Realism

On Friday, I attended this drama production by Singapore Playhouse London. We watched two pretty serious plays, dealing with pretty grim issues like suicide and some sort of political conspiracy. Good stuff...thanks Hui Min!

I've just finished reading Salman Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories. It's a book which Mr Rushdie wrote for his 10-year-old son some time back. It's one of those books which both kids and adults can read. For adults, I suppose if you thought about the storyline you'd probably spot certain contemporary ideas that Mr Rushdie plays around with like suicide bombing, male chauvinism, dictatorial governance etc. I won't give the story away. Let me know if you want to borrow the book. It's a really light read, trust me.

There's this bit near the middle which I thought was quite interesting:

'Oh isn't it?' Blabbermouth shot back. 'That's the trouble with you sad city types you think a place has to be miserable and dull as ditchwater before you believe it's real.'

I think this is true to some extent. There's this idea in International Relations (a module I'm studying this year) that's called realism. Basically a realist believes that the world community is in a state of anarchy and everyone's looking out for their own self-interests. War is unavoidable -it's been happening throughout history and just as human beings argue, states do so too and hence fight each other. Forget My Little Pony, once reality hits you, you're swamped with suicide, corruption, the rat race, divorce, cancer, racism.

It's a pretty pessimistic take on life, I say. And yet, you can't deny that bad things happen. Wars are fought, people die. People do stupid things and people get hurt. Even if you don't want to be a realist, sometimes you can't help it. Why do we associate the phrase real world with that part of life which is difficult, painful and hard. Do we not do the real world discredit when we neglect to mention the happy, idyllic events in life.