Team of Rivals

“Team of rivals” is a book that I have been attempting to complete reading for a fairly long time. On my reading stand, with a fair amount of stickies marking the interesting pages. As you can guess from the number of stickies jutting out, it is a marvellous read.

Lincoln’s first anti slavery speech (1854) is beautifully described in this book. It was against the Nebraska Act. The author writes “ Once he committed himself, however as he did in the mid fifties to the anti slavery cause, he demonstrated singular tenacity and authenticity of feeling. Ambition and conviction united, “as my two eyes make one in sight”, as Robert Frost wrote, to give Lincoln a political future and a cause worthy of his era.

The poem is “Two tramps in mud time” and the entire verse containing this line goes thus:

My object in living is to unite
My avocation and my vocation
As my two eyes make one in sight.
Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For heaven and the future’s sakes.

In the present era this line sits well on the shoulders of yet another individual in his fifties; Rahul Gandhi as he takes us on the journey of our lifetimes, firm in his conviction and staying true to his ambition of uniting us all. His chosen path that of love and harmony; a path not for the faint hearted for sure.

We will be tested for sure but in my heart I know we will prevail. Keep walking. The Yatra continues.