Today Alec Baldwin is probably the best comedian around in Anglo-Saxon world including India.
In non-animated space that is. He loses to Homer and Bart Simpson when competition widens.
His slightly-drunk looks, right-wing views and everreadiness to say something dismissive of the world in 30 ROCK make me laugh.
I first liked him when he announced that he was God. (Malice,1993)
Is there any other reason why I like him so much? Yes, he reminds of Shammi Kapoor.
Because for me, although he himself doesn't say it, Shammi Kapoor was god of entertainment. He stood for: Good food, pretty girls, mellifluous music, the lark's on the wing, god's in his heaven!
Read an earlier post on Mr. Kapoor here.
I still remember how, while watching Brahmchari(1968), sitting with my mother in 'Ladies' of Deval cinema in Miraj, I got to my feet and started cheering wildly during his fight with Pran towards the end of the movie. Mr. Kapoor, I am happy to report, won the bout! He continues to do so till today.
I have been watching Season 3 of 30 Rock on Star World and can't help feel how Alec Baldwin looks similar to Shammi Kapoor.
Particularly when he takes a stylish turn in this theme song/title sequence .
Thursday, January 07, 2010
Sunday, January 03, 2010
Te acompaño en tu pesar
Mahatma Gandhi translated a few of Tukaram's poems when he was jailed in Yerwada in 1930.
One of them reads in Marathi:
"जेथे जातो तेथे तू माझा सांगाती । चालविसी हाती धरूनिया ॥१॥
चालो वाटे आम्ही तुझा चि आधार । चालविसी भार सवे माझा ॥धॄ॥"
Gandhi's translation reads:
"Wherever I go, Thou art my companion. Having taken me by the hand Thou movest me.
I go alone depending solely on Thee. Thou bearest too my burdens."
Tukaram.com also has its translation in Rajasthani:
"हूं जठै-जठै जाऊं हूं बैठे-बैठे तूं म्हारे सागै चाले है और म्हारो हात झालनै मनै चलावै है ।
मारग में चालूं जणै मनै थोरा ई सायरो रैवै है, म्हारो सगळो भार तूं ई संभाळो है"
("म्हारो सगळो भार तूं ई संभाळो है". Sweeter than even Tukaram's original words! "चालविसी भार सवे माझा".)
The key phrase in the poem is 'to accompany'. "Taking by hand" is less important.
One of the greatest books, "Don Quixote", was written in Spanish c 1605-1615. Tukaram was already borne and perhaps writing.
Terry Castle informs that there is a phrase "...used in Spain to console someone: "Te acompaño en tu pesar"—"I accompany you in your sorrow.""
Castle continues:"...At the deepest level Don Quixote is about accompanying someone and being accompanied in turn..."
For me the most moving sequence of Richard Attenborough's Gandhi is the Dandi March. The way the March gathered strength. People kept joining in. In total silence.
They were accompanying and being accompanied in turn!
Last year, for the first time, I read D B Mokashi's (दि. बा. मोकाशी)- 20th century Marathi's foremost existentialist- Palkhi 1964 (पालखी). What a read! It describes how such an exercise transforms even a skeptic. Outsider in the end belongs.
Yesterday I finished reading Cormac Mccarthy's masterly and numbing 'The Road'. In apocalyptic times, father and son come closer. Thanks to a journey together.
Artist: Vijay Wadekar
To view more such pictures click here.
One of them reads in Marathi:
"जेथे जातो तेथे तू माझा सांगाती । चालविसी हाती धरूनिया ॥१॥
चालो वाटे आम्ही तुझा चि आधार । चालविसी भार सवे माझा ॥धॄ॥"
Gandhi's translation reads:
"Wherever I go, Thou art my companion. Having taken me by the hand Thou movest me.
I go alone depending solely on Thee. Thou bearest too my burdens."
Tukaram.com also has its translation in Rajasthani:
"हूं जठै-जठै जाऊं हूं बैठे-बैठे तूं म्हारे सागै चाले है और म्हारो हात झालनै मनै चलावै है ।
मारग में चालूं जणै मनै थोरा ई सायरो रैवै है, म्हारो सगळो भार तूं ई संभाळो है"
("म्हारो सगळो भार तूं ई संभाळो है". Sweeter than even Tukaram's original words! "चालविसी भार सवे माझा".)
The key phrase in the poem is 'to accompany'. "Taking by hand" is less important.
One of the greatest books, "Don Quixote", was written in Spanish c 1605-1615. Tukaram was already borne and perhaps writing.
Terry Castle informs that there is a phrase "...used in Spain to console someone: "Te acompaño en tu pesar"—"I accompany you in your sorrow.""
Castle continues:"...At the deepest level Don Quixote is about accompanying someone and being accompanied in turn..."
For me the most moving sequence of Richard Attenborough's Gandhi is the Dandi March. The way the March gathered strength. People kept joining in. In total silence.
They were accompanying and being accompanied in turn!
Last year, for the first time, I read D B Mokashi's (दि. बा. मोकाशी)- 20th century Marathi's foremost existentialist- Palkhi 1964 (पालखी). What a read! It describes how such an exercise transforms even a skeptic. Outsider in the end belongs.
Yesterday I finished reading Cormac Mccarthy's masterly and numbing 'The Road'. In apocalyptic times, father and son come closer. Thanks to a journey together.
Artist: Vijay Wadekar
To view more such pictures click here.
Thursday, December 31, 2009
Are you ready for Eternity?
Anton Chekhov in 'The Three Sisters' (Tri sestry), 1901: "Well, maybe we’ll fly in balloons, the cut of jackets will be different, we’ll have discovered a sixth sense, maybe even developed it - I don’t know. But life will be the same - difficult, full of unknowns, and happy. In a thousand years, just like today, people will sigh and say, oh, how hard it is to be alive. They’ll still be scared of death, and won’t want to die.”
महाभारत १/१/२४७: कालमूलमिदं सर्व भावाभावौ सुखासुखे॥
(Mahabharat 1/1/247: Living and death, happiness and sadness all originate in time.)
महाभारत १२/२२७/५६: कालेनाभ्याहताः सर्वे कालो हि बलवत्तरः॥
(Mahabharat 12/227/56: Time has killed all. Time is the most powerful.)
Simone Weil:
“All the tragedies which we can imagine return in the end to the one and only tragedy: the passage of time.”
Roger Penrose:
"So this means that in a sense, the present past and future are out there, and that also gives us a very deterministic view of the world. We have no control of what happens in the future because its all laid out. I think the trouble that people have with this idea is that you think the future is under your control, to some degree, and so this means that if the future's laid out then in a sense its not under your control.
The question of the passage of time is something the scientists have rather set aside, and taking the view that its not really physics, it's a subjective issue; and subjective questions are not part of science. Now when you start talking about phenomena like one's own perception of the passage of time, then that is a subjective thing. And that's almost a taboo subject for science because it's subjective. The physical world at least according to Relativity, is out there, and there is no flow of time, it's just there; whereas our feeling (we have this feeling of the passage of time) are intimately connected to our perceptions."
Artist: Robert J Day, The New Yorker, December 4 1943
Mark Twain has tried to answer the question:
"I do not fear death, in view of the fact that I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it."
महाभारत १/१/२४७: कालमूलमिदं सर्व भावाभावौ सुखासुखे॥
(Mahabharat 1/1/247: Living and death, happiness and sadness all originate in time.)
महाभारत १२/२२७/५६: कालेनाभ्याहताः सर्वे कालो हि बलवत्तरः॥
(Mahabharat 12/227/56: Time has killed all. Time is the most powerful.)
Simone Weil:
“All the tragedies which we can imagine return in the end to the one and only tragedy: the passage of time.”
Roger Penrose:
"So this means that in a sense, the present past and future are out there, and that also gives us a very deterministic view of the world. We have no control of what happens in the future because its all laid out. I think the trouble that people have with this idea is that you think the future is under your control, to some degree, and so this means that if the future's laid out then in a sense its not under your control.
The question of the passage of time is something the scientists have rather set aside, and taking the view that its not really physics, it's a subjective issue; and subjective questions are not part of science. Now when you start talking about phenomena like one's own perception of the passage of time, then that is a subjective thing. And that's almost a taboo subject for science because it's subjective. The physical world at least according to Relativity, is out there, and there is no flow of time, it's just there; whereas our feeling (we have this feeling of the passage of time) are intimately connected to our perceptions."
Artist: Robert J Day, The New Yorker, December 4 1943
Mark Twain has tried to answer the question:
"I do not fear death, in view of the fact that I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it."
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Is Bengali Cosmopolitanism a Bengali Parochialism?
Pradip Das in Asian Age Dec 16 2009 on the state of West Bengal:
"...Frustration, fear, insecurity and mindless violence have overtaken a state which, at one point, touted its intellectual and cultural superiority over its counterparts across India..."
Reviewing Indian bestseller "The Hindus: An Alternative History" by Wendy Doniger, A K Bhattacharya writes in Business Standard October 29 2009:
"...Swami Vivekananda’s role in the revival of Hinduism is dismissed in one page. While Rammohun Roy gets some mention for having worked towards abolishing the Sati system, there is no mention of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar, who not only helped Roy in his reform movement, but also influenced the British to allow remarriage of Hindu widows..."
Perhaps not fair to the great trio.
However, Bhattacharya does not say if the book does justice to the work of other great Indian reformers like Jotiba Phule (ज्योतीराव फुले), B R Ambedkar (भी रा आंबेडकर) and reformers from other parts of India, particularly from the South.
Phule and Ambedkar are probably the two most important names from the history of Hinduism of last two hundred years.
Kancha Illaiah says: "Hinduism is in a state of crisis, facing a kind of civil war within. The primary reason for this is the stranglehold of the varnashram system which keeps 750 million Hindus subjugated and humiliated.
These are the Dalits, tribals and the backward classes. Hinduism has failed to convince them that they are part of it, despite the fact that they were the carriers of all science and technology for centuries.
Hinduism is the only religion that has failed to negotiate and engage with reason and science.
No social reformer, except Phule and Ambedkar, challenged the caste system. Other religions are now competing to win over these people hence there is an imminent explosive crisis..."
When I recently acquired Doniger's tome, I looked up the index to see how many pages mentioned Phule and Ambedkar.
Out of seven fifty three pages, Ambedkar gets three and Phule gets one.
(M S Golwalkar too gets three pages and is mentioned ahead of Phule, Ambedkar in the book. I hope Golwalkar's Hinduism does not prevail over that of Phule-Ambedkar in future. Although Phule-Ambedkar lead Golwalkar 4-3 in this contest, looking at the current environment of intolerance in urban middle-class Maharashtra, I am not sure what will happen!)
Doniger talks about just one work of Phule while her treatment of Ambedkar doesn't do justice to his impact on the past of Hinduism and the likely impact on its future.
While I will talk about Doniger's work later- currently I am quite enjoying reading it- I can't hide my irritation with Bhattacharya's approach.
When one writes for a national newspaper, one is expected to take a larger view, national if not global.
But this shouldn't have bothered me because earlier I had read this:
Ramachandra Guha reviewing "The Argumentative Indian: Writings on Indian History, Culture and Identity" by Amartya Sen wrote in 'The Economic and Political Weekly':
"...All works of history must necessarily be selective; still, reading Sen’s book, a younger reader may come away thinking that, apart from the splendid aberration of Rabindranath Tagore, there were no Indian intellectuals or arguers between the age of Akbar and the age of Hindutva.
I wonder – is Sen’s neglect of what I have called the proximate argumentative tradition linked somewhat to the characteristic insularity of the Bengali intellectual? The typical “bhadralok” scholar travels a straight line between Kolkata and some point to the west: this might be London or, by way of variation, Paris or Moscow or Havana or New York.
But his interest in other parts of India is pretty nearly non-existent. In this respect his Bengali cosmopolitanism is also a Bengali parochialism.
Thus one member of the species has written that “Bengal was the site of the most profound response to the colonial encounter”, and that the province’s capital city, Calcutta, “was the crucible of Indian nationalist politics, and the home…of modern Indian liberal consciousness itself”.
Writing from neutral Bangalore, I would instead award the honour to the state of Maharashtra (as is now is).
Consider a few names: Ranade, Gokhale, Phule, Agarkar, Ambedkar.
Now consider a few more: Tarabai Shinde, V R Shinde, D D Karve, Shahu Maharaj.
If one sees “liberal consciousness” as being composed of individual rights, caste reform, and gender equality, then I think the contributions of these Marathi-speakers rate rather higher than those of their (admittedly more loquacious) Bengali counterparts..."
Have such loquacious Bengalis gathered in the picture below?
(By the way, there is no mention of Dnyaneshwar, Namdev, Eknath, Tukaram in Sen's book while Kabir is mentioned more than ten times!)
Artist: Robert Kraus, The New Yorker, 5 March 1955
"...Frustration, fear, insecurity and mindless violence have overtaken a state which, at one point, touted its intellectual and cultural superiority over its counterparts across India..."
Reviewing Indian bestseller "The Hindus: An Alternative History" by Wendy Doniger, A K Bhattacharya writes in Business Standard October 29 2009:
"...Swami Vivekananda’s role in the revival of Hinduism is dismissed in one page. While Rammohun Roy gets some mention for having worked towards abolishing the Sati system, there is no mention of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar, who not only helped Roy in his reform movement, but also influenced the British to allow remarriage of Hindu widows..."
Perhaps not fair to the great trio.
However, Bhattacharya does not say if the book does justice to the work of other great Indian reformers like Jotiba Phule (ज्योतीराव फुले), B R Ambedkar (भी रा आंबेडकर) and reformers from other parts of India, particularly from the South.
Phule and Ambedkar are probably the two most important names from the history of Hinduism of last two hundred years.
Kancha Illaiah says: "Hinduism is in a state of crisis, facing a kind of civil war within. The primary reason for this is the stranglehold of the varnashram system which keeps 750 million Hindus subjugated and humiliated.
These are the Dalits, tribals and the backward classes. Hinduism has failed to convince them that they are part of it, despite the fact that they were the carriers of all science and technology for centuries.
Hinduism is the only religion that has failed to negotiate and engage with reason and science.
No social reformer, except Phule and Ambedkar, challenged the caste system. Other religions are now competing to win over these people hence there is an imminent explosive crisis..."
When I recently acquired Doniger's tome, I looked up the index to see how many pages mentioned Phule and Ambedkar.
Out of seven fifty three pages, Ambedkar gets three and Phule gets one.
(M S Golwalkar too gets three pages and is mentioned ahead of Phule, Ambedkar in the book. I hope Golwalkar's Hinduism does not prevail over that of Phule-Ambedkar in future. Although Phule-Ambedkar lead Golwalkar 4-3 in this contest, looking at the current environment of intolerance in urban middle-class Maharashtra, I am not sure what will happen!)
Doniger talks about just one work of Phule while her treatment of Ambedkar doesn't do justice to his impact on the past of Hinduism and the likely impact on its future.
While I will talk about Doniger's work later- currently I am quite enjoying reading it- I can't hide my irritation with Bhattacharya's approach.
When one writes for a national newspaper, one is expected to take a larger view, national if not global.
But this shouldn't have bothered me because earlier I had read this:
Ramachandra Guha reviewing "The Argumentative Indian: Writings on Indian History, Culture and Identity" by Amartya Sen wrote in 'The Economic and Political Weekly':
"...All works of history must necessarily be selective; still, reading Sen’s book, a younger reader may come away thinking that, apart from the splendid aberration of Rabindranath Tagore, there were no Indian intellectuals or arguers between the age of Akbar and the age of Hindutva.
I wonder – is Sen’s neglect of what I have called the proximate argumentative tradition linked somewhat to the characteristic insularity of the Bengali intellectual? The typical “bhadralok” scholar travels a straight line between Kolkata and some point to the west: this might be London or, by way of variation, Paris or Moscow or Havana or New York.
But his interest in other parts of India is pretty nearly non-existent. In this respect his Bengali cosmopolitanism is also a Bengali parochialism.
Thus one member of the species has written that “Bengal was the site of the most profound response to the colonial encounter”, and that the province’s capital city, Calcutta, “was the crucible of Indian nationalist politics, and the home…of modern Indian liberal consciousness itself”.
Writing from neutral Bangalore, I would instead award the honour to the state of Maharashtra (as is now is).
Consider a few names: Ranade, Gokhale, Phule, Agarkar, Ambedkar.
Now consider a few more: Tarabai Shinde, V R Shinde, D D Karve, Shahu Maharaj.
If one sees “liberal consciousness” as being composed of individual rights, caste reform, and gender equality, then I think the contributions of these Marathi-speakers rate rather higher than those of their (admittedly more loquacious) Bengali counterparts..."
Have such loquacious Bengalis gathered in the picture below?
(By the way, there is no mention of Dnyaneshwar, Namdev, Eknath, Tukaram in Sen's book while Kabir is mentioned more than ten times!)
Artist: Robert Kraus, The New Yorker, 5 March 1955
Friday, December 25, 2009
पण म्हणून का त्याच्या शिकवणीचे महत्व कमी होते?
G A Kulkarni:
"...He gave the message of love and peace, but it spread on the strength of the sword; he insisted on austerity, and now the support of his religion is wealth. You think it's his victory, look it this way: his true followers would not exceed the population of a village. But then does it reduce the importance of his teachings ?...
('Yatrik', 'Pinglavel' 1977). It's an allegory of Cervantes's 'Don Quixote'.
(जी ए कुलकर्णी: "...त्याने प्रेमाचा व शांतीचा संदेश सांगितला, पण प्रसार झाला तो तलवारीच्या जोरावर; त्याने निरिच्छ्तेवर भर दिला, तर आता त्याच्या धर्माचा आधार आहे संपत्ती. हा तुला त्याचा विजय वाटतो, तसे पाहिले तर त्याचे सच्चे अनुयायी एखाद्या खेड्यातील वसतीपेक्षा जास्त नसतील. पण म्हणून का त्याच्या शिकवणीचे महत्व कमी होते?..."
'यात्रिक', 'पिंगळावेळ', 1977)
Charles Dickens:
"…………a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of other people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys" ('A Christmas Carol' 1843)
FREEDOM FROM WANT
Artist: Norman Rockwell, 1943
(Rockwell fussed over this cover a long time before he completed it. He was very concerned that it would convey overabundance instead of freedom from want.)
"...He gave the message of love and peace, but it spread on the strength of the sword; he insisted on austerity, and now the support of his religion is wealth. You think it's his victory, look it this way: his true followers would not exceed the population of a village. But then does it reduce the importance of his teachings ?...
('Yatrik', 'Pinglavel' 1977). It's an allegory of Cervantes's 'Don Quixote'.
(जी ए कुलकर्णी: "...त्याने प्रेमाचा व शांतीचा संदेश सांगितला, पण प्रसार झाला तो तलवारीच्या जोरावर; त्याने निरिच्छ्तेवर भर दिला, तर आता त्याच्या धर्माचा आधार आहे संपत्ती. हा तुला त्याचा विजय वाटतो, तसे पाहिले तर त्याचे सच्चे अनुयायी एखाद्या खेड्यातील वसतीपेक्षा जास्त नसतील. पण म्हणून का त्याच्या शिकवणीचे महत्व कमी होते?..."
'यात्रिक', 'पिंगळावेळ', 1977)
Charles Dickens:
"…………a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of other people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys" ('A Christmas Carol' 1843)
FREEDOM FROM WANT
Artist: Norman Rockwell, 1943
(Rockwell fussed over this cover a long time before he completed it. He was very concerned that it would convey overabundance instead of freedom from want.)
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Inflation Hurts Literature Some More
In last few years I have across articles like "If Odysseus Had GPS" where the author claims that if today's technology were to be available in the past, some of the world's great literature would not be borne. Or an essay "Call Me, Ishmael" that fantasises "...every thorny literary problem solved by modern technology..."
For me, it's complete baloney for technology doesn't solve any of our basic problems. It just packages them differently.
John Gray: "Today the good life means making full use of science and technology - without succumbing to the illusion that they can make us free, reasonable, or even sane. It means seeking peace - without hoping for a world without war. It means cherishing freedom - in the knowledge that it is an interval between anarchy and tyranny...
...At present we think of science and technology as means of mastering the world. But the self that struggles to master the world is only a shimmer on the surface of things. The new technologies that are springing up around us seem to be inventions that serve our ends, when they and we are moves in a game that has no end."
So if technology doesn't affect great literature, does inflation?
B V (Mama) Warerkar:"...all the money with the public is exhausted and, the little that is left with a few, is of no value because of the shortage of things..." (Dhule, 1944, Presidential address of Marathi Sahitya Sammelan)
(भा वि (मामा) वरेरकर : "...जनते जवळचा पैसा संपला आहे आणि ज्याकडे थोडाफार शिल्लक आहे, तो वस्तुंच्या दुर्मिळतेमुळे कुचकामी ठरला आहे..." धुळे, १९४४ च्या मराठी साहित्य संमेलनाचे अध्यक्षीय भाषण )
Pune will host 83rd Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in 2010. I wonder if the presidential address will contain a thought on inflation.
The title of one of my previous posts read :"Inflation Hurts Literature too! तानी मावशीचे दोन आणे". Read it here.
It was posted on Dec 27 2007.
In two years time, inflation has wreaked havoc in India.
Business Line reported on Dec 13 2009:
"If you had paid Rs 500 at the beginning of the year 2009 for a kg of a dozen items in your grocery basket such as atta, rice, sugar and various dals, do you know how much it would cost you now? You would have to shell out at least 35 per cent more – or Rs 675 – for the same products, going by prevailing prices at major modern retail outlets..."
Tani-mavashi's love remains undiminished but her 12 paise (two-anna)...
Poor in India spend most of their money on food.
The question I am asking is: Did we give our maid 35% raise this year?
The answer is NO.
Are we finding an excuse like the couple in the picture below?
Artist: Perry Barlow, The New Yorker, 12 July 1946
For me, it's complete baloney for technology doesn't solve any of our basic problems. It just packages them differently.
John Gray: "Today the good life means making full use of science and technology - without succumbing to the illusion that they can make us free, reasonable, or even sane. It means seeking peace - without hoping for a world without war. It means cherishing freedom - in the knowledge that it is an interval between anarchy and tyranny...
...At present we think of science and technology as means of mastering the world. But the self that struggles to master the world is only a shimmer on the surface of things. The new technologies that are springing up around us seem to be inventions that serve our ends, when they and we are moves in a game that has no end."
So if technology doesn't affect great literature, does inflation?
B V (Mama) Warerkar:"...all the money with the public is exhausted and, the little that is left with a few, is of no value because of the shortage of things..." (Dhule, 1944, Presidential address of Marathi Sahitya Sammelan)
(भा वि (मामा) वरेरकर : "...जनते जवळचा पैसा संपला आहे आणि ज्याकडे थोडाफार शिल्लक आहे, तो वस्तुंच्या दुर्मिळतेमुळे कुचकामी ठरला आहे..." धुळे, १९४४ च्या मराठी साहित्य संमेलनाचे अध्यक्षीय भाषण )
Pune will host 83rd Marathi Sahitya Sammelan in 2010. I wonder if the presidential address will contain a thought on inflation.
The title of one of my previous posts read :"Inflation Hurts Literature too! तानी मावशीचे दोन आणे". Read it here.
It was posted on Dec 27 2007.
In two years time, inflation has wreaked havoc in India.
Business Line reported on Dec 13 2009:
"If you had paid Rs 500 at the beginning of the year 2009 for a kg of a dozen items in your grocery basket such as atta, rice, sugar and various dals, do you know how much it would cost you now? You would have to shell out at least 35 per cent more – or Rs 675 – for the same products, going by prevailing prices at major modern retail outlets..."
Tani-mavashi's love remains undiminished but her 12 paise (two-anna)...
Poor in India spend most of their money on food.
The question I am asking is: Did we give our maid 35% raise this year?
The answer is NO.
Are we finding an excuse like the couple in the picture below?
Artist: Perry Barlow, The New Yorker, 12 July 1946
Monday, December 21, 2009
100 Years After Pandit A M T Jackson, a good Topivalla
December 21, 2009 is the 100th anniversary of the assassination of the collector of Nashik, A M T Jackson, of the Indian Civil Service, by Anant Kanhere (अनंत कान्हेरे), using a revolver sent by V D Savarkar (वि दा सावरकर) from England, at Vijayanand theatre where he had gone to watch famous Marathi play Sangeet Sharada (संगीत शारदा) by G B Deval (गो. ब. देवल). Jackson was first shot in the back and then in the front. He died on the spot.
I have yet to read a detailed history of that episode.
Y D Phadke (य दि फडके) has a chapter dedicated to it in his book 'Shodh Savarkarancha', 1984 ('शोध सावरकरांचा').
There I learnt Jackson was shot just before the play started, Bal Gandharva (बालगंधर्व) and Nanasaheb Joglekar (नानासाहेब जोगळेकर) were actors in it.
I have not read the feelings of Bal Gandharva or Nanasaheb Joglekar about this horrific incident. Or the reaction of the paying public. I wonder if they got their ticket money back if the performance was cancelled! And even if they did, I am sure, many must be deeply disappointed that they missed the show. Kanhere and his two colleagues had paid twelve annas each for the ticket.
Book also says that Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj (राजर्षी शाहू महाराज), ruler of Kolhapur, had warned the British government in 1906 about the possibility of extreme violence because of the views of Brahmins from the districts of Kolhapur, Belgao, Nashik and Pune (page 6, 'Shodh Savarkarancha', 1984-2000).
I have yet to read a detailed history of that episode.
Y D Phadke (य दि फडके) has a chapter dedicated to it in his book 'Shodh Savarkarancha', 1984 ('शोध सावरकरांचा').
There I learnt Jackson was shot just before the play started, Bal Gandharva (बालगंधर्व) and Nanasaheb Joglekar (नानासाहेब जोगळेकर) were actors in it.
I have not read the feelings of Bal Gandharva or Nanasaheb Joglekar about this horrific incident. Or the reaction of the paying public. I wonder if they got their ticket money back if the performance was cancelled! And even if they did, I am sure, many must be deeply disappointed that they missed the show. Kanhere and his two colleagues had paid twelve annas each for the ticket.
Book also says that Rajarshi Shahu Maharaj (राजर्षी शाहू महाराज), ruler of Kolhapur, had warned the British government in 1906 about the possibility of extreme violence because of the views of Brahmins from the districts of Kolhapur, Belgao, Nashik and Pune (page 6, 'Shodh Savarkarancha', 1984-2000).
But Phadke's book doesn't have much information on the scholarship or life of Jackson.
Following is the account of the case that is available on the website of Bombay High Court:
"...Unlike other English district officers, he (Jackson) was sympathetic towards Indian aspirations, was a student of Sanskrit, and generally was popular as a man of learning and culture.
It was his interest in Indian history and culture, which induced him to attend the performance of a Marathi drama at Nasik. During an interval in the performance, a young Brahmin student of Aurangabad, named Anant Kanhere, stepped forward, drew out a pistol and shot Mr. Jackson through the heart at point blank range.
The murder created a great deal of sensation in Nasik, Poona and Bombay; and it even created consternation in the ranks of Indian Nationalists, because of Jackson's reputation as a very sympathetic and popular district officer.
Many Indians could not understand why such a good man ("good Topivalla ", as such Englishmen were called in those days) was singled out for such a dastardly murder. But it seems that there was a school of extremists at the time, who believed perversely that, these "good Topivallas" were really more dangerous than officers of the type of Dyer and O'Dwyer, for instance; for, it is the good popular government officials who reconcile Indians to foreign rule..."
The journal of the Anthropological Society of Bombay wrote: "The Society records its deep sense of grief for death of one of its most learned members,AMT Jackson, ICS."
Bimanbehari Majumdar: "...Jackson was a learned Indologist. He contributed many interesting papers on Indian history and culture and was popularly known as Pandit Jackson..." (Militant nationalism in India and its socio-religious background, 1897-1917)
Sir John Cumming: "...the late Mr. A M T Jackson drew out attention to 'the attractive power of Hindu civilization, which has enabled it to assimilate and absorb into itself every Foreign invader except the Moslem and European..." ('Revealing India's Past')
(Savarkar would agree with Jackson's views on lack of assimilation of Muslims. It also shows how Europeans had now transcended 'White Mughals' phase. It was the phase, documented most notably by William Dalrymple, in which they tried to assimilate.)
On Google Books I found following books by A M T Jackson:
"Folk Lore Notes: Vol. II - Konkan
Folk lore notes: Compiled from materials collected by the late A. M. T. Jackson. R. E. Enthoven, Volume 1
Folklore notes from Gujarat and the Konkan
Folklore of Gujarat
Folklore Notes V2: Konkan (1915)"
I remember to have read Durga Bhagwat (दुर्गा भागवत) writing that the chase of Jackson's valuable library was entrusted to the Royal Asiatic Society, Mumbai. (Read my blogpost dated July 26 2013: Coppersmith Barbet, Green Rose & Books- A M T Jackson & Durga Bhagwat-... तांबट पक्षी, हिरवा गुलाब आणि ढीगभर पुस्तके)
Following is the account of the case that is available on the website of Bombay High Court:
"...Unlike other English district officers, he (Jackson) was sympathetic towards Indian aspirations, was a student of Sanskrit, and generally was popular as a man of learning and culture.
It was his interest in Indian history and culture, which induced him to attend the performance of a Marathi drama at Nasik. During an interval in the performance, a young Brahmin student of Aurangabad, named Anant Kanhere, stepped forward, drew out a pistol and shot Mr. Jackson through the heart at point blank range.
The murder created a great deal of sensation in Nasik, Poona and Bombay; and it even created consternation in the ranks of Indian Nationalists, because of Jackson's reputation as a very sympathetic and popular district officer.
Many Indians could not understand why such a good man ("good Topivalla ", as such Englishmen were called in those days) was singled out for such a dastardly murder. But it seems that there was a school of extremists at the time, who believed perversely that, these "good Topivallas" were really more dangerous than officers of the type of Dyer and O'Dwyer, for instance; for, it is the good popular government officials who reconcile Indians to foreign rule..."
The journal of the Anthropological Society of Bombay wrote: "The Society records its deep sense of grief for death of one of its most learned members,AMT Jackson, ICS."
Bimanbehari Majumdar: "...Jackson was a learned Indologist. He contributed many interesting papers on Indian history and culture and was popularly known as Pandit Jackson..." (Militant nationalism in India and its socio-religious background, 1897-1917)
Sir John Cumming: "...the late Mr. A M T Jackson drew out attention to 'the attractive power of Hindu civilization, which has enabled it to assimilate and absorb into itself every Foreign invader except the Moslem and European..." ('Revealing India's Past')
(Savarkar would agree with Jackson's views on lack of assimilation of Muslims. It also shows how Europeans had now transcended 'White Mughals' phase. It was the phase, documented most notably by William Dalrymple, in which they tried to assimilate.)
On Google Books I found following books by A M T Jackson:
"Folk Lore Notes: Vol. II - Konkan
Folk lore notes: Compiled from materials collected by the late A. M. T. Jackson. R. E. Enthoven, Volume 1
Folklore notes from Gujarat and the Konkan
Folklore of Gujarat
Folklore Notes V2: Konkan (1915)"
I remember to have read Durga Bhagwat (दुर्गा भागवत) writing that the chase of Jackson's valuable library was entrusted to the Royal Asiatic Society, Mumbai. (Read my blogpost dated July 26 2013: Coppersmith Barbet, Green Rose & Books- A M T Jackson & Durga Bhagwat-... तांबट पक्षी, हिरवा गुलाब आणि ढीगभर पुस्तके)
I don't know what family Jackson left behind. Wife, kids, parents?
In Frontline dated Sep. 12-25, 2009, A.R. VENKATACHALAPATHY has written about the assassination of Robert William Escourt Ashe on June 17, 1911.
I was most moved by this family photo of Ashe's.
PICTURE FROM THE ASHE FAMILY ALBUM/
COURTESY ROBERT ASHE and Frontline
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Gandhi and Tiger Woods: Animal Passion on the day Father Died?
Most Marathi newspapers, quite rightly, don't give a damn to Golf. Not even to Golf WAGS or Golf widows. (I wonder why they care about Tennis as much as they do.)
But even they couldn't resist this.
On December 14 2009, English newspapers reported: One of Tiger Woods's alleged mistresses says the superstar golfer was in bed with her the night his father, Earl, died on May 3, 2006.
I didn't know that Mr. Woods has been compared to Mahatma Gandhi.
Robert Wright said in Slate, July 24, 2000:
"...Earl Woods, pressed to justify his belief that his son could have greater humanitarian influence than Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, or the Buddha, explained that Tiger "has a larger forum than any of them. Because he's playing a sport that's international."...
...It is not crazy to suggest that Tiger Woods' discipline and unity of purpose—year-to-year, day-to-day, second-to-second—has been matched by only a few people, including Gandhi. Of course, the two men's goals differ. Gandhi was devoted to human understanding and world peace. Tiger is devoted to being the best ball-whacker ever. But give him time. Maybe he'll branch out."
Maybe he'll branch out. Maybe he will help solve Kashmir problem.
But today, if the allegations are true, a 'sorry' episode in Gandhi's life, and not human understanding or world peace, have brought them together.
Here is how Gandhi describes it in his autobiography or 'The Story of my experiments with truth' (1927):
"...It was 10.30 or 11 p.m. I was giving the massage. My uncle offered to relieve me. I was glad and went straight to the bed-room.
My wife, poor thing, was fast asleep. But how could she sleep when I was there? I woke her up. In five or six minutes, however, the servant knocked at the door. I started with alarm. "Get up," he said, "Father is very ill." I knew of course that he was very ill, and so I guessed what "very ill" meant at that moment. I sprang out of bed.
"What is the matter ? Do tell me !" "Father is no more." So all was over ! I had but to wring my hands. I felt deeply ashamed and miserable. I ran to my father"s room. I saw that, if animal passion had not blinded me, I should have been spared the torture of separation from my father during his last moments. I should have been massaging him, and he would have died in my arms. But now it was my uncle who had had this privilege...
...The shame, to which I have referred in a foregoing chapter, was this shame of my carnal desire even at the critical hour of my father"s death, which demanded wakeful service. It is a a blot I have never been able to efface or forget, and I have always thought that, although my devotion to my parents knew no bounds and I would have given up anything for it, yet it was weighed and found unpardonably wanting becuase my mind was at the same moment in the grip of lust.
I have therefore always regarded myself as a lustful, though a faithful, husband. It took me long to get free from the shackles of lust, and I had to pass through many ordeals before I could overcome it..."
Gandhi was a 'lustful, though a faithful, husband'. And Tiger?
James Surowiecki says in The New Yoker December 21, 2009:
"...In other words, Woods has been presented as the embodiment of bourgeois virtues: dedication, hard work, single-mindedness...
For millions of people—many of them, to be sure, affluent middle-aged white guys—Woods embodied an approach not just to golf but to life..."
Maybe this 'embodiment of bourgeois virtues such as dedication, hard work, single-mindedness' just slept in the wrong apartment. One more time...
Artist: P C Vey, The New Yorker, March 2008
But even they couldn't resist this.
On December 14 2009, English newspapers reported: One of Tiger Woods's alleged mistresses says the superstar golfer was in bed with her the night his father, Earl, died on May 3, 2006.
I didn't know that Mr. Woods has been compared to Mahatma Gandhi.
Robert Wright said in Slate, July 24, 2000:
"...Earl Woods, pressed to justify his belief that his son could have greater humanitarian influence than Nelson Mandela, Gandhi, or the Buddha, explained that Tiger "has a larger forum than any of them. Because he's playing a sport that's international."...
...It is not crazy to suggest that Tiger Woods' discipline and unity of purpose—year-to-year, day-to-day, second-to-second—has been matched by only a few people, including Gandhi. Of course, the two men's goals differ. Gandhi was devoted to human understanding and world peace. Tiger is devoted to being the best ball-whacker ever. But give him time. Maybe he'll branch out."
Maybe he'll branch out. Maybe he will help solve Kashmir problem.
But today, if the allegations are true, a 'sorry' episode in Gandhi's life, and not human understanding or world peace, have brought them together.
Here is how Gandhi describes it in his autobiography or 'The Story of my experiments with truth' (1927):
"...It was 10.30 or 11 p.m. I was giving the massage. My uncle offered to relieve me. I was glad and went straight to the bed-room.
My wife, poor thing, was fast asleep. But how could she sleep when I was there? I woke her up. In five or six minutes, however, the servant knocked at the door. I started with alarm. "Get up," he said, "Father is very ill." I knew of course that he was very ill, and so I guessed what "very ill" meant at that moment. I sprang out of bed.
"What is the matter ? Do tell me !" "Father is no more." So all was over ! I had but to wring my hands. I felt deeply ashamed and miserable. I ran to my father"s room. I saw that, if animal passion had not blinded me, I should have been spared the torture of separation from my father during his last moments. I should have been massaging him, and he would have died in my arms. But now it was my uncle who had had this privilege...
...The shame, to which I have referred in a foregoing chapter, was this shame of my carnal desire even at the critical hour of my father"s death, which demanded wakeful service. It is a a blot I have never been able to efface or forget, and I have always thought that, although my devotion to my parents knew no bounds and I would have given up anything for it, yet it was weighed and found unpardonably wanting becuase my mind was at the same moment in the grip of lust.
I have therefore always regarded myself as a lustful, though a faithful, husband. It took me long to get free from the shackles of lust, and I had to pass through many ordeals before I could overcome it..."
Gandhi was a 'lustful, though a faithful, husband'. And Tiger?
James Surowiecki says in The New Yoker December 21, 2009:
"...In other words, Woods has been presented as the embodiment of bourgeois virtues: dedication, hard work, single-mindedness...
For millions of people—many of them, to be sure, affluent middle-aged white guys—Woods embodied an approach not just to golf but to life..."
Maybe this 'embodiment of bourgeois virtues such as dedication, hard work, single-mindedness' just slept in the wrong apartment. One more time...
Artist: P C Vey, The New Yorker, March 2008
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Dilip Chitre, We'll always have Tukaram
Ashok Shahane: "Dilip Purushottam Chitre had to incarnate to tell even the poets here that Tukaram was a poet to the bone." [Napeksha, 2005]
(अशोक शहाणे: "तुकाराम हाडाचा कवी होता हे इथल्या कवींनाच सांगण्यासाठीसुद्धा दिलीप पुरुषोत्तम चित्रे अवतरावे लागले." (नपेक्षा))
It's hard to believe this but it is true. It's similar to explaining 20th century playwrights that Shakespeare was a playwright to the bone!
Chitre chooses this poem of Tukaram for the last section "Farewell to Being" (असण्याचा निरोप) in his book "Punha Tukaram" (पुन्हा तुकाराम).
सकळ ही माझी बोळवण करा ।
परतोनि घरा जावें तुह्मीं ॥1॥
कर्मधर्में तुह्मां असावें कल्याण ।
घ्या माझें वचन आशीर्वाद ॥ध्रु।॥
वाढवूनि दिलों एकाचिये हातीं ।
सकळ निश्चिंती जाली तेथें ॥2॥
आतां मज जाणें प्राणेश्वरासवें ।
माझिया भावें अनुसरलों ॥3॥
वाढवितां लोभ होइऩल उसीर ।
अवघींच स्थिर करा ठायीं ॥4॥
धर्म अर्थ काम जाला एके ठायीं ।
मेळविला जिंहीं हाता हात ॥5॥
तुका ह्मणे आतां जाली हे चि भेटी ।
उरल्या त्या गोष्टी बोलावया ॥6॥
I wonder if anyone else in the world has ever said such moving farewell words. Nice try Humphrey Bogart though.
(They remind me of my last meeting with my mother. I could never say it but 'Aai, We'll always have Miraj'.)
Following picture of great Saul Steinberg has appeared on this blog before. There I imagined that it depicted how Namdev (नामदेव) created the myth of Lord Vitthal.
Here I see: D P Chitre painting the image of his great forebear Tukaram, complete with a horn in his mouth, for anyone who could read either Marathi, English or German, and Tukaram in turn places a wreath on Chitre's head for a job well done!
Artist: Saul Steinberg, The New Yorker, Jan 6 1962
(अशोक शहाणे: "तुकाराम हाडाचा कवी होता हे इथल्या कवींनाच सांगण्यासाठीसुद्धा दिलीप पुरुषोत्तम चित्रे अवतरावे लागले." (नपेक्षा))
It's hard to believe this but it is true. It's similar to explaining 20th century playwrights that Shakespeare was a playwright to the bone!
Chitre chooses this poem of Tukaram for the last section "Farewell to Being" (असण्याचा निरोप) in his book "Punha Tukaram" (पुन्हा तुकाराम).
सकळ ही माझी बोळवण करा ।
परतोनि घरा जावें तुह्मीं ॥1॥
कर्मधर्में तुह्मां असावें कल्याण ।
घ्या माझें वचन आशीर्वाद ॥ध्रु।॥
वाढवूनि दिलों एकाचिये हातीं ।
सकळ निश्चिंती जाली तेथें ॥2॥
आतां मज जाणें प्राणेश्वरासवें ।
माझिया भावें अनुसरलों ॥3॥
वाढवितां लोभ होइऩल उसीर ।
अवघींच स्थिर करा ठायीं ॥4॥
धर्म अर्थ काम जाला एके ठायीं ।
मेळविला जिंहीं हाता हात ॥5॥
तुका ह्मणे आतां जाली हे चि भेटी ।
उरल्या त्या गोष्टी बोलावया ॥6॥
I wonder if anyone else in the world has ever said such moving farewell words. Nice try Humphrey Bogart though.
(They remind me of my last meeting with my mother. I could never say it but 'Aai, We'll always have Miraj'.)
Following picture of great Saul Steinberg has appeared on this blog before. There I imagined that it depicted how Namdev (नामदेव) created the myth of Lord Vitthal.
Here I see: D P Chitre painting the image of his great forebear Tukaram, complete with a horn in his mouth, for anyone who could read either Marathi, English or German, and Tukaram in turn places a wreath on Chitre's head for a job well done!
Artist: Saul Steinberg, The New Yorker, Jan 6 1962
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Dilip Chitre's Bhopal Gas Tragedy
How much does the brute force of history change the quality of an artist's output?
How much role did the famines of first half of 17th century play in Tukaram's life to make him what he became? How much did the tragedy of Bhopal affect Chitre, the artist?
Chitre's e-mail to me on August 6 2009:
"Dear Aniruddha,
...To compare Bhopal 1984 with Mumbai 26/11 is not wholly unproductive. Innocent citizens of Bhopal didn't know they were at war with the giant Union Carbide corporation and that both the Union and the State government had welcomed the huge plant.
I am too close to the tragedy as it mentally maimed my only son, probably made an impact on my daughter-in-law and their six months old foetus that survived the nightmare now 25 and healthy).
best,
Dilip Chitre
My mail, after his (last?) surgery, to which he was responding:
Dear Shri. Chitre,
Hope you have now fully recovered.
Sorry for this intrusion but here is a post on my blog, comparing Bhopal Gas Tragedy and Mumbai Attacks, I wanted to share with you.
http://searchingforlaugh.blogspot.com/2009/08/idea-of-justice-warren-anderson.html
best,
How much role did the famines of first half of 17th century play in Tukaram's life to make him what he became? How much did the tragedy of Bhopal affect Chitre, the artist?
Chitre's e-mail to me on August 6 2009:
"Dear Aniruddha,
...To compare Bhopal 1984 with Mumbai 26/11 is not wholly unproductive. Innocent citizens of Bhopal didn't know they were at war with the giant Union Carbide corporation and that both the Union and the State government had welcomed the huge plant.
I am too close to the tragedy as it mentally maimed my only son, probably made an impact on my daughter-in-law and their six months old foetus that survived the nightmare now 25 and healthy).
best,
Dilip Chitre
My mail, after his (last?) surgery, to which he was responding:
Dear Shri. Chitre,
Hope you have now fully recovered.
Sorry for this intrusion but here is a post on my blog, comparing Bhopal Gas Tragedy and Mumbai Attacks, I wanted to share with you.
http://searchingforlaugh.blogspot.com/2009/08/idea-of-justice-warren-anderson.html
best,
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