INTERVIEWEE: Manu Dash, Writer, Publisher, Editor
INTERVIEWER: Kabir Deb, Interview Editor, Usawa Literary Review
KD: Hello Manu da! How’s life treating you? Congratulations for the success of The Big Book of Odia Literature. What’s the first thought that came in your mind when you were compiling works of such brilliant writers?
Thank you, Kabir! Life is better than ever before. Past is like chiaroscuro, future is indiscernible by thick mask of fog and present is clear like indigo calm water, vibrant as sunshine! Life often grants surprises and that is the greatest gift for us as termed by Boris Paternak.
Yes, I am chuffed by the success and visibility of The Big Book of Odia Literature in Odisha as well as in India. Many friends from regional languages in India are genuinely inspired to undertake such task for their own language. I squarely give credit to the Penguin Random House India for accepting my proposal and executing the project.
Well, while I was moving ahead with the project, suddenly an idea brooded over me that almost one fourth of Odia people- whom we call adibasi, tribal community- are not represented by any anthology published in Odia language and treated them as separate entity. I do not fathom, as a country of multiligualism for centuries, why the hell we ignore a good chunk of our people producing brilliant oral as well as written literature!
KD: Indian mainstream literature is full of anthologies, especially poetry. What is the first thing an editor should keep in mind while working on giving birth to an anthology? Also, how should one perceive an anthology to make it distinct?
If we go to the etymology of anthology, it refers to the garden and the anthologist is a gardener. A garden means assembly of varieties of flowers. Purpose, intent, canvas and uniqueness in the anthology that keeps an editor engaged while doing the anthology. Uniqueness of the theme draw the attention of the readers.
The editor should first define its intent and purpose before going ahead and must careful that it is not another work that already exists. For a moment the editor must impersonate himself as a reader to get most of the answers to the questions that come to his mind. The distinctness will automatically take a birth.
KD: In a poem named Village, its writer Naku Hasdah, addresses the philosophy of the Santal community. Such writers have not received the acclamation they deserve from the mainstream literature.
Firstly, how did you get introduced to Naku Hasdah’s work? How do you connect with the philosophy of life he kept in this poem? And why is India still way behind in translating the regional artists?
You have landed three questions at one go. I shall answer them in seriatim.
I am a literary enthusiast. I look for literature not only from the literate world but also from oral performances. I have worked at the periphery ( Jeypore, Nabarangapur and Rayagada) of Odisha for twenty years where indigenous populace like Paraja, Kondha, Bonda, Bhotra, Saura, Kui, Gadaba, Omanatya, Bhumia, Durua, Desia, Gondi and Halbi are wide spread tribes. I have visited hundreds of villages in the tribal area. Accompanying eminent Odia poet Dr. Sitakant Mahapatra two decades ago, I had spent a day in an inaccessible tribal village called, Khambesh, in Rayagada district. Gopinath Mohanty was also very fond of this remote village. We watched the life and living of the tribal people there. Besides, I am aware that Santali literature of late has been flourishing. I was always curious about how an oral tradition transposes itself to the written forms of literature. During one of my interactions with the poet Naku Hashdah I enquired about Santali literature and I got to know that I was speaking with a poet who was so very passionate about his language and literature, though he himself is a teacher of Odia literature (Dr. Naku Hashdah is an Associate Professor of Odia at Sambalpur University). He read out some of his poems to me. I was awestruck by the depth of his recitation and became curious to know the meaning of the poems he was reading out to me. He was more than willing to explain and tell me the meaning of the poems. That created an urge within to translate the poems and take them to a larger audience.
The poem “Aatu” or “Village” talks of the beginning of life and civilisation in the lap of nature. God made us and he gave us everything for life. Everything grows on land and the land is precious. “This village is our first country…/And each village has its own story” reflects how God’s creation is so unique. The village and our life in it are shaped by the ones who came before us, the ancestors but we are deserting this holy place for selfishness. We are building our lives in the cities by destroying the traditions of livelihood and the ways of life. The poet doesn’t deny that villagers are also responsible for the loss of the sanctity of the village. It was supposed to be their sacred duty to preserve the ways of the Gods and ancestors.
The regeneration of life can take place only on the soil of the village. The time is not far away when the world will once again turn to its original ways of life. Life in the village and the ancestors and the Gods there are waiting for the humans to return to it.
The entire poem echoes the need to return to the village. The advancement of technology and modern ways of life need to be reinvented in the villages.
This is a passionate call to turn to villages. True life lies in nature and the village is the perfect ecosystem where life can be nested otherwise, we are headed towards destruction.
India is still way behind in translating regional artists because India is rapidly losing its multicultural and multilingual traits, thanks to modern education and overemphasis on certain languages both national and international. It’s a fact that regional artists are never given the kind of platform they deserve. When learning in a particular state, national or international language is encouraged tribal languages and dialects tragically lose their charm.
The other aspect of the problem is picking up these regional artists and their practices. We are so full of them (almost seven hundred languages and as many traditions) that only a few regional literary practices and languages are picked up for translation.
Only the ones capable of catering to the popular cultures are picked up for translation. If we are to preserve these literatures then a conscious and conscientious effort towards these is essential.
KD: Gopinath Mohanty’s story Hidden Ganga shows a disturbing picture of marriage. How does the legal system of India perceive marriage? Also, the object oriented writing of Gopinath Mohanty leaves an impression which doesn’t get dissolved easily. Yet he doesn’t fail in making situations abstract for the readers. What is the basic necessity to develop a story in this form? And should it be done quite often?
All Gopinath Mohanty’s stories are developed from people and incidents that he met in real life. This is no exception. The woman whose story he narrates in Hidden Ganga appears in his autobiography. It was a case that had come up in his court when he was a Deputy Magistrate. Besides, it must be kept in mind that these stories were written almost a hundred years ago when the idea of marriage as an equal partnership was yet to be taken root. Marriage then was a patriarchal institution which benefitted the man. Women were indoctrinated into this idea of marriage and believed in it. Far from giving a dismal picture of marriage, Hidden Ganga gives a realistic picture emphasising the importance of fidelity and acceptance in marriage.
A reader can realize Hidden Ganga is a heavily nuanced story that has many layers. It draws attention to two marriages, the judge’s and the defendant’s – one, a man from the middle class, the other a man from the lower class. Both marriages are realistically portrayed. The judge is a respectable man, and has remained faithful to his wife as he is bound by social norms. His sanskara teaches him fidelity and he is faithful to his wife and committed to the marriage even though the years have taken their toll and both of them have changed. The defendant has strayed. He vilifies his wife, neglects his children and lives with another woman. The woman’s reaction to the judge’s sentence and the manner in which she is prepared sign anything to keep her husband away from jail glorifies her.
KD: How is Odia Literature different from the literature of other parts of the country? In Bengali literature, the essence of nostalgia is a common factor irrespective of the class, caste or religion of the protagonist. What is the one pivotal factor that’s common in writers of Odisha?
Every author writes his own time. So also the history of the community rationally preserves the essence of the time. Though writers and historians scribble their time, but writers do it artistically and aesthetically. If you look at the genesis and after math of the Odia stories, it starts with a melancholic tone. Be it, Rebati, the first story written in Odia, or Magunira Shagada( Maguni’s Bullock Cart), Mansara Bilapa( Lamentation of the Flesh), Sua Muhanre Patara ( The Leaf in the Stream) , Andharua, Masanira Phula( Cementary’s Flower) or novel Jhanja all these stories have a tragic plot. So the major tone of Odia stories speak about the saddest tales of their time.
The impact of nanka dubhiksha (The Great Famine of 1866) perished one third of its population and people succumbed injury into the jaws of hunger.
Of course the current situation has overtly changed. There is a visible shift from agri-based society to urban based liberal community and industrialisation is also taking shape in snail’s pace.
Besides, there’s a commonality among the Odia writers. They do not question to the authority nor want to be dragged to the discomfort zone. It’s perhaps as most of the writers are bureaucrats in different levels. They do not address the burning issues of their own society but talk about bigger issues which has no connection with their readers. Getting an award is their sole ambition, not win over the hearts of the readers.Someone rightly observed, “Odia literature was ensconced in the comfort zone of conformism and sentimentalism.”
KD: The economic chaos of Dash Benhur’s story The Crow is disturbing. How abusive is the system of India towards those who grow eating nothing but hunger? And what effect do such stories have on your mind?
“The Crow” is a symbolic story of protest. The protagonist of the story is a tormented child labour who represents a world that still continues in our society despite legal provisions against the same. He ultimately has found a vent in an wounded crow and in its resultant scenario.
If the story disturbs a reader, it seems to have served its purpose. It is not clear as to
why and how a reader finds an economic chaos in this story. Good stories do disturb and stir imagination of a reader. Has not Salman Rushdie once said, “Even when things are at their worst, there’s a little voice in your head saying, ‘Good story!’ ?
KD: Compiling works of writers is a tough task since there’s a need to have quality content without creating a mess in the literature arena. What drove you to create this enormous book? Also different stories affect us differently. How did you manage to select the stories which are there in the book?
Interesting question, Kabir ! Thank you for asking. Please remember, I am a student of Odia literature though I have tremendous inclination towards English literaure. Though the Odia and English literature Department are in one block of the building, but they behave each other like India and Pakistan. Odia students never bother happens in English Department and vice-versa. But, I was a frequenter to English department and in discussion on various literary issues.That enormously helped to choose the best writer and their best writing. I di not have to scratch my head. Fortunately we have long lis of brilliant Odia stories written over the centuries. Though I took thirty stories, I failed to take more brilliant writers due to space constraint. An anthologist always suffers from this guilt of not taking the writers whom he pays respect.
KD: Bepin Vehari Roy in his essay, Beauty says, “A poet confined in the physical, practical world cannot create beauty”. Yet poetry has to be pragmatic to address what’s pretty physical and at the same time, socio-political. What’s your take on this particular thought?
Vepin Vehari Roy, the essayist, was having a philosophical bent of mind as well as imagination. So he could not just keep schtum about the craft: looking for ideal beauty in essence, not in presence. His school of ideological kernel seems to have been inspired by Charles Baudelaire. Do you recall, Kabir, what did he express in his seminal poem, The Balcony?
“The eves illumined by the burning coal,
The balcony where veiled rose-vapour clings-
How soft was your breast then, how sweet your soul !
Ah, and we said imperishable things,
The eves illumined by the burning coal.”
Here in the poem, you don’t find the physical existence of the balcony as it transcends to an object for memory, desire and deep sense of nostalgic feelings. The poem symbolically conveys the deeper meaning of private realm of personal relationships and the external world.”
So for Vepin Behari Roy the concrete or object by its objectness cannot be treated as beautiful and destined to be transformed to the ethereal.
I am glad, Prof. Asim Ranjan Parhi’s careful translation has retained the essence of its original text.
Well, the time and space of Roy has already been in ill tandem currently and the current trend has hardly any room for this ideology. A writer has to be more realistic with no-nonsense attitude and connected with the time we live in.
KD: What are the five books that changed your life in many ways? Also what is that one book you’d recommend to the readers of this generation to go through?
Countless books, in a period of half a century, have awe-inspiringly seduced me. But, that honeymoons were always short-lived. While one exits from the memory, another makes a beeline. But, none of them have been successful in changing my life. I never thought to read a book to change my life though they have inspired, influenced and shaped my thought process. If my memory serves me right, Anam poems of Kumar Mohanty in Odia, for an example, had the first and deep influence on me, but slowly I escaped from its embrace and hugged the larger world waiting to take me in its fold.
KD: What do you think about the Usawa Literary Review?
Usawa is doing a fantastic work. Glad to know it believes in equality, which is chore tone of The Big Book of Odia Literature from where springs up the inclusiveness and indiscrimination. What better a magazine would do during a strange time we are living in?
Kabir Deb is the interview editor of Usawa Literary Review.
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