LITERATURE-LIGHT AND DELIGHT. 71.LITERARY GREATS: SUNLIGHT AND SHADOW

LITERATURE- LIGHT AND DELIGHT

71. LITERARY GREATS: SUNLIGHT AND SHADOW

There is a saying with us that one should not enquire into the origins of rivers and great figures. Perhaps what it conveys is the popular English saying that every saint has a past, every sinner a future.

Saints condemn themselves!

In the Hindu tradition, most poet-saints condemn themselves as great sinners, comparing themselves to dogs which are considered  lowly creatures, often giving a whole list of unworthy things they had done. Superficial commentators take such things literally and conclude that they had indeed been morally bad before they were rescued by God out of his mercy.Arunagirinatha is perhaps the most glaring example in Tamil literature.

Serious students know that this is not the way to take matters. The saints are usually imputing to themselves all the bad things happening in society- the five kinds of deadly sins, the three kinds of dire attachments, womanising, drinking, murder,etc. This is just a literary style,  not to be taken literally.

Lives transformed


Through legend and history, some events are recorded as the turning point: Valmiki's encounter with the rishis before he was imparted the name of Rama, Purandaradasa's excessive attachment to wealth and God opening his eyes through his wife's devotion, Tulsidas being snubbed by his wife about his excessive attachment to her physical form, etc.

But such transformation need not necessarily be after a period of immoral conduct. In  Kalidasa's case, it was a village idiot become a great poet through the grace of the Goddess. In modern days, the great Indian mathematical genius Ramanujam said that the Goddess revealed to him the mathematical formulae in his dreams.As the poet sang, 'God moves in a mysterious way his wonders to perform'. Yes, mysterious, but not arbitrary or capricious. There is surely a method- a reason, justification but we do not know.

Old idols and fallen angels

In our younger days, the leaders of the freedom movement were our idols- Sri Aurobindo,Tilak, Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Bose, Rajaji etc. But as we grew up, and read more about them, we saw that the public image, created, magnified and spread by the popular press did not reflect the whole truth.

Take Gandhi, for instance. What I learned about Gandhi did not match the image. I understood him in four main roles: as a political leader, religious experimenter, social reformer and economic thinker. He began as an advocate of the Indian genius as the foundation of his political thinking in the Hind Swaraj, but this idea evaporated or got diluted on the way.As he plunged deeper into practical politics, he became an advocate of parliamentary democracy. He developed ideas of Satyagraha, Non-violence, etc but they did not work. We finally got Independence in spite of Gandhi, not because of him.In the process the country got divided, something I can never forgive the Congress for. They had no mandate from the people to divide the country. This was betrayal, and Gandhi's greatest failure. Gandhi as a political leader failed at crucial times-all crucial times. As a political leader,  he was plain Mr.Gandhi, not the Mahatma he is taken to be.

As a religious experimenter, Gandhi is great, though his ideas were not based on a proper or deep understanding of any formal religion. He interpreted Hinduism in terms of his superficial idea of Christianity, and he had no understanding of Islam as a religious faith or historical force. "Iswar-Allah Tere Naam" is the most idiotic formula I have heard. God is one, no doubt but that One is beyond name and form. The Muslim will never say Iswar and Allah, or its variations Ram and Rahim, Krishna and Karim are the same! It is just a fancy, and only idiotic Hindus chant such nonsense formulae.

But there is another aspect to Gandhi's religion- his spiritual quest. He was a follower of Advaita, and a sincere devotee of Rama though his Rama was not necessarily the Rama of Ayodhya, son of Dasaratha.In the 20s he had stated that Ram had occupied his heart and if any one cut it open, he would find only Ram there! Twenty years later , in the thick of public life, some one put bullets right into his heart, and he died with the name of Rama on his lips!  This one act makes him Gandhiji, the Mahatma! I fall at his feet.

His social reforms were mixed. But he was reacting to too many things, a bit more than he could chew, swallowed more than he could digest.

But as an economic thinker, he was superb! He was far ahead of his times.  At one level, he gave and implemented practical ideas of a parallel economy and showed that things could be done positively, constructively  even without political power. This aspect has not been appreciated in this country. 

But the thoughts he gave against modern civilisation,and its absurd economic base make him one of the foremost economic thinkers of modern times. People like Schumacher understood it, and developed further. Today, it has become the very foundation of alternative economics with fancy names such as: steady-state economy, sustainable economics, economy of permanence, humanistic economics, etc. This again is not understood by Indians yet. Nehru himself is the chief villain here.

The net result is that I admire Gandhi in parts. I feel that on the whole, he has been a failure. This has been a great personal disappoint for me. My mother considered Mahatma an avatar of Rama and formally worshipped him, especially on Fridays, the day of his martyrdom!

Greatness thrust upon
Greatness overlooked

Nehru was an early idol- some one we learned to adore without knowing anything about him! As I studied more, and in detail, I feel he is a thoroughly useless leader- in fact not a leader at all, but one on whom greatness has been thrust. He is totally out of my reckoning. All the ills of Independent India are wholly due to the Gandhi-Nehru duo.

Netaji Bose was good but sadly mistaken in the method he adopted to fight the British.

Sardar Patel was a giant, a man with a strong character, solid leadership qualities, sound judgement. He was always wrong when he supported Gandhi, and right when he thought and acted independently. He was giant. If India is still one nation it is due to Sardar Patel alone. He is the real father of the nation, the architect of free India. It is our misfortune that Gandhi did him injustice and made Nehru PM. It was Patel's misfortune that he had to serve under someone like Nehru, who did not have sound economic or political ideas, suffering great humiliation and insult. A kind Providence released him through death. India will remember him as along as it remains one nation.

Rajaji is a very great leader, but born in the wrong place, wrong community. The idea of the first non-cooperation movement was born in his house in Madras , when he had hosted Gandhi. Gandhi decided to  wear his typical minimum outfit when he travelled with Rajaji between Trichy and Madurai. Rajaji is the only congress leader who proved  his mettle in administration, eliciting admiration even from the British. He was the one to introduce Prohibition in India first. He was the one to introduce sales tax to compensate for the consequential revenue loss. He was the one to introduce land reform in India, favouring the tenants as against the landlords. There are so many things he did silently.  Perhaps his greatest contribution was to understand the totalitarian trends of Nehru,warn the country against the evils of the permit -licence-quota raj, and take up the cudgels against disastrous socialist policies of Nehru,and float the Swatantra Party as the true opposition, when he was at the ripe young age of 80!   Unfortunately, people feared his intellect, and forgot his heart! He was not understood fully or properly in his time, or later. It is his his ideas which are followed in a distorted, deformed, diluted dose, without due acknowledgement!

My estimation of Patel and Rajaji has grown with the years, though I still cannot digest the fact that they too had to support partition- Gandhi had pushed every one to that corner.

The point in writing this is to show that with increasing access to information and knowledge, our childhood idols fall from their pedestals. Heroes turn villains, if we keep our heads steady.

This has happened in the case of our other international leaders also- Churchill, Kennedy, for instance. It has happened in the case of sports persons too.

Golden hearts in tinsel town

I have never been an admirer of any cine-star. I used to like the great film music of the golden 50s, but was not a fan of any star, nor had seen many films: I stopped seeing films 40 years ago! Even so, the world is such that you do get some information and get to like and dislike people. I liked that Kishore Kumar defied Sanjay Gandhi, and refused to meet him in the days of the emergency. I liked that Dev Anand even floated a political outfit to oppose the Emergency! I liked that Bimal Roy ascended the platform in his native dhoti-kurta to accept the Filmfare award, when the audience of fashionable filmi people indulged in derisive laughter! I liked that Talat Mohammad gave up his own chances and asked the music directors to take Mukesh  for playback singing in Madhumati, when Mukesh was struggling! I liked when one song composed by Roshan- Rahen na rahen hum- became a big hit, and S.D.Burman rang up to congratulate him, Roshan said that  he had merely copied an old tune of Dada Burman himself- from the song 'Thandi Hawayen, lehraake aayen'- from Naujawan! And I liked even more that Burmanda replied: Arre bhai, we all copy. After all there are only 7  swaras and we always keep copying! What  examples of personal courage,humility, camaraderie, in a  known  dog-eat-dog world!

I have noticed such instances in Hollywood too. Charlton Heston said that his entire outlook and character changed after he played Moses in The Ten Commandments: he could not play normal hero roles. I liked when the following incident was reported about Clark Gable: He had longed to get a child, but his son was born posthumously. One day it seems that his spirit appeared to his son and warned him: 'My son, my son, let not Hollywood fool thee, let not Hollywood deceive thee!' ( So, Hamlet being advised by the ghost of his father is not pure fiction, after all!) I liked when actors were careful to play positive roles, to send moral messages to the audience: when Gregory Peck chose to play a cowboy to show that violence does not pay in the end, or when he played Atticus Finch, to defend a black when wrongly accused by the white residents of rape. And Peck was married to his wife for 50 years- in that fickle minded Hollywood. I liked when people questioned James Stewart how he agreed to play the role of a person prying into others' residences, in Rear Window, which violated personal privacy! And they also questioned Alfred Hitchcock how he could direct such a movie! I liked when 7 famed stars decided to work together without ego problems in The Magnificent Seven! I liked it when Clint Eastwood the hero of many Spaghetti Westerns portraying violence  decided to make amends, by producing, directing and acting in the Unforgiven to show that violence is not the right way! I liked it when it was reported that Tom Hanks is particular to play positive roles with neat messages. I liked it when Sophia Loren showed that she was not a play thing when she just stared at Marlon Brando when he was up to some mischief and made him back out! So, there are silver lines every where!

Big names- great people?

But alas! The literary world is not always good, and many authors are not men of character. It is said that if we know the detailed life of many philosophers we would not care to read their works! Bertrand Russell was one of them. I did not read Byron for a long time, knowing his life. On the contrary it moved me when I read that  Longfellow rushed to rescue his wife whose dress had caught fire, but himself got disfigured, while his wife died. Thomas Hardy had married out of love but was disappointed later. Yet when he died, he wanted his heart to be buried near the grave of his wife, who had pre-deceased him! What we read of Dickens is not always pleasing.Peter Drucker married his wife in 1934  when he was 25 and they remained married till his death at 95, 70 years later, in 2005, while his wife died at 103 in 2014! It is great when great authors and writers are also great in personal life. It is difficult to stomach when things are otherwise.

I often wonder how writers can describe bad things in such detail, with a clear conscience. They say some gory details are required by the story- but why write such a story at all? Unless your mind is already gory! And it cannot think of anything clean or good!

Sri Ramakrishna used to say that one should not act as bad characters in dramas even for fun.

 When a modern writer like Nevil Shute writes clean novels, and good novels, we feel so happy. One reason why I like the writings of Louis L'Amour is that though they are described as Westerns, they are not pulp fiction. He never advocates or glorifies violence. His heroes never resort to shooting for the fun of it, and they always feel sorry that they had to use their gun at all! And just read his nature descriptions! Show me another author who had written so much on nature over so many years in so many books, almost never repeating  them! L'Amour himself is the greatest hero of his writings. Unless the man was himself great, he could not produce such stuff, so much of such stuff! If you want to open a book and read openly in front of your children and spend an entire evening or even day, choose L'Amour without hesitation. With L'Amour, children will always want to be good, better than they are!

When unsavoury aspects of the life of so called great or famous figures are revealed, we wonder what is the use of education and knowledge, when they do not result or reflect in right conduct. Are money and fame everything? Is any method right to get them? Can good people write bad stories ?

LITERATURE-LIGHT AND DELIGHT. STUDY OF INDIAN LITERATURE.

LITERATURE-LIGHT AND DELIGHT
STUDY OF INDIAN LITERATURE

Since 1836, when English education was introduced under the influence of Macaulay, Indians have taken to it in a big way.The colonial govt. established its own system of schools and prescribed  qualification from these schools with knowledge of English as a condition for jobs. The colonial rule had also disturbed the  indigenous economic arrangements based on a network of delicate mutual relationships and obligations, largely devoid of money. So people were tempted to go to govt schools, get English education and seek govt jobs on an ever-increasing scale. This system of education-job linkage continues even now!

What started as English education ie study of English as a subject at the school level turned into English medium at  the University, which had been established at Bombay, Calcutta and Madras in 1857.The subjects taught were mainly of Western orientation like Western philosophy, science, English and European history, English language and literature etc. The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna records how deeply the middle class Bengalis were influenced by such education in all spheres. This was the case in the other provinces too. Sri Ramakrishna used to jokingly call such people "Englishmen". This adversely affected their faith in our religion and considerably reduced their interest in our languages and literature.

Indian indigenous school systems were run on private initiative and were supported by public charity and old rulers' patronage.. The colonial govt did not support them. With the change in the economic arrangements and consequent disruption in social relations, these schools slowly withered away. We read from the autobiography of Dr.U.Ve.Swaminatha Iyer how he studied Tamil- and Tamil alone- in the Tiruvavaduthurai Aadheenam. The colonial govt did not encourage the learning of indigenous languages and literature; the schools which taught them gradually dwindled and disappeared. Tamil was taught as a subject at the school level, but the large literature was neglected.

Since the old generation was still present in sufficient strength ,our knowledge and proficiency were not lost immediately. But over the years, indigenous ways and methods of mastering our language and literature were given up completely. No one learns Tamil today as did a Ki.Va.Ja. under Dr.Iyer, as he had himself done under Pillaival.

But here history crossed us.Modern Science rose gigantically in the 20th century, and English emerged as the leading international language of trade, commerce, academic studies and scientific research. And more and more, the academic standards and practices adopted by the western European and then American institutions became worldwide. Proficiency in English became indispensable for higher education in all academic subjects, not just science.

None of the Indian languages could develop on modern lines to become a medium of study in any discipline, beyond very elementary levels. All of them have just become languages for strictly local communication for mainly non-academic purposes.Classical or not, these languages are only useful for studying the old literature: they simply cannot cope with the expansion of English in all spheres. So we face a dichotomy: we may learn our language (mother tongue) for sentimental reasons but it is not sufficient or indispensable or even useful for serious learning in any academic discipline. They survive only on fiction or frivolous writing.

The great middle class is under terrible economic stress to acquire means of survival, but knowledge of our languages is not helping them in any way. The load of academic studies is so heavy the students have no time or energy or inclination left to master our language and literature. The state govts are all making appropriate noises for encouraging local languages, but the standards have fallen dismally low. A stage has come for instance in Tamil Nad when most school children cannot even read old poems unless the words are split; there is no question of comprehending their meaning! 

The Dravidian parties spread the canard that Sanskrit is a dead language because it is not spoken; but Tamil is worse because it is not spoken as it is written, and it is not used for any serious purpose other than filling some govt.forms. Pure or literary Tamil is not useful even for entertainment, as the many Tamil TV channels show.

The problem for Sanskrit  is not that it is not spoken; in fact it was never the means of mass communication. As its very name implies, it was for elite  and selected use; these uses are still there! The danger is that the number of Indians with the knowledge of Sanskrit adequate to read our scriptures in the original is fast declining; more and more Indians are resorting to translations.

This is the real danger because the translation business has become an almost total monopoly of foreigners who learn Sanskrit and attain academic proficiency in foreign universities which have their own hidden agendas, influenced by Christian missionary interests! This has world-wide ramifications, since these academics have nexus with the press and international publishers with wide distribution networks so that their books get adequate publicity and circulation! Most such books are written without practical knowledge or experience, and on the basis of some  western academic theories; they almost always distort the truth, misrepresent facts and give inaccurate meanings.

Some examples are necessary.In the academic circles, there are theories as to how to interpret literature: eg. Marxism, feminism,psychoanalysis, post-colonialism, structuralism, deconstruction,etc. Western academics have applied psychoanalysis (Freud) to Sri Ramakrishna and pronounced that he was a paedophile! They have written that Kali is a blood-thirsty goddess who killed her own husband, and that Shiva is a notorious womaniser! Their books are prescribed for study in universities and every year thousands of students pass out with such ideas about Hinduism! They are all backed by church organisations.Neither Indian Mathadipathies and their hero-worshipping followers, nor the new-age Gurus and their followers seem to care. These Maths or Gurus have not made any serious attempts to counter such publications,nor come out with their own authentic translations. For instance, if you want to study Manu or Kautilya or even Mahabharata, there are few competent translations and comments by Indian scholars.Those who know the subject,do not have competence in English; those who are competent, do not know the subject or are west-oriented. 

Two centuries of English education have made us all acquire a western orientation, not only in our attire and attitude, but in our very thought process. For instance, we regard a scripture like Ramayana or Mahabharata as literature! Kamban called his Ramayana "Ramavataram" but our people take it as mere kavya! Valmiki and Vyasa are poets, but they are not like Kalidasa or Bana. They represent a different /higher category altogether. Valmiki and Vyasa are Rishis,though they wrote poetry but Kalidasa is not:he is a mere poet, though a great one. He wrote Sakuntalam , Raghuvamsam  and Kumarasambhavam which are themes occurring in our Itihasa-Purana, but what Kalidasa wrote is kavya, not itihasa!

The general western orientation has some serious effects on our idea of culture and civilisation.

• We all tend to believe, like westerners, that civilisation started with ancient Greece and Rome.Even our ideas and institutions are assessed on that basis.Our people do not know that our philosophy is more ancient than that of Greece.
• Since western criteria rule academic standards, and since these are based directly or indirectly on Christian ideas, these are generally applied here too. After all, we observe weekly holiday on Sunday, according to christian notion! Kautilya is spoken of as our Machiavelli!
• Western literary, mythological, and classical figures are accepted in our usage too.
• Science is regarded as a western discovery. Most educated Indians are not aware of India's own contribution.
• Political ideas and institutions as well as economic principles and practices are all copied from the West. Most Indians are not even aware that till the middle of 18th century, India contributed about 30% of world GDP!
• Generally , in everything we apply western standards or yardsticks. Some Christian bishop determined in 1794, on the basis of the Bible, that the world was created by God on 23 October, 4004 BC, when Adam the first man was created. Everything in history was decided on that basis. Since the world was colonised by the Christians, this was applied to other cultures also. In the case of India, they assigned arbitrary dates to our scriptures on this basis. And our so called scholars (including unfortunately such nationalistic figures as Dr.S.Radhakrishnan, Dr.R.C.Majumdar etc) merely worked on that basis, and still do so- because all of them want western acceptance! The irony is that  science have proved that the earth is billions of years old, and Biblical theory of creation is utterly discredited;but our people cannot come out of the old mind-set.

What is overlooked through all this is that unlike ancient Greece and Rome, which are now in the museums, India is still a living civilisation, and our religion, in all its rich variety, is still practised, as it has always been! We still repeat the same Gayatri mantra uttered by our ancients 10,000 years ago.We still visit Kashi and Rameswaram, Badri and Kedar, observe Kumbhamela etc -we do not know since how long. Our Valmiki and Vyasa are still  part of our daily life and are accordingly honoured. We still remember and honour our Rishis and offer them tarpana. Who does anything for a Socrates or Plato, Homer or Virgil? They are great figures, mighty and majestic, but they are not part of the daily life of Westerners.They are remembered by scholars , but that is about all.

One thing most Indians do not understand is that western academics simply apply theories to our practices and such theories keep changing! These theories in sociology, anthropology, economics or politics or even in the sciences are mostly not proven facts, but merely the opinion of some powerful group which has power to enforce compliance. The pity is that Indians still continue to hold on to old theories and ideas which have been discarded.The same incident or observation may be explained by many theories, but what is the truth? 

In considering Indian subjects, we have to adopt Indian standards. We have to distinguish between mere literature, and itihasa-purana and other scriptures. We cannot merely analyse characters in Ramayana as we would do in say, Sakuntalam or Shakespeare. ( Rt.Hon'ble Srinivasa Sastry did that in his famous lecture series on Ramayana in the early 40s.) No doubt Mahabharata is poetry, but it is itihasa  written in poetry form- it was written for edification, not entertainment.Its main concern is Dharma- something foreign academics will never understand and respect. For that we need someone like Chaturvedi Bhadrinath, whose delightful book on Mahabharata deals just with this single theme!

But the irony is that we cannot  read Ramayana and Mahabharata in the original, even as literature! The same thing applies to many classical Tamil works, including Sangam literature or even Kamba Ramayana. It appears to me that the solution is very simple: some of us should take up just one book  and study it in the original- be it Ramayana, or Bhagavata or Gita or Narayaneeyam. We would thus master both the language and the scripture. We don't have to study Sanskrit to become poets, but we may learn enough to read, understand and appreciate poetry written in it! Age is no bar. I know one who retired as Deputy Accountant General, learned Sanskrit, studied Ramayana and Bhagavatam in the original and acquired enough proficiency to expound it too.Incidentally, he could also compose poems in Sanskrit! So, let us not curse darkness, but light lamps-even small ones!