“Rāg Lalit by Hariprasad Chaurasia, the flutist, inspires me as a writer. It is a predawn raga that evokes the hour in India when the sun is yet to burn away the mist that hangs over the fields. I have played this raga every morning for years because I believe its pace mirrors the pace of the mind, still sodden with sleep, still in a semi-dream state, beginning to process the first thoughts of the day. Rāg Lalit is one hour, nine minutes, and two seconds long and by the time it has reached its climax—and what a climax it is!—the day, with all the noise and suddenness with which it breaks in India, is upon the listener.”
—Aatish Taseer, author of Noon (Faber and Faber, 2011)
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