On Brown, White, and Rushdie

Sometime back, Venkat (better known as VGR), one of the early day Sulekhaites, wrote a blog at Sulekha, discussing the problem Indian writers (writing) in English have to face. The blog: Writing English While Brown was an interesting read, even though I disagreed with much of its central thesis and opinions.

Consistently, and quite apart from my own skills or lack thereof, I find that one of the hardest things about writing is being Indian. Like black Americans have their little joke about ‘Driving While Black’, Indians, given our peculiar relationship to the English language, might well say, ‘Writing English While Brown.’

No matter what you write – you with your very Indian names, that is – your Indianness will be part of the piece, he insists, in introduction.

The problem is this. How do you write a piece in such a way that when it is read, with your Indian name attached, it leads
to a coherent aesthetic experience for the reader?

The lack of coherence could come, I presume, from the expectations that an Indian name creates about the writing, and what the writing actually is. I don’t think Venkat would disagree with my presumption though. It’s mostly what he’s said all through in the blog.

Anyways, the two ends of the spectrum of responses, according to Venkat, are:

Some combine an incredible naivete with a lack of self-awareness and cheerfully write pastiches of their favorite English authors (say Muthuswamy Chandrasekharan writing a Ludlumish thriller with a hero named Jack Bauer, with no sensitivity to the fact that his name changes the reading of the story). Others are painfully oversensitive and self-conscious to the point that they invest all their creative effort into countering the Writing English While Brown effect, to the point where it ruins the actual intent of the piece.

And then he insists:

Somewhere in between is a happy medium where you can Write English While Brown and be aesthetically successful with respect to your intent (not necessarily commercially). We just haven’t discovered it yet.

Hmmmm. Then he goes on to exhaustively (almost) list the range of responses. I ended up commenting to the blog, which you can read here, if you’re terribly interested (which I assume you aren’t and hence I’m not embedding the comment here).

I forgot all that for a while. Then couple of weeks back, I picked up Vikram Seth’s Equal Music. And right away, I remembered that blog again! Vikram Seth has created all Caucasian characters, living in England, making Western classical music, with totally British problems, if one can call it that. Yes, remind me to put up my (yet unwritten) review, as I would anyways, but that’s not the point. In Venkat’s list this probably No. 9 response: Global Warriorization — something which he doesn’t think Fiction writers (IWEs) have tried (with any success, that is). Did it bother me? Vikram Seth, with clearly Indian name writing about characters who’re do not share a trace of Indian ancestry? Clearly, it did not. If I hadn’t read Venkat’s blog, I’d have not even thought about it. Would it have bothered the Brits? The Americans, for whom Briton is probably as alien as India, the French, the Germans (if select few of the latter two can read English at all)?

Then today, I came across this old little interview of Salman Rushdie from Salon.

When asked if he, “ever worr[ies] that using so many culturally specific references will leave many readers unable to understand what [he is] trying to say?”, Rushdie answers in his characteristic style:

No. I use them as flavoring. I mean, I can read books from America and I don’t always get the slang. American writers always assume that the whole world speaks American, but actually the whole world does not speak American. And American Jewish writers put lots of Yiddish in their books and sometimes I don’t know what they’re saying. I’ve read books by writers like Philip Roth with people getting hit in the kishkes and I think, “What?!”

That’s what I love about Rushdie (and probably that’s exactly what I hate about him, too), his spunk.

It’s fun to read things when you don’t know all the words. Even children love it. One of the things any great children’s writer will tell you is that children like it if in books designed for their age group there is a vocabulary just slightly bigger than theirs. So they come up against weird words, and the weird words excite them. If you describe a small girl in a story as “loquacious,” it works so much better than “talkative.” And then some little girl will read the book and her sister will be shooting her mouth off and she will say to her sister, “Don’t be so loquacious.” It is a whole new weapon in her arsenal.

Too bad Venkat dismisses Rushdie, who dared to write in an English that was anathema to the brown writers (more than it would have been to the whites, even) as escapist: write about anything other than the real world, or about the real world mired in so much of the fantastic that only a literature PhD can figure it out. But then, he’s entitled to his opinion.

I guess Rushdie will just sigh, after all he had taken bull by the horns, long back, in Midnight’s Children. And called the bull a bull.

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The New Face of Indian Feminism

The new face of Indian feminism, and whole lot of crabs:

Ah, the prude me! If only I had the guts to substitute the word face with something with more, umm, oomph factor, I guess I’d have made the cut (into the real liberal league, or the RLL for short). I should start kicking myself, and learn to be more liberal (or more real liberal). Bear with me. Bear with me, as you’ve been bearing with me all these days/months/years, the way you bear with any other megalomaniac dimwit (if you’re a first timer, go to paragraph no 31 directly). This time, I’ve an excuse. I’m writing after a long time (unless you count book review as writing). Yes, at times, the anti-constipation medicines might be a little too effective for comfort. So, for the third time, bear with me. I’ll come to the point, later, rather than sooner. Oh hell with it. I’ll come to it anyway. What’s sooner or later between friends?

Yes, I’ve come down from the pedestal already, as some of my regular readers (actually one, unless I count myself), would say (IW, you’re still reading, aren’t you?). I mean, why oh why, am I chewing on a subject that deserves its own share of ignoring? The reason, as I already told you, is this: something is better than nothing. I mean, I’m thirty one plus (not twenty-something, unless 11 counts as something), not getting any younger, definitely not getting any smarter, more definitely not getting any creative (I contemplated if I should add more before creative, but then backed off). My writing career is in the middle of nowhere, since the day I started. Mind you, it hasn’t moved left or right, up or down. It’s right in the middle of nowhere, all along. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that that is where it’s gonna stay. So what was I doing on the pedestal anyways? Smart question. But then, I’ve come down, haven’t I? OK, OK! I promised I’ll get to the point.

Let’s begin at the beginning, shall we, for a change? Let me share all that I learned in the last two hours (I hope my manager, who has the feed of this blog in his reader, and even reads it sometimes, isn’t reading this. He thinks I’m writing a design paper. There! I’ve confessed! Ummm. Sorry, I shouldn’t be jumping the gun). So first thing I learned is: there is a blogger called eM. Damn this new Firefox feature of online spell check. It says eM is a misspelling. I mean, do these guy have any sense of humor? Just because you spell something in reverse doesn’t make it a misspelling! Doesn’t make you ulta either. There! Another red line under ulta. Okay, honest now, I’ll keep it straight. Not that straight, dear. I mean, of course I’m straight. But as an aspiring member of the RLL, I don’t want anyone to think that I meant straight as a value-judgment. The last thing I need is being called homophobic!

So anyways, I was telling you about eM. She has a blog. What did you say? Everyone has a blog these days. Thanks for educating me. But eM has an ubercool blog: The Compulsive Confessor. It deals with: “partying, smoking and binge drinking, along with candid musings about sexual techniques and escapades” according to Telegraph (UK) feature. Oye, where are you going? I haven’t even finished! Good thing I didn’t give you the url right away. So anyways, Telegraph (UK) did a story on her. And what’s more, the story divulged that Penguin India has commissioned her to write a semi-autobiographical book. So far so good. What has it got to do with feminism, you ask? Well you tell me. I wish I knew! Who’s saying anything about feminism?

Oh you mean the title. Sorry. Fooled ya! Ha. Just kidding. I’ll get to that. (No wonder no one takes me seriously).

On Sepia Mutiny — the greatest thing to have happened to Indian Blogdom since Margaret Thatcher (what? what has she got to do with Indian blogdom? I’ve no clue. It’s the first name that came to my mind. It seemed as good as any) — Amardeep did his take on the article, and then Indian feminism was born. Err. Okay, not really. Again, blame it on those anti-blogstipation medication thanks to Amway. I’d have sued Amway, but then my brother will be implicated too. (What I’ve no brother? How did you know? Is there no privacy on net, dammit?)

So we had two of the most famous Indian Women Bloggers (or so I’ve heard) taking up the fight against the patriarchy that was pulling crabs down, and pants up.

What’s wrong with compulsive confessing, Sakshi asked. Well, absolutely nothing, I agree. I mean, just because it’s compulsive doesn’t mean there is something wrong!

Wonder why our society’s philosophy on empowerment starts at providing women with decent education and then abruptly ends when she starts expressing her individuality.

Indeed! With you all the way.

Similarly, many think eM writes solely to attract attention and gain that temporary hype (and therefore she ended up getting a book deal) because it’s difficult for them to comprehend the fact that an Indian woman can also think, write, discuss and not be apprehensive about her intimate thoughts on a public platform

Absolutely. Indian Women rock! Err. I didn’t mean… you know what I didn’t mean.

On the other hand if her writings were preaching the sati-savitri qualities in desi-women, the joys of motherhood, the precious value of an intact hymen – she would be applauded for her thoughts, no matter how farce they maybe in actuality.

There you lost me, Sakshi. Intact hymen? Are there bloggers writing about intact hymen? Where are they? Why are they hiding? I mean, if they’re being applauded, as you contend, surely I should have heard about them. But then, I’m a little hard on hearing, so sorry for asking again. Where are they? I so love blogs about intact hymen.

The only question I have is, where in the blog did Sepia Mutiny/Amardeep actually said she should not express her individuality, or take off her blog/not write a book/do whatever? But asking that question might bar me from RLL. So for the record, I never asked it.

Melody highlighted the Indian Crab mentality with a nice old story. Of course she was being a little judgmental of the crabs but then I’m not a PETA activist, so I guess crabs will have to deal with the damage to their self-esteem on their own. (Comment to the crabs:) Sorry guys. I like you, but on my dish. Lightly spiced, and cooked well. Your self-esteem is, frankly, not my problem. (End of comment to the crabs). Besides, she didn’t really give the crabs a benefit of doubt. Maybe they are pulling the other crab down, because they:

1. Think he might be killed if he goes out, in the unknown world.
2. Like him so much that they don’t want him to go away.
3. They are actually trying to push him up, but are just plain incompetent.
4. It’s not a he crab, but a she crab. And the he crabs surely don’t want to let a her go.

(Note: I’ve implied that the pulling crabs are all male. After all, women crabs cannot be that insensitive!)

But I get the point. Postmodernism is not on offer for the crabs (although crabs are on offer for the postmodernists! What a win-win). Especially not for the Indian crabs. There I almost sound like a PETA activist now (except for that insensitive comment about the dish. But then I really like crabs, when dished out that way). I’ve heard PETA members have a preferential queue in RLL. But then we aren’t reading for any ulterior motives, and just taking the things on face (errr! there again, I lost my second chance. the prude me) value.

According to Melody, its a “very very sad” thing to “diss”(miss?) another blogger, a fellow Indian blogger at that, a fellow Indian Female blogger at at that that (this last I presumed), especially by a group of “desi bloggers”. Doesn’t she get it? There are Indian bloggers, and there are Desi bloggers. Surely, you can’t expect one group to root for the other! But then, I’m with you Melody. We must not ever dismiss anything Indian. Even Shobha De. There, I’m against Sakshi, even. She says Shobha De is a hypocrite! How could she. I mean, Shobha De is an Indian Writer for god’s sake. And an Indian women writer at that. And an Indian women writer who wrote about women taking down their pants (or so I’ve heard), and men too, for it takes two to tango, and in those days when you said two, you said one M and one F, how homophobic!) long before there were bloggers writing about women taking down their pants.

I get it. I get it. Why Shobha De is not kitsch, is that she only wrote about other people taking off their pants. Never about she taking off her pants. But it’s a big mistakes. She never wore pants! So come on now. Let’s forgive Shobha De for her alleged hypocrisy. We must root for Indian feminism, in all shapes and forms. Err… I didn’t mean it that way. You know what I didn’t mean, don’t you?

Blog Hopping

Every once in a while I go on random blog hopping, and then I realize how hard it is to find interesting blogs, due to the sheer number of blogs that are floating around. There are clusters of bloggers who follow each others blogs and typically you see the same commentors on the blogs. Add to that the problem of people blogrolling others for reciprocal reasons, or just because you gotta have a blogroll. So we gotta go back to recommendations before the so called web 2.0 (or 3.0 or whatever it is) really starts helping us there (in finding content that we might enjoy). So here is my bit, for those who share some of my tastes in the written matter: a few links to blogs that I have come across lately, which caught my attention. I hope to do this activity more often.

I’ll start with (probably) the youngest blogger in this potpourri

Sometime back I read this poem by Merryweather: For Whom the Bell tolls, which grabbed my attention right away…

When the leaves were autumn-gold
But you were too involved to notice
Their sullen dance on a cemented pathway
All you could see were the unwinding, winding forest roads

I wish I could write like that even at my age! Check out her blog. Yes, the themes are kind of commonplace, but the poetic spark is there.

Prat’s Bookstore totally floored me by its sheer poise (for the lack of better word).

A lot of other what ifs
I asked you
You explained
Destiny and the human mind
You showed me
It is true

And then she ends it beautifully… no I won’t put those lines here. No spoilers here

And before I move away from poetry, this one from ubermensch , an old friend from the virtual world. Ubermensch is Nietzsche in the making; don’t take him lightly, even though this one is light:

Once someone told me
It was beyond his imagination how
such a thing as free verse
came to be called Poetry…

That’s almost a quarter of his small poem: Libre

Okay, away from poetry as promised. Anumita’s blog, 10 Days Canned Stored and Treasured is one of the most heartfelt pieces of writing I’ve come across in the so called Indian blogosphere. What I like is the sheer honesty that the piece radiates, and the fact that she hasn’t tried to anonymize it through fiction or other devices. No excerpts here, since it’s a prose piece, nevertheless strongly recommended!

And away from words altogether, onto one photoblog: Atul Sabnis has this excellent photoblog: If I Could See Better. He has quite an eye, to want to see better. Definitely worth a dekkho, as the say.

That’s it for now, hopefully I’ll come up with second round soon.

Literary questions

It’s no secret that Amitav Ghosh is one of my favorite writers (not just Indian favorite writer). So on a Sunday morning I checked the Hindu Literary Review (which is another favorite of mine) and there was this Ghosh interview, I had to read it. The interview probably deserves a blog on its own, but what got me more interested is a reference about “Anxiety of Authenticity”. So I dig it up, and there it was: Vikram Chandra’s piece entitled, The Cult of Authenticity.

Some time back I wrote a blog, The Unintentional Exoticising, that tried to do a Devil’s advocate, or rather sympathized with another Devil’s advocate. At that time I wasn’t aware of this Vikram Chandra piece, or I wouldn’t have bothered writing that blog. True, the piece is slightly (?) long and repetitive and even polemic in nature — the last kind of inevitable after the barrages from the other side, yet it is a much needed voice from that side — the voice that we need hear a tad more often, to compensate for the noises from the other side of the other side.

Chandra talks about this “damned if you do, damned if you don’t” predicament of the Anglo-Indian writers, a vernacular as pure Vs english as impure generalization, identities of cosmopolitan Indian writers, futility of notions of Indianness and authenticity and so on. The issues of “intent” are covert, but they interest me, always:

It apparently never occurs to Dr. Mukherjee that style is something that one feels in the pit of the stomach, that Narayan may be interested in a minimalistic representation because it grows from the marrow of his Malgudi bones, that perhaps when Narayan sits down at his desk with his pen and his paper, he is not thinking of his pan-Indian or international audience, not any more than Ernest Hemingway and Raymond Carver were thinking of their audiences in Ghaziabad and Vishakapatnam when they chiselled their laconic turns of phrase. But no, in this understanding of the universe, to write in English is to be transparently vulnerable to the demands of the market, any market. And conversely, to write in anything but English is to be preternaturally chaste and upright.

It’s a pity that the essay is so long that one is prone to jump forward just when he actually delivers the punch.

All art is born at this crossroads of ambition and integrity, between the fierce callings of fame and the hungers of the belly and the desires of one’s children and the necessities of art and truth. Michelangelo knew this, and Ghalib knew this. There is no writer in India, or in the world, no artist anywhere who is free of this eternal chakravyuha, this whirling circle that is life itself.

And while he’s at it, he even questions the questioners motives:

… the most vociferously anti-Western crusaders I meet are inevitably the ones who are most hybrid. It is these comfortably situated citizens, these Resident Non-Indians, who, beset by a consciousness of their own isolation from “Real India,” feel an overpowering nostalgia for an Indianness that never was, for a mythical, paradisaical lost garden of cultural and spiritual unity…

Intent again, albeit through a excerpt by Jorge Luis Borges, who ends up dismissing intent as insignificant in the larger scheme of things:

I believe, moreover, that all the foregoing discussions of the aims of literary creation are based on the error of supposing that intentions and plans matter much…. Therefore I repeat that we must not be afraid; we must believe that the universe is our birthright and try out every subject; we cannot confine ourselves to what is Argentine in order to be Argentine because either it is our inevitable destiny to be Argentine, in which case we will be Argentine whatever we do, or being Argentine is a mere affectation, a mask. I believe that if we lose ourselves in the voluntary dream called artistic creation, we will be Argentine and we will be, as well, good or adequate writers.

And Chandra chips in with this fabulous one-liner:

To be self-consciously anti-exotic is also to be trapped, to be censored.

In the end Chandra asks, “How should a writer work, in these circumstances?” and comes up with his own answer: ignore criticism, beware of praise, write freely, don’t think about either audience or critics, be local and global at the same time, be fearless, and most of all covet the goddess, of good writing. The answer couldn’t have been more difficult.

Amitav Ghosh interview (old one)

 

“For me, the value of the novel, as a form, is that it is able to incorporate elements of every aspect of life – history, natural history, rhetoric, politics, beliefs, religion, family, love, sexuality. As I see it the novel is a meta-form that transcends the boundaries that circumscribe other kinds of writing, rendering meaningless the usual workaday distinctions between historian, journalist, anthropologist etc.
”

Excerpts from a short but interesting Amitav Ghosh interview. Check out the last question and the pithy answer.

I’m currently reading An Antique Land, Ghosh’s work on Egypt, and my admiration for the guy has taken a new high. Will probably review it later, if I get time, but suffice to say that it’s an extremely interesting read.

Smell, A Review

Smell By Radhika Jha

As a rule, if I put down a book I rarely pick it up again, if it can’t hold my attention in ten pages. When a book by Indian female writer starts with stereotypical portrayals of first generation immigrants, and the book is set outside India, I would typically not break that rule. Still, I am glad I curbed my instincts, when it came to Smell for I had not one but two strong recos from people who are probably more dismissive of bad writing than I.

Smell is a refreshingly original book by Radhika Jha, for one it’s anything but Indian (not that I’ve anything against a book being Indian, but it’s refreshing to see an Indian not being bound by that identity while writing, especially fiction). Yes, she uses the angst of a refugee – doubly so, for her protagonist has to leave her native country Kenya, and has never seen her ancestral country and yet the identity is kinda stamped on her — but that’s just a minor detail.

The novel itself is an adult version of Alice In Wonderland, only a dark one. When Leela, the protagonist is sent to her uncle’s place in Paris, after her father’s death, she doesn’t know that she’s almost abandoned by her mother to her faith. The new home is also closed on her, in unusual circumstances, and she’s left to fend for herself in an alien country.

What transpires is a series of experiences and relationships, as she tries to find a meaning, in all the chaos. With only her strong sense of smell to guide her, she steps in an out of different worlds. There is an element of unbelievable in the story, but it’s just plausibility which is a question. When a writer flirts with implausibility, it’s absolutely forgivable if the story is fascinating, and not trying to ram something dull down your throats, and Radhika has left nothing to complain in that department. You become a part, and not just a spectator, of Leela’s sensual journey, as she struggles to rediscovers her soul. The breadth of experiences and the stories and sub-stories keep you guessing where will you be led next. Smell is more than worth a read.

Five Points Anyone?

Book Review: Five Points Someone

The book starts with a tagline “What not to do at IIT” and in all fairness sticks to it. For FPS is NOT a book about IITs anymore than Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance is about, well motorcycle maintenance. For one, it could have been set absolutely anywhere and would still have been as enjoyable as a well made teen movie.

Yes that’s a compliment, for FPS — whatever else it doesn’t have — has all the makings a bollywood love story, including its obsession with the lame and the banal.

Like, the protagonist is hit by (sic!) a charming girl who ends up being (yeah you guessed it right) the prof’s daughter. The prof (yeah right again) is the HOD of the institute…

Or, the young prof back from US is the only prof who looks beyond grades…

Or, the topper has oily hair and is a hopeless mugger…

Or, the coolest guy is the last in the class in GPA

Or ….

But that’s just a minor crib. The thing that I felt barely twenty pages into the book was a creepy feeling — the kind you get when you see the author talking in stereotypes and you know that the subtleties is the last thing you can expect, and that he’s going to screw up badly. Way before the end, I was vindicated. Bhagat hit onto something interesting and ended up spoiling it big time.

I asked myself, if I had read this book before going to the IIT, would I have ever wanted to go to a place like that and my answer was (using the IIT lingo) “scope hota hai!” (not a chance). The very idea of fun in the book is so beaten — grass, vodka and Floyd. I mean, I understand the profs being stereotyped but why do even the I want to break free students have to be cardboard characters? I was just a matka student (as the real IITians — the btechs would call the post grads), and still in less than half the time I had more fun in IIT, and met more interesting people than any in the book can ever come close to.

Bhagat’s story on the other hand goes on creating the carefree five-pointers having fun and the nerdy mugger nine pointers missing on life stereotype that’s so disappointing coming from an ex-IITian. But my worse disappointment is that the book completely misses the excitement, the sheer intoxicating excitement, that life on IIT campus is — despite the backbreaking workloads and the monstrous relative grading system. Where are freshie nites, the socials, the PAFs, the Mood Indigos (or its counterparts), the wing-treats, the film-shows (and the pondy shows), the various clubs, the intra-hostel sporting events and spats, the late night carrom sessions, the doom competitions in labs … the list is practically endless. Surely not all of this can happen with people mugging up all the time?

But then, of course, Bhagat was not writing a book about IIT, he was writing a book that would be easy to read, fun and easy to market (successful on all counts). The IIT in the name is just to increase that marketability. Plus when you do it, you create a minor controversy — a sure recipe for success (any review is good review, right?).

To be fair, the book is not totally worthless. It has its moments of fun, and is a nice traveling companion, or just a relaxing read. If you’re looking for anything more, you’d be disappointed. It’s the Indian Da Vinci Code. All masaala no meat.

The Unintentional Exoticising

Thoughts on and around “On strangeness in Indian writing” by Amit Chaudhuri (Hindu Literary Review Oct 2, 2005)

The Hindu is still leagues apart from anything else that you get delivered to your doorstep under the category of Newspaper. Sometimes I think the categorization is wrong, or at least clubbing of Hindu with other excuses of daily publications are wrong. Hindu’s Literary Review, for instance is, in my knowledge the most sweeping tour of the literary landscapes – Indian and otherwise, that you’d find in any Indian publication.

It’s in there that I stumbled upon On strangeness in Indian Writing — Amit Chaudhuri’s immensely thought-provoking review centered around Arun Kolatkar’s Jejuri. On the onset, let me say that I’ve not read the book (a sequence of poems) or had never heard about it, despite Kolatkar being a Marathi (bilingual) writer. But I’m aware of Jejuri — the religious town (of the deity Khandoba) — that’s the setting of the poem(s).

Using the work itself and reactions to it (including an essay about Indian writing in general by Bhalchandra Nemade, a distinguished Marathi writer) Chaudhuri opens up a sensitive topic.

Chaudhuri touches a raw nerve when he says:

In India, where, ever since Said’s Orientalism, the “exotic” has been at the centre of almost every discussion, serious or frivolous, on Indian writing in English (tirelessly expressing itself in the question, “Are you exoticising your subject for a Western audience?”), the aesthetics of estrangement, of foreignness, in art have been reduced to, and confused with, the politics of cultural representation. And so, the notion of the exotic is used by lay reader and critic alike with the sensitivity of a battering ram to demolish, in one blow, both the perceived act of bad faith and the workings of the unfamiliar.

I think this is the dilemma that most writers of our generation will have to contend with. It’s the tightrope walk between unintentional exoticizing — a result of urban upbringing, which makes some of the writers as much aliens to the subject matters, as an Indian living outside India or even a non-Indian — and forced agreement. But when we stop dissenting, in the fear of exotifying, we are not honest to ourselves. So Kolatkar’s outsider (to Jejuri, and the culture that surrounds it) has as much right to be as the insiders. In the days of post-colonization, these outsiders, these recluses are torn between a world they can’t relate to and a world that they can but don’t want to elope into.

Then he raises the subject of the intended audience. It’s another dimension of this same tightrope walk. Can you not legitimately write for a fringe — provided you don’t exotify for the covert gains (acceptance by the foreign readership and critics, who want a certain idea of India reinforced?). For instance Nemade ¹ asks: (quoting from Chaudhuri’s essay with the context)

“An Indo-Anglian writer looks upon his society only for supply of raw material to English i.e. foreign readership.” He mentions three instances of what, for him, are acts of “aesthetic and ethical” betrayal: Nirad C. Chaudhuri’s The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian, Narayan’s The Guide, and Kolatkar’s Jejuri. And the now-familiar question, still relatively fresh in 1985, is asked and sardonically answered: “What kind of audience do these writers keep in mind while writing? Certainly not the millions of Indians who are `unknown’ who visit Jejuri every year as a traditional ritual… “

But what does Kolatkar have to offer to those millions of Indians? And if he doesn’t wouldn’t it be counter-productive trying to say things that one doesn’t know? And for every such millions there are at least a hundred urban Indians who Kolatkar can talk to, only in English. How does talking to them instead of the millions constitute an act of treason? In all fairness, I must read Jejuri first to judge Nemade. But then there are questions which spring to your mind without the inner judge’s consent.

The essay goes on raising many such pertinent questions in reader’s mind.

In fact, estrangement becomes, once more, a form of cultural distance, and the notes a narrative about alienation; a narrative, indeed, of semi-articulate but deep undecidedness and uncertainty about what constitutes, in language, poetic wonder, citizenship, nationhood, and in what ways these categories are in tension with one another.

or

But surely there’s a third level in the poem, in which a significance is ascribed to the mundane, the superfluous, that can’t be pinned down to religious belief; and it’s this level that Jayakar herself finds inaccessible, or refuses, for the moment, to participate in.

And then we’re back at the exoticism vs defamiliarisation — the following is very very jargony, but the point that it is making is worth mulling over:

I think Jayakar’s and Nemade’s response to the superfluous and random particular in Jejuri (comparable, in some ways, to the impatience Satyajit Ray’s contemporaries felt with the everyday in his films) is symptomatic, rather than atypical, of a certain kind of post-independence critical position, which obdurately conflates the defamiliarisation of the ordinary with the commodification of the native. With the enlargement of the discourse of post-coloniality in the last two decades, the critical language with which to deal with defamiliarisation has grown increasingly attenuated, while the language describing the trajectory of the East as a career has become so ubiquitous that, confronted with a seemingly mundane but irreducible particular in a text, the reader or the member of the audience will almost automatically ask: “Are you exoticising your subject for Western readers?”

All in all a very gripping read, the essay itself. Now it’s time for me to go hunt Jejuri.

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1. Nemade got into limelight due to his Marathi book Kosla which I’ve read. Curiously, Kosla is inspired from Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye, and is sort of an Indianized version of the book — where the protagonist, a loser of sorts, struggles at coming to terms with the way the society around him is. He has done a brilliant job of localizing the angst. But then isn’t this parroting of sorts too? How does this parroting become more acceptable?