Sep 21, 2015

Review: Bharathi Baskar's books

I should thank YouTube for introducing me to Mrs.Bharathi Baskar's works. On one of the bored Saturday afternoons, I stumbled upon her talks given at an Engineering college orientation programme as part of my YouTube recommendations. If you can understand Tamil, I highly recommend the two videos. My hubby who doesn't watch much of Tamil programmes loved them too.

Later I realized that she is one of the prominent speakers in various pattimandrams (debate shows). For me, pattimandrams remind me of my childhood when TV channels would play them on festival days at 10 AM. The elders in my family would be glued to them while we (kids) would be happily munching on some sweets or taking a nap. I was never a fan of such debates in growing-up years.

Anyway, coming to the topic, Mrs.Bharathi's speeches are multi-dimensional - humorous, contemporary, thought-provoking, passionate and most importantly, she knows exactly how to connect well with an audience. I have been listening to many of her talks and I've become a big fan of her. During my last trip to Chennai, I made a visit to Vikatan publisher's office and picked up a bunch of books written by Dr.Sivaraman, Nammalvar and Bharathi Baskar.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading her two books - Nee Nathi Pola Odikondiru and Siragai Viri!Para ; both have the same characteristics as that of her powerful speeches.

Nee nadhi pola odikkondiru is a collection of essays focused on women-centric issues at home, work and society. Her examples and anecdotes from her personal life make this book an interesting page-turner. She touches upon various issues such as lost friendships in women's lives, expectations from family, lack of appreciation, importance of personal care, taking ownership of finances etc. My most favorite example in this book is where she compares fridge and a ladies handbag and how we stuff so much into each of them :-) She applies the same logic to the various thoughts we dump into our minds and how they spoil our health, relationships and well-being.

It's a pleasure to read how she links each issue to that of a flowing river. So poetic and mesmerizing! Reminds me of the beautiful song - nadhiye, nadhiye from the movie rhythm.

Siragai viri para is a one-of-a-kind book where the author connects present challenges of the society with examples from mythology, literature, spirituality, religion and history. I felt like I was going back in time to my Tamil and History lessons from school. In one of the chapters, she talks about the story of Manuneedhi Chozhan and the cow and stresses on the leadership qualities and fair justice. It felt so good to rehear this story after a long time that I have started to narrate it to my 3-year old. The author's interest and knowledge across various subjects and her knack of beautifully stringing them together is very inspiring.

I'm so grateful to YouTube for a good recommendation that led me to hear, learn and get inspired by Bharathi Baskar and her works.

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