Book: The Dove's Lament
Author: Kirthi Jayakumar
Publisher: Readomania
Price: Rs 99 (Kindle edition)
A book about conflicts should not be
the choice for reading during a holiday season but in a year where
war and terrorism grabbed more headlines than peace, talks,
communication, development, business, corruption, environment, sport,
celebrities and gossip, The Dove's Lament, is a good pick.
With author, Kirthi Jayakumar, you hop
from one region of conflict to another across continents –
Colombia, Rwanda, Democratic Republic of Congo, Bosnia, West Bank,
Afghanistan, Pakistan, India and Sri Lanka – collecting images of
people who loved, lost, killed, hurt, damaged, defeated, helped and
survived. Human trafficking, drug trafficking, the fight for every
inch of land there is to fight for, communal violence, vengeance, the
politics of peace, the excesses of war, the triumph of humanity –
the stories cover them all.
At the end of each story, Jayakumar has
written an essay discussing the origin and/or the nature of the
conflict that is the backdrop of the story. You move from one piece
to another, processing your thoughts, containing your emotions, as
the images of war and its victims and their numbers flit in and out
of your head. Then you read this line, “The time had come when the
pallid shades of murder and gloom were swiping the life out of our
existence while the world moved on. Death to us had a name, a face
and a lot of memories. But to the world outside, it was another
number that was only adding up to the total figure that they bandied
as a statistic.”
Jayakumar's beautifully-woven tapestry
of stories, memories and raw facts makes The Dove's Lament a
compelling read. Don't miss this one.
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