The Mesmerising effect of die Nadel

First off, I was quite surprised that the book club picked this book for review! It is probably one of the oldest popular thriller fictions of an era that was still nursing the wounds of the two world wars – incidents that perhaps gave fodder to a lot of imagination. ‘What ifs’ are a great way to prepare for the morrow……

What makes Ken Follett’s work fascinating to me is the historical positioning of the plot and strength of characters. More the latter than the former. I have been a poor history student all my life and ironically, with increasing age, I am just beginning to appreciate the role of history in shaping lives. But then as one interested in psychology, my interest always veers towards the individual and their role in shaping historical events. That, to me, makes all the difference between fiction and non-fiction in some ways.

The book Eye of the Needle, one that propelled Ken Follett into stardom, is one of the finest titles in my opinion, because it invokes the idea of being ‘in the eye of a storm’ – in the midst of action, so to say – and promptly proceeds to dump us right in the middle of one. Perhaps it’s an interesting co-incidence that the climax plays out at the ‘Storm Island’. (The first edition of the book was in-fact called the ‘Storm Island’). The central theme of the book is 'idea' of die Nadal himself (We don’t quite know what name he likes to go by – Faber, Baker…whatever). The man who gets his name from his tool – the stiletto that he is so skillful with. Despite the fact that the book carries extensive description about the man and explains his every thought and behavior, it is rather hard to get under his skin, quite differently sketched when compared with Lucy, whose every thought, feeling and perspective is quite transparent. He continues to be quite opaque as a character throughout the book and we are never quite sure what he’ll do. We know he is capable of intense violence, but we are never sure when he will lash out and when he won’t. He is not a mindless killer and that to me makes him even more dangerous and fascinating. 

Most plots would trace the travails of the protagonist. Follet however does an incredible job of keeping us close to the antagonist, letting us into his every move, every strength and vulnerability, and still not letting us really know him. It’s almost like, if we were stuck in a room with a wild animal, we would be watching it’s every move out of sheer fear of letting it out of sight – a situation where familiarity does not breed liking or trust – it is sheer terror! When he dies, we don’t feel the least bit of remorse and actually are relieved….After all, we know upfront that we don’t want him to win this game – he’s a Germany spy and we know that the Normandy landing was perhaps the one defining moment of the allied victory in the second world war – but then all that is history!!

We tend to like Lucy though and empathize with her situation and wonder why she puts up with what she does. She comes across as a person we could like because she isn’t afraid of being who she is, feeling what she does and doing what she does.

Despite his efforts at being self-sufficient and acting strong, we tend not to like David very much and tend to think of him as a sour loser! Although we feel a twinge of regret at his death, our thought immediately veers to Lucy and at least in my head, I said Good Riddance! (I know - very mean!!).

The side stories of Blogg and Godliman almost seems unnecessary until the end where as usual the police and intelligence forces make the last minute entry. On second thoughts though, this is an interesting parallel as it shows how much it takes to trace a smart spy who knows how to disappear. I kept wondering how things would have been different with the technology we have today!! These characters help to set the political context quite well without making that part of the story a historical descriptive weight on the text.

When I opened the musty and crumbling old book, I started with a slight fear that I might not find it as gripping as I did when I first read it a couple of decades ago. But all that was set to rest rather quickly. It was as fascinating and interesting as I had found it then – actually even more since I seemed to appreciate the historical nuances much better this time around. So also the characters. When I read the book earlier, I wasn’t married and am not sure I could appreciate Lucy’s grit as much as I could now. 

Anyways, the book put me so much in the mood for more Ken Follett, that I went ahead and bought his latest one – The Winters of the World!!

IBS ADIEU

8 years ago, I found myself amidst an eclectic bunch of people who seemed to have suddenly decided that ‘academics’ was their chosen career. Although I was quite earnest in my presentations to the admissions committee, I am quite certain (now) that I had no idea what I was getting into!! How they must have laughed and laughed.

 

This is how I surmised what was expected of me - I was expected to pass an exam (I was good at that - taking exams - or so I thought), and then write a big fat book that no one would read, and then keep talking about what was in other books to batches after batches of students. Who would then proceed to promptly forget everything that was said, just like I used to. So I said to myself - I get to read and write and even bully fresh minds into hearing about what I had read. And they would actually pay me for it – AWESOME!!!

 

So no fret!  Seemed fairly easy to do. I wasn’t up to taking up the ‘amazing race’ challenge anyways. Retrospectively, I think I was just so relieved to be interacting with grown-up people after having spent the past year and half with squalling-screaming babies that only wanted to be fed and diaper changed at frequent intervals. I was simply starved for social interactions in which I didn’t have to baby talk!! Or with whom I didn’t have to talk about babies!!

The first year was a flurry of readings, assignments, tests, projects and grades that I didn’t have to try very hard to botch up – all of a sudden I seemed to have developed a natural talent for doing that. Some revelation that. After a point, I could actually see my grades shouting – “Surprise, Surprise” from afar as I hit lower and lower depths.

But then there were a sturdy set of gentlemen who would keep propping me up and sending me down the rabbit hole again – only to botch up again. I sometimes like to think (to protect my ego of course) that they did this only to their favourite pupils – the ones they thought were most amusing! And salvaging me must have helped them prove their own prowess. I think they should go ahead and pat themselves on their back for getting me across the huge chasm between not-understanding and understanding. Tremendous task!

 

Having written that huge book, which was a labyrinthine 400 pages, which no one expect my supervisor could have read more times than I myself could stand it - I was lost. Sent requests to the lost & found department that returned a report that said, "Srividya Raghavan was found in a dazed condition trying to figure out what just happened to her. She reports being hit by a meteor, for which no evidence was found".

 

Then it dawned on me, somewhere along the way (Hey, epiphany takes its time to arrive ) that I had more to do than recite what I had read in the books, even if told myself I did it eloquently (I like to hear myself talk J). I needed to do much, much more. I had to get my students across that big wide gap too and I couldn’t do that by simply telling them what was in the book. Making sense of what was in them books - and getting critical and practical was an art – an art that is most often not amenable to subtlety and grace. Getting there is indisputably, a rough ride. I started sensing that the ‘gap bridging’ might have been the whole point of that convoluted journey called a doctoral program and the Management Teachers Program (MTP)* anyways.

 

That started the next leg of my journey at IBS - learning from not those who were more learned than me, but those who were less learned than me and still knew more about what I wanted to know - My students. What a scenic journey that has been!! I have vignettes in sepia etched on my mind that I’ll carry to my grave (figure of speech – doubt very much if I’ll have a grave of my own). I had been “teaching” at IBS since 2007. But it wasn’t till 2009 that I actually started realising what I was doing and what I needed to do. Like I said – a slow learner. Story of my life.

 

In a lot of ways, still meandering in the no-man’s land between the lost and found regions, I have been ambling along with all kinds of experiments in my classroom and research. A lot of effort that ended with a big fat ‘FAIL’ label, a majority of them quite unremarkable and few sweet success spots (Seeee.....notice the bell curve right there?). But when in the business of learning, I realise now that I have learnt more in failing than in succeeding. I know now few things that could work and almost everything that could go wrong.  The fun though is in doing it like the Nike folks say. Rather do it and make the mistakes than not do it at all.

 

That might sounds rather masochistic…but trust me, it is not. In the company of those you love, success and failure does not matter as much as the intent. It’s just the feeling of security and acceptance from which one draws the strength to make mistakes.  Of that - Security and Acceptance - I have had abundantly at IBS. I have been fortunate enough to have had the most incredible set of students and colleagues who have put up with all my charades and experiments. IBS gave me the platform to do all my trials (tribulations of course is for those who are put through them) and has allowed me to grow as a person. I couldn’t thank IBS enough for absorbing all of the risk that goes with hiring ‘nuts’ like me.

 

At the threshold of leaving IBS to start another leg of my journey as an academic - it feels like cutting off the umbilical cord. I feel the pangs of separation, but I also know it must be done for the benefit of both.

 

I will miss IBS more than IBS will miss me. Of that I am sure.

 

But like they (not sure who ‘they’ are) say, a good bye is only a promise to return!! (Now, don’t panic!)

 

PS: (For those who dont know, MTP was the doctoral program designed to make scholars and teachers of us at IIMT - Icfai Institute for Management Teachers).