Jaipur Literature Festival: Day 2

Spicezee Bureau

Jaipur: The 2nd day of the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival was visited by writers, scholars, publishers and book lovers from across the world.

Highlights:

An unlikely Hero: Nandita Puri and Om Puri

The day began in the front lawns of Diggi Palace Hotel, wherein a fascinating discussion between husband and wife team, Om and Nandita Puri, about the latter’s controversial biography of her legendary husband’s life and career ensued. Om Puri talked of his humble beginnings in a tea shop, financially independent by the age of 15, and going on to film school to become one of India’s most famous film stars. Nandita Puri commented that it had been difficult as his wife to write about, but that she had tried to remain dispassionate: ‘not a wife writing a biography but a journalist, a writer.’

When asked about his childhood, Om Puri said ‘it was representative of millions of children, not only in India but all developing countries,’ adding that other people have ‘been through worse than I have, fighting for their lives and to be successful in their lives.’ He conceded that his best work was in the eighties and nineties ‘my golden period to be honest’, after which he went more commercial for financial security in later years: ‘it was a kind of a compromise - art cinema gave me credibility and stability, commercial cinema gave me money to live a decent life.’

Travels with a Typewriter

`Theatre can go wrong` and that`s how Girish Karnad explains the success of drama. He says, jokingly, that people are always waiting for something to go wrong in a production, `a beard to come off or someone forgetting the lines`. He went on to talk about the theatre scene in Indian history. There were no playwrights in ancient India. But, there was theatre. `The idea of written plays itself was considered ludicrous,` he explains, the importance of audience interpretation and reaction to plays with one of his own plays, Nagamandala, as an example. The play tells a folk story about a snake falling in love with a girl. The initial ending was a tragic one where the snake crawls into the hair of the girl and dies.

Michael Frayn added to Karnad`s original statement that, `[drama] is inherently human and inherently imperfect`. He also, agreed with the importance of the audience and their interpretation of the play as stated by Karnad. Karnad uses Arthur Miller`s A View from the Bridge as another example to illustrate the importance of the audience where an Indian audience felt that the incestuous love that Eddie Carbone seems to have for his niece, Catherine, was deemed unnecessary.

Talking about acting and getting into and out of character, Karnad talks about actors in Kathakali, who when doing violent roles `find it easy to generate the energy to get into a role. But, hard to get out`. `We just go to a pub and get drunk` he quotes, chuckling, about what some actors said to him when asked about getting into and out of character

Wole Soyinka with Jasbir Singh

In a masterful and poised talk, the timelessness and poetry that runs through Wole Soyinka’s work was fully evident as he spoke to a captivated audience at the DSC Jaipur Literature Festival. The Nobel Laureate discussed his novel The Road, saying that the main character had been ‘hankering after some spiritual meaning to his existence, so goes among the rejects of society to find the mystic way to explain the phenomenon of existence.’ He talked of the three spheres in Nigerian cosmology – ancestors, the living and the unborn, and how it is possible to leap from one sphere of phenomenon to another: ‘that is the nature of the road.’ He also observed that Nigerian culture tends to mix ribaldry with thoughts of heaven and dying, saying that ‘the road to heaven is long… my Creator, please be kind to me.’

When asked whether literary tragedy was still possible in a rationalist world, he replied that ‘tragedy involves the relationship between humanity ad society on any level whatsoever’ so there was still ‘profundity’ in mechanised existence because of the ‘immensity’ of all phenomena. Soyinka read his poem and treated the audience to a section of trancelike song. When asked what he thought of forgiveness in the context of Apartheid, Soyinka said he thought the South African peace process had been a ‘brave and noble experiment’, but that alongside forgiveness and reconciliation, there must also be voluntary acts of restitution, because otherwise some people will continue to act with impunity and repeat their crimes. The revered writer, who describes himself as a ‘jack of all trades’ has recently registered his own political party in Nigeria, because the ‘ruling party is as corrupt as anything you have ever known.’ He observed that religious terrorism had become ‘an epidemic, a virus that has spread around the world, one doesn’t really know how to handle it.’ He suggested that perhaps a combination of education and rigorous punishment was the best approach, though he also quipped that another possible solution was to fire all religious intolerants in a rocket ‘into space.’ This was met with laughter and applause from the enthusiastic audience.

The Queen’s Hinglish: Ira Pande, Mark Tully, Prasoon Joshi

In a lively debate, the panel and audience discussed the nature and implications of the English language in India. Prasoon Joshi argued that schoolchildren who learn English in schools have an ‘unfair advantage’ because ‘language is politics.’ The issue of English language in India is more than a joke, he said, because it is affecting people’s lives and prospects, and therefore there should be a uniform language in the education system.

Mark Tully said he thought a good policy suggestion would be for all children up to class 6 to be educated in their mother-tongue but also be taught some English, though he observed that there was the problem of a shortage of good English teachers, which meant many children ended up knowing neither mother tongue or English properly. One audience member argued that children in India were not learning ‘Queen’s English but President’s American.’ Ira Pande talked of the ‘element of fun’ in mixing the languages, as long as it is not about point scoring, and that was ‘all part of a language growing.’ Ira Pande asked what about call centre English, to which Joshi responded that was ‘a split personality.’ One audience member noted that the integration of African American language into American English was in part due to the vernacular permeating popular culture through literature and music. Joshi went on to say that Indians find it easy to co-exist in the modern world because historically they are so used to co-existing with others, that even if English were to become more prevalent a language in India because of the growing IT culture, that it would not lose its cultural distinction.

Art of Biography

Biography has always been looked upon with suspicion. This was the subject of a fascinating discussion between Claire Tomalin and Kai Bird. Tennyson was glad the correspondence of Austen and Shakespeare were not available. Tomalin pointed out that biography has, in fact, often been regarded as a form of intrusive voyeurism. A writer like John Updike refused to `be summed up`.

Kai Bird stated that it is necessary to `approach [biography] with great humility`. Tomalin said that one of the insurmountable shortcomings of biography is that the biographer `can`t be inside` the authors. All the same, once an author is dead, he or she is part of history and open to scrutiny.

Tomalin then went on to speak about her work The Invisible Woman, which deals with the life of Nelly Turner, Dickens`s close friend and mistress during his last years. Her aim in writing this book, she said, was to `see the world through women`s eyes`. Bird, in turn, spoke about his work on the Bundy brothers, two of the architects of the Vietnam war.

The motivation behind the writing of biographies, the two concluded, is curiosity, the desire to learn something new and then share it with the world. Biography, they cautioned, is `not art, but hard work`.

Language and Identity

Pavan Kumar stated that, "English is a global language". We have one identity i.e., knowing one language or to say, English. If we don`t care "sense or superiority that is related to English" we must have a problem. We are civilized and we are a civilization. Language is also a window to culture not only a medium of communication. Language invites us to become a part of our own inheritance. We have to understand first and analyse what language is. English is necessary because we`re in an English speaking nation. We must not think "when we`ll become like him or her or a particular person".

Gulzar stated that, "by listening to others and trying to become like others, be conscious about your mother tongue and language is really a culture".

Outcaste

At this year’s Jaipur Literature Festival, as India commemorates 60 years of being a Republic on 26 January 2010, the focus is on Dalit writing. The panel discussion on Outcaste: The Search for Public Conscience featured S. Anand, publisher of Navayana which focuses on dalit literature, P.Sivakami, novelist and political activist from Chennai; Omprakash Valmiki, author of the bestselling Joothan; and Kancha Ilaiah author of the best-selling Why I am Not a Hindu. Chairing the session, S Anand said that despite the Constitution being piloted by Dr Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar, a Dalit and one of the architects of modern India, Dalits seem to hardly figure in sectors where there is no affirmative action. Consequently, beyond representation in jobs in the government sector (which too is begrudged to them) and in politics, they continue to be shunned in the realms of culture, literature and the arts. Invoking Ambedkar`s 1952 speech, Anand wanted the speakers to examine the “absence of public conscience”, especially among the Hindus.

Ilaiah said the caste system made the brahmins, kshatriyas and vaishyas caste-proud and they therefore did not believe in introspection since they believe dalits and sudras have no right to write forget even speak. The Hindu public has no conscience, he said. Valmiki said that there`s segreagation in every village in India, and the dalits are forced to live in ghettoes to the West of the village or near gutters. Caste envelopes every aspect of life in everyday India. Valmiki said even in Rajasthan today dalits face discrimination. In the vilage Chakwara in Rajasthan, after dalits managed to gain access to the lake, the caste Hindus started defecating there and polluting it, Anand pointed out. Sivakami said that upper caste Hindus have only a caste conscience and not a public conscience; they lack a human conscience. All the writers agreed that there was no reason they would call themselves Hindu since Hinduism offered them no dignity or respect. Valmiki earlier said that it was wonderful that the DSC Jaipur literature festival in its fifth year has welcomed dalit writers.

The Conspiracy

This session aimed to discuss the conspiratorial mindset, why certain people, such as those in the Islamic world, are susceptible to conspiracy. Lawrence Wright stated that as one who was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, conspiracy was part and parcel of life. He spoke about the conspiracy theories surrounding Kennedy`s assassination and 9/11.
Tunku Varadarajan said that the `rejection of evidence` is a feature of all conspiracies. Kai Bird claimed that conspiracies arise out of a need for design. People don`t to believe things happen by chance. Also, there`s the `fun` element to conspiracies.

Wright made a pertinent observation that the Internet has become a platform for conspiracy theories in the modern world. The panel also touched upon possible solutions to the problem, these being political empowerment, openness and accountability.