The BYOB Party at IISc started on a serious note with the discussion of the surreal Partition. Srikanth lightened the mood with a light read by the jolly good Wodehouse called  Joy in the Morning, a good book to start the Wodehouse series of 96 books with and a good writer to alleviate depression. He talks about aristocratic bumblings in the quaint English countryside. The title is from an English

translation of Psalms 30:5: “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.”

“You either live Wodehouse or you don’t,” Srikanth said. He was delighted by the social commentary, gags and one-liners, similies, metaphors and slang. “Phrases like God’s gift to the gastric juices,” mentioned another reader, “are the reason why we love this author.” He’s also one of the few writers who has given golf such prominence in some of his books.

Listen to Stephen Fry talk about Wodehouse here. The irony lies in how a man with such a sense of humor was misunderstood to have Nazi leanings. Read this to understand Wodehouse as a social commentator and this essay by Orwell defending Wodehouse.

Milind got an inspirational book called The First Indian by Commander Dilip Donde, who was the first Indian to complete a solo circumnavigation under sail in an Indian built boat.The decision to embark on such a journey was done on a whim. The entire exercise was ‘made in India’- the boat was made, provisions arranged, the bureaucracy managed and then he sailed solo.  It was inspiring to know that one of the readers in the group, Nandini, had attempted to climb Mount Everest twice!