Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri

I usually don’t write book reviews because at the very outset I am stumped by this feeling, “Why would anyone want to read my impressions or critique of a book when he or she can access the real stuff?” But recently I read a book which I liked hugely and came across a blog called At Pemberley Life Between Pages where because of book reviews I’ve been introduced to books I’ve added to my reading list. And the combination of both makes me want to present to you Lowland by Jhumpa Lahiri. It’s a book I relished because Jhumpa Lahiri’s writing is limpid, light and poignant, because Lowland like all her other work moves back and forth between different continents and cultures , though ultimately the movement is away from India and towards the  United States, and because I find in her characters reflections of my own upbringing, experiences and conflicts. And when I say I, I am just one amongst many Indians or citizens of today’s world, whose identities are the result of moving away from one’s country to another,  of growing up with diverse cultural inputs, of speaking one language at home and another with the world, of experiencing  solitude and nostalgia for a country left behind, of adapting, making space for the alien and eventually of coming to terms with the multi-faceted nature of one’s being.   

In Lowland we get to know two brothers with about a year of age difference, growing up in Calcutta. They are very close to each other and can be mistaken as twins. They do everything together. The younger brother Udayan is more daring, impulsive while the older Subhash is more cautious and patient. Their ways start diverging during their college days.  In 1967 tribal peasants in Naxalbari, a village in the north of West Bengal revolted against the feudal system of wealthy landlords who forcefully evicted them from the fields they cultivated, thus cutting them from their only source of subsistence and revenue. Their armed uprising was brutally suppressed . Udayan deeply upset and enraged by this turn of events joins the Naxalite movement which sought to empower tribals and peasants,The movement eventually turned extremely violent. People who were considered to represent the state and consequently oppressors were ruthlessly assasinated. The government's retort was equally if not more ruthless.   It was greatly influenced by the ideology of Mao Zedong.  Subhash is sceptical about its success of this movement and  would like to go the United States to continue his studies. So their ways part.  Subhash goes to a university in Rhode Island in the States and Udayan stays back in Calcutta. Udayan gets married to Gauri, a girl of his choice and Subhash has affair with an American woman separated from her husband,with always the thought that his parents would never approve of a liaison with a foreigner. And three years after Subhash’s stay in the States he receives a telegram: Udayan Killed. Come if you can.  I feel tempted to tell more but that would be like my aunt who always told me the ending of a film when curtains went up.  

One of the strongest points of this novel is that it doesn’t cease to surprise you and yet the surprise is never forced. The unfolding of the plot seems a natural outcome of the evolution of the characters.  

 The different geographical, cultural and emotional spaces the characters inhabit , constitute the depth and breadth of the novel. Through Subhash’s and Udayan’s childhood and parents, through Udayan’s activities and his relationship with Gauri, we live through a tumultuous period in Bengal. Along with Subhash and Gauri  we move from Calcutta to the States and have the first generation immigrant’s experience.  And finally through their children we are at home in America. It’s a long journey; nobody is spared from separation, disillusionment, heartbreak, and death. It’s a journey I felt completely involved in. And the end is graceful, holding the promise of reconciliation, appeasement, and the beginning of other stories.  

The only critique I have after reading the story a second time is that Subhash seems lacking in some vital element. We don’t witness his torments, the battles he wages with himself. His character in my opinion would be more real if he had more rough edges.

Arunima Choudhury

Bollywood in Bamako

 Ah Bollywood, Bollywood, you have enraptured the imagination of people through time and space. Your heroes jumping from rooftops, single-handedly disabling dozens of armed bandits, your heroines in body hugging blouses and artfully draped saris,  batting their eyelids and casting languorous glances from kohl rimmed eyes have lightened men’s miseries and made them dream of a happier clime. Here it suffices to feel an emotion to break into song, and go dancing through meadows and over hills. Here love triumphs over the barriers of class and caste, the wicked are punished and the enemy eventually contrite.

And Bollywood has a very special place in the heart of the citizens of Bamako , the capital of Mali. Mali is a country in the west of Africa; thousands of kilometres away from India, on the other side of the Arabian sea.  I am quite sure only about 1 percent of Indians have heard about it and 1 percent of Indians is already 1000000000 people. It’s a country of diverse ethnic groups such as Fulas, Bobos, Bozos, Dogons, Malinkes, Soninkes, Bamanas, each with their history and language, customs and traditions. Here the national language is Bambara, which a Hindi speaking employee in the Indian embassy of Bamako told  me did not in anyway resemble Hindi,  like other Indian languages did. ” This language is absolutely meaningless,” he assured me.    And yet these people whose language does not resemble any Indian language throb to the rhythm of Bollywood beats.

 One of the cult films in Bamako is Don, released in 1978, starring Amitabh Bachhnan; the tall, lanky, actor of the seventies and eighties.  His onscreen personality was synonymous to that of the angry, young man who is the avenger of the innocent. Amitabh Bacchan was and is a household name in India, which is in the order of things. .  But in Bamako too he is almost as popular though he is better known as Don, like the name of the action-thriller film where he plays the role of the hero as well as the villain.  The other film and hero which rivals the fame of Don is Disco Dancer known here as Jimmy with Mithun Chakrabarty in the leading role of a pop star Jimmy, released in 1982. In 1978 I wasn’t even 10 years old and in 1982 when I was in my terrible teens , “ Jimmy, Jimmy aja, aja aja , aja or I am a disco dancer,”  blared from every loudspeaker in town. I remember going with my cousin to see this film in a decrepit film hall in Bengal and being mesmerised by Mithun in crotch hugging white, bell bottoms, gyrating amidst flashing blue, green and pink strobe lights .  The  café-au-lait complexioned, wavy- haired hero with the muscles of  Rambo, was my heart-throb for quite some time.

Mamadou is a young artisan who has a small shop in N’goloni, the colony of artisans. I had gone there with my companion when he and his friend invited us for tea. Here the tea ceremony is a long drawn out affair. The tea leaves are brewed thrice  in a small metal kettle on an equally small brasier . The first brew is very strong and the Malians say that it’s as strong as death, the second brew is a little milder and is as good as life, and the last brew is as sweet as love. When you sit through these three brews you get ample time to get acquainted with your tea-mates . We thus came to know Mamadou and his friend both stoic philosophers in spite of their young age.

The conversation turned to music and films. “Hindu films are the best,” he exclaimed.  “Indeed!” I replied trying to puzzle out how films of Parvathy or Shiva could interest a young Muslim Malian of 25 years.

“I love Jimmy. Great dance, Great music! “ he enthused.  

 “Jimmy?” I echoed, even more bemused. I didn’t know any Hindu divinity by that name.                    

“ Yes, Jimmy, Jimmy aja, aja, aja.”

It took me a few seconds to make the connection, and then I replied with, “I am a disco dancer.”

“Yes,”  he beamed.

“You have seen Jimmy?”

“Yes!”

“But Jimmy is an old film! I saw it in my teens!”

“Everybody knows Jimmy here,” replied Mamadou. 

During the rest of the conversation I gathered that Hindu is equivalent to Indian,  and that Jimmy in Mali  has the same aura as Elvis Presley.  Thus a generation which wasn’t even born when Disco Dancer was made, has been infected with the Jimmy fever. In my mind I saw thousands of pirated copies of Disco Dancer circulating in the lanes and by lanes of Bamako. His friend, a charming young man with dreadlocks,  who rapped for us a song of his own composition in Bambara,  was not of the same opinion. He was a fervent fan of Don,  

Since then I’ve heard a waiter reminisce  about how excited his friends were whenever a Hindu film came to town and how they would go three or four times to see the same film.  To prove his point he hummed the tune of a song sung by Kishore Kumar in one of Rajesh Khanna’s film;  Zindagi ka safar, Hai iye kaisa safar. It' a melodious, philosophical song which says that the journey of life is strange indeed, impossible to foresee and to understand.   This was also a very popular song during my teens.

 While house hunting  I came across a Franco-Malian lady proprietor, an impatient, snappish person who was transformed when she came to know I was from India, the land of Bollywood. She turned to her brother and said, “Remember how we would climb up on the terrace to see Indian films,” then turning towards me and saying, “I used to live in  Mopti and there would be open air projections of films near our house.  It was wonderful. There was this film about a friendship between  elephants and an orphan who grows up to own a circus.  She looked at me expectantly, “Hathi mere Sathi,” (Elephant my friend)  I volunteered hopefully. It’s a film of the 70s which was a big hit with children. I went to see it when I was about seven or eight years old with my mother.  “Exactly,”  she confirmed.

And besides them there have been taxi drivers, teachers working in the French school, doctors, house help, who have unanimously expressed their love for Bollywood’s ravishing heroines,  action packed stories and the mesmerizing songs and dances. However most of the films they have spoken to me about date from the seventies and eighties, and it’s Amitabh Bacchan, Rajesh Khanna, Zeenat Aman, Hema Malini, Mithun Chakraborty who are the evergreen heroes and heroines. Contemporary films are less appreciated. Some of the critiques are that they have too many songs and dances, are not traditional, do not have good action and are not as gay as the old films.

So Bollywood is the bridge between Bombay and Bamako, and the ambassadors from India are the actors and actresses of the seventies and eighties. The Hindi and Hindu gentleman at the Indian embassy who thinks that Bambara is gibberish would be surprised to learn that the strangeness of Hindi has not deterred Malians from appreciating films made in this alien tongue.

Arunima Choudhury

Helplessness

courtesy Indian Express

Looking out of the window of my friend's car,               

At the grey march of the mountains in the distance,                                    

The green vines planted in long  straight rows,                                  

Wind ruffling my hair, soft music on the radio,                                               

A hard -bound  book of Ondatje’s poetry in hand                           

The lines like the delicate gait of a black wood stork                    

Leaving claw prints of blood and loss, on creamy pages                                             

When the news reader  announces  on the French radio,                         

In the bland, matter-of -fact voice of a news reader:                                  

¨Twenty children in Bihar, dead due to food -poisoning                                              

And thirty others hospitalized. The free lunch served                                  

In the canteen suspected of containing insecticide.¨                                      

There is no poetry here, no rhythm or rhyme                                                

Just a blunt statement  of the ultimate betrayal ;                                         

Death meted out through the promise of life,                                               

To the innocent, needy and powerless.                                                    

I exclaim in blind anger to my friend,                                                                   

"This is the difference between your country and mine                              

In ours, people’s lives  are counted in numbers                                                            

Twenty, a hundred, what difference does it make ?                                   

In yours an accident on the highway is announced                                      

Over and over, as if it’s of primordial importance !"

                                      

Who am I angry with ? Him the son of  a rich country ?                            

Myself  'cause I am exiled in one 'n enjoy the privielege ?                        

I have never been an activist, here or back home                                        

Never taken part in rallies, nor raised my voice in anger.

Is that why I am angry ? At my self-imposed impotence ?

Arunima Choudhury

The Lakshman Rekha

I have recently caught myself thinking about the Lakshman Rekha. When Lakshman went to look for Ram, he drew a boundary line in front of the hut and expressly asked Sita not to cross it. Staying within the boundary line would keep her within the circle of protection created  by her husband and brother-in-law and stepping outside it would expose her to the dangers of the  wild. Unfortunately, Sita urged by the kindness of her heart does step out of the Lakshman Rekha and is abducted by the evil Ravana, which sets the ball rolling for the great war that follows. So if Sita had not disobeyed her brother-in-law, we would have had another, maybe less thrilling version of  the Ramayana, watered down to Ram  spending fourteen years wandering around the forest with Sita and Lakshman, and eventually returning to Ayodhya to claim his throne. The fabulous leap of Hanumana over the ocean from Rameshwaram to Sri Lanka, the bridge of stones built by an army of monkeys and bears, the magical plant that Hanuman finds to restore Lakshman to life, all would have been unwritten story.

Now just for fun what if we imagine that Sita out of sheer curiosity wanted to step out of the circle of protection created by Ram and Lakshman and explore the dangerous world which lay beyond home and hearth? What if that is why she sent Ram to bring her a golden deer in spite of him telling her again and again that golden deers were unnatural and that he feared the trickery of a black magician? ? What if she chose to disbelieve Lakshman, who along with her heard Ram crying out in distress from afar, but unlike her had complete faith in Ram's invincibility and was convinced that it was an illusion, while Sita prodded Lakshman to go after Ram accusing him of being a coward and coveting her in secret. Of course, she had not bargained for Ravana.  But she had stepped out of the limits imposed by the patriarchy and had to pay her due. And she keeps on paying even when Ram eventually rescues her from Ravana’s clutches fourteen long years later.

To quote Valmiki, the author of Ramayana: “The heart of King Rama, as he saw Sita, (the beloved of his heart) near him, was torn for fear of public scandal.” (Book VI : Yuddha Kanda - Book Of War.) So Rama, God incarnate who was so heart-broken at losing his wife that even the animal world moved by the intensity of his distress joined ranks with him against Ravana, addressed the beloved of his heart thus:

"Let it be known to you that this endeavor in the shape of war, which has been successfully carried through, due to the strength of my friends was not undertaken for your sake. … This was done by me in order to keep up my good conduct and to wipe off the evil-speaking from all sides as well as the insinuation on my own illustrious dynasty." (Book VI : Yuddha Kanda - Book Of War.)

and

"You, with  suspicion arisen on your character, standing in front of me, are extremely disagreeable to me, even as  light is to one suffering from  poor eye-sight." (Book VI : Yuddha Kanda - Book Of War.)

and

"O Sita! That is why, I am permitting you now to go wherever you like. All the ten directions are open to you, my dear lady! ....(Book VI : Yuddha Kanda - Book Of War.)

Poor Sita! What didn’t she do when she stepped out of the Lakshman Rekha? Now I wonder why Sita is presented to us as the model of an Indian  woman’s aspirations when the major part of her life was a series of misfortunes. Though she is not weak, because resisting Ravana for fourteen years must have taken enormous passive strength, she never rebels against the role allotted to her,  that of a perfect wife, except at the end when she commits suicide by asking mother  earth to swallow her up. After having proved her mettle for fourteen years, she has to prove her authenticity and chastity as a model wife again by stepping into fire and emerging unscathed. And even that does not earn her her husband’s protection and esteem for long . When she is the queen of Ayodhya and pregnant, a washerman abuses his wife who did not come home at night saying that  that he is not like Lord Ram who took back Sita even though she had stayed with another man for fourteen years. This incident reaches Ram’s ears who instead of defending Sita’s honour asks Lakshman to take Sita and abandon her in a hermitage. This is apparently to maintain the morality of the kingdom.  What morality can there be  in a kingdom where a woman’s position is so insignificant that an illiterate washerman’s unthinking words can be the cause of banishing one’s pregnant wife. 

So why right from our childhood are Ram and Sita presented to us as the model couple and Sita as the perfect woman? What can be more ignominious than Ram’s treatment of Sita? And why does Sita accept and keep on accepting being humiliated and abandoned with such meekness?   The answer could be, “But if she had not stepped out of the Lakshman Rekha, none of all this would have happened. Or, the Ramayana is after all just a story, or, it was another era, you cannot apply all your new-fangled ideas in that context.” And I would counter-question these answers by asking, “If the Ramayana is just a story why is it presented as an eternal truth, existing out of time and space? Why have we deified imperfect mythological figures as beings  we have to emulate? Why is such a big deception being perpetuated through the ages and by whom? 

Many modern women and men may say that Sita as a role model is outdated, outmoded. But that is not true because the Ramayana holds as much sway over our imagination as it did a hundred years ago, otherwise why would a Bombay High Court Judge in the year 2012, in the context of a divorce case, opinionate that married women should follow the example of Goddess Sita and give up everything to follow their husbands as  Sita did. That a panchayat leader says this would be  understandable, but a High Court Judge!

As women we have choices either to stay within the Lakshman Rekha or not. Many women in spite of being enclosed in suffocating boundaries do not step out for various reasons;  perhaps because they do not have a choice, or perhaps  because the known is infinitely more reassuring than the unknown. Others do and face retribution and   are scathed in the process. But there are   others who confront and vanquish the multi-headed Ravana who is an apt metaphor indeed of the dangers of the world. So this Lakshman Rekha instead of being a circle of protection is actually a circle of restriction. And stepping out of it is stepping into freedom, though that freedom may be fraught with dangers. Now is it worth it, is a question, which, of course, every woman  who wants to step out must ask herself and the answer is not always obvious. 

Arunima Choudhury

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