Sparks Satire

From a fraudulent psychiatrist grappling with two equally fraudulent clients in Aiding and Abetting, to the dirty dealings of The Abbess of Crewe's band of corrupt nuns, to the three plane crash survivors of Robinson eking out an existence on an Atlantic island after its resident mystic disappears, these three satires probe the recesses of human fallibility with formidable precision. Spanning five decades, the glittering, sharp and sinister works of Spark's Satire confirm their author as one of our most incisive and wickedly funny satirists.

This book is an alternative representation of my thoughts, which have been presented more comprehensively in another of my books Writings @ Ankur Mutreja. I felt the need to publish this book separately to cater to the needs of those readers who don’t have much time to read books. The book is indeed a light reading. The book starts with the chapter entitled Satire, which, as the name suggests, comprises pointed attacks on the societal idiosyncrasies and hypocrisies, albeit mockingly. In the following chapter on Travel Locales, I have reviewed four disparate locations in India, attractive for their own unique appeals: Puducherry, Shillong, Auroville and Agartala. Next is the chapter on Movie Reviews & More. In the past few years, Hindi Cinema or Bollywood has seen many huge revenue collectors competing with the creativities – I don’t think the creativities need to compete with anybody. Only one huge revenue collector Ek Tha Tiger finds place in my list of reviews. I don’t like publishing my frustrations; therefore, if I have written a negative review, the movie must be really pathetic: Love, Sex and Dhoka. Other movies reviewed: Satyagraha, Raanjhana, Table No. 21, OMG, Mod, Udaan and Welcome to Sajjanpur. Other than that I have also reviewed a website, Flattr.com, and an architectural structure, Antilla: the Residence of Ambanis, in this chapter. Finally, the chapter on Book Reviews comprises my reviews of three books: Bhagwat Gita, Swaraj by Arvind Kejriwal, and An Ordinary Person’s Guide to Empire by Arundhati Roy. This is a non-professional endeavor; therefore, you may be able to download it either free or for a small price, and the royalties, if any, accumulating where from will go in charity. Enjoy Reading! Ankur Mutreja

Satire, according to Jonathan Swift, is a mirror where beholders generally discover everybody's face but their own. and over twenty-four centuries the mirror of satirical literature has taken on many shapes. Yet certain techniques recur continually, certain themes are timeless, and some targets are perennial. Politics (the mismanagement of men by other men) has always been a target of satire, as has the war between sexes.The universality of satire as a mode and creative impulse is demonstrated by the cross-cultural development of lampoon and travesty. Its deep roots and variety are shown by the persistence of allegory, fable, aphorism, and other literary subgenres. Hodgart analyzes satire at some of its most exuberant moments in Western literature, from Aristophanes to Brecht. His analysis is supplemented by a selection and discussion of prints and cartoons.Satire continues to help us make sense of the conventions that seem to have been almost genetically transmitted from their satiric ancestors to our digital contemporaries. This is especially evident in Hodgart's repeated references to satire's predilection for the ephemeral, for camouflaging itself among the everyday, for speaking to the moment, and thus for integrating itself as deeply as possible into society. Brian Connery's new introduction places Hodgart's analysis in its proper place in the development of twentieth-century criticism.

First published in 1970, this work explores the literary genre of satire. After identifying the definitive aspects of satire, it goes on to examine the subjects which can be susceptible to satire, the modes and means of satire, the tone of satire and the satirist’s relationship with the reader. In doing so, it introduces the reader to a number of key satirical writers such as Geoffrey Chaucer, Jonathan Swift, John Dryden, Samuel Johnson and Henry Fielding. This book presents a comprehensive overview the genre and provides a useful starting point for those wishing to further study satirical literature.

"The short dirk in the hands of Muriel Spark has always been a deadly weapon," said The New York Times, and "never more so than in The Abbess of Crewe." An elegant little fable about intrigue, corruption, and electronic surveillance, The Abbess of Crewe is set in an English Benedictine convent. Steely and silky Abbess Alexandra (whose aristocratic tastes run to pâté, fine wine, English poetry, and carpets of "amorous green") has bugged the convent, and rigged her election. But the cat gets out of the bag, and--plunged into scandal--the serene Abbess faces a Vatican inquiry.

In Aiding and Abetting, the doyenne of literary satire has written a wickedly amusing and subversive novel around the true-crime case of one of England’s most notorious uppercrust scoundrels and the “aiders and abetters” who kept him on the loose. When Lord Lucan walks into psychiatrist Hildegard Wolf’s Paris office, there is one problem: she already has a patient who says he’s Lucan, the fugitive murderer who bludgeoned his children’s nanny in a botched attempt to kill his wife. As Dr. Wolf sets about deciding which of her patients, if either, is the real Lucan, she finds herself in a fierce battle of wills and an exciting chase across Europe. For someone is deceiving someone, and it may be the good doctor, who, despite her unorthodox therapeutic method (she talks mainly about her own life), has a sinister past, too. Exhibiting Muriel Spark’s boundless imagination and biting wit, Aiding and Abetting is a brisk, clever, and deliciously entertaining tale by one of Britain’s greatest living novelists.

Postcolonial Satire: Indian Fiction and the Reimagining of Menippean Satire positions postcolonial South Asian satiric fiction in both the cutting-edge territory of political resistance writing and the ancient tradition of Menippean satire. Postcolonial Satire aims to disrupt the relationship between postcolonial literature and magic realism, by discussing the work of writers such as G. V. Desani, Aubrey Menen, Salman Rushdie, and Irwin Allan Sealy as one movement into the entirely subversive realm of satire. Indian fiction, and the fiction of other colonized cultures, can be re-construed through the lens of satire as openly critical of a broad spectrum of political and cultural issues. Employing the strengths of postcolonial theory and criticism, Postcolonial Satire expands upon the postcolonial works of these authors by analyzing them as satire, rather than magical realism with satirical elements.

Wherever you are on the path to 1:1 teaching and learning, you need a guide that can help you make the best use of the powerful technology available in today's classrooms. In Power Up: Making the Shift to 1:1 Teaching and Learning, Diana Neebe and Jen Roberts draw on research and their extensive experience working with teachers across subject areas and grade levels to share the keys to success when teaching with a computer or tablet for every student. This is the book secondary teachers need to understand the changes in pedagogy, planning, classroom organization, time management, and collaboration that will help them be successful in a 1:1 environment. Whether providing immediate and detailed feedback to student writers, giving voice to quiet learners, or creating more time for actual work in a jam-packed school day, Neebe and Roberts show teachers how communication, differentiation, and other effective practices can be powered up with personalized technology. Throughout the book, Neebe and Roberts coach teachers through their initial concerns about technology integration, offer advice about avoiding common problems, and encourage innovation. Using detailed classroom examples, questions, and suggestions, they provide a framework for shaping the transformation of a traditional classroom into a student-centered, technology-rich learning environment. Readers will come away with a clear sense of how a fully implemented 1:1 classroom operates. Power Up makes the transition to 1:1 a manageable and exciting journey. It's a key part of supporting teachers and ensuring the success of your 1:1 program.