NOUS AT NADIR

Sundays are always an obdurate melancholy. Appearing uninterruptedly every sixth day it hardly promises imagination. Much of the day is passed in the thought, ‘So many things to do, so little time left.’ While  doing nothing and idling away your brain is a difficult task too. It may give the cerebrum some serious rest, a much sought after relaxation of twenty-first century but it spoils away your time.Unable to do so, one lazy Sunday afternoon I was struck with the idea to research “Information, Intelligence and Common Sense”.  Are any two of those same? Or separate entities deserving togetherness.  Are they comparable? Is one dependant on the other? Such random thoughts having descended on made leave my cozy divan for an Oxford face saver (my dictionary) and finally internet.

                     

 I wondered, if one has some serious intention of listening to others in a harmless spying mood, even  to those unknown,  at street corners, one will often find talkative individuals superiorly ‘intelligent’ and  knowledgeable. Such knowledge was not available some twenty years or so, before the internet and opening up of the society to everything that is available, good or bad, rational or irrational, sense or nonsense.

                                                        

                      

This flourishing business of ‘Information Technology’ with management spree produce learned humanoid , half hearted, indecent, arrogant, good looking, smart and  handsome population. They exhibit  knowledge about everything  and an empty pocket with a plastic in it. On a Friday evening a distinguished friend of mine and secretary of an updated, upfront, up market club took the risk of inviting me to a sitar recital. There I found so many upwardly mobile men and women discussing Israel conflict to innocent herbals without side effects in weight reducing drinks. So knowledgeable were they, that it would put you to shame. I couldn’t resist inviting one of them to deliver a quarter hour lecture at our university club only to listen that time is too scarce for him. Knowledge here seemed ample, making everyone proud with unputdownable heads and glamorous grin.

                      

 So what is this knowledge about? This age of information technology brings enormous amount of awareness  but only in the form of half-hearted learning, popularized by the present generation to be kings in their own world. A man who had surfed internet in a desultory way comes out from this veritable ‘net world’ remembering little about the pages he had visited. It’s rightly called surfing, I believe. Touching everything but nothing is in vogue and it guarantees social standing.

              

 ‘‘Keep talking’, the golden word for cell phone companies is no more restricted to billboards. It is now part of our life. We keep talking, often ejecting unhealthy unverified data. Smart and convincing are we now, much more than our forefathers .With so much in our head, ready to be displayed like throwaway objects in glorified gatherings funded by billion dollar establishments, is the  trend of this age ,a prestige indeed for the  speaker.

                                                              

  A few decades back when knowledge was not that rampant,  learning was slow  like a fat lazy lady strolling about one winter afternoon. Not many a bright student would care to show off their reference books. A score card never nearly touched the full score. The readers chewed each line like a cud in search of thoughts kept out of sight. Chewing the fat at street corners was common. In modern times this phenomenon will be looked down upon as obsessive compulsive disorder. In countries like India where buying magazines like National Geographic and Life was sheer luxury, bibliophiles would throng around dusty old book shops mining earlier issues for a bargain. Books and magazines would never turn old and obsolete and would rightfully occupy spaces in a voracious reader’s unkempt rooms.

                                                        

  Is it really necessary to slowdown? My honesty murmurs, “ I don’t know.” Speed though measurable, is incorporeal to modern man making it difficult to ascertain its power to push human race to destitution. But there is no harm in pausing, I believe. It may provide a closer look at your heart that occupies your brain. It is the ‘mind’ you had forgotten. It gives you the free chance to breed your good sense and reasoning. It gives you the rich thought of understanding and perception, regaining the power to think rationally. For the time being it may be enough of what the human race had learnt provided it forgets unshackling it’s destructive powers. The nous may be shedding silent tears. Heraclitus had complained “much learning does not teach nous” and this saying still stands upright.

                              

 So where is this four letter word ‘nous’ gone? But the modern man has forgotten this word remembering only one four letter word that kept missing from dictionaries in our childhood days  some fifty years back. Believe me, I won’t lie, the nous is at nadir impatient to reach zenith. If intelligence  is human discovery, nous  is the application or technology we enjoy. So long we don’t appreciate nous, we are all humanoids, heartless engines running after “ Buy one get one free’. 

A miser and a conservationist

Away from explicit, rigid, non negotiable expressions of disapprovals live a layman’s world where these two are inseparable and coexistent like one’s shadow. I have often found a conservationist being referred to as a miser in public place much to the latter’s amusement. These days the educated form crowd, bringing into shape those invaluable existences into valuable standards of behaviour. Every one seems to be educated in this age of internet, ready to put forward his views like a cheap ‘ready to fry’ envelope of mouth watering battered marinated fish. Silence is scarce, beyond reach of a gullible magic box eligible to cast his ballot in an untruly democratic country.   The public is thickly populated in twenty-first century, much thicker than the quiet listeners of the sixties of twentieth. You rarely would find people listening to you and pay heed. We are all kings in this new world but not very much like what Tagore referred to in “Amara sabai Raja amader ei Rajar rajotye” (we are all free like king in our state).

            My father’s friend, already dead by now, quietly put off the electric switch behind a person, carelessly leaving an empty room. People use to call him nuts, saving money for no one. Improperly turned off taps would find him finishing the left out work. It was one thing that made co-habitants see shades of red but they kept on reffering him as hoarder . This half dead, lean, meatless man would save, torn pieces of blank unused papers believing trees will be lost soon for making as few as half a dozen paper.

            Who is this ‘nuts’? I don’t know. I have often seen a scarcely read man, likely self groomed, a self styled existence who persistently nurtures his nous, unnoticed, an un-smart soul indeed, haunted at every corner of his living by his nonexistent, tempestuous dumb countertenor.    

            In today’s world where human interest other than in self is absconding, conservationism is in exile making room for a miser impersonating others. This is likely the future of modern man with changes coming faster than the speed of an  ultramodern computer chip. He adapts to the speed very much like the inhuman ‘transformers’ on screen unable to role back to his basic self.

How many times in the recent past had you witnessed a comon man on the street, conserving? Conserving a clean environment, not throwing his empty chocolate wrapper or an exhausted cigarette packet on the pavement. Not honking an enormously sharp sounding exhibitionistic car horn without suitable cause. A rareity indeed you never even thought of some twenty years back. At one time, a quality which showed up automatically and no one botherd to call it humane as it came up without a conscious thought and willingly with maturity, is scarse and may be needs ‘Finishing Schools’ for a come back. So the water keeps flowing, unused and uncared for  in government taps on streets, street lights keep burning at seven in the morning may be throughout the day, a noisy thoroughfare becomes a smarter avenue for the modern man, slangs flow down the lips in public places, newer babies keep seeing the daylight on pavements without their parents rarely using their brains, teachers slap their pupil without loving and caring for them.

Its time to conserve, not only the water on the street but the slang too, you had memorised in your childhood. May be the next door neighbour with whom you had never cared to talked to, is conserving the air for your next generation. Its time to conserve the word ‘ miser’ you often use for a quiet backbencher who keeps using his dusty gadget which has lost its shine.

My Tendulkars, My Cricket

About the size of two bedrooms an utterly undulated piece of barren land occupies right across my ground floor terrace. Like birds flock to their torn nests by the turn of the evening, eight under weight cricketers, surely below the age of twelve, appear one after other with the little one carrying a drowsy looking bat under his armpit. The shapeless, lustreless rubber ball will now change hands bringing thrill, no less than a seventies’ five-day match with daring Farook Engineer at stumps. There is no one standing behind the wickets, I find. A rather doubtful set of three ugly looking, crooked vertical lines on the moss filled broken wall, marks the fate of the batsman. No one complains about that. No spectators, no actors, no cheer girls is in view. Only a rarely summoned third umpire waits to-day’s thrilling half hour.

            There is so much fun and excitement in this friendly game that it puts the bribe trodden international cricket to shame. Even the honest that cheer the international players and watch these pre-decided matches should hide their face in disgust. But to my utter disbelief the friendly cricket game opposite my balcony too has some fighting inherent. All of my little friends love to bat, none care to move their arm like a half drawn cartwheel throwing the ball. Bowling seems to be tiring. To them bowling is a less attractive option than hitting the ball hard and bringing it to tears. So sometime there is difficulty to get the bit between one’s teeth and often expression of childhood anger evolve disappearing within minutes. These lilliputs  fight, some sort of transient jostling I should say which soon turn into human bondage. Such charming, unadulterated expression of human behaviour you always would envy in your adulthood.

            My duty is restricted to watching. But my honesty and rationality shine high in their mind. One day after some extended display of anger for who should bat first I was given the chance to decide their fate. I took it seriously, encouraging a fair play. I drew numbers one to eight in a row with a prefixed dash and covered the digits with the bat. The younger one was asked to choose a dash first and then the others. After all the markers were chosen by eight of them, I uncovered the digits by removing the bat. It was an easy task with impending clarity and little punctilious behaviour from me at sixty.

            The game was high on note but confusions came faster than the runs. Markings made by the ball on wall came one above the other, making decisions difficult. Display of anger followed by cries became obvious. No one was ready to leave the bat and take up a fielder’s job. Then one day larger controversies came, stopping the game like a bolt in the blue. I had no other option but to interfere. I couldn’t be a dumb spectator and watch these little champs display disgust like the adults. And then I thought, why don’t I gift them a set of real wickets and a piece of nice cricket bat?  The ball came next putting me to tears to see their joy.

CHARLES COLLYER AS A BOY WITH A CRICKET BAT by  Francis Cotes (1726-1770) from Wikimedia Commons

            While watching one such local game of cricket on a lazy Sunday afternoon I thought, how immensely fool the human race is, spending hundreds of pounds for a pre fixed, well rehearsed, pre decided match at an international arena. That half nourished, ill trained juveniles with their never ending energy, I contemplated, play and play and keep playing not loosing their honesty for even a second. The light was dim by now and the kids have reluctantly called off the match at least for today. I felt sorry for them. I said to myself,” Hats off my children, hats off to your truthfulness, righteousness and honesty.”

COLOR KABIGURU and KETAKI

                                                                   

                  With the November breeze came a little astonishment from an unusual quarter. Literary works of Tagore and the bard’s perception of colour were to be discussed by the Ophthalmologists at their annual conference. Ketaki Kushari Dyson, the well known litterateur but an odd man out amongst the medical professionals was invited to deliver Major S.C. Dutt Memorial oration making it obvious of a unicameral origin of human knowledge. That he was a colour blind more specifically a protanope, was known to Tagore himself. He discussed at length with Indira Debi, Roman Rolland and Rani Chanda how disturbing it was. But those around him who made him into an institution tried hard to keep it a secret. Rarely would you find Viswa-Bharati publishing books on poet’s colour vision. In the last decade of   Nineteenth century, Tagore discussed his problem with eminent scientist friend J.C.Bose. Dr. Jyotirmoy Bose, another eye surgeon and R.W Pickford jointly published an article in British Journal of Aesthetics (Volume 27, No 1, winter 1987) about Tagore’s colour perception. But it was Ketaki Dyson who opened the doors into the inner world of Tagore’s psyche. Colours have so many things to say, so many things to do. Much of our thinking and a large part of the human soul is dependant upon it. When one does not perceive colour in its full spectrum he is ought to sustain breaking down his peaceful behaviour. How distressful it was when Tagore was at loss in describing the colour ‘red’ and its nearer spectrum. You can’t write about colours without seeing them. While Tagore came up with innumerable unusual words like ‘ranga’ (eng. Deep colour), ‘shyamal’ (eng. Cloudy greenish yellow) to describe primary colours like red, green etc, alliterations sprung in abundance evolving the Bengali language into an ornamental one. He was so helpless in appreciating sunsets (to Tagore it was yellow or orange like yellow) and sunrises (helplessly describing it as golden) that such colours like ‘red’ brought different meanings to his life. He thought ‘red’ to be darkness, painful, death, hidden, sadness and he was hurt by this colour. ‘Red’ to him was elusive and invincible or an absence of colour. Blood became a phobia or near black. And from it arose plays like ‘Raktakarabi’ (red oleander). Next time when you read this play, appreciate it in this unusual angle. ‘Red’ to him was of two types, good red or bad red and with it alliterations emerged in vivid sound patterns as ‘ranga hashi rashi rashi’.  In Purabi she said, “You will find the mournful sound of colour of sindur or red vermillion worn by married women on their forehead as a mark of respect to their married life.” Colour vision decides so much about one’s writings that Tagore gave birth to unimaginable usage of varied words in his published works you would never have dreamt of. Tagore is likely the end of Bengali language and it will take years to come up with some thing new. Ketaki said that Tagore would rarely write explicitly about colours. Tagore talked about colourful garlands, colourful clouds without describing the colours individually. With this came the glorification of the unseen. From not seeing, came touching. Colours turned out to be haunting and inflicting pain and then slowly turning into monochromatic ones. Tonal variations became rarer and Tagore started brushing layers after layers in search of the true colour. Paints took longer to dry. It took longer and longer, as the days passed by. Blue was seldom used. European skin became difficult to distinguish and the bard compared it with the colour of the grapes. There was immense problem with the green and red and as a result there was no green-red contrast. Tagore turned to primitive art like African wood cut masks, wood cut prints and expressionism. Usage of brown emerged in abundance while details in paintings lost its importance.  It was only the lines and boundaries and shapes that mattered.  

       

Rabindranath Tagore (Photo wikimedia commons)

   Only a few months (27.2.2011 to 8.3.2011) before this deliberation by Mrs Dyson, the Government Art College at Calcutta witnessed a unique incident hitherto unheard of. It held an exhibition of twenty-seven paintings by Tagore celebrating the bard’s sesquicentennial anniversary and managed to declare it open by none other than the Governor of West Bengal. Out of these twenty-four paintings emerged as fakes. Little did the deceivers remember that Rabindranath was a red-blue colour blind individual. He was an informal artist, untrained in the chiaroscuro effects of trained painters. Imagine the devastation if the culprits would have assigned a colour blind, untrained human hand. A painting by Tagore displayed here, named "Dancing Girl"  will tell you how unusual the colors are.

                                                                                                                      

            This oration by Mrs Dyson was preceded by a series of scientific papers on eye surgery, presented to the august gathering in form of a cricket match like platform in which each team scored runs to ultimately win a trophy. It was a packed house witnessing ear bursting applause. What came as a surprise was the thinning out of the crowd with the beginning of Dyson’s oration reminding me that hardly a few are interested in serious interdisciplinary discussions. Where there is fun, more is the number of audience. This is not only true for the illiterate and poorly groomed community but also for the elite educated class too. It is one who has an inclination towards extracurricular reading and matured thoughts, actually wins the trophy. My hat goes off to Dr. Jajneswar Bhunia, the dynamic eye surgeon, who dreamt of this oration and finally put it to shape. Many a surgeon may not pat your back Dr Bhunia, but one is crowd here.

            For those who are not comfortable with Bengali literature may know, Tagore is often referred to as ‘Kabiguru’ which means, poet of poets.

THE VERDICT

The end of the first decade of this new century is marked out by two dramatically opposite events. Tagore’s sesquicentennial birth anniversary falls this year together with the verdict on ever bewildering Ayodhya conflict. If the first reflects epitome of peace and tranquility then the other is sheer desecration. Any structure that invites inhuman relations will defile the area in question. A religion is true to its sense only when it debars hate and skepticism. No verdict is acceptable which breed inhuman relations and raises mankind to bad repair Let there be a violation of norm in this disputed land of the holy unknown and an institution arise from the dust where the poor and the ill and the injured irrespective of their religion, caste, creed and colour take shelter beneath the benevolent, compassionate hands of the doctors.

THE CULTURE OF EATING

It’s a disgusting and noisome face of human culture you have to interact with even if you abhor. It’s the culture of ‘eating’. Once a wise and witty friend of mine, having invited me for a dinner introduced me to a family friend of his saying that his friend belonged to a cultured lot of the elite subclass of northern part of Calcutta. I could measure the expansion of chest his friend was subjecting himself to on endorphins being released. After the gentleman had left our proximity, my friend said with a wink, ‘Its pisiculture.’ This culture of eating and talking and discussing about food at exorbitant lengths is a human development we see at the end of the twentieth century. It’s quite difficult to pinpoint at which juncture of time the human race had inherited such deviation but it is for certain that till seventies we could hardly find such people in the gathering. If found, so looked down upon, that the heat could easily be felt by them.

BREAKFAST (from wikimedia commons)

As the end of twentieth century approached, people became more and more interested in themselves, thinking little about others. It was only the self that mattered. Their concern encircled around the self, their own likings, their own habits and even their own dreams. So it was only ‘self’ that existed. Reading habits narrowed depending upon ones necessity, extracurricular activities did exist but only those which were essential to ones growth. As human being stretched their endurance, little did they know that only the physical endurance was being put to test not the endurance of their heart or soul. It’s the heart in the brain I am talking about, not the heart in chest cavity the doctors talk of. This unknown heart in the brain gives you patience, love and compassion for others. All these three are literally on their way to extinction. So more you find gatherings, even of the thinking class, more there is food in it. It’s not the food of thought Tagore or Ray or Bergman used to enjoy. It’s the food in its true sense. More they eat, more they talk about food, only about food, of different types of food. They hate discussing books, about films, about the present day politics. So when you decide to have your entry with a story about something in print, you are looked down upon, so much so that you end up in a shameful exit. They are giant eaters and you will be surprised to know that they keep discussing food even when their stomachs are full. And this is one thing you will always fail in.

BACK TO SQUARE ONE. WHERE ARE WE HEADING?

The human race had begun its life with four things for sure. Anger, Hunger, Fear and Desire were ample to start with. As time raced by, the race became aware that there were much more to explore and exploit. Shedding their primitive cocoon they started their journey toward a golden era of knowledge, culture, perseverance, humanity and love. Anger has little value was taught to the human kind by two wars in the twentieth century. It was India which miraculously escaped its wrath. So it came to know very little of anger. And now it believes ‘anger’ to be a smart man’s ornamentation. Heroes in celluloid preach younger generation to be angry men.

Love for good food having pleasant flavour was always a cultured gentleman’s attaché. But to be infatuated to food is a domain of those who are not well versed in their culture. If you are aware of the root meaning of the word ‘infatuation’, I will sleep well having conveyed what I wanted to mean. It’s origin in Latin means ‘make foolish’.

                                                

Fear had always been a man’s companion. From worshiping wind, fire, water and sun at what juncture of time man had turned to invisible god, they themselves don’t know. Then rose the faculty of ‘reasoning’ which rejuvenated the human seat of thinking, ‘the cerebrum’. ‘Fear’ took a backseat making way for ‘love’. And when there was love, ‘desire’ morphed bringing in a chaste human class. Here too I would prefer to refer to the Latin origin of the word ‘chaste’ which means ‘morally pure’.

Where is all that love gone from the human heart? It is anger which has taken its toll. More the ‘educated’ super star of films play ‘angry young man’, nearer we move   square one. Man has lost his good taste. Its ‘eating’ which now is eating the human culture.  If you believe in natural cycles of ‘time’, then may be its time for the human race to end its state of affair and succumb to death. It’s more pertinent to call it a death of the soul than to stamp it as a rotten flesh and blood. Let the human class perish before they experience sexual desires on open streets

A NO MAN'S LAND IN 2009

My little island country, an atoll, situated south of Pacific is nearly out of reach of any other human habitation. It was a beckon with surprisingly clear blue sky, coral blue waters, uninterrupted green vegetation looking like the small of the back and busy urban backdrops highlighted with skyscrapers. The buildings have nearly reached  heaven but the human mind has not. This land has changed so much that I too often fail to appreciate why and how. Being abandoned with my thoughts and rusticated by the authorities I have taken shelter in a dilapidated rotunda high in the hills, scarcely reached by my fellow countrymen. What are they, my authorities, doing there down below, I looked from the hills. The flags fluttering high on the turrets have changed colours, bolt from the blue to black. The last election held some twenty years back brought about radical changes in my country. The poor man's party who got themselves elected, promulgated a law making every person's identity documented in a single name irrespective of the economic obesity they enjoy. They said, "No more struggle among the classes." As the class burden was removed, the government decided to nomenclature human beings with a uniform title, "Hooligan". Everyone since then was being known as 'Hooligan'. After someone had pointed out the meaning of the word, the head of the state  asked  his subordinate ministers to withdraw  all  dictionaries from the  country together with the man who pointed out the meaning. Thus one great  problem was solved, marking the era as " The great depression of the country."  After the dictionaries disappeared, the authorities brought out tens of millions of copies of a new dictionary containing a new meaning of the word 'Hooligan'. They said 'Hooligan' is 'Hooli' + 'Gan'. 'Gan' is a vernacular word meaning, 'the tribe'. They said, "Our fellow countrymen have originated from a tribe called 'Hooli' who descended from a rare intelligent group from the east."  As confusion arose in finding the proper  person, men and women henceforth were called as 'Hooligan the tailor from fifty-second street' and so forth. Such large were the names that  it  took away valuable time  and people became lazy  like those in the poor third world states.  The king then rose on the podium  after a year of completion of his tenure, delivering a speech  which made  him 'The second great man.' He said, 'Country of the Hooligans, by the Hooligans, for the Hooligans, let us rise and show the world that we too can do it.'  But he didn't say what to do. None asked him 'what to  do.' and the days passed by.

But what do I see today? Flags have turned blue to black. The whole population is out on the streets, with cheerful outbursts. Colourful grafiftis, joy in every one's face and music in every heart. I can't believe what I see. I just can't believe. Let me have my binoculars on. Oh my God, what do I see? Are they the same Hooligans turning the slogans on? Where did they get those black costumes and black flags?

Suddenly I remembered, there is a foolish hermit who stays next to my broken house, right inside the caves. He too was boycotted by the authorities for his idiotic deeds. Truly a fool indeed. He still should be remembering 'Goopy Gayen and Bagha Bayen.', Ray's film. Does he have that pinch of drug when blown by the wind changes the whole lot of human population. Let me try that pinch. Let the whole generation change for good. Not just a change by changing their clothes.

HINDU MAHASABHA

Politics had never been or will be a clean man's domain. Even if you debate on this, time after time it has been  ascertained that whoever honest had joined this field had one time or the other been maliciously proved an outcast or debarred.  Two names Subhas Chandra Bose and Sri Lal Bahadur Sashtri, I believe, are suffice to speak the truth. And if you look at to-day's political scenario in Bengal, there is no dearth of example to speak in favour of my statement. For reasons best known to them, even as late as December 2009 someone has raised questions about Dr.Shyama Prashad Mukerjee's cause of death in 1953. Though the Government of India declared his death to be a natural one, no inquiry was held based on the fact why Sri.Mukerjee was administered Penicillin (death caused by allergic reaction to Penicillin) in spite of  Mukerjee intimating the doctor that he was allergic to the drug. His death in the valley of Kashmir still remains a mystery. Here is a rare photograph of Dr.Shyama Prashad Mukerjee, the gentle giant, at the 26th session of All India Hindu Mahasabha held at Bilaspur on Sunday, the 24 December, 1944. To Sri Mukherjee's right is seen Smt Latika Lahiri, the only lady in this photograph. To Smt Lahiri's right is her husband, a medical doctor, Phanindra Mohan Lahiri.

CRIES WITHOUT TEAR

(Extracts from a school boy's summer holiday diary)

It's the best time of my life, may be the 'best time'. I am on a summer holiday. I won't have to get up for the school. On these days I feel much relaxed when I leave my bed. No more wrinkles on my forehead, no more dull headaches. No more looking at the wall clock too. Only five days of the twenty-day honeymoon has gone, I believe. But I know it's not going to last long. Headaches will be back with stomach cramps in another fifteen days. Abraham, the bald headed six-footer, should have been a dull headed rowdy boxer instead of a maths teacher. He knows well, how to slap, taunt a student and turn him a fool out of the thirty odds in the class. So that you too start laughing. When he is angry he can kick you on the arse never thinking that you too have grown up hairy armpits like his and you deserve some kind of respect (at least like his pet 'Jojo') before the girls. May be he doesn't like an idiot-headed five- footer like me but he has a heart for Aron the all-rounder. He loves him like his son and sometimes its so overwhelming that the whole class keeps laughing. But I am not entitled to laugh with them. My father doesn't pay for my laughing, I am told by my class-teacher. If Abraham sees me enjoying with others he would drive a smart tight slap on my face colouring it violet with shame.

I don't know what is wrong with my cerebrum. Nothing goes in, in time. Not even a bit of easy trigonometry or an algebra. I know how to add, how to subtract and even multiply and divide. But not algebra. Bullshit, I believe my skull is filled with. But I am not sure of it. If it's shit from a bull, it must be smelling through my nostrils? But it doesn't. Still Abraham keeps on repeating that it's shit in my head and my classmates have started believing that too. Each time I tell him that I can't see properly from the last bench, he keeps on saying that its shit from the brain that obstructs my view. I know if I keep repeating my request, he will make me kneel down right in front of the black board. May be he believes, then only can I see the writings on the wall, best. 'A wall', I said? My classroom wall seems like a German wall that divides the east and the west. I can see the street corner from my seat. At four, when I am free, my blood pressure drops to normal. Then I am free to carry me around the street corner away to my home with ease. No more questions, no more humiliations, no more slaps, no more insults.

Trojan sits next to me in the class. He is a good friend of mine. He too is a six -footer but not like Abraham Sir. He loves me, he understands me and protects me too. When others start bullying me, Trojan comes to rescue. Others are afraid of Trojan because he is tall and stout like a colt who can thrust a solid blow to your head when he is angry. I have noticed Abraham too respects Trojan. I think it's Trojan's physique that brings him respect. Trojan too sits on the last bench but he doesn't have bull shit in his head like mine. Abraham doesn't say so but I know Trojan has thin watery crow shit in his vault. I have often seen crow shit on the back of his shirt. It must have spilled out of his head when he tilted. It's almost in the same way the shit in my head obstructs my view. I plan to gather some courage and ask Abraham about Trojan's head, one day.

When I grow up I wish to be a minister in the government. I know it requires little education to be so. Aron too has told me that. If by chance I am elected to the parliament I will make life tough for Abraham. Abraham doesn't have a brain to dream of that. I will promulgate a law that will deduct one point from a teacher when he fails to teach one student and two points if two students fail. And you know what is 'one point'? One point is half of one's salary. I know one plus one is two. And what is two points? I told you earlier that I can perform additions well. 'Two' is no salary. Then only I believe will Abraham learn how difficult it is to learn mathematics.

PEN AND THE SWORD

(Extracts from a school boy's summer holiday diary) The school teachers keep reverberating the same questions every alternate year without knowing how tiring and uninteresting it is to appear in the examinations.'Pen and the sword', 'A village fair', 'A railway journey' keep repeating like poor report cards intentionally published by schools every December. Don't they upgrade themselves like my friend upgrades his cell-phone every winter? A pen is no more made of steel or such durable material. It's made from plastic these days and cracks even when it falls over a bale of stacked cotton. I love my class teacher so much that my heart refuses to use even a single dirty word against him. Otherwise I would have met Mr.Stuartson, the Principal and told him that he holes up a pair of dinosaur's testicles in his skull vault. He still believes that his pen is mightier than the sword. It's not just bull-shit, it's the dirty smelling shit my nearby slum dwellers evacuate at the pavement edges. My father is another such empty vaulted dinosaur like my class teacher. Last year when the dipsomaniacs from my nearby slum came for a festival bonus without earning it, my goddam father refused. They slapped him twice on the face believing that a professor might need two slaps for the memory engram to work. But it did not. He straight went to Mr.Dobson the chief law-keeper. The law keeper was having a vertigo he suffers every saturday night from the medicine he takes, prescribed by his doctor friend, an honour'ble member of the supreme bureau belonging to my honour'ble country. My father didn't know that Dobson was a left handed strong bull. Dobson gifted him one slap on right side of his face and angrily snatched the pen my father kept in his pocket. 'Writing a complaint?.....' uttering, he tore the letter my father carried to his office. With a sixty kilometers an hour blow to the pen, Dobson broke open the cap and pushed it's nib into the wooden table. 'See what I have done to your pen, it now looks like a silver beaked kingfisher', he said and left the room.

(from wikimedia commons)

He came back the next moment, still smelling. 'Do you know this?' ,he asked, pointing at his holster. 'This is a sword, a modern day sword. Its getting smaller and smaller, like your laptop', he uttered, 'Its my pen too, it doesn't write I know but it can make holes. 'You can write with holes too' he laughed.

NOBEL AND NOBILITY

Once a cricket frenzy friend of mine asked me, "Do you know who the best judge is to decide when a batsman should be discharged leg-before-wicket?" It was a difficult question indeed knowing well that half of such decisions invited controversies. Not much aware of the game, I used my intelligence and replied with confidence, "The wicket-keeper", believing he is the only man looking staright into the ball and positioned exactly behind the batsman. "No" was the bold reply from my honour'ble friend. His lightning, disgruntled behaviour just floored me. Sharp came the right answer which I haven't even dreamt of. "It's the batsman himself", he said. But the irony is, how many such batsmen we know have walked away before the umpire had raised his finger? I know of one such living person who has the courage but had never dared to express. But courage without it being delivered is of little value. It's Barrak Obama, the American President. He knows that he is not worthy of the Nobel Peace Prize but he lacks the strength to express. He is an intelligent man who ought to know whether he is treading the right path or not. The road; one less travelled by, he took, only a few months back is no more with him. He may be remembered in the history books to be the first black President of "guardians" of this unholy world but the book likely is to be a "cartoon book". Its October of 2009 and its high time before the bells ring in second week of December. Let the man rise from his humble chair and show the world, the astonishing strength of the color of his skin and genuflect before the world saying, " Let me be the first to refuse the prize which I know am not worthy of". He may then find the whole world genuflecting before him with tears in their eyes.

SESH ANKA (The last act)

(review of a nearly lost Bengali film)

If you wonder how infinitely stable buildings and bridges were built in ancient ages without modern sciences' gift of electricity and computers, it is time to think why good cinema is not produced these days even with the advent of newest tricks in Physics and Chemistry. With markets flooded by ever increasing mega pixels of sophisticated cameras and high ended film institutes, there is no sight of rebirth of Ray, DeSica or Ghatak. It was by mere chance that I came across a compact disc from Angel Videos of SESH ANKA a black and white drama produced in 1963, which later turned out to be an eye opener to my rusty sense of fine arts.

'Sesh Anka' is a full length feature film in Bengali produced from one of the Tollygunge studios in Calcutta. The movie was a hit but never counted a milestone. Based on a rather common story of 'whodunnit' it is worth watching how sheer power of editing, crisp dialogues and a bit of good acting can turn a film spellbinding. There are two types of 'whodunnit'. In the first type the person responsible is disclosed by the director at the very beginning of the film and later the magic continues in describing how it happens. In the second type, the feature never tells you who the culprit is and the viewers are mesmerized as the magic unfolds. Though the first type is surely the difficult one to portray ('Psycho' from Alfred Hitchcock or Billy Wilder's 'Double Indemnity'), the second type will only be remembered when its member will not lose its magic even on repeated viewing. 'Sesh Anka' is a member of the second type.

Directed by Haridas Bhattacharya, Uttam Kumar (all time hero of Bengali cinema) had the courage to act as an anti hero at the pinnacle of his acting career. Running through fourteen reels of celluloid, as it was measured in those days, Sharmila Tagore (Soma) as an actress recalls her charming innocence in Satyajit Ray's films in 1950's.

The film begins directly with title cards as was the style in those days, depicting innumerable names involved in the making of the film. But it delivered a unique haunting background music with it, which would later repeat itself in variations making it a string suspending the story. Uttam Kumar plays the role of Sudhangshu Dutta an affluent businessman who falls in love with Sharmila Tagore, daughter of a reputed (knighted by the British), wealthy lawyer of Calcutta. Sudhangshu had been married earlier to one named Kalpana. Kalpana died in a train accident. And it was then when Sudhangshu finally decided to marry Soma. Soma knew of Sudhangshu's earlier marriage but could not resist marrying him. There is nothing special about the camera work in this film which will make you restless but repeated jump cuts blending uniquely with excellent editing will attract your attention. The dialogues are down to earth relentlessly combining with the tempo of the film. The film never loses its tempo.

While the movie progresses it is worth to keep a watch on the background music. Soon after the first shot you will find a variation of the introductory theme when Sudhangshu hears Soma play a Tagore song on the piano. You will find repeated jump cuts and not fade outs hold the tempo of the film. But there is a unique transformation when the haunting introductory music (scene at the railway level crossing when Sudhangshu recalls Kalpana) dissolves into a song in Sudhangshu's lips (sung by Hemanta Mukerjee "ami to jani...."). Through jump cuts the film shuffles from one serene romantic moment to another hair raising drama of murder and moral decay. There is good music, fair amount of suspense (Salim Mia behind door) blending contagiously with persistent good acting. At one time viewers are bound to shift their attention from Uttam Kumar (the hero) to Bikash Roy (multiple identity). There are a complex set of dialogues describing dozens of little known places through which the plot has shifted. This is a style you often find in a detective book and you need to go back through pages to recapitulate them. But recapitulating in a motion picture is not possible. I would suggest viewers to be extra attentive in some shots where dialogues flow randomly (in the court scene and the last scene where Sudhangshu's brother- in- law comes in). Actor Kamal Mitra is one very man who will steal your attention once more while playing a lawyer's role and remind you of Edward.G.Robinson in 'Double Indemnity' as an insurance claim officer. Good actors are everywhere on this earth, you just need a pair of trained eyes to locate him.

The cinema holds the quality of a good detective novel where the latter grows complex to more complex as it reaches the finishing line. This movie is not a melodrama but it reaches a melodramatic suspense with the arrival of Debesh Sen but too loud back ground music at this juncture inhibits the film reaching Hitchcockian quality. The soundtrack of a train will remind a serious viewer of the importance of a background music in cinema. But the message "CRIME DOES NOT PAY" at the end of the film reflects the director's childish effort.

Credit goes to Haridas Bhattacharya, the director in visualising Raj Kumar Maitra's novel that the latter can be turned into a good cinema. Editor Santosh Ganguly will be remembered for his repeated jump cuts. Pavitra Chattrjee's music is mind blowing when taken into account the scond grade movies in those days. It is important in a thriller, how it unfolds. Based on this criteria 'Sesh Anka' deserves ten upon ten. But the irony lies somewhere else. If Kalpana (name of Sudhangshu's dead wife) is the soul character around whom the movie revolves, is it a sheer coincidence that the movie was produced by "Kalpana Movies"?

FACTS NEWS VIEWS

Rejuvenating Bengal School of Art
It is time for the premier institution 'Asiatic Society' at Calcutta to express their humility they inhabit, towards the invaluable, rapidly destroying, paintings and sculptures of Bengal school of art. The society has recently acquired valuable objects of art from private collectors who were eager to giveaway to save the priceless ones from desuetude and damage. The objects will be restored and displayed for public viewing shortly. The list includes timeless pieces from Abanindranath Tagore, Nandalal Bose, Jamini Roy, Ramkinkar Baij and others.

REVISITING RAY AT ACADEMY

At the North Gallery of Academy of Fine Arts in Calcutta, an exhibition on Satyajit Ray, started from 19th January, 2008. It’s likely for the first time Calcuttans are experiencing Satyajit’s days (1940-1950) at D.J.Keymer, the reputed advertising agency which was situated at Calcutta. Ray’s layout of ‘Jabakusum Hair Oil’ reminds one of Calcutta in 1940’s and 50’s. There is a unique collection of title cards from Ray’s film ‘Kanchendzonga’ (1962). Ray himself had drawn the pictures and had used a font looking similar to that used in Sikkim and Bhutan. This shows how much complete he was in making a film. The original exhibit of Ray’s design of ‘Ek-khon’ magazine’s cover, made from a simple paper, hand cut and not cut by scissors, gives idea of his imaginative powers. Then there were those inventions of fonts namely ‘Ray Roman’, ‘Bizarre’ etc (1976-77) literally forgotten by the common men today. A close look at the 'Holiday Script' tells you how descriptive he was in communicating the leisurely mood of a man free from his daily commitments. Viewers are aware how Ray explicitly made diagrams detailing each step his camera and crew members would follow much before he had communicated his plans to his fellowmen. One can appreciate details of such schedule while he was filming ‘Sonar Kella’. At the bottom of this poster you will find scribblings like KAMU, R.K made by Ray. It is likely he was recalling his favourite anti-hero Kamu Mukerjee.

Ray had gathered immense practical knowledge and technical ability in visual art while working at D.J. Keymer. He had literally toyed with every branch of arts and fine art before his final productive years in films disapproving the saying that rolling stone gathers no moss. His noteings in pencil like ‘Reduction’ on cover design of his book “Badsahi Angti” (1966) , ‘ 5 ½’ , ‘on zinc’ on the layout “Halum” , ‘pashapashi dui patai jabe’ (eng. To be covered in two pages) , ‘9``’ on the layout “Hatyapuri” are examples of his in depth knowledge in printing and book designing. Even he has made a note in pencil ‘Pierce’ , where to put the binding material. He kept a note of all his thoughts, even what not to do. On the layout of book “ Hypnogen” he wrote ‘Ei blokta kalikai pathano hobe na’ (eng. This block is not to be sent to Kalika). Even the size of the block ‘12``’ is seen noted. The unused hoarding design of his film “Devi” (1960) is a rare display. You will be surprised to know that even the half moon shaped glass window on the door you see in his film “Ghare Baire” was designed by him. If you look closely at the layout planned by him on the sets of “Goopy Gayen, Bagha Bayen” you will find intentionally lightly sketched with a pencil, pictures of three spotlights, placed at different angles. Only a detailed research will enlighten us about his plans. He was keen in detailing the wizard’s room in “Goopy Gayen…”. The film being in black and white, he has used only a pencil in his sketching. A diagram of two rectangles put one above the other at right angles to each other, occupying the upper right corner of this layout is a mystery. How he has used the road plan of Darjeeling in his film “Kanchendzonga” tells us how scientific and logical his mind was. Of all these drawings, a small sketch of a sculpture from Ellora caves in Maharashtra, will tell you how matured his fingers were when he was barely twenty.

A film poster designed by him for the film ‘Satranj Ki Khiladi’ (Chess Players), which was finally not used by Ray, deserves a look because even the discarded ones from this master look the best in the world. The bold letters bearing the name of the film resemble the pieces on a chess board expressing completeness in his imagination. His imagination showed immense restraint that never went naive. Similarly the fonts used in the cover designing of the book "Birbaler Galpo" (eng.Story of Birbal) mimic the Urdu script simply because Birbal was a Musalman and spoke Urdu.

Credit goes to the organisers undoubtedly but Sandip Ray, Ray's son, who is also a film maker, deserves a praise without prejudice for carefully and meticulously preserving Ray's originals. Hats off to him. ( See posts in VISUALS. Photographs courtesy Ray's exhibition. )

ADVANCEMENT OF MODERN ART IN EUROPE by Ordhendra Kumar Gangopadhyay (O.C.Gangoly)

(The article was originally written in Bengali and published in several parts in the literary magazine ‘Bishan’ in the year 1936 (Bangla year 1343). A little magazine with its office at Bowbazar Street, Calcutta, Bishan easily boasted on its editorial board luminaries like Dr. Kalidas Nag D.Lit(Paris),Dr.Jatindranath Sen P.R.S, DSc, Suniti Kumar Bandopadhyay PhD(Edinburgh). Asit Krishna Mukhopadhyay PhD(London) was the editor. The magazine was priced at one anna per copy in the year 1936 and offered a discount if subscribed yearly. This is a translation of only the fourth part of the article.)

In London just before the war (WW1), in March 1914, a new movement in the field of art called ‘Vorticism’ was born. In fact this school was protesting Wassily Kandinsky’s lack of construction. It rose from the idea of two contemporaries Wyndham Lewis from London itself and Henri Gaudier-Brzeska, a young sculptor from France. He died in war on the fifth of June, 1915. From the trenches he wrote two articles published in ‘Blast’ a magazine which belonged to the Vorticists. Some ideas about this school of thought could be made of from these two articles and from some writings of Lewis. They objected to the static form of geometry in Cubism while on the other hand they evaded the ideas of dynamism in Futurism. Nevinson who was a follower of Vorticism often had his ideas returning to dynamism, thus making this school of thought often ambiguous. At one time Kandinsky’s ideas, uplifting from his theory of ‘lack of construction’, neared Vorticism. Proof lies in the writings of Brzeska and from some writings of Lewis in Blast.

Every work of art or artistic imagination is bound to share some resemblance or similarity with another work of art. But one must not exactly imitate the beauty of the nature. The logic behind this truth is that the joy and feeling on visualizing its beauty cannot be copied or imitated in exact likeness. The only way of doing it is through one’s complete unification and salvation with the beauty of the nature. Appreciating this statement can only be done when one truly understands the Vaishnavite philosophy. While thinking of Radha and Krishna one loses his oneness and starts believing himself to be Krishna. It is like losing ones individualism when in love with someone. But the philosophy of oneness in Vorticists was a bit different. They wanted to fathom the true beauty of the nature which formed the foundations of the beauty that an ordinary human being witnesses.

Let us appreciate the philosophy the Vorticists pronounced through their own words or statements. “The inner beauty of an object at times is beyond the reach of the simple thoughts and often contradicts or opposes the virtual beauty we appreciate. The external or the outer beauty of an object may not truly communicate or realise its inner true beauty. The importance of it’s external beauty, its weight, may not be the same as it’s scientific truth. The sky does not project its true beauty under the covering of the light. If by sheer imagination we can bring into balance and regulate the different forms and beauties of the external world it may seem like dreaming. The sole object of the practice of art is to express the beauties of life, the different forms it takes, through this world of imagination. Imitating bluntly the haphazard way in which nature unfolds its beauty expressing its innumerable forms and to jot down all of them is an audacious venture I am in. The logic of nature’s beauty cannot be conceived in writing. Even the slightest imagination can’t be had of it. In no way can the spiritual weight of an object be felt, by the art of copying.” These complex sentences within the quotes do not clearly portray the thoughts of the Vorticists. It is likely that their main thoughts and thinking lie within the world of ‘spiritual weight’. Every object has a fundamental, elemental and essential beauty encased within its external one. I feel that Vorticists intend to express this primary form of beauty. Every object’s existence or entity, its sense of beauty, projects itself in a sensible viewer’s mind in its fundamental form. The science of dynamics states that every object in a circular motion produces a centric form of energy at the centre of the pathway the object follows. The energy is maximum at the center. This powerful bright centric force, a centric force of thoughts, of beauty is called the vortex (point of maximum energy). The Vorticists believed that every individual object has some form of basic, intrinsic, primitive, fundamental form of beauty and their motive was to find out this true inherent beauty and express it in the form of an art. Their form of art worship had no place for imagination or over expression. So this school , I mean Vorticism only had a simple, erect, bare naked machine like truth to express without any form of ornamentation.

The heroes of Vorticism were Edward Wadsworth and C.R.W Nevinson. “Rotterdam” is a representative piece of work in the field of Vorticism. Brzeska’s sculptors truly express their thoughts. This young sculptor’s stonework named Ezra Pound was effective in expressing the inherent accumulated power in the persona of Pound and provided a unique form of beauty. While Vorticism went on developing Cubism in a new form, centering around England before the first world war, a separate group of five more artists in France were drowned in similar thoughts. They were Brancusi, Robert Delaunay, Henri Laurens, Jacques Lipchitz, LouisMarcoussis and Juan Gris. They were trying to free first generation Cubism. But Gris could never free himself from Cubism.

Delaunay had produced in 1925 a painting on a scene on Eiffel Tower. This decorative piece of art ushered Cubism into a new and worthy way. But the most worthy of all the artists in this group were Laurens and Brancusi. Their ideas followed the school of thought of the Vorticists. Brancusi’s imagination and his continued search for the fundamental beauty in an object often led to a meaningless world. In 1925; his imagination of a ‘flying bird’, with its head and tail removed and the torso only represented by a torpedo like cylindrical object, brought immense controversy in the field of art. He fixed this on a square shaped pedestal and made it more pronounced. The United States of America’s import law at that time exempted any work of art from paying taxes. The customs’ officer on seeing this object did not believe it to be a piece of art and suggested that this raw alloy should attract a lump some duty. Finally the matter ended in a court battle where the customs official commented that not even a mad hunter would like to kill this bird. Brancusi won this case at last and the orthodox old art critics had to face it.

The Vorticists sincerely tried to extract the true inner beauty of an object. There are such extensive examples in the field of ancient Indian sculptures. Brzeska has analysed different procedures followed in ancient sculpting and had showed that this tradition had been in existence since long. Young sculptor Brzeska of this new era had only followed this ancient tradition.

“ Art lives on tradition, of which contemporary culture is nothing but the last development” ( Bell )

All forms of art exist devouring nourishment from old forms. Modern arduous endeavour is only a consequence of the ancient form. It is the last wave arising from the sea of innumerable endeavours.

Foot notes in English used by Prof.O.C.Gangoly in this article :

(1)“ I have been told that Kandinsky is a very great painter, That his lack of construction is a magnificent quality, that he has hit something new. I agree with these colours set free, so to speak- have an effect of mirth. This is a very slight emotion nevertheless. My temperament does not allow of formless vague assertions.” All that is not like me is evil;” so is Kandinsky” Gaudier Brzeska.

(2) “ They began with the theory that every painting must be in some slight sense representative season for not imitating nature is that you cannot convey the emotion you receive at contact with nature by imitating her, but only by becoming her…..

The essence of an object is beyond and often in contradiction to, its simple truth….The sense of objects, even, is a seuse of the significance of the object and not its avoirdupois and scientifically ascertainable shapes and perspectives. If the material world were….. organized as in the imagination, we would live as though we were dreaming. Art’s business is to show how then life would be…Imitation, and inherently unselective registering of impressions is an absurdity. It will never give you even the feeling of the weight of the object or scene which is its spiritual weight” Wyndham Lewis.

(3) “Every concept, every emotion presents itself in the vivid cousciousness in some primary form. It belongs to the art of this form” Gaudier Brzeska.

(4) ‘It is that a Vorticist believes that there is an absolute quality, a spiritual or essential characteristic in every object, and he strives to express this while his emotion over discovering it is red hot; and his means is purged of sentiment, elaboration or ornamentation and tend to a special rigidity and machine like hardness”

Additional notes from Pinaki Lahiri :

In this excellent article by Prof Gangoly there are innumerable printing mistakes done by amateur proof- reading especially in little magazines in those days. The mistakes are shown in bold words. The word ‘season’ should mean ‘reason’, ‘seuse’ by ‘sense’ and so forth. But only once did this great connoisseur make a mistake in sheer hurry. He wrote" five artists in France…" But he mentioned names of six of them.