think about the meaning of success.

An artistic figure whom I respect much for his individuality is none else than Palghat Mani Iyer. How Mani iyer, maintaining in tact his strong individuality and tacit straight forwardness, could get renowned as a great starlwart by the people in common and simultaneously by the most knowledged, is something that always fascinates and perplexes me. But that is moreover an empirical truth which none could/can ever deny. Needless to mention is the truth that, his fame and glory were not something he earned in a day or two; much unlike the present day Guinness bookers or the Big brothers who shoot into immortal vainglory within a few days of public gimmickry. During MDR’s Padmasri award felicitation ceremony, Mani Iyer noted, “Never play for the masses. Instead, train them to hear and appreciate what we play”. I sincerely doubt whether there is any artist today, who have the guts to proclaim and adhere to this.

Another embodiment of individuality is the Varadadasar, Sri MD Ramanathan. He is, I would say, the man who gave a new definition for the term, ‘individuality’ in carnatic music. Much obviously, his was not such a colorful life in terms of glories and stardom.

The movie Fountainhead (based on a novel by Ayn Rand) comes to my mind in this context. The protagonist, an architect by birth and profession, is a quintessence of strong individuality. His uncompromising zeal for getting the buildings constructed strictly based on his designs, without any negotiation for aesthetic appeal and fame, makes him grossly an unsuccessful person. And in a tough situation of his life, when another architect pleads with him to use one of his marvelous designs, he agrees to it without demanding even a single dough as compensation, strictly on the condition that the construction be made exactingly according to his plan. But later when he finds that his condition has been neglected he intrepidly ventures to blast down the construction!

The list of such figures is endless. In Carnatic Music itself if I can cite the names of several such great artists as TK Murthy Sir, Palghat Raghu Sir… how many more such purists would have immortalized their niche in other forms of music, performing arts, literature, sciences and philosophies of other nations, other civilizations…It was nothing else for their undiluted faith in their meritorious creations, that they stood for. It was that confidence of them, the purists, to surpass all the powers of social doctrines based on superficiality and ignorance. Their contributions were out of the ample time they made found for themselves unlike their mediocre counterparts, who might have probably wasted their time in getting themselves preached.

My earnest salutations to all the masterminds, especially for the ones whose names are unknown to us just because they weren’t interested in getting their names carved on the sands of history. It would have been nice if our society, to the least, took care not to term them, appallingly as ‘gandhians” or ‘idiosyncratic brats’ if not try to become eligible and meritorious enough to realize and acknowledge their contributions.

The Valentine's day

This year, as usual, the Valentine’s Day made a huge hue and cry, with a mega increase in the pomposity of celebrations, and subsequent increase in the number and strength of hollow protests by political parties and organizations which claim themselves as the moral police ‘meant’ for the prevention of social evils.
Hearing the term Valentine’s day, arouses in me no more than a contemptible laughter, pitying the necessity of a unique day to express one of the basic emotions of human beings called LOVE. Emotions are simply instantaneous and unpredictable phenomena. It is hard to compel oneself to evoke emotions. Emotional joy or ecstasy comes out of inner contentment, which may have various triggering factors in various individuals. I wonder how people can derive inner joy when they receive some ready made roses or greeting cards with the boring romantic clichés encrypted in a jargoned fashion. This time, as I understand, there have been a number of ‘innovative’ but fundamentally absurd and ridiculous ways celebrating V day. Thanks to the media and the corporate, who have with them the power to make anything sane or insane.

Why do we need a separate day to express our love to our loved ones? Do we need a Mother’s day, Father’s day or sister’s day? Does that mean that we don’t love them on other days? These are some of the obvious logical questions against the credibility of the V day. Love is in the work you do to earn a living, love is there when you give your seat in a crowded bus to an old man, love is there when you switch off the fans and lights of your workroom after your use, love is there when you put a blasting metal music in a low volume, so as not to disturb your neighbors! Love is something ubiquitous in everything you see, in everything you do, in everything you think. Love is about the sensitivity of our hearts, it is about how we respect and care to bother for our fellow beings, how we identify the emotions and ethos of others with ours. Just that love has different forms and manifestations depending on the individuals, situations they encounter and the relations they maintain.
Anyway I don’t enforce anyone to regard my concepts of love as universally true. The least I can or shall do is just keep myself away from celebrating the Vday, so as to happily uphold and feel satisfied about the principles I believe in.
Though I find the whole idea of V day obscurely ludicrous, I defend the right of an individual to celebrate it. I have to acknowledge the existence of such individuals who derive pleasure and satisfaction from celebrating the Vday. Hence I pity the politicians and the conservative jingoists who bark like dogs trying to invite the whole attention to their stubborn ideology which they foolishly advocate to be solely universal. It is a well known fact, but a rarely respected fact, that the constitution provides each and every citizen the right to celebrate any festival in whatever way he/she likes, provided it does not debilitate the right of his/her fellow citizen. Such a fundamental right existing, I wonder why those political scoundrels are not arrested by law, for harassing and hampering the constitutional rights of others. What eligibility do they have to proclaim themselves as the custodians of our culture and heritage? Why don’t they target the bollywood heroes and babes who have been playing the significant role, in redefining the whole concept of ‘Indian’ness and Indian culture and legitimizing extreme boundaries of love and sex?


Be it fortunate or unfortunate, I believe that, all these changes are simply the habitual results of a large scale influence of westernization and globalization phenomena. Whether we need such a superficial amalgamation of cultures and social customs is a question too profound to answer. Today when westernization is the only criterion that wholly defines development and prosperity in all fields of Indian life, the popularity of the V day sentiments among the middle class Indian youth doesn’t give any special surprise. But what I plead to ask is, don’t we have enough number of indigenous festivals that uphold the concepts of love and prosperity? Don’t we have myriads of prestigious classical and traditional art forms, dance and music, that calls for love and peace, perhaps in a more subtle and respectable manner?

Westerners don’t have any similar fests and when they celebrate the V day they may be probably, quite sincere and contented about it. They are in a different cultural domain of emotional expression and formality where such a unique day can’t be regarded as something preposterous. But when it is celebrated in India, it largely becomes a vainglorious symbol of artificiality and meaninglessness, lacking emotional sensitivity and faith. It becomes just another opportunity for the market forces to play upon and extract the maximum profit from their prey; the middle class youth who in their bloated euphoria don’t care to ponder over such issues with profound social and cultural implications.
So this cycle of celebrations and protests will continue in the years to come. It is an everlasting battle between the contrasting interpretations of Indian culture and modernism.