A Confession-The Mistake of the attempt to measure a master

                                      

Recently, I happened to fulfill a long standing wish of mine, the wish to read The Shadow Lines of Amitav Ghosh. While I started reading the the book I was not completely free from the reservations about Amitav Ghosh that I had developed after reading The Glass Palace, especially the way he treats sex and at time

his method of plot construction which, I thought, was heavily dependent on chance and coincidence, notwithstanding his genius of story-telling and penchant for detailed researches about his subject. However, the former appeared to me as a so compact and well knit piece of literature that I had to rethink and blush over my earlier evaluation of Ghosh. In this novel Ghosh played almost all his cards to assert his mastery over the craft. He made it very clear that though he usually writes in a very simple style, he is equally conversant with the comparatively complex literary devices and could have outshined many self proclaimed Post Modernists, had he wished so. As I finished the book it once again made me recall the old saying that going to measure the masters with our small scales is not a wise option as there remain ample chances of being befooled.

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Kabir Suman- A Pathbreaker in Politics?

Recently there is the news of Kabir Suman expressing his disgust over the present system of party-politics here, without even caring to spare his own party.This may seem striking as we are not quite accustomed to such a comment from a sitting MP. Of course, some leaders criticize their parties, interestingly enough, only when they are on the verge of quitting the party to join another. And though our intelligentsia often show concern about the present stagnant state of politics, its being dominated by parties which in turn are dominated by opportunist anti-social elements, once they join mainstream politics they usually stop talking about the high morals; then they start to cite the ground realities which cannot be changed overnight. But, Suman is a man who chose not to talk from the podium of Bengal’s self-proclaimed intellectuals only. He rather joined active politics. In the mean time he also had to perform some gallery show. Initially he didn’t react. Probably it took him some time to analyse. But the important thing is that finally he has raised his voice.

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 The commitment he had shown as an artist and promised to show in his new Avatar also, has been fulfilled by him. His drastic statement may in effect help the ruling party , or may be the reason of a split between the intellectuals or may not even manage to create a fuss against the high tide on which the opposition is riding nowadays; but whatever be the impact the fact that at least this one man has really, selflessly (at least it appears so from this distance) has spoken out his mind, has highlighted the collective desire of a lot of people that we do not want to welcome the obnoxious elements from either side, that actually it’s not the symbol but the people or the kind of people enjoying power must change, the way in which they are exercising their power must change, and that the faces of the civil society must change, must be honoured. It is not quite predictable what kind of drama is going to unfurl before us following this episode. But I wish if this time some real, positive things had happened, with some credible, really educated, competent people coming forward to echo the mood of the ‘civilised’ (I chose to skip ‘civil society’, it has almost become a slang now) people, to purge the system of the gangrene. What Suman did by directly approaching the media and the masses definitely sets a new trend. Our only hope is that this gesture ushers in a new age politics, a more participative and interactive kind of politics.

An Open Letter to A New Age Bengali Writer

Recently while surfing the net I logged on to the website of a new age bengali writer - http://www.shuvadeepbarua.com/ , who appears to be very smart in both his ideas and expression, providing us with some hope about bringing a freshness in the monotonous world of bengali literature. The writer is one Shuvadeep Barua, whose writing I found to be very interesting when they first came to my hands and of whom, I have been an admirer since then. Particularly I have been very excited since going through his recent book 'JANUARY SATERO THEKE SATASER SITE INDURERA JAKHAN SAB POSHAK KETE DIE JAI' and waiting for a dialogue with him. Here is an open letter addressed to him, which I would like to share with fellow readers.

Image courtsey: http://www.shuvadeepbarua.com/

Dear Shuvadeepda,
I have been an ardent admirer of your writings since years back, when a copy of your ALOKBIDDHA ANADHAKAR came to my hands.And it seemed to me that your book had brought some spalsh of fresh air in the stagnant pool of Bengali literature. The short stories contained in the book, which I see as a rich collection of parables, were of a genre, though initiated by masters of world literature, yet awaiting explorations by their Bengalee counterparts. This book attempts to provide a perfect picture of our worldly existence, explores its different aspects, and in this attempt takes the readers in a voyage in quest of some eternal truths and help us reach a junture where the rationale and mystic lay side by side, where darkness and light coexist and get dazzled by each other in such a way as to make the readers conscious of a higher reality within the surface reality or beyond it.
After that, there was a long wait for us, the readers, for a second book from you. Though during this period some of your short stories reached us, they were miles away from quenching our thirst in a similar way as a complete volume would have done. Among them, ‘Andhar Sagarer Opar Ek Birat Pakhi’ offered promises to be developed into a full fledged novel, but it did not as you chose to tell the story in the form of a short story. However, even if it does not fulfill our that very expectation, it proves to be a class by itself in dealing with a vast span of time in a very compact manner. This further enhanced our eagerness for a taste of your writings, in a scale greater than witnessed so far. And then finally, at this 2009 Kolkata Book Fair, our long wait has been met with a volume of your second book JANUARY SATERO THEKE SATASER SITE INDURERA JAKHAN SAB POSHAK KETE DIE JAY.

A casual reading through first few lines which gives us enough liberty to read the text in more than one alternative ways, each complemented by the others, and suddenly the text takes to gallop in a rhythm entirely of its own, bearing a sign of high musical influence, which does not fully conform to your personal account nor to the readers’ own fascination. A lot of musical references here and there made me conscious of the Rock n Roll days, the passion, crisis and expression of those days. In your novella the same eternal emotions have been vividly penned in the backdrop of Calcutta at the threshhold of the new millenium. Stark social realities like the local and colonial history of the place, and the air of globalization are mingled with the personal emotions of the protagonists as their streams of individual consciousness form the basis of a higher one, in such a way as to give a glimps of reality from a magical flight from where one can take a bird’s eye view, where one can feel the emtions objectively, and this elevation has been enabled by you in a very smooth, delicate way.
Thank you very much for offering us such a nice piece of text.

your admirer,
Sourav Adhikary.

The Pink Brief Campaign and Beyond

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This article refers to the news of The Pink Brief Campaign and the kind of response it has managed to formulate. It is still a long way to state whether this movement will be able to attain the magnitude like The Bra Burning Movement and assert its impact on the issues of Indian women’s liberty in the same way or whether the pubgoing activity of some urban women can alone assure the liberation of women in an underdeveloped country like ours, where the society is plagued with diverse problems, complex and composite in nature. Mr. Mutalik rightly says that all these issues need to be debated ideologically and theoretically.But, this should be equally applicable to determine the standards of ideal Indian society, culture and the ideal Indian woman. Did his boys care to listen to the voice and logic of the other end in Mangalore? Launching direct action on one day and talking about dialogues on the very next day, when faced by direct resistance from the other side, only depicts his duality.