Seriously Good
A recent review of Amartya Sen’s new book Identity and Violence has sparked some heated debate on Amardeep Singh’s website. The review has been written by Tunku Varadarajan who, if some reports are to be believed, has roamed the forests of journalism like a fierce bandit. At one point, with his long mustache, he even looked like Veerappan in a tie.
I liked the review for its rebarbative edge but have been taken aback by some of the arguments made in its favor by a reader taking issue with the original post on the above-mentioned website. Does Tunku really want to be considered a defender of right-wing Hindu ideologues? I don’t think so. More important, I feel his questions to Sen are pretty good (I’m thinking in particular of the following section: “So when Mr. Sen asks–Is a ‘religion-centered analysis of the people of the world a helpful way of understanding humanity?’–I ask back: Is ignoring religion, or diminishing its importance, a helpful way of understanding humanity? The view from Cambridge (Mass. and England) is clearly not the same as the view from my office in New York, which overlooks Ground Zero.”) and find them capable of disturbing a complacent idealism. The irate exchanges on Amardeep’s site aren’t exactly lacking in some of that complacency. For the record, while I take seriously Tunku’s questions and, even more, appreciate his mocking of the “seriously good,” I do feel that he hasn’t been entirely generous to the admirable Mr. Sen, an important voice for reason and inclusion in our divided societies. Let’s return to Tunku’s opening scenario. I thought Sen was quite un-serious and effective–witty but at the same time gentle–at puncturing other people’s assumptions. The story of the encounter with the immigration official was a pretty good one; I would have only felt rage and nervousness–and I applaud Sen’s ability to turn the unpleasantness into a funny and instructive tale. Of course, Varadarajan is untroubled by his parsimony because he provides several humorous turns in his own review. My particular favorite is the one that appears at the end, embedded in an argument about how universalism, too easily claimed, is also a form of parochialism:
Mr. Sen, inescapably, is a member of Bengal’s bhadralok, or gentleman class. (As the joke goes: One Bengali is a poet; two Bengalis are a film society; three are a political party; and four are two political parties–both leftist.) What Mr. Sen really wants is for all of us to be “fair” to each other. Fair enough. But his idealistic thesis twists and turns to remake the world in its own image. Ultimately, his picture–though pretty–bears little relation to reality. It makes me so sad.
