The Glass Palace

I just finished another book by Amitav Ghosh…The Glass Palace. I loved it. This time he weaves a story about Burma and India during the British rule. Apart from a rather abrupt ending, the book is fantastic. Specially the first part about the Burmese royal family.

This passage is at the end, when an intense character, Dinu, talks about Aung San Suu Kyi.

‘Its strange.. I knew her father and many others who were in politics.. But she is the only leader I’ve ever been able to believe in.’

‘Why?’

‘Because she is the only one who seems to understand what the place of politics is.. what it ought to be.. that while misrule and tyranny must be resisted, so too must politics itself.. that is cannot be allowed to cannibalise all of life, all of existence. To me this is the most terrible indignity of our condition – not just in Burma, but in many other places.. that politics has invaded everything, spared nothing.. religion,art,family.. it has taken over everythiong.. there is no escape from it.. and yet, what could be more trivial, in the end?.. She understands this.. only she.. and this is what makes her much greater than a politician...’

And no.. I have not written down this passage as it applies to todays Raj Thackeray and Pramod Muthalik world.. You must read the book to realize what a profound thing has been said by Ghosh here.