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Friday 22 July 2011

Not Love is bought but sweating made

Lest this thought distress the Marwari maid
'Not Love is bought but sweating made'
Bollywood rose from out the Sea
To hear Ruskin hymn  Dharavi.

Notes
1) The Marwaris are a caste of, often very wealthy, entrepreneurs from the arid and socially conservative  State of Rajasthan.
2) Dharavi- the terrible slum in Mumbai featured in 'Slumdog Millionaire'. It first enters Eng. Lit. when apostrophized in  John Ruskin's Newidgate Prize poem 'Salsette and Elephanta'. Gandhi considered Ruskin his Guru chiefly, it appears, because the latter was under the impression that being nice to very poor people would mean they'd work for you both more whole-heartedly as well as more cheaply than could possibly, otherwise, be the case.

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