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."

Saturday, April 17, 2021

'आम्रपाली' ही आम्रपाली, वैजयंतीमाला या दोघींची सुंदर, सुश्राव्य शोकांतिका आहे...Who is Rosie? What Happened to Her?...Amrapali @55

R. K. Narayan, Guide, 1958: “…As they sipped their coffee, Rosie began her dance, to the accompaniment of a song that she lightly sang. I ventured to beat time with my hands, like a very knowing one. They watched in fascination. She suddenly paused, wiped the perspiration from her brow, took a deep breath, and, before resuming again, said to me, “Don’t beat time; it misleads me.”

“All right,” I said, awkwardly grinning, trying not to look snubbed. I whispered, “Oh, she is so precise, you know.” They shook their heads.

She finished her piece and asked, “Shall I go on? Shall I do ‘The Dancing Feet’?”

“Yes, yes,” I cried, glad to be consulted. “Go on. They will like it.”

When they recovered from the enchantment, one of them said, “I must admit I have never cared for Bharat Natyam, but watching this lady is an education. I now know why people are in raptures over it.”

The other said, “My only fear is that she may be too good for our function. But it doesn’t matter. I’ll reduce the other items to give her all the time she wants.”…”

R. K. Narayan, ‘My Days’,1974: “…Lord Mountbatten suddenly asked, “What’s the story of The Guide?” Pearl Buck began to narrate it, but could not proceed very far with it. I heard her say, “There was a man called Raju—he was a guide—”

“What guide?” asked his lordship, in his deep voice.

This question upset her flow of narration. She turned to me and said, “Narayan, you tell the story.”

I would not open my mouth. Dammit, I had taken eighty thousand words to tell the story; I was not going to be drawn into it now. Press announcements had given Pearl Buck credit for writing the screenplay, and it was said that she had been paid an advance of twenty-five or two hundred thousand dollars, and I was not going to help her out now. She looked pleadingly at me, and everyone there tried to egg me on. I sat tight. Pearl Buck meandered: “There was Rosie—the dancer. . . .”

“Oh!” exclaimed M. “Who is she? What happened to her?” he asked with a sudden interest, which made Pearl Buck once again lose track of her own narration. I must admit that I enjoyed her predicament, as she treated Mountbatten to a mixed-up, bewildering version of The Guide…”

ZIYA US SALAM, Frontline, November 2017: “…But not once did (Lekh) Tandon remind anyone that cinema was essentially a director’s medium where actors carry out the director’s vision. He was always happy to stay behind the scenes, happy to let others hog the limelight. He was like an industrious worker who did his job, collected his wages, and worried about the next day. In his case, the next film.

This ability to blend with the shadows is particularly praiseworthy when one considers Tandon’s body of work. Besides the hits with Shammi Kapoor, he gave us Amrapali (1966), which was selected as the Indian entry for the Oscars. A more self-obsessed man would have been hungry for the spotlight, but not Tandon. He let Vyjayanthimala and Sunil Dutt, the film’s lead pair, be the talk of the town. And as the media talked endlessly about the film’s stars, music and dance numbers, it seemed that the director was almost incidental. Tandon was happy to be anonymous. Amrapali, in the common man’s mind, was a Vyjayanthimala movie with five superhit songs by Lata Mangeshkar…”

Sukanya Verma , March 2004: “…As for the dances, Vyjayanthimala's training in Bharata Natyam came in handy. The actress made Gopi Krishna's highly complicated dance steps look so simple with her grace. Her sex appeal was tastefully showcased in Bhanu Athaiya's costumes, which later came to be known as Amrapali blouses.

…Despite all its splendour, Amrapali didn't get a favourable response at the box-office.

Director Lekh Tandon moved on to find success in light-hearted comedies like Prince, Jhuk Gaye Aasman and dramas like Doosri Dulhan, Dulhan Wohi Jo Piya Man Bhaye and Agar Tum Na Hote.

But the film's leading lady, Vyjayanthimala, who looked breathtakingly beautiful, was heartbroken. Soon after Amrapali's no-show, she quit films.”

ह्या वर्षी हिंदी सिनेमा 'आम्रपाली' ला ५५ वर्षे पूर्ण होत आहेत.  

गाईड १९६५ मध्ये प्रकाशित झाला आणि असे म्हणतात की इंग्लिश भाषेतील गाईडच्या दिग्दर्शक पर्ल बक यांच्या मुळे रोझी (Rosie) ची भूमिका वैजयंतीमाला यांच्या ऐवजी वहिदा रेहमान यांना मिळाली कारण त्यांना आंतरराष्ट्रीय सिनेमासाठी बारीक रोझी हवी होती. 

आम्रपाली मध्ये वैजयंतीमाला अशा दिसतात की त्यांच्या इतके सुंदर आणि आकर्षक हिंदी सिनेमाच्या आजवरच्या इतिहासात क्वचितच कोणी दिसले असेल. (मला स्वतःला लहानपणचे c1967 त्यांचे आवडलेले ह्या सिनेमाचे पोस्टर्स आठवतात!)

जणू वैजयंतीमाला यांनी  दिसण्या आणि नृत्यावरून हे आनंद बंधूंना (देव आणि विजय) सिद्ध केले की त्यांनी वैजयंतीमाला यांना गाईड मध्ये न घेऊन मोठी चूक केली, मला स्वतःला वैजयंतीमाला, गाईड मध्ये , खूप जास्त आवडल्या असत्या...
 
आर के नारायण म्हणतात : "...My story is about a dancer in a small town, an exponent of the strictly classical tradition of South Indian Bharat Natyam. The film-makers felt this was inadequate..." 
(page 493, 'The Writerly Life', R K Narayan, 2001)
 
1965-> the best  South Indian Bharat Natyam dancer-> Vyjayanthimala@32!

असे सुद्धा ऐकले की आम्रपाली सिनेमाच्या वितरणात शम्मी कपूर ह्यांचा आर्थिक सहभाग होता, ते  वैजयंतीमाला यांच्या नृत्यावर प्रचंड फिदा होते, आम्रपाली चे बरेच सेट closed असायचे, म्हणजे no visitors. त्यामुळे शम्मी कपूर आणि आशा पारेख आपल्या सेट वरून (बहुतेक तिसरी मंझील) जाऊन, शेजारच्या सेटवर वैजयंतीमाला यांची नृत्ये बघायला जात असत...
 
खरोखर असे नृत्य प्रत्यक्ष बघायला भाग्य हवे, काय तो presence, काय ते हावभाव, काय तो पदान्यास...पर्वणी!
 
आम्रपाली मी एकदा संपूर्ण पहिला आहे आणि वैजयंतीमाला, संगीत व इतर तांत्रिक अंगे सोडून त्यात काही दम नाही. शेवटी तर तो गुंडाळल्या सारखा वाटतो. 
 
१९६२ आणि १९६५ च्या युद्धांनंतर अशा प्रकारचा १९६६साली काढलेल्या pacifist सिनेमाचा दर्जा, त्याला काही बाजारात किंवा समीक्षकांकडे भाव मिळण्यासाठी, उच्च हवा होता. पण १९४७ पासून, भरपूर हिंदी सिनेमे भिकार निघाले आहेत, त्यात आणखी एक. 
 
वैजयंतीमाला यांनी त्याआधी इतक्या चांगल्या सिनेमात कामे केली असून सुद्धा त्यांना ह्या सिनेमाचा मूलभूत weakness कसा दिसला नाही याचे आश्चर्य वाटते. सिनेमा वैजयंतीमाला यांना, एखाद्या documentary प्रमाणे, उत्तम पद्धतीने showcase  करतो. पण सिनेमा म्हणून तोंडघशी पडतो. 
 
'आम्रपाली', १९६६ ही ऐतिहासिक आम्रपाली आणि वैजयंतीमाला या दोघींची सुंदर, सुश्राव्य शोकांतिका आहे, त्यांना ती न्याय देत नाही पण तरी ती मनात दरवळत राहील. 
 
following pictures are courtesy of the current copyright holders of the motion picture Amrapali, 1966