Do Most Soldiers Just Want to Get Home in One Piece?

Erich Maria Remarque in “All Quiet On The Western Front":

“This book is to be neither an accusation nor a confession, and least of all an adventure, for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it. It will try simply to tell of a generation of men who, even though they may have escaped shells, were destroyed by the war.”

George Orwell in "Homage to Catalonia":

"One of the most horrible features of war is that the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting."

Arundhati Roy:

"...Sometimes the most rabid people calling for war, calling for Pakistan to be nuked, etc, are those who live far away, who will not have to suffer the consequences of what they're saying. You see it all the time in the Letters columns of magazines and newspapers..."

Recently in India, 10th anniversary of the Kargil war was observed. Many 'celebrated' India's 'victory' there.

On September 1, 2009, the world observed 70th anniversary of the start of the World War II.

The Greatest Generation is a term often used by Americans to describe the generation who grew up during the deprivation of the Great Depression, and then went on to fight in World War II.

While reviewing "D-Day: The Battle for Normandy" by Antony Beevor, Dominic Sandbrook says:

"...Despite all the patriotic American nonsense about the "greatest generation", Beevor shows that there were remarkably few heroes. There were rarely "more than a handful of men prepared to take risks and attack," he says; most men just wanted to get home in one piece and "somebody else to play the role of hero". Surveys showed that if a few broke ranks and fled, the rest would follow; in most engagements, as many as half never fired a shot..."

(The Observer, Sunday 31 May 2009 )

JONATHAN SUMPTION on "Finest Years" by Max Hastings:

"...Max Hastings’ views about the British army in the second world war are well known, and are pungently repeated here. Its ranks were filled with ‘many men willing to do their duty, but few who sought to become heroes.’ Its leaders, with a handful of exceptions, were risk-averse blockheads, devoid of imagination or initiative..."

(Spectator, September 16, 2009)

Back home, consider the third battle of Panipat that was fought on January 14, 1761.

Many high-profile commanders of Maratha army just wanted to get home in one piece and somebody else to play the role of hero.

What about India's battles since 1947? Are they tales of only courage and bravery?

For me, Haqeeqat(1964) remains the only authentic war tale told by the Hindi cinema since 1947.


Artist: Pat Oliphant

For more pictures of Pat Oliphant click here

So oft in cultural wars, the disputants rail on in utter ignorance

John Godfrey Saxe's (1816-1887) poem on the famous Indian parable "The Blindmen and the Elephant" concludes like his:

"...And so these men of Hindustan
Disputed loud and long,
Each in his own opinion
Exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right
And all were in the wrong.

So oft in theologic wars,
The disputants, I ween,
Rail on in utter ignorance
Of what each other mean,
And prate about an Elephant
Not one of them has seen!"

In 21st century Maharashtra, I see all around, men of Hindustan, first disputing loud and long, and then fighting 'theologic' and cultural wars, railing on in utter ignorance.

Vasant Sarwate's वसंत सरवटे cover of Lalit Diwali 2009 ललित दिवाळी is based on world famous M. C. Escher's woodcut print "Sky and Water I", first printed in June 1938.

The original print is reproduced at the end of my commentary and Sarwate's picture is embedded at the bottom of the post.

Wielding a sketch pen in one hand and a sword in the other, the artists in Sarwate's picture are ready to slit each other's throat to make their own perception prevail.

In fact, the sketch pens in their hands, which look more like spears than drawing instruments, seem so ferocious that they remind me of a chilling scene from Batman (1989) when the joker proves the adage "the pen is truly mightier than the sword"!

Killer weapons in their hands make a poignant comment on the current intolerant environment towards art (and artistic freedom) and history in Maharashtra.

No wonder Shiv Visvanathan observes: "Three great modernised societies in India — Maharashtra, Karnataka and Gujarat — are deep in the throes of rightist groups who use bans as a way of sustaining politics."

(Some people say Bal Thackeray and Raj Thackeray are artists first and then politicos. I wonder if the two artists in the picture are them because both claim to understand "Marathi culture" better than the other.)

Have the artists from Sarwate's picture seen the "elephant"?

Commenting on his own picture Escher said: "In the horizontal center strip there are birds and fish equivalent to each other. We associate flying with sky, and so for each of the black birds the sky in which it is flying is formed by the four white fish which encircle it. Similarly swimming makes us think of water, and therefore the four black birds that surround a fish become the water in which it swims."

This print has been used in physics, geology, chemistry, and in psychology for the study of visual perception.

GILBERT ADAIR: "...M. C. Escher, the Dutch-born graphic artist whose images of endlessly diminishing birds, fish and lizards, the tiniest of them bunched up at the edges of the picture frame, constitute a remarkable approximation of the counter- intuitive results obtained by adding up an infinite series of fractions (e.g. 1+1/2+1/4+ 1/8+1/16 … equals not infinity but 2)..."

I guess it's the first time it has been used in a cartoon.

To appreciate full esthetic value of 'Sky and Water I', see a short film by National Film Board of Canada on youtube here.


Artist: M. C. Escher, "Sky and Water I", 1938


Artist: Vasant Sarwate, Lalit Diwali 2009 ललित दिवाळी

(notice Sarwate's use of colours instead of Escher's B & W, warrior on the left is made of curves and one of the right of straight lines, only top three rows have fish-water/bird-air...)

Click on the respective years to see Sarwate's covers of Lalit Diwali 2008 and 2007.

You are Not-out, David Shepherd

Watching a good cricket test match is like reading a good novel. Many actors and situations.

One such actor was the late David Shepherd.

I enjoyed watching David Shepherd as much I did watching players.

I remember a test match in Melbourne, Australia in December 1999.

It was Brett Lee's debut test.

Peter Roebuck wrote: "This was a day to remember, a day on which Brett Lee made a startling first appearance in his country's colors and Sachin Tendulkar stood alone at the crease defying formidable odds with courage and skill.

It was a glorious confrontation between old and new, mighty and promising, an expression of the great gifts of the game, the brilliance of batsmanship, the excitement of pace and the powers needed to reach the gods. Meanwhile, a superb leg-spinner (Shane Warne) also bowled with artistry and cunning as he pursued his own landmark. It wasn't a day to have stayed in bed. There haven't been many better...

...When Tendulkar reached his 100, the entire crowd rose in acclamation. His dismissal, caught on the boundary, brought the crowd to its feet a second time.
It had been the perfect day. The visiting champion had scored a century. And a new fast bowler had arrived on the scene."

That was India's first innings.

In second innings, his back against the wall, Tendulkar was playing Shane Warne beautifully but a touch nervously.

In the end Warne prevailed by getting him out LBW.

David Shepherd was the umpire. He had watched the confrontation of the two masters from the close and probably made the correct decision in the end.

While Shepherd enjoyed two masters at work, I enjoyed three!



picture courtesy: Dylan Martinez/Reuters

Is 'Positive Thinking Talk' in Marathi TV Serials a Cheap Import from USA?

Joseph Conrad: “The fact is you want more scepticism at the very foundation of your work. Scepticism the tonic of minds, the tonic of life, the agent of truth- the way of art and salvation.”

While surfing cable TV, I often pause on Marathi channels, showing sitcoms, to find out what they are upto.

Every now and then, I meet a character that says: "Everything will be OK/ it will all get sorted out/ All will work out in the end."...In fact, these must be the most spoken statements in a Marathi soap.

Almost every character- hero/villain, old/young, male/female, rich/poor, being borne/dying, healthy/sick, Brahmin/Dalit, Hindu/Muslim- ends up saying it a few times during his/her life time in the drama.

Is this behaviour part of Marathi / Indian culture? I am not sure because I have not heard this with so much frequency in real life?

When I read Marathi books or watch Marathi cinema of previous eras, these smiley-faced talkers, bleating sentimental cant and wishful thinking, are hard to find.

From where do they come? USA?

BARBARA EHRENREICH:

"GREED — and its crafty sibling, speculation — are the designated culprits for the financial crisis. But another, much admired, habit of mind should get its share of the blame: the delusional optimism of mainstream, all-American, positive thinking...

...Positive thinking is endemic to American culture — from weight loss programs to cancer support groups — and in the last two decades it has put down deep roots in the corporate world as well. Everyone knows that you won’t get a job paying more than $15 an hour unless you’re a “positive person,” and no one becomes a chief executive by issuing warnings of possible disaster...

...Americans did not start out as deluded optimists. The original ethos, at least of white Protestant settlers and their descendants, was a grim Calvinism that offered wealth only through hard work and savings, and even then made no promises at all. You might work hard and still fail; you certainly wouldn’t get anywhere by adjusting your attitude or dreamily “visualizing” success...

...When it comes to how we think, “negative” is not the only alternative to “positive.” As the case histories of depressives show, consistent pessimism can be just as baseless and deluded as its opposite. The alternative to both is realism — seeing the risks, having the courage to bear bad news and being prepared for famine as well as plenty. We ought to give it a try."

(NYT, September 24, 2008)

MEGHAN COX GURDON

"...As Ms. Ehrenreich disapprovingly explains, positive thinking has saturated not just American religion but also corporate life and popular culture, and it is rapidly soaking into modern psychology. The problem for her is that people who are insistently reciting inspirational phrases won't hear the siren's wail in time to save themselves. Ms. Ehrenreich cranks her indignation up highest when aiming at the bankers, economists, bureaucrats and business honchos whose near-hallucinatory positive thinking, she believes, has pushed us all to the brink of economic collapse..."

(WSJ, OCTOBER 11, 2009)

Another example of the kind of Marathi that gets spoken in Marathi soaps:

तू कसा आहेस? (how are you?)
मी बरा आहे. (I am OK.)
तू कशी आहेस? (How are you?)
मी बरी आहे. (I am OK.)

Marathi people never greeted like this as long as I remember! Maybe they do now.

Bambooque of Avadh Punch would confirm our status as America-returned, newly-made gentleman & noisy Jee-Huzoors pretending to have forgotten our native tongue during our brief stay in America. He would describe us as "the personification of false hopes, the embodiment of extravagant expectations and the incarnation of utterly vain delusions."

I don't mind conversations about Marathi TV serials but I wish there were no conversations in them!



The Spectator

A New Adjective in Marathi: Ambedkar

James Fallows writes on The Atlantic:

"..."to Obama" -- has gained currency among some Japanese youths.

Explanation:

"obamu: (v.) To ignore inexpedient and inconvenient facts or realities, think "Yes we can, Yes we can," and proceed with optimism using those facts as an inspiration (literally, as fuel). It is used to elicit success in a personal endeavor. One explanation holds that it is the opposite of kobamu. (拒む, which means to refuse, reject, or oppose)...

...The absorptive-and-transforming power of the Japanese language is indeed one of its charms..."

When I read it, I thought:

why couldn't we be creative with the name- Ambedkar?

If Japanese care to lean about the achievements of B R Ambedkar- and they are no less than their favourite Gautam Buddha- what meaning will they assign to it?

Here is an attempt in Marathi.

The legend of Bhageeratha says because of his tireless efforts, the river Ganga descended to earth from heaven. It was considered an impossible task. To honour this, in Marathi, such efforts are called: Bhageeratha efforts भगीरथ प्रयत्न.

I have never forgot following lines of poet Namdev Dhasal since I read them in class X, thirty four year ago.

सूर्यफुले हाती ठेवणारा फकीर हजारो वर्षानंतर लाभला
आत्ता सूर्यफुलासाराखे सूर्योंमुख झालेच पाहिजे
('आत्ता', नामदेव लक्ष्मण ढसाळ, गोलपिठा, १९७१ )

[After thousands of years, we met a fakir who handed to us sunflowers
now we must become sun-facing like sunflowers

('Aatta', Namdev Lakshman Dhasal, Golpitha, 1971)]

Ambedkar's task was harder than that of Bhageeratha because in 1891- the year he was borne- growing, plucking and handing over the sunflowers, in the total darkness that engulfed the Dalits of India, was possible only in the dreams.

And yet, he did it. Therefore, let us call such efforts: Ambedkar efforts आंबेडकर प्रयत्न.

Who is the Greatest Indian Bilingual Intellectual?

Matthew Arnold:

"We are often told that an era is opening in which we are to see multitudes of a common sort of readers, and masses of a common sort of literature; that such readers do not want and could not relish anything better than such literature, and that to provide it is becoming a vast and profitable industry. Even if good literature entirely lost currency with the world, it would still be abundantly worth while to continue to enjoy it by oneself. But it never will lose currency with the world, in spite of momentary appearances; it never will lose supremacy. Currency and supremacy are insured to it, not indeed by the world's deliberate and conscious choice, but by something far deeper, -- by the instinct of self- preservation in humanity."

Damodar Mauzo:

"The first traces of the Konkani language were written by Sant Namdev..."

Ramachandra Guha has written an essay that

"interprets the rise and fall of the bilingual intellectual in modern India. Making a distinction between functional and emotional bilingualism, it argues that Indian thinkers, writers and activists of earlier generations were often intellectually active in more than one language.

Now, however, there is an increasing separation of discourses – between those who operate exclusively in English and those who operate in the language of the state alone.

The decline of the bilingual intellectual is a product of many factors, among them public policy, elite preference, new patterns of marriage, and economic change."

(Economic & Political Weekly, August 15 2009)

While reading Guha' essay, my thoughts strayed to arguably the greatest bilingual intellectual of India: Sant Nāmdev (c.1270-c.1350 CE)

He wrote in Marathi, Konkani, Hindi and Punjabi. Sixty-one of his compositions are included in the Guru Granth Sahib.

Oh my word! He knew how to write!

One of his Hindi abhangas:

एकै पाथ र धरिए भावो। दुजै पाथर धरिए पावो।
जे एहु देवा तो ओहु भी देवा ॥

(a stone makes a step on which we plant our foot, another stone makes an image of god in which we put our faith and worship it. Both are really stones. The difference is in belief.)

Namdev's resume is still not finished!

M V Dhond म वा धोंड argues that it was Namdev who created one of the most enduring 'myths' of India- Lord Vitthal.

Namdev animated Vitthal. Vitthal started walking and talking.

Namdev dragged Vitthal to the homes of his devotees and made him do menial work for them.

[ऐसा विटेवर देव कोठें! ("Aisa Vitevar Dev Kothe!") 2001]

Namya's poetry will never lose currency with the world, in spite of momentary appearances; it never will lose supremacy. Currency and supremacy are insured to it, not indeed by the world's deliberate and conscious choice, but by something far deeper, -- by the instinct of self- preservation in humanity.

This is how I saw the following picture: the artist (say Namdev) creates the myth (say Lord Vitthal) and the myth in turn places a laurel wreath on the artist's head. (Vasant Sarwate is a big fan of Steinberg. I should ask him.)


Artist: Saul Steinberg, The New Yorker, Jan 6 1962

Little Man You only Hope to Know!

Like last few years, I was looking forward to Madhukar Dharmapurikar's मधुकर धर्मापुरीकर Diwali greeting.

I wasn't disappointed.

For me calendar 2009's theme has been John N Gray's "Straw Dogs: Thoughts on Humans and Other Animals" (2002).

One of the quotes I liked from the book is by Joseph Brodsky: "...should the truth about the world exist, it's bound to be nonhuman."

Therefore, I was delighted to see that the greeting was consistent with the theme.

See the picture below. (To view 2008 card, click here)

The picture made me nostalgic. At a public garden in Miraj, a few decades ago, on a mild sunny morning, three of us and our parents had a photo session. There was no one else other than us and the photographer.

Were there birds? I don't remember but surely no albatrosses or seagulls!

Although the family in the picture seems to be enjoying their presence, what are birds there doing?

Do they want to fit in the frame? Are they swooping down on the junk strewn at the beach? Are they enjoying irritation of family dog? Is this a scene from Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds" (1963)?

R K Laxman once described how dozens of crows sat without a sound on overhead cables during the entire reception of Prince Charles in Mumbai.

Does a poet have an answer?

Walter de la Mare?:

"Over these unremembered marble columns,

birds glide their old remembered way.

Dive in red gold setting tide and write dark alphabets on evening sky

whether an epitaph, chorus or strange augury

little man you only hope to know!"

Here is hoping for happy Diwali 2009!



Artist: Norman Thelwell (1923 - 2004)

Lucky me. I didn't send a letter to Har Gobind Khorana

Dr. Jayant Narlikar replies in long hand to every letter he receives.

My childhood was spent taking pride in Har Gobind Khorana, an Indian American molecular biologist, who was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1968.

Luckily I never sent an e-mail or a letter to him.

The Times of India reported on October 14 2009:

"...Nobel laureate Venkatraman Ramakrishnan has expressed disenchantment with people from India "bothering" him "clogging" up his email box and dubbed as "strange" their sudden urge to reach out to him.

"All sorts of people from India have been writing to me, clogging up my email box. It takes me an hour or two to just remove their mails," he said...

..."There are also people who have never bothered to be in touch with me for decades who suddenly feel the urge to connect...

...He expressed anguish over "all sorts of lies" published about him in a section of the media..."

Maybe he could have used technology to filter out the messages he did not wish to see, the way commoners like me do. Instead, he chose to attack the well-wishers in public.

Why do educated Indians have this overwhelming urge to take pride in Indianness found anywhere in the universe, from knowledge of Sanskrit to Obama administration to NASA to Slumdog to Chicken Tikka?

Does Nobel prize matter? (Henry James, W H Auden, J L Borges, Joseph Conrad, James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Nabokov, M Proust, L Tolstoy, M Twain, and E Zola among many others never won literature Nobel!)

Does a person of Indian origin winning it matter?

I will never understand.

Pune is lucky to have Pigs, Cows, Donkeys, Crows, Dogs & Goats

G. C. Lichtenberg: "That man is the noblest creature may be inferred from the fact that no other creature has contested this claim."

Every morning I walk past two big stinking garbage heaps located on the main street of a Pune suburban where I live.

They are less of garbage dumps and more of zoos in early morning hours.

Crows, dogs, cows, pigs, donkeys, goats and, I am sure, rodents, roaches and other forms of life feast there.

The other day I saw the donkey herdsman driving away cows saying to himself how his donkeys deserved to eat there more than the 'bloody' cows.

Poor cows- who are never accompanied by their herdsman- stood there confused, not knowing what to do next!

MICHAEL SLACKMAN writes from CAIRO:

"...It is unlikely anyone has ever come to this city and commented on how clean the streets are. But this litter-strewn metropolis is now wrestling with a garbage problem so severe it has managed to incite its weary residents and command the attention of the president...

...But the crisis should not have come as a surprise.

When the government killed all the pigs in Egypt this spring — in what public health experts said was a misguided attempt to combat swine flu — it was warned the city would be overwhelmed with trash.

The pigs used to eat tons of organic waste. Now the pigs are gone and the rotting food piles up on the streets of middle-class neighborhoods...

...“They killed the pigs, let them clean the city,” said Moussa Rateb, a former garbage collector and pig owner who lives in the community of the zabaleen. “Everything used to go to the pigs, now there are no pigs, so it goes to the administration.”..."

(NYT, September 20, 2009)


Artist: Sudhir Tailang, The Asian Age, August 2009

I just looked towards Beautiful Boy- Rajan Bala

I have read and liked many Indian cricket writers.

N S Phadke ना सी फडके, V V Karmarkar वि वि करमरकर, K N Prabhu, Raju Bharatan, Mihir Bose, Sunil Gavaskar, M A K Pataudi, Ramachandra Guha...but no one came close to Rajan Bala- who passed away on October 9 2009- in appreciating the game, which perhaps is a proxy for life.

His "All the Beautiful Boys" (1990) remains one of the best books I have read. I must have read it dozens of times since 1993, the year I bought it.

When he interviewed (chatted with?) people connected to the game, he brought the best out of them.
When I read the quotes attributed to M L Jaisimha, Gundappa Vishwanath, Eknath Solkar, Erapalli Prasanna, Chandu Borde in his book, I thought - my god, they all are as erudite as Ian Chappell or Sunil Gavaskar!

Here are a few examples of his writings:

"...Tauseef the Pakistani on a death trap of a wicket in Bangalore must have realised that Sunil (Gavaskar) was a different class of a player. I remember one ball which was pitched short and changed course- did not turn. It bounced straight on and over Sunil's shoulder. Sunil had read it all the way, It was the mobile front foot which enabled him to avoid the ball. It was incredible..."

Why do you need a TV when you have a description as graphic as that?

"...It was the only time I have seen a fast bowler in a Test match resort to bowling to widish bouncers in order to prevent a batsman getting a single. The West Indians wanted to deprive Vishy of his second century in two Tests and get at Chandrasekhar, the last man. They succeeded. That was Andy's (Roberts) ultimate tribute to Vishy..."

How he evokes the drama in a diminutive man humbling one of the greatest fast bowlers of all time bowling on a helpful wicket.

"...One of my best moments off cricket watching was a defensive stroke in a Test match. This was in Madras. India were playing Pakistan and Imran Khan was bowling to Sunil Gavaskar. Imran dung the particular delivery short. It was not a bouncer but one which forced Sunil to get on his toes and defend. Sunil did just that. He was on his toes, on the back foot, left hand tight on the bat handle, right hand removed, both hands wide apart, and standing absolutely sideways. The ball hit the bat fairly high and then virtually rolled down the length of the blade to drop passively at Sunil's feet. Imran, on his follow-through, applauded the batsman..."

Isn't there so much to cricket than just runs, wickets and catches?

"I remember M L Jaisimha waiting under a big mishit at the edge of the boundary. The ball seemed to be suspended in the air for ever so long. Some one hundred and forty thousand eyes were focused on the ball and the man, in turns. Jaisimha positioned himself and finally, after what seemed an eternity, grasped the ball with both hands and closed his eyes. Seventy thousand hearts heaved a collective sigh of relief. the scoreboard registered unemotionally, G. Sobers caught Jaisimha bowled Chandrasekhar. One more Test dismissal.
For a full and agonizing minute Jaisimha was the loneliest man in the stadium, the mammoth and magnificent Eden Gardens..."

World is a stage!

"All the four spinners, Chandra, Prasanna, Bedi and Venkat, who benefited from Ekky's (Eknath Solkar) catching prowess, have readily sung the man's praises. Chandra said: "He gave me great confidence. Considering the pace I bowled at, and also the fact that the ball could have deviated either way, Ekky must have been genius to even react to some of the deflections." Bishan Bedi said: "If he did not go for one that popped, I was quite convinced that the batsman had not got his bat to the ball. His anticipation was uncanny." Venkat said: "I always believed that I was a capable catcher. But he could really catch." And Prasanna said: "If my delivery had the right loop and the ball turned, I just looked towards Ekky."

To judge if the show put on was worth it, I just looked towards Rajan Bala.