Tivolian Cowardice

Sci-fi writers really observe people so closely and can lift out behaviour traits so well and isolate them just to make them sound/look ridiculous until one day you’re like: OMG I know a Tivolian!!

Now, Tivolians are a humanoid race of people from the planet Tivoli whose main defining trait is cowardice. But this cowardice was not subjective or passive. In fact, this cowardice was very calculated. The Eleventh Doctor would describe it as “aggressive cowardice”.

At first glance, the Tivolians were a society of cowards who had grown so used to being conquered and occupied by other races it had become a way of life just to accept it. They never defended themselves and did everything they could to make their conquerors as comfortable as possible. In fact their anthem was basically “Glory to [Insert Name Here]” so as to make it easier for invaders. 

All this seemed amusing, if but slightly exhausting, and you even feel sad for them and maybe would defend them, until you start to realise that this cowardice was decidedly a plan of hostile action. That at the core of it was a combative disloyalty. You realise that a Tivolian would switch sides on you the moment the wind shifted.

Now do you understand my first para better? You do know a Tivolian in real life too, don’t you?

Of Art Shows and Ât So

Some time back, people in Mizoram seemed to think art was synonymous with nudity. Nude art is definitely art but it is definitely not all there is to art. I remember being amused and yet mildly irritated at the time. One of the best jokes that came out of it, as I remember, is the frustrated rant of a friend over an art show that had a number of nude art on display: this is not an art show, this is ât so! 

Ât so. I still chuckle over it. I think the pun was immensely clever. Display of madness. Or that translation may still not be enough to convey the utter mayhem of ât so. Brilliant.

To me, though, boudoir shots have always been intriguing. I liked in Disney’s Lilo & Stitch how Lilo would take pictures of grotesquely fat, semi-nude people on the Hawaiian beach like they were interesting and then displayed the polaroids on her bedroom wall as decor. Art. Boudoir shots remind me of Lilo all the time. Or vice versa. 

Beauty as a concept often changes. Botticelli’s Venus has love rolls, for example. Today’s beauty standards – the Britney Spears abs, the Zendaya figures, the Angelina Jolie looks – do not allow for imperfections. No love handles! It is impossible to attain these. I believe this impossible standard of beauty is displayed best by the Kardashian sisters. The thick, long, dark, lustrous straight hair of Asian women, the perfect angular facial features of Caucasian women, the lightly tanned olive skin of the Mediterranean folks, the full lips, breasts and ass of African women, the perfectly toned abs of a modern gym-going woman... beauty standards of different races (and even time?) all rolled into one perfect plastic mould. No one should ever emulate them. That way lies madness. Let Image be the domain of the Kardashians; this is the butter that coats their bread. Not for us regular mortals working 9-to-5s. They say the future is beige and that may be so but I guess the Kardashians couldn’t wait that long. Good for them. They have the money. I judge rich people who remain ugly.

And that’s on beauty. But Art is not just a depiction of beauty. It means so many things. It is what survives after we are gone. It is what encapsulates us in our Present. It is what we hope for will come to pass. I don’t know how else to say it as that Art is as Art does. It is how it makes you feel. Happiness, sadness, anger, loss, lust, whatever. It moves your soul. And thankfully, there's new art all the time.

I cried the first time I watched Doctor Who’s Vincent And The Doctor. This episode pays a beautiful homage to Van Gogh’s Starry Night. It showed you a way of looking at this canvas and how Van Gogh, as depressed as he was in real life, could see majestic beauty in ways no one else could see, the way the night sky swirled around in shades of blue and gold, the colours of the wind and the way the air dances around in the inky blackness of the dark. 

It is good that God created artists. Their art has lived on even after they have died and gone. They have ensured that people understand they are not alone. No matter how lonely and sad you may be, or how ecstatic and hopeful you might find yourself, any feeling that makes you human, some old artist of bygone days have also felt, and they’ve left behind their experiences in their art – their melodies, their lyrics and poems, their voices, their books, their videos, their canvases, their sculptures... I believe art confirms our humaneness. I think the most important message of art is this: you are not alone.

It is perfectly wondrous how there never seems to be a shortage of new art. Speaking locally, I’d never have thought it possible to have rhyming scheme in Mizo poetry and lyrics. But recently, the new crop of Mizo rappers have incorporated rhymes in their songs, weaving puns into their lines seemingly effortlessly. I’ve always marvelled at this. I think this is brilliant. I also have always thought Mizo language was best suited to Gospel, Country and Rock. And mostly only those. But apparently, if done right, it fits in well even with pop, indie, rap and, actually indeed, most genres! Even nonsensical-sounding, prose-like lyrics could be charming if executed properly. If you don’t compare them to the Oldies, which you really shouldn’t anyway, and allow them to stand on their own, they’re wonderfully fabulous.

If you don't agree to a piece of art, it really could seem like a veritable display of insanity: ât so! But in my most humble opinion, even if you don't like it or don't agree with it, as long as you react to it, it still counts. And funny thing, someone else might find themselves in that. Someone you don't like, most probably though.

Truthfully, art is what makes us human.