Bibliofile

Clinton may not have graced William Dalrymple’s book launch in Los Angeles, but the author of White Mughals was more than happy with the guest who turned up at the LA County Museum of Art. It was Aamir Khan in a hip-hop outfit, in baggy jeans, cap on his head. Dalrymple’s Hollywood dream remains just that. Shekhar Kapur took him to lunch seven times; nothing came out of courting Hollywood script star Sabrina Dhawan either. But with Aamir in the audience, Dalrymple delivered a slide-lecture that seemed straight out of Bollywood. And according to an eyewitness: "His own delivery made one think he might be angling for a role."

Some publishers have a curious sense of humour. To register their protest at the burnt books in Baghdad, the Roli editors sweated it out to produce a quickie. The result: a Dubya joke book, with a ‘foreplay’ by Suhel Seth and a postscript by the editors. A sample: "A tragic fire on Monday destroyed the personal library of George W. Bush. Both of his books have been lost. Presidential spokesperson Ari Fleischer said the President was devastated as he hadn’t finished colouring the second one."