NEW HOPE INTERNATIONAL REVIEW

Prakalpana Literature gives the first impression of being a strange brew of words and images. What is Prakalpana? Well, PRAKALPANA QUEST: QUESTION RAIN # 2, strives to answer this and other questions. Basically, Prakalpana is a mixture of forms from literature and art, encompassing as much of the wider scope of culture as it can. THE QUESTION RAIN answers use a form of words that commingle or create new compounds. For example, big and ignorance becomes bignorance.

Ultimately Prakalpana could be described as a revealage [sic] of humanity, taking out the order and patterns that we have come to expect, and leaving just what has been already always, allwhere, scripted inherently, like air, space, time, matter or life [sic].

Especially interesting in Prakalpana Literature is the grafting together of real life experiences and the imagined realm, or the fantasy world of film. In LAUGH IF U R WISE — MARTIAL, the prose morphs from an exploration of laughter at nothing, to an airport lounge waiting scene, to a post-tsunami hospital complete with liberal application of clowns and jokers — inspired by Robin Williams' movie character Patch Adams.

Some people may well consider writing such as this as bordering on the surreal, calling to mind perhaps the earlier work of writers such as early T.S. Eliot, as in PRUFROCK AND OTHER OBSERVATIONS. Indeed, observations might be a better way of viewing Prakalpana. At the end of LAUGH IF U R MARTIAL WISE, laughter itself has the last laugh.

Paul Murphy's AUTOLYCUS ANTIPASTA features Professor Hiram Q. Pipesucker the third, and sounds as though it is a cross between Magritte's CECI N'EST PAS UNE PIPE, and a overblown college professor. It works by a series of surreal progressions, but is imbued with much humour that lightens the overall surreality.

These examples are but a few from the journal. I think the best way to describe Prakalpana's effect on the reader is that it works with the pre-set determinates that one has already acquired from literary exposure, to wrangle around and change those perceptions gradually. Prakalpana Literature could be considered a brew much like stout — an acquired taste at first, but one that grows on you with renewed imbibing. Perhaps savoured best of all in the original country of brewing.

Presentationally, this is certainly a mixed bag of poetic offerings. Some of the English grammar and phraseology is, perhaps not surprisingly, a tad quirky. Some would say that this only adds to its charm. For me, however, I found the end result a little disappointing in terms of layout.

I read through to page 22 under the heading PRAKALPANA QUEST: before I found anything which made me stop and really think. I particularly liked the lines ...

even having all the ingredients and spices can't make a delicious dish if the cook is inefficient ... hub and herb of art.

However, I can end on a positive note and say that I enjoyed David Stone's BRIDGEWORKS 8 at its beginning but then, it fell away and failed to retain my interest towards the middle and end.

In summary, I found the whole anthology experimental with a small e as well as lots of naval gazing most of which failed to engage me as a reader.