Fine and Dandi

Some parochial flavor at last! I had been thinking of putting up something India-centric for a while now and yesterday's Hindu article was a godsend for my cynical pen to start moving again. I wonder if the Open Page guys are going to indulge me , because this is a bit stronger than the usual platitudes. Here it is then, "Dandi is redundant"

Dandi is redundant

It is no great feat of the imagination to conjure up an image of the Mahatma sitting at his rickety charkha, spinning slowly, determinedly, a vision of India as a macrocosm of a self-sustained village community. It would be equally facile though, judging by current political events, for one to imagine him spinning in his grave at the continual defilement of his legacy by his very own political progeny – the Congress.

The AICC headquarters informs us that the Congress, to commemorate the 75^th anniversary of the historic Dandi March, seeks to ‘re-enact’ it for a period of 26 days, beginning March 12. The ostensible purpose is to apprise the younger generation of the “great legacy the country has inherited from the Father of the Nation”.

The Salt March, as it is usually called, is one of the finest examples ever, of the power of symbols. Gandhi’s determined rebellion against the perceived injustice of the British administration galvanized millions of heretofore apathetic Indians to join the ranks of the ‘Civil Disobedience Movement’. The march to Dandi was a call to arms for a people long inured to suffering iniquities uncomplainingly. Concomitantly, it acted as a rite of passage for M K Gandhi, allowing him the psychological leverage to become the undisputed arbiter of the direction of the freedom struggle for more than a decade.

The Salt March was a deliberate attempt to subvert the power of the administration, an orchestrated act of anarchistic demagoguery. While unqualifiedly a stroke of political genius in its own context, one ponders over the possible significance of a ‘re-enactment’ of the same 75 years hence, by none but the ruling party. Why should a democratic, civilized, and developing nation want to relive anti-establishment activities?

The Dandi incident was one of the barely half-dozen occasions in Gandhi’s political career where he welcomed the Press. His intention, en route to the Gujarat coast, was quite simply, publicity for the statement of his resolve to persist with the freedom struggle. And yet, even though his scheme was incredibly successful in vitalizing the masses, he did not resort to publicity stunts like this one save as a last resort. And, more importantly, he would carry through each and every one of his public resolves irrespective of physical, mental or political cost.

It is perfectly acceptable for cultural heroes to be glorified. Gandhi, in this respect, probably deserves an exceedingly higher pedestal than the usual assortment of skilled murderers and raconteurs that populate the Hall of Fame of popular perception. It is therefore, understandable, in the typical Indian hagiographical context, for the nation to pay homage to the great man on the anniversary of his achievement.

But then, how much of the soul of the march to Dandi does the Congress hope to encapsulate for the benefit of the younger generation? Can they, or anyone else for that matter, even dream of empathizing with the fervor of dedication that those earnest followers of Gandhi felt as they walked alongside his frail form? What is it that they hope to ‘re-enact’? The physical aspect of the march – the 241 miles from Sabarmati to Dandi? Paula Radcliffe would probably do it better.

How do you celebrate the occasion of one frail, loincloth-garbed ascetic’s gesture of revolt against the might of the British Empire? Well, if you are the Congress, you start by forming an organizing committee with patrons-in-chief and patrons-of-programme and chairmen and vice-chairmen running around primping for the cameras. For a month’s duration, you spend money on pomp and splendor that might have come in very handy indeed for the starving poor in AP or the tsunami-hit destitutes in TN.

One may choose, alternatively, to be incensed or baffled by the cavalier use that the Congress makes of its rich legacy of upright statesmanship and homogeneously nationalistic ideation. It has, thanks to the internal collapse of the Indian far Right, been able to rid itself of its minority-appeasement policy but is now in danger of drifting back to the old days of toadyism to the ‘dynasty’. The megalomanic charisma of Indira is yet to wear off the senior cadres and insofar as the rejuvenation of the party is concerned, the sooner it is past, the better.

Which is why it is painful to find the leading lights of the Congress indulging in anachronistic jingoism at a time when India, both as a society and an economy, is preparing to take wing as a power to contend with. It would be a far grander gesture of political maturity should the Congress from this embarrassing prospect.

It is almost excruciatingly clichéd to point out that Indian politics, for uniquely indigenous reasons, is extremely corrupt and decadent. It is also palpable that political stunts like Advani’s Rath Yatra affect large, extremely gullible segments of the voting population. To ask our worthy representatives to refrain from manipulating the populace for electoral gains is akin to praying for snowflakes in Hell.

How, then, do we convince our leaders that, with all due respect to the Father of the Nation, we, his descendants, need to move on?

Portrait of a non-artist as an old man

Hi all. don't have time for the cheery introductions. This is a short story I wrote for a contest by the British Council. In an hour's time I'll be in Anna Salai, listening to a reading of the same, and I hope I win, although it isn't very spectacular, so far as literary merit goes. Anyway, here it is

Into each life…

There was no possibility of taking a walk that day, U__ S______ decided, as he ponderously rearranged the window curtains. He closed his eyes, turned around, then opened them again. “You are a foolish old man”, he muttered to himself reprovingly.

He looked at the cushions in disarray on the sofa. He looked at the children’s trinkets obscuring his Air Force awards on the walnut mantelpiece. He looked at the life-sized stuffed toy orangutan, who returned his stare with enamel-polished eyes.

He was an old man, older for being surrounded by youth. “You are old,” Ishaan’s Spiderman remarked from the settee. “You are old,” Medha’s colorful little sandals caroled from under the sofa.

“What nonsense”, he shook his head, “ Grandchildren are a gift from God. I am not unhappy. I am perfectly alright.” He made his way to the bedroom. His son’s Pink Floyd CDs nodded gravely from their racks, “We understand and sympathize.”

“Would that the fates were to be kind enough to allow me a cup of tea”, he said as he entered the room. The old woman looked up from her book. Her voice was always gentle, reproachful.

“Darling, must you be so sarcastic all the time?”

“Oh! Very well, you need not bother.”

“No, no. It is just that the way you say it, it…”

Oh! Of course, it is always my fault.”

The old woman was already out of the room, moving in her assured, helpless manner. The conversation hindered the movements of neither. “It is a ritual almost”, thought the old man as he carefully placed various portions of his anatomy on the bed in order.

“Why does Grandfather act so grumpy with Grandmother?” the grandchildren would often wonder. “He is so cheerful with everybody else.” The old man looked at Ishaan’s dinosaur book lying, dog-eared on the play-bucket. “Are two Loch Ness monsters better than one?” he thought.

“I smile at my son’s guests till my jaws ache. And I laugh at the children’s antics when nobody else bothers. And every smile is a thread for my shroud; every laugh is a spar in my pyre. I am happy because nobody cares if I am unhappy.” He turned his face into the pillow.

“Let me be angry a little, Lata,” he whispered, “Because it proves I am still alive.”

“You are talking to yourself again” broke in the old woman, “ Here is your tea.”

“And about time.” said the old man gruffly.

A weak thing, he thought as he sipped, for a throat inured to cantonment whisky for so long. “But then, everything about me is weak, now.”

“I am getting worried about Guddu and Smita. They will be on the way home now. And it is raining like anything”, she said.

“Who asked them to go to Fatehpur anyway?”

What asininity, what irresponsibility, he thought. To go off on a vacation just like that. With all the bills to be paid… And the children, poor dears, missing a week of school. And heaven knows how healthy the food is in that little slum. And to go and leave us here, alone, on the Diwali weekend… “No, not that of course. The bills, the bills…”

N____ could never understand what the ‘bills’ were. As an adolescent, he could only perceive them to possess all the undesirable characteristics of Hanuman’s tail. You could never be rid of them. At least, Grandfather never could. He would either be fretting about a bill, or worrying about an installment due; or calculating income tax deductions on his pension.

“Callow youngster”, the old man would say. “Where would youth be were it not to depend on age to sustain the inglorious process of Life? Ah! How frivolous is youth.”

And so he thought still, the indomitable old man, sitting in his bedroom, in a three-bedroom flat in an E___ D____ settlement, sitting in the murky light cast by the copper-colored sky of a chilly, rainy, November morning.

“Suniye, I think we should call Baby today. The poor dear! With all that work in their nursing home, she probably can’t get time to call.”

The old man thought of turning his face to answer, then decided against it. His right shoulder ached. Rheumatism is but a euphemism, he grimaced.

“If she is too busy to call, won’t she be too busy to talk? Do you want to waste her time?”

The old woman sighed and returned to her reading.

At least, she still has her reading and her religion, he thought. Slowly, he had begun picking up her habits. “What a stupid suggestion…” he reprimanded himself, “…the silly old woman.”

There had been a time when he would call her by name, defining the limits of their relationship and her influence on his identity. Now, “I am getting soft in the head”, he was content to emulate her, hearing himself address her, “Sunti hain…” with but a slight jar of the ego.

Suniye – literally ‘listen’; representative of the ancient tradition of Indian womanhood of not referring to husbands by name, symbolic of the acceptance of a man’s supremacy over her own identity.

“Why do I say that?” thought the old man, lying beside the old woman under her reading light. He thought of the little flutter of the stomach that preceded addressing his children and grandchildren – the fear of the understanding, sympathetic smile, the terror of the supercilious, condescending glance.

And he turned over in bed to face her, whom he would not name, she who would not name him, and listened to the incessant patter of the rain. There they lay, two Rumpelstiltskins, and in the uncertain light, it would not be a feat of imagination to regard their gray, amorphous silhouettes to be one.

He was half-asleep when she had another one of her coughing fits. The old man moved nothing but his eyelids to watch her scrabble, wheezing, in her little blue bag for the inhaler. She found it and the old man rolled over in bed to face the door.

“I am not angry. Why should I be angry?” he thought. “ I am not angry at my entirely loveable son-in-law, whom I greatly admire and respect as an individual and who gives us all these medicines for free with that insolent, virtuous smirk on his face.”

“I am a feeble old man with an oversized ego,” he thought. He rose impatiently and stepped out of the bedroom, rubbing his shoulder gingerly.

“The air feels cold on my bones,” he muttered as he trudged across the dining room. He stopped and scratched his side. Then he went across to the mantelpiece to pick up his reading glasses.

He looked at the denture bowl and the two translucent mandibles suspended in liquid. “If all of me was as easy to replace, who would replace whom? I am no longer here. I don’t know…” he blinked, “I am rambling.”

He made his way across the drawing room to the door of the balcony. “This shall be my cave,” he had announced to all and sundry when the masons and window-workers had finished insulating it from the elements. The old man had moved in, replete with religious books and icons and mementoes from the past.

Now, he entered his cave again. “I am a restless sanyasi, though” he grumbled. The love of life ran strong in him still, carrying him through a career in the Air Force and three heart attacks to the age of 76. He still loved life, though there was nothing left in life that he loved.

Sitting cross-legged, even on an upraised divan was an imposition on his arthritic knees. But the feat was silently accomplished. He picked up a book at random, flipped through the pages, then abandoned this pursuit and looked out of the window.

This rain was a prisoner of war, pouring down resignedly on the concrete walkways of the apartment’s compound, marching to the obscurity of the sewers under guard of the ruthlessly efficient drainage system.

He sat there, the old man, as anachronistic and incongruous in the second floor flat’s window, as the cold November rain that beat down upon it on the other side.

“What is this piece of paper doing in my hand?” the old man mused. He looked at the children’s little play-field beside the car-park that was trying hard not to look like a pond. “I am a silly old sentimental fool,” the old man told himself as he started folding the paper.

“If arthritis is not the herald of rigor mortis, the world does not make sense,” he thought as his fingers protested against the unaccustomed exercise. But then he stopped thinking as he concentrated on the intricate task at hand.

“They go to origami classes enough. Where are all the little children with their paper boats?” he wondered. No matter, his would be the first.

He bent over as he contrived to pull the paper out into a recognizable hull, then subsided into repose as some of the paper came apart in his right hand. The old man sat there, watching the puddle in the play-field rise in tiny plops to meet the rain. He labored up and walked back into the house.

He walked back to the bedroom and painstakingly worked his stiff body into a jersey and shoes. The old woman, stirring from her light doze asked, “What is it, darling? Has the rain stopped?” Then she drew herself up against the bedstead.

The old man walked out of the room and the old woman followed him. He went out of the front door. She locked it behind him and went to the kitchen to set some water on boil. Then she went to the bathroom and switched the geyser on. She laid out the old man’s woolen dressing gown and socks.

The old man stood beside the puddle, rain dripping off his still abundant, snow-white hair. The little paper boat, bobbing slightly askew in the water, struggled to survive the spear thrusts of the rain. There he stood, a sinking old man watching his little boat sink, as the rain beat down on both, steady as the ticking of a clock.

The old woman went to the balcony and looked out of the window. She saw the valiant little paper boat in the throes of its watery demise. She saw the old man stumping stolidly out of sight. The old woman watched both, one after the other, afraid to lose sight of either. Then she fixed her eyes on his form as he trudged slowly out of sight. The old woman waited patiently, eyes fixed in the distance.

(1780 words)

…Some rain must fall

Making a stair way to heaven

Hi all. A combination of vacations and circumstances colluded to keep me from posting anything new for the last two months, i'm afraid. This is to make amends for the same. The nice thing about this article is that I wrote it in an end-semester exam. The bad thing is that the lack of polish is extremely palpable. Anyway, here it is for all it is worth,

There’s a lady who’s sure
All that glitters is gold
And she’s buying
A stairway to heaven

The concept of divinity and a Supreme Entity is fairly recent, dating back not more than 3000 years. The monotheistic Semitic religions were preceded, however, by a vast evolutionary span of religious practice, originating from the Animism of Chalcolithic cultures. The origin of God, thus, lies in the awe of Nature, the might of the mastodon, the fury of the hurricane, the raging sea, the tempestuous lightning.

And when she gets there, she knows
If the stores are all closed
With a word she can get
What she came for

But awe was soon replaced by respect, and respect gradually assumed anthropomorphic connotations. Thereby, primitive cultures, established elaborate rituals to commune with non-corporeal entities and entreat them to do their bidding. It is known that Neanderthal man possessed a very firmly entrenched and intense religion of this type as far back as the early Neolithic period. The time period when Cro-Magnon adopted these practices cannot be stated definitively.

There’s a sign on the wall
But she wants to be sure
‘cause you know sometimes
Words have two meanings

This was followed by the establishment of a separate priestly class, for the purpose of propitiating, on rigid ritualistic lines, the forces of Nature, now anthropomorphized as gods. The worship of gods was too important a task, it was now held, to be left to amateurs.

In a tree by the brook
There’s a song-bird that sings
Sometimes all of our thoughts
Are misgiven (sic)

It was now that, owing to various economic and political factors, the priestly class attempted to increase its influence on society. This was primarily accomplished by repeated reiterations of human incompetence and insignificance before the all-powerful majesty of the Being that was then born – God.

There’s a feeling I get
When I look to the west
And my spirit is crying
For leaving

At this stage, Semitic religion made itself apparent, insistence on elaborate rituals being its link to the past, monotheism the pennant of its novelty. The key new element in proto-Judaism was the concept of the Adamite fall from Grace and the consequent theological distaste for affairs of the corporeal realm.

In my thoughts I have seen
Rings of smoke through the trees
And the voices of those
Who stand looking.

This was followed by a period of turmoil in western civilization. The outmoded Greek pantheon, accompanied by Roman innovations, was fighting a losing battle against Father Time to retain its faithful. Apollo, Dionysus et al would brook no divided allegiance from their devotees. For the first time in recorded history, the State actively involved itself in favoring and persecuting religious creeds. The stage was set for a world-historical event.

If there’s a bustle in your hedge-row
Don’t be alarmed now
It’s just a spring clean
For the May queen

The advent of Christianity sealed the victory of monotheism and hence, God, over the vast pantheon of Greek, Nordic, Egyptian and Hindu lore. Christianity, with its simple message of universal love and brotherhood, its powerful symbology and most importantly, its cohesive political vitality, stormed all bastions of ‘heathen’ thought and beliefs.

Yes, there are two paths
You can go by, but in the long run
There’s still time to change
The road you’re on

There remained but one modification to be made. The somewhat abstruse concept of the sacrifice of Christ, and the consequent Salvation of mankind was substituted by the concept of a totally anthropomorphic just Providence, requiring model behavior in daily life and perfect submission to the will of the one God – Allah. This was the seal of Semitic religion; this was the end of the evolutionary road for the anthropomorphic Semitic God. This was the inception of Islam.

And as we wind on down the road
Our shadows taller than our souls
There walks a lady we all know
Who shines white light and wants to show
How everything still turns to gold

And so we wind up to the modern Semitic milieu, walking down a lonely narrow road, encroached upon by an incredibly materialistic culture. And it is palpable to most that life is naught but strife and that the human spirit needs a beacon to guide it onwards. That beacon, for want of a better description is the 20th century God.

And if you listen very hard
The tune will come to you at last
When all is one and one is all
To be a rock and not to roll

The future, it is being claimed, belongs to pantheism. Judging by the popularity of Zen and Vedanta in non-Catholic communities in Europe and America, one would be obliged to concur. Is Vedanta the one true world religion of humanity? Time will tell.

All hail Sir Vidia!

hi all
i remember Naipaul having some unflattering things to say about the IQ of the average Indian woman. I decided to take a shy at one aspect of her behaviour a couple of weeks ago, when Brandon Routh was announced as being Christopher Reeveś successor. Unfortunately, I had the Hindu at the back of my mind and so restricted my verbosity to 800 words. A pity really, I had some nice, caustic remarks to make.

Will the real Superwoman please stand up?

After long deliberations, the mantle of Superman (at least the cinematic version) has found its successor. In which case, speaking in a figurative sense, will the real Superwoman please stand up?

It is a strange, though to socio-anthropologists interesting, fact that whereas Indian culture has managed to throw up a certain number of ‘cultural heroines’, in other words feminine archetypes, the same are conspicuous by their absence in the history of European civilization.

Where do women figure in Caucasian, Greek and Semitic mythology? As Harpies, Valkyries and river nymphs? As witches, priestesses and fortune-tellers? The woman is ever the unknown; the woman is ever the mystery. In consequence, the woman is ever the snare; the woman is ever the temptation.

The mistrust of the feminine character is innate to Semitic religion. It originates with the fanciful tale of Genesis and Eve’s foibles and continues to this day to haunt the fabric of our society. In all of Semitic religion, women are simultaneously vilified as being harbingers of ill-fortune and marginalized as being inept with regard to worldly concerns.

So, with the rise of mass education, where do women seek their archetypes? Of course, in ‘pseudo-men’. Hence Boedicea and Joan of Arc, thus the Amazons and those cartoon superwoman in bikini suits, thereby Halle Berry in a ridiculous leather dress no sane person would be found dead in a ditch in!

The point is that, it is imperative, in the Western ethos, for the feminine principle to be ruthlessly suppressed if an individual is to garner any modicum of respect in society. This particular prejudice is so very deeply and homogeneously ingrained in the Western psyche that any attempts to view it as such are will in all eventuality be viewed as bigoted ravings of chauvinistic puritans.

The mythical Amazons were a tribe of fierce women archers who, to facilitate the pulling of the bow, would cut off their right breasts. This myth, as we shall soon see, is deeply symbolic, and in a way, representative of the argument aforementioned. The price a woman pays for competing in contemporary society is the loss of a very large part of her femininity. “Sacrilege!” scream the ranks of feminists.

And yet, for all the bra-burning of the 1920’s and for all the emancipated life-styles of the 21st century, where is the Superwoman? The successful corporate executive, juggling responsibilities confidently both at home and at work? Is she not yet another Amazon, as a person a self-made hermaphrodite; as an archetype simply a substitute male?

Why? Why is it that in contemporary society, a woman is required to prove herself as being ‘equal to a man’ to attain any semblance of self-worth and societal recognition?

Western society has developed, by virtue of its evolution through incessant warfare, on lines wherein the masculine principle has acquired overwhelming dominance. If a woman chooses to establish her individuality in this phallus-driven society, she must, to use a vulgar but effective analogy, procure a dildo for herself. Such are the rules of the Western game.

The East, it is immediately evident, has attained a more equable equilibrium as regards gender-discrimination in society. This, of course, is a direct consequence of the fact that these civilizations have seen a shorter history of militaristic brutality. It is a fact that the East has managed to reconcile the difference between the sexes and created a much more wholesome paradigm of existence, with regard to gender, than the West. In the bargain, it is devoid of the purely masculine instinct of aggression and in consequence has been imposed upon on the geo-political scene since time immemorial.

China owing to its racially segregated existence for long centuries has probably the most balanced of gender philosophies, as expressed on a very fundamental level by the concept of yin and yang. India, owing to the incessant onslaughts of invaders from the North-West in the past millennium, has begun to acquire some Semitic traits.

But even so, we still retain some civilizational memories of a more sophisticated mode of societal existence. The deities of Knowledge and Wealth, for instance, both passionately sought after and both notoriously fickle, are represented as women. Touché! In Durga, the embodiment of the rage of destruction, the Indian archetype matches the post-Freudian view of the libidinous nature of passion. Of course, even here, the qualities ascribed to the feminine principle are not very flattering to Westernized ears.

But bringing the discussion to more mundane realms, in the light of the aforegoing, it is rather piquant to find Indian women (even more than Indian men) desperately eager to adopt Western modes of lifestyle and expression. If in spite of all, Indian women find the idea of sacrificing their feminity for their individuality appealing; the popular opinion of the meagerness of the feminine intellect will stand profoundly vindicated.

Blood is thicker than water

hi all
readers of my blog are here accorded the privilege of reading my article for the magazine 'Bharati' before its out in print. Due to some obscure relation between the two clans, my relatives on my father's side of the family are fiendishly enamored with 'Madhushala'. Well , its good enough to go a little ga ga over. Here , I continue the family tradition, but with a slightly more balanced perspective. Readers may suggest titles for the work, the author cannot think of any at the drop of a hat. Here goes,



The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam occupies a unique place in the literary firmament.The magnificence of Baghdad, the splendor of the Islamic Arab empire,are reflected in Omar's insouciant exhortations to the world. This compilation of quatrains of the famous 11th century astronomer-poet first burst forth into the intellectual sphere through Edward Fitzgerald's brilliant English translation back in 1865.Fitzgerald's literary reputation rests almost entirely on this monumental work, culminating in the publication, over a period of 11 years, five slim editions comprising of verses culled from the original.

'Awake, for Morning, in the Bowl of Night,
Has flung the stone that sets the Stars to flight.
And lo! The hunter of the east has caught
The Sultan's turret, in a noose of light.'

The task of translating Omar's mystical metaphorical flights into a more accesible language, Persian gradually becoming defunct, required an Oriental mind acquainted with medieval Persian culture at an intimate level. The task was accomplished, in part, by a personage uniquely suited for the purpose. Ladies and gentlemen, Harivansh Rai Srivastava.

'Madiralaya jane ko ghar se, chalta hai peene wala,
Kis path se jaoon, asmanjas mein hai yeh bhola bhala.
Alag, alag path batlate sab, par main yeh batlata hoon
Rah pakad too ek chala chal, pa jayega Madhushala.'

Harivansh Rai Srivastava was born in Allahabad on November 27, 1907. He graduated from the Benares Hindu University. During his college days, he acquired his celebrated nom-de-plume, 'Bachchan'. In later life, by virtue of his son's exploits onscreen, he was known exclusively as Harivansh Rai Bachchan. He went to Cambridge in 1952 , where, in 1954, he became the first Indian ever to complete a Ph.D in English.

'Sun kal kal chhal chhal, madhughat se girti, pyalon mein hala
Sun run jhun run jhun, jal vitran karti madhu-saki-bala,
Lo aa pahunche, door nahin, kuchh char kadam ab chalna hai,
Chahak rahe sun peene wale, mahak rahi le Madhushala.'

'Madhushala', earned Harivansh Rai instant fame upon its publication in 1935. However, it must not be assumed that, as in the case of Fitzgerald, Bachchan's work was a simple translation. He himself acknowledged his inspiration to the original. But that was as far as he went. This technicality essentially absolves him of any liabilty corresponding to liberties in translation , the bane of Fitzgerald.

'Ek baras mein ek baar hi jalti Holi ki jwala,
Ek baar hi mane Diwali, jagmag deepon ki mala
Duniyawalon, kintu kisi din, aa madiralaya mein dekho
Din ko Holi, raat Diwali, roz manati Madhushala.'

As is evident, Madhushala is not meant to be a translation of the Rubaiyat, as the poet uses Omar's medium to communicate in a very different cultural milieu. To clarify his position, he later published a literal translation of part of the Rubaiyat, which unfortunately, does not live up to his usual high standards. Madhushala, it is contended, is not a linguistic translation, but a mystical translation of Khayyam's philosophy.

'Lal sura ki dhar lapat si, kah na ise dena jwala.
Phenil madira hai, mat isko kah dena ur ka chhala.
Dard nasha hai is madira ka, vigat smritiyan Saki hain
Peeda mein anand jise ho, aye meri Madhushala.'

Thus, the hiatus in Fitzgerald's is complemented by Bachchan's Indianized rendition of the same theme. In metaphorical terms, Fitzgerald provides the body, and Bachchan provides the spark of soul to enliven the translation. It is a matter of dispute as to whether Bachchan was influenced by the English translation to a very great degree. Some verses in Madhushala hint at the likelihood of this being the case. Contrast, for instance the following :

'Yama will then be thy cup-bearer, and bring thee the dark cup,
Drink, and know no more consciousness, O carefree one.
This is the ultimate trance, the final Saki, the last goblet.
O traveller, drink well, for you will never find the tavern again.'

'So when at last the Angel of the darker drink
Of darkness finds you by the river-brink,
And, proffering his Cup, invites your Soul
Forth to your lips to quaff it - do not shrink


Bachchan succeeded where Fitzgerald failed for he inherited a rich and vibrant culture of Urdu poetry, that, to an infinitesimal extent, kept alive, as it still does, vague memories of the forgotten days of Islamic world domination. To describe Omar's poetry is to describe the revolt of a fertile mind against the decadence fomented by rigid fatalistic doctrines that pervaded Persian society for the entire period of its decline, beginning in mid-11th century. It is the rebellion of a free spirit against dogmas perpetuated by the existing oligarchy of ulemas, and at the same time a heart-felt expression of sorrow at the irrationality of existence.

'Oh Thou, who didst with Pitfall and with Gin
Beset the Road I was to wander in,
Thou wilt not with Predestination round
Enmesh me, and impute my Fall to Sin?

Oh Thou, who Man of baser earth did make,
And even with Paradise devise the Snake,
For all the Sin wretched Man's face is
Black with, Man's forgiveness give - and take.'



Postscript: Alas! I just remembered. Owing to the legerdemain of the philistine Fudu, four paragraphs of the article were lost irretrievably at the time of composition when he leaned on the 'Delete' key and saved the document in one smooth motion. He shall pay for this in blood when we both stand in the literary Valhalla when the last trump sounds.

Drunkennesh is the besht policy, hic!

hi all
i guess the title says it all, doesn't it. yes, this is what i wrote when i woke up around one in the afternoon today. i am beginning to enjoy this relaxation of quality criteria in my writing. it is making me a lot more prolific and a lot less portentuous. however, if i end up writing without having anything to say, well then, it shall be this blog to blame. anyway, the poem is called

Drunkenness is the best policy

A dark, musty room, stuffy with Ego
A nostalgic rain falls sullen outside
The air depressedly stagnant with ennui
Despite the efforts of a valiant fan
A fan that looks just like my conscience

Yawning deliberately, forcing my mind
To reconcile itself to intellectual exile
For looking inside is just too hard
And all my hopes swirl in as murky a puddle
As waits to greet me outside the door

In my little hole, safe from the rain
And a chill wind, mindful of loneliness
Refusing to peep out, grow up
Into an irrational, confused world
Trying hard not to wake up
On a rainy Sunday morning

Go Kerry go!

hi all, well here i am, figuratively, fiddling while Rome burns. Mihir Mysore expects me to come up with a 10000 word play for the institute dramatics contest by tonight. progress?

let me put it this way. there are to be two acts and an intermission. i've just about finished the intermission.

Chestnut!

anyway, having tasted the forbidden fruit of free versification i just had to have another go at it. this is what did/did not ensue...

A literary abortion

The poet grimaces, head in hands
Gazes despondent at his juvenile scrawl
Digits on the watch metamorphose
One into the other as political alliances
While his mind races, the intellect drills
Alack! the track is a circle, the soil barren
Fold the foolscap, twice tear symmetric
Bury the corpse with averted eyes, unsung
Consigned to oblivion at the verge of utterance
Inchoate thoughts march solemnly to their Bardo
As the Muse, coquettish, withdraws her lips.
A literary abortion.

baleful prosody for my bed...

Hi all, I fight and I fight and I fight but eventually I have to surrender. After a decade of inveighing against blank verse, a decade of protest against the lethargic abuse of poetic meter and verse, I have finally been beaten down by the progression of post-Modernism into giving the bally thing a shot. Anyway for all it is worth , here goes,

Baleful prosody for a bed

The pillow slumps belligerent,
Though shiny with ages of oily grime

The iron cot lies passive; equable
Flakes of brown paint irritably peeling

The coverlet, limp, amorphous
Gingerly noisome with all too human odors

How useless, yet how so very intimate
As all things truly beautiful are

With due respect to Edward Said...

Hi all. I presumed to title my IIT creative writing entry 'Culture and Imperialism' and hope Mr. Said isn't too unhappy about it as he looks on from on high (unless i am misinformed of his demise in 2002, in which case i stand grievously, apologetically corrected).

My next post, i hope, will be the tablature to the 'Stairway to Heaven' solo, as i am trying to crack it and am at the moment of writing about halfway through. LED seems to think (i wonder if he was being facetious ) that i ought to get it by the weekend. Join me friends in paying humble obeisance to Jimmy Page!

In the meantime, i leave you with the following :

Culture and Imperialism

(Adi-dasa the ever-ambitious sadhoo
Burnt his feet walking the fire-bed through
So the next time, he ran on the coals
With hidden padding on his soles
And invented the first ever sports shoe.)

// this verse belongs to bakri. i take on from here.

So his ochre robes he did renounce
And out of the ashram did petulantly flounce
Muttering ‘neath his breath
“Thus I belie a celibate death,
Why, these imposters are naught but clowns!”

With his invention he made his way
To the bustling port city of Bombay
But was reduced to dire straits
Being an apostate to his faith
For news of his heresy had reached Thackeray

Thus it came to pass, through ubiquitous umbrage
When it came to asking for safe sea passage
To the land of the free and home of the brave
The captain considered, this answer gave,
“Errant monk! May the gods turn thy brains to cabbage”

Then did Adidasa volubly bemoan his fate
Following which, slyly hiding in a crate
Was taken aboard with none the wiser
Even saving passage-fee, the miser;
And cast eyes on Manhattan at an early date

Alas, Adi’s guttural accent impeded his way
For black-suited officers whisked him away
As onlookers milled about and cried,
“That man is first cousin to Richard Reid!”
For all they understood was “shoe” and “bomb”(ay)

In the trial court Adi was hard-pressed
As the iniquity of Islamic terrorism was stressed
Said the prosecution to the jury, “Be wise!
He is naught but bin Laden in disguise”
But the myopic judge, Adi a flagrant prostitute guessed

So he was let off, but with stern advice
To keep his hands from gentlemen’s flies
“You Oriental Geishas can’t do more wrong
Than sell your honor for a song.
Don’t you know wandering topless ain’t nice?”

“Admitted the age is one of spaghetti straps,
But that string which your torso enwraps,
The craziest haute couture doesn’t take
The liberty, such a skimpy bra to make.
Not least, exhibitionism must succeed possession, you poor sap.”

Thus the noble Adi did they basely demean.
The media clustered about, made a scene
To the fleeing monk, thus “O Demimondaine!
Flutter for our shutters”, they chanted in vain
But Adi, eluding their snares, fled to Chicago by the 11:15

There his countryman, Vivekananda he met
And to procure money, entered into a bet
“When you speak to the Congress,
You will find me there in a bikini dress”
Gagging prudery, our hero a handsome dividend did net

With which, thankfully, he bought his passage back
And returning, covered his visage with a gunny sack
When solicitous enquiries men did address,
Adi said, “Having beheld the Mother Goddess,
Wherefore earthly sights? The supreme Bliss they sorely lack

And thus, acclaimed universally, the following autumn
He retired to the forest, with disciples who sought him
And, even today, the leafy glades of Gurvayur
Resound to the sound of that entrepreneur
Deploying the sport shoe upon an errant devotee’s bottom.

:-)

Smoke , don't inhale!

Hi all. I guess one has to keep the ball rolling so here's another exposition of putrescent prose for your perusal. This came out in the Hindu on the 12th of this month and you can see the neo-conservatism brimming over. Basically, I think it is a rather stupid of young folk to veer to extremes of illogicality in their rebellion against authority. Right now , the emphasis is on "Doing it different." Even if doing it the right way is the most logical thing to do. Poe knew what he was talking about when he wrote that brilliant monologue on perversity. Today's youth is mind-bogglingly perverse.

Anyway , here goes.

Smoke, don’t inhale

If the modalities of expression of public outrage over the Stephanie hit-and-run case is any indicator, Indian nouveau riche society has been badly bitten by the ‘smoke but don’t inhale’ bug. The Stephanie case is but a microcosm of a crisis of identity that is looming, menacingly, over young metropolitan India.

It is interesting to note that the primary defense offered by the accused was that the victim was an ‘acquaintance’. The implicit assertion here is the rather austere statement that good girls do not hang out with acquaintances at late hours of the night.

The existence of this puritanical streak is further supported by the evidence that, over the week following the incident, certain newspapers reported Stephanie as having been a ‘night-club’ dancer. We are confronted here with two puritanical presumptions. One, being a night-club dancer is a questionable profession. Two, murdering a woman perceived as being ‘easy’ is, in a way, less of a crime.

The question now is, given that bourgeois India finds the concept of open sexuality abhorrent, why is it that the metro yuppies insist on flaunting their liberated sexual mores so very insistently? Popular teenage perception, consistently reinforced by main-stream Bollywood, has raised, among other things, alcohol consumption and eve-teasing to the status of mandatory rites of passage to that exacting Holy Grail of ‘coolness’.

The trouble is that the archetypal urban dwelling 20-something metropolite derives his outlook upon life not from the reality of Indian society but from the unadulterated poppy-cock of MTV. Concomitant with the economic liberalization of the early 90’s, India witnessed a massive burst in the somnolent entertainment industry. Studio after studio, with little or no talent aboard, jumped on the cable telecasting bandwagon and to stay alive in the market, religiously adopted the trends of the US industry ad libidum.

Unfortunately for us, while the American industry has moved on from its fixation with bubble-gum pop and while American society is in the process of moving on from its experiment with liberal sexuality, the Indian nouveau riche is caught in a cleft stick. When all the hoopla raised about pub-hopping and live-in relationships etc. finally began to garner metro mainstream acceptance, they found that their American idols had moved on.

In a culture as hysterical and volatile as ours, there is little scope for rational demarches. Once the slide to decadence, euphemistically denominated ‘emancipation from ossified medieval mindsets’, had commenced, there was little the yuppies could do about it than to learn to like it.

And that is why, while farmers in the Andhra heartland starve and their crops wilt for lack of water, the booze flows without fail in the pubs of Hyderabad. That is why, while a 21 year old girl is chased at midnight and killed on the streets of Chennai, in all probability, a Tollywood film unit is recording a similar stunt for the hero to pull off not so very far away. Of course, in reel life, the hero can hold his drink like a man, drive like a maniac and still impress the adoring muse who, coyly, accepts his proposal for marriage, cohabitation, sex etc.

If the above statement appears abstract, readers are invited to recall a certain Bajaj Pulsar ad, first telecast last year, where the hero commandeers his elder brother’s bike and drives about town, ‘hitting on the chicks’. The protagonist’s disc brakes allow him to spare the life of a rabbit that happens to blunder in his way. Stephanie, alas! She was not so lucky.

How can our youngsters be blamed if we, through the mindless commercialism of our entertainment industry, present them such ambiguous social messages? Where does machismo end and idiocy begin? Where does seduction end and molestation commence? For today’s generation, these ethical boundaries are becoming increasingly fuzzy.

In our zeal to ape Occidental values, we have omitted to consider the fact that, such as they are, these values have evolved indigenously in a social milieu very different from ours. Our efforts to superimpose American ideologies on our own have resulted in the creation of a dangerous dichotomy between our societal archetypes and our ethical values. In simpler terms, society today wants to smoke, but is not ready to inhale.

It is the task of the media to mould the objectives of the entertainment industry to confirm to our collective vision as a nation. To replace films about prostitutes and homo-sexuality with crude, unimaginative indigenous icons, as the Government persists in doing, is to further propagate the myth of Western superiority.

A plant, in the absence of artificial splints, will grow to assume its natural shape. Likewise, gradual censorship of the MTV culture is likely to result in the maturation of metropolitan young India as a strong, vibrant social entity, in conformance with our cultural ethos.

Full stop!

(Oh, to those of you who have been kind enough to point out a blog is for recording personal musings, i am afraid i have to offer a firm nolle prosequi to the prospect. It is with the sole intention of getting my articles down on the net that i am prosecuting this venture. anyway , the contents of my biography would merit publication on asbestos at the very least! Ciao for now.)

speech for the (con)dumb

hmm ... how does the red guy go about writing his very first blog?

Stop Press!

Condom here wants me to write an article on the vices of live-in relationships for his english class tomorrow. funny thing is, it was a week ago that he asked me to write an article in favor of the business. Something fishy ?I suspect a girl is the reason behind his volte face. All in a day's job for the esteemed Condom.

Anyway , here goes:

"Ahem , what is the first thing that comes to your mind, ladies and gentlemen, when you think of living-in,' cohabitation', as it is euphemistically called. I, forgive my puritanical views, am reminded of the redoubtable blunt Duchess in Tolstoy's "War and peace" , who when apprised of the Countess Bezhukova's extra-marital aspirations, acidly remarks, " There is nothing heretical in what you are attempting dear, its been done for ages. Only, they call it adultery." Or words to that effect.

While the world has certainly moved on from that cruel Russian winter of 1812, I intend to prove by virtue of my arguments, that certain verities stand true forever, and that the indispensibilty of matrimonial sanctity is one such.

Proponents of live-in relationships argue that marriage is anachronistic in today's hectic metropolitan lifestyles. They assert that the concept of the existence of an indissoluble bond between a man and a woman is as irrelevant to society as is the abacus to computing. The contention, justifiable in a sense, is that the concept of matrimony assumes on the part of both contracting parties a constancy of thought, speech and action that we as a species are genuinely incapable of.

With women increasingly holding their own as professionals and with metropolitan ethicality increasingly tending to a unisexual ideal, the idea of delimiting spheres of interest based on gender no longer holds water. With the nouveau riche increasingly demanding a lifestyle of convenience, an institution that imposes upon you a long-term liability would certainly appear to be a bad bargain.

It is obvius that, viewed from the 'I-me-myself' point of view, the stand against cohabitation is rather untenable. The question to be asked then is this, is society merely the sum of its parts, or does there exist a bigger picture that we need to collectively consider for the furtherance of our culture, of civilization itself?

If so, we need to look beyond live-in relationships per se at their impact on society in general. The biggest issue is, the issue of issues. What about children? Do they or do they not entail long-term commitments in the union of a couple? Or is reproduction out-moded just as well? Children, it is universally established, are a humongous nuisance. Why not dispense with them altogether? That's what sensible, modern, emancipated, liberal live-in couples do.

Not really? You want children? But you want to be able to walk out of a relationship at an hour's notice too! Please gentlemen, you can't have your cake and eat it too. The question here is, would you like your relationships with your kids to also be just as disposable as you would make your sexual ones?

Next, we consider sexual bonding from an evolutionary perspective. Once upon a time, back in the hoary mists of pre-history, homo sapiens used to live in massive, rigidly exclusive social groups. To the end of the Paleolithic period, we find no evidence of structure in sexual associations. This was followed by the hierarchical structuring of mates on the 'Alpha male rules' Darwinian principle. By the early Neolithic period, however, we find that, with increasing linguistic and social skills, sporadic efforts were made by group leaders to match all group members in long-term bonds. Such behavior, it may be noted, is also evinced by the higher mammals, viz. primates and pinnipeds.

By the end of the Chalcolithic period, we come across the first instances of religiously ordained marriage ceremonies. In history, of course, the matrimonial relation is too well documented to brook further discussion. A pertinent point, however, is that the concept of polygamy(or polyandry for that matter) has never been found to rise uniformly as a trend.

The crux of the argument is as follows. Is the nouveau riche not, by arguing for looser connubial ties (or their abolishment), bucking a Darwinian trend established 10,000 years ago at the end of the last Ice Age?

In summary then, is not this endeavor perverse in terms of both biological and social evolution?

I think we may, with some justification, answer in the affirmative. If so, what is the rationale behind cohabitation? "

phew , enough of this . Condom is going to make quite a splash tomorrow, isn't he?