#India unknow Facts

[mermaidsirennikita]

No but for real can we TALK about how there is some genuinely offensive shit re: the Romani in Kleypas's book that gets a pass, but the in-character stupid line stuff gets cut bc it's the 21st century or whatever. Like I generally like her books, but if there's something to update that should be it!

Yeeeeah dude it really bugs me, ESPECIALLY because I feel like there's really zero excuse. Beyond just "educate yourself Lisa" ... she's aware that her books have "race issues". Because the incident that I'm pretty sure helped kick this off was Hello Stranger getting called out for a racist passage. Her oldest books (which she's essentially let go out of print) have been critiqued re: race. While there are some complex intersections re: race and ethnicity at play with Cam and Kev, I still feel like the fact that she's aware that her books aren't perfect re: race means she has to know those aspects are problematic.

I knew Seduce Me at Sunrise had edits to the moment when Kev kidnaps Win.... and though that's honestly one of my favorite moments in the book, I though maybe the edits were meant to be downplay the kidnapping as Kev's Mystical Rom Dude Ritual moment. Which I don't remember being HUGE in the act itself, but in dialogue, etc. But no! I was just basically taking away the aspects of "ravishing". Which is fucking stupid, lmao. Because in no way could you read the line about "she was going to be ravished" and interpret it as "Kev is going to rape Win". Why? Because we are in Win's head when that happens, and she is literally like "FUCKING FINALLY".

(Personally, I think Lisa unintentionally wrote Win as having a bit of a rape fantasy/CNC fetish vibe, and like... that's fine. People don't like to talk about it, but rape fantasies are among the most common fantasies for women to have, and it is fine, and it is one reason why a lot of people like old school romances, dark romance etc.)

But all the weird shit wherein, for example, Cam will be all "YOU ENGLISH DON'T UNDERSTAND, WE ROM DO NOT VIEW A HOUSE AS HOME" when like, the a good chunk of series revolves around the Hathaways basically doing a massive home reno in which Cam and Kev are both quite invested lmao, stays. The weird asides about Kev's hot-blooded Rom nature stay. (And might I add, lol... Kev seemed a lot more disconnected from that stuff, and one thing I dislike a good bit is that him shedding his inhibitions with Win and letting loose is like, aligned with him letting this Rom aspect of his personality that he'd been denying... free. The shedding of Kev's sexual inhibitions are aligned with his heritage, because in these books Lisa basically uses Roma to suggest "wild, untamed sexuality". And after his own book, Kev is significantly more involved in Cam's "let us help these unknowing English people with our mystical ways" stuff than he was before. Because now that he's fucking Win nasty the way he always wanted, he's like... more... Rom....? I love Kev and Win, but I hate that.)

Lisa is by no means the only historical romance writer who's done this. I think there's a grand tradition in historical writers working around the aughts especially where you get the vibe that they're like "well, I want to acknowledge that poc existed back then, and I want to portray them positively" but they also don't want to invest in deep characterization or push their (let us be real, often racist) readership too far... So it'll be like "here's the hero's best friend, a former slave!" "here's the hero's half-brother, also a former slave because their dad owned a plantation!" (Read a Tessa Dare book that did this, and I can absolutely see what she was going for, but it didn't come off well.) I love Jennifer Ashley's Mackenzie books. I LOATHE The Seduction of Elliot McBride because she tried to incorporate India into the narrative by having the hero like, live there in the past as a colonizer, and be all "India is amazing, here are my friends because I like Indian people more than white people now" (which, woof, but very common at this time) but lmao his buddies were his employees? And also his illegitimate daughter whose Indian mother was DEAD? Like, come on dude.

(Still not quite as bad as the Kerrigan Byrne book wherein the hero is a literal former war criminal whose big kindness was taking the lone survivor of a village he massacred home and making him his valet. But still.)

And I mean, this does continue, which in some ways I view more harshly because there has been years for feedback and critique to accumulate so more recently working authors should know better. Like the Evie Dunmore "hero has a Plot Important Dancing Shiva tattoo except that isn't actually Shiva in any way, shape, or form and also let's throw in a predatory villainous gay man for good measure" book.

And I'm not saying that Lisa's work is as egregious as those examples. I'm not. But none of the above examples are going back and revising their work in minute detail, while missing the most problematic aspects of the work lol.

I'll also be real and add that another huge reason why these edits suck is that... Nobody is saying you can't edit your work. Authors can and should be able to do that. But... It sucks when people don't know that they're buying what is essentially an abridged version of your book, especially when the edits are heavy, as they are with certain books. Someone could've read your book 10 years ago and when they buy it on Kindle now because they finally have an e-reader, they should be able to know outright that they're buying a different version.

[aro-geo-turtle]

Comprehensive Timeline of Jon and Melanie’s relationship

Because a pet peeve of mine is people over-simplifying it to just “they hate each other’s guts.” It's much more complicated than that! This analysis does lean into some interpretation at some points, but I tried to stick to the facts.

Season 1/Skintight--- Melanie comes in to make her first statement. She’s mad at her peers for their disbelief and embarrassed about turning to the Institute. Jon’s still in his bastard era, and they both look down on each other’s jobs. They wind up screaming at each other. Bad start.

Early Season 2/End of the Tunnel--- Melanie comes back for library access. She and Jon are both still pretty sore from last time and snipe at each other quite a bit, but they’re both trying to be nicer. Melanie notes how bad Jon looks, says he’s the closest thing she has to a friend here (not Sasha?), and says Georgie spoke well of him. Jon says he’d noticed she stop updating the channel (meaning he’s kept an eye on her), says he’s sorry for what happened to her, and easily agrees to vouch for her. They part on pretty much friendly terms.

Late Season 2/Smell of Blood---Melanie comes to tell Jon about the train graveyard, and seemly to just... see what he thinks of her deduction, and so someone knows where she’s going. They exchange a couple barbs at the start but move on. In the middle of the statement, she talks about the obsessive need to find answers and proof, and they share a moment of mutual understanding of that feeling. Afterwards, they have a total nerd-out session about occult history where they’re on exactly the same wavelength (listen to that bit and tell me they’re not having an absolute blast together). Jon repeatedly expresses worry about her well-being. Things only go south when Sasha comes up. Melanie, having lost her entire support system to people thinking she’s crazy, freaks out and jumps to the worst possible conclusion. Jon is also freaked, but fully 100% believes her with no real proof and immediately starts investigating.

Early Season 3/Upon the Stair, Possessive, and Tucked In---The first thing Melanie does after getting shot by a ghost in India is head for the Institute to check in with Jon and see what he thinks, even with how they parted last time. She’s in utter disbelief that Jon could murder someone and meets up with him and agrees to be his person on the inside despite the allegations. Jon shows immediate worry the moment he hears from Georgie what happened, and picks her as the best candidate to contact, showing a lot of trust.

Late season 3/Nesting Instinct, Matter of Perspective, Breathing Room, and Testament---When Jon interrupts her murder attempt, she’s incredibly angry and lashes out at him (likely starting to feel the bullet’s influence), blaming him for her being trapped, but listens to him and reluctantly backs down. In other circumstances, she shows little-to-no hostility towards him at all, though outing him to Basira is a pretty dick move. When checking out Gertrude’s storage unit with Martin, Jon and Melanie banter easily with each other and, apart from general out-of-sorts-ness from the “performance review,” she only gets angry when the tape recorder is revealed, and then Martin is equally upset. In his pre-Unknowing statement, Jon expresses worry for Melanie alongside Martin with the plan, as well as sorrow for what happened to her. Melanie’s statement is a lot of foreshadowing about the bullet starting to effect her and talking about her anger taking over. She briefly mentions Jon activating her anger a lot, like wanting to punch him sometimes and hoping that beating the Stranger also hurts, but she also tells him what happened in India.

Early Season 4/Web Development and Civilian Casualties---Melanie here has been seriously warped by over a year with the infected bullet. She’s not thinking remotely straight and lashes out with extreme rage at Jon for getting her trapped and not being here and accuses him of being a full monster. She’s violent, throwing something at him and shoving at him. Jon is scared and confused and wants to help her. When Jon learns of the infection, he drops everything to go help her right away. Melanie’s reaction to the surgery is honestly understandable even without the Slaughter in her.

Mid-Season 4/Remains to be Seen and Flesh ---After the surgery, Melanie understandably doesn’t want to see Jon for a while but sends Basira to give him an apology for the shoulder wound for her. Eventually she does come talk to him, still very angry and agitated (and traumatized) about that, but she understands it was necessary and tries to communicate to Jon what it was like. Jon tries to be supportive but keeps sticking his foot in his mouth and making her angrier, but she keeps it under control. When Jon jokes about Jared, she takes him down to see Helen and mostly stays quiet as they argue.

Late Season 4/Threshold, Weaver, Cul-de-sac, Cost of Living, and Rotten Core--- Melanie cools down over time and she and Jon seem to become a little more comfortable around each other again. She participates in the intervention, and is generally a quieter, sassy but more-or-less nice part of the assistants gang. She goes out of her way to tell Jon that she’s not going to work anymore and then comes to Jon when she decides to quit. They discuss if she’s really ready to do this and what the plan is and she asks him to call the hospital for her, and he says he’ll miss her. When Jon needs someone to talk things through with, he goes to Georgie’s place specifically to ask for Melanie, and Melanie tells him that she can’t be his ally, but she can be his friend (she called herself his friend!!)

Season 5/Peers, Scavengers, What We Lose, Parting---Therapy having been completely thrown off by the apocalypse, Melanie is struggling with her anger more. She’s wary of bringing Jon into the tunnels, scared that it might break their fragile peace and very bitter towards him for being the center of all of this, but says she’s glad he’s alive and knows he didn’t do it on purpose. Jon is happy to see her alive and fine, as he worried about her and Georgie in the first 2 acts of the season. Within the first minute of reuniting, they start bantering and bickering. Jon finds the cult thing hilarious and starts making fun of it the moment he gets his bearings, while Melanie calls him various Beholding-themed names. Melanie does say to Georgie that she “just [doesn’t] like him. I never have,” but that doesn’t seem to fit with a lot of her actions around him? She later helps him look for Martin after their fight and when Jon says he can’t take her teasing right now, she apologizes and backs off. When Jon starts panicking, she helps him calm down and think things through (including whapping him with her cane), until he gets a possible motive for Annabelle and realizes where they’re going. That’s the last sole Jon and Melanie scene, and they sadly do not get a final heart-to-heart before the end like Jon and Georgie do.

Despite Melanie flat out saying she never liked Jon in What We Lose, her actions don’t really add up to that. The times when she is hostile towards him boil down to 1. the very start of their relationship, where they each made a very bad first impression, 2. when she was badly infected by a magic ghost bullet enhancing her anger at everyone and telling her it was good, and 3. the literal flipping apocalypse, which Jon has a very complicated role in. And past their 3rd meeting, Jon is never hostile towards her except light bickering. There are a bunch of times when they are shown peacefully coexisting and even working together to great effect. They’re friends!!!!

(actually I didn’t even remember the line about her not liking him until looking at the transcripts for this, but now I can’t stop thinking about it and its kinda making me mad, cause I just don’t think its true? Like, going straight to him to check your notes and research is not how you act towards someone you’ve always hated)

[indiejones]

FURTHER EVIDENCE ON BRITISH DOMINION RAJ IN POST-1947 (SUPPOSEDLY INDEPENDENT) INDIA, VIA ‘MANAGEMENT & ULTIMATE CONTROL’ OVER INDIA’S & THE SUBCONTINENT’S POPULAR COMMUNICATION IE RADIO! ..........................................................................................................................................................THE ‘REAL REASON’ FOR THE RISE TO UNPARALLELED FAME, OF SRI LANKA’S ‘RADIO CEYLON’, OVER INDIA’S ‘ALL INDIA RADIO’!

A strange dichotomy in press or media workings from 50’s India, came to our attention at Indies, making us investigate it’s roots, & the revelations from it & deeper emerging links to the Indian panorama of then, is what’s presented in form of this blog.

Now all regular readers of Indie blogs, would’ve taken notice of the Indie revelation from month back, of the pre-1977 Indian Film Censors rule, of not allowing film shootings within the land, till every 3 reels of each film were made to pass thru & be certified by censors before proceeding ahead. In light of this, emerged another unrelated claim stating how twas the Indian Information & Broadcasting Min of 1950’s India, B.V. Keskar, I & B Minister from 1952-1962, that outright banned the broadcast of all Hindi songs in 1952, for supposedly being too crass & uncultured, thus paving way for the emergence & prosperity of India’s rival business, Sri Lanka’s state radio broadcast service ‘Radio Ceylon’ (most famous to audiences of today, for hosting Ameen Sayani’s ‘Binaca Geetmala’, a weekly Top 10/20 Hindi Film Songs rating & broadcast show) that became immensely popular on account of such ‘folly’ by Mr. Keskar. And this theory was bought by the nation enmasse, for Mr. Keskar being a known proponent of the classical arts, & who In an article in The Hindu (19 July 1953), had argued that “The country’s appreciation for classical music has fallen and was on the point of extinction, particularly in North India, & the onus of making his countrymen intimate with (classical music) that therefore was bestowed on AIR.” “We must make (ourselves) familiar with our traditional music," was what he’d declared. Now further research on the matter gives us no other direct quotes or even second-hand convos from Keskar on the matter of Hindi Film Songs being degenerative or a bad influence on Indian society, ever, anywhere! .. All such talk, attributing such motives to him, only appearing in independent (?) columns of journalists, assuming his self-asserted appreciation for Indian classical music as a direct potential assault on Hindi film Music, in some zero sum game, that being the decided motive for the AIR Film Music ban, no further questions thence to be asked! This theory may even have worked in unknowing & gullible 1950’s India, but to us 75 yrs later, armed with Google baba & other means of info, the knowledge of real facts, that smelt of something far more sinister or atleast shady to begin with- HOW WAS IT EVER POSSIBLE, THAT THE SAME I & B MINISTRY THAT OVERSAW, CERTAINLY SINCE INDEPENDENCE & ALSO BEFORE, WHAT SONGS WERE FIT TO BE TELECAST OR SCREENCAST (IE WITH VISUALS, MOREOVER) IN HINDI MOVIES OF THEN, WITH A METICULOUS MICROSCOPE, WOULD FIND THE SAME SONGS OBJECTIONABLE IN THEIR MERE PODCAST OR TRANSMISSION (W/O VISUALS), OVER A PUBLIC CARRIER ‘ALL INDIA RADIO (AIR)’ ALSO RUN ENTIRELY BY THE I & B MINISTRY??!! Further, we are told that AIR’s situation improved after Keskar was removed & AIR’s new ‘Vividh Bharati service” division was started, now allowing the playing of Hindi songs, thus gaining popularity, & finally beginning to bring in rewards to Indian public entrepreneurship. Only to learn upon some more research that: 1. Mr. B.V. Keskar was the I & B minister continuously for 10 yrs from 1952 – 1962, while ‘Vividh Bharati’ began services in October 1957! Ie. Keskar also oversaw the emergence of Vividh Bharati in AIR during his leadership. 2. It is learnt that parent body AIR still didn’t allow of advertising slots on this new ‘Vividh Bharati’ channel, even then, thus refusing the chance of generating revenue & sprucing up it’s programming & presentation. This infact reportedly continuing into early 1970’s.

All this while rival state broadcaster, Sri Lanka’s ‘Radio Ceylon’, was reportedly earning millions upon millions of rupees, via the biggest & hottest commodity of the nation since independence, in Sri Lanka or India – Radio! Far far more monopolistic in attracting the maximum audience & ad revenue & trade then, as one would imagine, on account of there being no rival modes of entertainment or mass enjoyment then! RADIO WAS UPTO TEN TIMES MORE PROFITABLE AND ATTRACTIVE & PRESTIGIOUS A VENTURE & A DOMINATING (& CONTROLLING) PUBLIC INFLUENCE, THAN EVEN THE TELEVISION OF TODAY!

Which brings one to the obvious question, as to why would the Indian Govt, allow the clearly most potentially impactful & most public interfacing & public controlling Ministry, take a string of the stupidest upon stupidest of decisions, one after the other, for upto years to decades on end, that too, & need it be said, with a rival & unimaginably successful & profitable & national coffer-bourgeoning business model, in just the neighbouring nation, using the Indians’ own intellectual property to increase their own nation’s wealth, all to India’s detriment!???? Ofcourse also to how the same supposedly Hindi Film music-phobic I & B Minister Keskar, had such a change of heart, to first unilaterally declare such a vastly unpopular & need I say, electorally impactful decision in 1952, & then do a 180 degree turn in just 5 yrs, & undo the same decision unilaterally in 1957, unquestioned or un-investigated upon further, forever thereafter! Btw. B. V. Keskar continues to be the longest serving I & B Min in Indian democratic history, having served on this post for a full 10 yrs, that’s 5 times more than the average term duration of 2 yrs for Ministers holding this post in India thereafter! Does anyone even remotely believe that Nehru of all people, SO hands-on in all his affairs, that his own 1950’s Finance Minister of all people, John Matthai, one of Indies Top 136 Greatest Personalities in the Known History of India incidentally, & one of the most important Cabinet posts in the Govt, resigned, writing an open letter of resignation to Nehru in 1950, alleging how Nehru’s Planning Commission headed by Nehru himself, had become a parallel Cabinet that’d turned the entire real Cabinet into mere petty registering authorities…could allow some unheard of & certainly nationally unknown Minister called B. V. Keskar to run riot with the dynamic national sentiment, not once but twice, & continue on with no say in the matter at all!?

https://indiafacts.org/complete-truth-jawaharlal-nehru-forced-john-mathai-resign/

This was not stupidity of the highest order, but certainly something far more sinister.

And a little further deep-dive, made matters far clearer indeed!

THIS WAS NOT ABOUT INDIAN BUSINESS OR SRI LANKAN BUSINESS, BUT BRITISH & AMERICAN BUSINESS ALL ALONG!

You see some research on ‘Radio Ceylon’ will tell you, how it took the shape of it’s most famous avatar, from the erstwhile ‘Colombo Radio’ that began transmission in 1925, only after the nation of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) was officially granted Dominion Status by the British in 1948 just a year after the same as unofficially granted to India in 1947 (read earlier Indie blogs on India’s Dominion Status till atleast the late 1960’s, on Indies sm), that meaning all controlling authority, if not day-to-day operations, & certainly lotsa the decided revenues or rewards, from the nation’s activity, were to stay with the British Crown.

Further, how ‘Radio Ceylon’ acquired it’s operational strength thanks to the short-wave transmitters that were donated to Radio Ceylon, at the time of it’s dominion-independence, by the officers of the then Indian Gov General Louis Mountbatten’s earlier command, namely his position as Supreme Commander of the South- East Asia Command that Mountbatten held till 1946, & one officer in particular, Major Frank Courtney. During WW II, Frank Courtney was posted in India and assigned to the British Garrison at Bombay as the Signals Officer. The Allied Forces were spread far & wide, from the Middle East to the Far East and the Indian Peninsula in the centre, formed a very strategic location. Real time communications with the Allied Forces became paramount and an urgent need was felt to set up a Medium Frequency/High Frequency (MF/HF) transmitting station. FC was tasked with identifying a suitable location and equipment and setting up the same. After a thorough study he concluded that Colombo would be the ideal location and he proceeded with the project as directed. Just as the equipment arrived at Colombo the War ended and the equipment continued to lie in some warehouse in the port premises.

Frank Courtney, who was totally in the picture of the details & position of the MF/HF Transmitters, approached the new Government in Ceylon and proposed the setting up of a powerful radio station for their country. The Ceylon Government accepted his proposal and commissioned him to complete the project on a turn-key basis. That meaning, the Govt of Sri Lanka basically appointed Major Frank Courtney, Signals Officer of Mountbatten’s South-East Asia Command, as a large stakeholder & large part owner of Sri Lanka’s national radio service, that was also soon re-positioned as a full-fledged separate department of the Ceylon (Sri Lankan) Natl Govt.

Now given how Sri Lanka was legally a Dominion of Britain then (& continued to be till 1972 when officially became a Republic), & Mountbatten very much in control of India as Governor General in 1948, fair to say, this was in effect the British Crown acquiring rival legal ownership to the then illegal Indian radio-service ownership! .. In modern biz talk, many would call this, a potential way to convert black into white!

And that is how Radio Ceylon came into being. The most powerful transmitting station in this part of the world!

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Ceylon

2. https://pediahut.com/radio-ceylon/

3. https://www.historyforpeace.pw/post/the-strange-and-amusing-history-of-indian-commercial-radio

4. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/1579447/Major-Frank-Courtney.html 5. https://www.mail-archive.com/goanet@lists.goanet.org/msg140357.html 6. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0268740/plotsummary/

What happened thereafter, as mentioned in first half of the blog, & why moreover, would now be almost clear to everyone reading! The entire facade of the Hindi Film Song ban by All Indian Radio & Keskar in 1952, would’ve been, as we can almost certainly now say, an exercise in subterfuge, in transferring all Indian listenership & consequent ad revenue from AIR to the Crown‘s near-official Radio Ceylon, under directions of the Crown, dutifully followed & implemented on by the self-confessed last British PM of India. Btw, do you know when ‘Vividh Bharati’ actually started accepting advertising revenue? In early 1970’s, just as Sri Lanka became a Republic!   Another aspect that also comes to mind, as an interesting aside, is how Major Frank Courtney, official part-owner of or substantial stakeholder in ‘Radio Ceylon’, also roped in 2 more people as official partners – First, an enterprising American Daniel Molina, who sensing a great business opportunity in India then, founded (or was made to found) a company called Radio Advertising Services in Bombay in 1951 to recruit sponsors for Radio Ceylon’s programmes.

Molina also established Radio Ceylon’s production arm, Radio Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. (REPL), and hired an AIR broadcaster named Hamid Sayani to head it. Who was also a theatre actor & a executive in 2 big British advertising agencies J. Walter Thompson and Stronachs.

Did you know that 'Radio Ceylon' ran it's outrageously profitable venture, in the name of the Sri Lankan Govt's official department, right from Colaba in South Bombay, from Cecil Court & nearby locations!

Incidentally, the 2 other people that were hired & became famous, in this radio jockey role, were Hamid’s younger brother Ameen Sayani, who was to radio compere inarguably Radio Ceylon’s biggest money-spinner ever (thanks to Indian & British Govt’s calculated Hindi song ban), ‘Binaca Geetmala’, & the other, a guy called Balraj, who first hosted & became famous with a show called ‘Lipton Ki Mehfil’ & subsequently a show by the name ‘Lux Ke Sitaray’, that during course of his 2nd show, would land up at Dilip Kumar’s ‘Shikast’ film set for an interview in 1953, & per online info, impress the Director Ramesh Saigal enough to bag a lead role for his next film, titled ‘Railway Platform’, releasing nationwide in 1955, the man now rechristened as Sunil Dutt!

The Radio service, now having acquired unparalleled & loyal fan base, would, despite being an official Sri Lankan Govt enterprise, also then go on to begin a segment on  ‘unbiased Indian news’ pertaining to India, & begin a Christian missionary ad-purchased Christian religious programming to India, slot, too. Just saying.

Now we mentioned earlier how Major Frank Courtney had roped in 2 partners for his advertising agency arm of Radio Ceylon, the 2nd of them being a guy going as S. Hariharan, that from the only available literature on him, was also the ‘overseer’ of 1972’s Malayalam film ‘Vayanadan Thampan’, the plotline for which, as an amusing aside, we surely hope has no real-life connections whatsoever! For below is what the Imdb plotline as on July 2023 of the film reads (As I said, have a fun read): “Vayanadan Thamban is nearing his death, he starts to worship devils and comes across a devil Karimuthey. Vayanadan Thamban requests him to grant everlasting youth to which Karimuthey agrees on a request that he should sacrifice 10 virgin girls as an offering to him, on specific intervals. Upon offering him a sacrifice of every virgin girl, Karimuthey grants Vayanadan Thamba a boon to become younger on every interval. But warns him that if he fails to offer the sacrifice, his body shall go rotten.”

Sounds very much like few dark occult underground community terms & conditions & rituals, we’ve now heard aplenty from experts & activists alike, isn’t it?! .. But as I said, let’s hope just restricted to cinematic entt (even if at it’s very worst!).

Btw, we’ve blogged on before, using Dr. Samuel Stevens’ expert works, how the British Empire was essentially a Freemasonic Empire. With most people forming a relationship with them as part of their prestigious ring, having to vow to the dark cult’s terms & conditions, in some direct & indirect way (per Dr. Stevens & other experts). That if being the case here at all, or if so to what extent, is as good a guess of your’s as of mine!

Frank Courtney, who incidentally lived all his 1940’s time in Bombay, would continue to live & operate from the same Bombay for the rest of his life, his British wife from before independence incidentally also owning a fashion boutique at Colaba’s Taj Mahal Hotel for many decades, from before him, that being the place of their first meeting too btw. Frank would go on owning a home in London, yet staying in Bombay, till he died in the 2000’s, spending most of the evenings of his retired life as President of the Royal Bombay Yacht Club, winning yacht races well into his 80’s & overseeing the club’s activities, even at one point of time, receiving an official letter from the Queen, for his efforts in resisting the movement to change the name of the Bombay in The Royal Bombay Yacht Club to Mumbai. Frank Courtney was also conferred the OBE (Order of The British Empire) in 1980, ‘for public service outside the (official) civil service’.

[chiyohsfistyourface]

Okay so we all agree that Sasha as the archivist would be far too competent but consider....Archivist Tim

It would include:

Tim going full from “Head Archivist” to “Archivist” VERY quickly because unlike Jon, he LOVES talking to people and even before everything people would spill their secrets to him cause he’s very charismatic

So Tim doesn’t even notice that people can’t lie to him anymore

He also doesn’t notice any of the nightmare stuff cause he already has tons of nightmares about the circus. Figures he’s now having nightmares about statements

In fact, Tim doesn’t notice anything is off until he begins to know things about people and basically begin reading their mind

By this point Elias is screaming because he has a powered up Archivist with no goddamn clue about anything

Also, Tim constantly evades any attacks from other entities.

Like the worm attack worked but once Elias tries to get Tim to visit Mike Crew or Jude Perry he ends up becoming friends with them instead

Now Tim has an avatar gang

Jon, Martin and Sasha are all archival assistants who Tim sends on globetrotting adventures as an excuse to abuse the Institute’s budget

Tim 1000% “dies” in the worm attack cause he’s alone in the archives that day (Sasha is at lunch and Jon And Martin are in India) and that is when he becomes fully realized

Immediately pegs Elias as Gertrude’s murderer after and tries to compel him

Doesn’t work so Tim punches him in the face instead

Tim needing time stop the unknowing so calling up Daisy who he knows would love to blow shit up and heading down to the Wax Museum

He’s fully realized so this man just strolls in to the middle of the Unknowing and says, “This bitch Stranger, YEET” And blows it up before leaping backwards into Helen’s door with Daisy

Also, since Tim wouldn’t care so much about Helen’s “lost humanity” they become very fast friends after she becomes the Distortion

Elias is sobbing because Tim is basically Gertrude 2.0 but without the whole greater purpose bit

Tim is here to cause chaos and now he has all-seeing eye powers.

[not-a-space-alien]

[Best attempt at] A summary of The Magnus Archives. Contains major spoilers up through the most recent episode (168: Roots).

A kind soul wrote this out for me and put it in my submissions box to help me understand the Magnus Archives.  THANK YOU SO MUCH and SORRY it took me so long to publish this Dx 

Major spoilers ahead for anyone else who wants to read!!  But this helped me a lot and I feel like I could keep listening now!  Thanks again!!!

Basic worldbuilding details: There are 14 extra-dimensional Entities that feed on fear (Eye, Web, Corruption, Stranger, Spiral, Hunt, Slaughter, End, Vast, Buried, Desolation, Lonely, Dark, Flesh). Various people serve them, and are trying to bring about apocalypses by bringing them into our dimension.

A Victorian guy named Jonah Magnus thought serving the Eye and bringing about its apocalypse would make him immortal. Through trial and error he learned that an Entity cannot be brought through alone, and he needs to bring through all 14 at once. To accomplish this, he needs to take someone (The Archivist) and have them experience EVERY entity - "experience" in this case means "be afraid it's about to kill them."

Until he manages that, he's been possessing various people over the years by means of sticking his own eyeballs in their heads. When the show starts he's possessing Elias Bouchard, Head of the Magnus Institute.

SEASON ONE: Jonathan Sims becomes the Head Archivist after Gertrude Robinson dies. He's set out to make audio copies of all the statements in the Archives, and he uses a tape recorder for the ones we hear because they won't record digitally. He has three assistants, Tim, Sasha, and Martin. He trusts Tim and Sasha but thinks Martin is incompetent.

Martin gets attacked by Jane Prentiss, who is infested by parasitic worms. Jon lets him live in the Archives because it's safer than going home. The worms start showing up around the Institute, but don't attack anyone (yet).

Sasha meets a man(?) named Michael and learns that the worms can be killed with CO2 gas. They start stocking up on fire extinguishers.

Two deliverymen named Breekon and Hope deliver a spooky table and a cigarette lighter with a spiderweb design on it to the Archives.

Jon smashes a hole in the wall of his office trying to kill a spider, and finds a network of tunnels under the Institute. The tunnels are filled with worms, which attack. Over the course of the attack, Jon and Martin bond a bit, Jon and Tim get partially eaten by worms (mark 1: Corruption), Martin finds Gertrude Robinson's corpse in the tunnels (she was murdered), Sasha gets killed and replaced by a monster that was bound to the spooky table (Not!Sasha), and Elias triggers the Institute's CO2 fire represent system, killing Prentiss. Jon swears to find out who murdered Gertrude if it kills him.

SEASON TWO: Paranoia time. The whole season is basically one long "who killed Gertrude" murder mystery, in which Jon suspects literally all of his coworkers. He works with Basira and Daisy, the two police officers assigned to solve the case, and starts to realize that Gertrude was deeply embedded in the supernatural world (and had access to explosives).

Major events include: Jon investigates the tunnels and doesn't find much. Martin frets a LOT, Jon thinks it's suspicious, but it's pretty clear that he just cares about Jon. It's also revealed that he lied on his CV, and isn't actually qualified for this job, hence his incompetence. Tim becomes very bitter about Jon suspecting him of murder and basically stalking him. Michael shows up again, traps a woman named Helen in a maze of unending corridors, and stabs Jon (mark 2: Spiral). Basira quits the police near the end of the season.

In the season finale, Jon realizes Sasha has been replaced and smashes the spooky table with an axe. This does not kill the monster, instead setting it free to try and kill HIM (mark 3: Stranger). Michael appears and offers him a door into his corridor maze to escape the Not!Sasha, and drops him in the tunnels to fend for himself. Martin and Tim try to find out what Jon's doing, and end up trapped in Michael's corridors themselves.

Jon is saved from the Not!Sasha by a man named Jurgen Leitner, who has a book that can move the walls of the tunnels around (he basically traps it in a wall Cask of Amontillado style). Leitner collected tons of these supernatural books, which are now called Leitners, and has been living in the tunnels for decades. Jon is convinced he's evil, but he reveals that he was working with Gertrude before she died and that Elias killed her. He begins to explain about the Entities, and the fact that Jon works for one (mark 4: Eye), but Jon leaves the room because he needs a cigarette. Elias appears and murders Leitner. Jon returns, finds the body, and flees.

Tim and Martin find their way out of the corridors, find the body, and call the police.

SEASON THREE: Jon is on the run from the police because they think he killed Leitner. He gives a statement about why he always hated Leitner. When he was a child, he found one of Leitner's books, which nearly got him eaten by a giant spider (mark 5: Web). His childhood bully got eaten in his place. Jon is living with his ex-girlfriend, Georgie, while he's in hiding.

Back at the Archives, Daisy (police detective) is convinced Jon is guilty of killing Leitner and Sasha. She's not looking for evidence, she just wants to catch him. Tim is also pretty sure he did it. Martin thinks he's innocent. Elias shows his first hint of supernatural powers by giving a statement about Daisy's first murder, which he just knows without her telling him.

Melanie takes a job at the Archives. She previously appeared to give a few statements. She's the former star of a ghost hunting YouTube show, and now has lost everything due to the circumstances of a few genuine encounters. She recently came back from a trip to India, where (as is revealed later) she was shot by a ghost soldier. She is friends with Georgie.

Basira visits the Archives to try to find Daisy, and runs off again looking for her when she realizes Daisy wants to kill Jon. Martin starts recording statements to "pick up the slack" while Jon's away.

Elias sends Jon statements while he's staying with Georgie, and in a bid to learn more about the supernatural he seeks out various servants of the Entities. Jude Perry nearly burns his hand off (mark 6: Desolation), Mike Crew nearly suffocates him by simulating the feeling of falling off a building (mark 7: Vast), and then Daisy catches him. Daisy kills Crew, and threatens to kill Jon (mark 8: Hunt), but Basira shows up and stops her. They drag Jon back to the Archives.

Everyone confronts Elias. We get confirmation that Jon can "compel" people (force them to answer his questions) but it doesn't work on Elias. Elias confesses to killing both Gertrude and Leitner. Everyone finds out Sasha was replaced during the Prentiss attack. Elias blackmails Basira into joining the Archives under threat of getting Daisy arrested; then turns around and blackmails Daisy into doing his dirty work in exchange for Basira's safety. He reveals that if he dies, or if the Archives are destroyed, anyone who works for the Institute dies too. Elias tells Jon he needs to stop the "Unknowing," which is a ritual the Stranger's servants are trying to complete to bring about the apocalypse.

Jon goes back to Georgie's; we find out she had an encounter with the supernatural when she was in university and now she literally cannot feel fear. Jon is confronted by Orsinov, a living mannequin that works for the Stranger. Orsinov tells him to find a taxidermied gorilla skin she needs for the Unknowing otherwise she'll kill him. He decides to go back to the Archives to get help, but on the way is kidnapped by Orsinov's goons. Orsinov says she's decided to use HIS skin in place of the gorilla one.

He's trapped for a month, and is eventually rescued by Michael, who reveals that he was one of Gertrudes's assistants before she sacrificed him to stop the Spiral's ritual. He wants to kill Jon, but as they are going into his corridors he is replaced by Helen (the woman he trapped in season two) who decides to drop Jon at the Archives instead.

Jon decides to follow in Gertrudes's footsteps to try and find the gorilla skin (to destroy it). He visits an Archive in China, and several locations in America. He is kidnapped by Julia and Trevor (Hunters) and gets on their good side. They let him talk to Gerry Keay (goth ghost that the fandom goes wild over). Gerry gives Jon the rundown on all of the fears, and explains a bit more about Gertrude. Jon agrees to release him from this world by burning a page of the book he's trapped in (this angers Julia and Trevor, which is important later). Jon goes back to England.

They find the gorilla skin in Gertrudes's old storage unit (and explosives), but it has been destroyed. Orsinov exhumes the bodies of Gertrude and Leitner to use their skin instead. There's a stretch of waiting where not much happens.

Jon, Tim, Basira, and Daisy go to a wax museum with Gertrudes's explosives to blow it up in the middle of the Unknowing. Martin and Melanie stay in the Archives to steal the tape with Elias's confession on it and get him arrested for murder.

At the Unknowing, Basira makes it out alive. Daisy kills Hope (one of the deliverymen from season one) but Breekon traps her in The Coffin (this has shown up in several statements before; it's an artifact of the Buried and traps people underground forever). Tim sets off the explosives and dies, while Jon ALMOST does in the same explosion. He ends up in a coma instead.

At the Institute, Martin distracts Elias while Melanie steals the tape. Elias taunts him about his feelings for Jon, then forces knowledge on him about how much his mother hates him (his mother's in a nursing home: caring for her is why he couldn't go to university and had to lie on his CV). Melanie succeeds in stealing the tapes and Martin barely restrains her from killing Elias.

Elias reveals that Jon is trapped in a nightmare realm where he constantly relives the statements of the people who have told them to him directly (not the ones that are written down). He is arrested, and Peter Lukas (servant of the Lonely) becomes the Interim Head of the Institute.

SEASON BREAK: Six months pass. Three major events occur: Martin's mother dies, Jared Hopworth (servant of the Flesh) attacks the Institute and is trapped in Helen's (Micheal's replacement) corridors, and Peter tells Martin that he'll protect the Institute from further threats if Martin works for him and isolates himself from everyone else. Martin, more than a little suicidal due to his mother's death and the man he loves being in a coma, agrees.

SEASON FOUR: Martin's plotline is revealed in drips and drabs throughout the season, and is easier to tell all at once. Basically, Peter convinces him that there's a 15th Entity, Extinction, that is about to emerge into the world and kill everything. This is based on research done by Adelard Dekker, one of Gertrudes's allies. Peter says that Martin is the only one who can stop it, because he has been marked by the Beholding and he is getting closer and closer to the Lonely as he isolates himself. This is enough of a threat that Martin sticks with his plan despite several opportunities to leave.

Jon's plot starts with Oliver Banks giving a statement in his hospital room and telling him he's too human to live, too much of a monster to die (mark 9: End). If Jon decides to stay human he will die; if he gives into the Beholding he will live. Oliver leaves; Jon wakes up. Georgie is disappointed that he gave into the Beholding, and walks away. Basira is cold and practical, following in Gertrudes's 'ends justify the means' logic. She is watching Jon closely, and prepared to kill him if he becomes dangerous. Melanie is boiling with anger and tries to attack Jon whenever they're in a room together.

Jon reads a Slaughter statement and knows (by supernatural means) that Melanie is becoming a servant of the Slaughter because the bullet that the ghost shot her with is still in her leg. He and Basira perform amateur surgery to get it out. Melanie stabs him in the shoulder (mark 10: Slaughter). She is, understandably, furious, but she becomes calmer as she heals and she starts going to therapy.

Breekon (the surviving deliveryman) drops off the coffin. Jon displays a new power by extracting a statement from him. He learns that Daisy is still alive, but trapped in the coffin. Basira leaves the Archives based on information from a "source" (Elias, though Jon does not know this yet). Jon learns that he can go into the coffin and get out again if he has an anchor to the real world. He tries to cut off his own finger, fails, and under Melanie's advisement finds Jared Hopworth (Flesh servant who attacked when he was in a coma) in Helen's corridors. Jared removes two of Jon's ribs (one to keep and one for Jon) and gives a statement (mark 11: Flesh).

Jon goes into the coffin (mark 12: Buried) and finds Daisy. She is much more clear-headed than before, because she has been separated from the Hunt for so long. Jon cannot feel his anchor (rib) at first, but the signal is amplified when Martin places a bunch of tape recorders on top of the coffin. Jon leads Daisy out, and both are extremely confused by all the tape recorders.

Jon and Basira find out that the servants of the Dark might be trying a ritual in Norway, and head off to stop them. On the way, Jon forces a sailor on the boat they're on to give a statement. Basira is disturbed, but doesn't try to stop him. (Back in the Archives, Martin hears from another person who Jon took a statement from, and is rightfully horrified.) In Norway, Jon and Basira learn that the Dark's ritual failed the same week Gertrude died, though there's still an artifact - the Dark Star - left from it. Jon destroys the Dark Star by literally just looking at it, though it nearly kills him (mark 13: Dark). Helen gives them a shortcut home through her corridors.

Martin leaves a tape of his conversation with the person Jon took a statement from on Basira's desk. Jon confesses that he's done this to five people. He promises not to do it again (from this point on, both he and Daisy grow weaker as they try to resist the Beholding and Hunt, respectively).

Jon, Basira, Daisy, and Melanie visit Hill Top Road (I cannot even begin to explain Hill Top Road, there's so much going on and there's no answers yet. Best I can say is it's been strongly affected by both the Web and the Desolation, and there seems to be some warping of reality in the basement.) They find a statement from Annabelle Cain (main servant of the Web) that's basically one long taunt to Jon about how the Web may or may not be orchestrating everything. Main takeaway from this is that once he starts reading a statement, he cannot stop.

Jon finds out how to quit the Institute, via an old tape from Gertrude. Her assistant, Eric Delano (Gerry Keay's father) escaped the Institute by gouging out his own eyes. Jon runs to Martin with this information and begs him to run away together, but Martin refuses. Jon tells Melanie, Daisy, and Basira. Melanie decides to act on this information, and puts her eyes out with an awl. She goes to live with Georgie, who she is dating by this point. Daisy and Basira stay in the Archives.

Season finale, Peter launches his plan. He and Martin head into the tunnels under the Institute. While down there, Peter frees the Not!Sasha and sends it to attack the Institute. He brings Martin to the Panopticon of Milbank Prison, and explains that Jonah Magnus's original body is still in the center of the Panopticon watching EVERYTHING. Elias shows up (he escaped from jail) and reveals that he IS Jonah Magnus. Peter says that Martin needs to kill Jonah's original body and take his place. From the Panopticon, he will be able to learn how to stop the Extinction (it will also trap him there forever). Martin realizes he's been manipulated and refuses, because even though the Extinction is a threat he doesn't want to sacrifice himself just so Peter can win against Elias. It is revealed that Peter and Elias formed a bet: if Peter could get one of the Institute staff to willingly join the Lonely, he would be allowed to kill Elias and take over the Institute forever. Since he failed (Martin is close to the Lonely but doesn't entirely serve it) he instead traps Martin in the Lonely, and then goes in himself.

Meanwhile, Jon finds out that the Extinction isn't as immediate a threat as he thought, and that Martin has gone with Peter to complete his plan. Jon tries to get help from Georgie, Melanie, and Helen, but all refuse. Basira and Daisy inform him that Elias escaped from prison, and they find a tape revealing that he is Jonah Magnus. All hell breaks loose at this point. Julia and Trevor (the Hunters from season three who he stole Gerry's page from) show up to try to kill Jon, and they run into Not!Sasha, which has escaped from the tunnels. Basira and Daisy tell Jon to run and help Martin. He does. Daisy makes the decision to lean into the Hunt again, and makes Basira promise to find her and kill her once it's all over. Basira agrees (unwillingly) and runs. Daisy attacks the Hunters and Not!Sasha.

Jon finds Elias at the Panopticon. Elias explains where Martin has gone, and Jon dives into the Lonely after him (mark 14: Lonely). Jon meets Peter in the Lonely, takes his statement, and kills him. He finds Martin and manages to save him.

Jon and Martin flee to one of Daisy's old safehouses in Scotland. Twenty-two days after they arrive, they receive a package that they think is from Basira containing a bunch of statements and tapes for Jon. Martin leaves to take a walk, and Jon reads a statement. It turns out to be from Elias (Jonah) explaining his whole plan with marking Jon with the Entities and various ways he manipulated events so that that would happen. Jon is unable to stop reading, and at the end of the statement is an invocation that brings all fourteen Entities through into the world. Martin makes it back to the safehouse, and they watch the world end together.

SEASON FIVE: Jon and Martin are still in the safehouse. Martin wants to leave and kill Elias, Jon wants to stay at least a bit longer to grieve the world. They could stay forever: they no longer need food, water, or sleep to survive. Jon's been constantly relistening to the tapes from the package that was delivered, and there's some backstory revealed in them: Gertrude had planned on Sasha being her replacement once she died, and had made a tape with all the information she would have needed to stay alive. She suspected that if the Entities came through into the world, they would be here to stay, and that things like space, time, and the laws of physics would stop working. There's also some nostalgic stuff with Tim and Sasha.

Jon gets hit with the knowledge that the safehouse is not actually safe, and is feeding on Jon and Martin's fear of losing each other. He and Martin agree to leave, setting out on a quest to kill Elias and try to save the world.

The structure of this new world is revealed: each fear has taken up a domain in which it is the primary source of fear for the people trapped in it, and Jon and Martin need to pass through all of them before they can get to the Panopticon and Elias. So far they've been through the Slaughter, the Corruption, the Stranger, the Buried, and the End. People are only dying in the End; in the others, there is no escape from the horror. Any time Jon gets too close to one of these domains he is overwhelmed by the fear and needs to give a statement about it. The first time, Martin just stuck his fingers in his ears, but since then he's been going on walks so he doesn't have to hear.

Annabelle Cain (Web) tries to call Martin via a payphone; he doesn't pick up.

Jon realizes he can know basically anything he wants to, and Martin asks him a series of questions, learning that: Daisy is Hunting between the domains; Basira is chasing her, planning to kill her but starting to doubt that; Melanie and Georgie are in London but he can't see them clearly; Elias is in the Panopticon; Jon and Martin are safe, traveling like they are; Jon can't see Annabelle AT ALL; and the world can be turned back if the fears are removed, but the fears can't be destroyed as long as there are people left to fear them.

Helen shows up to "check up on the happy couple" and try to make friends. Martin asks if her corridors can give them a shortcut to London, but Jon's powerful enough that he would hurt her if he tried to do that. She leaves.

They run into the Not!Sasha in the Stranger's domain. It threatens them, but cannot actually hurt them. It taunts them about Sasha, and Jon kills it. Martin is very impressed.

Helen shows up again, and explains that there are two roles people can take in this new world: afraid or feared. Jon has the ability to make something that is feared afraid, and doing so destroys the feared things utterly (this is how he killed Not!Sasha). Martin wants to go on a murder spree killing any monsters they come across; Jon does not. Helen leaves again.

While Jon is giving a statement Annabelle calls Martin on a cellphone. He answers, and she offers him help. He refuses and hangs up.

Jon reads Martin's mind and learns about the conversation with Annabelle. Martin is annoyed, and Jon promises not to do it again. They stop for a rest. Martin starts wondering about Gertrudes's past, and Jon launches into a statement about it: one of her assistants fell to the Web and killed a bunch of her other assistants, and Gertrude never trusted anyone after that. It is also revealed that if an Archivist dies, their assistants are free to leave the Institute without gouging out their eyes.

Jon and Martin are both disturbed by the statement and by the fact that neither of them could stop it. Jon explains that Gertrude would have lost purpose in the apocalypse without anyone to trust, and that Martin is giving HIM purpose. He also explains that all servants of the Entities have a domain in this new world. His is the Panopticon, and Martin DOES NOT want to know what his own is.

The most recent episode was the End's domain, run by Oliver Banks (the guy who woke Jon from his coma). This statement explained that the End is still killing people permanently, and there is no new life coming into this world; therefore, the End will eventually start stealing victims from other fears. This will ultimately deplete all human and animal life which will kill the Entities themselves and leave an empty universe.

UNADDRESSED TOPICS:

What do the Spiders want? It's surprisingly easy to leave out any traces of the Web's influence from this summary, but Jon is still carrying the cigarette lighter with the web design from season one and he doesn't seem to notice it, several important tapes he's found have been covered in cobwebs, and Annabelle is clearly targeting Martin.

Random plots that have less impact on the main story! This completely skips over characters like Mikale Salesa and Maxwell Rayner, and other oft-appearing but easily missed background people. If there are any in particular you're curious about let me know, but I don't THINK any of them are going to show up again.

Random plots that I don't know if they're going to have an impact on the main story! Agnes Montague, Gertrudes's assistants, everything with Hill Top Road - I have no idea what about their stories is going to be important from this point forward. Maybe everything, maybe nothing.

My askbox is always open if you've got any questions (@cirrus-grey). This is a broad summary that misses out a LOT of details!

[anotherkindofmindpod]

this isn’t related to a specific episode but I’m confused about the beginning of John & Yoko’s relationship. I’ve heard so many different things about when/how it started- from she was stalking him to meeting at a gallery to Paul’s manuscripts (or pictures of Paul’s butt?!) to they were sleeping together two weeks after meeting- also varying dates on the 2 Virgins night (before or after NYC?) And was he really pining after her in India? Did he try to bring her? I trust you guys- what’s the deal?

Hello listener, thanks for the ask!

Regarding John & Yoko’s origins:  some stories are inconsistent, and some things are unknowable (i.e. internal emotions), but we’ll do our best to lay out what we do know.

Yoko approached Paul first, through a contact (probably Dunbar) related to Indica Bookshop and Gallery.  Since Paul was a patron, supporter and friend of Indica and was somewhat known within the art community as a rich celebrity with a growing interest in the avant-garde (music, films and art) he was an obvious choice for an artist seeking funding/exposure.  Yoko was an avant-garde artist (performance, gallery and film) whose biggest claim to fame at that point was working with John Cage.  This was the credential/name drop with which she approached Paul at his house in Cavendish sometime in late 1965.  Paul (being Paul) invited her inside to make her pitch: she was collecting manuscripts from various composers as a birthday gift to Cage.  Paul declined.  (For the record, Paul has never suggested or intimated that Yoko came onto him at that first meeting, so let’s assume she didn’t and this was strictly business)  The following year, in November of 1966, Indica hosted an exhibition of Yoko’s work.  This is where John Lennon first met Yoko, when he was introduced to her by Indica co-owner John Dunbar.

This was Yoko’s initiation into the Beatles’ world and it should ALWAYS be told like this, FULL STOP, END OF STORY.  Anyone in 2020 who tells the story any other way is a bald-faced liar and a coward.

Does this sound like an overreaction?  Is Paul’s part in this story really SUCH a big deal?  Let’s reverse things and imagine….

In 1965, John Lennon develops a keen interest in photography.  He immerses himself in the photography world, creates a dark room in his house and brings his photo influences into the Beatles’ artwork. John also finances and helps launch a photography gallery in Weybridge. 

One day, photographer Linda Eastman shows up at Kenwood to show John her portfolio and ask for one of John’s original photographs.  John declines.  Paul later meets Linda at her exhibition at Weybridge Gallery. 18 months  later, Paul starts dating her, calls her his new partner, declares her the greatest influence in his life, and brings her to every Beatles session.  Paul and Linda have a joint photography exhibit at the Weybridge Gallery in 1968, hosted by one of John’s closest friends and mentors.  

Paul then loudly and repeatedly proclaims that he was the only Beatle ever interested in photography, he’s responsible for all the visual art in the Beatles oeuvre and implies that John couldn’t stimulate him anymore because he was too square and conservative to understand or appreciate photography.  

Be honest and try to imagine that.  No one would EVER let Paul and Linda get away with that level of bullshit, but for some reason, Jean Jackets are slavishly obedient to whatever John and Yoko say, regardless of facts.  

So anyway, back to those facts...

After the meeting in November 1966, Yoko began to pursue John Lennon at his home, the studio and even Brian’s office.  She constantly asked for funding and money, but was probably seeking publicity as well.  There are rumors that she was also pursuing John sexually, but to our best knowledge they are unsubstantiated.  In 1967, Yoko was REALLY trying hard to get her career off the ground and/or get famous; there are numerous accounts from multiple people in the Beatles circle (Hunter Davies, Michael Lindsay Hogg, Robert Fraser, Barry Miles) that Yoko was hustling nonstop at that time.  So while Lennon was her main target, our impression is that she was probably just trying to make inroads with anyone who could help her become famous.  Accounts consistently suggest that John intermittently found her intriguing (when he didn’t find her scary or annoying), so I imagine she kept soliciting him because that’s where she made the most progress.  Anyway, her stalking is a matter of fact, corroborated by EVERYONE.  Also corroborated by everyone is the fact that John began to sometimes talk to her and occasionally let her inside (the same way the Beatles treated other Apple Scruffs), starting in/around late 1967.  

Tony Bramwell tells a very bizarre story about John being panicked one day in late ‘67, regretful and paranoid after giving Yoko a hand-written letter and a lock of his hair (?).  A frightened John asked Tony to retrieve the items from Yoko.  Considering the fact that John believed (until his death) that Yoko had magical powers, it sounds as if John asked her to make some sort of voodoo/love potion.  Perhaps their early friendship began as sorceress/client (but who knows? That’s just a guess).

We know that John continued to receive tons of mail from Yoko while he was on retreat in India.  According to John, he eventually began to really look forward to receiving these items.  Yoko would send bizarre, artsy stuff like a maxipad with a drop of red paint in the middle.  Who wouldn’t enjoy weird mail like that?  :)   According to John (in both 1970 AND 1980), he still only thought of Yoko as a weird artist by that point.  He insists he was NOT interested in her sexually or romantically, only intellectually, and there is nothing to suggest that he was lying about that.  More importantly, John was having some kind of emotional breakdown in India; he wrote and talked about feeling suicidal in Maharishi's camp.  John never specified the exact cause of his breakdown, although he did later pinpoint ongoing feelings of self-hatred and worthlessness.  

After returning from India, John was highly emotional, erratic, depressed, and abusing drugs and alcohol at an alarming rate.  Derek Taylor recounts John taking some acid trips at his house over two weekends.  During one of these weekends, John’s now-friend Yoko (who he still insists he wasn’t sexually interested in) showed up and helped “rebuild John’s ego.”  In other words, Yoko threw John a life raft and helped pull him out of the darkest, bleakest depression of his life.  

Then in May, after months of erratic behavior, John declared he was Jesus in an Apple board meeting (!).  The following night, with Cynthia away for the weekend, John invited Yoko over (or had Mal invite her) and the two of them dropped acid, made some tapes and had sex for the first time.   As far as we can tell, this information is accurate as it is corroborated by Pete Shotten (who was making the tapes with John before Yoko came over and replaced him!).  Pete said in the morning John came downstairs and shocked Pete by saying Yoko was the answer to all his problems and he was so certain he’d go off and live in a tent with her.  That sounds shocking until you realize John was on acid at the time (in that light, not quite as shocking).  :)  In any event, after that point John and Yoko became basically inseparable for the next 5 years.

There are rumors/theories that John and Yoko were already having sex for months, but so as far as we can tell these are based on nothing but speculation.  We believe John’s initial interest in Yoko was intellectual and personal rather than sexual, as he contends.  We think John slowly warmed to Yoko over that 18 month period; while initially he might’ve found her annoying, frightening and disturbing, eventually he began to find her quirky, intriguing and charming.  We believe their relationship was founded in friendship and that Yoko’s emotional support (and her professed admiration for him as an artist) during that acid trip at Derek’s was vitally important to their bond.

Now, here’s where things get murky. 

John was also later quoted as saying that in retrospect he realized he was unconsciously falling in love with her from afar whilst in India - which may or may not have been the case.  It is certainly common to look back with fondness on one’s own courtship and also possible to fall in love before you realize you are in love (John described experiencing something similar in 1964) so debating this is kinda pointless and we choose not to nitpick this particular point.  However, people have since used this to extrapolate that John was, as you put it, “pining for Yoko in India” which is simply not what John described.  John described gradually looking forward to her wacky mail and developing a strictly platonic curiosity about her.  If you are highly invested in the John & Yoko love story, it’s easy to spin this into secret “pining,” but when you consider that John was, as he put it, suicidal and going insane, it doesn’t quite make sense.  What makes even less sense is why John wouldn’t immediately ask Yoko out upon returning to London in early April, especially since she was aggressively pursuing him at that point.  Yoko was present for at least one of the Derek Taylor acid trips in May.  Why did John wait an entire month to initiate a private moment with her?  

John also said (in Lennon Remembers, I believe) that he privately considered “bringing” Yoko to India (though not as a love interest, but rather in her contemporaneous role as amusing curiosity, i.e. Magic Alex 2.0).  Once again, this may or may not be true, but we have no reason to doubt him.  Nevertheless, this has also been spun fannishly into “John was pining for Yoko as a girlfriend” which (again) isn’t what he said.  :)

To be perfectly candid,  John & Yoko’s public persona is almost entirely artificially crafted.  THIS is corroborated (and detailed) by nearly everyone close to them- May Pang, Ray Connolly, the Dakota staff, etc.  That doesn’t mean their love was fake, just that their relationship was much different from how they portrayed/sold it (or how fanboys like Lewisohn portray it).  At the end of the day, they are just celebrities who we don’t actually know.   We want things to make sense, which is why I think the “John was secretly pining for Yoko for years and his mind was obliterated by love” appeals to some people.  It’s a cleaner, more familiar boy-meets-girl story.  

Rumors and conspiracy theories are plentiful and can lead you down all kinds of rabbit holes (fun or infuriating, depending on your POV).  The “John & Yoko were secret lovers” one makes things a bit sleazier and sexier (I believe Albert Goldman really leaned into this one!).  But if you really want to consider everything, you should also consider this: Yoko’s Tarot card reader John Green insists that Yoko claims Paul was the one she wanted all along.

She told him:  Paul was her first choice (as boyfriend), which is why she approached him first.  She moved on to John only to make Paul jealous (!), which ultimately backfired when Paul then refused to make advances on John’s new girlfriend.  According to Yoko, Paul’s sense of propriety (?!) ironically prevented him from being with Yoko (even though Yoko KNEW Paul was always in love with her)!  So Yoko inadvertently got stuck with John, who she didn’t really want. Also she was convinced, in the late 70s that Paul was still in love with her and only married Linda because he was devastated he couldn’t have Yoko!

Green swears this is what Yoko told him (for the record, she also thought Mick Jagger was in love with her).  Do we believe Yoko said it, that she believed it? Who knows, maybe?!?  Green’s credibility is certainly questionable. But it’s no crazier than much of the nonsense in Goldman’s book (or Francie Schwartz’s), and Green is alleging to quote Yoko directly.  Parts of this account do ring oddly true; Yoko does seems interested in Paul in the contemporaneous audio/footage from the late 60s.  John did ask Paul not to sleep with Yoko (which Paul seemed a bit nonplussed by).  John and Yoko are bizarrely convinced in the early 70s that Paul and Linda’s marriage is doomed (is it because Yoko convinced John that Paul is actually in love with her???).  Many believe Yoko was jealous of John’s affection for Paul; could Yoko also be jealous of Paul’s affection and respect for John?  Maybe.  But this story blatantly contradicts the entire John & Yoko Myth and is so over the top weird... there’s just no room in our understanding for this alternate reality where Paul and Yoko are the true star-crossed lovers :)   

The point is that you can’t believe ALL the theories and rumors because they often directly contradict each other.  Sometimes you just have to use your own best judgment. We hope this was helpful and that we didn’t just confuse you further.  Thanks again for writing in! -Phoebe and the crew

[soniartem]

Social comment and Anish Kappor.

Anish Kapoor , ‘A Brexit, A Broxit, We All Fall Down.’, Photoshop, 2019

This photoshop piece by Anish Kapoor is as curious as it is controversial. It depicts a huge open wound running through the middle of the UK splitting it in two. The bright scarlet of the fresh blood of the wound and the green of the countryside starkly contrast each other. The huge black space in the centre, looks like an emptiness that may expand. The piece is striking full of juxtaposition and I think that it also mirrors xenophobic attitudes. It is without a doubt controversial which echoes much of Anish Kapoor’s  work. He studied at Hornsey College of Art and later at the Chelsea School of Art and Design and was born in Mumbai in India.

The piece was specially commissioned by the guardian newspaper. Anish Kapoor has called the piece “A Brexit, A Broxit, We All Fall Down.” The Irish Times stated that it looks like a  ‘photoshop project by a sullen teenager phoning it in’, people on social media have also commented that the artwork looks like a vulva. However there is more to the work than meets the eye despite the fact it may look simple. Kapoor is known for his anti-Brexit views which are mirrored in this piece and has let the piece speak for itself by not revealing any information about its possible meaning.

The deep hole seems to have no end, alluding to the political situation with Brexit which has been going on for 4 years straight with almost no solutions. The wait for some sort of deal has felt endless which I think is possibly what Kapoor wishes to convey in the work. The wound is also running through the centre of the UK, which is maybe representing the Brexit vote with almost half of voters wanting to remain and half voting to leave, I think it means that this artwork is  showing political divisions. Kapoor is known for his use of the ‘blackest black’, one of his most famous pieces “Descent into Limbo (1992)”, a 2.5 metre hole was dug and coated with a deep black for an exhibition in Portugal and a man actually fell into it. This idea of an uncertain void is prevalent in his photoshop artwork. A profound blackness which looks terrifying and precarious. Anish Kapoor has often commented on Brexit and has said “We’ve allowed ourselves as a nation to enter a space of unknowing” referencing the great unknown which is the political situation.

In my opinion, this artwork by Kapoor challenges society in a unique way. The wound could represent the impact that Brexit has had on the lives of British citizens abroad and EU citizens in Britain, complicating their livelihoods unnecessarily. British citizens living in the EU are now feeling alienated from their home country. Travel restrictions may be put in place and it is becoming more apparent that certain freedoms may be taken away from each individual. This has deeply wounded relationships between Great Britain and the EU and these wounds can not be healed easily or will bleed forever.

References:

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/art-and-design/visual-art/anish-kapoor-s-brexit-art-it-looks-like-a-transition-year-photoshop-project-1.3848177

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/apr/03/anish-kapoor-brexit-artwork-britain-edge-abyss

https://www.dazeddigital.com/art-photography/article/41032/1/man-fallen-into-anish-kapoor-artwork-hospitalised-descent-into-limbo

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anish_Kapoor

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/brexit-prejudice-scientists-link-foreigners-immigrants-racism-xenophobia-leave-eu-a8078586.html

[yogaadvise]

5 Things I Wish I Had Known When I Began Meditating

Before I began meditating I really felt that I had two benefits: I came from India, and due to my medical background, I had actually checked out the health benefits of reflection. When I think of five things that I want I 'd known 30 years earlier, I would change the topic to 'things I desire everybody understood.'

Meditation is natural. It's not an exotic import from the East and also the cultural worths of the East.

Meditation is regarding mind, body, and spirit as one continuous whole, not three separate things.

The advantages of reflection probably go deeper than we envision. At least, genetic task reacts extremely swiftly and considerably to meditation.

Meditation uncovers real self that exists at the core of every person.

The state of pure awareness that is reached with meditation is the ground state of everything.

I had not been entirely unknowing regarding these points. Three years earlier, the mind-body connection was swiftly arising, with research to support experiences that had previously been rejected as subjective, religious, unusual to Western values, or pure dream. I did assume, mistakenly, that meditation was in some way in my genes as an Indian, and also this would certainly make me a "natural,' while my Western close friends who practiced meditation were driving with a learner's authorization, so to speak.

As you look over the 5 things I have actually provided, their relevance will vary, of program, depending on your background, exactly how long you have meditated, and also various other aspects personal to you alone. However one common thread runs with the listing: There is a covert fact in human awareness.

I utilize a fairly neutral term, the true self, so that this hidden fact doesn't obtain puzzled with various religious customs. In the world's wisdom customs, there is always the contrast between 2 states of consciousness. The very first is the state of duality or separation. The second is the state of integrity or unity consciousness.

From all looks, separation is all-natural, due to the fact that the fact we face daily consists of revers: good as well as negative, light as well as dark, pleasure and also discomfort etc. Our minds are conditioned to 'address' duality by choosing the better side of each opposite. As a result, we attempt to be good, ethical people who abide by humane worths. Somehow the state of splitting up continues suffering, no issue exactly how good, pure, and also well-intentioned you are. For thousands of years there have actually been wisdom practices that state, 'Splitting up is a given if you pick to stay in a particular state of awareness. It really feels all-natural because you accept that the mind is the very same as the materials of the mind, all the ideas, images, wishes, as well as experiences that fill your head. This activity takes area versus a history that is silent, entire, as well as complimentary of enduring. This is your real self, and also when you show up here, integrity is equally as all-natural as splitting up.'

In every tradition, this promise of a greater state of awareness is main. In modern-day language, awareness is like a motion picture display on which any type of movie can be projected. Whatever takes place in the movie, the display isn't impacted. Consequently, everyone has an option between an 'I' that is at the facility of continuous activity or an 'I' that is consciousness itself. The five points I detailed are entry-level awareness, one might say, that enable your mind, despite the fact that it is steeped in duality as well as the play of opposites, to see an additional facet of itself. That's the initial as well as most priceless thing, to see an available to wholeness.

When I began meditating, and also to some level today, it was clear to me that people hesitate to begin the technique unless you hold out motivations that interest the separate self, or ego. This is absolutely valid. The mind-body advantages of meditating have been confirmed via numerous research studies. At the other end of the range, other individuals are convinced to start generally to come to be mentally pure as well as boosted in their sense of self. This is additionally valid, however it discreetly positions spirit in a fortunate setting over mind and also body. The truth is that wholeness can not be achieved like a jigsaw puzzle by setting up a collection of pieces.

Wholeness is a state all its very own. If it had not been, somebody might go along as well as tear apart the jigsaw puzzle you so meticulously constructed. Being a state all its very own, wholeness or unity consciousness is the ground state of being. It is the womb of production, the only actual 'stuff' from which the globe 'in below' and also the globe 'out there' are produced. Thus, meditation is mysterious in its capacity to change a person because regardless of just how much harm the state of separation has actually created, both directly and for culture, each people is inseparably whole. Exactly how can we be entire as well as not understand it? That's the mystery that meditation provides. At the very same time, it offers the solution to the enigma: Integrity is the quiet ground of presence as well as a result can not be called a point, the means we understand other things like rocks, clouds, and trees.

When understanding is conscious of itself, it is whole. When recognition concentrates on an object, either 'in here' or 'available,' the state of wholeness is camouflaged. You end up being the observer of something that appears to be outdoors yourself. In truth, the entire cosmos exists in consciousness, therefore, all experience remains in you.

To know and also comprehend this would have been excessive for me to ask of myself when I initially began to meditate. Recalling over my shoulder-- with the recognition that reflection has created over the years-- I value the procedure that takes anybody out of splitting up right into wholeness. Life has come down to this one choice, and also by meditating, the choice to be entire occurs naturally.

Learn whatever you need to know to develop your desire reflection exercise with Basics of Meditation, a self-paced on-line training course led by Deepak Chopra. Learn More.

[moviesbufff-blog]

Asur Review : Spine - Chilling Web Series

Cast : Barun Sobti, Arshad Warsi, Ridhi Dogra, Anupriya Goenka, Sharib Hashmi, Amey Wagh

Director : Oni sen Writer : Gaurav Shukla, Niren Bhatt, Vinay Chhawal Streaming Platform : Voot

The coronavirus lockdown has blast the entire boxoffice collection in a high and dry manner but these online streaming platforms will spell-bound you during this epidemic.

Summary of Asur Web series

Written and well concocted by Gaurav Shukla, Asur is a murder mystery of serial Killer who is psychopath and used religion as a weapon to justify himself and create great trouble in lives of the two main leads Dhananjay Rajpoot (Arshad Warsi) and Nikhil Nair (Barun Sobti). It is a series of eight episode and every episode begins with a cold-open sequence teasing some glimpse from the killer's previous years life in the ghats of Varanasi.

In present, Nikhil Nair, a CBI forensic expert-turned-forensic professor at FBI has been receiving encoded messages related the coordinates of places across India where charred and mutilated bodies found and forced him to fly to India to solve the cases.

The gruesomeness and awry of the murder spread high voltage shock-wave throughout the entire city, as Dhananjay Rajpoot and his brilliant forensic department colleagues of CBI, comprising Nusrat Saeed (Ridhi Dogra), Lolark Dubey (Sharib Hashmi) burn midnight oil to solve the cases.

Things turn darker and ugly as a senior CBI officer Dhananjay Rathore (Arshad Warsi) conducts an autopsy of a mutilated body, unknowing of the fact that it is his wife on the postmortem table. In just two episodes, he is labeled as guilty of planning his own wife’s horrifying murder and is arrested on basis of evidence pointing towards him. The body count doesn’t stop though as a man goes on a brutal killing spree, taking the index finger of the victim as a trophy.

With each passing episode, the idea of heroism corrodes to reveal the frailty and malleability of our protagonists. It loses the sheen towards the last episodes though. It becomes obvious and plays as per the natural progression in the viewer’s head. On second thought, it might seem as an oversimplified version of the good versus bad plot, but it will definitely hold your attention till you reach there.

In the last I would like to say that there is a difference between human being and being human and only few understand it.

Rating : 3.5 from 5

[creepyspider-stuff-blog]

Interesting Facts About India

Lambasingi (or Lammasingi), a village in the Chintapalli Mandal of Visakhapatnam district is situated at 1000 meters above the sea level. It is the only place in South India which has snowfall and is also nicknamed as Kashmir of Andhra Pradesh.

Prolific film producer from the state of Andhra Pradesh, D. Ramanaidu holds a Guinness Record for the most number of films produced by a person.

Arunachal Pradesh is the most linguistically diverse state in India. It is having around 90 languages and is the least densely populated in India. It is one of the two states of India where English is the only official language. The other one is Nagaland. Assam is India’s first state where AFSPA(Armed Forces Special Powers Act) was imposed. It is still in effect unbroken since 1958. The state ofAssam is believed to be home of the largest number of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

Digboi is a town in Assam where the first oil refinery of Asia was set up in 1901. It is known as the oil city of Assam.

The world’s largest riverine island, Majuli on the Brahmaputra, is located in Assam.

This state of Bihar is home of one of the oldest universities of world i:e Nalanda University.

Bihar plains are among the most fertile plains of the world. Formed by mighty rivers like Ganga, Koshi and Gandak.

The ancient city of Vaishali is considered to be the first republic in the world.

A man can be imprisoned for up to 5 years for committing adultery i.e. having an intercourse with a married woman without the consent of her husband (section 497 of IPC).The woman on the other hand goes Scott free. Andhra Pradesh is on top among the Indian states in Consumption of alcohol.

HINDI is not the national language of India. Infact there is no national language in India. Rather we have many regional languages. The Union Of India has Hindi(devnagri script) and English as Official languages. We can call all the 22 languages listed in the 8th schedule of indian constitution as national languages. Calcutta polo club located in Kolkata, West Bengal, India is the oldest polo club in the world.

Calcutta is one of the fewest cities in the world and only city in South Asia to have Tram Services.

The wholesale market of Azadpur in Delhi is the largest fruit and vegetable market of Asia.

Credit- Quora

[buzz-london]

Question - How did the transition from worshipping Vedic Gods like Indra, Varuna, Mithra to other Vedic Deities like Vishnu and Shiva occur? 

Answer -  ‘How’ the religious views changed, is a complex subject. ‘When’ the religious views changed, is easier to explain.

Mahabharata's time was a transition time – from Vedic to Puranic. This is evidenced by the fact that Kunti and Madri sought to sire their children from the Vedic pantheon and not the “trinity", so popular in the Puranas. Kunti, Madri and Pandu chose from the original Vedic pantheon of Mitra, Varun (Yama / Dharma), Vayu, Indra and the Ashwinis.

Mitra was the original solar deity, friend to all lifeforms. (Mitra = friend) Kunti chose Mitra / Surya to sire her first son.

Varun / Yama was originally the god of righteousness – an earlier version of Dharma. As kings must be righteous, Pandu chose him has the ideal God to sire his first born.

Vayu was the god of strength, as can be seen from Ramayana when he sired Hanuman – the strong man of that epic. Kings require strength to maintain their empire, so Vayu was chosen to sire the second child.

Indra was the petulant God of heaven who could shower his mercy or withhold his grace in the form of rain. As Lord of heaven and king of "devatas", Indra was chosen as the ideal god to sire the third son.

Ashwini twins were probably pre Vedic Gods and dealt with herbal lore, healing and health. They were chosen as the ideal gods to sire the fourth and fifth sons by Madri.

Later, Vishnu and his avataras became more popular in India. Krushna and Rama became the most popular avatars of Vishnu. Shiva and his various forms was also popular in Mahabharata times, as can be seen from Kirat-Arjun and vision of Mahakal by Ashwashthama.

As this was a transition time – between old and new – sometimes the text of the Mahabharata prefers the older gods, sometimes the newer ones (Krushna and Balarama). Sometimes the Vedic gods require the help of Krushna, Arjun and sometimes, they help these heroes in their own battles. Conflict between followers of Vedic Gods is highlighted by the fact that Indra and Agni stand on opposing sides concerning the Nagas. Agni wants to consume them. Indra wants to protect them. In the epic, Agni and Indra clash on two occasions over the Nagas - during the burning of Khandav forest and Janmanjaya's Sarpa-satra.

Agni wants Khandav forest to be burned down with everyone inside it. Indra is opposed to the idea and sends torrents of rain to protect the kingdom of his Naga friend Takshat. Krushna and Arjun help Agni carry out his plan and burn everyone except Maya danava. Takshat was in Indra's court at the time and hence escapes the conflagration. He tries to kill Arjun but fails and takes out his vengeance on his grandson Pariksheet.

Situation worsens to such an extent, that the brahmins in-charge of Janmanjay's Sarpa-satra attempt to sacrifice and kill all snakes in a yagna of epic proportions. When Indra tries to save Takshat, sages and brahmins in charge of the yagna prepare to sacrifice Indra along with Takshat ! Sacrificing Indra, using sacred Vedic mantras would have been unthinkable in the Vedic times. In this transition time, between Vedic and Puranic influences, everything was possible !

Vedic Gods of heaven would not require humans to fight for them. Puranic gods of heaven seek humans to fight on their behalf. In Puranic legends, the Trinity are infallible and defeat the heavenly gods with ease.

Mahabharat reflects these changes in people's perception of their Gods. There are legends, myths and histories from all corners of India. Some of the stories are of pre-Vedic Gods, tribal Gods, Vedic pantheon and new emerging Gods. Mahabharat is a reflection of the social, spiritual and philosophical milieu of its time.

This is not to say GOD is one thing or another - or that new GOD / GODS came and went. Mahabharata reflects changes in human perception of God(s). Hinduism's singular GOD (Brahman) is polymorphic and has changed form(s) over the centuries to keep pace with the visions of his worshipers. This has allowed Hinduism to survive the test of time and adopt to evolving attitudes of devotees towards divinity. Western world finds it difficult to reconcile with an idea of a polymorphic God who can change shape, form and function. Fixed with Abrahamic ideals of a singular God who is unknowable, they often mistake Hinduism's polymorphic God as a pantheon of demi-gods jostling for power and position. Hinduism's vision of an omnipresent, omnipotent God is one who can take any form, as many forms, at anytime and place of God's own choosing. For this reason, Hindus are comfortable with God being represented in various forms - human or otherwise. Maybe it's because of this that the society at the time of the Mahabharata was so comfortable worshiping Indra, Shiva and Krushna with equal zeal.

http://www.pushti-marg.net/bhagwat/thoughts.htm

[bbclesmis]

Here’s the complete Radio Times article:

My Misérables

Sunday 30 December 9.00pm BBC1

WHEN I WAS a little boy, about seven, I had a book called Gems from the Classics, or some such title, and one of these gems was the story of The Bishop's Candlesticks, in which a kind old bishop befriends a scary, bearded ruffian, who repays his kindness by stealing his silver candlesticks in the night. When the ruffian is arrested, the bishop tells the police that the candlesticks were a gift.

I was transfixed by the alarming illustration of the baddie standing over the sleeping bishop, in two minds about whether to bash his brains out, and completely missed Victor Hugo's message: that everyone deserves a chance, and each of us is capable of redemption. And I'd have been amazed if anyone had told me that the bearded baddie would turn out to be the hero of the story. Seventy-odd years later, Simon Vaughan of out production company Lookout Point took me to lunch and asked me to consider adapting Les Miserables for TV, and so I read the book for the first time. It's a "baggy monster", running to more than 1,400 pages, but by God it grips you.

There's a huge existential struggle between Jean Valjean, the reformed ex-convict, and Javert the implacable police chief, who pursues Valjean through a lifetime that can only end in the death of one of them. And there's the heart-wrenching story of Fantine. We meet her as a carefree seamstress in Paris, the youngest and the pet of her little gang, see her fall in love with a wealthy student, and then we watch horrified as she falls with dizzying rapidity to the bottom of a society that has no safety net.

We encounter Thenardier as a human scavenger, robbing the bodies of dead soldiers the day after the battle of Waterloo. And Thenardier in goes right through the story, enslaving Fantine's little daughter Cosette in his gruesome pub, falling back into the underclass in Paris, and living at the end like a rat in the sewers.

Les Miserables translates as The Wretched, and it's not hard to find present-day parallels on the streets of London and Paris, or indeed any town or city. It paints a society of brutal contrasts between the haves and the have-nots - and with little hope of any change. When students and workers unite in rebellion, they are crushed.

Is the whole thing too grim? No, it isn't: there are some marvellously funny characters and moments, and some relationships that tug at your heartstrings. The most poignant for me perhaps is Valjean learning to love little Cosette - his first true love relationship - and then having to accept that she will leave him. I think this will ring true for every father who has loved his daughter, and every daughter. Eponine and Gavroche, too, are inspiring characters who, despite their brutal upbringing, display extraordinary unselfishness, courage and sheer insuppressible vitality.

So, yes, it gripped me, and it felt like a story that spoke to our time as well as Hugo's.

I DIDN'T SEE the musical until after I'd read the book, and it made me even surer that people need to experience the real Les Miserables. Fantine's story; the way Thenardier links all the characters together; the turbulent, swirling energy of the narrative, the sheer drama of it - lovers of the musical I think would be surprised to find how much more there is to Les Mis than a bunch of people standing in a row and singing.

It took the best part of a year to write the scripts - a time of intense discussions. I work with a team of producers and script editors, and every draft is subjected to a lot of questioning. I love this way of working - it's collegiate and congenial. The team usually come up to Kenilworth for meetings in my house and we have lunch just up the road, the London sophisticates ordering off the menu - three-cheese sandwiches with red onion jam and curly chips a favourite choice. All my colleagues are many decades younger than me. I feel very lucky.

We smoothed out the chronology and got rid of a lot of the coincidences and implausibilities in the book. For example, Hugo expects us to believe that Javert and Valjean don't recognise each other when Javert turns up as police chief in Montreuil-sur-Mer. If we accept that they must recognise each other instantly, their relationship becomes a much richer game of cat and mouse. But what a pair of characters they are, each of them ultimately unknowable, even to himself. Valjean is tormented by anger, guilt, resentment of an unjust society, but tenderness keeps breaking through. Javert's intransigence becomes an obsession on the edge of madness.

I have a reputation for bringing out, and (some say) even inventing the sexual element in the great classics. It is there in Les Miserables, too, but deeply buried. Curiously, neither Valjean nor Javert appears to have a sex life, but we sense something under the surface in Valjean's response to Fantine and his over-protective love for Cosette; and one can even see a twisted kind of love in Javert's obsession with Valjean.

These great roles call for the finest available actors, and we were thrilled to be able to cast Dominic West as Valjean and David Oyelowo as Javert. That casting reflects the often-ignored fact that France, like Britain, has a multi-cultural history going back to Napoleon's time and beyond. We reflected this, too, in the casting of the brilliant Adeel Akhtar as Thenardier, with Olivia Colman as Mme T. One of the delights of the series has been to see the Thenardiers' son Gavroche as a toddler, and daughters Eponine and Azelma at ages three and six before we meet them again as teenagers.

It's been a dream come true for me to follow a great Russian novel (War and Peace) with a great French one; and I'm currently at work on Vikram Seth's masterpiece A Suitable Boy, set in 1950s India. To follow, something American: John Updike's novels. Watch this space!

[cslupus]

Of Mountains And Molehills

Greetin's Cretins! It's Lupus! I've discovered that writing a one-shot is, in some ways, more difficult than a novella. Economy is the key, but if you make it too information-dense, the reader will get fatigue from all the heavy-lifting! I've done my very best to strike the balance between brevity and description though tasteful use of exposition! Go one and hate me! But if you wish to hate me to appropriate music: "Mountains and Molehills" by Flux Pavilion.

"Where's Letty?" Andrew asked sweetly.

"You sister Letitia is dead. We've told you this." And so Digory Kirke had, 5 times that day.

Tears spilled from Andrews eyes as he absorbed the shock for what felt like the first time once again. This is the reality of dementia.

Letitia was his twin sister. There were four children total. He, Letitia, and Mabel all had the same father, but their eldest sister was a bastard, sired by a mysterious stranger. Her name was Asteria.

When her mother met the man who was the be the father of her next three children, she knew she didn't have very many options. He was a simple man, but he was kind, and he provided for his family to the best of his ability. He even gave his surname, Ketterly, to Asteria, adopting her. It was a show of acceptance she was not used to and never forgot.

When asked about Asteria's father, her mother, Scarlette (You may have heard of someone with the same name having adventures in Narnia.), simply said he was the most radiant man in all of the land. Asteria grew up strange, quiet, and beautiful.

The marital status of Asteria's mother upon her birth limited her in life. The inhabitants of Dorsetshire were basic and prone to jealousy. Growing up was hard and people her age weren't accepting.

So when a handsome local lad began to pay her extra kindness, she was putty in his hands. When she was heavy with her own child, the lad pretended not to know her. She was laughed out of town for her claims. After all, he was the son of a powerful man in the village.

Asteria named her son Adam. Soon after his birth, a woman who went by the name of Ms. Lafey, who claimed to have fairy blood, began to visit them. At first, Scarlette welcomed these visits as Ms. Lafey had arcane knowledge that helped her to understand her daughter and grandson. Andrew had also taken a liking to this woman and would run to the door when he heard her distinctive three raps from the pommel of her pretty sword-cane.

But over time, Ms. Lafey's erratic behavior and broken promises wore on the family. Finally, after she showed up drunk late one evening and became violent when asked to leave, Scarlette was at her limit. She shut her door for good.

When Andrew and Letitia were 16, they both begged to go to London and were finally granted permission. Andrew wished to track down "Lady Lafey" as he called her and bump elbows with other occultists, haunting opium dens and darkened parlors. Letitia merely wished to marry money. Both found their heart's desire.

Soon, Letitia was the young widow of an old rich man, scorned as an opportunist, but set up to life comfortably for all of her days. She was very practical and paid little mind to the opinions of her in-laws.

Her brother moved in with her and continued his study into the occult. He faithfully visited Ms. Lafey in prison, neglecting his own mother. When Lady Lafey was near death, she gave him an ornate box and ordered him to destroy it without opening it. He knew he was lying when he promised it would be done.

He toiled for years to unlock the mystery of the box, living off of Letitia's windfall that she shared with her twin either out of duty or guilt. When their baby sister, Mabel, developed cancer, Letitia welcomed her into her home as well so she could be close to the best doctors.

Asteria looked after their ailing mother and, unable to meet ends, asked Letitia to also take Adam as a boarder so he may work and send money home. She was penning her response when Andrew intervened.

He'd used his eldest sister's strange parentage to his advantage in the circles he ran with and had long ago learned that they were far more interested in his sister than he, so when it looked as if someone of star-blood would be under the same roof once more, his avarice and ambitions got the better of him.

Had he come to the matter with a different mind, perhaps he would've welcomed the chance to be a guiding hand to a protégé. He could've been everything for Adam that Ms. Lafey was not for him. The young lad's enthusiasm and natural light might've strengthened Andrew's character. Perhaps they would have donned rings side by side and explored Charn together, where they would've known better than to strike the bell that woke Jadis. Perhaps when curiosity led to their inevitable return, they would've found a newborn Narnia and King Adam would've ruled with his Magician Advisor on his high council.

Perhaps, but no one is ever told what would have happened.

"Oh. Diggory! Is that my tea? Oh wonderful. Now, where's Letty? Let's wait until she joins us." Andrew said sweetly.

"Uncle Andrew," Digory said with more patience than he felt, staring down the cracks in the pavement of the garden patio. "You sister is dead." Digory watched the cookie drop from his Uncle's hands as he fell into tears once more.

Digory lived in their manor out in the country. It was the roaring 20's and while other landed gentry were throwing parties and playing in their society, everything was kept low-key in his manor. Sometimes he longed for the care-free lot of his peers, but he knew all too well that all that glitters is not gold.

They knew he took care of his Uncle. They came to him because, though they didn't want for problems, they'd never learned how to be sad and were helpless to it when life inevitably happened. They involved him in their most private matters because they were bound by a covenant entailed with the title of Lord or Baron to be ever vigilant and never trust equals.

The Kirke's were unknowns: new money that'd struck it rich in India. They were also relations of a known gold-digger. Her in-laws had put out word to keep the Kirke's at arms-length. For this reason, Digory was paradoxically trusted by a few of them. He was the social Hermit, utterly blameless in his circumstance.

When Andrew had more of his mind intact, he'd entertain guests with his stories of life as an urban sorcerer in the Victorian heyday of spiritualists and mediums. He was before Alan Parsons; before Anton LaVey; before even Aleister Crowley. He read Emanuel Swedenborg and even traveled to meet Cora L. V. Scott in her parlor after years of correspondence. And he met the most interesting and unstable people you could imagine along the way.

His most interesting story, the birth of Narnia, stayed hidden. Sometimes, when he was sitting in the garden, he'd remember. His face would light up and he'd look like he was about to say something, and then he'd go back into his confusion.

"Excuse me, sir." said the maid. "Your cousin has arrived." Digory stood and went inside to welcome Adam. He was counting on his help. He was at his wits end with the day in and day out of putting up with other people's bullshit drama while his Uncle deteriorated. He knew the only way it would end is in his Uncle's death.

More than once, he considered going for the rings they'd buried at the base of the apple tree and finding something in some world to cure his Uncle, but he felt in his soul that this is the sort of thing that is only granted once. So he waited for the dark day that would mark his freedom. In the mean time, Adam was here.

"How is your mother, Adam?" asked Diggory.

"She's still traveling. Here's a picture of her in Paris that she sent." he said as he handed him a picture in a frame with a ribbon and bow. In it was a woman who looked 25, but was in fact much older. She was in a flapper dress and smiling coquettishly. "She means it as a gift for Andrew."

"I don't know why he needs new pictures of her, ever. Aunt Asteria is never going to age, is she."

"It's possible it's happening, just incredibly slowly." Adam replied. "But look, new hairstyle."

"So I see." Digory raised his eyebrows and nodded as he looked again at the picture. She was sporting a stylish bob with a feathered headband. "Well, he's not very lucid today, but I can take you back to see him. I've had to tell him Aunt Letty is dead 6 times since breakfast."

They walked back to the rear garden table where Andrew most liked to sit to find his blanket in his chair and his slippers gone, along with him.

"UNCLE ANDREW!"

Andrew often saw things that weren't there. Today he was seeing The Lion and feeling a regret he could not elucidate even to his own mind. The Lion bid him to follow, which He had never done before. Andrew stepped into his slippers and he was off.

He continued, unknowing of time, until the English hills and plains gave way to forests unlike English forests. Where it was cloudy and misty before, it was now bright and like the month of May.

He heard bubbling female laughter and followed the sound to find a tribe of Maenads maying (as is their namesake) and braiding one another's hair. They all turned and saw him simultaneously like a pride of lions. They quickly assessed him and the most decorated amongst them stepped forward and helped the old man sit down.

They tended to his blistered and bleeding feet. They gave him fresh water and some wild-picked fruit and goat-milk with honey, but they held back the mead, seeing that his mind was very damaged. Then they bid him rest on a blanket draped over a pile of soft greenery they prepared. "I know what to do, sisters." said one to the others after Andrew was asleep. "This nameless one needs great care. I know a small knot of dwarf brothers that reside together. They'd be number enough and are of great competence." They all agreed quickly and then, with the business done, got back to their enjoyment, albeit at a much lower volume. This is the Maena way: they do their part and then leave you to your fate.

Andrew sat in the hand-hewn rocking-chair provided for him by the dwarves. The Narnian air had done him some good physically; his mind was still worsening despite this. Pants were hard for him, so he wore long robes like a Calormene but made of soft Narnian textiles. He had a staff for walking, which he did daily with a dwarf accompanying him. It was early summer and there was much celebrating.

He was restless that morning. Without the mind, Mankind is left to animal instinct, and every animal in the forest felt the change. He needed to hide. Flee. He stood, leaving his staff, and wandered again into the countryside as white flakes of snow fell and a chill came to the air.

This first snow didn't stick and melted on contact. Had the 100-year winter not started in summer, the snow would have accumulated sooner and the dwarves might've been able to follow find his tracks, but his footprints blended with those of others on the road. The one who was to stay back and take care of Andrew lamented his mistake of not bringing him to the well with him.

Invigorated by the Narnian air, he was able to walk for a day and a night with little rest. Soon he was collapsing at the edge of Cauldron Pool. There above him on the rocks of the cliff clung three Hagons. They spread their wings and glided downward, circling, like pterodactyls. The cast their shadows as they stood over him, wings crossed around their shoulders like cloaks.

Andrew looked up and desperately reached out:

"Thirst." he said eagerly. One of the smaller Hags, the gentle twin, cupped some cold mountain water into her hands and tipped it into his waiting mouth. He drank, and afterward began to shake his head emphatically. "Shine." He said again. The three sisters looked at one another with puzzlement. He spoke once more. "Blossom!" he said with great desperation.

"I think I know what he wants." Said the elder of the three after a moment. She picked him up like a bride and flapped her great wings, climbing the air until she was well above the cliff. Her sisters flew below her.

It was nearly a whole day before they finally began their circling descent, Andrew asleep in Sapphire's sinewy arms. Emerald and Ruby landed a little ways from them. They were next to an ancient orchard of dark-wooded trees with papery leaves bearing brown fruit. Sapphire plucked one and handed it to Andrew. He eagerly took a bite and, upon tasting that it wasn't what he was looking for, he dropped it and began to cry like a toddler.

"This confirms it. He desires The Fruit." Sapphire concluded.

"But what can become of him if he takes of the fruit? He'll be cursed and become twisted like our cruel mother!" Emerald said with great fire.

"Too true." concurred Ruby, "We could trick someone into stealing one to give to him. The writing on the gate says the fruit may be taken for others."

"We know enough about magic to know the writing can come to mean something else. Such treachery may yet come to affect us." reasoned Sapphire.

"Well I certainly won't jeopardize myself or my sister." said Emerald.

"Very well, then. Only one need go. I can make it by dawn." Sapphire said as lifted the weeping Andrew once more and took to the frigid skies.

The sun crested over the eastern horizon behind them as they arrived at the valley. There, shining golden within the walls of the hilltop garden, was the Lion. Sapphire sensed him and had no desire to steal an apple while He was present. She was at a loss for what to do, so she made like a Maenad and dropped him at the far edge of the valley.

"Blossoms! Shine! Drink! Brandy! SHINE!" said Andrew, squirming like a child in her arms as she touched down. She watched him walk to the base of the hill before flying to rejoin her sisters in the Toffee orchard.

Andrew stared up the green turfed hill. It was steep, nearly impossible for an old man in his state to climb, but his mind was too gone to tell him this. He began upward and soon he was climbing up using his hands and feet, gripping the dewy earth with his gnarled toes. The grass was green, impossibly uniform, and slick. He was as Sisyphus. He would gain ground, then lose it all, then gain once more. At one point he was three quarters of the way to the top when he slid down to near the bottom. He clawed the dirt, leaving a trail of gouges in the earth.

Finally, his eyes were level with the very bottom of the gate, just two arms-lengths away. He felt such relief, but he'd forgotten what he was trying to do and almost let himself slide limply down the side of the great hill. A beautiful, shrill cry came to his ears from the garden. It was a sound that broke your heart while also filling you with joy. He followed the cry of the Phoenix and soon was laying face-down on the loam outside the gates.

He could smell The Fruit and something else. It was something warm, as if forgiveness itself had a scent. He forced himself to his hands and knees and crawled through the open gates. The silence with the light from the Silver Apples and the glow from the Lion brought a stillness to Andrew's mind and he felt safe for the first time that his broken mind could remember.

"You shall not steal the Fruit." said Aslan with a low rumble.

"Blossom! Thirst!" Andrew pleaded.

"You shall not steal the Fruit." Aslan repeated. He then sprang up, twisting in the air, to swing his paw into the bows of the tree. "CATCH!" He roared as he freed one Apple. It soared through the air with such immaculate trajectory that it landed perfectly between Andrews raised and begging hands. He reflexively gripped it. He had what he wanted. He wept for joy and then in sorrow because he could not remember what to do next. "Eat." ordered Aslan.

Andrew bit into the fruit, covering his chin in dark amber-burgundy juice. He devoured the apple, knowing only that one action, capable of nothing else. As he finished, he felt satisfied. Color returned to his face and his musculature returned to it's youthful state. His hair, which had been a dirty-looking mess with some black hairs around the base of his skull, was pure platinum and fell thick and wavy down his back. His beard thickened and became salt and pepper with dominant white.

Then he started to remember. He remembered Digory, Letty, Astaria, Mabel, Adam, dear responsible Adam who helped his ageless sister look after their mother. He remembered Jadis and he remembered Narnia. He understood where he was now.

"Well then, Lion. I suppose I owe you now." he said with considerable ire.

"If you choose to view it as such."

"Am I not in your Bond? Why did you bring me here? What am I to do now?" he asked, puzzled. Aslan walked out through the gate, saying:

"Do whatever the fuck you want to."

[lilad10]

tibetan pop stars / feminist reclamations of selfhood / imagination & disguise

so here’s the t, the real t is that i haven’t been able to spend a single day in my life without listening to this song at least once since my first listen. so in honor of the incredible moment we are experiencing as mitski stans, i’m going to try to describe why this song has unexpectedly been the precursor to the success of radical, unflinching vulnerable songs written by women. in this case, frances quinlan of hop along and “tibetan pop stars” from their sophomore release “get disowned” (march 2012). 

we begin with a whistle, and then: a flood of unsuppressed guitar on E, the most achey major, followed swiftly by the discordant and lovely C#m. we have a conversation. a question: how content are the ones with simple demands? 

we know, to a degree, they must be more content than those with more complex, perhaps darker, requests. and these requests, the evidence of them, point to our dissatisfaction in uncomfortable clarity--this belies the interrogative nature of the question, but it also provides a level of distance from completely admitting to our desire. because desire is weak, is fragile. what is simple: cherry-picking. Canadian vacations. 

but even what appears simple has its own demands, manifesting in the disembodiment of the only named male-figure in the song: he is seven-fingered, he is the picture of disappoint, maritally and emotionally. something about this quick-draw stick-figure man is missing, causing us all to despair of whatever notions we imagined may cease if only we could be more content. 

& just listen to her voice. i recently read a pitchfork (fuck i know) article that put it perfectly: 

If you listen to Frances Quinlan sing long enough, you will attempt to describe her voice. This is a trap, and you should not do this. The frontwoman for Philadelphia indie rock band Hop Along doesn’t have one voice—she might have 10. Listing them would yield no insight, only a deranged sommelier’s tasting notes: cat, bugle, Rod Stewart, roaring motorcycle. 

when it is time to leave, you just know. you can feel the dread of non-escape creep against your legs, begging you to get a move on before the unknowable tomorrow sucks you into a pattern you’re trapped by. so you leave for some action: you are pursuing so you cannot be pursued. running toward something looks the same as running away from something, the body performing the same, the mind and heart saying different things nonetheless. having admitted that every single one of us is searching, we go out into the world with our feet bare and our pockets empty. the reminders of civilization, of obligation, become distant cousins to the gnawing sensation of nobody having asked you, “hey, where are you going? why are you alone? what about your other?”

because we’d like to answer them, wouldn’t we? 

we become each other’s gazes, each other’s strangers, and therefore we become strange to ourselves. you have an easy time othering that which you do not understand. the glamour of being watched and sought-after comes at the price of losing power over whoever is gazing at you. so goes the history of music written about fantasy, face-less, strangered women from the minds of men who only want to seduce them in the same careless fashion of car wrecks, of unaccountability for masculinity. 

am i saying the speaker of this song is subverting this tradition because she is a woman? no, and in fact, the desperate desire to have this capacity for detachment and objectification is exactly this imbalance of power in action. behaviors that society have permitted cis men to exhibit at no cost come at a much higher a price for the speaker, an unfairness she clearly understands--she admits, yes, me too. i wish i was you, maybe. i wish to be your stranger. 

ok this is the verse right here that clutches everything in its hands and whispers and cries and carries it to the tallest hill in an abandoned town just for a glimpse of the sunset and i don’t have much to add to that except:

I wanted to hurt you but the victory is that I could not stomach it. We have swallowed him up, they said. It's beautiful. It really is. I had a dream about you. We were in the gold room where everyone finally gets what they want. 

- Richard Siken, “Snow and Dirty Rain”

listen to frances quinlan’s gasp between “India” and the return to “i’m gonna be creeping on you” on the hook. you can feel her revving herself up to fess up, confront, scream, fight. this song is anthemic in so many ways: its meter, its explosive progressions, its unremitting melody. and the way she soars above the phrase “pop stars”!!! none of us, not a single one of us listening, are left to wonder about what’s happened to the speaker’s heart. its cracks are on full display, accompanied by the full energy and distortion of a perfect indie punk act. 

at this point, we may begin to wonder: what’s so fantastic about this dream? you’re either a stranger or a stalker, you’re a waiting game or a disappointing statistic, you’re on hold with life & unfulfilled either way. is this song actually steeped in too much despair? 

NO & fuck you! we’re doing OK so far!!!! despite everything, despite it all. the only criminality of heartbreak is in its misunderstanding and contortion. as it exists, as it impacts us all in its most simple manifestations, we are united. 

and not only that, but in this whole wide world, yes, you. you are still the only one. you are. 

Of all the Souls that stand create — I have elected — One — When Sense from Spirit — files away — And Subterfuge — is done — When that which is — and that which was — Apart — intrinsic — stand — And this brief Drama in the flesh — Is shifted — like a Sand — When Figures show their royal Front — And Mists — are carved away, Behold the Atom — I preferred — To all the lists of Clay!

- Emily Dickinson, #664

from here until the close, there is not a single second spared for the doubt that shelters us all from truly expressing what we are, who we are made of, because after all the love, there is the difficult, crushing, invisible struggle of...waiting. this whole song the speaker has convinced us she has the patience, she has the measured rage necessary to hold on in the face of a firestorm of impossibility. but what can become of that waiting if someone never returns? wouldn’t it be worse to offer a home and have someone reject it? if you never have to ask for someone to return, you never have to admit you missed them. and she misses them, fuck. who else sings “india” like that? someone in deep, passionate ecstasy, someone living in the sublime trap of finding and losing and wanting. 

so that’s the reason why we have looped. we are discontent, we are content, we are tibetan pop stars. we are waiting for home to come back to us, a home that has metamorphosed into a symbol of potential consequence, failure, another round of brokenness. here she is, at the mic. here she is, asking. here we are, in the gold room, where everyone finally gets what they want. 

a coda: a hand, outstretched. can you hear everyone singing along now? can you hear us all sharing in this desperate, beautiful noise? isn’t this love so average, and aren’t we all the more powerful for it? 

[connectingtravellerofficial12]

Tourist destinations in Lansdowne

Lansdowne is one of the best hill stations in India which is till now left untouched as not many people visit there. It is located in the district named Pauri Garhwal of Uttarakhand state. It is far away from the places where you will find too many people and these are very crowded. This place on the other hand is an ideal option to go for a vacation. This place is covered with large pine and oak trees and offers a great view of the Himalayan range. There are many places to visit in Lansdowne, mainly some of them are unknowable for the normal people as this place is secluded and not many people prefer to go there as this place is not so crowded like other ones.

Tourist places to visit in Lansdowne are:

1. Bhim Pakora

2. kaleshwar Mahadev Temple

3. War memorial Lansdowne

4. Tip N Top point

5. Kalagarh Tiger reserve

Lansdowne is not a bad place to spend your vacation as the places given below can have the ability to just prove this fact.

1. Bhim Pakora

Bhim Pakora is one of the major tourist destinations in Lansdowne which can be easily reached by doing a trek of 2.5 km. This place has two rocks placed over one another. The rock which is placed on the top is said to be shaken by a little finger but if you are going to put all the pressure on it in the hope of falling it then it is never gonna happen. This place according to the Mythology was created by one of the Pandavas named Bhim. He was so strong among all the brothers that he put two rocks on one another in such a way that they can’t fall off. This place is so famous for this fact and people came here to check whether it’s true or not which makes this place a popular one to visit in Lansdowne.

2. kaleshwar Mahadev temple

This is one of the places which are so famous among the local people in Lansdowne and it is mostly visited in Lansdowne by the tourists that came there for a holiday. Kaleshwar Mahadev temple is known as the land for meditation for the sages, justified by the fact that you can find many graves of the ancient sages near this temple. This temple is dedicated to Lord Shiva and has the shivlinga which is said to be self-formed. There is a mythological fact about this temple that on the auspicious day of Mahashivratri, the cows of the local people just vanished and later on they found them near the temple milking on their own.

3. War Memorial Lansdowne

This memorial place was created by one of the British Commander-in-chief of India in the memory of the Garhwal regiment. It showcases the achievement and valour of the Sepoys of this regiment. If you want to take a dip in the history of the army before the Independence time then this place is a paradise for you other than that it offers the views of the Great Himalayas covered in snow peeking through the clouds.

4. Tip N Top point

Tip N top is also called Tiffin top which is considered to be the highest point in Lansdowne. People can easily reach here by doing a simple and small trek. The views from here are indescribable, you can witness the beauty of the whole city along with Garhwal region and in the background can see the Himalayan range. There is a large area among the mountains covered with forests which makes the view as a painting.

5. Kalagarh Tiger Reserve

Kalagarh Tiger reserve is a part of the famous National Park i.e., Jim Corbett National Park. This is the northern part of the national park which was later named as Kalagarh Tiger reserve which is one of the best places to visit in Lansdowne. This place as suggested by the name has a large number of tigers along with more cat family animals. It consists of 580 species of birds, 50 species of mammals and 25 species of reptiles in the whole national park. The diversity of flora is also quite appreciable here, it consists of Sandal, teak, bamboo and Sheesham.