TLS Vol 2 Issue 1

7/23/2019 TLS Vol 2 Issue 1

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Editorial

Dear Reader

KALYANI VALLATH EXPLAINS

THE HOW AND WHY

OF THIS MAGAZINE.

The rst issue o TES Literary Supplement had an

overwhelming response, and copies have reached all

major universities and colleges across the country. Six

months have fown by, and beore we realize it, it is time

to bring out the second issue o TLS! These six months have

witnessed numerous national and international upheavals such

as debates over capital punishment, the introduction o the anti-

rape bill, deaths o Carlos Fuentes, Chinua Achebe, Ruth Prawer

Jhabvala and Hugo Chavez, the Academy Awards and eects

o global warming and waste accumulation, to name a ew.

Students, young scholars and senior academics rom

across the country have written to TLS on many o these

issues, which we have included in the current number.

We are proud that this little magazine is already growing beyond the

bounds o region, discipline, perspective and identity into a healthy,

democratic orum or all its readers. We have purposeully avoided

an introductory note on the contributors, or we eel the writing will

speak endlessly when the author and reader remain anonymous.

Do keep writing to us; become part o the many voices o TLS.


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Backstage

Krishna Badigar

Mithun Yelve

Ajithkumar Chougule

Archana S. Viswan

Souar Ali

Shivakumar Channagowdra

Neelima Santhosh

Tintu Anie Mathew

Gayathri Krishna

Priyanka Susan

Rahul Chavan

Nitesh Telhande

Shivaguru Vhandkar

Ranganath J. Ugale

P.N. Santhini

Chie Editor

Dr. Kalyani Vallath

Executive Editor

Sudip N.

PatronsPro. R. Balakrishnan NairDr. P.P. Ajayakumar

Dr. C.A. Lal

Dr. Babitha Justin

Dr. Rajesh Nair

Managing Director

Ilyas C.A.

The people behind TLS

Research Team

Editorial BoardVinita Teresa

Rajitha Venugopal

Suhana Sathar

Prasara V.P.

Issue EditorsMary Suneeta Joy

Mini John

Akhila V.L.

Chandini Retnan

ProductionLayout: Renju Varghese

Printed at Drishya Oset

Printers, SS Kovil Road,

Thampanoor, Trivandrum

Cover: Chinua Achebe (1930-2013)

Call or contributions

We welcome contributions to TLS in the ollowing categories:

Brie original writeups on books, lms, newspaper / magazine, articles o literary and cultural interest,

literary events, travel, and personal experiences.

Poems, brie one-act plays, paintings, drawings, caricatures, and other creative works.

Translations o brie poems, and translations o excerpts rom novels, articles or plays in any

language into English. [Please send us a copy o the original also.]

Games and interesting activities on literary and cultural topics.

All contributions should be emailed to [email protected]. Only copies should be sent

and they will not be returned to the contributor. The contributions will be peer-reviewed and requests

or revision/ editing may be made. The publication o the contributions will be at the discretion o the

editors. Acceptance will be intimated by email.

Comments, responses, criticisms, and queries to the editors / contributors should be sent by email to

TLS at [email protected].


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ANNIVERSARY

Double Century for Pride and Prejudice 7

CLASSICS

The Magic Mountain 17

COMPARATIVE

The Plural and the Singular 19

CURRENT

Orthodoxies: Debates on the film Celluloid and Beyond 46

DRAMA

The Other Side of the Door 48

GAMESKnow em? 24 Communication Crossword 59

Identify the Work 30 GK Scramble 60

Solve It 55

IMPRESSIONS

Intrepid 24

Tagore 25

Creativity 39

Modernity 44

Affection 58The Leader 62

Restrictions 65

MUSINGS

Think 41

Ignorance 45

What is life? 63

POEMS

Thank You God 8

Forget 10Way of life 10

Sweet Morning 14

Quest 14

Go City Go 16

Ethnical Infliction 18

On the Street 23

The Last Moment 24

ContentsVOL. 02 ISSUE. 01 JUNE 2013


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ContentsAn Adamant Heart 27

Why Bother to Brother? 32Art 37

frnd 43

I am a racist 44

Sublimation 53

Years 61

I bleed sir; but not killd 64

RESPONSES

Bharathipura: A Voice against Casteism 36

The Kite Runner: Karbala and the Persian Saga 38

The Darker Side of Shining India Revealed in Aravind Adigas The White Tiger 40

REVIEW

Tabish Khair and The Thing About Thugs 31

Yann Martels Life of Pi 33

SNIPPETS

Seven Deadly Sins 35

Fun Facts 54

Literary Awards 56

Losses of 2012 and 2013 57

Paan Singh Tomar 66

STUDY

Dalit Translation: A Necessary Evil 29

TRAVEL

A Statue of Liberty 26

TRIBUTE

Chinua Achebe: The End of an Era 9

Ruth Prawer Jhabvala: Writing from the Outside 11

Carlos Fuentes: A Renaissance Man Who Makes the Book Bleed 13

Hugo Chavez: The Beacon of the Future Class Struggle 15

Rituparno Ghosh 28

WRITER

The Warrior of Light: Paulo Coelho and His Books 34

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: Literary Genius Overshadowed by Deductive Brilliance 42


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Anniversary

DOUBLE CENTURY FORPRIDE AND PREJUDICE

Vinita Teresa analyses thereasons behind the classics

enduring charm.

Pride and Prejudiceis probably one o the very ew novels that has had its plot subtly and overtly

transormed into the stu o hundreds o romance novels and movies. The classic plot line where

boy meets girl resulting in a war o words and wit with an undercurrent o sexual tension and a nal

resolution o misunderstandings, leading to a happily ever ater, is perhaps best exemplied

in Jane Austens Pride and Prejudice. The novel completed its 200th anniversary in January this year

and continues to hold sway over the collective imagination o literature enthusiasts across the world.

I literary historians are to bebelieved, the novel held a special

place in Austens mind. She

completed the manuscript o the

novel when she was merely 19

years old and she observed that

its protagonist Elizabeth Bennet

was as delightul a creature as

ever appeared in print. Being

a woman and a debutant writer,

Austen suered her own share

o tribulation to get the novel

published. In 1797, at the age o21, she approached Cadell and

Davies, the prominent publisher

o her day, to get the novel

published under the title First

Impressions. Not surprisingly, she

was promptly turned down. Years

later, in 1813, Egertons Military

Library, which had hitherto

published only military history,

published the revised novel under

the title Pride and Prejudice.

Interestingly, in her rst publishednovel Sense and Sensibility,

the author is reerred to as a

lady and in Pride and Prejudice,

the author is mentioned as the

author oSense and Sensibility.

Jane Austen continued to

maintain her anonymity till her

death in 1817 at the age o 41.

Pride and Prejudice inarguably

has the most amous opening

line o any novel rom the

nineteenth century. The line

It is a truth most universallyacknowledged that, a single man

in possession o a good ortune

must be in want o a wie is

loaded with multiple meanings

and beautiully sets the theme

and ironic tone o the novel. The

enduring appeal o the novel lies

in the act that it has something

or all categories o readers. Onthe most supercial level, it is

a humorous and entertaining

Mills and Boonish account

o a witty woman who brings

down an arrogant aristocrat

with love. A more intellectually

incisive reading brings out a

sharply nuanced portrayal o

the cultural demography o

rural English society and the

attitudes towards the institution

o marriage. Be it Mr. and Mrs.Bennets marital monotony,

Charlottes and Collins

marriage o convenience,

Lydias and Wickhams

scandalous elopement, Janes

and Bingleys conventional

marriage or Elizabeths and

Darcys passionate and

romantic relationship, Austen

gives the readers slices o

multi-hued perceptions.

Feminist writers see the novelas a commentary on the

mandatory male-dependency o

women. Marrying a nancially

secure man is oten a womans

only chance to attain economic

and social stability. Since the

late 1970s, Austens writings

have been seriously analysed

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in the context o eminism.

In act, many academiciansconsider her a proto-eminist.

Today, Jane Austen is literally

a global brand with her works,

especially Pride and Prejudice

being adapted into dierent

media. Also, an clubs all over

the world actively discuss and

react to her work. Fan ction,

most o which are spin-os o

Pride and Prejudice, attempt

to look at the novel rom

the perspectives o dierentcharacters and are generally

postmodern in nature. Famous

adaptations include BBCs Pride

and Prejudice television series

(1995) and Joe Wrights critically

acclaimed Pride and Prejudice

movie (2005). Close to home, we

have Gurindher Chaddhas Bride

and Prejudice (2004) which

celebrates the story in true

Bollywood style. While the ones

mentioned above have beenmore or less aithul to the spirit

o the original novel, there are

more quirky takes on the novel.

Popular crime-writer PD Jamess

Death Comes to Pemberley

(2011) catapults Elizabeth and

Darcy, now a married couple,

into the midst o a murder

mystery. Seth Grahame-Smiths

Pride and Prejudice and the

Zombies combines the novel

with zombie ction. In thisrst-o-its-kind literary remix/

mash-up, Smith casts Elizabeth

as a sword wielding, Kung-Fu

practising, slayer o the undead.

The opening line o this novel

is a clever subversion o the

classic opening line o Pride

and Prejudice It is a truth

universally acknowledged that a

zombie in possession o brains

must be in want o more brains.

Other Pride and Prejudice-inspired works include Lizzie

Bennet Diaries, a serial told in

the orm o video blogs, Lost in

Austen, a television series where

a modern-day protagonist steps

into the antiquated world oPride

and Prejudice and skews the

plot and character delineation.

As the world celebrates the 200th

anniversary o this iconic novel,

one is awed by the plethora o

literary reactions and devotedan culture that Pride and

Prejudicehas spawned over the

years. Hence it can be concluded

that this novel bears the mark o

a true classica story that has

stood the test o time and still

remains accessible, relevant

and interesting to the masses.

Poems

Thank You God

On the busy road, I saw a dazzling black our wheeler with silver panes.

It made me sad when I saw the drivers diamonds and white Gucci

I sighed and looked at the wide blue sky and said, God, this is not right.

She has it allthe car, the rings and all the things that give her pleasure;

While I toil all day, to make both ends meet, with no moment o leisure.

On the suburban North Street, I saw a lavish house with lush lawns

With pricey lamps and the servants were tough and hard to count.

I sighed and looked at the wide blue sky and said, God, this is not right.

They have it allthe lawn, the lamps, the things which give them pleasure,

While I toil all day, to make both ends meet, with no moment o leisure.

Back home, as I rang the door bell, there was a contest amid the kids

To be the one to win their moms kiss; to tell the things Id missed.

As I looked with joy at their glowing aces, I orgot the car and the house,

I sighed and looked at the wide blue sky, elt no other pleasure can trade or this,

And said, I thank you dearest God, I eel I am blessed, I want nothing anymore.

Pooja Malik Choudhary


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Tribute

CHINUA ACHEBE:THE END OF AN ERA

Prasara V.P. pays tribute tothe ather o Arican English

literature.

The entire literary world ell apart as Achebe bid arewell to this mortal world on March 21, this year.

However, his legacy o writing lives on through his books that share shelves with Shakespeare

and Dickens. Chinua Achebe was a doorway to the traditional Arican lie, its belies and customs.

His elegiac novel Things Fall Apartlaments over the Arican continent that was ravaged by the

claws o Eurocentric determinism. A preoccupation with the disintegration o Arican society induced

rst by orced territorial subjugation ollowed by covert hegemonic prepotency dened Achebe and his

world. An Ibo born to Christian parents, Achebe held on to the Ibo culture o which he was a loyal aliate.

He elt torn between Christianity and Ibo culture, between Nigeria and Britain and these pulls let him in astate o political, cultural and religious turmoil. Achebe who started writing when Arica was in desperate

need o independence interlaced his novels with issues o power, representation, colour and reedom.

Achebes works center on

Arican politics, the way Arica is

represented in the West and the

eects o colonization in Arican

societies. Achebe was born in

Ogidi in Nigeria on November

16, 1930. He began working

with the Nigerian Broadcasting

Service in Lagos in 1954. Duringthe Nigerian Civil War o the

60s, the people o the Eastern

region tried to establish an

independent Republic o Biara

and Achebe tried to publicise the

plight o his people. He wrote

There Was a Country: A Personal

History o Biara, a memoir

that deals with his lie during

the civil war that nearly tore

Nigeria apart. He has lectured

in universities around the worldand was Proessor o Aricana

Studies at Brown University,

USA, prior to his death.

A dynamic Arican writer,

Achebe wrote or a human

purpose and used relevant

Arican adages in his novels

to convey his messages. For

him art is, and always was, at

the service o man. He walked

ater Cesaire and Senghor, and

sought to dispel the denigrating

images o Arica universalized

by Western meta-narratives.He marched in ront to reclaim

the Arican past and its lost

glory and to make the global

community acknowledge its

achievements and contributions.

It was the univocal meta-

narratives that enraged the

artistic consciousness o

Achebe. Things Fall Apart is

a denite pronouncement

o his anti-colonial urge and

was inspired by his reading o

Mister Johnson, a 1939 novel

set in Nigeria written by an

Anglo-Irishman, Joyce Cary.

Carys is the story o an idiotic

Arican protagonist who madlyworships his white master and

in the end, to avoid the gallows,

begs his master to kill him. The

portrayal o the blind mimicking

o the white mans culture

by the protagonist provoked

Achebe to write against

the authors Irish prejudice.

Achebes eorts to liberate

Arica rom the stranglehold o

European imperialism continuedwith No Longer at Ease, Arrow

o God, The Man o the People

and the Booker Prize-winning

Anthills o the Savannah.

His Okonkwo and Ezeulu are

tragic heroes. They failed at

colonial powers and ultimately

became victims. Achebe has

Chinua Achebe


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also penned numerous poems,

critical essays and childrensbooks. An Image o Arica,

his critique o Conrads Heart o

Darknessis controversial or its

depiction o Conrad as a blatant

racist. He has made substantial

contributions to journalism too.

He was the ounding editor o theHeineman Arican Series, edited

the university o Nsukka journal,

Nsukka Scope and ounded

Okike, a Nigerian journal o new

writing. Innumerable Arican

writers have elt his infuence,

but it is quite unortunate thatAchebe was not awarded the

Nobel Prize or Literature even

though our Arican writers have

received the award till date.

Poem

s

Poem

s

Forget

It is strangely pleasing,

To see that you remember,

Each and every word I said,

Every word o nonsense,

Recorded and stored,

In your ond memory

All the queer antasies,

Uneasiness and likes,

Every turn o phrase,

Recorded and stored,

Careully held close

In your ond memory.

But I would rather you orget,

Every little thing, every word,

Than remember and store,

Treasure with sharp ache,

Going through every day

Like on a bed o arrows

I would rather you change

Change with the seasons

Dance with the crowds

Shake with roaring laughter

Smile that slow-breaking smile,

Than ever remember me.

Even when the candle burns

And lips move in silent prayer,

That may or may not reach,

For blessings to ll your hands,

To give you strength to orget,

An intense slice in our lives.

Way o Lie

I walk through the road o lie

Like a horse with eyes bound;

My dreams gasp or breath

Like goldsh in a broken bowl.

I lie counting the luminous stars

And wish I was one among them.

I lie wounded, attacked by a Pisces,

Helpless and battling or lie.

While my lie stretches beore me,

Like a vast and arid desert,

Trampled and tred,

While I yearn or an oasis.

Myriad voices evoke memories,

Memories scrawl the past

And like tired travellers

Search or the elixir o lie.

Maria Anu Placheril


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Tribute

RUTH PRAWER JHABVALA:WRITING FROM THE

OUTSIDE

Jayalekshmi N.S.writes about Jhabvalas

contributions to literature

and lm industry.

Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (7 May 1927 3 April 2013), is the only writer to have won both the Booker

and the Oscars without any ground o being out o which to write. Being a German-born

Anglo-Indian, Jhabvala did not really have a home, and she despaired that she had been blown

about rom country to country, culture to culture. Her true home was her writing, and there she

delineated lives that were as intense as they were extraordinary. It was there she nely etched portraits

o interpersonal lives set amidst the socio-cultural tumult o the early decades o the 20th century.

Jhabvalas lie and art captured

the driting lie o a writer

bueted about by the whirlwind

o history. For her, India was

the prism that reracted riotous

histories in myriad colours. Her

rst novel, To Whom She Will,

appeared in 1955. It was ollowed

by The Nature o Passion (1956)

and Esmond in India(1957). We

can see that her early novels

ironically depicted the lie andmanners o Indian middle-

class amilies, the spectrum

o how the Europeans tried to

understand India, and the clash

between Eastern and Western

cultures. By interacting with

her husbands colleagues and

clients, she became acquainted

with people who lived lives

which were much dierent

rom hers. That is probably

why most o her stories arewritten rom the point o view

o an outsider. O course, many

Indian critics have labelled

her authorial detachment as a

sign o Western condescension

towards India. Apparently,

her insights and depiction o

snobberies, sel-delusion and

orthodox Indian amily ties

made her sound like an old-

ashioned colonialist. However

it has to be noted that she was

a writer who took pains to keep

her identity away rom her

writings; it has to be mentioned

that Jhabvalas German-Jewish

heritage has never even once

occupied a central place in her

works. She wrote 12 novels, vecollections o short stories and

around 20 screenplays, two o

which won Academy Awards.

Writing about the intense heat,

the lack o a social lie and

the great animal o poverty

and backwardness, Jhabvala

explained why she disliked

westernized Indians, or they

are not conditioned to look at

themselves. As the New York

Times puts it, living in Delhi in

the years immediately ollowing

independence, Jhabvala, with

her European sense o irony,

was probably the rst writer

in English to see that Indias

westernizing middle class, so

preoccupied with marriage, lentitsel well to Jane Austen-like

comedies o manners. Unlike

Naipaul, she wasnt drawn

to India by ancestry or, as in

Forsters case, by a desire to

move beyond a complacent

Western liberalism. In between

heat and dust, she indulged

hersel in her rootlessness

through the sights and smells o

India, till eventually India tired

her out. Slowly, the melancholyand oppression o being an

outsider in India caught up with

her. I am no longer interested in

India, she wrote in 1971. What

I am interested in now, is mysel

in India, which sometimes, in

moments o despondency, I

think o as my survival in India.

Ruth Prawer Jhabvala


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Notably, her collaborations

with the producer IsmailMerchant and the director

James Ivory which started in

the 1960s, led to beautiully-

crated lm productions. She

won Oscars in 1987 and 1993

or her screenplays o A Room

with a View and Howards End

respectively. Both were adapted

rom E.M. Forsters eponymous

novels. In 1990, she won the

Best Screenplay Award rom

the New York Film Critics Circleor Mr. & Mrs. Bridge. She was

nominated or a third Academy

Award or screenwriting or

The Remains o the Day (1993),

adapted rom the novel by

Kazuo Ishiguro. She also won a

Bata (British Academy o Film

and Television Arts) award or

Heat and Dust, which explored

the East-West relationship

through parallel narratives and

was awarded the Booker Prizein 1975. She was honoured

with the CBE (Commander o

the Most Excellent Order o

the British Empire) in 1998 and

a joint Bata ellowship with

Merchant and Ivory in 2002.

Her perception o lm adaptation

diagonally raises curtains

o a emale lm directors

methodology in that eld. You

can take up the theme but neverdo it literally. Youd come up with

a kind o travesty, i you tried

to interpret anything literally.

Fidelity is not the rst [thing],

the theme and the eel o the

characters... the ambience and

their relationships... So its a

separate work, in a waythere

is a period when the book and I

are two separate entities, shesays in an interview to Philip

Horne. Away rom adaptations,

the scene o Ruth Prawer

Jhabvalas own literary interests

moved rom India to New York.

In Search o Love and Beauty

dealt with the destinies three

generations o Austrian and

German immigrants in the city.

Her literary, subtly shaded

screenplays were lauded or theirdepictions o people caught in

social worlds circumscribed by

manners and emotional restraint.

In both lm and ction, Jhabvala

examined the theme o cultural

dislocation, o outsiders becoming

involved inand sometimes

victimized byan exotic, oreign

environment. Jhabvala is well-

known or bringing the queer

sensibilities o E.M. Forster and

Henry James to the screen asthe writer o the Ismail Merchant-

James Ivory queer period-piece

lm-making team. She always

considered her screenwriting a

hobby, while ction was her true

passion, the lms were un I

live so much more in and or the

books, she wrote to a riend.

Receiving the 1979 Neil Gunn

International Fellowship,

she gave a rare insight intoher psyche in an address

entitled Disinheritance. She

spoke o her lies losses but

acknowledged their part in

what she had become. Jhabvala

saw hersel locked in a double

pretence o being Indian

and Anglo-Saxon. Jhabvala

apologetically gave natural

colours or her rootlessness. Shethought it was like changing

countries like lovers a cuckoo

orever insinuating mysel into

others nests... chameleon hiding

mysel in alse or borrowed

colours. The wit, economy and

detachment that she achieved

in her ction was also refected

in her personality, and there

too, they masked contradictory

qualities. Her characters surge

with violent emotions (whichthey oten suppress) and pursue

voracious appetites (or ood,

sex, love) with a relish which their

creator seems to share. Her vision

was bleak; her tone austere. But

her supply o complex characters

and subtle, vivid scenes was

inexhaustible and she caught the

ambiguities o human behaviour

and the pleasures o the senses

in precise, perect words.

She wanted her stories to eel like

nonctionake biographical,

ake autobiographicalbut on

the other hand, she wanted it

to have literary appeal. It was

her lush, sensual language and

her keen ear or smouldering

restraint in dialogue, her

nuanced sensitivity to the class

conficts and consciousness

in the Merchant-Ivory lms

that drove the big, romanticproductions to become perennial

award-winners. Throughout her

lie she was ingenuous to her

motto, as an artist or writer,

youre much more your work

than you are yoursel. This

makes her a golden eather in

the dome o woman writers.


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Tribute

CARLOS FUENTES:A RENAISSANCE MAN WHO

MAKES THE BOOK BLEED

Drisya K. lists theachievements o the

pioneer in Spanish

writing.

Carlos Fuentes, Mexicos elegant public intellectual, an unettered cultural orce and grand

man o letters, was pivotal in mainstreaming Spanish writing in the second hal o the 20th

century. His panoramic novels captured the complicated essence o his countrys history.

He was born in Panama to Mexican parents on 1928. True to his name, which means

ountains in Spanish, he was a prolic writer, producing plays and short stories and co-ounding a

literary magazine, Revista Mexicana de Literatura, with Octavio Paz. He was also a columnist, political

provocateur, essayist, critic, screenwriter and playwright, editor, ambassador and a cultural historian.

A towering gure in Mexican and

world literature, Fuentes, along

with Gabriel Garca Marquez,

Mario Vargas Llosa and Julio

Cortazar, acted as a catalyst

or El Boomthe explosion o

Latin American literature in the

1960s and 1970s which became

closely associated with magical

realism. Fuentess rst short

story collection, Masked Days(1954) was ollowed by his rst

novel, Where the Air is Clear

(1958), laying the oundation

or the boom. It was a literary

sensation, mixing biting social

commentary with interior

monologues and portrayals

o the subconscious. It was

his second novel, The Death

o Artemio Cruz (1962) that

won him recognition as one o

Latin Americas leading youngauthors. The book is based

on the Mexican revolution

(1910-20) and criticizes the

distortion o the revolutionaries

original aims through class

domination, Americanization,

nancial corruption and ailure

o land reorm. The Death

o Artemio Cruz was the rst

Latin American novel to employ

stream o consciousness

technique. His mystery-novel Aura (1962) narrates a

romantic encounter beneath

a crucix with a black Christ.

In his 60s and 70s, Fuentes

produced a stream o novels

and essays that deepened

his investigation into the

possibilities o ction. The

major novels Fuentes produced

in these years were A Change

o Skin (1967) and Terra Nostra

(1975), a massive, Byzantine

work in the baroque tradition.

It spans more than 2,000

years o history and has been

called a panoramic Hispano-

American creation myth. His

1985 novel The Old Gringowas the rst Mexican novel

to gure in the New York

Times. In Christopher Unborn

(1987), he tries to exorcise all

the evils o Mexico City. The

1990s started with a furry o

publications: Constancia: and

Other Stories or Virgins(1990);

The Campaign (1991), the rst

o a planned trilogy spanning

the 100 years between the 1810

Year o Revolution and the 1910Mexican Revolution; and The

Buried Mirror (1991), a wide-

ranging account o Hispanic

culture. His other works that

caught international attention

were The Crystal Frontier(1997),

The Years with Laura Daz(1999)

and Inez (2003). His epistolary

Carlos Fuentes


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novel The Eagles Throne

(2003) comically takes apart thecomplexities and absurdities o

Mexican political lie. In 2008, he

published Destiny and Desire: A

Novel, in which the narrator is a

severed head. At the time o his

death, he had just completed

a new novel, Federico

on His Balcony, and had

embarked on writing another.

Fuentes was weighed down with

prizes, awards and honorarydegrees or his versatility.

Fuentes received the National

Order o Merit, Frances highest

civilian award given to a

oreigner; Spains Prince o

Asturias Award or literature; the

Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking worlds highest literary

honor; Frances Legion o Honor

Medal as well as honorary

doctorates rom universities

in the US and Britain including

Warwick, Harvard, Cambridge

and the University o Caliornia.

Carlos Fuentes considered

writing as a struggle against

silence. He himsel drew on the

concept o the agora, a place or

citizens to assemble in ancientGreece. He dened the power

o the novel as that o the agora,

where all voices are heard,

where all voices are respected.

He wrote novels that ormed

a kind o Mexican Comedy,

a deep portrait o Mexicansociety, economy and politics.

Carlos Fuentes died in 2012,

depriving the nation o its most

internationally recognized

voice. Fuentes works have been

translated into 24 languages.

Though Carlos Fuentes wrote

works belonging to just

about every genre, including

opera, he declined to write an

autobiography till his death inMay 2012. He once said one

puts o the biography like

you put o death. To write an

autobiography is to etch the

words on your own gravestone.

Poem

s

Quest

Spring smiled, summer dried

And autumn wished her ruitullyThe cold winter she always elt

Still lingering by her side,

The time was ripe, and little did she realize

For the quest was hard to quench alone

To let it go, ree o all.

There started she with hope and prayer

Not knowing, but all in vain

Still empty with her thoughts.

And oh, listen she reached the spot

Where the quest had reached beore

Lying on the tiny grass

With dew drops all around.

She elt it with her weary hand

This took her breath along.

For it was the call, o eternal might,

The peace she yearned

The quest which burned.

Poem

s

Sweet Morning

The night gives way to the daybreak

The morning breeze kisses my cheek,

The beautiul world o nature welcomes

As I open my eyes to another nice day.

The trees dance and the leaves touch

As i whispering secrets to each other.

The fowers bloom and their scents,

Their colours permeate the universe.

Through the trees, the sun peeps,

Wishing to me, Have a nice day,

Showering his golden rays on me,

Though the dewdrops melt away.

The dew drops on the windowpane

Hide themselves rom the sunrays,

As I look, theres a knock on the door,

Have to go, to my duty, to do Gods will.

Soorya Nayana S.S. Soumya Remesh


15/68

15

Tribute

HUGO CHAVEZ :THE BEACON OF THE

FUTURE CLASS STRUGGLE

Abhilash Babupays homage to

the Venezuelan

revolutionary.

Hegelian dialectics posits that society develops through conficts o internal contradictions.

When history turns to the new dawn o capital sovereignty, our politics is also very much

infuenced by the capitalist policies as the economic base ashions the superstructure.

(The term politics in all its possible scope, as nothing is unaected by political science.)

Haveshave nots, Slave ownersSlaves, Bourgeoisproletariat relations gave way to the new

antithetical multi-national corporateconsumer relations. We, the consumers, are subjected to and

exploited by the subtle orces o virtual capitalism. (We dont know exactly where it originates rom

and where its center is. But it is here, there and everywhere). Our wealth is tapped rom our home

economies to ll some invisible pockets (veritably, the Swadeshi movement and drain o wealth

theory will never lose its signicance whenever there is imperialismdirect or hiddenin opposition).

Here is the signicance o

alternates or the prevailing

system as one put orth by Hugo

Raael Chvez Fras (July 1954

5 March 2013) popularly known

as Hugo Chvez, the President

o Venezuela rom 1999 until

his death in 2013. Latin Americahad a splendid history o anti-

imperialistic struggles as

maniested by Simon Boliver,

Che Guevara, Fidel Castro etc,

to mention a ew. And Cristina

Kirchner, Dilma Rousse,

Ollanta Humalathe new let

fag holders o the modern

eraare trying to take up the

populist, pro-working class

politics to wield the legacy o

Latin American revolutionariesand their tenacious

struggle against inequality.

Ater Chavez took up charge,

all the privatized oil elds were

nationalized and the very action

was a bolt rom the blue or

the private owners. Under his

administration, poverty was

brought down rom 71 per cent

in 1996 to 21 now, and extremepoverty came down rom 40

per cent to 7.3. The benets o

social programmes he started

reached 20 million people

and 2.1 million senior citizens

o the country were relieved

by his pension programme.

During his tenure, poverty

and malnutrition rates ebbed,

clean water accessibility and

enrollment ratio increased. He

could increase the standard o

living o the tribal communities

o Venezuela who were reeling

under utter poverty. The

most praiseworthy amonghis actions was o course that

he could lead the bloc rom

the ront prompting the letist

leaders all over the globe to

achieve the goals o socialism.

The capitalist orces under the

leadership o the US and the

media controlled by them tried

their level best or coups in

the country and to tarnish the

personality o Chavez. Chavezcould tide over all these attempts

and become the icon o anti-

capital struggle o the new era.

O course, he is not a oolproo

leader. He was and is being

criticized or many o his

actions. But the thing is he

Hugo Chavez


16/68

16

could achieve something or

the downtrodden and onlybeyond that he was fayed by

those apolitical orces without

social consciousness. What are

the capitalist orces and media

controlled by them doing today

or the people and the nature?

Our culture has changed (or

is changed!). We are orced

to look at everything in terms

o moneylove, relations,

personality are all commodied

and indigenous cultures arecrushed under the eet o

new modes o imperialism.

Everything is made available

in the market. Weapons are

largely produced to strengthen

the war market. For that

purpose, nationalisms and

ethnicities are used as potent

weapons to ignite divisive

passions in the minds o social

groups using media. Instances

are numerous in this context.

Here the Chavezian ideologies

become relevant. Our rulers

must declare who they are ruling

or. I it is or the majority, here

is the model. I it is otherwise,

we are taking him as the model

in our struggle against tyranny.

Poems

When sarcasm ate me

Every inch and every bit,

No doping drug

Could save the t.

The oolish city and its food

Reeking drains o selsh brainsAmidst the sordid thunder

And dark rains

The sacred eponym

The golden sculpture

The kind posture became

Farces under the same sun

Glances that x

The laughter o your ace

And royal o your heart

Timid hypocrites o the tainted soil

Hungry way wards

For a deeming dawn

For a rejuvenating vitamin

On a heartbreaking holiday

Burn down his corridors

The savage tailor and his doggone ways

The humbug sailor o abominable seas

Scissor him to knit con clothes or the feas.

Guardian angels are all dead and gone

Long back, into a ading holy yardExtinct thinkers or a ne democracy

The cheap ditz have replaced them all.

The dirty athletics is on

Go volunteer silly

You might benet

In odd ways unlike the old days

Nonsensical brows

Showing o their ups and downs

O a superior hypocritical

Land and a hyperbolic race

O hackneyed promises and ghostly dreams,

In the unethical sleep o an insecure thie.

Raid on his plans and grant him vilication

Go city go..

Jyothi Jagadish

Go City Go


17/68

17

Classics

THE MAGIC

MOUNTAIN

Maria introduces to the readers, ThomasManns classic novel The Magic Mountain,

which views lie through the prism o

insanity and death.

The Magic Mountain is a 1924 philosophical novel by the German writer Thomas Mann. Set in a

tuberculosis sanatorium in the Swiss Alps, this is a growing-up novel or bildungsroman that ocuses

on the growth o its hero Hans Castorp. It also comments on the European civilization just beore

the First World War using disease as a symbol o the moral deterioration o the society o that time.

The novel begins with the hero

Hans Castorps journey to thetuberculosis sanatorium in

Bergho to take three weeks

o rest as prescribed by his

physician. His cousin Joachim

Ziemssen, already an inmate o

the sanatorium, meets him at

the train station and brings him

to Bergho. Once at Bergho,

he meets Dr. Krokowski who

laughs when Castorp says that

he is healthy and had come

or rest and not or treatment.

Castorp is rom an aristocratic

amily and is studying ship-

building. Joachim, who was

sent to Bergho to get better, is

a Lieutenant with the German

army. Settembrini is an Italian

inmate and man o letters who

addresses Castorp as Engineer

and Joachim as Lieutenant.

Settembrini later introduces

him to Naphta, a Jewish Jesuit.Castorp meets Horat Behrens,

the director o the sanatorium

and makes riends with many

other inmates as well. Frau

Sthr is a memorable character

who uses several malapropisms

in her daily conversations

providing a lot o hilarity to

Castorp who says that he does

not know whether to laugh or

cry, on listening to her errors.

Everyday, Castorp encounters

dierent responses to

death and listens to morbiddescriptions rom Joachim.

Joachim describes how Behren

treats dying patients brutally,

especially i they create a scene.

Castorp becomes used to the

schedule o the sanatorium

heavy meals, checking o

temperature, rest-cures and

the resultant dream-like state

o consciousness. Castorp eelsattracted to Clavdia Chauchat

while Joachim is in love with

Marusja, another hopeless case.

He eels that Madame Chauchat

is the center o his lie. Chauchat

and Castorp firt with each

other and arouse each others

sexuality. Instead o getting

better, he gradually loses his

health and becomes part o

the atmosphere o Bergho.

Castorp discovers that Chauchat

was also involved with Behrens,

who had painted her in the

nude. On Walpurgis Night,

Behrens presides over the party

conducting diabolic games in

reddish semi-darkness. That

night, Castorp proesses his

love to Chauchat, who leaves

the sanatorium. Later Castorp

decides to stay back at the

sanatorium because he isgenuinely ill. He takes up serious

reading and gathers insights

on the origin and composition

o lie. He spends time with

Naphta and Settembrini, who

discuss various topics and

argue endlessly over them.

The relationship between

The Magic Mountain


18/68

18

Joachim and Castorp becomes

strained. Joachim leaves theplace to return to the army and

beore he leaves, asks Castorp

to ollow him while there is still

time. Castorp gets permission

rom Behrens, but reuses

to leave. However, Joachim

comes back ill and ater his

death, is buried in a soldiers

grave. Castorps uncle Tienappel

comes and persuades him to go

back but he still reuses to go.

Amidst an atmosphere o

boredom at the sanatorium,

people resort to various activities

to while away their time. Dr.

Krokowski, with the help o a

young girl named Elly Brand,

establishes communication with

the world o spirits. Castorp is

told that he had been at Bergho

or the last seven years. In

one o the sance sessions,

where Elly Brand acts as themedium, Castorp requests the

return o Joachim rom the

dead. Hans wish is granted

as Joachims shape appears

but he is so scared by theappearance o Joachim that he

switches on the light and causes

Joachims spirit to vanish.

Gradually, the atmosphere

in the sanatorium grows

into total intolerance among

the inmates. Castrop, lies

delicate child returns to the

fatland ater seven years at the

sanatorium and the war hurls

him back into the real world.

The novel, as a bildungsroman,

ocuses on the heros

progression towards a

meaningul idea o himsel

and his role in the world. He

encounters various temptations

and obstacles during the

process o his education.

Though at times, he moves in

circles and makes no evident

progress, his constant strivinghelps him to grow. However,

his educators are his ellow-

inmates at the sanatorium and

lie itsel. His introduction into

the world o Bergho initiateshis process o education.

At Bergho, he develops his

aculties and this leads to

his growing sel-awareness.

The narrative techniques

employed by the writer involve

shits in time and perspectives

oered rom dierent vantage

points. The writer ponders over

the concept o time, especially

the timelessness o lie at thesanatorium. The questions o

lie and death are dealt with rom

the perspectives o the inmates

o the sanatorium where all

kinds o people rom dierent

European nations recuperate

rom tuberculosis. However,

during their stay at Bergho,

they become shadows o their

previous selves and are reduced

to mannerisms, appearances,

actions, or gures o speech.The novel is a stark commentary

on the European civilization

beore the First World War.

Poem

s

Ethnical Infiction

Heaps o breasts are kept or sale

The breasts o a mother is being

Rummaged by the orlorn child.

A girl playing beside her house

Rushed inside to lock the door,

Imagining the sounds o the crackers

To be the bombs that

Took away her playmates, cousins, neighbours

The tears o the child dried out completely

Watching the wounded body o its dead mother.

Karunya Sakthi


19/68

19

Comparative

THE PLURAL AND

THE SINGULAR

K. Satchidanandangives an insight into the

richness o the literatures

o India.

Whenever I think o the concept o Indian literature, a story retold by A.K. Ramanujan

comes to mind: Hanuman reaches the netherworld in search o Ramas ring that had

disappeared through a hole. The King o spirits in the netherworld tells Hanuman that there

have been so many Ramas over the ages; whenever one incarnation nears its end, Ramas

ring alls down. The King shows Hanuman a whole platter with thousands o rings, all o them Ramas,

and asks him to pick out his Ramas ring. He tells this devotee rom the earth that his Rama too has

entered the river Sarayu by now ater crowning his sons, Lava and Kusha. Many Ramas also mean many

Ramayanas and we have hundreds o them in oral, written, painted, carved and perormed versions.

I this is true o a single seminal

Indian work, one needs only

to imagine the diversity o

the whole o Indian literature

recited, narrated and written

in scores o languages. No

wonder, one o the undamental

questions in any discussion

o Indian literature has been

whether to speak o Indianliterature in singular or plural.

With 184 mother tongues

(according to Census 1991; it

was 179 in George Griersons

Linguistic Survey o India, along

with 544 dialects, and 1,652 in

1961), 22 o which are in the

Eighth Schedule o the Indian

Constitution, and 25 writing

systems, 14 o them major,

scores o oral literary traditions

and several traditions o writtenliterature, most o them at least

a millennium old, the diversity

o Indias literary landscape can

match only the complexity o its

linguistic map. Probably, it was

this challenging complexity that

had orced an astute critic like

Nihar Ranjan Ray to conclude

that there cannot be a single

Indian literature as there is

no single language that can

be termed Indian. To quote

him, as translated rom Bengaliby Sujit Mukherjee (Towards

a Literary History o India):

Literature is absolutely

language-based, and language

being a cultural phenomenon,

it is all but wholly conditioned

by its locale and the socio-

historical orces that are in

operation through the ages in

that particular locale. I that be

so, one may reasonably argue

that the literature o a given

language will have its own

specic character o orm and

style, images and symbols,

nuances and associations.

It is true that oten Indian

tends to imply the values that

argue or the cultural unity o

India as a whole. The use o

English to write about literature

in Indian languages seems to

reinorce such a view. As E.V.

Ramakrishnan observes in his

introduction to Making It New:

Modernism in Malayalam,

Marathi and Hindi Poetry (IIAS,

Shimla), the ramework o grandnarratives o history cannot

accommodate the subversive

unction o the new trends in

literature unless they become

domesticated and canonised.

The levelling eect o history

and the domestication implicit

in canonicity nally ossilise

K. Satchidanandan


20/68

20

authors and works, leaving

no trace o their relevance toour present. We also have to

recognize the act that the gap

between the national and the

regional has been problematised

by the post-colonial vocabularies

o identity and dierence,

and centrality and plurality.

Composite Histories

Comparative literature scholars

like K.M. George and Sisir

Kumar Das have attempted

composite histories o Indian

literature as in the ormers

Comparative Indian Literature

and the latters A History o

Indian Literature. Sisir Kumar

Das tries to locate the points

o convergence and parallels

on a civilizational terrain o

labyrinthine complexity. He

looks at the history o Indian

literature as a history o the

total literary activity o the Indian

people, an account o all literary

traditions, great and little, their

ramications and challenges,

their recessions and revivals,

dominance and decline. In

act, a literary text produced in

an Indian language answers

a certain need or perorms

a historical unction in the

context o a specic linguistic

community, and its meaning

lies essentially in its specicity.

This relationship o the text

to its contexts gets blurred or

distorted when we abstract a

text in an Indian language into

the realm o a national literary

history. In order to understand

how a poet or a ction writer

radicalises the literary idiom,

it is necessary to grasp thespecic history o that literature

along with its social background

rom which the literary registers

spring. There is, in addition,

the question o the overlapping

o various tendencies at the

same juncture in most Indian

languages. In Malayalam, or

example, even now there are

romantic poets ollowing an

older idiom jostling with those

who consider themselvespostmodern and experiment

with avant-garde idioms.

This gets urther complicated

i we introduce the element

o ideology that, according

to Michael [sic] Bakhtin, is

inscribed in the language. In

short, there are problems o

chronology (or synchrony and

diachrony), o ideology and o

terminology involved in the

consideration o the singular /plural nature o Indian literature.

Let us now look at the other

argument. While Nihar Ranjan

Ray is not without some

ollowers in contemporary India,

it is also possible to interrogate

his general approach to

literature as something tied

entirely and inextricably to the

language in which it is originally

written. Language cannot bethe only criterion o literature;

other criteria, social, cultural,

political, ethical and aesthetic,

have been applied to literature

rom time to time. It can be,

and has been, categorised, read

and analysed rom the point

o view o class, race, caste,

gender, myth, archetype, sign,

structure, ideology and textualunconscious. In all these cases,

the language o the text assumes

a secondary status under

another dominant paradigm.

Secondly, there are many

literatures that are known by

the name o the nations they

belong to, rather than the

languages they are written

in. This is true o American,

British, Australian, Canadian orIndian English literature where

literatures mostly in the same

language are given dierent

nomenclatures. On the other

hand, a category like European

literature cuts across languages

as it is written in diverse

languages, like German, French,

Italian, Spanish or Swedish.

And Spanish literature written

in South America is considered

to have a separate identity asit belongs to the larger corpus

o Latin American literature.

Thirdly, crossings o linguistic

boundaries are so requent in

Indian literature that we nd it

dicult to divide our literature

solely on the basis o language.

In the words o the distinguished

Marxist theoretician Aijaz

Ahmad, multilingualism and

polyglot fuidity are in the

very nature o Indian creativity.

We have Indian writers o the past

like Kabir, Namdev, Meerabai,

Guru Nanak or Vidyapati who

were all multilingual. In modern

times, we have many writers

who belong to the composite

Hindi-Urdu tradition that can


21/68

21

perhaps be called the Hindustani

tradition, like Premchand,or bilingual writers like A.K.

Ramanujan, Jayanta Mahapatra,

Kiran Nagarkar and Kamala Das

who wrote/write in their mother

tongues as well as in English.

Thirdly, most Indian languages

share genres and orms

rom the mahakavya, doha,

prabandha, prahasana, nataka

and ballad to sonnet, elegy,

lyric, narrative poem, shortstory and the novel. Fourthly,

they also share concepts o

poetics, both oriental and

occidental, rom rasa, dhvani,

alankara, anumana, vakrokti,

bhava and vibhava to mimesis,

catharsis, metaphor, metonymy,

suggestion, myth, archetype

and several other, more

contemporary, terms, concepts

and methods. Fithly, many

literatures in India share literaryinfuences as well as trends

and movements like the Bhakti,

the Nationalist or Swarajist,

the Progressive or Pragativadi,

the Modernist or Adhunik

Movements and the later trends

like post-modernist or uttar-

adhunik, nativist or deseevadi,

ecological or prakritivadi,

eminist or nareevadi, Dalit and

tribal or Adivasi movements.

This is besides shared patternso thought, eeling, concerns

and their modes o expression.

These common eatures must

have inspired the amous

statement by S. Radhakrishnan

popularized by the Sahitya

Akademi: Indian Literature

is one even while written in

dierent languages. Oneproblem with this approach is

that it is reductive and tends to

standardize all the literatures

o India and in the process

leaves out and thus alienates

many literatures like the oral

tribal literatures and literatures

o the north-eastern region

and o certain languages and

dialects where the history has

proceeded in other directions

and which have had little impacto the West. This dilemma

was best summed up by U.R.

Ananthamurthy once when

he said, I you look at the

diversity o Indian literature,

you come to see its unity ad

i you look or unity, you are

struck by its diversity. This is,

in act, a dialectical statement

that is nearer the truth than

the positions expressed by

either Nihar Ranjan Ray or S.Radhakrishnan or, while there

have been pan-Indian trends

and movements, there have

also been regional ones, and

even the pan-Indian movements

like Bhakti have maniested

themselves in dierent orms

in dierent Indian languages.

It is also not true to say that all

the movements have aected

all the literatures alike or thatthe infuences rom outside the

languages, Indian or otherwise,

have had the same impact

across languages. There are

orms that are unique to certain

languages, like or example

the thullal poem, the kathakali

verse, the cartoon poem or the

pattalakkatha (barrack stories)

to Malayalam or bijak or ramainipeculiar to ancient Braj as used

by Kabir, or the pillaipadal

(lullabies), chintu (a kind o

song), akaval (metric mode in

narratives), venpa (or didactic

works), kalippa (or love poetry

and choral music), vanchapp (or

descriptive situations), kumm (a

song or dancing women), and

kanni (couplet orm) in Tamil,

abhang in Marathi, vachana in

Kannada, vakh in Kashmiri (allorms o Bhakti poetry) or rubai,

maznavi, qavvali manaqib,

nama, qasida or quita in Urdu.

This is also true o the concepts

o poetics. All the languages

were not equally permeated

by Sanskrit poetics. Tamil, or

example, had its own concepts

like that o the tinai or terrains

with their peculiar moods

and contexts. Tholkappiyamalso speaks o meypadus

comparable to the rasas. There

are also concepts like ullurai,

connotatively close to dhvani.

Urdu has inherited a lot o

concepts rom the Perso-Arabic

critical tradition. One can also

see that dierent languages

have appropriated Sanskrit as

well as Western concepts in

poetics with nuanced semantic

shits. Some orms are commonto some languages, but not to all

alike; the ghazal that came rom

Persian was developed in Urdu

and then had practitioners in

Hindi, Marathi, Gujarati and even

in English in India (remember

Agha Shahid Ali, or example).

This is also true o neoclassical


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22

orms like champu and

sandeshakavya, or movementslike Dalit literature shared

chiefy by, say, Marathi, Gujarati,

Hindi, Punjabi, Kannada, Tamil

Telugu and, more recently,

Malayalam. Even a pan-Indian

tendency like the Progressive

Literary Movement was

stronger in languages like Urdu,

Hindi, Oriya, Bengali, Telugu

and Malayalam than in others.

There are also movements and

debates conned to one or twolanguages like desseevad [sic]

or nativism, chiefy, observed

in Marathi and Gujarati.

In short, while languages have

interacted rom time to time

and received orms, trends

and movements rom other

regions and languages, each

language has had also periods

o isolated growth and its own

special genius just as eachregion in Indian has its own

customs, celebrations, orms o

art and literature and at times

even certain temperamental

tendencies. Indian culture is a

mosaic o cultures, religions,

races, languages, attitudes and

word views; hence the concept

o Indian literature also has to

be open, inclusive, dynamic and

fexible so that it accommodates

diverse voices o the majority aswell as o the religious, linguistic,

sexual and ethnic minorities.

Imperative to

Rethink Concepts

Ater more than six decades

o independence and ve

hundred years o imperial and

colonial rule, it is imperativethat we rethink concepts like

Indianness and Indian literature.

One may then be able to

unveil the complicity o these

concepts with the ideology o

colonialism on the one hand

and globalization on the other.

We have come a long way since

the German romantic theorist

Wilhelm von Schlegel used

the term Indian literature to

mean Sanskrit literature (1823).Since then many other scholars

have used the term as being

synonymous with Sanskrit

literature, at the most extended

to include Prakrit, Apabhramasa

[sic] and Pali literatures. M.

Garcin de Tassys two-volume

History o the Literature o Hindu

and Hindustaniin French (1839-

47, later revised and enlarged

as a three-volume edition in

1870-71), Albrecht WebersHistory o Indian Literature

in German (1852), George A.

Griersons Modern Vernacular

Literature o Hindustan (1889),

Ernst P. Horowitzs A Short

History o Indian Literatureand

Moriz Winternitzs History o

Indian Literature (1908-1922)

in German as well as Herbert

H. Gowens History o Indian

Literature (1931) have all

contributed to the constitution othe category o Indian literature.

Most o these do not represent, or

under-represent, the literatures

in the modern Indian languages

that were ull-grown by the

time: many even had their own

histories o literature written in

the concerned language itsel.

Sanskrit was posited by themas the classical code o early

India, congruent with new linked

conceptions o classicism and

class. Indian scholars too have

contributed in a big way to the

constitution o the category

o Indian literature though

many o their approaches

are more nuanced and they

take into account modern

languages in various ways. Sri

Aurobindo, Krishna Kripalani,Suniti Kumar Chatterjee, V.K.

Gokak, Umashankar Joshi, Sujit

Mukherjee, Sisir Kumar Das, K.M.

George, Ganesh Devy and so on,

have elaborated the category

as a posited unity o diverse

language ormations or as the

articulation o Indian culture.

Aijaz, Ahmad, in his essay on

Indian literature In Theory, has

acknowledged the diculties oposition such a unitary category.

Pointing to the introduction o

Narrative Strategies: Essays

on South Asian Literature and

Film by Vasudha Dalmia and

Theo Damsteegt (Leiden, 1998),

where they claim to let the world

know the seriousness o their

discipline, he points out how

their statement is unabashedly

Eurocentric and ignorant or,

deliberately neglectul o theenormous scholarship that

has been produced on Indian

literature by scholars o various

hues rom the south Asian

subcontinent. It is disgraceul

that the attitude o European

scholarship to this mighty

archive remains unchanged


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23

since the 19th century. All

these works also share theclass and caste prejudices o

the tradition o the Sanskrit-

based Hindu orthodoxy.

Only recently have some

scholars like Sheldon Pollock

begun to realize this, as is

evidence in his introduction

to Literary Cultures in History:

Reconstructions rom South

Asia (New Delhi, 2003) where

the language literatures havebeen treated in isolation as also

in relation to other language

literatures in India. Sheldon

Pollock says: With very ew

exceptions, European histories

o Indian literature remained

histories o Sanskrit and its

congeners The real plurality

o literatures in South Asia

and their dynamic and long-

term interaction were scarcely

recognized, except perhapsincidentally by Protestant

missionaries and British civil

servants who were prompted

by the practical objectives

o conversion and control.

Pollock also examines how

the subaltern school ohistoriography has sought

to redirect the study o 19th

and early 20th century Indian

society and politics toward the

popular, the vernacular, the oral,

and the local, and recapture

the role o small people in

eecting big historical change.

Contemporary analyses o

colonialism have shown how

new Indian pasts with real-liesocial consequences, such as

the traditionalisation o the

social order by the systematic

miscognition o indigenous

discourses on caste, were

created by colonial knowledge.

They have demonstrated at

the same time how discourses

such as nationalism that were

borrowed rom Europe entered

into complex interaction

with local modes o thoughtand action that, through a

process not unlike import

substitution, appropriated,

rejected, transormed, or

replaced them. He goes on to

Ranganath J. Ugale

say how the reexamination o

theory, practice and historyo areas, especially driven by

the analysis o globalisation,

has made us aware o the

articiality o geographical

boundaries o inquiry.

Today we need to develop

alternative genealogies that

go beyond the hegemonic

canon and travel to the deepest

springs o popular creativity.

Rather than a mechanicalunitary concept, we need to

develop a comparative concept,

a resh literary cartography,

marking areas o isolation and

interaction, patterns specic

to languages and infuences

that they share. Only then will

we be able to overcome the

binary opposition between

the singular and the plural as

irreconcilable antinomies and

arrive at a dialectical concepto Indian literature in its twin

aspects o unity and diversity.

Article previously published in Frontline,

19 April 2013 .

Poem

s

On the Street

Theres a amily on the street

We think they are sad;

Only they know.

They beg on the street,

And sleep on the street.

All their days are same

To live is their sole aim.

Where do the streets take them?


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24

Know em?Jithesh J. Nair wants you to identiy these great writers.

1. ______________ 2. ______________ 3. ______________ 4. ______________

Game

s

ANSWERS

1.BertoltBrecht2.LeoTolstoy3.PabloNeruda4.BapsiSidhwa

Poem

s

I opened the room

And the door creaked.

It was inundated

With smoky darkness

And very deserted.

A walking stick stood

Still in a corner,

A big row o medicine bottles

By the window,

An old pair o spectacles on the table,

And an ayurvedic smell in the air,

And at last,

A stamp pad let open

In place o a glass o water in hal

And the lost drops on the pillow...

The Last Moment

Ram Sharma

Imag

es

Intrepid: Ajay B.R.


25/68

25

Impressions

Tagore: P.P. Ajayakumar


26/68

26

Travel

A STATUE OF LIBERTYLal C.A. talks about his walk tolocate and photograph a statue in

Seattle, USA.

Imeant to ask Kim to go with me looking or the old mans statue, just as she had asked me the previous

day to explore Capitol Hill in uptown Seattle. But she had hopped o the bus at the Pike Place Market,

and I decided to go on my own. It was my third day in the city, and a rather hectic one. It was already

late aternoon, and I had only a couple o hours beore I was to join Magda and Anzar or dinner with a

senior lady living in a beautiul house overlooking the sea. She was to pick us up rom the hotel around 6 p.m.

I had read a version o ChieSeattles speech in early 90s

when I was taking care o the

Eco Club in my college, and

had ound it very appealing. Its

rhetoric and poetry, even more,

the eerie and apparently intuitive

undertone o a keen ecological

awareness, haunted me. So

when the IVLP programme o

the US Department o State took

me to Seattle, I naturally wished

to look or monuments relatedto the old Duwamish chietain,

who in his legendary speech

in 1850s, is supposed to have

made a ervent appeal to the

white authorities to have a more

holistic perception o mans

locus within the biosphere.

Nobody knows what he actually

spoke, as his speech was

written down only a ew years

ater he made it. There aremany versions, and the most

popular one, the one in most

text books, and the one that

appealed to me, was created

by a screenwriter named Ted

Perry in 1972, which sounds so

good, but is not always what

the poor old man actually said!

Seattle is in the state o

Washington, on the Pacic side

o the USA, and the largest city

in the whole Pacic Northwest

region o the country. It isamusing that, as in many other

American states, the most

prominent city is never the

capital province; the more

laid-back Olympia happens

to be the capital o the state

o Washington. Regarding

Seattle, Bill Gates has his oce

some 16 miles rom this city,and in the neighbourhood are

the Starbuck corporate oce

and the rst Boeing actory.

The Seattle Central Library is

an amazing place where one

could read, browse, or even

have computer and language

classes, as much as one liked,

and not pay anything or it.

The lady who accompanied us

to the library commented: I

I were a homeless, Id spendall my days here. I had never

heard the word homeless

being used to mean a homeless

person, and it was interesting

to know there were quite a ew

homeless people around, and

that they could, and many did,

spend a lot o time in the library!

I hurried up to my room in the

Max Hotel, and changed into

casuals, remembering to takemy scar and the thick jacket, as

the air outside was rather nippy.

Down at the lobby I looked or

the pretty Korean receptionist

with irregular upper teeth,

who I hoped would give me

directions, and perhaps a nice

smile! But she was nowhere to


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27

be seen, but a young man with

a distinctive regional Americanaccent was in her place. I was

not particularly impressed by

his smiles, but he was very

helpul with his directions, and

etching me a map o the city,

he drew on it the way I should

go to reach the monument I

was looking or. It was more or

less along the amous Seattle

Monorail, and generally in the

direction o the Space Needle.

The Space Needle is a vivid

landmark o the city, and near

it is the EPM Museum (ormerly

known as the Experience Music

Project and Science Fiction

Museum and Hall o Fame),

which has several interesting

movie related artiacts, including

those rom major Hollywood

movies like the Jurassic Park,

the Star Wars, and E.T. the Extra-

Terrestrial. The monorail ran

rom the city center, covering just

a miles distance rom one endto the other, and passed straight

through the EPM building. I

elt it was more o a curiosity

than an eective and useul

mode o mass transportation.

I discovered all these on the

days ater my walk to the statue.

Following the map, and observing

the lie on either side o the street

the best I could, I hurried along

until I was suitably conused andhad no idea where I was. Nobody

seemed to have even heard o

the human being ater whom

their city was named, and nally

a man, well past middle-age,

waved his hand in the direction I

was going and told me he is just

two blocks rom here. I was, ater

all, going in the right direction!

Cars were rushing past in all

directions round the little pool

on which the old man stood

with a grim ace on a pedestal!There was no water in the pool

as the ountain that should be

gushing rom the bears mouth

was not turned on. A girl was

sitting on the little low wall

enclosing the statue space,

acing the monument, with her

eet dangling down, and totally

lost in the book she was reading.

She hardly moved all the time I

walked around taking snaps.

There is one photograph that Istill nd rather amusing, the one

in which the chie seems to hold

the Space Needle as i it were a

lighted torch! That was the one I

sent, soon ater I reached back at

the hotel, to one o my students

back in my college. I knew I could

rely on Lois to share it with other

riends who might be interested.

I was excited because they had

Chie Seattles speech in their

English text book that year!

Poem

s

Suhana Sathar

An Adamant Heart

It isnt the obscure memory that begirds my heart,

And raises me into an awul world o shabby raiment,

That shackles the banquet o natures blissul Art,

Alas! Their act that has moulded my heart adamant

Breaking a rhythm, that too a soothing moment o curse,

Out o a jacket-open mind, that too a red blood shower

There wakes up the re dancing with makeup, O worse;

And also arises a huge, small and little fesh o tower.

Let them enjoy the day at times; let them cry or lives,That too a shame or the Lord? Not the mother; to celebrate,

The part-blood lives or lie, not to retrieve; but lives.

Enjoying the sons return and allowing the fays; to liberate

Lets exalt the adoration o the disguised devil, otherwise be sober,

Abet the earth to weigh all the evil-urban and timid o violence,

For briale the red-blood that ruin the loam, a noxious lover

Dont throw me into lethal clay and make my Heart Adamant!


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28

Rituparno Ghosh

(31 August 1963 30 May 2013)

Tribute

Rituparno Ghoshs death is a massive loss to the creative vitality o Indian cinema. Ater nearly 22

lms (most o them in Bengali, two in Hindi, and two in English), Ghosh, was indeed beginning the nextphase o his career. He had made the transition rom a successul regional lm director o independent

art-house Bengali cinema to a sought-ater director o urbane Hindi cinema, and nally, to being an

Indian lmmaker o international acclaim on par with Shyam Benegal and Mira Nair.

Ghosh was oten compared to another amous Bengal-born director, Satyajit Ray. Ghosh in turn

reinvigorated and reinvented the Ray canon o Bengali cinema. He took Rays early material, stage and

literary adaptations o the great 19th century Indian writer, Rabindranath Tagore, and breathed new lie

into them by ocusing on the psychological complexities o womens lives in colonial India.


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29

DALIT TRANSLATION:

A NECESSARY EVIL

Jyothi S. wonders whether it ispossible or English translations

o Dalit writings to eectively

acilitate Dalit empowerment.

Can English translations o Dalit literature proclaim with an air o triumph

that they have been able to athom the real eelings o the Dalits?

New researches in Dalit

literature bring its exclusive

character, distinct language,

indigenous culture, and

ethnicity into the limelight. This

new literary genre consists o

several translated texts romDalit communities and has

received worldwide acclaim.

The text also has a new sense

o armation which strives to

liberate itsel rom being labelled

victimhood literature. Though

Dalit translation catapults

the text to an international

audience, these translated

texts apparently ail to convey

the aesthetic sensibility, innate

eelings and indigenous cultureo the author because o the

inability o the oreign language

to make a covalent bond

between two dierent cultures.

The reception o the text can be

seen rom dierent perspectives.

Though Dalit texts can migrate

rom their indigenous language

to any other oreign language,

the innate culture cannotbe translated through this

process. The real essence o

the text dwells in the vernacular

language and it transcends

translation. There arises a sack

ull o questions regarding the

readings and interpretations

o these translated texts. The

oreign reader denes the limits

and boundaries o the text

because he/she is not aware o

the real context in which the

text is produced. The struggles,

violence and resistance that the

Dalits suer are totally unknownand inexplicable to the new

reader. Here, the real objective o

the text, i.e., the empowerment

o Dalits is unattainable. An

imagined community o

Dalits in desperate need o

sympathy is conjured up in the

mind o the target language

reader who, more oten than

not, is dissociated rom the

realities o Dalit lie. Linguistic

and rhetorical questions linkedto translation, the question

o accessibility, political

interpellations regarding

canonization o texts and

stereotyping the Dalit literature,

etc., gure prominently in

the debate surrounding

translations o Dalit writings.

Dalit literature represents a powerul, emerging trend in the Indian literary scenario. The emergence

o Dalit literature coincides with the emergence o the Dalit as a political category and identity.

Given its overarching preoccupations with the location o Dalits in the caste-based Hindu society,

their struggles or dignity, justice, and equality, this literature is by nature, similar to Arican-

American literature. With the works by Dalit writers in various regional languages being widely translated into

English, Dalit literature is poised to acquire an international presence in the realm o literature. Dalit literature

also poses a major challenge to the established notions o what constitutes literature and how we read it.

Study


30/68

30

According to A. K. Ramanujan,

language is a tree, [which]loses colour under another sky.

These words are very relevant in

the case o Dalit translation. In

the current situation, translators

must concentrate more on

cultural rather than on mere

literal translation. They have

a crucial role in liberating the

Dalits rom a repressive socialsystem. In order to do the work

eciently, translators must

strive to capture the culture in

which the text is embedded.

Translating Dalit poetry is an

especially challenging task and

the translator, who is almost

like a second writer, must be

able to translate not simply thewords, but also the passion, the

innate anger, the sarcasm and

the truths o a group o people

whose realities are dierent rom

those o mainstream society.

Game

s

Chandni Retnan challenges you with a game on Partition Novels.

1. 1956 novelset in the village Mano Majraabout the lie o a village gangster

Juggut Singh

2. Novel about the lie o Gian, a Gandhi ollower and a ruthless woman Sundari, who is

hal in love with her brother

3. 1975 novelstory about a sweeper Nathuset in a small-town rontier province

4. First novel by a woman novelist rom Pakistanabout the child Lenny, who is lame

and helplessate o people in Lahore

5. 1961 novelset in Lucknowautobiographical account by the character Laila , a

15-yr old orphan

Identiy the Work

1.TraintoPakistan

2.ABendintheGanges

3.Tamas

4.Ice-Candyman

5.SunlightonaBrokenColumn

Answers


31/68

31

Review

TABISH KHAIR AND

THE THING ABOUT

THUGS

Athul Jayakrishnan gives us aglimpse o smoke-lled dens,

anonymous serial killers and

unscrupulous physicians who

inhabit the eerie world presented

in The Thing About Thugs.

T

abish Khair is an Indian English author whose works include Babu Fictions, The Bus

Stopped and The Thing About Thugs among others. Born and brought up in Gaya, his

was not a case o late blooming or premature withering as is seen commonly among

many promising writers. The world recognized his talents rom his younger days itsel.Apart rom being a winner o All India Poetry Prize and ellowships rom Cambridge University,

Delhi University and Baptist University, his works The Bus Stopped and The Thing About

Thugs have been shortlisted or Encore Award and Man Asian Literary Prize respectively.

The Thing About Thugs (2010)

is an odd conection o a

novel, set mostly in a place

resembling late-Victorian

London. It is a subversive,

macabre story o a young

Indian mans misadventures

in the city. In a small Biharivillage, Captain William T.

Meadows beriends Amir Ali,

a member o an inamous

cult named Thugee. Amir is

whisked away to London by the

ormer to become a test subject

or phrenological research.

The gas-lit streets, which orm

the backdrop o the novel, are

peppered with grim underworld

actions. The city, overwhelmed

with crime and prostitution,takes one back to Jack the

Ripper days. Unsurprisingly,

a serial killer starts wreaking

havoc by decapitating his

victims, and curiously, the

severed heads are absent rom

the scene o crime. The police

are bafed while characters

with names such as One-Eyed

Jack strike shady deals in

seedy taverns and clubs. In the

background, members o the

upper class vigorously debate

the theory o Darwinism.

Naturally, the suspicion alls on

the thug. The novel has its own

share o gore and sickening

corpses reminiscent o works

o R.L. Stevenson. The eerie

actor is urther enhanced

by descriptions o skull-lined

mansions and underground

tunnels. The novel is a eat

o imagination which rivalsthe works o Wilkie Collins or

Michael Chabon. The novel

ends ambiguously, leaving

a lot o possibilities. The

novelist asserts that none o

what we have read is true;

that none o it matters; that it

was all ction in the rst place.

Though the atmosphere and

settings give a late-Victorian

era eel, the narrator statesthat it is 1837, the year in

which Victoria ascended the

throne. Khair seems to relish

his plots liberation rom the

more rigorous conventions o

historical ction. This work is

inspired by so many other books

that it sometimes resembles

Tabish Khair


32/68

32

a Frankenstein monstera

monster whose tissues areheld together by smooth and

at times coarse, sutures. The

novel touches upon a variety

o topics including the theme

o the Other where a colonial

subject is placed in the heart

o the imperialist center. This

concept is intricately linked to

the authors personal lie as well,

since according to him, he is a

minority among minority. During

a talk given at the Florence

Poetry Festival in 2005, he says:

Muslims are the biggestreligious minority in India. But,

within the community o Indian

Muslims, my amily again

belonged to a large minority:

that o middle class, proessional

Muslims. When you are born

into a minority that is a minority

within a minority, you learn

to belong in dierent ways.

Another aspect in the novel

is the implicit claim that since

every story is the product o

other stories, a writer needntbe shackled to notions o

verisimilitude, historical

precision, plausibility or even

coherence. However, this point

o view can prove to be sel-

undermining as ar as the novel

is concerned. But still, to a certain

extent, the author manages to

pull it o admirably and prevents

the novel rom alling apart.

Poem

s

I called him brother

till it began to bother him.

My mother used to say,

that we were born

In dierent homesOn the very same day

And when he cried,

I cried and when I cooed

He did the same.


Till he learnt at school that

One minus two is One;

And he was number one,

Always!

Way back home,

he caught my pigtails and said:

You minus I is still I.


Till he went to college;

When I stayed back at home:

My mother could use extra hands,

As my siblings were growing up;

One evening, I ran to ask him

What he learnt on the top most foor

O the huge building

And he said:

I learn to learn

You learn to unlearn.


Till he went abroad

And I stayed back

On the streets

Selling groundnuts:

Dark, brown and crisp

Folded in newspapers:

Black lines on white paper

And when he came or his vacation

I ran and asked him what he learnt

Abroad and he said:

I am air

And you are dark

Why Bother to Brother?

Nithya Mariam John


33/68

33

Review

YANN MARTELSLIFE OF PI

Indu B.C. reviews

Martels Booker Prize-

winning novel

Lie o Piis a 2001 adventure novel by the Spanish-born Canadian author, Yann Martel and it won

the Man Booker Prize or ction in 2002. It portrays the story o Piscine Molitor Patel, nicknamed

Pi, son o a zookeeper and his misadventures. Pi is peculiar because o his aith which is an

amalgam o Hinduism, Christianity and Islam. It is a story within a story where a Canadian author

Rae Spall is asked to meet an Indian in Montreal to listen to a story intended to restore his aith in God.

The rst part deals with Pis

experiences o growing up with

animals, his aith and his amily.His story begins with his ather

owning a zoo in Pondicherry

and having to relocate to

Canada to sell o the animals.

The Japanese reighter that

was shipping the animals gets

caught in a massive storm in the

deepest part o Pacic and sinks.

This is the point rom

Documents

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