September in October

 What kind of a person sets out to find romance and instead chooses murder? Me. Obviously I’m talking about reading — from the creased titles of crime writing on my bookshelf, I’ve gathered that murder in real life requires more focused attention than I’m likely to lavish on violence. For instance, I can absolutely see myself heading out, determined to buy a gun, only to get distracted by a sunset. Or some really pretty stationery. But I digress. Of late, the books in my Kindle or on my bedside table have all been dense (more on that later) and so, the other day, I thought it would be nice to have a tonal shift. Entirely set on getting a Mills & Boon, I started looking for romances only to find myself, five minutes later, in the middle of a clutch of cosy mysteries.

Like I said, for better or for worse, this is not the kind of focus that will get murders done in real life.

Mary Winters’ Murder in Postscript is set in Victorian London and her protagonist is Countess Amelia Amesbury, a young widow who has a secret life as an agony aunt for a newspaper. When she receives a letter that speaks of a suspected murder and that letter writer is found dead in a park, Amelia sets herself the task of uncovering the killer. Sleuthing while being an aristocratic lady requires some deft multitasking, especially since Amelia lives with her husband’s stern aunt and not-so-stern niece. There’s also a dashingly handsome marquis in the mix, but if you’re hoping for a romance, don’t get your hopes up. Murder in Postscript is the first in a series and Winters knows that the best part of a love story is not in the happy ending, but in the road to it. 

It seems wrong to describe a murder mystery as easy and breezy, but that’s Murder in Postscript. Amelia is pleasant enough, the mystery is interesting (until we reach the resolution, which is meh), yet there’s something very uncompelling about this novel. The beginning sets the scene well, but in later chapters, Winters struggles to figure out ways to get Amelia out of the house while remaining credibly within the conventions she’s laid out for this faux-Victorian society. In parts, Murder in Postscript feels like something written by someone who loved the Enola Holmes mysteries, but didn’t have as much invention or wit in their writing. Bottom line: Murder in Postscript is one of those cosy mysteries that is perfect for when your brain has given up. You could abandon the book halfway, and it wouldn’t bother you for even half a second. Or you could finish it and cheerfully forget most of what happened in the novel within 15 minutes. It also made me appreciate just what a fantastic job Agatha Christie did with the Miss Marple mysteries. 

Much better written is Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld, which Bijal recommended to me (I think I read it in August, not September; but whatevs). Bijal and I are both voracious romance readers, but our preferences are different. I tend to go for smart and smutty, and if a romance wants to keep me interested without some graphic lusty action, it better be sparkling with wit and charm. Bijal veers towards romances that are well-written, well-observed and well-behaved. True to her style, Romantic Comedy is PG-13 and entirely delightful, offering a contemporary take on the ye-olde-trope of the lead pair falling in love over letters. Sally’s a writer for a late-night comedy show that’s a lot like Saturday Night Live. Noah’s a pop star whose path crosses with Sally’s when he guest-hosts an episode of the show. Through their relationship, Sittenfeld slyly looks at gender biases, social rituals and the sweet comfort that make love stories so damn special. Also, it’s very funny. Think You’ve Got Mail, but more feminist and set in the Covid era.

Time for a mini epiphany. I was listening to the current season of Anita Anand and William Dalrymple’s excellent podcast Empire and one of their guests was Simon Sebag Montefiore. He came on their podcast just a week after I’d finished his majestic book on Russian monarchy, The Romanovs. What a coinkidink, I thought. But is it really? Anand and Dalrymple’s podcast made its way to Russia and its imperial ambitions because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. They’re looking at the history and constantly finding parallels with the present, and also showing how much the past impacts the present. Which led to…

… a lightbulb moment in my head. Here are the books about or set in Russia I’ve read (or re-read in parts) in the last few months: The Lost Pianos of Siberia, Mikhail and Margarita, Anna of all the Russias: A Life of Anna Akhmatova, The Romanovs, Natasha’s Dance. All excellent books, by the way, and while they’re not the only books I’ve read, there’s a distinct pattern here if one is looking for it. Case in point: Mr.B, which I just finished yesterday. I thought I’d moved heaven and earth to get a copy of Jennifer Homan’s biography of dancer and choreographer George Balanchine because it won a Pulitzer this year and because I couldn’t remember having actually read a book about any dance, even though I love watching all dance. While all that is true, Mr. B also fits very snugly into the Russo-centric reading list that I’ve unwittingly been following. (If anyone has suggestions of Ukrainian history or fiction, I’m all ears.)

George Balanchine was one of the most brilliant choreographers and is considered the father of American ballet. He was born in St. Petersburg to a proudly Georgian (and bigamous) father. His early childhood was spent in Finland but that idyll ended when was accepted into the Imperial Ballet School at age nine. Separated from his family, he would survive revolutions, World War I and illness, and leave the Soviet Union in 1924. After some years in Europe, in 1934, he came to America upon the invitation of arts patron Lincoln Kirstein, and the country became home. He had four wives, one common-law partner, and many lovers. He died in New York City, in 1983.  

(Photo by Ernst Haas/Hulton Archive)

It’s an incredible life, lived during some of the most turbulent periods in modern history. That’s good enough reason to read a biography, but Homans is why Mr. B is unputdownable. First, there’s her research. Balanchine, who described himself as “a cloud in trousers” is a difficult man to pin down (that phrase is borrowed from a line by Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky to whom Homans attributes another lightning-bright phrase: “All is new! Stop and marvel!”). His childhood years are not neatly archived and he often embroidered the past when recounting it later. Of his dance and his process, he was fiercely protective. Homans says his ballet troupe was almost like a secret society. Still, Homans’s patient research brings together records, letters, diaries, interviews she conducted with 200 dancers, and historical facts, tied together with the ribbon-like beauty of her prose. Here’s an example: 

“Equilibrium is forever perilous, and the stage floor at the Mariinsky [Theatre] was dangerously raked, slanted at a sharp angle so that audiences could better see the whole. Dancers learned to calibrate their balance and weight on this disorienting incline, like dancing on the deck of a ship tilting to sink.” 

Elsewhere, she writes, “Dancers’ bodies are like the memory palaces of antiquity,” which is beautiful on its own and perfection as a description of Balanchine’s work. The czarist Russian culture in which he was immersed as a child was erased by revolution, but traces of it lingered, mingling with influences from so many other cultures as well as Balanchine’s distinctively original choreography. There’s fondness in her narrative voice as she details his dance and his life, but she doesn’t turn a blind eye to uncomfortable details (like the times he used blackface in his choreography or the romances that he had with vulnerable young dancers).         

Mr. B is a gem. I’ve lingered over its sentences, scribbled notes, highlighted sections and already thinking of how wonderful it will be to revisit it. Here’s Homans’s description of one part of a performance titled The Four Temperaments:

“The body dismantled like a machine. A once-strong supporting leg bent and broken like a warped metal pipe. A man pivoting a woman like he is screwing a twisted nail into the floor. A woman thrusting her hips jarringly off-kilter and swinging into a gyrating arabesque that her partner can barely control. There is sex, but it is mechanical: a woman’s legs split wide to the audience; a man’s thigh jutting phallically between her legs as their bodies interlock. They do not melt or romantically join, but instead assemble like industrial parts. Dancers climb in and out of their own movements, squatting, skittering, backs humped with effort, and at times they appear dismembered, joints broken. There is no easy flow, and the steps and phrases unfold like the montage of static images in Balanchine’s choreographic notes: a man without a memory cannot see a dance.” 

There’s a photo by Paul Kolnik from a performance of The Four Temperaments that I think of when I read “a man without a memory cannot see a dance”:

Coming back to Mr. B, I don’t think you can write like this if you haven’t known dance in your own body, which Homans has, having trained at Balanchine’s School of American Ballet (not for the book. She’s also a former professional dancer). I hope someone will be able to write biographies like this about Indian dance greats, whose lives and work are slipping out of conversation and memory.  

Something that comes through again and again in Mr. B is how magpie-esque Balanchine was, collecting influences and inspirations from different cultures. Is it offensive? (Occasionally.) Is there a whiff of appropriation? (No.) How much of a part do factors like race, age and power dynamics  play in this power dynamic? (A lot.) Balanchine was once described as a man who was liberal in his heart and conservative in his gut, which Homans brings out in her biography. He was also someone who took creativity seriously and you see this in the way he threw himself into the art that appealed to him. Homans’s careful record of his artistic influences is a great reminder of how cultures are enriched when they engage with one another through the medium of an artist.  

This idea is also at the heart of Martin Puchner’s Culture: A New World History, which sounds like one of those annoying, crash-course-esque books that reduce history and cultures to a wordy Powerpoint presentation, but is actually the opposite. There’s another edition of this book, which has the title Culture: The Story of Us, From Cave Art to K-Pop. It’s not snappy, but it’s a much better summary of Puchner’s argument. 

Puchner is one of those people whose work seems to stand as a counterpoint to the culture of specialisation that has dominated the past few decades. Part historian, part literary critic, part philosopher, Puchner brings a range of topics into his writing and emphasises that culture is about connections, not cateogries. In The Written Word, which covers everything from Gilgamesh to Harry Potter, he looked at how writing as a practice developed. It’s a delightful read that covers thousands of years with smooth ease. Culture also does the equivalent of a pub crawl through world cultures, and this time it’s to establish how cultural products have thrived or survived because outsiders encountered them. Puchner’s point is that for knowledge from one culture to be passed down generations, it needs to go beyond its boundaries and that sometimes happens with a translation; sometimes it takes an archaeological dig. The book is a joyous reminder that cultural exchange and resonances don’t have to be mired in appropriation. It’s possible to love another’s culture and despite politics and hierarchies, one culture can be enriched by foreign influences.

I’m writing to you from Kolkata, a city where I don’t belong but which has grudgingly become home because of my parents. I’m at my parents’ dining table and scattered around me are seven newspapers (yes, they get seven newspapers. Daily), two boxes of medicines (one for each parent), the latest Keigo Higashino (which my dad wasn’t impressed by), Lizzie Collingham’s The Biscuit (which my mum has approved of), the latest edition of the literary magazine Biblio (which I’d forgotten existed), an old edition of a Bengali little magazine that my father gave me to read an essay describing Ramzan in Bengal (he has not forgotten my vow to read at least one Bengali “thing” every month), and a recipe book my mother has pulled out because she wants to make me something to carry back to Mumbai (I’m not complaining). There are also three cups of tea, cooling swiftly, and a giant jar of ginger biscuits, disappearing just as swiftly. Our three phones are nearby, within hearing, and we’re ignoring the alerts for new messages and emails. A breeze wanders in and out from an open window that looks on to another building’s roof where someone is putting laundry on a washing line, looking up every now and then at the thin layer of clouds in which the October sky has wrapped itself. In a few minutes, I will check email, my parents will surrender to WhatsApp and we’ll all hurtle-turtle into everyday life. Let me leave you before that happens, freeze-framing this slice of life instead, made up of morning tea, rustling pages, hard news, harder recipes and the comfort of literature. May the bric-a-brac of your life come together like mine has to bring you many such precious moments.  

Thanks for reading and Dear Reader will be back soon.