History: Tales of Kings and Tales of Ordinary People

More than the average people, I like to read history. The reason that I like to read history is that it is related to human beings. Today what I am doing will become history tomorrow. Thus, if I can become an important person then I can be a part of history of my field or my country or my society. If I am not an important person then I will be gone forever after my death.

When we read about the past time, we mainly read about the important political events. It is natural because in the past knowledge was limited to rich people and it was the king or the rulers who could afford to pay money to historians and write about their glories. The rulers thought that they were very important and they ordered their poets and scholars to write about their heroic deeds.

Often, the poets and scholars or historians did exaggerations to please the king.

If we look at the history of India then we will notice that before the coming of England, no king could rule all the parts of India. It was British who could totally capture almost all the parts of the modern day of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Myanmar or Burma. However, in the past, the poets and historians of Indian kings used to glorify the kings as the rulers of all over India until the Indian Ocean. This was a very common trend among Indian kings. As a result, we can see claims of completing kings over one area at the same time.

Now a days, we are giving more importance to the social history. Social history is also important because this gives us an idea of the people and their society. We now like to know about ordinary people and how they were in the past. I think that Chaucer did extra ordinary thing in his The Canterbury Tales. There, we can find the description of ordinary people in England in the 14^th century. I really cannot think of any other book written in English literature that depicted the lives of ordinary people so well like The Canterbury Tales in medieval age. 

Shakespeare in Live: The Miracle Motivation

It was a nice commercial movie that brought a lot a of money and awards in the end. I am talking about Shakespeare in Love. The plot is almost entirely fictional. When Shakespeare suffers in life and finds that his GF is in bed with another man then he lost any motivation to write. However, when he later meets the heroine and they fall in love then he found a miracle motivation and finished the writing of the drama ‘Romeo and Juliet’ in a very short time. In real life too, when you are in a positive mood then you can write a lot and when you are depressed then writing becomes very tough.

It is more than 8 months that my health suffered and I could not write at all. Today, suddenly, I feel better in my health and in my mind. I feel that I must start writing again. I must admit that I am a very lucky man in marriage. My wife is very dedicated, loving and supportive. So, I feel double motivation today. I really wish to write something memorable someday and dedicate the book to her.

If you are married or in a relationship, then, try to get motivation and energy from your love and marriage. 

Dream, Hope, Living in a Society and Literature

Human life is not ideal. Here, we do not get what we want or dream. We also live in a society. We have relatives, friends, neighbors and unknown people. We get married and we get a new set of family. Thus, it is a very complicated thing to live in a society as a human being. The people who are in higher than you try to offend and oppress you. Even if they are good still, you have to obey them and listen to them. On the other hand, the people who are lower than you, you get the expectations that they must listen to you.

The main problem is that we often just look at others and forget our own situation. We get annoyed and angry with the injustice that we face and experience in our every day life. We do not have the same kind of attitude towards our own misdeeds. Even if you can analyze your own mistakes, you cannot always feel the guilt with the same kind of strength that you feel about the injustice carried towards you by others.

Loneliness is another fear that haunts almost everyone. We sometimes are afraid to express our own feelings just not to offend others. We don’t want to hurt them because we like them and because we don’t want to alienate ourselves. This simple matter is not that simple. In society, we need help from each other. If you today you alienate me then tomorrow you cannot come to me for any help you need.

There are many other factors that put a lot of stress in our mind. That is why, we love to read books, watch movies and listen to music. We like to escape from the tough reality in life. Literature can communicate with us emotionally. That is why, even in this age, many people find pleasure by reading novels. When people are asked to list their most favorite novels then often we can find serious novels come in the list.

A few years ago, BBC carried out a survey of popular Bengali songs. Thousands of people voted and serious and beautiful songs hit the chart. I guess out of 20 songs, only 2-3 were romantic. Not even one cheap or light song could make in to the list.

I don’t know why I started writing this entry. In fact, I wrote it yesterday. May be at that time, I was sad and frustrated. 

Self Publishing and Online Publishing

Many of us have the dream to write a book and get published. This dream is very strong and in internet, I can find that there are many companies that would take money from you and publish your book. Self publishing is not bad but I consider that it is not actual publishing. I know that many writers would get annoyed with me but the reality is that the writers who could not get published in a standard way go for self publishing.

I think that it is better to publish your works in a blog or website because then you can make sure that some people will read your works. For example, this blog nearly attracts one hundred visitors per day. That means that per month nearly 3000 people are reading my content.

I know that the content of this blog is not that good because I can not give enough time for it. Still, some people are reading my content. The same can not be said when you are publishing a book on your own and you are spending the money. You just get the satisfaction of printing a book. In most of the cases, hardly anyone will read what you have written.

So, I think that in stead of going for self publishing, you should start a website or blog and even you can make e-books. 

Everything Historical: A Blog on Historical Fiction

There are not a lot of blogs on literature in the first place and it gave me a lot of happiness a blog called Everything Historical. It is managed by Deanna Proach. She updates the blog only a regular basis and she is putting excerpts from a historical novel that she has written. The novel is based on the events of French revolution. So, if you have any interest about history and historical novel then I think that you should visit this blog.

In future, I hope to write some historical fictions only after I can get free from the money worry. 

Some Messages of French Revolution 1789

French revolution is an important time in history of man kind. To many people, it is perhaps the start of the modern age. The events before the revolution and after it were full of anarchy and a lot of people lost their lives. It was a very troubling time for France.

With all the problems and anarchy, the message of French revolution was very powerful. It inspired of the people of France and inspired the people of Europe and America. Just thirteen years before the French revolution, American war of Independence happened and it was also like a revolution itself with its own message. However, the message of French revolution was more powerful because perhaps it talked about humanity in general. Equality, liberty and brotherhood can be applicable to people of all age and all nationality.

About French revolution, the best novel that I can think of is A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. Here, we can see both sides of the coin. Dickens showed the torture of the aristocrats and also showed the anarchy that happened when the aristocrats fell.

In England there was a fear that the same thing could happen but it did not happen. In stead, in England, another kind of revolution happened and it was industrial revolution. As a result of the Industrial Revolution, many people came to the towns and cities and a new economy and social system emerged in England. 

MBA is Cool but History is Important Too

Yesterday, I was talking with a journalist. We mainly discussed about the current economic crisis and how it is affecting everyone. The economic recession has harmed all the economies a lot. Fortunately, in my country Bangladesh, the impact was not that much felt. However, I felt a lot because I work in blogging and I earn money with Google Adsense. So, bad condition of US economy directly affects me. One of the worst things that has happened in this recession is perhaps that people now a days do not give value to humanities subject. For example, most people are now interested about technology and business.

Doing an MBA is perhaps the best thing for any student anywhere in the world now. As a result, bright students are running after business and technology and people are forgetting humanities subjects like history, philosophy, literature and political science.

When I was young, I made a serious decision of studying humanities. Most of my friends went to science or commerce. At that time, many of my friends could not understand why I was doing it because I was basically a good student. Now, I don’t regret because I understand the importance of humanities subjects.

Yesterday, we were discussing that it is very difficult to earn money everywhere in humanities field. I can understand it because I wanted to write about literature and history. History is my main favorite topic and whenever I find any spare time, I try to read about history of different countries. However, at the same time, I know that opening a blog on history will not bring any money for me.

I think one of the good parts of economic recession is that suddenly many people can see that studying MBA cannot guarantee your future. At least in USA, many people with good business degrees lost their jobs and unemployment is not limited to only humanities subject anymore. So, many people are unhappy now and perhaps they will try to think.

In the last one decade, most young people everywhere felt that running after money was the best thing to do. They became too much addicted to consumerism and they felt that they must earn more money and enjoy life more. However, this idea reached in its peak and then the great recession of 2008 came. I just hope that people start to think about this matter seriously and try to think about humanities subjects. They must try to understand that history and philosophy are very important for any human being. 

French Revolution of 1789: What Went Wrong?

After the French revolution took place in 1789, France fell into anarchy. The aristocrats lost their power and many of them were executed. The leaders of the revolution did not have their unity and it was more or less like a civil war. The ordinary people had too much expectation from the revolution and they felt disappointed and frustrated. So, anarchy was the only thing that followed after the revolution and it was a brave tragedy in human history.

The lesson that we have to learn is that when any change or glorious revolution happens in any country, people should try to give it some time to work. They must not have too much expectation and they should not imagine that everything will change overnight. When a bad system is deep in the rout of a country or society then it takes a long time to remove the hidden impacts.

People have to always remember that they make the leaders. The leaders of any political party or any country are made by the ordinary people. They must always remember to push the leaders in the right direction. They must not feel that some leaders will come and make everything ok or save them. This is another lesson we must remember from the French revolution. 

Blogging: The Good and the Bad

Last few days, I have been able to work some more compared to the past. My health is improving and I have also come back to blogging. My blogs are doing well again and one of them is South Asia blog. South Asia blog in the last 12 days received around 120,000 page views. It is quite amazing and I am very happy for the success. Good traffic always means more income and I am happy that I am free of the money worry for the time being.

The only problem that I can see at this moment is that I have to write on various topics. For example, on a typical day now, I have to write on sports, blogging, in literature, business, entertainment and technology. It is very difficult and it surely destroys the possibility of writing any quality content. I have good knowledge of South Asia and that’s why when I write something about South Asia then I can hope that it will be good and the same goes for sports. Except these two topics, it is very difficult for me to write quality content on a regular basis especially when I am writing on five or six topics at the same day.

Writing is not an easy thing. I am gradually thinking of just focusing only one topic and writing about it and I know that if I just focus only one thing then I can write quality content and perhaps get good success too. However, at the same time, I have to earn money on a day to day basis and I can not simply neglect it.

Perhaps the best way, is to update other blogs once every week. This way, I can focus on South Asia Blog. Last night, I opened another blog, http://www.bangladeshresearch.com/

If you have any interest about Bangladesh, then this will be a good place for you in future. 

How to Promote Bangla Literature in Internet?

Last few days, I was thinking a lot about promoting Bangla literature more in internet. The easiest solution came to my mind was that many people should open blogs on Bangla literature in English language. This is the best way and they should all try to right something and whatever they can do. Even if you can translate just one short poem or write one hundred words about any poet or a novel or a drama of Bangla literatures then it helps. Don’t get discouraged if you see that it is not bringing you any money or does not make you famous. It does not matter because reality is that you have to do it not for earning money but for promoting your own literature.

I live in Dhaka, Bangladesh and even I did not study Bangla literature. In fact, I studied English literature and then English language teaching from English department of Dhaka University. However, since I love my country and my language, I opened this blog four years ago. It is not that I have done a lot of things but in this blog, we have written about Michael Madhusudan Dutta, Sharat Chandra Chatterji, Syed Mujtaba Ali and so on. We translated some short stories and we translated some poems. You can do the same thing by just giving small amount of time.

For this blog, I never give time seriously simply because it does not bring any revenue for me. However, I gave small amount of time whenever I could and this way now we have small but good materials on Bangla literature.

You may wonder why not open a website but open a blog? The best part of opening a blog is that thanks to Google it is free and you don’t need to have any technical knowledge. All you need is just a free Google account and then the rest is very easy. Just simply go to blogger.com and then sign up for a blog. It takes around five minutes and it is very easy to do.

After opening a blog you don’t need to have any technical knowledge or you don’t need to maintain the website. All you need is that sometimes write some content and then put in it. If you do not want to maintain a blog then there is another way.

In Wikipedia, there are many entries in Bangla language and English language on Bangla literature. You just can add two or five sentences whenever you can. This will be very helpful if you can do so because Bangla has one of the richest literatures on earth. But unfortunately very few people outside of Bangladesh and West Bengal of India know about it.

Yes, we are proud of Tagore but people from other countries hardly know anything about our writers and poets except Tagors. This must change and because we live in the age of Internet, we all can contribute. 

Translating Bangla Literature: No Revenue Model Yet

Last night, for a long time, I was thinking of translating some short stories from Bangla language to English. I know that I can do the work and it may not be very good at least, something is better than nothing. At this moment, there is hardly any short story or novel from Bangla literature that have been translated in English. Secondly, the translations are not even available in internet. So, although Bangla has one of the richest literatures in the world, very few people have got taste of it until now. This is sad and sometimes I feel that I leave everything and just do this work. However, I have to think of its impact too. I do not come from a rich family and I have to pay all my bills and then save some money for future.

Thus, I was thinking last night to find a balance between these two. On the one hand, I wanted to translatehttp://translate.google.com/ some short stories from Bangla literature and while on the other hand, I was thinking of a revenue model. I understood that one of the biggest problems is that here people are not yet accustomed to buying e-books. I just simply can translate any short stories and then publish it in a DVD. It is possible but most people do not have a habit of buying e-books. Piracy is another big problem. I was counting the expenses related to this project. The biggest expense is my time. Then I was thinking that if I publish this kind of DVD then it will be pirated very easily and I will not get any money.

I just wish that some people set up an organization or a NGO to work for translation of Bangla literature.