BOOK REVIEW: Aziz Ansari – ‘Modern Romance’

The digital world of love and romance remains grossly unexplored by authors, let alone  narrated to the global audience with an investigative spin. Either prevailing writers such as Tharun James Jimani illustrate love and romance as a casual affair in novels like Cough Syrup: Surrealism, or the voluminous works of 18th Century master poet Mirza Ghalib prolong the classical rendition of loverly affection.

But Aziz Ansari’s 288-page Modern Romance is a trailblazing piece of research and humor, praising the salacious exchange of words between two introverts on a single internet wire, when at the same time, debunking their ability to share a real-life kiss. It is a contradictory masterpiece.

The theme of Modern Romance focuses on the influence of technology on the personal life of a 21st century individual. Ansari’s creative mix of social science and humor takes  the reader on an idiosyncratic adventure, exposing the illusion of a perfect life partner  on the internet, the differences in modern age personalities, and the rapid decline of  depth and sensitivity in true companionship.

Best known for his role as the suave Tom Haverford in the American television series Parks and Recreation, Aziz Ansari began making his name as a stand-up comedian in New York during the summer of 2000. Ansari’s improvisational comedy, presented in   the critically acclaimed MTV sketch comedy show Human Giant, earned him a place in  Rolling Stone’s comedian hotlist of 2004, becoming one of the sharpest comedic voices of the decade. His other works include the live audio album Intimate Moments for a Sensual Evening, and the American action-comedy film 30 Minutes or Less.

The entertainer’s meticulous attention to adults’ social media usage constructs the backbone of his latest project. Finessing responses from a forum started on Reddit last year in October, Ansari quotes a young woman’s experience with the social networking  site, Tinder: “I’m actually currently dating a guy I met off Tinder, we’ve been exclusive   for about a month now? It’s going well, I like him a lot and we’re very happy. I deleted it  after we agreed to be exclusive.”

The result of such disclosure is undivided frankness and honesty, a combination instantly stirring interest in the book’s target audience ― every living human with a  tablet in hand. Moreover, the Columbia-born humorist’s practiced observational  narration makes the reader a part of a live stand-up comedy show somewhere in New York. Ansari throws a double entendre in the very first chapter of the book, Searching for a soulmate, “With time you’d realize how to be confident on ask-out-calls. Witty banter would be at the tip of your tongue, and soon you and Stephanie would be two  verbal fencers parrying and riposting it up.”

A die-hard introvert’s insecurities whilst dealing with his new-found digital girl and the annoyance on the face of single-women as they watch their beloveds turn cold, finally have answers. The book is devoid of a proper storyline, since comprehensive research  sees to the project’s substantiation with ample statistics. The number of people not   involved in romantic relationships since 1987, percentage drop in arranged marriages since 2005, the percentage of men asking women out on phone calls instead of texts, are all peppered in graphs and tables across seven crisp chapters.

Perhaps the strongest competitive edge of the comedian’s humble writing debut over its contemporaries, is the precedence of understanding over eloquence. Romance, as an institution, stimulates the reader’s interest only when he feels himself shadowing the writer’s narrative, feeling the symptoms of excitement and anxiety surge through him. In  Modern Romance, short Facebook statuses, shorter tweets and slang texts substitute the traditionally preferred style of lengthy, affectionate poetry. In the wake of such inclusions, Ansari wordlessly mocks the current generation’s appetite to enjoy an  absolute deficit of words, in place of sophisticated rhymes, rendering it both ignorant and drawn.

Eric Klinenberg, a professor of sociology at New York University, teamed up with Ansari to lend the book an array of psychological angles for approaching romance as a global reality, and not just a nation-bound survey. Chapters four’   social-romance exigencies, in view of the region’s conservative current. “The young people we met argued, social media is giving people in Qatar and in the United Arab Emirates more new ways to meet and express themselves. In the cyber-isolation of Emirates, and pretty much everywhere, social media and the Internet are introducing all   kinds of new options into social and romantic life”, writes Ansari.

Maintaining an exclusive attitude towards the world’s take on romance, and rather  encouraging an America-centric focus, would have opened the book to easy criticism.   However, one-on-one interviews with a superabundance of men and women in Wichita, Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, Paris, Tokyo and Doha establishes commendable diversity   throughout Aziz Ansari’s hazardous effort. Furthermore, scholars in the disciplines of anthropology, psychology, sociology and technology have offered their research contributions to the project, including Robb Willer of Stanford University, Sherry Turkle of MIT and Sheena Iyengar of Columbia Business School. Sensitivity to thought, and neat articulation are not traits naturally attributed to stand-up comedians, but that is precisely what separates Aziz Ansari’s caliber from the rest of the industry.