baparao's posts on satish chander & Ekalavya discussions - FWD from SCIT
Venkateswara Rao Veluri (vrveluri@worldnet.att.net)
Thu, 31 Oct 1996 22:09:23 -0600
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Hello Friends:
I am forwarding Sree Baparao's recent posts related to Satish Chander -
Ekalavya debate on the net. These were in response to Sree Hari Krishna
Tadepalli's and Sree Ramabhadra Dokka's posts. I hope Sree Baparao
would not mind. - V R Velui
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Subject: Re: Re(2): Re's: SrI bApA rAo and SrI PALANA gArla comments on pancama vEdam
Date: 31 Oct 1996 01:25:52 GMT
From: brao@pollux.usc.edu (brao)
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
To: soc-culture-indian-telugu@uunet.uu.net
Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian.telugu
References: <9610301755.AA59362@st6000.sct.edu>
In article <9610301755.AA59362@st6000.sct.edu>,
Ramabhadra Dokka <sdokka@st6000.sct.edu> wrote:
[ further analysis of Satish Chander's poem ]
I think there are a few different (but related) things here, which
are overlapping in the discussion:
1. Evaluating how the poet rendered his experience into verse,
in terms of aesthetic appropriateness of his imagery etc.
2. A discussion of "objective" contents of Bhaaratam, and their
message.
3. A general quest for a way to relate to, and reconcile with, the
past in a way that our efforts for the future are all strengthened and
not weakened by it.
If we take 1, Ram Dokka garu was very specific in his critique (while
acknowledging the genuineness of the emotion behind the poem):
>1. Symbolic mis-representaion
>2. Castigating attitude
>3. The author missing the view of the whole picture
>4. The author not staying focused on what he is saying
Likewise, Hari Tadepalli garu also analyzed the poem from a similar
perspective.
Compared to HT and RD gaarlu, I am unschooled in literary criticism
and wouldn't know style if it bit me in the leg. I tend to use the
question "did it work for me?" as my sole yardstick. Like a typical
uninformed and lazy consumer, I tend to see stylistic criticism as
something for the author and his critic buddies to worry about, with
the ultimate aim of producing something tasty for my
consumption. That is why I don't care very much if the poem deviated
from perfect aesthetic symmetry.
Regardless, I can still play the litcrit game. But not necessarily on
RD/HT gaarla grounds, or with their rules. Consider this. The thing is
a protest poem and should be evaluated on its own terms, and not
necessarily on what we may think of as the proper lakshaNas for
poetry in general. For instance, isn't it perfectly consistent for a
protest poem to have a castigating tone? Will we complain that a rap
song is angry and abusive in tone and lacking in melody, or that a
rock-and-roll song has cacophonous parts, when that's
the whole point of the genre? (At least we can complain, but it won't
be taken seriously by the singer. He might tell us to take our
criticism to the nearest classical concert.)
I think what's happening in the poem is that the elements chosen by
the poet, including the teacher, Bhaaratam, manuvu, saastraalu,
sanskrit &c are simply pegs for him to hang his feelings and protest
on. If he is protesting and rebelling against the symbols of society,
including Bhaaratam, why should he remain faithful to a literal
reading or Bhaaratam? The creative effort here is all about "transforming"
established symbols, so I think he is under no obligation to stay
faithful to the structure and verities of the symbols in a literal
sense. In fact, a better litcritter than me might be able to make a case that
had he stayed faithful, he would be defeating his purpose, which is
protest.
By the way, there is a fundamental inconsistency in the way Ekalavya
is perceived in the popular mind, which is shared by Satish
Chander. I'll point it out since no one else did so. It is that E,
unlike his "descendants" the dalits, was not actually coerced into
giving up his thumb, if we go by a face-value reading of Bharatam. He
could well have rejected drONa's request. Presumably he was driven by
his honor and integrity to acede. Or maybe he didn't think beyond the
notion that a guru dakshiNa request must be honored without
question. Was he afraid of drONa's curse, feeling that drONaa's anger
would make him lose the spiritual force behind his skill? We don't
know. At any rate, it brings home to me the idea that there are
important differences in the way people think across boundaries of
both time and space, but especially across time. So, it is never
accurate to say in a literal sense that so-and-so did something in the
Mahabharata, therefore it says something good or bad or neutral about
our society today. (It actually only works the other way around.) The
point is that our psychological identification with the characters of
Bharatam can only be approximate at best. The life and thinking of
those people was different from ours. This is what is called yuga
dharmamu. (I imagine that Ekalavya and Arjuna and DroNa would be quite
puzzled at the discussion we are having here. )
So, what it comes down to is that we take up the characters and events
of epics as abstract symbols which we then proceed to invest with life
derived from our own human experience and outlook (the image goes
through a praaNa pratishTa as it were). Poets of course will do this
consciously, deliberately and wantonly to everything in their path (as
in kukka pilla, aggi pulla, ...). That is the nature of their
business.
There is really no other meaningful way to relate to an epic in my
humble opinion. We all do this; by force of habit we come to think
that our own personal image is the real thing, objective reality. So,
when a Satish Chander comes along and offers us his own personal
image, which challenges the objective validity of our own (even unto
flouting textual consistency), we will find the exposure disturbing.
(Less philsoophically, the man is a poet, not a scribe or copyist. And
aren't poets notorious for the liberties they take with the language
and their material? After all, their primary goal is to expand our
vision, and faithfulness to icons is not even a secondary goal!)
I noted in an earlier post that his imagery is not as inapt as might
appear (the part about inheriting the missing thumb). But this may not
even be all that important; there is a point in stretching the imagery
beyond which the poet will lose the attention of his audience, but
until that point is reached, he has the flexibility to play with the
idea.
....
>>> I fear that the distorted views may lead to illogical references like
>>> the epics were written by a section/so called upper class of the society
>>> for their own benefits
>
>and bApA rAo gAru said in his response that --
>
>> I am sure they were, at least in part...
>
>I was totally amazed by this response and could figure out what he meant by
>it ONLY when he was talking about the piTTa kathalu etc.. in the epics. I
>agree with the point that not all of us can have the same opinion about the
>epics, SAstras etc.. but Sir, don't you think that your statement is like
>stretching it a bit too far ??
I said that there is considerable scholarly consensus that when
"jayam" grew into "mahabharatam", there were a great many accretions,
and that I am sure that several of these had what might be termed a
propaganda motivation, The first part doesn't need any support. It is
well-known. The second part, suggesting that thee was a propaganda
motive, could use some clarification.
First, what is propaganda to some is teaching to others. Saanti
parvam, bhagavad-gita, yaksha prasnalu, etc. are all didactic in
nature. They incorporate the understanding of the world had by people
who had power in society at that time. That again is
self-evident--they controlled the means to ventilate and propagate
their ideas. That leaves us with the question: were they
self-serving? Well, do you know any established elite in any time or
place that was not self-serving in their teachings by and large? If
you don't, why should the bhaarata-kartas have been any different? We
have a right to hope and expect that while serving themselves (as a
group), they were also serving society as a whole. But some people
today are expressing the feeling that they served some segments of
society better than other segments. Again, it would be surprising if
they didn't. Is it true? That depends on who reads some of the stories
and how they read it. Clearly the Ekalavya episode is an example of
alternate readings on the matter.
Does it mean that I think we should burn and extirpate the
mahabharata? I don't think I ever gave any indication that I thought
this way. What it means to me is that we need to acknowledge that
bhaaratam belongs to everyone, and that means in turn that everyone is
free to interpret and use it their own way. It is perfectly OK to do
this, even desirable. The quality of great epic literature is that the
more it is read and interpreted, the richer it gets, and thecloser
grow the people who read it in their diverse ways.
>Coming back to bApA rao gAri statement, IMHO, the epics (of course not
>talking about the piTTa kathalu and pilla kathalu etc..) are symbolic
>representation of our culture and are of equal literary and historical
>value. Literally, rAmAyaNam and BAratam are the longest versifications
>known to history, in any language. They wouldn't have survived for
>generations and stood against time if they are mere anecdotes comparable
>to the stories written by BRITISH or somebody else for their own benefits.
I didn't get into a comparative evaluation of the literary merits of
our epics and British literature and I won't do it now.
>Coming back to the point of discussion(I've already swayed too much..:-)),
>Baratam was not written to please anybody ( a king or somebody else ) and
>BAratam was not written for the BENEFIT/GAIN of any one person or a section
>of the society. The last thing one would do is to attribute the SELFISH
>and BIASED attitude to its author -vEda vyAsa-. IMHO, the epic is a symbolic
>representaion of the good and bad practices and the characters portray the
>symbolic notation of what goes on in everyone's mind. As far as the history
>part of it is concerned, vyAsa wouldn't have expected anyone to mis-interpret
>this incident in his epic as "EKALAVYA WAS A PANCAMA AND HENCE HIS FINGER HAS
>TO BE AMPUTATED" for the simple reason that he himself belongs to the same
>section of the society and was called a sUtaputRDu, in those days. The points
>I think vyAsa wanted to make at this instance were the
I agree that the intent of the narrative and the manner of its use by
the poet are two entirely different things. The question is whether we
agree that it is legitimate for the poet to stray from a standard
interpretation of the narrative.
....
>At least that is what as far as my understanding goes, but there could be
>more and more factors involved in it but if I want to write a 'kavita' just
>by highlighting a portion of what I think is the truth, can I be called a
>responsible POET ?? IMHO, I DO NOT THINK SO...
We may differ on this, but my view is that a poet's primary job
description is to tell us as clearly and truthfully as possible how he
sees the world. Others who take action based on the poet's words are
responsible for their own actions.
My personal views.
Bapa Rao
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Subject: Re: [3/4] Poetry, imagery, collagerie and menagerie: some rational approximations to ....
Date: 30 Oct 1996 09:27:04 GMT
From: brao@pollux.usc.edu (brao)
Organization: University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA
To: soc-culture-indian-telugu@uunet.uu.net
Newsgroups: soc.culture.indian.telugu
References: <3276C4DB.15FB7483@venkata.co.intel.com>
In article <3276C4DB.15FB7483@venkata.co.intel.com>,
Hari Krishna Tadepalli <harit@venkata.co.intel.com> wrote:
[ very incisive and entertaining analysis deleted. ]
I think your abstraction process should go a little further--the
teacher, marks obtained by the student etc. are all symbolic of a
state of mind and a relationship to society, but you don't need me to
tell you that. Manu dharma saastraalu or vedas need not be literally
taught or followed in school; the author resents the system for his
despair arising from a feeling of being "beaten down" by society; and
the teacher and the classroom are just channels for articulating the
resentment and unhappiness.
The "kuntemma" bit may be a bit of a stretch, but let me take a shot:
Kunti's real problem (if we forget the surya bhagavaanuDu story for a
moment) was premarital sex and probably miscagenation. Under
manu-dharma saastraalu she and her issue were probably prime
candidates for panchamahood. She escaped that fate by making a
terrible choice of abandoning her infant. The author empathizes with
her condition, and speaks with understanding of the many kuntemmas who
didn't quite make it in society and ended up in the pancha of
the panchama community. As you said, he had a need to stay with the
Bharatam theme; maybe he wobbled a bit and took an extra step when
jumping off that balance beam. So the thing isn't a perfect 10. But
it's got to score in the high 9's for generating all this thought and
discussion, I think.
My personal views.
Bapa Rao
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