Saturday, August 19, 2006

Epiphany

Reading stories and novels, watching movies are past-time pleasures, most of the time. But at times they enrich your understanding, widen your horizons and give you a new perspective. To borrow a phrase, 'Reading literature is as important as studying philosophical/mystical volumes. Great truths would've been expressed in simple, everyday situations!'

I think this happens when you read hemingway, rushdie, camus--not the rowlings and dan browns. Or when you watch kurosawa and satyajit ray, not 'kabhi alvida na kehna' or superman.

A character in Naipaul's novel says--' When my father was on his death bed, his nature changed. From a gentlemanly person, he became a wicked character. He would insult everyone--even my mother, brother, his business associates....Whatever he thought about them, he brought out. He held nothing back. Proximity to death gave him that license and made him fearless, I suppose. He had nothing to lose....'

For me, this is an epiphany. Encountering this situation in the middle of a story rings a thousand bells in you. The effect touches somewhere deep within you, where even a hundred self-help books do not reach.

2 comments:

  1. i came across epiphany when i first read the poem the 'Fish'

    Books do the trick all the time,
    movies too
    and life itself at times...

    the relevation is quited true and shocking but it is there ...

    Ash

    ReplyDelete
  2. The Rev. Alan Jones, an Episcopal priest in met in St. Louis, Missouri, many years ago just as he returned from a 2-year trip visiting many different types of monasteries throughout the world said as much. He said he was finding more theology to reflect upon in fiction—in novels—than he was in theology books.

    ReplyDelete