विमानांचे हल्ले / बेचिराख जिल्हे...Oh what have you done to Johan Christian Dahl's Dresden?

Oh bountiful Gods of the air! Oh Science and Progress!

You great big wonderful world! Oh what have you done?

—John Betjeman, “1940”

बा सी मर्ढेकर, 'प्रेमाचे लव्हाळें', १, कांही कविता, मर्ढेकरांची कविता, १९७७

"... विमानांचे हल्ले,

बेचिराख जिल्हे;

रक्ताचीं थारोळी;

अपंग आरोळी;

..."

Wikipedia:

The bombing of Dresden was a joint British and American aerial bombing attack on the city of Dresden, the capital of the German state of Saxony, during World War II. In four raids between 13 and 15 February 1945, 772 heavy bombers of the Royal Air Force (RAF) and 527 of the United States Army Air Forces (USAAF) dropped more than 3,900 tons[vague] of high-explosive bombs and incendiary devices on the city. The bombing and the resulting firestorm destroyed more than 1,600 acres (6.5 km2) of the city centre. Up to 25,000 people were killed

 View of Dresden by Moonlight, by Johan Christian Dahl (1788-1857

सातारा औंधचे संस्थान अव्वल दर्जाचे होते...Aundh State Stood Out Before 1947

 John Zubrzycki, 'Dethroned: Patel, Menon and the Integration of Princely India',  2023:

"...The motivations of the main players in this endgame of empire differed greatly. For Congress leaders, the princely states were bastions of despotism, debauchery and decay. Nehru derided them as ‘sinks of reaction and incompetence and unrestrained autocratic power, sometimes exercised by vicious and degraded individuals’.  Corfield and others who had served in them, including many Indian dewans, ministers and administrators, took a more nuanced view. Yes, there were tyrants who should have been deposed had it not been for their usefulness to the British, but there were also many states such as Mysore, Baroda and Aundh where indigenous rule was benevolent, devoid of communal friction, based on a stable social structure and carried out in an atmosphere of security and loyalty. Given time, it would be possible for the princes to put their houses in order. While Nehru was making no secret of his abhorrence of feudal autocracy, the father of Hindutva, Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, saw the states as representing the true India, ‘portals to a pure, ancient past’, and even as ‘the foundation on which the future nation’ could be launched. As for the princes, all but the most myopic had some inkling that the tide of history was turning against them, that the prospect of dozens of ‘mini Ulsters’ made up of larger states exercising their right to independence and of small states creating their own federations would never be tolerated by the leaders of a newly independent dominion of India or Pakistan..."

My grandfather the late D G Kulkarni was a Political Secretary to the ruler of Aundh in 1947 and before. 

 

हिंदीची चलती ...Popular Reading Material in Hindi in Maharashtra in 1970s

 माझ्या लहानपणी (१९६९-१९७५) हिंदीची फार चलती मुंबई बाहेरच्या पश्चिम महाराष्ट्रात सुद्धा होती... 

 अधिकृत चलती  म्हणजे आम्हा मुलांना एका पाठोपाठ एक हिंदी परीक्षा देण्यासाठी केले जात असलेले शाळेतून आवाहन... मी हिंदी 'बालबोधिनी' परीक्षा उत्साहाने दिली पण मला हिंदी भाषा आवडत नसल्याने 'पहिली' परीक्षा कशीबशी दिली आणि तो प्रकार संपवला ...

 

अर्थात ती नुसती अधिकृत नव्हती , लोक हिंदी मासिके (उदा मनोहर कहानियाँ) , गुलशन नंदा (तत्सम लेखक मराठीत उदयाला त्यातूनच आले) यांच्या सारखे लेखक (त्यांच्या जाडजूड पॉकेटबुक्स) मोठ्या प्रमाणावर वाचत असत, त्यामुळेच 'दीपावली' मासिकाच्या  हिंदी वार्षिकाचा उदय झाला असावा... 

 

त्याचे एक कारण मराठी म्हणजे  तेंव्हा माफक दारात लोकप्रिय असे वाचायला कमी मिळत होते ...

 

आम्ही लहान मुले सुद्धा वाचायला हपापले होतो पण फक्त स्वस्त असे चांदोबा मासिक आणखी छोटीछोटी पुस्तके मिळत असत... कॉमिक्स भारतात इंद्रजाल कॉमिक्स सुरु होईपर्यंत मिळत नव्हती ... आणि इंद्रजाल फक्त  दोन-तीन सुपरहीरोच छापायचे ... ती पुस्तके मी कोल्हापूरला माझ्या मावशीकडे वाचली... इतर गोष्टीची पुस्तके होती आणि मला ती सुदैवाने खूप वाचायला मिळाली  पण सगळे महाग असायचे ... कारण छापलेला कागदच महाग होता... 

 

माझ्या वडिलांमुळॆ मी इंग्लिश पुस्तकांकडे सुद्धा वळलो होतो आणि आमच्याकडेच त्याचा मोठा संग्रह होता ...

 

बरेच जण वाचनालये ऍक्टिव्हली वापरत असत, मी तर डिटेक्टिव्ह पुस्तके (काशीकर, नाईक, शिरवळकर...अर्नाळकर मात्र नाही कारण ते मला बोअर व्हायचे) वाचून, वाचून मिरजेतील एक दोन लायब्ररी संपवल्या होत्या .... 

 

दीपावली हिंदी वार्षिक १९५५ चे मुखपृष्ठ सोबत 

 

 कलाकार : दीनानाथ दलाल, दलाल आर्ट स्टुडिओ

 

सौजन्य आणि आभार :

 

महाराष्ट्र राज्य मराठी विकास संस्था, चित्रकार दीनानाथ दलाल मेमोरियल समिती, दलाल परिवार

विशेषतः जळाऊ लाकडांत तर म्हणे नगाला नग फायदा असतो ... Don Quixote has begun to take on some of Sancho Panza’s characteristics, and vice versa

डॉन : " विशेषतः जळाऊ लाकडांत  तर म्हणे नगाला नग फायदा असतो ..."

(जी. ए. कुलकर्णी, यात्रिक, पिंगळावेळ , १९७७, पृष्ठ २४१)

Paul Strathern, "Dark Brilliance: The Age of Reason: From Descartes to Peter the Great":

"...The frail and spindly ‘knight’ Don Quixote on his nag Rocinante, followed by the rotund ‘squire’ Sancho Panza on his donkey, has formed one of the great comic double-acts of literature. The earthy realism (and native intelligence) of Sancho Panza provides a perfect foil for the self-deluded idealism of Don Quixote. Cervantes gives full range to Sancho, allowing him to comment on his master’s chivalric deeds in colloquial fashion. Though ironically, by the end of their long succession of picaresque exploits, Don Quixote has begun to take on some of Sancho Panza’s characteristics, and vice versa. Thus, as the book eventually draws towards its close, with Don Quixote on his deathbed, he is trying to persuade Sancho Panza that they should embark upon a life as pastoral shepherds...."

यात्रिक च्या शेवटी जीएंनी  "Don Quixote has begun to take on some of Sancho Panza’s characteristics, and vice versa" ह्याचे हृद्य वर्णन केले आहे ... 

"... “For God’s sake, Sancho, no more proverbs!” exclaimed Don Quixote; “it seems to me thou art becoming sicut erat again; speak in a plain, simple, straight-forward way, as I have often told thee, and thou wilt find the good of it.”

“I don’t know what bad luck it is of mine,” said Sancho, “but I can’t utter a word without a proverb that is not as good as an argument to my mind; however, I mean to mend if I can;” and so for the present the conversation ended...."

Title: The History of Don Quixote  Author: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra Translator: John Ormsby illustrated by Gustave Doré