The More Things Change

What happens when you revisit a book after many years? The reunion is fraught with possibilities — the book may now sound dreadfully archaic or appears to be laden with new meanings. It is not going to be the same book you once read; nor are you, the same reader. On re-reading Balzac’s Old Goriot, Jean-Claude Carriere, the French writer and screenwriter, in his conversations with Umberto Eco (later published as This Is Not The End of The Book), said, “I hadn’t read the novel in the last 30 years, so I sat down one evening to flick through it. I couldn’t put it down till I finished it… [There] are not only public rediscoveries, but also precious personal rediscoveries made, one evening when one pick up a forgotten book.”

In 1974, when the late M Govindan, a school dropout who later grew into a renowned Malayalam poet, essayist, editor, talent-scout and a formidable public intellectual, published Poetry & Renaissance: Kumaran Asan Birth Centenary Volume, the book was almost immediately recognised for its daring, scope and 360 degree vision. The editorial genius of Govindan used the peg of Malayalam poet Kumaran Asan’s birth centenary to draw together a wide variety of writers, their writings and writings about them. The grand schema of the book included presenting Asan, his views and the poems to the world. Asan’s strong rebuttal (Alchemy of Religious Conversion) of a popular view among Ezhavas, his caste people, that the best way to free them from the oppressive caste system was to convert to Buddhism, is imbued with new meanings in 2015.

The book was also a two-way mirror. Govindan opened the doors of poetry to readers who might have read Asan. Thus, we have Ivor Brown writing about Shakespeare; Istvan Soter about Sandor Petofi and Hungarian literature. Among the American poets, there is an unlikely Ogden Nash, bookmarking the editor’s eclecticism.

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Govindan had also tried to situate Asan in the context of the sub-continental poetry. Tagore, Iqbal, Keshavasuta, Mahjoor and other greats are anthologised and their works discussed in detail. In this section, Melur Damodaran’s essay on many Ramayanas, Archetypal Image of Rama, prophetically ends with, “The long journey of Rama, through space and time of India, has not ended.”

Govindan was a relentless moderniser. This volume is probably a continuation of the All India Art Conference, Aluva, where Govindan was one of the prime movers. Conducted in 1965, the conference introduced modern art, films and pan-Indian literature to many Malayalees. Young Adoor Gopalakrishnan, many years away from his first film, was in charge of films; a cartoonist named Aravindan curated paintings. People thronged in Kochi to listen to Sachchidananda Vatsyayan “Agyeya” recite poetry in Hindi.

Back in the 1970s, the world was different, or at least, its map was. A large chunk of Europe was one country. In Kerala, the communist parties enjoyed almost hegemonic hold over progressive thought. That was when Govindan tried to chart alternate paths through modernism. As an MN Roy-ist, Govindan was always viewed suspiciously by the communists. Now that the USSR is balkanised, the Berlin Wall fallen, and ideological irritants shorn off, there are practically no challenges to Govindan’s acceptance.

Renaissance in the Kerala context was more of a social phenomenon, unlike the cultural movement in the West. It denoted the rise of the subaltern, a rebellion against upper caste oppression, and was led by leaders like Sri Narayana Guru, Ayyankali, Pandit Karuppan, etc.

With the downturn of history, these icons are now being appropriated by the Hindu majoritarian ideologues. Kerala is also regressing in more than one way: fundamentalism of all hues is on the rise, the argumentative Malayalee is now more intolerant and politics is almost entirely caste-driven. Blaze Media’s timing could not have been better for reprinting this four-decade old volume. The Letterpress technology employed for printing the first edition is now extinct; what are not is Govindan’s ideals behind the book.

Madhavan is an acclaimed Malayalam writer.