Passion and Piety in Nepali Poetry

Padma Devkota

Passion and Piety in Nepali Poetry

    In an essay titled “Is Nepal Small?” Laxmi Prasad Devkota, the most revered poet of Nepal, describes his country in three simple words: “Beautiful, serene, vast” (3). Today, the beauty of its yet largely unmolested nature, especially of the northern sublime snowcaps and the lower mountains, remains the major attraction for nature lovers and international tourists. Located between two giant neighbors, its vastness may seem paradoxical. Nepal’s area of 147,181 square kilometers is no indicator to its vastness: it is a country that has sufficient resources to feed its population of about 30 million. It is also capable of accommodating more than sixty ethnic groups and more than seventy languages in a culturally rich and harmonious national existence. However, its serenity has succumbed to bangs and blasts of political unrest for some time past. This recently secularized Hindu nation, which is also the birthplace of Buddha, has today exploded into fragments as a result of political and ethnic rivalry for power rather than for peace, progress and prosperity. Perhaps peace had also meant too much of passive submission to dominating groups in the feudal past. Perhaps peace had also been a non-critical acceptance of the unmarked as normal. Perhaps peace had also been a rising level of inarticulate anger that has finally found its expression against those who refused to see poverty, disease, and untimely death outside the centre of power. Politically, Nepal is now seeking to emerge out of a tenacious feudalism into a democratic republican state with a greater emphasis on human needs and rights.
    The earliest but little known Nepal was inhabited in the north by the Tibeto-Burman Kirata. The Indo-Aryan Khas comprising the Brahmin and the Chhetris came from the south and settled to rule. However, it was in the southern Terai belt of what is today Lumbini that King Ashok (268-31 B.C.) converted to Buddhism and built his stupas. From here, Buddhism has spread all over the world with its central message of peace and compassion. In Medieval Nepal, the division between the vikshus and the vajracharyas or the “teachers of the thunderbolt” led to sectarian Buddhism, of which Vajrayana has flourished in Nepal. Today, despite the large Hindu majority of 80.6% compared to the 10.7% of Buddhist population, the two ways of life have blended so smoothly that temples and stupas are one in faith though two in form. Children of Nepal grow up reading stories of Buddhism and Hinduism alike.
    Given this common ground from which our writers peck and pick to construct their monuments of art, some of the major themes of Nepali literature centre around peace, love, pity, and compassion—themes that are a part of the Buddhist imagination, which is also the major focus of this symposium. I would however like to begin introducing Nepalese literature by briefly sketching its history. One way to understand this history is to follow the evolution of the Nepali mind through the two polar oppositions of passion and piety: passion for the basis of all life and piety for the continuation of all life and creation itself. In a broad way, it would seem that passion is related to life on earth, and piety to life hereafter. However, the consequences of both pious and passionate acts are felt experiences that only the living can describe. This is probably why the enlightened Nepali mind seeks to balance passion and piety rather than to renounce one in favor of the other. Addressing exactly such a tension between passion and piety, between instinctive attraction to the beauty of a female form and the restraining voice of social and moral responsibility, Laxmi Prasad Devkota writes in “To a Beautiful Prostitute”:

O daughter of the earth, the thing called man

Is dominantly earthy! Nor I for one

Enter the frigid cave, disdaining flesh!

In the past, the Vajrayana monks, too, refused to disdain flesh, gave up celibacy and preached the possibility of enlightenment in this very life.
    Let us now trace the development of Nepali poetry, which records significant events of national and cultural life from its earliest days in the hilly wilderness through devotional fervor and amorous/erotic emotions to a mature modernity that coincides with the present reality of globalization. In slightly over two and a half centuries of growth, the Nepali vernacular itself has undergone drastic changes to meet the requirements of expression of a once largely spiritual population that is going global today. An offshoot of colloquial Sanskrit known as Prakrit, Nepali has already established itself as a national language favored unanimously by its speakers. Enriched by other languages such as Hindi, Urdu, Persian and English, it is now the most powerful medium of national instruction and cultural expression.
    Although much of the earliest literature of the Age of Heroic Poetry (1744-1815) was written in a language imbalanced by an abundance of foreign linguistic influence, the content was largely national. This literature is said to celebrate the bravery of heroes who, in one way or another, contributed to the unification of the numerous mini-kingdoms sprawled all over the present geographical boundary and to the preservation of national sovereignty and independence. On closer look, however, the distinction between eulogy of national heroes and panegyrics of feudal lords often blurs out of focus. Although the cult of hero worship yet forms a significant part of folk culture of Nepal, it is deplorable that even the more recent Nepali criticism has not wished to displease the Shah rulers by outlining self-evident features of feudal panegyrics on the one hand and the myth of individual greatness has not yielded to appreciation of human achievement on the other. This is especially self-evident in the daily news in channels and print that highlights people rather than actions. Nevertheless, there were a few songs by Suwananda Das, Gumani Pant and others that used native words, rhyme and rhetoric to glorify their national heroes.
    The following Age of Devotional Poetry (1816-1882) found in Bhanubhakta Acharya (1814-1868) a hitherto unprecedented elevation of devotional fervor that gushed out in his highly original transcreation of Ramayana in mellifluous meters. Poet Acharya’s Nepali version of Valmiki’s Sanskrit epic imparted meaning to the daily activities and aspirations of the god-fearing populace of the day by reinforcing their ideals of piety and devotion. It also provided culturally enhanced entertainment in the form of public poetry that was recited on important occasions such as marriages so that much of this poetry was committed to memory and transmitted to other places and peoples through dramatic recitations rather than through the print media. Proper communication network connecting the various mountain pockets of Nepal as well as the print media were yet lacking in a nation that was, nevertheless, aware of its cultural integrity.
    Bhanubhakta Acharya is today acclaimed as the first significant poet who nurtured the Nepali language in its cradle, who sought to enhance the afterlife of his fellow beings through devotional literature and who attempted to refine the social and domestic conduct, especially of women, through works such as “Education of the Bride.” The anger he expresses in one of his poems against bureaucratic delay in the performance of administrative tasks is more a personal resentment at being harassed than a political awareness of the need for democratic behavior.
    The Age of Amorous/Erotic Poetry (1918-1950) saw the rise of Motiram Bhatta who discovered, recognized, and published Bhanubhakta Acharya’s Ramayana some forty years after its composition. In doing so, he also wrote a biography of this first great poet of Nepal in 1864. Motiram’s major contribution to Nepali poetry was the introduction of the gazal, a rigorous, lyrical form of classical, devotional poetry borrowed from the Urdu language. However, he went beyond the scope of pious devotion to a deity to celebrate the beauty of the female form. His love poems, different from the devotional poetry of the day, caught immediate public attention. Today, the gazal has established itself as an important form of Nepali poetry.
    Pre-modern or New Age (1918-1950) is also an age of literary awakenings. With the rise of formal journalism in 1901, Gorkhapatra, the national daily, was established. It also published poems, stories, and articles besides its regular news features. Similarly, the newly formed Gorkha Language Publication Committee not only published books but also censored them so rigorously that periodicals such as Sundari (1906), Madhavi (1908), Gorkhali (1916), and Nepali Sahitya Sammelan Patrika (1932) started coming out from India to evade the repressive atmosphere of governmental censorship in Nepal. All these publications, nevertheless, helped spread awareness among the more conscious Nepali people who, learning the significance of political freedom from their neighboring country, had slowly started opposing the autocratic Rana Regime from various cities of India. Many Nepali writers, too, had chosen to reside in India and to express themselves from there. Thus, much of Nepali literature, especially in the decade of the forties, was written and published abroad. The trumpet call for rebellion against the autocratic Rana Regime in favor of a cabinet-led parliament guided by the monarch formed the first step of a long inactive nation towards democracy. The bugle poet Dharinidhar blew from Darjeeling echoed from the Himalayas down the hills to the plains:

Awake, awake, now awake, arise!

Fall to work, to work, now strive towards progress!

It was in this context that Bala Krishna Sama once remarked: "What Darjeeling thinks today, Nepal thinks tomorrow."
    The Modern Age (1951- ) of Nepali literature, ushered by the Triumvirate Lekhanath Poudyal (1885-1966), Balakrishna Sama (1903-1981), and Laxmi Prasad Devkota (1909-1959), coincided with the political movement for democracy in Nepal. Although Nepali criticism synchronizes literary modernity with the first advent of democracy in 1951 and the consequent opening up of a closed Nepal to the vast and yet largely unwelcome world, the reality as we have already seen was that modernity had already pervaded the consciousness of her writers and thinkers. If the external signs of modernization of Nepal were clear in her increasingly active participation in international events, in the rise in tourism and in the accumulation of foreign aid, the more subtle symptoms showed themselves in a desire for greater freedom of thought and expression and also in a growing interest in understanding the human condition as opposed to clinging on to an age-long tradition of attempting to safeguard the after-life. Writers felt their social responsibilities were more immediately significant than their spiritual quest.
    On the political side, the Nepalese Congress, the leading party of the day stationed largely in India because it was banned in Nepal, not only took an active interest in her struggle for independence from British Raj, but also sought the help of Indian political leaders and thinkers to reestablish King Tribhuvan to the throne of Nepal by ridding the country of its autocratic Rana Regime. This Rana oligarchy did not give the Nepalese people the right to free self-expression, the right to information, the right to organize themselves for creative and constructive work, the right to move around freely or the right to dissent. Troubled by this jeremiad, the more conscious elite that had gone to India fortified their democratic ideals through the Indian experience. And, students, self-exiled activists, conscious writers, and many other Nepalese residing in India assisted the Nepalese Congress in its attempt to establish democracy in Nepal. The Nepalese Congress, taking the lead, even resorted to armed resistance against the Rana rulers and, on Sunday February 19, 1951, succeeded in declaring a parliamentary democracy in Nepal.
    During this struggle for democracy, Lekhanath Poudyal, an employee of a powerful Rana, Bhim Shumsher, grumbled at home. Obviously, his contribution to the Nepali language cannot go unnoticed. He polished, refined and enriched the language to the extent that it has provided many other writers a modern medium of self-expression. Although orthodox in his pursuit of Vedanta philosophy and classical in his adherence to the conventions of Sanskrit poetics, the poet survives in his spontaneous emotional gushes and extraordinarily smooth flow of language. Gods and nature are a greater part of his poetic diet than contemporary social and political issues. His best known poem, “A Parrot in a Cage” equates poetry to compassion for those whose freedom has been snatched away. The parrot deplores “a life subjected to a bond” and accuses the human race of being “hostile to virtues fair.” Literally, this poem is an exposition of human domination over the animal world. Spiritually, it analyses the fate of a human soul “tied to a dying animal.” And, politically, it is the poet’s personal expression of anguish and anger as an employee of Bhim Shumsher. Regarded as one of the first poems criticizing the autocratic Rana families, it remains one of the very finest examples of Nepali poetry, finer than its sequel, “The Parrot Out of the Cage,” which celebrates the political freedom experienced by the Nepalese people after the overthrow of the 104 years old Rana Regime.
    Balakrishna Sama, born to the Rana family, stayed home to refine his art. He is the most influential Nepali playwright; but, he is also a poet, short story writer, essayist, painter and musician. In this respect, he exhibits more facets to his personality than Lekhnath Poudyal. Sama, who wrote more poetry in his later years than in his youth, used both classical meters and free verse. Since he was basically interested in philosophic enquiries, some of his poems have a powerfully speculative tone. In “Nine Emotions” the poet applies the nine rasas of Sanskrit literature to sketch the horrors, pity, glory and joys of Nepal’s battle with the English. He welcomed democracy by changing his aristocratic surname Shumsher to “Sama,” meaning “equal.”
    Laxmi Prasad Devkota’s contribution is by far the largest. A prolific writer more interested in newer creations than in refinement of the older ones, in twenty-five years of his poetic career he produced almost fifty books including plays, stories, essays, criticism, translations from and to world literature, a novel, and poems ranging from four lines to an epic of 1,754 verses. Although he wrote prolifically in English too, these works are just beginning to see the light of day. Devkota’s writings are unsurpassed in terms of intellectual and creative intensity. In fact, he has remained a literary institution in himself and embodies the entirety of Nepalese Romantic Era in his oeuvres.
    Devkota is first and foremost a poet. He was drawn into politics by circumstances. He lived during a Rana oligarchy that preferred to keep the populace ignorant and submissive. Political rulers of Nepal have always sought to control education of the public for their own advantage. Instructional materials were politically controlled during the Panchayat Regime. Recently, Tribhuvan University remained without a Vice-Chancellor, a Rector or a Registrar for almost one whole year and higher education suffered utter neglect at the hands of political leaders. Vacant university posts greatly disturbed scholars and academicians, some of whom also quit their jobs out of frustration. These posts were politically filled at the beginning of May 2007 after the eight-party alliance had superciliously presumed the right to appoint their cadres to such posts. This was in keeping with Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala’s opinion reported earlier in the press that the street is more important than education. Although this leader of the Nepali Congress is neither a dictator nor an autocrat, attitudes such as the one he expresses here have considerably harmed the growth of the nation by promoting mediocrity.
    Devkota would not have agreed with Koirala for he perfectly well understood Thomas Jefferson who wrote: “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never shall be.” When Devkota was young, books were a rare luxury. Therefore, a total of forty-six people including the poet had decided to open a public library during the rule of Bhim Shumsher. However, even before they had the opportunity to submit this proposal to the authorities, they found themselves under police detention and were released only after paying a fine of Rs. 100.00 each and signing a document to the effect that they would never venture to open a public library again. This is the beginning of Devkota’s political career.
    Next, in 1947 Devkota went into self-exile to Vanaras, India, where the banned Nepali Congress had its office. From there, he edited Yugvani, a literary magazine patronized by the Nepali Congress to raise the political consciousness of the Nepali people. While on a lecture tour to Kolkata, he learnt of the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi and, struck with grief, composed over fifty sonnets in English, thirty-six of which have been included in Bapu and Other Sonnets. Influenced by Gandhi’s non-violence, the poet addresses him as a “demi-Buddha” who equates God with Truth. Gandhi is described as a “Promethean man” who smiles and makes politics holy. However, the poet is everywhere clear that what Gandhi stands for is more important than who the man is.
    And, finally, after the advent of democracy in Nepal in 1951, Devkota became the minister of education in the cabinet of Dr. K. I. Singh for about 118 days. During his tenure, he opened a lot of schools all over the country, made Nepali the medium of national instruction, and contributed greatly to the establishment of Tribhuvan University.
Devkota lived with passion for poetry and compassion for humanity. His preaching of love and compassion were not empty ideals but everyday acts of love and charity. Returning home with his salary, he would distribute it freely to people who sought financial help and reach home empty handed. Seeing a beggar shivering in the frigid cold one day, he took off the coat he was wearing and gave it to the beggar. Endowed with an extraordinary sensibility, he reacted to people and events of everyday life with such unusual genuineness of feeling that people failed to understand his behavior, which to them was impractical, almost abnormal. In a poem titled “The Lunatic,” really the first powerfully modern confessional voice in Nepalese literature, Devkota satirizes the insensitive, mediocre, and materialistic society by pitting its reality against the subjective and aesthetically far more pleasing world of the mad persona he adopts. The sensibility of the mad persona comes close to Buddhahood in the following lines:

Shocked by the first streak of frost on a fair lady’s tresses,

For a length of three days my sockets filled and rolled.

For the Buddha, the enlightened one, touched me in the depths,

And they called me one distraught.

Such things, he says, occurred time and again. And, in the same breath, he also denounces the political leadership of those that, in the name of the people, had gained heights of power but had remained emotionally cut off from the grassroots:

Look at the strumpet-tongues adancing of shameless leadership

At the breaking of the backbones of the people’s rights!

Devkota was not convinced that Nepal was a democratic nation yet.
    This was indeed contrary to the feelings of the masses, including that of many of his contemporaries. The general atmosphere of celebratory euphoria after the political turnover of 1951 took some of Devkota’s contemporaries off of their heels. Poet Siddhicharan Shrestha, for example, was the first to invite writers to redirect their thoughts and expressions to meet the challenges of the new democratic age. The enemy, meaning the Rana Regime, was defeated. Writers now needed new subject matters, styles and techniques, he said. A group of writers were convinced, but Devkota was not. He looked at simple, every day things such as the electric light that dimmed and brightened whimsically at night and refused at times to emit enough light to show itself. Sometimes the lights would go out all of a sudden for the whole night and not come back. The poet then felt that the government had told him to go to bed when he wanted to work late night for the nation. Neither a conscious writer nor a democratic leader ever saw anything wrong in the supply of electricity. Complacency and fatalistic acceptance of mediocre performance, Devkota thought, could not be democratic behavior. This is how he examines himself in the essay titled “The Electric Bulb”:

I feel as if I were unworthy of democracy. One who cannot feel alive to the ugliness of one’s surroundings, to the presence of one’s powerful wants; one who shows no measurable degree of reaction to the denial of home light, be he ever so blatant about abstract political ideals, is never a true democrat, never a conscious citizen.

He found the “protesting voice of conscious individuality” absent “even in those who rule and command.”
    Devkota, therefore, challenged both Siddhicharan Shrestha and the popular political leaders of the decade by demanding a change in attitudes and behavior, not in personalities on the top rung of the government. Especially after he attended the Afro-Asian Writers’ Conference in Tashkent in 1958, Devkota became more critical of democracy in Nepal and more concerned with the fate of writers at home. In an essay written originally in English Devkota comes down hard upon the apathy of the Nepalese government:

When I compare the lot of the writers of the U.S.S.R. with those of Nepal, I feel like comparing contrary poles—where there is perpetual sunshine on the North, we find eternal darkness in the South. Writers’ fates are determined by socio-political philosophies and the systems that evolve out of them. We, the writers of Nepal, are the most unfortunate of human tribes, robbed of our royalties, denied our copy-rights, no human laws working our literary defences, general frustration writ large upon our shriveled brows, making our rough shifts for mere existence as if we apologized to live in a society where, amidst general apathy and negligence, we command the best brains. We are a scattered lot, a routed regiment of intellectuals, pushed back by a political tide, that, started by ourselves, has rushed so far ahead of us, towards exploitative heights that we are left behind merely like scum and filth, too base to be lifted up to the positions of our natural claims. And the boasted democracy of today, whose army is a feudal and profiteering group of sordid self, cut off from the masses, divorced from popular interests, confidently balanced on a tottering economy, sounding its programmes and projects like blaring bugles of nonsense, conscious of its own unworthiness, yet superciliously demonstrative of its own achievement, is a democracy without the people, a vision of equality among giants and dwarves, mountains and dales, of liberty among a slavery of economic dependence, and fraternity among a riot of crossing multifarious interests. And it is, above all, a democracy without Enlightenment…. It is a democracy where the torch-bearers have no place and no claims on respect. (“The Necessity of a Strongly Organised Writers Union for Nepal”)

Devkota was far too discerning to be misled by political slogans. As a writer, he constantly leagued himself up with the grassroots without denouncing anyone because he was intolerant of certain attitudes, not people. I have a feeling that Manhae carried a similar flame of imagination in his struggle to upgrade human life in Korea.
    What followed in the 1950s in the name of democracy and modernity was a flood of experimentations in literary styles, techniques, forms and subject matters. Literary productions began to be shaped by political ideals, international influences, social utopias, current economic realities, longings for freedom, notions of equality and other aspirations of the awakened mind. Writers emphasized political goals of freedom and democracy and the individual’s passion for democratic ideals overtook the need for pious moments of spiritual experience. And the whole world flooded into Nepal, changing its life-style, thoughts and behavior. After all, democracy can at the most give writers and artists the freedom of self-expression; what they can make out of that freedom is the business of art.
    The decade of the fifties, in fact, saw a Renaissance of the creative and artistic spirit that flourished in various trends and movements seeking to express itself through new images, similes, styles, and structures. As Devkota and Siddhicharan Shrestha walked their own literary highways, Romanticism practiced by these two remained one of the major influences on the younger generation of writers. The refinement in poetry practiced by Lekhanath and Sama was a second important influence upon younger writers. However, there were others who refused to be influenced by preceding literary canons and strove for total break from tradition. Some turned to Progressivism as early as 1950 and adopted leftist ideals and practices. Yet others experimented with literary styles and techniques. These, in turn, were to have their impact upon the writers of the following decades.
    A small group of young poets of the fifties including Mohan Koirala, Bairagi Kainla, Ishwar Ballav and others decided that they would never be able to write like Devkota, Sama or Lekhanath. So, adopting the free verse style initiated by Gopal Prasad Rimal, they rejected the Classical norms of poetic composition and found a voice of their own in a more purist language. Throughout his poetic career, Mohan Koirala continued evolving in terms of themes and styles. His strength lies in recording the external as well as psychological changes in the social and political arena and also in denouncing those that stifled democracy for personal advantages. He clearly wanted enlightenment to permeate throughout the nation like the sunshine. His comments on social and political issues are very poignant. In “The Fiddle,” he writes:

Where are those rotten wise men who said,

“May all beings be happy”?

Where are the men who said,

“Truth, not Falsehood, shall triumph”?

This is indeed a strong rejection of a naively optimistic faith in the ultimate victory of the good over the bad in the context of felt realities of day to day modern existence where competence and civilized behavior are constantly undercut by the pragmatic self-promotions of the wielders of economic and political powers.
    Bhupi Sherchan’s poems too express a mellow tone of sadness, but not of defeat, resulting from the miserable socio-economic conditions of human existence. Unlike Haribhakta Katuwal who bursts out sporadically in powerful utterances as when he condemns life itself—“What a damned life, this life!”—Bhupi is thoughtful, precise and poignant. He is perhaps the next important poet after Devkota and Mohan Koirala. A leftist from a wealthy family, this contradiction inherent in his personal life so haunted him that he stopped thinking of isms and started writing about things that really touched him. His poetry, therefore, is honest, passionate and ironic. He chose to write about simple and ordinary things such as a candle, the clock tower, a bicycle or the courtyard, but it was his extraordinary perception of ordinary things and the simple but powerful language in which he expressed these that caught the attention of his readers. His collection of forty-two poems in A Blind Man on a Revolving Chair (1969) became one of the most influential best sellers after Devkota’s Muna Madan. His statements of simple truths have hit hard and have stuck to hearts that have felt it once: “This is a land of uproar and rumor…” he wrote about Nepal. This truth still bites.
    In 1960, Nepal took a politically nasty turn. King Mahendra dissolved the parliament, imprisoned the major party leaders and imposed a partyless Panchayat Democracy run by the king’s cabinet. Freedom of expression was once again lost and forced submission was advertised by the government as good national conduct. However, Nepal was not a watertight compartment anymore. The international world had penetrated its frontiers. And the western world that flooded into the country was mainly young, frustrated, disillusioned, and drugged. A small group of Hippies with a mission of peace, love and freedom stood in opposition to the domination of controlling power structures of the west that suppressed and enslaved individuals. These were lost in the larger crowd of Hippies who came to Kathmandu with a vision impaired by drugs, influenced by sex and inspired by individual freedom to practice a superficial lifestyle of their own. These caught the imagination of the Nepalese public, of which a large number of youths and some older writers too cherished this new lifestyle. Since tourism was a major industry of the country, the government failed to deal effectively with this movement, which left its stamp on the cultural life of Kathmandu. Many people then accepted tourism as a necessary evil.
    The western world has often penetrated eastern cultures both with its ideologies and commodities. I would believe that Asian reactions to such cultural penetrations are similar in many cases. An intelligent guess at the general history of our literatures is that they all begin in some oral tradition under the influence of some religious or philosophical system—Buddhism and Confucianism in Korea, Hinduism and Buddhism in Nepal—and build their own paradise where gods, nature and human beings are united. The sable influence of deities upon the human psyche has often proved to be a fatalistic acceptance of status quo, which in turn has been reflected both in the life and literature of the nation. There is no doubt a powerful love of nature expressed in much of early literatures that also uphold human values. In doing so, such literature even tends towards the didactic to maintain behavioral patterns suited to age-old ideals. The single dominant message of such literature is the ultimate victory of good over evil. Modern Asian literature under the liberalizing influence of the west has widened its scope of subject matter and themes, and, in the name of self-criticism, it has basically proved itself to be a literature of dissent vis-à-vis its own tradition on many levels. In Nepal, the general acceptance of the inevitability of a two-way cultural osmosis and a general faith in the society’s capacity to transform the received into the desirable, which may not always succeed, have remained the two best options for a continued cultural connectivity. While global influences cannot be resisted, we hope that they will nevertheless be transformed by the culture they come into contact with and turn into what societies desire the most.
    Thus, the young Hippies in Kathmandu in the 1960s, seeking to escape into the exotic wilderness of their own innate drives either through meditation or with the help of Bacchus and his pards, helped break some of the taboos of the conservative society that had nevertheless begun interrogating tradition. In 1934, Devkota’s Muna Madan had rejected the caste system as a wrong measure of man. In 1940, the Nepali Congress Party had organized a public picnic where caste and untouchability were rejected as harmful social behavior. In the 1950s, Freud and Marx had already influenced the writers to the extent that both traditional morality and feudal value systems were under interrogation. An ardent student of Freud, Pushkar Lohani was among the first poets to write openly on issues of sexuality. His daring use of even religious images as sex symbols, offensive no doubt to orthodox Hindus, nevertheless fail to attain meditative heights. The poet succeeds at the level of images and symbols. In the days that followed, many younger poets, both male and female, were soon to produce tons of texts that frankly and openly discussed sex.
    The literature after 1960, taking its cues from writers and movements of the earlier euphoric decade, was both a continuation of the trends and experiments already started in the decade of the fifties and of renewed struggle for democratic values and practices. At its worst, poetry became a garbled grumble behind sable clouds that could not pour down as yet and, therefore, remained padded, abstract and suggestive. Reduced to political slogans, poetry often barked at corrupt politicians and political practices. The sole purpose of such artless writing was to achieve another democratic victory for the people. Passion for political ideals had submerged the priests at the altar of the Muse. Therefore, when in 1989 the people’s movement succeeded in restoring a multiparty electoral system to the country, these poets had lost the subject matter of their poetry and produced very little for some time after that.
    At its best, Nepali literature continued trying out new ways of making itself heard both by the public and by the rulers. Many new literary trends appeared after 1960. Since it is not possible to discuss all of the dozen or so of such movements, I will mention very briefly only a few of them.
    In 1963, Indra Bahadur Rai, Bairagi Kainla, and Ishwar Ballav started a movement from Darjeeling called the Third Dimension. These writers believed that Nepali literature was incomplete in itself because it was two dimensional. It lacked the third dimension of depth to provide a complete picture of the human individual. So, they added well sculpted pictorial images to their writing but remained modern in so far as they were attempting to communicate more clearly and precisely with their audience. While Bairagi Kainla is relatively more concrete, Ishwar Ballav is more abstract and difficult. Indra Bahadur Rai is incisive, concrete, and powerful as a writer. These very poets and writers move towards postmodernism with their campaign of lila lekhan or mirage writing, which is founded on concepts that are closely related to Derrida’s deconstruction. The illusiveness of truth is linked with the incapacity of words and language itself to capture reality. Monolithic truth is rejected as multiplicity of interpretations is advocated. This line of reasoning, reinforced by western deconstruction, has found many followers.
    In 1966, Parijat, Manjul and several other writers of the left adopted the common penname “Ralfa” and suppressed their family name to sign their creative writing. This came to be known as the Ralfa Movement. Since they were writing not only against social discriminations based on religious and economic caste, sex and ethnicity supported by traditional and conservative faiths and values but also against the suppression and exploitation of the people by the government, the common penname strengthened their voice.
    In 1969, Shailendra Sakar, Pushkar Lohani, Manjul, Parijat, and others were part of what is called the Unaccepted Group. These writers argued that the ugly is as much a part of reality as the beautiful. All human beings are not born the same: some are handicapped, others are intellectually or morally feeble, yet others are sexually aberrant. Writers, they argued, should embrace the whole of humanity in their vision, beautify the ugly and present it in a palatable way to the public.
    Even as some writers were refusing to cooperate with the government by rejecting awards and prizes offered by institutions that it supported, the Young Writers’ Front consisting of twenty-one writers opposed established publications that refused to encourage new and young voices. Oppositions to establishment came in stranger ways than this when, on September 28, 1974, Shailendra Sakar, Kashinath Tamot, Kavitaram, Dhruba Sapkota, and others lined up in New Road, the main business street of Kathmandu, to shine the shoes of passersby. This Shoe Shine Movement, as it was later called, spoke of the degree of respect that the Nepalese government had given to its writers.
    On May 24, 1979, after the announcement of the referendum for a multiparty democracy, Mohan Koirala, Toya Gurung and Dinesh Adhikary among others began the Street Poetry Revolution. They read their poetry in the open streets to raise the awareness of the people. This movement caught the imagination of the public and spread throughout the country. Since these poets were bent on making the multiparty democratic system work, they spoke daringly against the partyless Panchayat Regime.
    In this way, writers have struggled to establish democracy in Nepal. With the Second People’s Movement in 1989, the Panchayat Democracy came to an end. However, feudal attitudes and practices still remained. A powerful group of Maoist insurgents who were dissatisfied with constitutional monarchy among other things launched an armed revolution in 1996 and threatened to bring down the regime. When, in February of 2005, the king dissolved the government and declared a state of emergency and imprisoned political leaders, mass protests were organized by the seven-party opposition and the Maoists. After the peace accord between the Maoists and the government in 2006, the Maoists were allowed to enter the parliament in mid-January 2007. Today, dissatisfied with the eight-party coalition, they are beginning to show signs of unrest.
    It is important for people to understand that democracy is a continuous struggle for the rights of citizens, not just a moment of victory over its assailants. Supported by systems of free and fair elections, it must involve the participation of the people in a rule of law. Walking the streets of Kathmandu today, one is witness to more instances where laws are broken than upheld. Civility, respect for the individual and tolerance of opposing ideals are conspicuously absent in public behavior. This is also why poets are still vociferously upholding the cause of democracy. While writers of the left are united against monarchy, those of the right are not upholding it.
    Poetry, especially after 2002 has expressed unity among writers for a democratic republic. Such poetry expresses today ideas that Nepalese people are powerful enough to uproot monarchy, that the struggle of the people against suppression is a present reality, and that the people are competent enough to rule themselves. This faith adds up to the hope that a democratic government will also rid the society of discriminations in the name of race, caste, region, and sex. Progressive poets, especially, are clear today that they no longer can accept the king as an incarnation of God. Amar Giri writes:

I cannot

like my grandparents

believing you to be an avatar of Vishnu

forgive your heaven of plunder

(“Time Awakened from Loss of Consciousness”)

To Ramchandra Bhattarai, the king is a white elephant, a big economic drawback.
Confident that democracy will be established, poets today are more outspoken than ever in the past. The following lines by Dil Sahani, for instance, would have been suicidal during the Panchayat Era:

I want to parade along the street

wearing emperors’ crowns like shoes…

(“I Write the History of Progress”)

Hope is the keynote. And the call to struggle for democracy echoes everywhere. Images of rivers of blood and poisonous bugles that pollute the air are common. Faith in the power of words is high.

They are afraid of words

Yes, afraid of words

because

they are afraid of truth

* * *

These lords of missiles

these rulers without policy

are terrified by a small pen

(Rishiram Bhusal “Our Words”)

And, among the wielders of such small pens are young women such as Dr. Aruna Upreti, Sudha Tripathi, Sita Sharma and others who are also very active and outspoken.
Poets and writers all over the world are a race of people united by a common flame. They dream of a better world for the whole of humanity and actively participate in the struggle to achieve it. In Nepal, writers today aspire for democracy, the rule of law, a just society, economic prosperity, plenty of opportunities for everyone, respect for life and liberty, and all such values that form the basis of dignified human life.
    When I reflect upon the last five or six decades of Nepal, I am satisfied that struggles and conflicts have become a part of our daily national life. In fact, conflict has been one of the strengths of the nation: on the one hand, it does not allow people to remain indifferent on matters of national importance, and, on the other hand, it promotes interrogation of tradition and status quo. We have yet to learn from the topographical diversity of Nepal that the world’s deepest gorge and the tallest peak actually exist in the same country. Our poets and writers have pointed out that differences in terms of ethnicity, religion, region, and so on are to be respected rather than to be feared. They have also upheld the dignity of human life and constructive work even as they continue spreading the message of love, compassion, peace, justice, universal fraternity and sorority. This is the message that our writers have to give to the world. They have a great faith in human potentials and they greatly revere the dignity of human life.

May 10, 2007

Devkota's Self-Defense

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.

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)

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 Circe 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 Circe
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 Circe’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 Circe
The black-eyed, voluptuous Circe
    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 Circe
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,
    Circe 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 Circe 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.

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.

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.

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