मेघदूत: "नीचैर्गच्छत्युपरि दशा चक्रनेमिक्रमेण"

समर्थ शिष्या अक्का : "स्वामीच्या कृपाप्रसादे हे सर्व नश्वर आहे असे समजले. पण या नश्वरात तमाशा बहुत आहे."

G C Lichtenberg: “It is as if our languages were confounded: when we want a thought, they bring us a word; when we ask for a word, they give us a dash; and when we expect a dash, there comes a piece of bawdy.”

C. P. Cavafy: "I’d rather look at things than speak about them."

Martin Amis: “Gogol is funny, Tolstoy in his merciless clarity is funny, and Dostoyevsky, funnily enough, is very funny indeed; moreover, the final generation of Russian literature, before it was destroyed by Lenin and Stalin, remained emphatically comic — Bunin, Bely, Bulgakov, Zamyatin. The novel is comic because life is comic (until the inevitable tragedy of the fifth act);...”

सदानंद रेगे: "... पण तुकारामाची गाथा ज्या धुंदीनं आजपर्यंत वाचली जात होती ती धुंदी माझ्याकडे नाहीय. ती मला येऊच शकत नाही याचं कारण स्वभावतःच मी नास्तिक आहे."

".. त्यामुळं आपण त्या दारिद्र्याच्या अनुभवापलीकडे जाऊच शकत नाही. तुम्ही जर अलीकडची सगळी पुस्तके पाहिलीत...तर त्यांच्यामध्ये त्याच्याखेरीज दुसरं काही नाहीच आहे. म्हणजे माणसांच्या नात्यानात्यांतील जी सूक्ष्मता आहे ती क्वचित चितारलेली तुम्हाला दिसेल. कारण हा जो अनुभव आहे... आपले जे अनुभव आहेत ते ढोबळ प्रकारचे आहेत....."

Kenneth Goldsmith: "In 1969 the conceptual artist Douglas Huebler wrote, “The world is full of objects, more or less interesting; I do not wish to add any more.”1 I’ve come to embrace Huebler’s ideas, though it might be retooled as “The world is full of texts, more or less interesting; I do not wish to add any more.” It seems an appropriate response to a new condition in writing today: faced with an unprecedented amount of available text, the problem is not needing to write more of it; instead, we must learn to negotiate the vast quantity that exists. How I make my way through this thicket of information—how I manage it, how I parse it, how I organize and distribute it—is what distinguishes my writing from yours."

Tom Wolfe: "The first line of the doctors’ Hippocratic oath is ‘First, do no harm.’ And I think for the writers it would be: ‘First, entertain.’"

विलास सारंग: "… . . 1000 नंतर ज्या प्रकारची संस्कृती रुढ झाली , त्यामध्ये साधारणत्व विश्वात्मकता हे गुण प्राय: लुप्त झाले...आपली संस्कृती अकाली विश्वात्मक साधारणतेला मुकली आहे."

Tuesday, April 09, 2019

कोलंबसाचे गर्व (शरम) गीत....How Mean Columbus Could Be!

कुसुमाग्रजांचे "कोलंबसाचे गर्वगीत", १९३६ ही एक मराठीतील cult कविता आहे.  (पहा 'विशाखा', १९४२/२००३, पृष्ठ ५६-५७) 

कोलंबसाचे खरे रूप जगासमोर १९३६साली मोठ्या प्रमाणात आले नव्हते. ते शिरवाडकरांना माहित असते तर त्या कवितेचे नाव नक्कीच वेगळे असते.

वि स खांडेकर फेब्रुवारी १९४२ साली 'विशाखा' साठी लिहलेल्या अर्ध्यदानात (प्रस्तावनेत) या कवितेबद्दल म्हणतात : "... मानवतेचे निशाण मिरवू महासागरात /  जिंकुनी खंड खंड सारा' या कोलंबसच्या गीतातल्या त्यांच्या ओळी नवे जग निर्मू पाहणाऱ्या मानवालाही मार्गदर्शक आहेत ! नाही का?..." (पहा 'विशाखा', १९४२/२००३, पृष्ठ १५) 

कोलंबसचा आणि मानवतेचा काहीही संबंध नव्हता: “...As an explorer, the Admiral of the Ocean Sea is widely seen as an opportunist who made his great discovery without ever acknowledging it for what it was, and proceeded to enslave the populace he found, encourage genocide, and pollute relations between peoples who were previously unknown to each other. He was even assumed to have carried syphilis back to Europe with him to torment Europe for centuries thereafter. He excused his behavior, and his legacy, by saying that he merely acted as God’s instrument, even as he beseeched his Sovereigns, Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, to enrich him and his family. Historians have long argued that Columbus merely rediscovered the Americas, that the Vikings, the Celts, and American Indians arrived in the “New World” long before his cautious landfall....”

त्यामुळे तिथेच ती कविता कोलंबसची रहात नाही....शिवाय कवितेत कोलंबसच्या एकाही सफरीच्या हार्डफॅक्टस नाहीत. त्यामुळे कवितेचे नाव केंव्हाही बदलता आले असते...

मी Laurence Bergreen यांचे 'Columbus: The Four Voyages, 1492-1504', २०११ हे पुस्तक वाचत आहे. आधीचे इंग्लिश अवतरण त्यातीलच आहे.

पहिल्या सफरी मध्ये सुरवातीलाच काय झाले ते पहा.


““I sailed to the West southwest, and we took more water aboard than at any other time on the voyage,” wrote Christopher Columbus in his logbook on Thursday, October 11, 1492, on the verge of the defining moment of discovery. It occurred not a moment too soon, because the fearful and unruly crews of his three ships were about to mutiny. Overcome with doubt himself, he had tried to remind the rebels of their sworn duty, “telling them that, for better or worse, they must complete the enterprise on which the Catholic Sovereigns”—Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon, who jointly ruled Spain—“had sent them.” He could not risk offending his royal patrons, whom he lobbied for ten years to obtain this commission, and so he insisted, “I started out to find the Indies and will continue until I have accomplished that mission, with the help of Our Lord.” And they had better follow his lead or risk a cruel punishment.
Suddenly it seemed as if his prayers had been answered: “I saw several things that were indications of land.” For one thing, “A large flock of sea birds flew overhead.” And for another, a slender reed floated past his flagship, Santa María, and it was green, indicating it had grown nearby. Pinta’s crew noticed the same thing, as well as a “manmade” plank, carved by an unknown hand, perhaps with an “iron tool.” Those aboard Niña spotted a stick, equally indicative that they were approaching land. He encouraged the crew to give thanks rather than mutiny at this critical moment, doubled the number of lookouts, and promised a generous reward to the first sailor to spot terra firma.
And then, for hours, nothing.
Around ten o’clock that night, Columbus anxiously patrolled the highest deck, the stern castle. In the gloom, he thought he saw something resembling “a little wax candle bobbing up and down.” Perhaps it was a torch belonging to fishermen abroad at night, or perhaps it belonged to someone on land, “going from house to house.” Perhaps it was nothing more than a phantom sighting, common at sea, even for expert eyes. He summoned a couple of officers; one agreed with his assessment, the other scoffed. No one else saw anything, and Columbus did not trust his own instincts. As he knew from experience, life at sea often presented stark choices. If he succeeded in his quest to discover the basis of a Spanish empire thousands of miles from home, he would be on his way to fulfilling his pledge to his royal sponsors and attaining heroic status and unimaginable wealth. After all the doubts and trials he had endured, his accomplishment would be vindication of the headiest sort. But if he failed, he would face mutiny by his obstreperous crew, permanent disgrace, and the prospect of death in a lonely patch of ocean far from home....
....He would spend the rest of his life—and three subsequent voyages—attempting to make good on that pledge. Many in Europe were inclined to dismiss Polo’s account, by turns fantastic and commercial, as a beguiling fantasy, while others, Columbus especially, regarded it as the pragmatic travel guide that Polo intended. His attempt to find a maritime equivalent to Marco Polo’s journey to Asia bridged the gap between the medieval world of magic and might, and the stark universe of predator and prey of the Renaissance. Although Marco Polo had completed his journey two hundred years earlier, Columbus nevertheless expected to find the Mongol empire intact, and Kublai Khan, or another Grand Khan like him, alive and well and ready to do business. But Kublai was long gone, and his empire in ruins.
Protected by his delusion, Columbus conveniently concluded that he had reached an island or peninsula on the outskirts of China, a leap made possible only by omitting the Americas and the Pacific Ocean from his skewed geography. And as for the promised reward, which should have gone to the humble seaman, Rodrigo de Triana, who had first sighted land, Columbus decided that his own vision of the glowing candle took precedence, and so he kept the proceeds for himself.”

त्या कोत्या मनाच्या कोलंबसाने साधे जमीन दिसल्याचे बक्षीस सुद्धा आपल्या खलाशाला (Rodrigo de Triana) न देता स्वतःच्या खिशात टाकले!


Artist: Mastroianni and Hart

3 comments:

अवधूत डोंगरे said...

चांगला संदर्भ आहे.
कोलंबस या व्यक्तीविषयी १९३६पर्यंत कितपत माहिती सहज उपलब्ध होती, त्याचा अंदाज नाही, पण फारशी माहिती नसेल तरीही, किमान भारताच्या तत्कालीन राज्यकर्त्यांवरून आणि त्यांच्या उपलब्ध इतिहासावरून नि व्यवहारांवरून काही रिकाम्या जागा कवीने भरल्या असत्या तर चांगलं राहिलं असतं. शिवाय, कवितेत कुठेतरी गर्भितार्थ तसा क्रूरच आहे- 'जिंकुनी खंड खंड सारा', 'कोट्यावधी जगतात जीवाणू जगती अन् मरती, जशी ती गवताची पाती, नाविक आम्ही परंतु फिरतो सात नभाखाली निर्मितो नव क्षितिजे पुढती', 'कथा या खुळ्या सागराला', 'किनारा तुला पामराला', इत्यादी (जाणीवपूर्वक त्यांनी तसं केलं नसेल. पण शब्दांच्या वापरातून ते तसं चित्र समोर येतं). या उलट, १९३६ सालीच प्रकाशित झालेल्या 'श्यामची आई'च्या प्रस्तावनेत साने गुरुजी असं लिहितात: "मोठेपणा याचा अर्थ जगातील काही व्यक्तींच्या ओठांवर आपले नाव काही काळ नाचणे, असा मी करीत नाही. हिमालयाच्या द-याखो-यांत असे प्रचंड व गगनचुंबी वृक्ष असतील, की ज्यांची नावे जगाला माहीत नाहीत; रानावनांतील कानाकोप-यात असे एखादे रमणीय व सुगंधी फूल फुललेले असेल, की, ज्याचा पत्ता कोणाला लागलेला नाही. समुद्राच्या पोटात अशी गोलबंद व पाणीदार मोत्ये असतील, की ज्याची जगास वार्ता नाही. पृथ्वीच्या पोटात ता-यांसारखे तेजस्वी हिरे असतील; परंतु मानवजातीस त्यांचे अद्यापि दर्शन नाही. वर अनंत आकाशात असे अनंत तारे असतील, की जे पल्लेदार दुर्बिणीतूनही अजून दिसले नाहीत. मोठेपणा याचा अर्थ जगाला माहीत असणे, असा मी करीत नाही."
तर, दृष्टिकोनातला फरकही कारणीभूत असावा. मानवकेंद्री दृष्टिकोन आणि मानवेतर सगळ्यांचा अंदाज बांधणारा दृष्टिकोन, अशी तफावत दिसते. साने गुरुजींच्या लिखाणात दुसऱ्या त्रुटी नसतील असं नाही, पण एक दृष्टिकोन म्हणून तो स्वतःला काही बाबतीत विस्तारायला बघत होता.
शिरवाडकरांनी 'कल्पनेच्या तीरावर' या कादंबरीत मात्र चांगला प्रयत्न केला असं वाटतं. ती बहुधा १९५० साली प्रकाशित झाली पहिल्यांदा. त्यात फँटसी वापरून असा थोडा लेखकीय कल्पकतेला विस्तारायचा गंमतीशीर प्रयत्न दिसला.

Aniruddha G. Kulkarni said...


थँक्स अवधूत.

ही कविता हे मराठीत अजून fashionable असलेल्या "मानवतावादाचे" (liberal humanism) गीत आहे. त्यात गवत, जीवाणू वगैरे फक्त माणसाचे "श्रेष्ठत्व" दाखवायला येतात.

अर्थात साने गुरुजी त्या मानवतावादाचेच मोठे पाईक होते. त्यामुळे त्यांचे म्हणणे तुम्ही म्हणता त्याप्रमाणे "काही बाबतीत विस्तारायला बघत होता." हेच असावे.

'कल्पनेच्या तीरावर' यात शिरवाडकर मानवतावादा पेक्षा वेगळा विचार करत असतील तरच त्या फँटसीमध्ये मला इंटरेस्ट आहे...

अवधूत डोंगरे said...

You say, "कोलंबसचा आणि मानवतेचा काहीही संबंध नव्हता". And I am saying that perhaps मानवता and the subsequent वाद and the poem (unintentionally and indirectly) go hand in hand with what Columbus did. [end]