Padma Devkota
Devkota's Self-Defense
My article "An Other Voice: A Cultural Misrepresentation" (The Kathmandu Post November 9, 2002) has created waves and ripples over the issue of a culturally detrimental remark made in the Preface to An Other Voice: English Literature From Nepal. A lot of non-issues have now become issue for debaters in this field. I have been accused of saying things I have not said in my article, and I have been under personal attack too, which Dr. Dipak Pant, of the Department of Physics, has rightly observed in his letter to The Kathmandu Post of December 6, 2002.
All this has not changed my original conviction that it is wrong for the editor-duo to make a negative comment on a poet of Laxmi Prasad Devkota's stature and to dismiss him without apparently even knowing what Devkota has written in English. After all this debate in the dailies, their silence has added strength to my conviction that any younger generation of writers must rise to sublime heights not by denigrating their established predecessors but by accomplishing artistic tasks on their own. Unfortunately, this is not the practice in Nepal even to this day. In his light write-up "'Clumsy' clashes, Chautari Chum" (The Himalayan December 9, 2002), Safal Sharma wonders why "The editor-duo of the book, around which so much rabble is being raised, have kept mum like graveyard stones in the face of such strange controversies raging around them—and that too, about their own handiwork."
The only people who have spoken up are two aspiring writers of the younger generation: Manjushree Thapa and Samrat Upadhyay. I will not be surprised if Manjushree Thapa turns out to be the ghostwriter of the Preface. She has been backed unblinkingly by Samrat Upadhyay despite her garrulous tone and her intention to "lambaste," to which she confessed in the letter published in The Kathmandu Post of Nov 28, 2002. As a result, I had to ignore her comments.
Samrat Upadhyay is someone I fail to understand. When he won the American prize for his collection of short stories, I too was happy. When he lambasted the Nepali scholars and participants who attended the LAN Conference in his article titled "Let's have a national consensus on literature," (The Kathmandu Post March 31, 2002), he was unaware of how that article boomeranged on his artistic rise. People then commented that he had received the American pat and had become an Emperor of Vanity. When I look back upon such comments on an uprising author, I think that Samrat Upadhyay should have been more careful in addressing the scholars and participants of that conference. Giving up the yellow journalistic and querulous style of writing will certainly help him and his students in the United States.
Of course, the same Samrat Upadhyay who, on the basis of what was reported to him of the discussions at the LAN conference, was vitriolic and indecent in his retort has today understood that even canons and classics might be criticized. What he has yet to understand is that you don't just make a free-floating, dismissive remark about a canon or a classic and expect people to agree with you. This may be a "writer's" convention in America; but it certainly is not the scholar's convention in Nepal. This is exactly what the Preface does. I think he should remain a bit more under Laxmi Prasad Devkota's shadow and learn a few more things that will help him gain respect as a writer in the future. I will quote only the fourth paragraph of an essay written originally in English by "clumsy" Devkota. The title of the essay is "Pulling Down the Higher Leg." The defenders of the editor-duo of the Preface under criticism have every right to denounce this as old and useless advice.
This is what Laxmi Prasad Devkota has to say in his own defense: "Do Indian literary figures tend to pull down the higher leg? That is a natural instinct among unhealthy spirits of competition. That unpleasant habit is most pronounced in our Kathmandu atmosphere. The aspiring type tries, after his fourth or fifth poem, to pull down the legs of the poet-laureate, Mr. Lekha Nath Paudyal. He plucks the oldest surviving grey beard for jealousy, and for demonstration of personal merit in progressiveness. A young writer in the dramatic field, who produces his second One Act Play, begins to thunder defiance at the dramatic art and practice of the greatest dramatist of the age, Mr. Bala Krishna Sum. A doggerel verse maker can be heard thundering his scurrilities on the public square of Indrachoke or Yuddha Park against the escapism of the Nature poetry of Mr. Siddhi Charan Shrestha. The mean prose piece producer of an oil paper journal will direct his invectives against the merit of high literary essayists. It is natural for the young to feel always cornered or left in the background by the grown up giants of merit. But the unhealthy spirits of rebellion swallow up the merit in their personal consciences and thunder against the enviable personality who overshadows them into oblivion. The iconoclast is abroad. He seeks to pull down the legs of Kala Vairab (The Terrible Death God) from below, insulted and frustrated by the gigantic symbol of divine power, without understanding what a heavy weightage should descend to crush him down, and what a number of heavy supports he would have to sweep away. It is like a democratic candidate of mean callibre standing for the General Elections against a high intellectual opponent against whom he has nothing to vent but false thunder, nor show anything else but the demonstration of a muscular fist. That is the psychology of frustration at its height. You do it because it pays you. You enjoy the hellish fees of false rebellion."
This tradition of pulling down the higher leg is alive in the Preface to An Other Voice: English Literature From Nepal. By defending the editor-duo, Samrat Upadhyay has only proved the American saying: "You can take the boy out of the country, but you cannot take the country out of the boy."
December 9, 2002.
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Friday, December 3, 2010
Sacrifice
Padma Devkota
Sacrifice
Out in the open sky,
the rain and the sun hung
an invitation of the coloured bow.
Electric impulses in the wire said,
“I am your friend.
I want to share with you
the burden of my heart.”
I listened to the heartbeat,
the coloured bow disappeared!
In the name of natural inspiration,
so many times have I lost friendship!
Today, in the name of friendship,
having lost natural inspiration,
I question myself:
“Was it wise to sacrifice a short-lived intense joy
for the sake of open sensibility?”
(Translated from Nepali)
Friday, November 26, 2010
Circe (Poem 1971)
Circe
Part I: The Journey
1. Foam and froth, surge and swell, billow and burst O Sea!
Blow and breathe thy fires and fumes,
Fulminate O Fury’s rage!
Let our heroes be!
They are not of common bred, Grecian heroes these.
They shall create a thunderbolt,
They shall stride the Earth and Moon
If any need there be!
2. O’er the angry waves and waters, winds and whining atmospheres,
O’er the churning vortex,
With the grace of Poseidon from all dangers free
Shall our dauntless heroes sail
Into the unknown seas.
Be it against the will of gods,
Nature be against them,
They are adrift and brave of heart
Our heroes these.
3. What if the vessel tilts too much?
Are not their hearts quite strong?
Mighty souls yet brave and calm?
The dance of Death! Those frolic waves undulating dark
Reflect the dullest gloom
Of the dullest sky
In the dullest manner
Under the rocking bark.
But the barks that sail through Time
Have a steady keel,
None is yellow in his liver
None has learnt to shake and quiver,
Fear they never feel.
4. Roar ye waters, crackle clouds, moan ye winds both soft and loud,
Die Oh Child of Morning’s breath!
Darken Earth and palpitate,
Fears will only turn you blue!
Masculine our heroes each
Bears a sun within his heart
Of some hopes a land to win,
To discover lands unseen,
Burns the sun within each heart.
5. Grecian Heroes! Lose not courage though difficult your task!
What is life for lazy lovers under lunar lights?
What is life for idle poets falling from their heights?
“Challenge!” is the word for heroes
And the word is “Fight!”
Tomorrow may not see you again!
On the vast seas the journey’s begun,
Creeping comes the night!
6. How the astral lights depict a stalagmitic ray!
Salty fountain like a fay!
‘Tis the strength of Death’s own grandchild
Heartless killer whale.
For a moment all our heroes
Gaping full and staring hard
Call upon the names they adore
Minerva and Jupitar,
Mercury and Mars!
How the waters rose upwards and with a swish fell back!
Thanks to the whale now off their track!
7. Ye may never find an island, floating ever live,
Does that matter Grecian Heroes?
Adventure is narcotics,
Arouser of kief!
Experience is in itself the greatest of all gifts.
Keep your brains within your heads,
Use your brawns and tug,
Forget home and wife and child,
Proceed through the fog!
Patriots of fertile Greece,
Proceed through the fog!
Part II: The Discouragement
1. Months elapsed, and every day twice afloat on gold
Half their hidden Suns were shrouded
Half their hopes were cold.
Sailing on the ink-pot vainly
Searching for an island comely
Day by day their lives re-told.
Almost starved and naked nearly
Curse they themselves all profanely,
“Foolhardy or bold?”
2. “Dead are many, dying many, sick or starved will die here any
You or he or he or any,”
Says a dying man to few remaining,
“Better home to die than here!”
Sickened by the fruitless years
Knowing, nodding, each one hears;
Hearts are heavy, sad and somber,
Were the pangs and pains made just for hombre?
Gush! You retained tears!
3. But ah! Among them one has heart of vulture,
Heart of lion,
Heart of man!
Tall and handsome, princely, shapely
He that all these hands commands.
Seeing thus the hearts of heroes
Dying, dying, dying,
Dissolving into darkest Nought,
To the Void replying,
Seeing thus the hearts of heroes from their strongest vessels leak
Up and with a hand for silence commences he here to speak.
4. “Friends and sailors! Here me now!
Battles fought with mortal-round
Has found us each safe and sound.
Here’s a challenge, Death’s the foe!
Onwards must we, we must go!
Or shall we turn our tails?
Green is absent, blue prevails,
Yet billowing, thrilling are our sails,
There’s a heaven awaits our advent
Let us through the distance rent,
We were by the gods here sent
Onwards must we! Or repent!
If Death is a never-dying foe
Shall we not die, return or go?
Turning back were doubly dead,
Then come! Our venture must ahead!”
5. Thus he spoke and threw a spark
Waking hero hearts,
Cirrus clouds on azure sky!
Do the gods now smile from high?
Or feel a jealous twang?
On they go now singing, ringing,
Now our heroes, Grecian heroes,
Belong to their rank!
Part III: The Island
1. Hearts of Heroes may be hard, but Man is ever Man.
Here a silent sailor sick, melancholy, grieved.
Lamentations in his heart, a lump was in his throat
Wishing sorely, but untimely, he was never afloat.
A form of colour and fresh Beauty saw he in the air
Feminine as wife can be, closest to his heart;
The tears were dried from her sweet eyes by length of longest years
And a Promethian pang had whitened all her hair jet black hair.
The face turned pale and paler and then dissolved in the cloud
Ask not me oh gentle readers! What sorrows his heart shroud.
With the look of lunatic and absent-minded stare
Like a child that reads of Freud
With a sheepish gaze on wise worlds, brave worlds,
Sane worlds, worlds of purpose, world of store,
Of his gentle bride at home
Dreams the sailor ever-more!
2. Far his gaze was scrutinizing the horizon blue,
Something calmed his lumps and laments
Something touched his nerves with joy,
Strange emotion from the sky
Of a different hue!
Of a different hue, my Lord! Of a different hue!
Green or red or brown or something I cannot tell you!
But the swallows chirped a welcome
Faint, but distinct, sweet,
Sucked the sailor all the air and shouted in the heat
“Land! Land! Oh mark that land!
Land! Land! Oh land!”
And the dying evening was buried in the “Land!”
3. Fast as hand and oar can move in rhythm “Thum, thum, thum!”
On thy verdure shall these sing; heroes come, come, come!
The stars so bright were never seen
So calm the sea has never been
Come sailors wine or rum?
The gods are on your side today, the greatest fortune send
‘Tis more than dream, ‘tis more than life, ‘tis more than paradise!
What lovely wine and women be here
I cannot surmise.
4. All night long the sailors turned poets as they stood
Playing with their fancies,
Dreaming of romances,
All in a blithe mood,
Hoping that Orion had a longer stride,
Praying to Apollo that faster he may ride.
And like the Truth, arising from the wine and brine,
Soon the sun did show himself splendidly divine.
5. Instructions were brief and clear
Few remained behind
All the rest did land
Apprehension was not there
Pleasure filled their minds.
6. The very touch of sand and soil grew a heart in sole!
Had they turned their tails and gone?
Oh this Paradise!
Flowers to their right and left,
Blossoms in the trees
Vermillion, shimmering yellow, deepest blue and pink,
Enticing the bees.
Softest lancelet-blades of verdant, succulent grasses flow
May-flowers like pink stars
Scattered on this sky do grow.
The misted-opulence of rosy apples mellowing in the sun,
Pomegranate, lemons, pears,
From different trees like different spheres,
Waiting to be plucked;
Here streams of milk-white waters run,
Here swans are bathing in the sun,
Here lakes and pools have dreamed and writ
Epics of the Nature’s realm
On their breathless life.
Here music warbles on her wings
Sprinkling life on everything,
But soft!
Have our heroes heard a different melody?
Part IV: Circe, the Witch
1. Drunken through the mouth and eyes and ears and all the senses
Tell us heroes walking in the empty air
All your pleasures, tell us truly, what juicy warble enhances?
What visions have you formed in mind?
What empty pleasures seek?
Have your fearless hearts now heroes
By sweet music turned weak?
Stern Duty’s voice grows weak and faint
Reluctance is suppressed,
Reason is flown and thoughts are blown
By Urge onwards pressed.
2. Why sailors! Saw you never castles?
Like they were all snow?
Walk you in mesmerism?
Unknowing where you go?
The eucalyptus pale and lofty
Stands a forbidding ground,
Deceit grins from some dark corner
Laughs in some sweet sound.
The sun would fain retrace his path,
Dissolve the world in darkness
Ah why should you with evil eyes
Look at Beauty’s brightness?
‘Tis time you return to your ship,
Give the rest a chance;
Wide-eyed wonder does not hear
Slowly they advance.
3. The music stops, the seconds drag, the castle door squeaks slight,
Each heart within now gallops fast, finds an inch of height
As black-eyed Cerci stands behind the warmest, reddest smile
Almost eighteen years of voyage, Oh! The lovely profile!
Is that face our journey’s end? Is that girl our goal?
Who would mind a little nap? The selling of the soul?
Translucent her morning’s white gown, her hair black waterfall
Sugared with the richest passion like a bird she calls.
4. Seeing how perplexed the sailors like busts of brass there stood
She knew what was in their hearts, their lusts she understood.
Her lifted bosom swelled and settled like a single wave
That calls the others just a minute, her signal she thus gave.
Turning round abruptly she then lithely walked indoors
Following Heroes? Play not with the females and with things that gore.
5. In she took them, wine she gave them, music played then,
Goofing heroes! Fall you into such stupore?
She is not, oh not your innocent Lenore!
6. When each had tasted of the wine and sat reclined
And felt himself sublime—
For he found the Circe’s glance
When he looked her every time,
Then up she got and shrunk a lot
And waved her wand in air
Wrinkling, crinkling, no more twinkling,
Crackled she, “Oh hear!
O hear! You foolish Grecian drunkards!
Fattest pigs you be!
Be the fattest pigs! Oh pigs!
The fattest pigs for me!”
How our dauntless, dauntless pigs
Answered with one accord
“Snort! Snort!” and wagged their tails
To her circling rod!
How she led them to a fence
And locked them in their place
Where are all our brave war-heroes?
Of them not a trace!
Fondest lovers! Now’s the time
For chewing on your cuds
Of the fevered-dream, fare you well!
Blame them not—the gods!
Part V: The Rescue
1. “Ulysses! Ulysses! Where are thy sailors brave?
Could such a lovely island be?
Be their darkest grave?
Have they lost their paths and wander
Like a river that meanders
Over the unknown lands?
Have thy commands been forgotten?
Or delinquency turns then rotten?
Or Fate has cruel hands?
Are they eating Lotus again?
Or by hostile natives slain?
Or taken as mere slaves?
Or the twinkling, tossing flowers
Shown them in their roots the bowers
And halls for ladies and braves?
Whatever their plights may be
Friends are friends on lands or sea,
Go in search of them!
If you find them, why! Rejoice!
If not don’t you bear the ice,
But hie! And search for them.
2. So the second party landed
With the very Fate were branded
Found the castle white,
Once more our black-eyed Cerci
Found the Greeks at her own merci
With her evil might.
3. Who is Ulysses this
That her eyes as vulgar sees
And to the next does pass?
Sane and wry his mentality
Will not lull to any ditty
Sung by the sweetest lass.
4. Their female host so hospitable
Filled with wine and fruits their table
Sailors gormandise:
Each has found a rebirth in him,
Black-eyes fill the sailors’ dream,
Life is a new surprise!
5. But our Hero with his heart
From which love can never part
And a head full reasons
Has not touched the wine nor food,
In them he has seen no good,
Though tempters come in legions.
6. As Cerci’s warble chimes and tingles
There’s a warning bell that jingles
Through the conscious mind,
Even then the music stops and
Cerci’s wand comes to her hand,
Ulysses steps behind.
7. Circling round her cruel wand
All the sailors she commands:
“Be the fattest pigs!”
Drunken, foolish sailors turn
Pigs, now Cerci have your fun—
Yet one does wear his wigs!
8. Perplexed, dazed and wondering
Speaking after pondering
Repeats her magic spell,
But he has in his hand a sword
And will not ail for all the world
Would fain have rung her knell!
9. Here his friends are snorting, snorting,
Some are glutting, others sporting,
How can he leave these dears?
Up he steps and slaps the Cerci
The black-eyed, voluptuous Cerci
Although she plays in tears.
10. Threatens her with such torture
As will scorch her long-lived future,
And pleadings will not hear.
Now our black-eyed, lovely Cerci
In the hands of god-like man she
Meets with her first fear.
11. Circles she her wand over
The filthy stink of pigs that hovers
And scents her magic hall,
Are these heroes she now raises?
Ulysses is crowned with praises,
Cerci is scared, dismal.
12. Hatred is like bitter bile
Just to think how in their style
Other comrades brood.
Even like the Fury rages,
Like a lightning built through ages
Waiting to strike he stood.
13. But apprehensive Cerci leads them
To the styles and repeats the same
Voodoo in a haste;
Victorious heroes from the war
Come you to this island far
Life of pigs to taste?
16-21 February, 1971.
Part I: The Journey
1. Foam and froth, surge and swell, billow and burst O Sea!
Blow and breathe thy fires and fumes,
Fulminate O Fury’s rage!
Let our heroes be!
They are not of common bred, Grecian heroes these.
They shall create a thunderbolt,
They shall stride the Earth and Moon
If any need there be!
2. O’er the angry waves and waters, winds and whining atmospheres,
O’er the churning vortex,
With the grace of Poseidon from all dangers free
Shall our dauntless heroes sail
Into the unknown seas.
Be it against the will of gods,
Nature be against them,
They are adrift and brave of heart
Our heroes these.
3. What if the vessel tilts too much?
Are not their hearts quite strong?
Mighty souls yet brave and calm?
The dance of Death! Those frolic waves undulating dark
Reflect the dullest gloom
Of the dullest sky
In the dullest manner
Under the rocking bark.
But the barks that sail through Time
Have a steady keel,
None is yellow in his liver
None has learnt to shake and quiver,
Fear they never feel.
4. Roar ye waters, crackle clouds, moan ye winds both soft and loud,
Die Oh Child of Morning’s breath!
Darken Earth and palpitate,
Fears will only turn you blue!
Masculine our heroes each
Bears a sun within his heart
Of some hopes a land to win,
To discover lands unseen,
Burns the sun within each heart.
5. Grecian Heroes! Lose not courage though difficult your task!
What is life for lazy lovers under lunar lights?
What is life for idle poets falling from their heights?
“Challenge!” is the word for heroes
And the word is “Fight!”
Tomorrow may not see you again!
On the vast seas the journey’s begun,
Creeping comes the night!
6. How the astral lights depict a stalagmitic ray!
Salty fountain like a fay!
‘Tis the strength of Death’s own grandchild
Heartless killer whale.
For a moment all our heroes
Gaping full and staring hard
Call upon the names they adore
Minerva and Jupitar,
Mercury and Mars!
How the waters rose upwards and with a swish fell back!
Thanks to the whale now off their track!
7. Ye may never find an island, floating ever live,
Does that matter Grecian Heroes?
Adventure is narcotics,
Arouser of kief!
Experience is in itself the greatest of all gifts.
Keep your brains within your heads,
Use your brawns and tug,
Forget home and wife and child,
Proceed through the fog!
Patriots of fertile Greece,
Proceed through the fog!
Part II: The Discouragement
1. Months elapsed, and every day twice afloat on gold
Half their hidden Suns were shrouded
Half their hopes were cold.
Sailing on the ink-pot vainly
Searching for an island comely
Day by day their lives re-told.
Almost starved and naked nearly
Curse they themselves all profanely,
“Foolhardy or bold?”
2. “Dead are many, dying many, sick or starved will die here any
You or he or he or any,”
Says a dying man to few remaining,
“Better home to die than here!”
Sickened by the fruitless years
Knowing, nodding, each one hears;
Hearts are heavy, sad and somber,
Were the pangs and pains made just for hombre?
Gush! You retained tears!
3. But ah! Among them one has heart of vulture,
Heart of lion,
Heart of man!
Tall and handsome, princely, shapely
He that all these hands commands.
Seeing thus the hearts of heroes
Dying, dying, dying,
Dissolving into darkest Nought,
To the Void replying,
Seeing thus the hearts of heroes from their strongest vessels leak
Up and with a hand for silence commences he here to speak.
4. “Friends and sailors! Here me now!
Battles fought with mortal-round
Has found us each safe and sound.
Here’s a challenge, Death’s the foe!
Onwards must we, we must go!
Or shall we turn our tails?
Green is absent, blue prevails,
Yet billowing, thrilling are our sails,
There’s a heaven awaits our advent
Let us through the distance rent,
We were by the gods here sent
Onwards must we! Or repent!
If Death is a never-dying foe
Shall we not die, return or go?
Turning back were doubly dead,
Then come! Our venture must ahead!”
5. Thus he spoke and threw a spark
Waking hero hearts,
Cirrus clouds on azure sky!
Do the gods now smile from high?
Or feel a jealous twang?
On they go now singing, ringing,
Now our heroes, Grecian heroes,
Belong to their rank!
Part III: The Island
1. Hearts of Heroes may be hard, but Man is ever Man.
Here a silent sailor sick, melancholy, grieved.
Lamentations in his heart, a lump was in his throat
Wishing sorely, but untimely, he was never afloat.
A form of colour and fresh Beauty saw he in the air
Feminine as wife can be, closest to his heart;
The tears were dried from her sweet eyes by length of longest years
And a Promethian pang had whitened all her hair jet black hair.
The face turned pale and paler and then dissolved in the cloud
Ask not me oh gentle readers! What sorrows his heart shroud.
With the look of lunatic and absent-minded stare
Like a child that reads of Freud
With a sheepish gaze on wise worlds, brave worlds,
Sane worlds, worlds of purpose, world of store,
Of his gentle bride at home
Dreams the sailor ever-more!
2. Far his gaze was scrutinizing the horizon blue,
Something calmed his lumps and laments
Something touched his nerves with joy,
Strange emotion from the sky
Of a different hue!
Of a different hue, my Lord! Of a different hue!
Green or red or brown or something I cannot tell you!
But the swallows chirped a welcome
Faint, but distinct, sweet,
Sucked the sailor all the air and shouted in the heat
“Land! Land! Oh mark that land!
Land! Land! Oh land!”
And the dying evening was buried in the “Land!”
3. Fast as hand and oar can move in rhythm “Thum, thum, thum!”
On thy verdure shall these sing; heroes come, come, come!
The stars so bright were never seen
So calm the sea has never been
Come sailors wine or rum?
The gods are on your side today, the greatest fortune send
‘Tis more than dream, ‘tis more than life, ‘tis more than paradise!
What lovely wine and women be here
I cannot surmise.
4. All night long the sailors turned poets as they stood
Playing with their fancies,
Dreaming of romances,
All in a blithe mood,
Hoping that Orion had a longer stride,
Praying to Apollo that faster he may ride.
And like the Truth, arising from the wine and brine,
Soon the sun did show himself splendidly divine.
5. Instructions were brief and clear
Few remained behind
All the rest did land
Apprehension was not there
Pleasure filled their minds.
6. The very touch of sand and soil grew a heart in sole!
Had they turned their tails and gone?
Oh this Paradise!
Flowers to their right and left,
Blossoms in the trees
Vermillion, shimmering yellow, deepest blue and pink,
Enticing the bees.
Softest lancelet-blades of verdant, succulent grasses flow
May-flowers like pink stars
Scattered on this sky do grow.
The misted-opulence of rosy apples mellowing in the sun,
Pomegranate, lemons, pears,
From different trees like different spheres,
Waiting to be plucked;
Here streams of milk-white waters run,
Here swans are bathing in the sun,
Here lakes and pools have dreamed and writ
Epics of the Nature’s realm
On their breathless life.
Here music warbles on her wings
Sprinkling life on everything,
But soft!
Have our heroes heard a different melody?
Part IV: Circe, the Witch
1. Drunken through the mouth and eyes and ears and all the senses
Tell us heroes walking in the empty air
All your pleasures, tell us truly, what juicy warble enhances?
What visions have you formed in mind?
What empty pleasures seek?
Have your fearless hearts now heroes
By sweet music turned weak?
Stern Duty’s voice grows weak and faint
Reluctance is suppressed,
Reason is flown and thoughts are blown
By Urge onwards pressed.
2. Why sailors! Saw you never castles?
Like they were all snow?
Walk you in mesmerism?
Unknowing where you go?
The eucalyptus pale and lofty
Stands a forbidding ground,
Deceit grins from some dark corner
Laughs in some sweet sound.
The sun would fain retrace his path,
Dissolve the world in darkness
Ah why should you with evil eyes
Look at Beauty’s brightness?
‘Tis time you return to your ship,
Give the rest a chance;
Wide-eyed wonder does not hear
Slowly they advance.
3. The music stops, the seconds drag, the castle door squeaks slight,
Each heart within now gallops fast, finds an inch of height
As black-eyed Cerci stands behind the warmest, reddest smile
Almost eighteen years of voyage, Oh! The lovely profile!
Is that face our journey’s end? Is that girl our goal?
Who would mind a little nap? The selling of the soul?
Translucent her morning’s white gown, her hair black waterfall
Sugared with the richest passion like a bird she calls.
4. Seeing how perplexed the sailors like busts of brass there stood
She knew what was in their hearts, their lusts she understood.
Her lifted bosom swelled and settled like a single wave
That calls the others just a minute, her signal she thus gave.
Turning round abruptly she then lithely walked indoors
Following Heroes? Play not with the females and with things that gore.
5. In she took them, wine she gave them, music played then,
Goofing heroes! Fall you into such stupore?
She is not, oh not your innocent Lenore!
6. When each had tasted of the wine and sat reclined
And felt himself sublime—
For he found the Circe’s glance
When he looked her every time,
Then up she got and shrunk a lot
And waved her wand in air
Wrinkling, crinkling, no more twinkling,
Crackled she, “Oh hear!
O hear! You foolish Grecian drunkards!
Fattest pigs you be!
Be the fattest pigs! Oh pigs!
The fattest pigs for me!”
How our dauntless, dauntless pigs
Answered with one accord
“Snort! Snort!” and wagged their tails
To her circling rod!
How she led them to a fence
And locked them in their place
Where are all our brave war-heroes?
Of them not a trace!
Fondest lovers! Now’s the time
For chewing on your cuds
Of the fevered-dream, fare you well!
Blame them not—the gods!
Part V: The Rescue
1. “Ulysses! Ulysses! Where are thy sailors brave?
Could such a lovely island be?
Be their darkest grave?
Have they lost their paths and wander
Like a river that meanders
Over the unknown lands?
Have thy commands been forgotten?
Or delinquency turns then rotten?
Or Fate has cruel hands?
Are they eating Lotus again?
Or by hostile natives slain?
Or taken as mere slaves?
Or the twinkling, tossing flowers
Shown them in their roots the bowers
And halls for ladies and braves?
Whatever their plights may be
Friends are friends on lands or sea,
Go in search of them!
If you find them, why! Rejoice!
If not don’t you bear the ice,
But hie! And search for them.
2. So the second party landed
With the very Fate were branded
Found the castle white,
Once more our black-eyed Cerci
Found the Greeks at her own merci
With her evil might.
3. Who is Ulysses this
That her eyes as vulgar sees
And to the next does pass?
Sane and wry his mentality
Will not lull to any ditty
Sung by the sweetest lass.
4. Their female host so hospitable
Filled with wine and fruits their table
Sailors gormandise:
Each has found a rebirth in him,
Black-eyes fill the sailors’ dream,
Life is a new surprise!
5. But our Hero with his heart
From which love can never part
And a head full reasons
Has not touched the wine nor food,
In them he has seen no good,
Though tempters come in legions.
6. As Cerci’s warble chimes and tingles
There’s a warning bell that jingles
Through the conscious mind,
Even then the music stops and
Cerci’s wand comes to her hand,
Ulysses steps behind.
7. Circling round her cruel wand
All the sailors she commands:
“Be the fattest pigs!”
Drunken, foolish sailors turn
Pigs, now Cerci have your fun—
Yet one does wear his wigs!
8. Perplexed, dazed and wondering
Speaking after pondering
Repeats her magic spell,
But he has in his hand a sword
And will not ail for all the world
Would fain have rung her knell!
9. Here his friends are snorting, snorting,
Some are glutting, others sporting,
How can he leave these dears?
Up he steps and slaps the Cerci
The black-eyed, voluptuous Cerci
Although she plays in tears.
10. Threatens her with such torture
As will scorch her long-lived future,
And pleadings will not hear.
Now our black-eyed, lovely Cerci
In the hands of god-like man she
Meets with her first fear.
11. Circles she her wand over
The filthy stink of pigs that hovers
And scents her magic hall,
Are these heroes she now raises?
Ulysses is crowned with praises,
Cerci is scared, dismal.
12. Hatred is like bitter bile
Just to think how in their style
Other comrades brood.
Even like the Fury rages,
Like a lightning built through ages
Waiting to strike he stood.
13. But apprehensive Cerci leads them
To the styles and repeats the same
Voodoo in a haste;
Victorious heroes from the war
Come you to this island far
Life of pigs to taste?
16-21 February, 1971.
Sunday, October 10, 2010
Teaching Writing at CDE
Padma Devkota
Teaching Writing at CDE
The Central Department of English (CDE) offers a compulsory Writing Course in its first year degree programme to help students conduct independent research and to write creatively and critically. Since students who write well usually score high in all other courses including Thesis, both students and teachers need to take writing seriously.
CDE, however, has failed to deliver this course with any significant degree of success. Because instructors are not properly trained and monitored, they tend to discuss theories of writing more than actually make students write. Both the academic leadership and the size of the class are responsible for this. But it is simply unfortunate that most of the instructors have never been formally trained to write during their academic career.
If no student is worth the MA English degree without at least some mastery over English language, anyone is free to examine the quality of MA theses that graduating students produce. With a few exceptions, one can easily demonstrate a general failure of the very basics of writing in many of these research works. I will not delve into cases of collusion, cut-n'-paste, and other malpractices that are growing and will soon swamp many departments.
Most of these problems can be effectively solved if teachers supervise theses properly, and seriously teach students to write. Instead, certain attitudes have intervened in the possibility of team spirit in the department. Besides the attitude of fawning students and each other, already discussed in "Celebration of Mediocrity," the other is one of fancied superiority of theoreticians over those condescendingly accepted as traditional colleagues. This I-know-more-than-thou attitude is unfortunately founded more on vanity than on actual meritorious scholarship. A neologism-spangled speech may dazzle the innocent public's eye, which, for lack of academic discrimination, can only behold an aura of versatile eminence of the speaker. But what of that! While the best literary scholars of the world strive hard to be simple, our students are brainwashed into thinking that the bigger the words they use, the wiser they are. They, therefore, argue that if you praise the fawning blurbs on their book, you are a postcolonialist, and, if you do not praise these blurbs, you are a colonialist. There is your sample postgraduate in English MA educated by theoreticians and groomed by "some higher consciousness" as SB Shrestha rightly perceives in "Strategic Minds" (TKP Dec 4, 2005).
While teachers have only to be honest to themselves and to their students to improve the situation, it is doubtful that some even read exam copies or chapters of a thesis submitted for correction. How can they if they supervise more than a dozen theses at a time? Why should they when the law of least sacrifice is human nature? Therefore, thesis writing has become a mere ritual where, to the utter neglect of desired research competence, some non-academic criteria help promote the student-loving teacher's image as a generous marker. And, in order to justify this, some claim that a good knowledge of postcoloniality and Marxism is enough to be a "nearly eighty-percent" scholar despite any fuzzy, non-academic writing ("Tantra and English," TKP October 16, 2005). Granted that knowledge is knowledge, the ability to express oneself must somewhere feature as a sign of education. However, for the present I will also concede to opposition to my line of argument because many of those who teach writing do not write well themselves.
For instance, when faced with such criticism, a richly arrogant but poorly composed Letter to the Editor befuddled the public with such jargons as "expressionism" and "elitism" (Abhi Subedi, TKP October 4, 2005). In the name of unfortunate Stony Brook, doctors with neither sense nor sensibility spit personal venom in the form of ad hominems, which are arguments directed against the person rather than against ideas expressed by the person (TKP November 20, 2005). And, one might also ask, "Do columnists of The Kathmandu Post really intend to communicate a message to an audience?"
What has the center for excellence in charge of English education all over Nepal done to improve the situation? In the past academic year, it offered a Writing Tutorial in the afternoon for its own students and compelled them to pay Rs. 2500 per head.
The significance of this strategy is simple. The department faces a genuine problem: most students opt for Thesis in which they can indiscriminately score approximately distinction marks although they may have barely passed in the other nine papers. They will, therefore, savagely resist any attempt to restore the original pre-requisite for Thesis, which is the average score raiser. The department, with its insufficient teaching faculty, then adopts a survival strategy. It attempts to prove that students actually deserve high scores by giving them about fifteen percent grace marks, which is against the rules of the university, for the rest of the other nine papers. Otherwise, the all too glaring discrepancy of marks would remain a telltale blotch. It is quite a face-uplift.
Then, the department decides upon another face-uplift by offering Writing Tutorial classes that turn out to be a grand financial success, but a blatant academic failure. First, the department already offers a compulsory writing course, which, if properly taught, will solve many problems. Second, students have already paid their university dues at the time of registration. Any coaching class that exacts a fee is additional financial burden upon them. Instead, teachers should have been available to them on campus, free of cost, to discuss their difficulties. Third, the head of the department literally intimidates students into registering for the Writing Tutorial by dictatorially turning it into a pre-requisite for the Thesis Paper. He, therefore, coerces them into filling certain coffers, which is shared among teachers who "love" their students.
Intelligent students who understood the importance of research writing at the degree level quietly tolerated this strategy for the benefit of their friends. They paid the dues; but, presaging the quality of the tutorial classes, they did not attend it. It probably was obvious to them that thirty students to a writing tutorial class meant additional lectures on the theories of writing. So, even as the head of the department counted bank notes at his desk and distributed these to selected teachers, students argued that the department should now indiscriminately accept their thesis proposals because they had joined these classes. Consequently, the more conscientious teachers, burning with shame, requested the head to return the money to students for the sake of a more academic line of action.
Imagine what will happen if other departments, too, start running paid tutorial classes for their students. I hope mature students will realize how their zeal for marks sometimes unnecessarily empties their pockets.
Teaching Writing at CDE
The Central Department of English (CDE) offers a compulsory Writing Course in its first year degree programme to help students conduct independent research and to write creatively and critically. Since students who write well usually score high in all other courses including Thesis, both students and teachers need to take writing seriously.
CDE, however, has failed to deliver this course with any significant degree of success. Because instructors are not properly trained and monitored, they tend to discuss theories of writing more than actually make students write. Both the academic leadership and the size of the class are responsible for this. But it is simply unfortunate that most of the instructors have never been formally trained to write during their academic career.
If no student is worth the MA English degree without at least some mastery over English language, anyone is free to examine the quality of MA theses that graduating students produce. With a few exceptions, one can easily demonstrate a general failure of the very basics of writing in many of these research works. I will not delve into cases of collusion, cut-n'-paste, and other malpractices that are growing and will soon swamp many departments.
Most of these problems can be effectively solved if teachers supervise theses properly, and seriously teach students to write. Instead, certain attitudes have intervened in the possibility of team spirit in the department. Besides the attitude of fawning students and each other, already discussed in "Celebration of Mediocrity," the other is one of fancied superiority of theoreticians over those condescendingly accepted as traditional colleagues. This I-know-more-than-thou attitude is unfortunately founded more on vanity than on actual meritorious scholarship. A neologism-spangled speech may dazzle the innocent public's eye, which, for lack of academic discrimination, can only behold an aura of versatile eminence of the speaker. But what of that! While the best literary scholars of the world strive hard to be simple, our students are brainwashed into thinking that the bigger the words they use, the wiser they are. They, therefore, argue that if you praise the fawning blurbs on their book, you are a postcolonialist, and, if you do not praise these blurbs, you are a colonialist. There is your sample postgraduate in English MA educated by theoreticians and groomed by "some higher consciousness" as SB Shrestha rightly perceives in "Strategic Minds" (TKP Dec 4, 2005).
While teachers have only to be honest to themselves and to their students to improve the situation, it is doubtful that some even read exam copies or chapters of a thesis submitted for correction. How can they if they supervise more than a dozen theses at a time? Why should they when the law of least sacrifice is human nature? Therefore, thesis writing has become a mere ritual where, to the utter neglect of desired research competence, some non-academic criteria help promote the student-loving teacher's image as a generous marker. And, in order to justify this, some claim that a good knowledge of postcoloniality and Marxism is enough to be a "nearly eighty-percent" scholar despite any fuzzy, non-academic writing ("Tantra and English," TKP October 16, 2005). Granted that knowledge is knowledge, the ability to express oneself must somewhere feature as a sign of education. However, for the present I will also concede to opposition to my line of argument because many of those who teach writing do not write well themselves.
For instance, when faced with such criticism, a richly arrogant but poorly composed Letter to the Editor befuddled the public with such jargons as "expressionism" and "elitism" (Abhi Subedi, TKP October 4, 2005). In the name of unfortunate Stony Brook, doctors with neither sense nor sensibility spit personal venom in the form of ad hominems, which are arguments directed against the person rather than against ideas expressed by the person (TKP November 20, 2005). And, one might also ask, "Do columnists of The Kathmandu Post really intend to communicate a message to an audience?"
What has the center for excellence in charge of English education all over Nepal done to improve the situation? In the past academic year, it offered a Writing Tutorial in the afternoon for its own students and compelled them to pay Rs. 2500 per head.
The significance of this strategy is simple. The department faces a genuine problem: most students opt for Thesis in which they can indiscriminately score approximately distinction marks although they may have barely passed in the other nine papers. They will, therefore, savagely resist any attempt to restore the original pre-requisite for Thesis, which is the average score raiser. The department, with its insufficient teaching faculty, then adopts a survival strategy. It attempts to prove that students actually deserve high scores by giving them about fifteen percent grace marks, which is against the rules of the university, for the rest of the other nine papers. Otherwise, the all too glaring discrepancy of marks would remain a telltale blotch. It is quite a face-uplift.
Then, the department decides upon another face-uplift by offering Writing Tutorial classes that turn out to be a grand financial success, but a blatant academic failure. First, the department already offers a compulsory writing course, which, if properly taught, will solve many problems. Second, students have already paid their university dues at the time of registration. Any coaching class that exacts a fee is additional financial burden upon them. Instead, teachers should have been available to them on campus, free of cost, to discuss their difficulties. Third, the head of the department literally intimidates students into registering for the Writing Tutorial by dictatorially turning it into a pre-requisite for the Thesis Paper. He, therefore, coerces them into filling certain coffers, which is shared among teachers who "love" their students.
Intelligent students who understood the importance of research writing at the degree level quietly tolerated this strategy for the benefit of their friends. They paid the dues; but, presaging the quality of the tutorial classes, they did not attend it. It probably was obvious to them that thirty students to a writing tutorial class meant additional lectures on the theories of writing. So, even as the head of the department counted bank notes at his desk and distributed these to selected teachers, students argued that the department should now indiscriminately accept their thesis proposals because they had joined these classes. Consequently, the more conscientious teachers, burning with shame, requested the head to return the money to students for the sake of a more academic line of action.
Imagine what will happen if other departments, too, start running paid tutorial classes for their students. I hope mature students will realize how their zeal for marks sometimes unnecessarily empties their pockets.
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
On Authorial Views
Padma Devkota
On Authorial Views
On February 24, 2006, The Rising Nepal published my article "Academia and TU" with a parenthetical footer that read: "The views expressed here are those of the author." (As if they could be somebody else's!) This vestige of Panchyat Regime humoured me, but it also set me thinking about the freedom of expression practiced in democratic Nepal. The need for such parenthetical footer as legal protection against possible lawsuits against Gorkhapatra Sansthan (as if my views were detrimental to an institution!) speaks loudly of the absence of exactly such freedom of expression in the media unless, of course, the footer intended to apologize to the authorities of Tribhuvan University mentioned in my article for having had to publish it. The only other reason could be that the editor is pre-appeasing the boss who might chide him for publishing such views.
Nepal is a country where there are insufficient laws to govern it to the point of civilization. Furthermore, whatever law exists on paper is more often broken than upheld in practice. Despite this sorry reality, frequent instances of fear of being caught up in some legal issues emerge in practices that remain conventional and unquestioned. Surgeons, for example, will not operate even to save life if the patient's kin refuses to sign a legal document saying that, whatever the outcome of surgery may be, no lawsuit will be filed against them. Even if death results out of mere carelessness, they have already, literally been given a licence to kill before they perform the surgery.
Both in the case of authorial views and surgery, the need for legal precaution only proves the possibility of errors. However, the shifting of responsibility from the press to the author also suggests something more: it is as if the editor is telling the author, "I do not think what you say is acceptable to my boss or to the government I serve. Therefore, I am not responsible if …."
As a writer, I have never denied, nor ever will, the responsibility of my words.
And, this is why I was shocked to find The Kathmandu Post refuse to publish three of my articles in which I am fully responsible for the authorial views and opinions. After three failed attempts to publish it in TKP, "Can the English Teacher Speak?" was published in The Rising Nepal on February 3, 2006. The content is strictly non-political in the conventional sense. The language may be a bit too difficult for the ordinary layman, but powerfully expressive. Was it because I wrote it or because it was about the academic malpractice at Tribhuvan University that the editors refused to publish it?
This question has haunted me against the backdrop of the larger issue of press freedom, which is a major political campaign these days. Even as mass media raises its voice against government censorship, like a toad in a serpent's mouth that instinctively flicks its tongue out at a fly, it has refused to publish non-party-political views on national higher education for some obscure reason. An "Opinion Page" of a daily newspaper should provide space for dissemination of the public's opinion, not that of the editors' or of the publishers' alone. Yet, like cab drivers who refuse to take passengers to certain destinations, editors refuse to publish certain views that do not tally with their own. Views, like destinations, are then not the public's choice. Yet, these very editors will publish letters that are stupidly defamatory and libelous of someone they do not support. Or, when they do support someone, even a mediocre is immortalized.
By refusing to publish a critical article such as "Can the English Teacher Speak?" the press has censored an individual's right to self-expression in the same way that the government has curtailed the freedom of the press through severe censorship. Both instances are expressions of power that undermines civilization. If a free society cannot be envisioned in the absence of freedom of the press, a free intellectual cannot exist in the absence of freedom of self-expression. Freedom of the press cannot mean an opportunity for the publishers and editors to advocate their own ideologies at the expense of dissenters who hold other views on issues of national importance. It is common knowledge that TKP does not favour the present government and that TRN will not dare to oppose it. Both being thus positioned at extremities of political ideologies, none is inclined to accept the freedom that is theirs to have. Like a free intellectual, a free press should be able to stand on politically neutral ground to promote critical discussions, however lengthy, on matters of national importance.
And, higher education is a matter of national importance. Failure of national education is failure of the state. Such a failure can only help maintain a slave's mentality. A slavish subjugation to the boss in any bureaucracy is a vestige of feudalistic fatalism. To pretend that no such thing exists or that, even if it does, it is not worth discussing would be hypocritical, or opportunistic at best. This is what the English (and other) teachers are guilty of at present. Instead of promoting academic standards, leadership in the educational field is uncritically submissive to non-academic and cantankerous encroachment in the oldest university of Nepal. Yet, when someone dares speak against this failure of academic ideals, TKP will not publish it! They deny a critical voice even as they accuse the government of stifling their press freedom.
Wisdom lies in a disciplined critical stance that is fully aware of the dichotomy between what should convince others and what actually convinces them. The press, considered as the fourth important body part of the government, cannot afford to play a tyrant to free thought. Let it convince the public by its willingness to promote a society of disciplined dissenters rather than seek to promote favoured ideologies.
On Authorial Views
On February 24, 2006, The Rising Nepal published my article "Academia and TU" with a parenthetical footer that read: "The views expressed here are those of the author." (As if they could be somebody else's!) This vestige of Panchyat Regime humoured me, but it also set me thinking about the freedom of expression practiced in democratic Nepal. The need for such parenthetical footer as legal protection against possible lawsuits against Gorkhapatra Sansthan (as if my views were detrimental to an institution!) speaks loudly of the absence of exactly such freedom of expression in the media unless, of course, the footer intended to apologize to the authorities of Tribhuvan University mentioned in my article for having had to publish it. The only other reason could be that the editor is pre-appeasing the boss who might chide him for publishing such views.
Nepal is a country where there are insufficient laws to govern it to the point of civilization. Furthermore, whatever law exists on paper is more often broken than upheld in practice. Despite this sorry reality, frequent instances of fear of being caught up in some legal issues emerge in practices that remain conventional and unquestioned. Surgeons, for example, will not operate even to save life if the patient's kin refuses to sign a legal document saying that, whatever the outcome of surgery may be, no lawsuit will be filed against them. Even if death results out of mere carelessness, they have already, literally been given a licence to kill before they perform the surgery.
Both in the case of authorial views and surgery, the need for legal precaution only proves the possibility of errors. However, the shifting of responsibility from the press to the author also suggests something more: it is as if the editor is telling the author, "I do not think what you say is acceptable to my boss or to the government I serve. Therefore, I am not responsible if …."
As a writer, I have never denied, nor ever will, the responsibility of my words.
And, this is why I was shocked to find The Kathmandu Post refuse to publish three of my articles in which I am fully responsible for the authorial views and opinions. After three failed attempts to publish it in TKP, "Can the English Teacher Speak?" was published in The Rising Nepal on February 3, 2006. The content is strictly non-political in the conventional sense. The language may be a bit too difficult for the ordinary layman, but powerfully expressive. Was it because I wrote it or because it was about the academic malpractice at Tribhuvan University that the editors refused to publish it?
This question has haunted me against the backdrop of the larger issue of press freedom, which is a major political campaign these days. Even as mass media raises its voice against government censorship, like a toad in a serpent's mouth that instinctively flicks its tongue out at a fly, it has refused to publish non-party-political views on national higher education for some obscure reason. An "Opinion Page" of a daily newspaper should provide space for dissemination of the public's opinion, not that of the editors' or of the publishers' alone. Yet, like cab drivers who refuse to take passengers to certain destinations, editors refuse to publish certain views that do not tally with their own. Views, like destinations, are then not the public's choice. Yet, these very editors will publish letters that are stupidly defamatory and libelous of someone they do not support. Or, when they do support someone, even a mediocre is immortalized.
By refusing to publish a critical article such as "Can the English Teacher Speak?" the press has censored an individual's right to self-expression in the same way that the government has curtailed the freedom of the press through severe censorship. Both instances are expressions of power that undermines civilization. If a free society cannot be envisioned in the absence of freedom of the press, a free intellectual cannot exist in the absence of freedom of self-expression. Freedom of the press cannot mean an opportunity for the publishers and editors to advocate their own ideologies at the expense of dissenters who hold other views on issues of national importance. It is common knowledge that TKP does not favour the present government and that TRN will not dare to oppose it. Both being thus positioned at extremities of political ideologies, none is inclined to accept the freedom that is theirs to have. Like a free intellectual, a free press should be able to stand on politically neutral ground to promote critical discussions, however lengthy, on matters of national importance.
And, higher education is a matter of national importance. Failure of national education is failure of the state. Such a failure can only help maintain a slave's mentality. A slavish subjugation to the boss in any bureaucracy is a vestige of feudalistic fatalism. To pretend that no such thing exists or that, even if it does, it is not worth discussing would be hypocritical, or opportunistic at best. This is what the English (and other) teachers are guilty of at present. Instead of promoting academic standards, leadership in the educational field is uncritically submissive to non-academic and cantankerous encroachment in the oldest university of Nepal. Yet, when someone dares speak against this failure of academic ideals, TKP will not publish it! They deny a critical voice even as they accuse the government of stifling their press freedom.
Wisdom lies in a disciplined critical stance that is fully aware of the dichotomy between what should convince others and what actually convinces them. The press, considered as the fourth important body part of the government, cannot afford to play a tyrant to free thought. Let it convince the public by its willingness to promote a society of disciplined dissenters rather than seek to promote favoured ideologies.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Reply to Birendra Pandey
Padma Devkota
Letter to the Editor
Dr. Beerendra Pandey's "Mocking at Mediocrity: A Disclaimer" (November 20, 2005) has revealed to every intelligent reader the academic quality of a university teacher who also tutors students on how to write. On the one hand, the tone of the write-up speaks for the sensibility of its writer. On the other hand, his claim that my "mischievous use" of his "Message" in the KMC prospectus turns it out to be "inflammatory" only proves the point that he does not understand what he writes.
Rather than be personal like Dr. Pandey, let me draw the readers' attention to the major issues of the debate. Ajit Baral's question on the sincerity of university professors in the blurbs of Yubraj Aryal's collection of short stories is still a burning issue. My article "Celebration of Mediocrity" (KTM Post October 9, 2005) highlights the fawning attitude of university teachers that functions elsewhere too. To prove that it doesn't Dr. Pandey has adopted the strategy of flattering his boss and some others from whom he probably has something to gain. He hopes to please some of his "respectable colleagues including the current HOD, whom I respect very much, both as an administrator and as a person" by slandering me in public. Such intellectual servility is simply another form of sycophancy.
Dr. Pandey's confidence that his dishonest, unethical and unprofessional act of undermining the Central Department of English, TU, Kirtipur, can be washed or waved away simply by chiding me in public and by ludicrously apologizing for what he once sturdily upheld among critical colleagues is really pitiable. He has indeed disclaimed his own institution, Tribhuvan University, because KMC bought his service with money. No, not all the perfumes of Arabia will wash the stain away!
Finally, Dr. Pandey has made his choice clear: to wallow in the sewage, which is worse than to be mediocre. Mediocres can be wonderfully civilized and sociable people despite their intellectual dimness. I cannot say the same thing about Dr. Pandey. Therefore, I am left with no choice but to dismiss and ignore his ranting.
The Kathmandu Post
November 23, 2005
Letter to the Editor
Dr. Beerendra Pandey's "Mocking at Mediocrity: A Disclaimer" (November 20, 2005) has revealed to every intelligent reader the academic quality of a university teacher who also tutors students on how to write. On the one hand, the tone of the write-up speaks for the sensibility of its writer. On the other hand, his claim that my "mischievous use" of his "Message" in the KMC prospectus turns it out to be "inflammatory" only proves the point that he does not understand what he writes.
Rather than be personal like Dr. Pandey, let me draw the readers' attention to the major issues of the debate. Ajit Baral's question on the sincerity of university professors in the blurbs of Yubraj Aryal's collection of short stories is still a burning issue. My article "Celebration of Mediocrity" (KTM Post October 9, 2005) highlights the fawning attitude of university teachers that functions elsewhere too. To prove that it doesn't Dr. Pandey has adopted the strategy of flattering his boss and some others from whom he probably has something to gain. He hopes to please some of his "respectable colleagues including the current HOD, whom I respect very much, both as an administrator and as a person" by slandering me in public. Such intellectual servility is simply another form of sycophancy.
Dr. Pandey's confidence that his dishonest, unethical and unprofessional act of undermining the Central Department of English, TU, Kirtipur, can be washed or waved away simply by chiding me in public and by ludicrously apologizing for what he once sturdily upheld among critical colleagues is really pitiable. He has indeed disclaimed his own institution, Tribhuvan University, because KMC bought his service with money. No, not all the perfumes of Arabia will wash the stain away!
Finally, Dr. Pandey has made his choice clear: to wallow in the sewage, which is worse than to be mediocre. Mediocres can be wonderfully civilized and sociable people despite their intellectual dimness. I cannot say the same thing about Dr. Pandey. Therefore, I am left with no choice but to dismiss and ignore his ranting.
The Kathmandu Post
November 23, 2005
Monday, August 30, 2010
Quest (Poem)
From: Frosty Breath in the Wilderness
by Padma Devkota
Part IV: "Quest"
3.
Teacher:
What a glorious morning this is.
Students, earth has not anything to show
more fair than this mighty heart
of a growing civilization.
First Student:
What civilization, Sir?
Teacher:
Waking up
is the finest moment of life.
Once awake, human intellect
cuts through ignorance like a knife
and serves the main dish of values
that build up civilizations.
Second Student:
Is value a dish, Sir?
Teacher:
Values
and priorities are the basis
of systems that must function well
to maintain civilization.
When we watch the sunrise, we see
that nature too obeys all rules
to maintain her holy practice
of eternal regeneration.
First Student:
Is not nature uncivilized?
Teacher:
Only those who break rules do not
promote civilization.
Those who break rules and upturn values
create their own demonic worlds.
Second Student:
And which is better, Sir?
Teacher:
Better?
That I do not know. But the best
is to follow the morning sun
like a lover, to yearn for it
throughout the night, to take delight
in its presence and to say,
"Sun, may you teach me to wake up
each morning, to brighten others
like you brighten all, and to shed
the light of life upon this world."
First Student:
Sir, what is "the light of life"?
Teacher:
It is not smashing peoples' shins
or quartering off all their limbs,
nor even hurting them with words.
The light of life shines best where we
care for each other's happiness
and tread with sensitive steps the ground
where people's hearts are strewn around,
for hearts are living, hearts are quick
to softest brush of voice and tone.
Of course, we need this crowd on earth;
"Beyond all this, the wish to be alone."
by Padma Devkota
Part IV: "Quest"
3.
Teacher:
What a glorious morning this is.
Students, earth has not anything to show
more fair than this mighty heart
of a growing civilization.
First Student:
What civilization, Sir?
Teacher:
Waking up
is the finest moment of life.
Once awake, human intellect
cuts through ignorance like a knife
and serves the main dish of values
that build up civilizations.
Second Student:
Is value a dish, Sir?
Teacher:
Values
and priorities are the basis
of systems that must function well
to maintain civilization.
When we watch the sunrise, we see
that nature too obeys all rules
to maintain her holy practice
of eternal regeneration.
First Student:
Is not nature uncivilized?
Teacher:
Only those who break rules do not
promote civilization.
Those who break rules and upturn values
create their own demonic worlds.
Second Student:
And which is better, Sir?
Teacher:
Better?
That I do not know. But the best
is to follow the morning sun
like a lover, to yearn for it
throughout the night, to take delight
in its presence and to say,
"Sun, may you teach me to wake up
each morning, to brighten others
like you brighten all, and to shed
the light of life upon this world."
First Student:
Sir, what is "the light of life"?
Teacher:
It is not smashing peoples' shins
or quartering off all their limbs,
nor even hurting them with words.
The light of life shines best where we
care for each other's happiness
and tread with sensitive steps the ground
where people's hearts are strewn around,
for hearts are living, hearts are quick
to softest brush of voice and tone.
Of course, we need this crowd on earth;
"Beyond all this, the wish to be alone."
Faction (Poem)
From: Frosty Breath in the Wilderness
by Padma Devkota
"Faction"
2.
Old Sage:
Aum! May the Goddess Vak grant tongues to you all!
Now listen to the gospel of the Sky.
We are all in essence one. What flows down
from the source is not changed by the nature
of the terrain that encloses it. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We are all in essence one. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! We, the children of Nature, are fed
by father Infinite Space who loves us.
What love begets must not kick with anger.
Rebellion is a slow suicide.
Submit to ancestral wisdom. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We submit to ancestral wisdom. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Upon the altar of Earth, like butter
the clouds melt with the fire of the Sun
to create heat, which is life. Without heat
there can be no life. Pour butter into
the holy pit each morning to appease
Agni, the fire that sustains life. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! Without heat there can be no life. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Upon the altar of life, shed actions
that melt like pure butter without residue
of greed, or lust, or desire. Appease
the Creator with pure devotion
to Him through nature and through gods. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We shall not desire nor lust. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Listen to the gospel of the Sky.
It is a sea of individual minds.
The drop that refuses to lose itself
in the water of the palm shall dry dead.
Mingling with the rest it shall survive. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We shall merge like drops with other pools. Aum!
Old Sage:
Blessings upon you all! May Goddess Vak,
too, bless you with learning.
Dismiss. Now go
and leave me to my solitude where I
may with closed eyes read the gospel of the Sky.
by Padma Devkota
"Faction"
2.
Old Sage:
Aum! May the Goddess Vak grant tongues to you all!
Now listen to the gospel of the Sky.
We are all in essence one. What flows down
from the source is not changed by the nature
of the terrain that encloses it. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We are all in essence one. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! We, the children of Nature, are fed
by father Infinite Space who loves us.
What love begets must not kick with anger.
Rebellion is a slow suicide.
Submit to ancestral wisdom. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We submit to ancestral wisdom. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Upon the altar of Earth, like butter
the clouds melt with the fire of the Sun
to create heat, which is life. Without heat
there can be no life. Pour butter into
the holy pit each morning to appease
Agni, the fire that sustains life. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! Without heat there can be no life. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Upon the altar of life, shed actions
that melt like pure butter without residue
of greed, or lust, or desire. Appease
the Creator with pure devotion
to Him through nature and through gods. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We shall not desire nor lust. Aum!
Old Sage:
Aum! Listen to the gospel of the Sky.
It is a sea of individual minds.
The drop that refuses to lose itself
in the water of the palm shall dry dead.
Mingling with the rest it shall survive. Aum!
Pupils:
Aum! We shall merge like drops with other pools. Aum!
Old Sage:
Blessings upon you all! May Goddess Vak,
too, bless you with learning.
Dismiss. Now go
and leave me to my solitude where I
may with closed eyes read the gospel of the Sky.
Thursday, August 26, 2010
Congratulations in Retrospect
Padma Devkota
Congratulations in Retrospect!
Immediately after the then Rector of Tribhuvan University Professor Dr. Mahendra Prasad Singh announced on TV the twenty percent internal assessment marks policy I congratulated him in advance in The Kathmandu Post of November 26, 2005. Once again, I take this opportunity to congratulate him in retrospect for his pragmatically successful policy. TU has indeed succeeded in diluting the academic strength of private colleges, too.
Since it is time for colleges to submit the twenty percent internal assessment marks to the examination section at Balkhu, private colleges are obviously worried about their students’ grades. They have only the Central Department of English (CDE) at Kirtipur to look up to as a model. CDE, however, has remained as blunt as ever to the requirements of academic culture. Unable to function in any other way, it has conducted a test for its registered crowd and has decided upon a specific policy of grading: everyone will be given marks between twelve and eighteen out of twenty for the internal assessment. This means that any student who has signed the exam attendance sheet will receive nothing below twelve out of twenty, which is 60%. What a luxury for fortunate students who don’t have to write a single word to receive a first division mark! And, of course, students need not be all present for the test at the same time. Anyone who misses the test will be given a chance to appear for it on demand.
And, if they do write something, they will receive a maximum of eighteen out of twenty, which is 90%. A real distinction! No one is going to get anything more than this despite their extra brilliance. And, examiners don’t have to be too careful in reading and grading student papers (which is generally not their habit anyway) because the marks students receive are determined less on the basis of academic performance than on the basis of a collusion between the Head of the Department, a few senior teachers and the representatives of the students themselves. These people sit down together and decide which student gets what.
Against this practice, private colleges are helpless. Throughout the year, teachers have properly monitored the academic performance of their students. Grades received for each class or home assignment are meaningful. And, students have written real research papers! Most of them have attended classes regularly unlike many of their counterparts in TU colleges. They have participated in class discussions, raised intelligent questions, and made serious attempts to learn. Even during long periods of time when TU campuses were shut down for political and other reasons, students of private colleges were attending classes and their teachers were constantly challenging them to excel themselves.
Given this reality, do students of private colleges deserve anything less than what their counterparts at CDE receive? Examination marks are academic signifiers, not gift parcels. If teachers of private campuses go by the rules of TU (that CDE itself does not follow), distinction is a mark of excellence. The five slots into which TU examinees of the Masters Level may fall are: Fail (0-39), Third Division (40-49), Second Division (50-59), First Division (60-74), and Distinction (75 and above). However, Tribhuvan University, and specially CDE, has made it their noble practice of offering marks as gifts to students out of love for the poor non-metropolitans (this democratically includes the metropolitans!) who have not had a chance to go to good private schools in their poverty-ridden villages. This is how the teaching faculty of CDE broke into three factions in the recent past: a group of teachers who artfully professed love for their students and slandered other colleagues as teachers who did not love their students even as a third group of teachers lost their voice out of fear of having to speak up.
Ironically, teachers who were not supposed to have loved their students were academically more demanding than those who loved their students. This resulted in the student-loving faction attempting to slander the non-student-loving teachers in various ways. One of the strategies was to befriend students and fill their ears against the academically more demanding colleagues. What is a greater crime than when a scholar colleague leaves the examination room after the thesis viva-voce of a student is over and, out of holy love for the student, tells him or her outside the examination hall that, although s/he wanted to give the student eighty-five percent, so-and-so objected to such high marks and gave him only seventy-two. And, what authority does this colleague assume to announce TU examination marks to the student before the Examination Board does so?
I explained the transparency of the policy of the Rector’s Office in my article of November 26, 2005: “since TU is unable to uplift its academic face, why not use the cosmetics of marks! And this too against the backdrop of competitions with younger universities that have a different grading system that marks down from one hundred rather than up from zero. After all, marks don't really have to stand for academic achievement; they may stand for various levels of ignorance or even for the intensity of ‘love’ the teachers profess for their students.” Today, it is clear that private colleges, too, are expected to play the “loving teachers” for the sake of justifying the malpractice of the central departments of Tribhuvan University. They too have been forced to say: “We will give first division marks to anyone who was present at the internal assessment exam even if that student has written nothing on the answer paper. We will not give anything over 90% to anyone.”
I am sure teachers are happy because they do not have to read any answer papers to give first division or distinction marks to students. And students are happy because they don’t have to write anything sensible to obtain first division or distinction marks. This is the present reality of our oldest university.
I must congratulate the Rector’s Office of Tribhuvan University for such a wonderful decision, which has led to the happiness of the majority.
Sarve bhavantu shukhina… May everyone (unconcerned for the morrow) be happy!
From: The Kathmandu Post Thursday, December 21, 2006
Congratulations in Retrospect!
Immediately after the then Rector of Tribhuvan University Professor Dr. Mahendra Prasad Singh announced on TV the twenty percent internal assessment marks policy I congratulated him in advance in The Kathmandu Post of November 26, 2005. Once again, I take this opportunity to congratulate him in retrospect for his pragmatically successful policy. TU has indeed succeeded in diluting the academic strength of private colleges, too.
Since it is time for colleges to submit the twenty percent internal assessment marks to the examination section at Balkhu, private colleges are obviously worried about their students’ grades. They have only the Central Department of English (CDE) at Kirtipur to look up to as a model. CDE, however, has remained as blunt as ever to the requirements of academic culture. Unable to function in any other way, it has conducted a test for its registered crowd and has decided upon a specific policy of grading: everyone will be given marks between twelve and eighteen out of twenty for the internal assessment. This means that any student who has signed the exam attendance sheet will receive nothing below twelve out of twenty, which is 60%. What a luxury for fortunate students who don’t have to write a single word to receive a first division mark! And, of course, students need not be all present for the test at the same time. Anyone who misses the test will be given a chance to appear for it on demand.
And, if they do write something, they will receive a maximum of eighteen out of twenty, which is 90%. A real distinction! No one is going to get anything more than this despite their extra brilliance. And, examiners don’t have to be too careful in reading and grading student papers (which is generally not their habit anyway) because the marks students receive are determined less on the basis of academic performance than on the basis of a collusion between the Head of the Department, a few senior teachers and the representatives of the students themselves. These people sit down together and decide which student gets what.
Against this practice, private colleges are helpless. Throughout the year, teachers have properly monitored the academic performance of their students. Grades received for each class or home assignment are meaningful. And, students have written real research papers! Most of them have attended classes regularly unlike many of their counterparts in TU colleges. They have participated in class discussions, raised intelligent questions, and made serious attempts to learn. Even during long periods of time when TU campuses were shut down for political and other reasons, students of private colleges were attending classes and their teachers were constantly challenging them to excel themselves.
Given this reality, do students of private colleges deserve anything less than what their counterparts at CDE receive? Examination marks are academic signifiers, not gift parcels. If teachers of private campuses go by the rules of TU (that CDE itself does not follow), distinction is a mark of excellence. The five slots into which TU examinees of the Masters Level may fall are: Fail (0-39), Third Division (40-49), Second Division (50-59), First Division (60-74), and Distinction (75 and above). However, Tribhuvan University, and specially CDE, has made it their noble practice of offering marks as gifts to students out of love for the poor non-metropolitans (this democratically includes the metropolitans!) who have not had a chance to go to good private schools in their poverty-ridden villages. This is how the teaching faculty of CDE broke into three factions in the recent past: a group of teachers who artfully professed love for their students and slandered other colleagues as teachers who did not love their students even as a third group of teachers lost their voice out of fear of having to speak up.
Ironically, teachers who were not supposed to have loved their students were academically more demanding than those who loved their students. This resulted in the student-loving faction attempting to slander the non-student-loving teachers in various ways. One of the strategies was to befriend students and fill their ears against the academically more demanding colleagues. What is a greater crime than when a scholar colleague leaves the examination room after the thesis viva-voce of a student is over and, out of holy love for the student, tells him or her outside the examination hall that, although s/he wanted to give the student eighty-five percent, so-and-so objected to such high marks and gave him only seventy-two. And, what authority does this colleague assume to announce TU examination marks to the student before the Examination Board does so?
I explained the transparency of the policy of the Rector’s Office in my article of November 26, 2005: “since TU is unable to uplift its academic face, why not use the cosmetics of marks! And this too against the backdrop of competitions with younger universities that have a different grading system that marks down from one hundred rather than up from zero. After all, marks don't really have to stand for academic achievement; they may stand for various levels of ignorance or even for the intensity of ‘love’ the teachers profess for their students.” Today, it is clear that private colleges, too, are expected to play the “loving teachers” for the sake of justifying the malpractice of the central departments of Tribhuvan University. They too have been forced to say: “We will give first division marks to anyone who was present at the internal assessment exam even if that student has written nothing on the answer paper. We will not give anything over 90% to anyone.”
I am sure teachers are happy because they do not have to read any answer papers to give first division or distinction marks to students. And students are happy because they don’t have to write anything sensible to obtain first division or distinction marks. This is the present reality of our oldest university.
I must congratulate the Rector’s Office of Tribhuvan University for such a wonderful decision, which has led to the happiness of the majority.
Sarve bhavantu shukhina… May everyone (unconcerned for the morrow) be happy!
From: The Kathmandu Post Thursday, December 21, 2006
Congratulations in Advance
Congratulations in Advance!
Padma Devkota
Our impatience to share joys with our loved ones almost always gushes uncontrollably forth prior to the event or the occasion that is supposed to cause such joys, thereby inverting the causal universe on its head. At such moments, we live in Alice's Wonderland where characters bleed before the needle pricks them, where fallacies of causal relationships overtake our rationality and render us into a bundle of emotions. Long before the wedding day, we offer our felicitations to the bride or the groom. We extend our best wishes to those who are about to venture into a new space of adventure. We wish a very Happy New Year to each other before the old year is out or a very Happy Vijaya Dashami before the festival is in. Our longing for such moments of joy circulates torrentially in our veins to reduce our competence of expression to a mere utterance of joy.
After listening to the Rector of Tribhuvan University on TV, I am so overwhelmed with excitement that I must congratulate him for his recent announcement of the twenty percent internal assessment marks policy. According to this policy, TU will allow campuses to conduct an internal assessment worth twenty percent out of a centralised one hundred percent at all academic levels if they want to do so, but will immediately and compulsorily implement this policy at the degree level with the help of the subject teacher. This mark of trust by the TU academic head in the competence of all its teachers is a dawn of civilization on campus for it certainly offers academic respect to all who deserve it. I, for one, would have appreciated it even more had subject teachers been trusted to handle not just the twenty percent but the whole one hundred percent of the examination marks. This would have been of greater advantage to both the students and the academic policy makers of the university.
I say so because the policy of the Rector's Office is transparent: since TU is unable to uplift its academic face, why not use the cosmetics of marks! And this too against the backdrop of competitions with younger universities that have a different grading system that marks down from one hundred rather than up from zero. After all, marks don't really have to stand for academic achievement; they may stand for various levels of ignorance or even for the intensity of "love" the teachers profess for their students.
And, how does this policy work? If Dharahara does not grow taller after whitewashing and renovation, it will at least look more presentable. That is the effect of cosmetics. That is why the burden of whitewashing TU academics has been partly decentralised to naïve teachers whose seats (if they have any) are bound to be set on fire (if they are just that lucky!) by demands for twenty out of twenty in the internal assessment marks. Any refusal to comply will surely be met with threats and abuses or even actual violence. This is a prediction, not an assumption.
History has told sadder tales than this. The hasty, failed experiment of the mid-seventies points a warning index at this new policy. During a politically more stable and better disciplined decade, the internal assessment system collapsed because TU could not offer any means of resisting student pressure upon teachers to give them twenty out of twenty for the internal assessment. Students threatened resisting teachers with knives and muscles, with threats and abuses, even as the university forgave them all like Christ on the cross. How does TU expect its teachers to resist the pressure of students who have adopted violence and incendiary techniques to score better marks today?
I do not believe that the Rector's Office expects teachers to resist such pressures, except at the theoretical level. It cannot, because it has already confessed to me that it cannot offer work with dignity to its academic staff. So, it has fallen into the rut of accepting the incapacity of individuals (including medical doctors) to change the ugly reality of the university's diseased system. Because this much is clear, I have attempted a calculation of the present pass marks for the degree level examination. On paper, it is forty percent. In practice, it is approximately five marks out of eighty, which is 6.25%.
How does this happen? First, since any exam (theses, for instance) handled individually by the subject teacher is not normally scored below ninety percent for obvious reasons that I have discussed in earlier articles, I discount the possibility of any student receiving anything below eighteen out of twenty in the internal assessment marks. This already brings the Master's level pass marks down to twenty to twenty-two percent. Second, the university has a tradition of offering a five percent grace marks to students for any exam. This brings the pass marks down to fifteen to seventeen percent. And, finally, the trend in some departments is to give students an additional ten to fifteen percent grace marks on their own discretion. Let us suppose that the five percent grace offered by the university is included in this range. Even then, this will bring the pass marks for the degree level examinations down to something between five to twelve percent. This pass percentage descends even lower at the hands of teachers who "love" their students. If one may obtain a Master's degree by scoring even twenty percent, who wouldn't?
The private student will certainly lose twenty percent of the total score simply by not registering as a regular student. Since attendance, like pass marks, has a double face by TU standards, it is academically suicidal to remain a private student. Therefore, my suggestions in "Admissions Open" (KTM Post Nov 12, 2005) stand even stronger than before.
The only question that nags me is this: Why does TU not switch over form its present marking system to a grading system instead of using cosmetics to uplift its face? It is daylight clear to the whole world that students who received a mere fifty percent five years ago were better products than students who receive sixty percent today. If the university continues merely whitewashing its face, there will soon come a time when employers and other universities of the world will reject its products as being academically underqualified. TU alone cannot define academics. It has to comply with the academic standard set by many other universities of the world if it wants to carry any conviction at all. Any refusal to do so is anti-nationalistic.
Contrary to the requirements of academic promotion, the Rector's Office has decided what it has decided: to whitewash its academic face even if that means to fall from the academic standard. The cosmetic effect has already brightened the faces of the policy makers and the students of TU. Students obviously understand only marks. The Rector also seems to understand only his term in office, which has to pass smoothly and without any untoward event. Even as I foresee the consequences of this decision, I must congratulate the policy makers in advance for the whitewash that has uplifted the academic face of TU, for the better scores that students will inevitably receive in the next exam as a testimony to their academic ability, and for the garlanding and honours the Rector may receive for his presumably innovative idea.
From: The Kathmandu Post Saturday, November 26, 2005
Padma Devkota
Our impatience to share joys with our loved ones almost always gushes uncontrollably forth prior to the event or the occasion that is supposed to cause such joys, thereby inverting the causal universe on its head. At such moments, we live in Alice's Wonderland where characters bleed before the needle pricks them, where fallacies of causal relationships overtake our rationality and render us into a bundle of emotions. Long before the wedding day, we offer our felicitations to the bride or the groom. We extend our best wishes to those who are about to venture into a new space of adventure. We wish a very Happy New Year to each other before the old year is out or a very Happy Vijaya Dashami before the festival is in. Our longing for such moments of joy circulates torrentially in our veins to reduce our competence of expression to a mere utterance of joy.
After listening to the Rector of Tribhuvan University on TV, I am so overwhelmed with excitement that I must congratulate him for his recent announcement of the twenty percent internal assessment marks policy. According to this policy, TU will allow campuses to conduct an internal assessment worth twenty percent out of a centralised one hundred percent at all academic levels if they want to do so, but will immediately and compulsorily implement this policy at the degree level with the help of the subject teacher. This mark of trust by the TU academic head in the competence of all its teachers is a dawn of civilization on campus for it certainly offers academic respect to all who deserve it. I, for one, would have appreciated it even more had subject teachers been trusted to handle not just the twenty percent but the whole one hundred percent of the examination marks. This would have been of greater advantage to both the students and the academic policy makers of the university.
I say so because the policy of the Rector's Office is transparent: since TU is unable to uplift its academic face, why not use the cosmetics of marks! And this too against the backdrop of competitions with younger universities that have a different grading system that marks down from one hundred rather than up from zero. After all, marks don't really have to stand for academic achievement; they may stand for various levels of ignorance or even for the intensity of "love" the teachers profess for their students.
And, how does this policy work? If Dharahara does not grow taller after whitewashing and renovation, it will at least look more presentable. That is the effect of cosmetics. That is why the burden of whitewashing TU academics has been partly decentralised to naïve teachers whose seats (if they have any) are bound to be set on fire (if they are just that lucky!) by demands for twenty out of twenty in the internal assessment marks. Any refusal to comply will surely be met with threats and abuses or even actual violence. This is a prediction, not an assumption.
History has told sadder tales than this. The hasty, failed experiment of the mid-seventies points a warning index at this new policy. During a politically more stable and better disciplined decade, the internal assessment system collapsed because TU could not offer any means of resisting student pressure upon teachers to give them twenty out of twenty for the internal assessment. Students threatened resisting teachers with knives and muscles, with threats and abuses, even as the university forgave them all like Christ on the cross. How does TU expect its teachers to resist the pressure of students who have adopted violence and incendiary techniques to score better marks today?
I do not believe that the Rector's Office expects teachers to resist such pressures, except at the theoretical level. It cannot, because it has already confessed to me that it cannot offer work with dignity to its academic staff. So, it has fallen into the rut of accepting the incapacity of individuals (including medical doctors) to change the ugly reality of the university's diseased system. Because this much is clear, I have attempted a calculation of the present pass marks for the degree level examination. On paper, it is forty percent. In practice, it is approximately five marks out of eighty, which is 6.25%.
How does this happen? First, since any exam (theses, for instance) handled individually by the subject teacher is not normally scored below ninety percent for obvious reasons that I have discussed in earlier articles, I discount the possibility of any student receiving anything below eighteen out of twenty in the internal assessment marks. This already brings the Master's level pass marks down to twenty to twenty-two percent. Second, the university has a tradition of offering a five percent grace marks to students for any exam. This brings the pass marks down to fifteen to seventeen percent. And, finally, the trend in some departments is to give students an additional ten to fifteen percent grace marks on their own discretion. Let us suppose that the five percent grace offered by the university is included in this range. Even then, this will bring the pass marks for the degree level examinations down to something between five to twelve percent. This pass percentage descends even lower at the hands of teachers who "love" their students. If one may obtain a Master's degree by scoring even twenty percent, who wouldn't?
The private student will certainly lose twenty percent of the total score simply by not registering as a regular student. Since attendance, like pass marks, has a double face by TU standards, it is academically suicidal to remain a private student. Therefore, my suggestions in "Admissions Open" (KTM Post Nov 12, 2005) stand even stronger than before.
The only question that nags me is this: Why does TU not switch over form its present marking system to a grading system instead of using cosmetics to uplift its face? It is daylight clear to the whole world that students who received a mere fifty percent five years ago were better products than students who receive sixty percent today. If the university continues merely whitewashing its face, there will soon come a time when employers and other universities of the world will reject its products as being academically underqualified. TU alone cannot define academics. It has to comply with the academic standard set by many other universities of the world if it wants to carry any conviction at all. Any refusal to do so is anti-nationalistic.
Contrary to the requirements of academic promotion, the Rector's Office has decided what it has decided: to whitewash its academic face even if that means to fall from the academic standard. The cosmetic effect has already brightened the faces of the policy makers and the students of TU. Students obviously understand only marks. The Rector also seems to understand only his term in office, which has to pass smoothly and without any untoward event. Even as I foresee the consequences of this decision, I must congratulate the policy makers in advance for the whitewash that has uplifted the academic face of TU, for the better scores that students will inevitably receive in the next exam as a testimony to their academic ability, and for the garlanding and honours the Rector may receive for his presumably innovative idea.
From: The Kathmandu Post Saturday, November 26, 2005
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
The Gem of Union (Poem)
X. The Gem of Union
From: A Flame for a Moth by Padma Devkota
The king retrieved the gem of union
and asked Urvasi why she had not said
a word about his child, to which the nymph
replied, “Lord Indra gave me leave to come
to you with special instruction that I
return to heaven the day you beheld
the face of your child. So I hid him well
in a proper ashram to be raised up
with love and care. And, king, now that you have
seen the face of your son, I have to leave!”
Fierce lightning struck from darkest clouds, a storm
brewed in the heart of King Pururava
tearing leaves of sweet, happy days ahead
and strewing them upon the sinking floor.
He stood astounded by this new knowledge
of strangest fate that with a single stroke
had stolen his lover and bestowed a child.
He reeled with anxiety and concern,
turned pale with feeling of a vice-like grip
inside his chest which he held with both hands
and uttered a single denial, “No!”
As if a royal order were not enough,
but needs be repeated as a request,
“No!” he said. “This cannot be! Do not go!”
And, regaining strength, he called upon love
to weigh the propriety of action
taken in conformity with a command:
“Can you profess me love and leave me thus
because a king commands? Love is our king!
This Supreme King of Love commands that we
always remain in each other’s embrace.
O, how can you, Urvasi, ever forget
this higher command and leave me alone?
Day is not day without the sun and moon,
chariots don’t run on a single wheel,
no streams of tear would deck the face of earth
should vapours not be lifted up by air,
no moth will flutter around a dead flame,
nor flame flicker towards an absent moth,
the two in copulative energy
sustain the living beauty of this world.
Go not, Urvasi! Leave me not alone!”
“I’m not of this world, my love, I obey
a different set of laws in heaven made.
I cannot disobey Indra, although
I wish I could not disobey you too.
Thus bound by superior laws, I fly
to heaven on heavy wings and submit
myself to what must be. You do the same.
You have a whole kingdom to regulate,
busy yourself in the people’s affairs
so that you have no time to think of us.”
With these words the nymph, ready to depart,
paused a while because the king grasped her hand
like a drowning man grasps a floating straw
and said, “These are cruel words, Urvasi!
Not a language of love! If you leave me
to my lonely fate, ...” The king looked around
and ordered his minister to prepare
for the coronation of the new king,
his just found son, for he would forsake all
and wander in the wilderness abroad
like a madman seeking to catch a dream.
Pearly beads rolled down the quivering cheeks
and summoned pearly beads in angel eyes
that felt a strange mortal link: soul to soul
and flesh to flesh. Parting like the tearing
of wedded souls oozed painful tears and sobs
on both sides of the mortal wound. The nymph,
still attempting to clutch the finger tips
of the king, still rose higher in the air.
The king, still attempting to draw her down
with finger tips yet in contact with her,
felt himself sinking in the underworld.
She met his pleading upward gaze with eyes
that wished themselves blind for seeing a man
so miserable that his gloom perhaps
would now render heaven forever dark.
Thus did they tarry for a brief moment
and were like a painted canvas, which each
of them desired would never fade.
From: A Flame for a Moth by Padma Devkota
The king retrieved the gem of union
and asked Urvasi why she had not said
a word about his child, to which the nymph
replied, “Lord Indra gave me leave to come
to you with special instruction that I
return to heaven the day you beheld
the face of your child. So I hid him well
in a proper ashram to be raised up
with love and care. And, king, now that you have
seen the face of your son, I have to leave!”
Fierce lightning struck from darkest clouds, a storm
brewed in the heart of King Pururava
tearing leaves of sweet, happy days ahead
and strewing them upon the sinking floor.
He stood astounded by this new knowledge
of strangest fate that with a single stroke
had stolen his lover and bestowed a child.
He reeled with anxiety and concern,
turned pale with feeling of a vice-like grip
inside his chest which he held with both hands
and uttered a single denial, “No!”
As if a royal order were not enough,
but needs be repeated as a request,
“No!” he said. “This cannot be! Do not go!”
And, regaining strength, he called upon love
to weigh the propriety of action
taken in conformity with a command:
“Can you profess me love and leave me thus
because a king commands? Love is our king!
This Supreme King of Love commands that we
always remain in each other’s embrace.
O, how can you, Urvasi, ever forget
this higher command and leave me alone?
Day is not day without the sun and moon,
chariots don’t run on a single wheel,
no streams of tear would deck the face of earth
should vapours not be lifted up by air,
no moth will flutter around a dead flame,
nor flame flicker towards an absent moth,
the two in copulative energy
sustain the living beauty of this world.
Go not, Urvasi! Leave me not alone!”
“I’m not of this world, my love, I obey
a different set of laws in heaven made.
I cannot disobey Indra, although
I wish I could not disobey you too.
Thus bound by superior laws, I fly
to heaven on heavy wings and submit
myself to what must be. You do the same.
You have a whole kingdom to regulate,
busy yourself in the people’s affairs
so that you have no time to think of us.”
With these words the nymph, ready to depart,
paused a while because the king grasped her hand
like a drowning man grasps a floating straw
and said, “These are cruel words, Urvasi!
Not a language of love! If you leave me
to my lonely fate, ...” The king looked around
and ordered his minister to prepare
for the coronation of the new king,
his just found son, for he would forsake all
and wander in the wilderness abroad
like a madman seeking to catch a dream.
Pearly beads rolled down the quivering cheeks
and summoned pearly beads in angel eyes
that felt a strange mortal link: soul to soul
and flesh to flesh. Parting like the tearing
of wedded souls oozed painful tears and sobs
on both sides of the mortal wound. The nymph,
still attempting to clutch the finger tips
of the king, still rose higher in the air.
The king, still attempting to draw her down
with finger tips yet in contact with her,
felt himself sinking in the underworld.
She met his pleading upward gaze with eyes
that wished themselves blind for seeing a man
so miserable that his gloom perhaps
would now render heaven forever dark.
Thus did they tarry for a brief moment
and were like a painted canvas, which each
of them desired would never fade.
The Hero and the Nymph (Poem)
V The Hero and the Nymph From: A Flame for a Moth by Padma Devkota
“The court awaits your pleasure,” a bowed head
addressed the king. “Grave matters of the state
need to be addressed, my Lord! Will you come?”
the solemn Minister voiced his concern,
which His Majesty did not seem to hear,
but lost in painful reveries of love
he sighed his soul out like a rooted tree.
“O Urvashi!” he cried, “How can I live
alone in this palace without my love?
It's like an empty hole dug in the ground,
cold and dark and stifling that suffocates
the life breath out of me. Designed to kill,
infested with unctuous fools who like ants
swarm around their great honey-trickling lord
and smile their disgust with an envious heart,
rich in pompous vanity, envious
of power and wealth, stratified in rank,
it knows not serene peace nor harmony
of genuine soul to soul relation, which
embracing all embraces greatest bliss.
No, it is not such flattering company
but genuine friendship that thrives on love
most strongly nourishes our life with joy.
And I, quite close to such a joyous life
in the company of my honest queen,
having found greater joy in Urvashi,
am torn like a river by a boulder
that will not yield an easy path to joy,
so that divided into two currents
it must gush beyond this dark obstacle
to seek wholeness of a divided self.
Yet, the unequal currents of water
on either side of the obstructing rock
gush with different force towards the bend
in their life's journey, intoning a truth
spelled out clearly in the book of nature.
Thus am I torn, but why should I dispel
a greater joy with one of lesser kind?
Why should I so unlike the river be
and force a greater volume to one side
than it can lend an easy passage to
and let the other thirsty bed go dry?
This would be madness! And if mad I am,
I owe no obligation to the world
and seek no favour from it. Instead, I
enchanted by unearthly beauty will
here meditate upon a form that holds
the single key to my sad existence
in the frosty winter of her absence
that colours all I do. O Urvashi!
Commander of my heart! When will you come
to spouse me by the singing riverside?”
“And the people,” complained the Minister,
“shall I tell them that King Pururava
once true and just and loving and beloved
has drawn the curtains of the Golden Age
over his self, which now is blind to all
but what possesses him demonically
with its power of fatal seduction?
Shall I tell them that you love them no more
because another claim upon your heart
is so potent that you, forgetting all,
permit yourself from duty thus to fall?”
“Go, Minister, ascertain that the state
does not miss me. Perform your duty well.
See that the systems of the state run smooth,
lubricate the rust, replace broken cogs,
and, should you need more vision, come to me.
I have a personal need of solitude,
which you should learn to respect. Go hence
and let me dream a while of heaven’s gate
that swings a thousand times to release
its greatest beauty for a dreamer’s ease.”
So spoke the king and with his dreamy eyes
he sought the vision of his fevered heart
within the farthest reaches of the sky.
The Minister his concern expressed again:
“Your noble Majesty! Half-witted love!
You seek to own the moon whose lunar charm
has cast a spell upon the woodcock, you!
O, wake up to the smell of earth and trees
that surround you. Urvashi is a dream.
She is a fantasy beyond your grasp.
The queen at your disposal should outweigh
a million dreams of fairies on their wings
and since all kings are husband to the state
they should firmly grasp more relevant things.”
To which the king replied as if from far:
“Urvashi is the poem of my heart.
She is the lunar gleam with argent touch
that embalms the world in joyful repose,
she is the vision that creates the throb
of a devoted heart, she is the joy
of the woodcock, she is the cynosure
of heaven and earth, the only being
that can dispel the gloom both here and there
the light of heaven and earth is Urvashi!
Is there a beauty resides in oceans' depths?
In its snaky dazzles of broad daylight?
In snow-capped peaks of primordial dawn?
Or moon-blanched heights that open mysteries
of poppy-drugged fields to vague yearning hearts?
She is a decanted drop of beauty,
of fulfilling love, of true harmony.
Go Minister, see to the state's affairs,
rimeless hearts should not roam the gardens here.
So, leave me in peace to warm my hoarfrost
with sweetest reveries of happy days.”
“The court awaits your pleasure,” a bowed head
addressed the king. “Grave matters of the state
need to be addressed, my Lord! Will you come?”
the solemn Minister voiced his concern,
which His Majesty did not seem to hear,
but lost in painful reveries of love
he sighed his soul out like a rooted tree.
“O Urvashi!” he cried, “How can I live
alone in this palace without my love?
It's like an empty hole dug in the ground,
cold and dark and stifling that suffocates
the life breath out of me. Designed to kill,
infested with unctuous fools who like ants
swarm around their great honey-trickling lord
and smile their disgust with an envious heart,
rich in pompous vanity, envious
of power and wealth, stratified in rank,
it knows not serene peace nor harmony
of genuine soul to soul relation, which
embracing all embraces greatest bliss.
No, it is not such flattering company
but genuine friendship that thrives on love
most strongly nourishes our life with joy.
And I, quite close to such a joyous life
in the company of my honest queen,
having found greater joy in Urvashi,
am torn like a river by a boulder
that will not yield an easy path to joy,
so that divided into two currents
it must gush beyond this dark obstacle
to seek wholeness of a divided self.
Yet, the unequal currents of water
on either side of the obstructing rock
gush with different force towards the bend
in their life's journey, intoning a truth
spelled out clearly in the book of nature.
Thus am I torn, but why should I dispel
a greater joy with one of lesser kind?
Why should I so unlike the river be
and force a greater volume to one side
than it can lend an easy passage to
and let the other thirsty bed go dry?
This would be madness! And if mad I am,
I owe no obligation to the world
and seek no favour from it. Instead, I
enchanted by unearthly beauty will
here meditate upon a form that holds
the single key to my sad existence
in the frosty winter of her absence
that colours all I do. O Urvashi!
Commander of my heart! When will you come
to spouse me by the singing riverside?”
“And the people,” complained the Minister,
“shall I tell them that King Pururava
once true and just and loving and beloved
has drawn the curtains of the Golden Age
over his self, which now is blind to all
but what possesses him demonically
with its power of fatal seduction?
Shall I tell them that you love them no more
because another claim upon your heart
is so potent that you, forgetting all,
permit yourself from duty thus to fall?”
“Go, Minister, ascertain that the state
does not miss me. Perform your duty well.
See that the systems of the state run smooth,
lubricate the rust, replace broken cogs,
and, should you need more vision, come to me.
I have a personal need of solitude,
which you should learn to respect. Go hence
and let me dream a while of heaven’s gate
that swings a thousand times to release
its greatest beauty for a dreamer’s ease.”
So spoke the king and with his dreamy eyes
he sought the vision of his fevered heart
within the farthest reaches of the sky.
The Minister his concern expressed again:
“Your noble Majesty! Half-witted love!
You seek to own the moon whose lunar charm
has cast a spell upon the woodcock, you!
O, wake up to the smell of earth and trees
that surround you. Urvashi is a dream.
She is a fantasy beyond your grasp.
The queen at your disposal should outweigh
a million dreams of fairies on their wings
and since all kings are husband to the state
they should firmly grasp more relevant things.”
To which the king replied as if from far:
“Urvashi is the poem of my heart.
She is the lunar gleam with argent touch
that embalms the world in joyful repose,
she is the vision that creates the throb
of a devoted heart, she is the joy
of the woodcock, she is the cynosure
of heaven and earth, the only being
that can dispel the gloom both here and there
the light of heaven and earth is Urvashi!
Is there a beauty resides in oceans' depths?
In its snaky dazzles of broad daylight?
In snow-capped peaks of primordial dawn?
Or moon-blanched heights that open mysteries
of poppy-drugged fields to vague yearning hearts?
She is a decanted drop of beauty,
of fulfilling love, of true harmony.
Go Minister, see to the state's affairs,
rimeless hearts should not roam the gardens here.
So, leave me in peace to warm my hoarfrost
with sweetest reveries of happy days.”
Monday, August 23, 2010
How Heads Are Replaced
Padma Devkota
How Heads Are Replaced
I discovered from The Himalayan Times August 4, 2004 that I had been replaced by Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma as the Head of the Central Department of English, TU, Kirtipur. I should have been the first to receive this information from the concerned TU authorities, not the press. What code of conduct is the TU acting under that its Professor and Head should discover such related information through the press?
Contrary to the uninformed report in The Himalayan Times about the time and reason for my "resignation," I had actually protested in writing to the Vice-Chancellor of TU on Wednesday June 23, 2004 (Ashad 9, 2061) against the despicable conduct of the vice-president of the Free Students Union at Kirtipur. As I was working at my desk that day, he entered the office, abused me like a slave, and ordered me to enroll a student immediately. When I refused to do so, he threatened to thrash me up and to kill me. He threatened me that if I did not enroll the student "within five minutes," he would lock me up inside the office and burn me up. This is what I protested against. I still believe that no one should act on campus like this person did. The authorities should see to it that they do not.
Before this incident, on January 1, 2004 (Poush 17, 2060) I had actually resigned from my job as a teacher at TU because of an even worse misconduct by the same person. As I was conducting the entrance exam, he openly abused me and other teachers of the department, forcibly took the exam copies from the room and later returned to the office to abuse us further. Our plea with the authorities to punish the culprit was unheard. I returned to the office only because the member-secretary of the central students union along with four or five other members came to my residence to apologize for the misconduct of this student leader. They promised me that this would not happen again.
This time, on June 24, 2004 (Ashad 10, 2060), all the teachers of the department wrote a letter to the Vice-Chancellor of TU asking him to punish the culprit. They even refused to take classes. The Rector met these teachers in his office and told them that my "resignation" would never be approved and requested them to go and teach. He did not mention anything about taking action against the culprit. The Free Students Union, Kirtipur, published a statement to the effect that this conduct of their vice-president was a misdemeanour, and that such a thing would not happen again. Because of such assurances, I too returned to my duty as the Head of the Department.
Now, I am actually on sick leave for a month starting July 26, 2004 (Shrawan 11, 2061). I had personally appointed Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma, with his consent, as Acting Head of the Central Department of English before going on a sick leave. I do not understand why the TU authorities such as the VC and the Rector are in such a hurry to replace me at a time when I am sick at home and to appoint a person who is already acting as head of the department. Could they not have waited until the day I returned to work? What norms of minimal courtesy and decent behaviour may we infer from this?
Finally, a word about the exams. When the Nepali daily Kantipur of Monday, August 2, 2004 reported that out of nearly 800 students only 28 of them had passed the exam, I rang up the Controller of Examinations to request him to officially refute this false statistics and to inform the public by publishing the correct one. He told me that he would include this request as an agenda of the board meeting that would be held in the afternoon that day. I did not understand why a meeting had to decide whether or not to flash the pass/fail percentage of an exam when the results were already out. On August 4, 2004, I called him up again to ask why nothing had been done. The meeting decided not to publish the statistics, he told me. Can any reasonable person explain to me why a board meeting of the Controller of Examinations should decide not to inform the public of the true statistics of an examination after the results are out?
The statistics that I have obtained from the Office of the Controller of Examinations shows that the pass percentage of English MA First Year was 10.47% in Vickram Sambat 2057; 17.87% in 2058; 26.41% in 2059; and 35.3% in 2060. Please confirm this with the Office of the Controller of Examinations, Balkhu, because I am not the authority behind this closed examination system.
I feel that the authorities have used my protest as a carte blanche to victimize me. They have intentionally used it to their convenience by linking it up with the exam results. Otherwise, why did they wait for so long to decide? They will probably use my letter of resignation from the job itself, which I submitted much earlier, as a carte blanche whenever the opportunity presents itself. Do they have a right to do so? Is it not such people who should resign from their posts? And, was it really necessary for my friend Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma to accept this "new honour" without consulting me on this matter?
August 4, 2004
How Heads Are Replaced
I discovered from The Himalayan Times August 4, 2004 that I had been replaced by Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma as the Head of the Central Department of English, TU, Kirtipur. I should have been the first to receive this information from the concerned TU authorities, not the press. What code of conduct is the TU acting under that its Professor and Head should discover such related information through the press?
Contrary to the uninformed report in The Himalayan Times about the time and reason for my "resignation," I had actually protested in writing to the Vice-Chancellor of TU on Wednesday June 23, 2004 (Ashad 9, 2061) against the despicable conduct of the vice-president of the Free Students Union at Kirtipur. As I was working at my desk that day, he entered the office, abused me like a slave, and ordered me to enroll a student immediately. When I refused to do so, he threatened to thrash me up and to kill me. He threatened me that if I did not enroll the student "within five minutes," he would lock me up inside the office and burn me up. This is what I protested against. I still believe that no one should act on campus like this person did. The authorities should see to it that they do not.
Before this incident, on January 1, 2004 (Poush 17, 2060) I had actually resigned from my job as a teacher at TU because of an even worse misconduct by the same person. As I was conducting the entrance exam, he openly abused me and other teachers of the department, forcibly took the exam copies from the room and later returned to the office to abuse us further. Our plea with the authorities to punish the culprit was unheard. I returned to the office only because the member-secretary of the central students union along with four or five other members came to my residence to apologize for the misconduct of this student leader. They promised me that this would not happen again.
This time, on June 24, 2004 (Ashad 10, 2060), all the teachers of the department wrote a letter to the Vice-Chancellor of TU asking him to punish the culprit. They even refused to take classes. The Rector met these teachers in his office and told them that my "resignation" would never be approved and requested them to go and teach. He did not mention anything about taking action against the culprit. The Free Students Union, Kirtipur, published a statement to the effect that this conduct of their vice-president was a misdemeanour, and that such a thing would not happen again. Because of such assurances, I too returned to my duty as the Head of the Department.
Now, I am actually on sick leave for a month starting July 26, 2004 (Shrawan 11, 2061). I had personally appointed Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma, with his consent, as Acting Head of the Central Department of English before going on a sick leave. I do not understand why the TU authorities such as the VC and the Rector are in such a hurry to replace me at a time when I am sick at home and to appoint a person who is already acting as head of the department. Could they not have waited until the day I returned to work? What norms of minimal courtesy and decent behaviour may we infer from this?
Finally, a word about the exams. When the Nepali daily Kantipur of Monday, August 2, 2004 reported that out of nearly 800 students only 28 of them had passed the exam, I rang up the Controller of Examinations to request him to officially refute this false statistics and to inform the public by publishing the correct one. He told me that he would include this request as an agenda of the board meeting that would be held in the afternoon that day. I did not understand why a meeting had to decide whether or not to flash the pass/fail percentage of an exam when the results were already out. On August 4, 2004, I called him up again to ask why nothing had been done. The meeting decided not to publish the statistics, he told me. Can any reasonable person explain to me why a board meeting of the Controller of Examinations should decide not to inform the public of the true statistics of an examination after the results are out?
The statistics that I have obtained from the Office of the Controller of Examinations shows that the pass percentage of English MA First Year was 10.47% in Vickram Sambat 2057; 17.87% in 2058; 26.41% in 2059; and 35.3% in 2060. Please confirm this with the Office of the Controller of Examinations, Balkhu, because I am not the authority behind this closed examination system.
I feel that the authorities have used my protest as a carte blanche to victimize me. They have intentionally used it to their convenience by linking it up with the exam results. Otherwise, why did they wait for so long to decide? They will probably use my letter of resignation from the job itself, which I submitted much earlier, as a carte blanche whenever the opportunity presents itself. Do they have a right to do so? Is it not such people who should resign from their posts? And, was it really necessary for my friend Professor Chandra Prakash Sharma to accept this "new honour" without consulting me on this matter?
August 4, 2004
The Birth of Urvashi (Poem)
II. The Birth of Urvashi
from: A Flame for a Moth by Padma Devkota
And to Spring he spoke: “A higher law commands!
Awake to full power! Tone and contrast
all shades and colours! Rise, O, soft and slow!
Breathe gently so the young shoots do not start
with winter fear of termination dreams,
breathe life into the very stones that sleep
blanketed by green, wet moss in slumber deep!
Shine with a celestial lustre bright
to freshen up the enveloping air,
let it resound with sylvan orchestra
chirruping, chirping, twittering delights!
Let gurgles, murmurs, tumbling cataracts
drown the whisper of ripples over rocks
lovingly caressed by sparkling water,
let banks be quenched and earth so water-drunk
exhale her high spirit in aroma sweet!
Wear your verdure enhanced by coloured blooms,
allow a myriad shapes and textures fine
to express the soul of superb beauty,
distil your essence into a daisy—
and, here, give it to me!” So saying, he
culled a white daisy soft and fresh as snow
with double stellate petals from a glow
of golden cushion, like the morning sun
cuddled by doting Himalayan peaks.
And this he laid upon his loving lap
whence like the flower's breath a translucent
mist of beauty unfurled to shape and form—
such shape as seduces with sensuous joy,
such form as fills the heart with devout bliss,
a shape to possess and a form to hold
in highest reverence of holy dread,
a shape to touch, a form to meditate,
an eyeful being and a soulful nymph!
She gasped and inhaled Narayana's breath,
and opened slow the calyx of her eye,
and, as with life's initial breath her breasts
heaved like the swelling sea beneath the moon,
a lunar peace descended on her joy
of discovery of this genuine love
whom she held with filial reverence.
“Rise!” he said. She rose. She took two steps back.
She stood with folded palms and reverence.
She bowed and thrice around him humbly walked
and awaited his command, which he spoke:
“Blessed daughter! Commander of all hearts!
You, the progeny of my rich vision,
shall now with grace and charm allure the world
with art and nature mingled into one
divine seductress of Indra's heaven.
Let the king of heaven forget the sage
in lonely penance and not dare disturb
serene contemplation of higher truths
as he, magnetized by your dance and song,
delights in sensual pleasures and the vine
that yields the soma for his tingling nerves.
Dance, Urvashi, in heaven's court. Go, dance!
For with this spring is born a new romance!”
from: A Flame for a Moth by Padma Devkota
And to Spring he spoke: “A higher law commands!
Awake to full power! Tone and contrast
all shades and colours! Rise, O, soft and slow!
Breathe gently so the young shoots do not start
with winter fear of termination dreams,
breathe life into the very stones that sleep
blanketed by green, wet moss in slumber deep!
Shine with a celestial lustre bright
to freshen up the enveloping air,
let it resound with sylvan orchestra
chirruping, chirping, twittering delights!
Let gurgles, murmurs, tumbling cataracts
drown the whisper of ripples over rocks
lovingly caressed by sparkling water,
let banks be quenched and earth so water-drunk
exhale her high spirit in aroma sweet!
Wear your verdure enhanced by coloured blooms,
allow a myriad shapes and textures fine
to express the soul of superb beauty,
distil your essence into a daisy—
and, here, give it to me!” So saying, he
culled a white daisy soft and fresh as snow
with double stellate petals from a glow
of golden cushion, like the morning sun
cuddled by doting Himalayan peaks.
And this he laid upon his loving lap
whence like the flower's breath a translucent
mist of beauty unfurled to shape and form—
such shape as seduces with sensuous joy,
such form as fills the heart with devout bliss,
a shape to possess and a form to hold
in highest reverence of holy dread,
a shape to touch, a form to meditate,
an eyeful being and a soulful nymph!
She gasped and inhaled Narayana's breath,
and opened slow the calyx of her eye,
and, as with life's initial breath her breasts
heaved like the swelling sea beneath the moon,
a lunar peace descended on her joy
of discovery of this genuine love
whom she held with filial reverence.
“Rise!” he said. She rose. She took two steps back.
She stood with folded palms and reverence.
She bowed and thrice around him humbly walked
and awaited his command, which he spoke:
“Blessed daughter! Commander of all hearts!
You, the progeny of my rich vision,
shall now with grace and charm allure the world
with art and nature mingled into one
divine seductress of Indra's heaven.
Let the king of heaven forget the sage
in lonely penance and not dare disturb
serene contemplation of higher truths
as he, magnetized by your dance and song,
delights in sensual pleasures and the vine
that yields the soma for his tingling nerves.
Dance, Urvashi, in heaven's court. Go, dance!
For with this spring is born a new romance!”
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Journey to Kashi (Poem)
Extract from: Harishchandra, "4. Journey to Kashi"
Padma Devkota
The autumn sun that fell behind the trees
glowed like an ember, splintered into rays
that shot not towards the earth but away
and far into a mellow sky that turned
red like the tearful eyes of a lover
lost to hopes of any reunion.
The further they went, darker grew the town
they left behind in the evening gloam,
fawns on their haunches sat and brooded long
as they chewed the remaining grass which they
dangled from their mouth, sparrows did not sport,
canaries were silent in their cages
and smoke did not rise from roofs, not this night !
The golden ocean of rich paddy field
stirred by a cooling vesper wind surged up
with hopes of winning Harishchandra's heart
and subsided to saddest dejection,
then seemed to wave and call the travellers
back to where their sorry journey begun.
The forest darkened, darkened fields and plains,
the road-side river mumbled, grumbled on,
sharp grit and pebbles bit into the sole
of their soft feet as if to slow their march
if not to stop them from their dark exile.
Yet on they trod on weary legs as night
soon met them in the wilderness alone.
Although the argent moon with fullness shrunk
by a quarter perhaps still illumined
their coiling path, although the stars too shone
with brilliance in the vast nocturnal sky,
they stumbled, staggered, struggled, slipped and strode
with hopes to find a human dwelling near
where they could share the comfort of a porch.
But there were no huts or cottages near,
no village or hermit's abode, just vast
wilderness where roamed hungry, stealthy cats
and tigers that sought the sorry prey.
There was but little else to do but walk
against the squeaking flesh and melting bone,
so they plodded on until they arrived
at a road-side shelter errected by
a thoughtful merchant for the pilgrim's rest
by day a cooling spot, by night a nest.
There, thanking God, three tired travellers
found a dark, warm corner wherein to rest.
'Twas one small room, a ten by eight perhaps,
and another couple lay huddled where
the wind was less likely to wander free.
Without disturbing those who slumbered there
these lay upon the cold but safer floor,
nor wanted more for weary flesh was quick
to welcome healthy sleep, a blessing great;
but when early birds chirrupped in their nests,
when like a sleepless lover's eyes the sun
rose red through trees over the vast plain
that breathed a thick layer of vapour white,
the travellers were already up and out.
Harishchandra, having bathed himself
at the water-spout of well-carvèd rock,
said his morning prayers with folded palms,
sighted Adhitya through netted fingers
and wished joy and peace to all the world.
He then addressed his fellow sojourners
at the shelter and inquired of them
their source, their destination and their name.
"We come from distant northern hills that rise
like devoted aspirants that look up
to the highest snowy peak that supports
the whole blue dome like a central pillar
of exquisitely variegated earth.
Long have we travelled, covered distance great
and are thankful that we have almost reached
Ayodhya's gate, where Harishchandra rules.
Truthful king of generous soul, kind heart,
whose immense fame has travelled all the way
e'en to us, draws us now to him. We go
to seek his charity and find a home
in his industrious country where we
intend to make a living better than
at home where we were living less than man."
Padma Devkota
The autumn sun that fell behind the trees
glowed like an ember, splintered into rays
that shot not towards the earth but away
and far into a mellow sky that turned
red like the tearful eyes of a lover
lost to hopes of any reunion.
The further they went, darker grew the town
they left behind in the evening gloam,
fawns on their haunches sat and brooded long
as they chewed the remaining grass which they
dangled from their mouth, sparrows did not sport,
canaries were silent in their cages
and smoke did not rise from roofs, not this night !
The golden ocean of rich paddy field
stirred by a cooling vesper wind surged up
with hopes of winning Harishchandra's heart
and subsided to saddest dejection,
then seemed to wave and call the travellers
back to where their sorry journey begun.
The forest darkened, darkened fields and plains,
the road-side river mumbled, grumbled on,
sharp grit and pebbles bit into the sole
of their soft feet as if to slow their march
if not to stop them from their dark exile.
Yet on they trod on weary legs as night
soon met them in the wilderness alone.
Although the argent moon with fullness shrunk
by a quarter perhaps still illumined
their coiling path, although the stars too shone
with brilliance in the vast nocturnal sky,
they stumbled, staggered, struggled, slipped and strode
with hopes to find a human dwelling near
where they could share the comfort of a porch.
But there were no huts or cottages near,
no village or hermit's abode, just vast
wilderness where roamed hungry, stealthy cats
and tigers that sought the sorry prey.
There was but little else to do but walk
against the squeaking flesh and melting bone,
so they plodded on until they arrived
at a road-side shelter errected by
a thoughtful merchant for the pilgrim's rest
by day a cooling spot, by night a nest.
There, thanking God, three tired travellers
found a dark, warm corner wherein to rest.
'Twas one small room, a ten by eight perhaps,
and another couple lay huddled where
the wind was less likely to wander free.
Without disturbing those who slumbered there
these lay upon the cold but safer floor,
nor wanted more for weary flesh was quick
to welcome healthy sleep, a blessing great;
but when early birds chirrupped in their nests,
when like a sleepless lover's eyes the sun
rose red through trees over the vast plain
that breathed a thick layer of vapour white,
the travellers were already up and out.
Harishchandra, having bathed himself
at the water-spout of well-carvèd rock,
said his morning prayers with folded palms,
sighted Adhitya through netted fingers
and wished joy and peace to all the world.
He then addressed his fellow sojourners
at the shelter and inquired of them
their source, their destination and their name.
"We come from distant northern hills that rise
like devoted aspirants that look up
to the highest snowy peak that supports
the whole blue dome like a central pillar
of exquisitely variegated earth.
Long have we travelled, covered distance great
and are thankful that we have almost reached
Ayodhya's gate, where Harishchandra rules.
Truthful king of generous soul, kind heart,
whose immense fame has travelled all the way
e'en to us, draws us now to him. We go
to seek his charity and find a home
in his industrious country where we
intend to make a living better than
at home where we were living less than man."
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Transformation (Poem)
Transformation
The curse of night over
like a rock that breathes again
and feels the surge of sensation old as life
stretching her cramped limbs and cowered curves
to fill the void that is not the consciousness
with rich splendour of softest form
dawn springs to life over the animated peaks
now crowned with glory all their own
in bluish distance deep and rich
replete with passion and with bubbling life
forcing a recognition of her charms
as she parades through cup-like valleys
that receive her like red, sparkling wine.
June 9, 2000
The curse of night over
like a rock that breathes again
and feels the surge of sensation old as life
stretching her cramped limbs and cowered curves
to fill the void that is not the consciousness
with rich splendour of softest form
dawn springs to life over the animated peaks
now crowned with glory all their own
in bluish distance deep and rich
replete with passion and with bubbling life
forcing a recognition of her charms
as she parades through cup-like valleys
that receive her like red, sparkling wine.
June 9, 2000
Merging of East and West : Role of writers
Padma P Devkota
Merging of East and West : Role of writers
To Carthage then I came
Burning burning burning burning
O Lord Thou pluckest me out
O Lord Thou Pluckest burning
- T S Eliot, "The Waste Land"
Binary oppositions have persisted in various forms in human thought. East and West is one example of such a division which has proved to be more politically than culturally useful in the past. This division is too broad and too general to give an accurate picture of the various national cultures that are involved within each category. On the one hand, the East means not only Nepal but also India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, Korea, Thailand, China, Japan and many other nations which are culturally diverse in themselves. The West, on the other hand, represents commercially affluent, socially homogenized, technologically advanced, and politically powerful. As a result, each nation of the East is pitted one at a time against the West which continuously provides the criteria by which eastern ideological and material advancement is measured. This partly explains the cultural impact of the West on the East.
Nevertheless, this broad categorization has also proved useful to describe two major attitudes -- the materialistic and the spiritual -- towards the world as a perceived reality, which in turn reflects the nature of the perceiver. That the West is materialistic apparently means that it is commercial, competitive, clear, questing and concise. That the East is spiritual apparently means that it is religious, muddled, abstract, and inflated with myth and magic. Yet, such notions can only be quite erroneous as they are partly the result of body of Oriental literature which has its corresponding reflection in the Dick Whittingtonian reveries of the eastern aspirant to fabulous wealth, freedom and fame in the West. Whatever else the East and the West might mean, all meaning are true and false at the same time since impermanence is the only truth we all share with conviction.
A vision of impermanence lies at the core of all Hindu philosophy and lifestyles. Reality eludes perception because it is a flux. Eyes see a stream of things they cannot properly define. Ears perceive a sequence that they attempt to interpret. Thought tries to capture the essence of this flux in a medium whose fundamental categories are themselves constantly changing. Categorical values fade away against a cosmic illusion, a lila, where consciousness can only discover itself as a part of the Brahman or the ultimate reality. Categories such as the East and the West have no place in the overall traditional Hindu consciousness.
Yet, we too have felt the impact of such provisional categories as part of the modernizing process in the twentieth century Nepal. Starting in 1951 when the country opened up to foreign influences and tourism, lifestyles and patterns of thought have changed drastically. Cultural osmosis has taken place with a natural effectiveness, not always in the desired direction, under the influence of politico-economic factors. Tourism has become at once a major source of national income and a major influence upon national cultural conduct. The resulting change has largely accommodated Western values within the Hindu lifestyle. Yet it has also rejected the Hindu lifestyle as demoded and uncritically accepted Western influences as the arrowhead of modernisation which is conspicuously outrageous to the eastern "civiligentia"-- a mass of intellectuals who prefer not to be cut off from the roots of cultural inheritance.
Eastern voices have always reacted strongly to cultural imperialism by claiming that aggression against culture can be as grave as a war crime. The world of the mid-century was filled with fear and distrust as a result of the war. This called for a mutual understanding among nations as well as peace and coexistence. Some way had to be discovered to save the rich cultural heritage of the people of Asia. One solution was to dispel distrust and suspicion through cultural exchanges. War had to be denounced by all peace-lovers. Imperialistic attitudes too had to be condemned. Rabindranath Tagore not only condemned Japanese imperialism on China as "a gregarious demand for exclusive enjoyment of all the good things on earth" but also wrote later on in life about war in these words:
The poisoned war-snakes are spitting fire
Prayers for peace shall be of no avail,
That is why, on the eve of my life
I call upon all to stand up,
Prepare,
And fight back the demon of war.
Peace and human rights have ever since become major concerns not only for politicians but for all conscious writers of the East and West.
Related to human rights are other concerns about race, religion, colour, sex, and so on. The feminist movement has strongly criticized the binary thought process and demanded a hearing in the name of human equality. Marxism, Freudianism, existentialism and many other attitudes to the world have contributed to the formation of a post-modernistic mind in the West. Although Nepalese writers uphold and cherish Freud, Marx, Sartre and others, post-modernism still feels like an empty space in Nepal.
This is probably not an illogical phenomenon. Modernism in the West is a reaction to the nineteenth century culture and values. Culturally different, Nepal cannot be modern in the same sense that the West is modern. Modernism in Nepal has meant an influx of western ideologies and commercial products rather than a qualified search for national identity. To the Nepali, modernity has meant an unconservative stance as a progressive or a neoteric in terms of the amount of western influences that can be individually imbibed. This is of course a negative definition of Nepalese modernism. A more positive definition must consider a corresponding evolution and modification of recent values as opposed to, say, those that dominated the pre-Devkotian age.
A very important contribution of the greatest modern Nepali poet, Laxmi Prasad Devkota, was to prove to the post-modern West -- or at least to that section of it which was willing to listen to him -- that what is marginal is modern as well. Writing from the periphery of the periphery of the world, Devkota speaks with a powerfully modern voice-- modern in the Western and the Nepalese sense of the world. To bring the Nepalese classical tradition to its height, to blow the bugles of modernity in national literature, and to be acclaimed as modern writer by western critics at the same time is a task of no small calibre. His vision is holistic, unbiased, yet nationalistic.
In the body of his literary works, Devkota also sought a meeting point between the East and West. In the myths of these two factions of the world, he found a common dream. Yet, dreams are but vapours of a painful reality -- vapours that arise when conscious efforts to alleviate the pains subside. Similar dreams arise from similar problems. Similar problems bring people together. Seeking a solution to the problems of the modern waste land, T S Eliot, for instance, discovered that wise men of both the East and West, St Augustine and Lord Buddha, have prescribed similar remedies to the general ailment. The conscious writers’ job is not only to identify problems but to propose solutions too. This probably also explains Devkota's and the Romantics' penchant toward a painful Promethian consciousness. It is only through such awareness of a painful reality that dreams precede actions. As writers of the East and the West have constantly reminded us, together we can hope to conquer the evils of the world. Apart, we will only begin to dislike each other.
Looking forward to the twenty-first century, therefore, we can assert that it is very important for writers of the world to be conscious of the yet painful reality of human inefficiency in creating peace and prosperity for all. Prophet, educator, clown or saviour, the writer must accept a social function first and then only take aesthetic naps in his or her ivory tower at intervals. He or she must learn to communicate, to create undeceiving words. His or her moral courage to speak up against all political attempts to suppress the writer's voice anywhere in the world must remain exemplary of a quest for newer horizons. Frontiers and restrictions must yield. Even age-long tradition and soul-deep culture must yield if such yieldings will create a better world to live in. The merger between the East and the West must first occur in the writer’s vision of a united world, which will then gradually materialize in times to come.
Merging of East and West : Role of writers
To Carthage then I came
Burning burning burning burning
O Lord Thou pluckest me out
O Lord Thou Pluckest burning
- T S Eliot, "The Waste Land"
Binary oppositions have persisted in various forms in human thought. East and West is one example of such a division which has proved to be more politically than culturally useful in the past. This division is too broad and too general to give an accurate picture of the various national cultures that are involved within each category. On the one hand, the East means not only Nepal but also India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Indonesia, Korea, Thailand, China, Japan and many other nations which are culturally diverse in themselves. The West, on the other hand, represents commercially affluent, socially homogenized, technologically advanced, and politically powerful. As a result, each nation of the East is pitted one at a time against the West which continuously provides the criteria by which eastern ideological and material advancement is measured. This partly explains the cultural impact of the West on the East.
Nevertheless, this broad categorization has also proved useful to describe two major attitudes -- the materialistic and the spiritual -- towards the world as a perceived reality, which in turn reflects the nature of the perceiver. That the West is materialistic apparently means that it is commercial, competitive, clear, questing and concise. That the East is spiritual apparently means that it is religious, muddled, abstract, and inflated with myth and magic. Yet, such notions can only be quite erroneous as they are partly the result of body of Oriental literature which has its corresponding reflection in the Dick Whittingtonian reveries of the eastern aspirant to fabulous wealth, freedom and fame in the West. Whatever else the East and the West might mean, all meaning are true and false at the same time since impermanence is the only truth we all share with conviction.
A vision of impermanence lies at the core of all Hindu philosophy and lifestyles. Reality eludes perception because it is a flux. Eyes see a stream of things they cannot properly define. Ears perceive a sequence that they attempt to interpret. Thought tries to capture the essence of this flux in a medium whose fundamental categories are themselves constantly changing. Categorical values fade away against a cosmic illusion, a lila, where consciousness can only discover itself as a part of the Brahman or the ultimate reality. Categories such as the East and the West have no place in the overall traditional Hindu consciousness.
Yet, we too have felt the impact of such provisional categories as part of the modernizing process in the twentieth century Nepal. Starting in 1951 when the country opened up to foreign influences and tourism, lifestyles and patterns of thought have changed drastically. Cultural osmosis has taken place with a natural effectiveness, not always in the desired direction, under the influence of politico-economic factors. Tourism has become at once a major source of national income and a major influence upon national cultural conduct. The resulting change has largely accommodated Western values within the Hindu lifestyle. Yet it has also rejected the Hindu lifestyle as demoded and uncritically accepted Western influences as the arrowhead of modernisation which is conspicuously outrageous to the eastern "civiligentia"-- a mass of intellectuals who prefer not to be cut off from the roots of cultural inheritance.
Eastern voices have always reacted strongly to cultural imperialism by claiming that aggression against culture can be as grave as a war crime. The world of the mid-century was filled with fear and distrust as a result of the war. This called for a mutual understanding among nations as well as peace and coexistence. Some way had to be discovered to save the rich cultural heritage of the people of Asia. One solution was to dispel distrust and suspicion through cultural exchanges. War had to be denounced by all peace-lovers. Imperialistic attitudes too had to be condemned. Rabindranath Tagore not only condemned Japanese imperialism on China as "a gregarious demand for exclusive enjoyment of all the good things on earth" but also wrote later on in life about war in these words:
The poisoned war-snakes are spitting fire
Prayers for peace shall be of no avail,
That is why, on the eve of my life
I call upon all to stand up,
Prepare,
And fight back the demon of war.
Peace and human rights have ever since become major concerns not only for politicians but for all conscious writers of the East and West.
Related to human rights are other concerns about race, religion, colour, sex, and so on. The feminist movement has strongly criticized the binary thought process and demanded a hearing in the name of human equality. Marxism, Freudianism, existentialism and many other attitudes to the world have contributed to the formation of a post-modernistic mind in the West. Although Nepalese writers uphold and cherish Freud, Marx, Sartre and others, post-modernism still feels like an empty space in Nepal.
This is probably not an illogical phenomenon. Modernism in the West is a reaction to the nineteenth century culture and values. Culturally different, Nepal cannot be modern in the same sense that the West is modern. Modernism in Nepal has meant an influx of western ideologies and commercial products rather than a qualified search for national identity. To the Nepali, modernity has meant an unconservative stance as a progressive or a neoteric in terms of the amount of western influences that can be individually imbibed. This is of course a negative definition of Nepalese modernism. A more positive definition must consider a corresponding evolution and modification of recent values as opposed to, say, those that dominated the pre-Devkotian age.
A very important contribution of the greatest modern Nepali poet, Laxmi Prasad Devkota, was to prove to the post-modern West -- or at least to that section of it which was willing to listen to him -- that what is marginal is modern as well. Writing from the periphery of the periphery of the world, Devkota speaks with a powerfully modern voice-- modern in the Western and the Nepalese sense of the world. To bring the Nepalese classical tradition to its height, to blow the bugles of modernity in national literature, and to be acclaimed as modern writer by western critics at the same time is a task of no small calibre. His vision is holistic, unbiased, yet nationalistic.
In the body of his literary works, Devkota also sought a meeting point between the East and West. In the myths of these two factions of the world, he found a common dream. Yet, dreams are but vapours of a painful reality -- vapours that arise when conscious efforts to alleviate the pains subside. Similar dreams arise from similar problems. Similar problems bring people together. Seeking a solution to the problems of the modern waste land, T S Eliot, for instance, discovered that wise men of both the East and West, St Augustine and Lord Buddha, have prescribed similar remedies to the general ailment. The conscious writers’ job is not only to identify problems but to propose solutions too. This probably also explains Devkota's and the Romantics' penchant toward a painful Promethian consciousness. It is only through such awareness of a painful reality that dreams precede actions. As writers of the East and the West have constantly reminded us, together we can hope to conquer the evils of the world. Apart, we will only begin to dislike each other.
Looking forward to the twenty-first century, therefore, we can assert that it is very important for writers of the world to be conscious of the yet painful reality of human inefficiency in creating peace and prosperity for all. Prophet, educator, clown or saviour, the writer must accept a social function first and then only take aesthetic naps in his or her ivory tower at intervals. He or she must learn to communicate, to create undeceiving words. His or her moral courage to speak up against all political attempts to suppress the writer's voice anywhere in the world must remain exemplary of a quest for newer horizons. Frontiers and restrictions must yield. Even age-long tradition and soul-deep culture must yield if such yieldings will create a better world to live in. The merger between the East and the West must first occur in the writer’s vision of a united world, which will then gradually materialize in times to come.
Friday, August 13, 2010
Can the English Teacher Speak?
Padma Devkota
Can the English Teacher Speak?
The very walls of the Central Department of English (CDE) ought to be tired of flame-wingèd charms called "postcolonialism" and "postmodernism" bouncing off of them all the time. Here, no one really cares to discuss "postincendiarism," which is safely locked up in the past as if it were not at all a threatening future. But black residues of reproachful flames still stain their forgotten nooks like a closed book of history that all fear to open and to read.
Fear is, indeed, the dominating factor. Fear of exposure of academic and administrative incompetence. Fear of publicity of a hollow hunger for cheap applause. Fear of being recognized as a neo-colonialist with powerful drives for political domination over friend and foe. Fear of being caught red-handed as possessing a potent urge to economically exploit the institution for whatever it may be worth. Fear of being discovered as a culturally erased zombie ritualistically wed to the dominion of the English classroom. And this fear is what sustains us all.
As intellectuals, a distinct and powerful voice should have sustained us, not fear. But, have we heard English teachers speak of their condition? Have they opposed the encroachment of the non-academic inside their departments? Have they cried out unanimously against sloth, deceit, malpractice, unprofessionalism or even sheer incompetence? No. Even those that contribute columns to English dailies complacently refrain from speaking sincerely about the problems of their profession. Instead, through the simple act of toleration of just about everything they have normalised such practices with a fake postmodernist's attitude of "I will not judge." They know that to judge is also to offend.
An intellectual cannot prioritize personal survival in a bread-earning situation over articulated judgment related to community welfare. English teachers who seek the privilege of shining in a postcolonial aura must learn to lose the self to find a powerful cultural and intellectual identity. Such identity must create itself through voice, which, whenever lacking, sounds louder than an empty drum. Squeaked columns in English dailies are often better than nothing.
Yet, even as the cultural construct of the Nepalese intellectual as a university teacher is "underscorched" by black stains of historical flames in the department, its "academic" staff continues replacing the playback machine in the classroom. With neither originality of perception nor a penchant for personalized expression, they hope to withstand the gale of public criticism with richly arrogant but poorly composed letters to the editor of an English daily or with fallacies and ad hominems tipped with eunuch rage.
Where have years of education gone? Or is the intellectual a false cultural construct, one that, by virtue of its heterogeneity, actually dissolves into a sort of subalternly silent collective? Like a modern Midas myth, whomever Father TU grants the license to teach that person becomes a life-long intellectual. And, Father TU is powerless to unbless itself with its deep yearned, long longed golden touch.
Waiting for Hermes would be absurd. Father TU must find the antidote to academic decadence within itself. This antidote must derive out of memory of history, not intentional disjunction from it. To seek the safety of deliberate forgetfulness of history is to ward off immediate shame at the risk of greater future failures. But the system of this institution has stiffened with years of malpractice. It is sick. Tradition spreads itself across the broken limbs of the institution like a steel plate that will not allow flexibility of movement. And, its domesticated watchdogs bark out orders that it cannot disobey in the night of national politics. The loudest and the most savage voice still dictates its will to the whole system of administration. In this situation, the only weapon of intellectuals is their voice. If they cannot find it, all will be lost.
But, can the English teacher speak?
He cannot if he does not dare to open this book of history and read the "underscorched" truth singed on the walls of the department. This is too painful an act because it requires a confession of incompetence and, perhaps, even malpractice to some extent. It is easier to blame the arson on mob psychology, which spares everyone of the crime, or to loosely accuse faceless hooligans who will never be punished because they will never be caught. The English teacher cannot speak because he cannot reconcile with the reality of his unprofessional role in starting the fire. It is easier for him to swim the current rather than to buffet it.
He also knows very well that any statement that contradicts the media announcements and exhibitions of imaginary success of CDE will most probably be counteracted with silent but powerful actions—administrative or otherwise. Therefore, he will not speak because university authorities who themselves cannot speak respect a lack of sincere and honest speech as in the fawning expressions of their yes-men. Promotions will be deterred or opportunities will be snatched away. It is a general practice in our great nation to permit a public freedom of speech but to punish in secret the tongue that does not support the authority in power.
Not only external deterrent forces freeze his speech, but very personal and political reasons also keep him dumb. He has never learnt to say the things he alone has felt, either in English or in his mother tongue. Self-expression never entered the university's curriculum for very political reasons during both Ranarchy and Panchayat Regime. And, today, alliance with political parties only steals his freedom of intelligent expression; non-alliance only stamps him as a sub-human category disposable by the machinery of the state. So, he clings on to the only voice that remains, his own in the classroom, which he looks upon as that of a university intellectual's, far above that of the madding crowd below. His individuality shines brightest there.
But is the English teacher aware that his brightness has already paled before that of historical flames? His credibility at risk, his performance under criticism, his honesty under scrutiny, his knowledge under interrogation, his very existence under threat, what has the English teacher done to expel public doubts and private regrets? How has he improved himself since then? Let him at least speak for himself and tell the world that the responsibility of enlightening it either rests or does not rest upon him. If it does, what has he done to enlighten himself? Uncritical silence can never assure an intellectual's survival.
Friday, December 30, 2005
Can the English Teacher Speak?
The very walls of the Central Department of English (CDE) ought to be tired of flame-wingèd charms called "postcolonialism" and "postmodernism" bouncing off of them all the time. Here, no one really cares to discuss "postincendiarism," which is safely locked up in the past as if it were not at all a threatening future. But black residues of reproachful flames still stain their forgotten nooks like a closed book of history that all fear to open and to read.
Fear is, indeed, the dominating factor. Fear of exposure of academic and administrative incompetence. Fear of publicity of a hollow hunger for cheap applause. Fear of being recognized as a neo-colonialist with powerful drives for political domination over friend and foe. Fear of being caught red-handed as possessing a potent urge to economically exploit the institution for whatever it may be worth. Fear of being discovered as a culturally erased zombie ritualistically wed to the dominion of the English classroom. And this fear is what sustains us all.
As intellectuals, a distinct and powerful voice should have sustained us, not fear. But, have we heard English teachers speak of their condition? Have they opposed the encroachment of the non-academic inside their departments? Have they cried out unanimously against sloth, deceit, malpractice, unprofessionalism or even sheer incompetence? No. Even those that contribute columns to English dailies complacently refrain from speaking sincerely about the problems of their profession. Instead, through the simple act of toleration of just about everything they have normalised such practices with a fake postmodernist's attitude of "I will not judge." They know that to judge is also to offend.
An intellectual cannot prioritize personal survival in a bread-earning situation over articulated judgment related to community welfare. English teachers who seek the privilege of shining in a postcolonial aura must learn to lose the self to find a powerful cultural and intellectual identity. Such identity must create itself through voice, which, whenever lacking, sounds louder than an empty drum. Squeaked columns in English dailies are often better than nothing.
Yet, even as the cultural construct of the Nepalese intellectual as a university teacher is "underscorched" by black stains of historical flames in the department, its "academic" staff continues replacing the playback machine in the classroom. With neither originality of perception nor a penchant for personalized expression, they hope to withstand the gale of public criticism with richly arrogant but poorly composed letters to the editor of an English daily or with fallacies and ad hominems tipped with eunuch rage.
Where have years of education gone? Or is the intellectual a false cultural construct, one that, by virtue of its heterogeneity, actually dissolves into a sort of subalternly silent collective? Like a modern Midas myth, whomever Father TU grants the license to teach that person becomes a life-long intellectual. And, Father TU is powerless to unbless itself with its deep yearned, long longed golden touch.
Waiting for Hermes would be absurd. Father TU must find the antidote to academic decadence within itself. This antidote must derive out of memory of history, not intentional disjunction from it. To seek the safety of deliberate forgetfulness of history is to ward off immediate shame at the risk of greater future failures. But the system of this institution has stiffened with years of malpractice. It is sick. Tradition spreads itself across the broken limbs of the institution like a steel plate that will not allow flexibility of movement. And, its domesticated watchdogs bark out orders that it cannot disobey in the night of national politics. The loudest and the most savage voice still dictates its will to the whole system of administration. In this situation, the only weapon of intellectuals is their voice. If they cannot find it, all will be lost.
But, can the English teacher speak?
He cannot if he does not dare to open this book of history and read the "underscorched" truth singed on the walls of the department. This is too painful an act because it requires a confession of incompetence and, perhaps, even malpractice to some extent. It is easier to blame the arson on mob psychology, which spares everyone of the crime, or to loosely accuse faceless hooligans who will never be punished because they will never be caught. The English teacher cannot speak because he cannot reconcile with the reality of his unprofessional role in starting the fire. It is easier for him to swim the current rather than to buffet it.
He also knows very well that any statement that contradicts the media announcements and exhibitions of imaginary success of CDE will most probably be counteracted with silent but powerful actions—administrative or otherwise. Therefore, he will not speak because university authorities who themselves cannot speak respect a lack of sincere and honest speech as in the fawning expressions of their yes-men. Promotions will be deterred or opportunities will be snatched away. It is a general practice in our great nation to permit a public freedom of speech but to punish in secret the tongue that does not support the authority in power.
Not only external deterrent forces freeze his speech, but very personal and political reasons also keep him dumb. He has never learnt to say the things he alone has felt, either in English or in his mother tongue. Self-expression never entered the university's curriculum for very political reasons during both Ranarchy and Panchayat Regime. And, today, alliance with political parties only steals his freedom of intelligent expression; non-alliance only stamps him as a sub-human category disposable by the machinery of the state. So, he clings on to the only voice that remains, his own in the classroom, which he looks upon as that of a university intellectual's, far above that of the madding crowd below. His individuality shines brightest there.
But is the English teacher aware that his brightness has already paled before that of historical flames? His credibility at risk, his performance under criticism, his honesty under scrutiny, his knowledge under interrogation, his very existence under threat, what has the English teacher done to expel public doubts and private regrets? How has he improved himself since then? Let him at least speak for himself and tell the world that the responsibility of enlightening it either rests or does not rest upon him. If it does, what has he done to enlighten himself? Uncritical silence can never assure an intellectual's survival.
Friday, December 30, 2005
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Incurable Dilemma
Padma Devkota
Incurable Dilemma
I was reawakened to the necessity of at least seeming to solve the problem of faith in God when my younger son told me one fine morning that he regarded me as an atheist. There can be nothing bad in being an atheist, or even a theist or a deist for that matter. However, thousands of years of racial prejudice against the unbeliever had not died in me so that the label of atheist itself felt bitter in a peculiar way. I culturally transformed the meaning of atheist from its Webster's denotation into whatever my sciolism of Hindu scriptures would permit me to buy space in the territory of believers. An atheist is a non-believer in the scriptures, in heaven and hell, in religious cult and current practices. One may be a believer in God and yet be an atheist, I convinced myself. The code and cult of religions have after all been distorted by personal needs of their keepers. I need not accept the scriptures or any of their interpretations to be binding for the perfection of my individuality. If rebellion against what does not suit my mental constitution is atheism, so be it, I told myself. What do words matter when people do not have the capacity of linking words to reality. And the reality is, I confess, I am not an atheist in the sense of being a non-believer in God.
All that I was really doing was seeking affinity with the 18th century deists. Nevertheless, such a line of reasoning led to the necessity of explaining how one could believe in God but not in Gita. For many people like me, the answer is quite obvious: Gita is an excellent fabrication of the human imagination, God is a supreme reality. The Mahabharat is an excellent epic, really the best that the world has produced up to now, and, as such, is just another epic like Paradise Lost or Iliad in the sense that all of these are long burning golden flames of human imagination. Therefore, Christ is no more a god than Krishna is as both are extraordinary samples of the human race. By claiming this truth, I have also just disclaimed the necessity of living the codes, and cults, of any religion as if life were meant just for that. Life is much larger than any scriptural mandate. Yasudha's rope is always too short for Krishna, a symbol of life at its fullest. American transcendentalists, too, understood this truth. By rejecting Christian religious practice, they stated their faith in life as it is lived in the most enjoyable manner in the natural world. They were wiser than many religious priests who never realized that they could live their life to the fullest by living it the way they wanted to, not the way that some scriptures prescribed it to them.
Yet, many atheists and defaulters of established societies are as wise as the transcendentalists when it comes to living their own life. Certain practicing theists have a big problem in this respect. Easy preys to religious prescriptions and proscriptions, they tend to miss the dawn each morning by simply laying a greater priority on ablutions and matins. One would think that the purpose of their life was to please divinity, to glorify the Glorious. But no! The only purpose of life is to live it to the fullest. A flower that blooms in the caterpillar's dining space must admit its affinity to death. The tip of the bud is black and jagged even before the petals show off their colours. Life that is charted by scriptures is born in the caterpillar's dining space. At its best, it is painted for public show only, like a piece of handicraft whose sole raison d'être is to appease the general taste of the beholder. What more is there in this than confirmation of inability to realize oneself to the fullest? Life is as it were skimmed and reduced to the white purity of conformation to established codes of religious conduct. For the boundless mind with a greater cosmic expansion than that of the religious theist's, each different possibility of human thought, action, and speech is an icon of life—life that will expand itself in all directions given its own sweet will, like the will of water that discovers the contours of mountains and plains. Each rebellion against the established, the expected, the predicted is a contribution to creation itself.
And, indeed, the Hindu mind has understood the present act of creation. "And God said, Let there be light: and there was light" is unknown past. The Bible itself should be rewritten thus: "And God says, Let the sap climb to the bud, let the calyx stir with warmth, let the sleeping petals feel that warmth, which will then awaken them to the glory and the radiance of the morning: and a new flower blossoms forth." For creation is an ongoing process, not a product, like a cake of soap from the factory for human use. And human intelligence has the function of helping maintain this process of creation. Wherever it falters and destroys, it counteracts the purpose of life and creation.
Life is continuation, death is culmination. Life is a river, death is a sea. Life needs to go on, and on, and on. If it does not, that is dissolution. The relay torch of life needs to be handed down to posterity beyond our conception of time if creation is to continue. However, for life to go on, we need to be awake and conscious of the fact that we are awake. Anything less than a full consciousness cannot supply us with the joie de vivre. The sleeper does not know this fact. Converted to an incurable faith in the reality of the dream, the sleeper will hardly understand the difference between life and death. And this is where all spiritual problems of humankind find their source. Faith in experienced reality is really rooted in ignorance. Obstinate faith in experienced reality becomes the religion of worldly people. However, its own scale of impermanence mocks our conviction of truth. Conviction, therefore, seeks the extremes. We are forced to commit the either-or fallacy by our desire to obtain heaven or to assert the self. Because we are lovers of life and refuse to admit its cessation, the self gains victory over heaven. But again, because we are lovers of life and imaginatively recreate its prolongation under different conditions, heaven lures us into its domain at the cost of a free unfurling of the self. Whichever is the truth, the only permanence we shall encounter in our whole life is the observing eye that screens and selects every detail of the vast universe with individual insight and sensibility. Yet, they tell me that this eye is itself impermanent.
With what judgment?
They see that the physically living are fewer than the physically dead. They see that earth continues revolving around the sun and reproducing seasons and seasonal varieties of warmth and cold, of forms and colours, of moods and atmosphere. They believe what they see: that the hugest bulk of clay present before their eye is more permanent than the human form. They therefore conclude that man is less true than earth! And they worship earth, and pray to her with devotional fervour. They have found their religion. For truth is eternal. The more permanent or long-lasting something is, the more worthy of worship it has to be because it is therefore closer to eternity.
They see neither that eternity lies in the present moment, nor that it lies within us rather than in what is external to our experiencing self. He who rides the present is saved. Human concerns for the immediate or distant future taxes him through routine and drudgery to a molested existence beyond repair by any civilized forces. Life itself can exist only in the present. The past is a ghost, the future is a vision. It is not by temporal duration of physical existence that eternity can be measured. It can be measured by the clarity of vision that pierces the fog of ignorance. This is what the wiser saints have told us. This is what I tend to believe in.
However, this is not what I have lived or would like to live. I live my ignorance to the call of Maya. To me, the earning of meagre bread is urgent. To me, commitment to the responsibilities I have accepted is morally binding. To me, the world is still a solid foundation on which my house is built. Flesh is all too real not to be experienced. And experienced reality is too powerful to dodge around. Maya is more like the earth's gravitational force than like the equator. Not experienced by the senses but real enough, it exists as a feeling of a particular moment, like the caress of the wind on the naked skin. Yet, ignorance is inbuilt in our system of convictions and acts as a filter of the perceived world. It creates and presents a performance, a pageant, a palpable reality that is not the ultimate reality.
The powerful immediacy of the material world is like that of a magician in action. Tricks and magic enchant us by befogging our intellect. We are passive onlookers of the show where we should have been active inquisitors of truth. And truth would have pleased us more than this magic show. For the truth is that we are ourselves the magician that has the knack of creating the fog wherein our unenlightened soul is lost. The soul is a spark of the Creator: that never understood reality that endows us with a consciousness with which we apprehend life. We need the teacher's nudge, or somebody else's for that matter, before we are capable of the fullest spiritual realization: I am Brahma, meaning, I am the creator of my illusions because Maya is my inherent property.
Once we have understood all this, arguments vaporize like morning dew. There is no more right and wrong, sin and virtue, good and evil. There is only illusion that enchants and removal of illusion that exposes the ultimate truth of all existence.
I seem to understand all this! Yet it also seems to me that I can be Brahma only to the extent that the son can be the father or the clone the original. That is why, although the reality of ignorance proves the existence of Brahma (that never understood reality), I fail to accept the equation between the father and the son to the Vedic extent. It simply does not hold. The spark and the fire are not the same in the process of burning. Only in a philosophically theorized situation can the essence of the two be reduced to the same substance. Only there the equation holds.
But—and this is a big BUT—what if the Vedic equation were another illusion I just created? What if that which I thought of as ingrained ignorance was in reality unrecognized knowledge? What if the lump of clay has actually evolved as the flower? Shall we not give credit to possibilities within contexts that yet need hairsplitting research? What if mind were a spark of matter, matter that flies through immeasurable space? Shall we not give the credit of curiosity to clay and applaud the realization of the faintest, remotest, least probable chance combination of the DNA and the RNA in some interstellar wilderness?
I was not trying to provide answers. I was trying not to reject possibilities for, by doing so, the theist and the atheist have both missed sight of one half of the universe. I have no desire to lose either half.
July 17, 2003
Incurable Dilemma
I was reawakened to the necessity of at least seeming to solve the problem of faith in God when my younger son told me one fine morning that he regarded me as an atheist. There can be nothing bad in being an atheist, or even a theist or a deist for that matter. However, thousands of years of racial prejudice against the unbeliever had not died in me so that the label of atheist itself felt bitter in a peculiar way. I culturally transformed the meaning of atheist from its Webster's denotation into whatever my sciolism of Hindu scriptures would permit me to buy space in the territory of believers. An atheist is a non-believer in the scriptures, in heaven and hell, in religious cult and current practices. One may be a believer in God and yet be an atheist, I convinced myself. The code and cult of religions have after all been distorted by personal needs of their keepers. I need not accept the scriptures or any of their interpretations to be binding for the perfection of my individuality. If rebellion against what does not suit my mental constitution is atheism, so be it, I told myself. What do words matter when people do not have the capacity of linking words to reality. And the reality is, I confess, I am not an atheist in the sense of being a non-believer in God.
All that I was really doing was seeking affinity with the 18th century deists. Nevertheless, such a line of reasoning led to the necessity of explaining how one could believe in God but not in Gita. For many people like me, the answer is quite obvious: Gita is an excellent fabrication of the human imagination, God is a supreme reality. The Mahabharat is an excellent epic, really the best that the world has produced up to now, and, as such, is just another epic like Paradise Lost or Iliad in the sense that all of these are long burning golden flames of human imagination. Therefore, Christ is no more a god than Krishna is as both are extraordinary samples of the human race. By claiming this truth, I have also just disclaimed the necessity of living the codes, and cults, of any religion as if life were meant just for that. Life is much larger than any scriptural mandate. Yasudha's rope is always too short for Krishna, a symbol of life at its fullest. American transcendentalists, too, understood this truth. By rejecting Christian religious practice, they stated their faith in life as it is lived in the most enjoyable manner in the natural world. They were wiser than many religious priests who never realized that they could live their life to the fullest by living it the way they wanted to, not the way that some scriptures prescribed it to them.
Yet, many atheists and defaulters of established societies are as wise as the transcendentalists when it comes to living their own life. Certain practicing theists have a big problem in this respect. Easy preys to religious prescriptions and proscriptions, they tend to miss the dawn each morning by simply laying a greater priority on ablutions and matins. One would think that the purpose of their life was to please divinity, to glorify the Glorious. But no! The only purpose of life is to live it to the fullest. A flower that blooms in the caterpillar's dining space must admit its affinity to death. The tip of the bud is black and jagged even before the petals show off their colours. Life that is charted by scriptures is born in the caterpillar's dining space. At its best, it is painted for public show only, like a piece of handicraft whose sole raison d'être is to appease the general taste of the beholder. What more is there in this than confirmation of inability to realize oneself to the fullest? Life is as it were skimmed and reduced to the white purity of conformation to established codes of religious conduct. For the boundless mind with a greater cosmic expansion than that of the religious theist's, each different possibility of human thought, action, and speech is an icon of life—life that will expand itself in all directions given its own sweet will, like the will of water that discovers the contours of mountains and plains. Each rebellion against the established, the expected, the predicted is a contribution to creation itself.
And, indeed, the Hindu mind has understood the present act of creation. "And God said, Let there be light: and there was light" is unknown past. The Bible itself should be rewritten thus: "And God says, Let the sap climb to the bud, let the calyx stir with warmth, let the sleeping petals feel that warmth, which will then awaken them to the glory and the radiance of the morning: and a new flower blossoms forth." For creation is an ongoing process, not a product, like a cake of soap from the factory for human use. And human intelligence has the function of helping maintain this process of creation. Wherever it falters and destroys, it counteracts the purpose of life and creation.
Life is continuation, death is culmination. Life is a river, death is a sea. Life needs to go on, and on, and on. If it does not, that is dissolution. The relay torch of life needs to be handed down to posterity beyond our conception of time if creation is to continue. However, for life to go on, we need to be awake and conscious of the fact that we are awake. Anything less than a full consciousness cannot supply us with the joie de vivre. The sleeper does not know this fact. Converted to an incurable faith in the reality of the dream, the sleeper will hardly understand the difference between life and death. And this is where all spiritual problems of humankind find their source. Faith in experienced reality is really rooted in ignorance. Obstinate faith in experienced reality becomes the religion of worldly people. However, its own scale of impermanence mocks our conviction of truth. Conviction, therefore, seeks the extremes. We are forced to commit the either-or fallacy by our desire to obtain heaven or to assert the self. Because we are lovers of life and refuse to admit its cessation, the self gains victory over heaven. But again, because we are lovers of life and imaginatively recreate its prolongation under different conditions, heaven lures us into its domain at the cost of a free unfurling of the self. Whichever is the truth, the only permanence we shall encounter in our whole life is the observing eye that screens and selects every detail of the vast universe with individual insight and sensibility. Yet, they tell me that this eye is itself impermanent.
With what judgment?
They see that the physically living are fewer than the physically dead. They see that earth continues revolving around the sun and reproducing seasons and seasonal varieties of warmth and cold, of forms and colours, of moods and atmosphere. They believe what they see: that the hugest bulk of clay present before their eye is more permanent than the human form. They therefore conclude that man is less true than earth! And they worship earth, and pray to her with devotional fervour. They have found their religion. For truth is eternal. The more permanent or long-lasting something is, the more worthy of worship it has to be because it is therefore closer to eternity.
They see neither that eternity lies in the present moment, nor that it lies within us rather than in what is external to our experiencing self. He who rides the present is saved. Human concerns for the immediate or distant future taxes him through routine and drudgery to a molested existence beyond repair by any civilized forces. Life itself can exist only in the present. The past is a ghost, the future is a vision. It is not by temporal duration of physical existence that eternity can be measured. It can be measured by the clarity of vision that pierces the fog of ignorance. This is what the wiser saints have told us. This is what I tend to believe in.
However, this is not what I have lived or would like to live. I live my ignorance to the call of Maya. To me, the earning of meagre bread is urgent. To me, commitment to the responsibilities I have accepted is morally binding. To me, the world is still a solid foundation on which my house is built. Flesh is all too real not to be experienced. And experienced reality is too powerful to dodge around. Maya is more like the earth's gravitational force than like the equator. Not experienced by the senses but real enough, it exists as a feeling of a particular moment, like the caress of the wind on the naked skin. Yet, ignorance is inbuilt in our system of convictions and acts as a filter of the perceived world. It creates and presents a performance, a pageant, a palpable reality that is not the ultimate reality.
The powerful immediacy of the material world is like that of a magician in action. Tricks and magic enchant us by befogging our intellect. We are passive onlookers of the show where we should have been active inquisitors of truth. And truth would have pleased us more than this magic show. For the truth is that we are ourselves the magician that has the knack of creating the fog wherein our unenlightened soul is lost. The soul is a spark of the Creator: that never understood reality that endows us with a consciousness with which we apprehend life. We need the teacher's nudge, or somebody else's for that matter, before we are capable of the fullest spiritual realization: I am Brahma, meaning, I am the creator of my illusions because Maya is my inherent property.
Once we have understood all this, arguments vaporize like morning dew. There is no more right and wrong, sin and virtue, good and evil. There is only illusion that enchants and removal of illusion that exposes the ultimate truth of all existence.
I seem to understand all this! Yet it also seems to me that I can be Brahma only to the extent that the son can be the father or the clone the original. That is why, although the reality of ignorance proves the existence of Brahma (that never understood reality), I fail to accept the equation between the father and the son to the Vedic extent. It simply does not hold. The spark and the fire are not the same in the process of burning. Only in a philosophically theorized situation can the essence of the two be reduced to the same substance. Only there the equation holds.
But—and this is a big BUT—what if the Vedic equation were another illusion I just created? What if that which I thought of as ingrained ignorance was in reality unrecognized knowledge? What if the lump of clay has actually evolved as the flower? Shall we not give credit to possibilities within contexts that yet need hairsplitting research? What if mind were a spark of matter, matter that flies through immeasurable space? Shall we not give the credit of curiosity to clay and applaud the realization of the faintest, remotest, least probable chance combination of the DNA and the RNA in some interstellar wilderness?
I was not trying to provide answers. I was trying not to reject possibilities for, by doing so, the theist and the atheist have both missed sight of one half of the universe. I have no desire to lose either half.
July 17, 2003
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