माधव जूलियन, डेक्कन एज्युकेशन सोसायटी आणि शेक्सपिअर, १९२५...The Year of Lear

(वरील कविता बा सी  मर्ढेकरांची, असंग्रहित)

माधव जूलियन यांनी ११ ऑक्टोबर १९२५ डेक्कन एज्युकेशन सोसायटीच्या आजीव सभासदत्वाचा राजीनामा दिला. ते त्याच दिवशी संध्याकाळी कवि गिरीश यांच्याकडे गेले होते. त्यांची मनस्थिती अत्यंत वाईट होती. 

त्यांनी गिरीश यांच्या कडून शेक्सपिअर चे किंग लिअर नाटक घेऊन , एका पानावर थांबून , हा भाग मोठ्याने म्हटला:  

Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand.

Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thine own back.

Thy blood as hotly lusts to use her in that kind

For which thou whip’st her. The usurer hangs the cozener.

Through tattered clothes great vices do appear;

Robes and furred gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold,

And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks.

Arm it in rags, a pigmy’s straw does pierce it.  
 

(20.154–59)

वाचून होताच पुस्तक भिंतीवर फेकून मारले आणि म्हणाले 'That's why Shakespeare is great'... 

(' माधव जूलियन', ले: गं. दे. खानोलकर, १९५१-१९६८, पृष्ठे: १५१-१५२)

 विशेष म्हणजे शेक्सपिअर यांचे मोठे अभ्यासक James Shapiro त्यांच्या 'The Year of Lear: Shakespeare in 1606', २०१५ या पुस्तकात सुद्धा ह्याच ओळींबाबत लिहतात:

"... Shakespeare’s engagement with Harsnett’s book (In 1603, Samuel Harsnett wrote a book, A Declaration of Egregious Popish Impostures which condemned exorcisms performed by Roman Catholic priests in the 1580s. Shakespeare used this book as a source, pulling words and phrases when writing the play King Lear)  deepens over the course of King Lear. The abuse of authority, so transparent in page after page of the Declaration, is a kind of nightmare that Lear at last comes to recognize. For Lear—and for playgoers—at play’s end, authority is shown to be arbitrary, its “great image” a beggar running from a barking dog (20.149–53). In what is arguably the most explicit piece of social criticism in all of his work, Shakespeare has Lear conclude that violence, deception, and hypocrisy in the kingdom are endemic... 

There is the evil that stems from the abuse of authority and there is another kind that cannot be so easily explained by self-interest and the human propensity for cruelty. In King Lear, Shakespeare wrestles with the nature of this kind of evil as well, something that Harsnett, in a book about the demonic, takes as a given but never confronts. Historical events would soon ensure that this question would take on even greater relevance as Shakespeare was finishing King Lear that winter. And he wasn’t done with Harsnett quite yet, or with questions of possession, bewitching, or where evil originates."

खानोलकरांचे पुस्तक वाचून आपल्याला पुरेपूर खात्री पटते की माधव जूलियन यांना त्यांची त्यावेळची स्थिती वर्णायला किंग लिअर पेक्षा चांगले उदाहरण सापडले नसते, आज आपल्याला २०२१ साली सुद्धा सापडणार नाही.... 

"Shakespeare has Lear conclude that violence, deception, and hypocrisy in the kingdom are endemic... " तुम्ही वेगळा निष्कर्ष काढू शकता काय?

 

Her Cat and Her Dog....

'Laziness', 1896 by Félix Vallotton

'Woman and a dog' 1935 by Christina Malman

शांता हेर्लेकर , महादेव पटवर्धन, माधव जूलियन....Marie Corelli's God's Good Man or Dr. Sigmund Freud's?

 माधव जूलियन यांच्या कडे मी पुन्हा पुन्हा येतो त्याचे एक कारण म्हणजे त्यांच्या आणि माझ्या वडिलांच्या आयुष्यात असलेलं विलक्षण साम्य. (या बद्दल विस्ताराने नंतर एकदा.)

कै. महादेव पटवर्धन यांना "ज्यूलियन् ऍडरले"  (Julian Adderley) असे म्हणायला त्यांच्या वर्गमैत्रिण शांता हेर्लेकर  यांनी १९११ च्या सुमारास सुरु केले. त्यावरून महादेव पटवर्धन हे स्वेच्छेने आणि आवडीने 'माधव जूलियन' झाले.

हे  ज्यूलियन् ऍडरले,  मेरी काॅरेली (१८५५-१९२४) यांच्या 'God's Good Man: A Simple Love Story'  (1904) या कादंबरीतील एक पात्र आहे, जे कविता करून दोन मुलींना वाचायला एकाच वेळी देत असत. आणि शांताबाई म्हणतात, माधवराव पटवर्धन तसेच  करत असत. (पृष्ठ: ३९-४०, 'माधव जूलियन', गं. दे. खानोलकर, १९५१-१९६८)

“... True — go on with the problem,” — said Julian vaguely, taking off his hat and raking his hair with his fingers as he was wont to do when at all puzzled— “The problem is— ‘why do I write poetry if nobody wants to read it’ — and ‘what’s the good’? Now, in the first place, I will reply that I am not sure I write ‘poetry.’ I try to express my identity in rhythm and rhyme — but after all, that expression of myself may be prose, and wholly without interest to the majority. You see? I put it to you quite plainly. Then as to ‘what’s the good?’ — I would argue ‘what’s the bad?’ So far, I live quite harmlessly. From the unexpected demise of an uncle whom I never saw, I have a life-income of sixty pounds a year. I am happy on that — I desire no more than that. On that I seek to evolve myself into SOMETHING — from a nonentity into shape and substance — and if, as is quite possible, there can be no ‘good,’ there may be a certain less of ‘bad’ than might otherwise chance to me. What think you?... ”

(यात्या पुस्तकातील काही अंश वाचून मला वाटले की शांताबाईंनी  Julian Adderley हे नाव माधवरावांसाठी योग्य काढले होते , ते माधवरावांना सुद्धा पटले आणि म्हणून ते त्यांनी 'घेतले'. माधवरावांचे Julian Adderley याच्याशी इतर अनेक बाबीत साम्य असावेसे वाटते.)

A simple love story?  शांताबाई आणि माधव जूलियन या दोघांमधल्या नात्याइतकी गुंतागुंतीची कथा मी कुठेच वाचली नसेल... एका क्षणी ते लग्न करायच ठरवतात पण ते फिस्कटत. त्या दोगांच्या संबंधात अनेक नाती निर्माण होतात आणि शेवटी आईचे चुंबन सुद्धा येते... २०व्या शतकातील पहिल्या भागात, मराठी पांढरपेशे लोक हे किती स्त्री-पुरुष नातेसंबंधात गोंधळून  गेले होते, याचे हे आणखी एक उदाहरण. (२१व्य शतकात ह्या सीमेवर सगळ आलबेल आहे असा याचा अर्थ नाही.)

ह्या मेरी काॅरेली आज २०२१ साली महाराष्ट्रात कितीजणांना माहित असतील? 

Marie Corelli (born Mary Mackay) was a best-selling British novelist of the Victorian and Edwardian eras, whose controversial works of the time often label her as an early advocate of the New Age movement.
In the 1890’s Marie Corelli’s novels were eagerly devoured by millions in England, America and the colonies. Her readers ranged from Queen Victoria and Gladstone, to the poorest of shop girls. In all she wrote thirty books, the majority of which were phenomenal best sellers. Despite the fact that her novels were either ignored or belittled by the critics, at the height of her success she was the best selling and most highly paid author in England.

जाड बाईवर कार्टून? काहीतरीच!.....Magnificent Inocencio Medina Vera

वजनदार स्त्रीयांवर आज कार्टून काढण अगदीच घिसापीटा वाटेल , पण १९०१साली इतक्या अप्रतिम शैलीत ते बघायला प्रचंड आनंद झाला असणार.... मला आजही होतोय...

भारतात जाड बायकांवर देशी विनोद तयार व्हायला कोणते साल उजाडले मला माहित नाही, मराठीत असे पहिले व्यंगचित्र केंव्हा तयार झाले कुणास ठावूक?

  “Crítica situación”, cover from “Madrid Cómico” magazine,1901.

Artist : Inocencio Medina Vera, 1876-1918

 

 

आकाशांतिल अधोरेखितें....1969 Moon Landing, Comets of the 1970's and Indians

 It may be little difficult to believe but the moon landing of 1969 captured the imagination of Indians as much as Americans or any other nation in the world. (Note:  most Indians could not watch or hear the event live.)

Just about every aspect of the culture, education etc. was impacted by the event. It became a part of the language, Hindi film songs etc.

The enclosed picture celebrates the same celestial event.

It shows that a wedding is taking place in space and solemnizing priest is asking the couple to go to the moon for their honeymoon because the rock is not too far away. (Since there is no native word for honeymoon in Marathi language, the English word honeymoon is translated as honey+moon!).

Bride and groom are shown like comets. 

Comet Bennett had graced the earth in 1970. My mother woke me up at pre-dawn and brought me down from our first floor bedroom to the street in front of our Miraj house to show the magnificent spectacle in the sky. I have never forgot the scene.

Sky was overwhelmed by the comet.  (I have often felt since my mother died in 2006 that her influence on me is like a great comet or comet Bennett. )

The artist is the late Shyam Joshi and the publication is Marathi magazine "Vangmay Shobha", Diwali, 1975, price is INR 6/-.

Just Drowning....Goya's The Dog

Stevie Smith (1903-1971):
"And not waving but drowning

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning."

Stephen Phelan, The Guardian, January 2019:

"...And I keep coming back to The Drowning Dog, which is funny only in the sense that it makes me cry in public. What long-dead pet served as Goya’s model? The artist loved dogs and wrote about them often in his letters. It reminds me of my own dog, now old and grey around the snout. How long do we have left together? I look at this painting and I see in that poor animal our condition in general, and our historical moment in particular. I’m the dog and you’re the dog, our heads held just above a dark, rising tide."


Jonathan Jones, The Guardian:

"A dog is drowning in quicksand. Its grey head pokes defiantly out of the brown sludge, even as a dead yellow sky above insists there is no hope. No saviour....

...Surely it was the madness of this war, not deafness, that drove Goya into the darkest regions of his mind. Here in Zaragoza – where people fought French soldiers in the narrow streets, and where as a young painter he churned out consoling religious nonsense about miracles and holy pillars – Goya looked into hell. And the Black Paintings are what he saw"

'The Dog',  It is one of Goya's Black Paintings,

 Artist Francisco Goya, 1819-1823

कोण सांगितल होत तुला ह्या अवतारात यायला?...Egypt

Maxfield Parrish, "Egypt", 1922

  

स्त्री : "चल पटकन आवर , माझ्या ढुंगणाला केंव्हापासून चटके बसतायत."

पुरुष: "कोण सांगितल होत तुला ह्या अवतारात यायला?"

 

Why Language Was Invented....!

#मराठीभाषादिवस #कुसुमाग्रज१०९

Artist : Carolita Johnson, The New Yorker, January 2019