Musings on the Life and Times of Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi         Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan                            9

Musings on the Life and Times of Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi

Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan

9

 

 

(Stunningly Beautiful Etching of Bharathi/Backdrop, exclusively for these Musings, by Ms.Adhishree Manokaran,Advocate, d/o. Mr. N Manokaran, Advocate,Madras High Court)

 

One is aware of  the minefield one is entering. Guardedly,  with abundant caution. Well aware of one’s abundance in lack of scholarship to indulge. Nevertheless, the flesh and mind are willing for the sweetness in the air and on the keyboard. It is too enticing to give it a pass. Is one being reckless? Possibly. Considering the chauvinistic waves it can unleash,even for a superficial work of a nondescript author as yours truly , and on the list  of worst sellers, not best,  has to  tread with care.

 

But then, why bother, as one is not being original in dissertation. It is on the heavily borrowed terrain. So good, bad or indifferent belongs  to those who provide the ammunition. And no pick and choose  or play a game of dice. ‘Just strike a balance from both sides of the fence when you compare distinct entities,  for comparisons are always odious. Yet it is fun. What is literature if not fun. Compare,  but not with bias or malice. Heat and light will automatically get generated and you can watch and revel from the sidelines as you are not the author of the comparison but only borrowing to quote’ as Sardar Khushwant Singh sent his invitation. It is too alluring. Yours truly took the plunge.

 

Wikipedia entry reads: Subramania Bharathi (11 December 1882 – 11 September 1921), was a Tamil writer, poet, journalist, Indian Independence activist, social reformer and polyglot. Popularly known as “Mahakavi Bharathi” (“Great Poet Bharathi”), he was a pioneer of modern Tamil poetry and is considered one of the greatest Tamil literary figures of all time. His numerous works included fiery songs kindling patriotism during the Indian Independence Movement. He fought for the emancipation of women against child marriageable stood for reforming Brahminism and religion. He was also in solidarity with Dalits and Muslims.

 

For Rabindranath Tagore, it reads : born Rabindranath Thakur, 7 May 1861 – 7 August 1941; sobriquet Gurudev, Kobiguru, Biswakobi)[a] was an Indian polymath, poet, writer, playwright, composer, philosopher, social reformer and painter.He reshaped Bengali literature and music as well as Indian art with Contextual Modernism the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Author of the “profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful” poetry of Gitanjali, he became in 1913 the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Tagore’s poetic songs were viewed as spiritual and mercurial; however, his “elegant prose and magical poetry” remain largely unknown outside Bengal.He is sometimes referred to as “the Bard of Bengal”.He was a fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society.

 

Tabulate the Biographies. Can you pronounce on their  comparative geniuses and skill set and accomplishments?  It would be foolhardy to even attempt one. Can we even dream of comparing Gitanjali with Panchali Sabatham?  ‘It would be insanity infinite’ as a debater on English literature  debate alluded to, on Lord Byron v John Keats v. P B Shelley. Forget it. ‘It would be a waste of time and puerile practice’ as a literary critic said.

 

Nevertheless, such ‘insane and puerile practices’ are not unheard of. What else is literature or writing meant for? Except to indulge in esoteric and rarefied. Such comparisons may be odious like, Sunil Gavaskar v. Sachin Tendulkar or Gundappa Vishwanath v. Rahul Dravid. But it happens all the time. Critics and fans lap it up, even if they run up diatribes too. ‘There is artistic and intellectual gymnastics in it ’ as the maverick Christopher Hitchens put it. Would Bharathi v. Tagore then  possibly fall  within such genre?

You be the Judge.

 

Rabindranath Tagore was born twenty years earlier to Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi. Tagore lived twenty years beyond too. And he was a Nobel Laurate. Bharathi was not. Is it a mismatch? A non starter and  a no brainer? Are there any tools available to compare two differing characters and poets, even if they were contemporaries. How does one compare? Their conduct, acts, discipline, output or quality or the  recognition they received from their peers or from academicians and researchers and the number of dissertations on them and their works they triggered. What indices  are there to rely on?

 

To illustrate, John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley were both leading Romantic poets, who produced some of the most memorable and musical poetry in English literature, full of vivid imagery and motivated by profound thought. Their intellectual preoccupations, however, were quite different. Shelley was politically a radical, an atheist and a vegetarian, motivated in all these beliefs,  by a hatred of tyranny and insistence on the liberty of the individual. Keats was a much more spiritual, mystical, and transcendental thinker. Both men died tragically young.

 

John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley had fairly similar childhoods. They were the eldest sons in rather large families, and there is evidence that both enjoyed warm relationships with their parents and siblings in their early years. Both Keats and Shelley had interests in the sciences.

 

In Western Hemisphere, we have the intellectually stimulating stage shows which attracts huge audiences on this ‘comparison mania’, as George Bernard Shaw derisively dismissed them. However, such shows are fascinatingly fluid and and lapped up by discerning fans of either or both.

 

For the record, Intelligence Squared Debates are rollickingly received,as stimulating. It may suffice to report this. Nearly four centuries after his death, no writer has come close to matching William Shakespeare’s understanding of the world – or his gift for dramatic poetry. It’s not just kings and queens that he captured so uniquely in his transcendent verse. Shakespeare analysed the human condition, not just for Elizabethan England, but throughout the world and for eternity. Britain may not have matched the Continent for music or art but when it comes to literature, Shakespeare sees off all international rivals, whether it’s in the spheres of comedy, tragedy or the sonnet. Even today you and I quote Shakespeare without knowing it: if you act more in sorrow than in anger, if you vanish into thin air or have ever been tongue-tied, hoodwinked or slept not one wink, you’re speaking , all the world’s a stage, lady doth  protest too much me thinks, to be or not be, to Thine own self be true, are the Bard’s English.

 

John Milton, say his fans, works on an altogether different, higher plane. In Paradise Lost – the best poem ever written in English – Milton moved beyond the literary to address political, philosophical and religious questions in a way that still resonates  strongly today. In his complex, intellectual poetry he drilled down deep into the eternal truths and sought to embody new scientific discovery in his work.

His engagement with the issues of the day – with the nature of knowledge, slavery, free will, love and creation – was unparalleled. Despite complete blindness in middle age, he was the English republic’s best known, most fervent apologist, and a key civil servant for Oliver Cromwell. In his other works, notably in Areopagitica, his attack on censorship, he showed himself as much a master of prose as poetry. He defines not only his age, but our own.

 

And Intelligence Squared debates brings present day writers, poets,critics, academicians and even actors to display the wares of the poets and authors and have them dissected on stage,  as if on a comparative table.

 

Let us go to our own Bharathi v. Tagore debate. Don’t worry. One would/could  safely leave it to the better informed to do it. Shall we?

 

( Author is practising advocate in the Madras High Court)