Things We Really Have To Stop:

how morally corrupt is your 19th century love interest on a scale of “aloof rich guy who doesn’t know how to express his feelings” to “has a secret wife in the attic” and “tries to dig up your grave so he can embrace your dead body”

october 22nd 2020 - civil law and some friends in the background

Hi! Love your page, what are some Indian dark academia movies/TV shows? Would love to hear your recs!

Hi! Thank you so much :) I can’t think of any academia TV shows except Stories by Rabindranath Tagore (and arguably Malgudi Days), but here are some movies I like and, in my opinion, fit the mood -

Maqbool - an adaptation of Macbeth fit to the Indian context as a story unfolding in a crime family; really well done

Haider - same director as Maqbool (Vishal Bhardwaj), this time an adaptation of Hamlet; set in Kashmir, also really well made. Also check Omkara (adaptation of Othello), although I have only seen bits of that one

Fitoor - an adaptation of Great Expectations; didn’t do well commercially, but it’s such a good movie zskjdbjsbk

Elizabeth Ekadashi - it’s a Marathi movie about these four kids who get together to earn enough money to save their cycle ‘Elizabeth’ from being given to a moneylender as mortgage for a loan; really, really sweet movie; shows financial strain and the lives of children during the strain; 14/10 would recommend

Killa - coming-of-age story about an 11 year old boy coming to terms with his father’s death and his mother’s job transfer which takes him to a new town and new school; the cinematography is *chef’s kiss*, shows coastal Maharashtra; about the boy adjusting in school, the friends he makes; the melancholy of knowing that his he will have to move soon; so dark academia it’s crazy

Aligarh - a Philadelphia-esque story about a gay professor who is accused on indecency; also about privacy and sexual morality

Udaan - coming-of-age story about a small-town boy who wants to be poet while his father wants him to get into the family business; really well-made; explores small-town aspirations really beautifully

Aankhon Dekhi - about a man who decides that he’s only going to believe something once he sees it for himself, and the implications of this philosophy on his family life; very fine movie

Pyaasa - about a poet in early post-independence India and his struggles with getting his work published; explores hypocrisy, redemption, tensions in 1950s India

Kai Po Che - based on a book (Three Mistakes of My Life by Chetan Bhagat; I have not read the book); on the lives of three friends as they start a sports shop and how their lives are caught in multiple upheavals of their time; kind of political drama, shows the friendship of 20-somethings in very poignant ways

Masaan - parallel stories of two people in Varanasi as they seek to break free of barriers of caste and gender; shows how their lives are governed by a strict moral code; very sublime in its depiction of tensions; really uplifting in the end

Kalyug (1981) - an adaptation of the Mahabharata set as a conflict between two rival business houses

Shatranj Ke Khiladi - based on a story by Premchand of the same name; historical drama set in Awadh in 1856 (right before its annexation by the British); shows two nobles who continue to play chess against the background of the schemes and intrigue happening at court regarding the annexation; shows the relationship between the political and the recreational areas of late nobility in 19th century India

Junoon (1978) - historical drama; based on Ruskin Bond’s A Flight of Pigeons; set around the rebellion of 1857; explores the lives of people differently placed in the social hierarchy and their response to the rebellion and its differing impact on their lives. (I highly recommend the book as well)

That’s all from me, head over to @papenathys for more Indian academia recommendations. Hope you find something you like in these :)

Day 6/100 days of productivity [01.13.18] I didn’t complete any academic work today but I did take my dogs to the park, gave them a bath, and did my laundry. Some days, it’s about the small accomplishments.

do you have any favourite love letters from the past?

“You have fixed my Life – however short,” Wilfred Owen to Siegfried Sassoon

“I am reduced to a thing that wants Virginia” / “Throw over your man, I say, and come,” Vita Sackville-West and Virginia Woolf

“Love is my religion – I could die for that, I could die for you,” John Keats to Fanny Brawne

“I know Hyacinthus, whom Apollo loved so madly, was you in Greek days,” Oscar Wilde to Alfred Lord Douglas

Reading with breakfast

january fourth: appreciating the warm morning glow of my apartment before reviewing family law for the bar exam.

There’s a very particular eeriness that befalls ruins during the golden hour. I’m living for it.

Persepolis, Iran // August 2018

ive trying to consciously make studying enjoyable, but also rigorous and productive lately. started by downloading forest and tidying up my desk (a very good mix of art and law obvs). today is day one. hope everyone is staying safe.