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, September 09, 2025

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

Saturday, September 06, 2025

गोपाळ गणेश आगरकर, जॉन स्टुअर्ट मिल आणि विनोदबुद्धी...Dostoyevsky, Funnily Enough, is Very Funny Indeed

गोपाळ गणेश आगरकर हे जॉन  स्टुअर्ट मिल यांचे भक्त होते...  

"...जॉन  स्टुअर्ट मिलसाहेब, पुढील जन्मीही तुमच्या पायाशी बसून शिकता आले तर मला अतिशय समाधान लाभेल. जर आपणास माझे सर्वात प्रिय व आदरणीय गुरु होणे शक्य झाले आणि मलाही आपला सर्वात नम्र आणि अज्ञात शिष्य होणे जमले तरच हे सुख मला लाभेल..."

('आगरकर', य  दि फडके, १९९६)
 
विचारवंत आणि तत्वज्ञ जॉन ग्रे याना मिल यांच्या बद्दल प्रचंड आदर आहे पण ते २०२२ मध्ये एका संवादात म्हणाले की मिल यांच्या संपूर्ण लिखाणामध्ये एकही विनोद नाही!
 
(there was nt a, there is one joke in john stuart mill except, i'm not, i'm not sureh was aware that he was making it when he, when he wrote it in his autobiography, he describes the mental breakdown he had in his late teems. He had a very complicated relationship with his father. And he wrote of his father, a james mill, rather do do utilitarian esaid, my father believed hat of a whole range of rather improbable reforms, where it were implemented, human life might become worth living semicodam. But he never displayed any enthusiasm at this prospect. That might be a joke.)

तोच 'गुण'  आगरकरांमध्ये होता का ? 
 
त्यांचे १८८२ चे 'डोंगरीच्या तुरुंगांतील आमचे १०१ दिवस' पुस्तक पहा , ते मराठी भाषेतील एक सर्वोत्तम पुस्तक आहे पण ते वाचनात आपल्याला अनेक वेळा हसू येते पण लिहणारा अतिशय गंभीर आहे ह्या कपनेने ते जास्तच येते. 

आगरकरांचे 'विकारविलसित' अथवा शेक्सपीअरकृत हॉम्लेट नाटकाचे भाषांतर ' १८८३ साली प्रसिद्ध झाले. 

ह ना आपटे आगरकरांनी तो अनुवाद का केला या बद्दल सांगतात :  

"...त्याची (शेक्सपीअरची) नाटके म्हणजे, विकारविलसितकारांच्या मताप्रमाणे केवळ मनोरंजनार्थ नाहीत, तर ती त्यांच्या योग्यतेप्रमाणे वाचून त्यांचा अभ्यास केला असता आपणास जीर्णारण्याप्रमाणे भासणार्या जगात उपयोगी पडणारी वर्तणूक शिकवणारी आहेत.…" 

('निवडक हरि नारायण आपटे', संपादक - विद्याधर पुंडलीक

बिचारा शेक्सपिअर सुद्धा उपयुक्ततावादी (utilitarian) होता!

त्याचे एक महत्वाचे कारण काय असावे याचा आणखी थोडा अंदाज मला एप्रिल २०२१ मध्ये एमा स्मिथ यांचे 'This Is Shakespeare' हे पुस्तक पाहताना आला

 : "... For the nineteenth century, Hamlet was identified as Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy, as clever, modishly alienated men saw themselves reflected in its cerebral and isolated protagonist. But as the twentieth century unleashed its mad cruelties at Passchendaele, Auschwitz and Hiroshima, King Lear insinuated itself in the cultural imagination instead...."

"clever, modishly alienated man"  गोपाळ गणेश आगरकर (१८५६- १८९५) स्वतःचे प्रतिबिंब "reflected in its cerebral and isolated protagonist." मध्ये पहात होते .. 

विनोद कुठून शिरकाव करणार?

मग मला हे आठवते:  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);...” 

Dostoyevsky, funnily enough, is very funny indeed!


 

The Labyrinth by Saul Steinberg

Wednesday, September 03, 2025

कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते...Natural Science, Religion...Krishna & Max Planck

 कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन।

मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि।।2.47।।

(Let your claim lie on action alone and never on the fruits; you should never be a cause for the fruits of action; let not your attachment be to inaction.)


 

Monday, September 01, 2025

Edgar Rice Burroughs@250...MAGNIFIQUE! Monsieur Tarzan, of Africa

अगदी कळायला लागल्या पासून टारझन हे नाव परिचित झाले -सिनेमातून, पुस्तकांतून .. त्यावेळी सुद्धा त्याच्या गोष्टीचे काही पैलू जरा समजायचे नाहीत, प्रश्न पडायचे, उदा: टारझन ची आपल्या आईवडिलांपासून झालेली ताटातूट... पण त्यामुळे काही फरक पडायचा नाही , मी मराठीत टारझन खूप वाचला....

 टारझन चा भारतातील सिनेमांवर, भाषेवर  सुद्धा प्रभाव होता, उदा सूरज, १९६६ वगैरे सारखे अत्यंत आवडलेले  सिनेमे कुठेतरी खोलवर टारझनवरच आधारित होते... 

 'Tarzan and His Mate', 1947, artist : J. ALLEN ST. JOHN (1872-1957)

With the publication of Edgar Rice Burroughs' second Tarzan novel 'The Return of Tarzan', in 1915, J. Allen St. John's legendary association with this timeless hero set a new standard in heroic fantasy art and inspired all the Tarzan artists to come, including such noteworthy talents as Hal Foster, Burne Hogarth, Frank Frazetta, Roy Krenkel, and countless others. The vast majority of collectors consider St. John's rendition of the Lord of the Jungle to be definitive.

This is how The Return of Tarzan begins:

"The Affair on the Liner

 

“Magnifique!” ejaculated the Countess de Coude, beneath her breath.

“Eh?” questioned the count, turning toward his young wife. “What is it that is magnificent?” and the count bent his eyes in various directions in quest of the object of her admiration.

“Oh, nothing at all, my dear,” replied the countess, a slight flush momentarily coloring her already pink cheek. “I was but recalling with admiration those stupendous skyscrapers, as they call them, of New York,” and the fair countess settled herself more comfortably in her steamer chair, and resumed the magazine which “nothing at all” had caused her to let fall upon her lap.

Her husband again buried himself in his book, but not without a mild wonderment that three days out from New York his countess should suddenly have realized an admiration for the very buildings she had but recently characterized as horrid.

Presently the count put down his book. “It is very tiresome, Olga,” he said. “I think that I shall hunt up some others who may be equally bored, and see if we cannot find enough for a game of cards.”

“You are not very gallant, my husband,” replied the young woman, smiling, “but as I am equally bored I can forgive you. Go and play at your tiresome old cards, then, if you will.”

When he had gone she let her eyes wander slyly to the figure of a tall young man stretched lazily in a chair not far distant.

“MAGNIFIQUE!” she breathed once more.

The Countess Olga de Coude was twenty. Her husband forty. She was a very faithful and loyal wife, but as she had had nothing whatever to do with the selection of a husband, it is not at all unlikely that she was not wildly and passionately in love with the one that fate and her titled Russian father had selected for her. However, simply because she was surprised into a tiny exclamation of approval at sight of a splendid young stranger it must not be inferred therefrom that her thoughts were in any way disloyal to her spouse. She merely admired, as she might have admired a particularly fine specimen of any species. Furthermore, the young man was unquestionably good to look at.

As her furtive glance rested upon his profile he rose to leave the deck. The Countess de Coude beckoned to a passing steward. “Who is that gentleman?” she asked.

“He is booked, madam, as Monsieur Tarzan, of Africa,” replied the steward.

“Rather a large estate,” thought the girl, but now her interest was still further aroused..."