it has been raining... and raining... and raining...
how much rain is enough to fill dams, to get crops, to get power...
how much rain is enough to make plants smile, to tickle the sea, to soak the earth...
how much rain is enough to fill your heart, to cleanse my soul, to make us all dissolve, disappear...
and its raining... raining... raining...
Monday, August 11, 2008
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
koii din gar zindagani aur hai...
Every one who has met vijay tendulkar once or twice or many times will have unique experiences of how their particular lives changed, became slightly more meaningful because that special interaction. Am no exception.
I could talk about my interaction with him when I was a gullible kid reporting on Marathi theatre among other things. I could talk about my interaction with him when I interviewed him twice over for a radio documentary on homosexuality in India (coz I lost my tapes). Or when I met him at Tendulkar festival in pune or at prithvi. Or when I saw him at a reading session. Or I could talk about the last time we met at his house, when it rained.
At pune festival or somewhere there about he said the only regret-like feeling he had was about not talking enough to his wife. He had said,"I did not understand her when she was alive. I probably did not make enough effort." And his voice cracked a little, was it old age, was it memory, it was so something different from a man who wrote fearlessly about human emotion ridden with violence and in a way that was more real than a sleepless night.
after all the issues you write about, matters that you take up,realities that you expose, fights that you fight, principles that you stand for, you said something so basic, so real, so mind fucking.
His plays speak for themselves. They are scary not because they are violent, they are not just violent. They are violent and real and inevitable. You don't want to believe them.
When I saw alyque padamsee's adaptation of vultures, one wonders why did he have to know this about human selfishness.
When Sakharam binder speaks you squirm, not because of its violence,but because u pretended all along that there was no sakharam in you,amidst you and Tendulkar caught you. May be that's why the play met with violent protests.
In ghashiram kotwal, he took on brahminical system. In kanyadaan he spoke about a dalit, non dalit relationship.In shantata court chalu ahe, he I think exposed the worst of human traits. Of cornering and pecking a weak one, for no apparent reason. Like William golding's lord of flies.
When he spoke to me about his short story about a lesbian girl, he was blunt about a hypocritical society that could drive people to death.He somehow never let the society forget that it was not doing its job– as a journalist, writer, playwright, speaker, friend.
I was never sure if he wanted to speak to me. I knew what he thought about today's journalism, more or less. Of course there was no scope of disagreeing. But one day I called, as usual, to get a quote about some issue or the other. I tried to introduce myself, you know you might remember me, and that dude said, why do you think am talking to you and willing to give a quote on the phone? It's rather narcissistic for me to recount this but honestly I still feel very happy about that reassurance. Coz it gave me the courage to call him just like that. Anyway.
There was no reason why I went to meet him on that rainy rainy afternoon. He had shifted from his parle house to andheri. His room was still like his own. With books, books, computer, mobile phone,rocking kinda chair, with a window that brought the rains in. His dog was missing. I reached dripping, craving chai. Bahadur, his man Friday got us chai, made him comfortable and then…And then we spoke about human beings, for a long long time. He said man was heading to his own annihilation rapidly. He said man is unable to see the disparity and dissatisfaction he has created for a majorityof its people. I tried to talk about the goodness and sensitivity that still exists. He said it is too little. So then, I asked. He said, so then what. Good people will do what they have to. You can hope, write,think, do what you can.
Then I asked him to translate his lines, jeevan mhanje barach kahi asakahch nahi, ani kahich nahi asa barach kahi. He said I should do it.He didn't want to. It very badly translates as life is nothing like alot, instead it is a lot of nothing…
He spoke about sanjay dutt's conviction, sentencing in the 1993 case.He said the irony of judiciary was that it was punishing a criminal after he had reformed. Of course we spoke about justice and after a point a ran out of questions and accepted that answers were not exactly the easy ones.
Chinmayi, a theatre actor, had dropped by to meet him. She seemed likea dear daughter. I left after some more chai, some more conversation,some more giggling.
I remember his interview with meghana pethe at pune. I also remember him saying he liked a new playwright manasvi as she speaks "directly."I remember this shot from "umbartha" when smita patil finally walksout of her home.
He was not a cynic. He just knew too much, may be?
He always knew what all of us were trying to say. And I feel he humoured everyone very affectionately.
He said he was writing something about his life – of course with a backdrop of political, social, personal times – loss of his familymembers, freedom struggle, emergency, riots, this and that. Will we get to see it?
I vaguely remember giving him some jasmine on that rainy day. Ivaguely remember choking on my way back. I vaguely remember rainsturning painfully beautiful that day.
until our souls stop resting in lethargic peace in our lives, will hissoul be able to find peace in death?
I could hold all this and more, close to my heart but I choose to let my vulnerability bleed in the open……
aatish-e-dozaKh me.n ye garmii kahaa.N
baarahaa dekhii.n hai.n unakii ra.njishe.n
deke Khat muu.Nh dekhataa hai
qaataa-e-amaar hai aksar nujuum
ho chukii.n "Ghalib" balaaye.n sab tamaam
I could talk about my interaction with him when I was a gullible kid reporting on Marathi theatre among other things. I could talk about my interaction with him when I interviewed him twice over for a radio documentary on homosexuality in India (coz I lost my tapes). Or when I met him at Tendulkar festival in pune or at prithvi. Or when I saw him at a reading session. Or I could talk about the last time we met at his house, when it rained.
At pune festival or somewhere there about he said the only regret-like feeling he had was about not talking enough to his wife. He had said,"I did not understand her when she was alive. I probably did not make enough effort." And his voice cracked a little, was it old age, was it memory, it was so something different from a man who wrote fearlessly about human emotion ridden with violence and in a way that was more real than a sleepless night.
after all the issues you write about, matters that you take up,realities that you expose, fights that you fight, principles that you stand for, you said something so basic, so real, so mind fucking.
His plays speak for themselves. They are scary not because they are violent, they are not just violent. They are violent and real and inevitable. You don't want to believe them.
When I saw alyque padamsee's adaptation of vultures, one wonders why did he have to know this about human selfishness.
When Sakharam binder speaks you squirm, not because of its violence,but because u pretended all along that there was no sakharam in you,amidst you and Tendulkar caught you. May be that's why the play met with violent protests.
In ghashiram kotwal, he took on brahminical system. In kanyadaan he spoke about a dalit, non dalit relationship.In shantata court chalu ahe, he I think exposed the worst of human traits. Of cornering and pecking a weak one, for no apparent reason. Like William golding's lord of flies.
When he spoke to me about his short story about a lesbian girl, he was blunt about a hypocritical society that could drive people to death.He somehow never let the society forget that it was not doing its job– as a journalist, writer, playwright, speaker, friend.
I was never sure if he wanted to speak to me. I knew what he thought about today's journalism, more or less. Of course there was no scope of disagreeing. But one day I called, as usual, to get a quote about some issue or the other. I tried to introduce myself, you know you might remember me, and that dude said, why do you think am talking to you and willing to give a quote on the phone? It's rather narcissistic for me to recount this but honestly I still feel very happy about that reassurance. Coz it gave me the courage to call him just like that. Anyway.
There was no reason why I went to meet him on that rainy rainy afternoon. He had shifted from his parle house to andheri. His room was still like his own. With books, books, computer, mobile phone,rocking kinda chair, with a window that brought the rains in. His dog was missing. I reached dripping, craving chai. Bahadur, his man Friday got us chai, made him comfortable and then…And then we spoke about human beings, for a long long time. He said man was heading to his own annihilation rapidly. He said man is unable to see the disparity and dissatisfaction he has created for a majorityof its people. I tried to talk about the goodness and sensitivity that still exists. He said it is too little. So then, I asked. He said, so then what. Good people will do what they have to. You can hope, write,think, do what you can.
Then I asked him to translate his lines, jeevan mhanje barach kahi asakahch nahi, ani kahich nahi asa barach kahi. He said I should do it.He didn't want to. It very badly translates as life is nothing like alot, instead it is a lot of nothing…
He spoke about sanjay dutt's conviction, sentencing in the 1993 case.He said the irony of judiciary was that it was punishing a criminal after he had reformed. Of course we spoke about justice and after a point a ran out of questions and accepted that answers were not exactly the easy ones.
Chinmayi, a theatre actor, had dropped by to meet him. She seemed likea dear daughter. I left after some more chai, some more conversation,some more giggling.
I remember his interview with meghana pethe at pune. I also remember him saying he liked a new playwright manasvi as she speaks "directly."I remember this shot from "umbartha" when smita patil finally walksout of her home.
He was not a cynic. He just knew too much, may be?
He always knew what all of us were trying to say. And I feel he humoured everyone very affectionately.
He said he was writing something about his life – of course with a backdrop of political, social, personal times – loss of his familymembers, freedom struggle, emergency, riots, this and that. Will we get to see it?
I vaguely remember giving him some jasmine on that rainy day. Ivaguely remember choking on my way back. I vaguely remember rainsturning painfully beautiful that day.
until our souls stop resting in lethargic peace in our lives, will hissoul be able to find peace in death?
I could hold all this and more, close to my heart but I choose to let my vulnerability bleed in the open……
koii din gar zi.ndaganii aur hai
Mirza Ghalib
koii din gar zi.ndaganii aur hai
koii din gar zi.ndaganii aur hai
apane jii me.n hamane Thaanii aur hai
aatish-e-dozaKh me.n ye garmii kahaa.N
soz-e-Gam hai nihaanii aur hai
[dozaKh=hell; soz=passion/heat; nihaanii=hidden ]
[dozaKh=hell; soz=passion/heat; nihaanii=hidden ]
baarahaa dekhii.n hai.n unakii ra.njishe.n
par kuchh ab ke sar_giraanii aur hai
[sar_giraanii=pride]
[sar_giraanii=pride]
deke Khat muu.Nh dekhataa hai
naamaabar kuchh to paiGaam-e-zabaanii aur hai
[naamaabar=messenger]
[naamaabar=messenger]
qaataa-e-amaar hai aksar nujuum
vo balaa-e-aasamaanii aur hai
[qaata-e-amaar=killers; nujuum=stars; balaa-e-aasamaanii=catastrophe]
[qaata-e-amaar=killers; nujuum=stars; balaa-e-aasamaanii=catastrophe]
ho chukii.n "Ghalib" balaaye.n sab tamaam
ek marg-e-naagahaanii aur hai
[balaaye.n=calamity; marg=death; naagahaanii=sudden/accidental]
[balaaye.n=calamity; marg=death; naagahaanii=sudden/accidental]
Monday, March 31, 2008
is daur-e-bejunuu.N kii kahaanii ko_ii likho
has taken months and weeks and days to come back to the blog... and i still have nothing pinching enough to say.
so here we are on a blank. with so much happening around, tibet, zimbabwe, raj thackeray, cricket, records, summer, farmers' loan waiver, economic boom, more car launches, more shahrukh's businesses, more media speculations, more of this and less of that...
how does one document absence, vaccum, gap?
absence of thought, feelings, ideas, creativity,
vaccum - which could have been filled with constructive stuff (or even destructive!),
gap between passive and active..
it's the presence of stuff - good or bad, happy or sad, mom or dad (hee hee! couldn't resist a bad poem) that we talk about, remember and even use for future?
but absence? like absence of poetry after world war II. like absence of enthu - boredom... like all the days when thoughts come and go as a matter of habit...like all those days themselves that come and go as a matter of routine...
dont they deserve a mention in our psyche, diaries, coffee conversations, drunken blabbers, blogs? even by doing nothing, it does some stirring some where... or is it just the beginning of april... pushing lilacs out of sleep as eliot said... lets not underestimate absences, vaccums, gaps...
here is to blanks...
so here we are on a blank. with so much happening around, tibet, zimbabwe, raj thackeray, cricket, records, summer, farmers' loan waiver, economic boom, more car launches, more shahrukh's businesses, more media speculations, more of this and less of that...
how does one document absence, vaccum, gap?
absence of thought, feelings, ideas, creativity,
vaccum - which could have been filled with constructive stuff (or even destructive!),
gap between passive and active..
it's the presence of stuff - good or bad, happy or sad, mom or dad (hee hee! couldn't resist a bad poem) that we talk about, remember and even use for future?
but absence? like absence of poetry after world war II. like absence of enthu - boredom... like all the days when thoughts come and go as a matter of habit...like all those days themselves that come and go as a matter of routine...
dont they deserve a mention in our psyche, diaries, coffee conversations, drunken blabbers, blogs? even by doing nothing, it does some stirring some where... or is it just the beginning of april... pushing lilacs out of sleep as eliot said... lets not underestimate absences, vaccums, gaps...
here is to blanks...
is daur-e-bejunuu.N kii kahaanii ko_ii likho
ahmed faraz
is daur-e-bejunuu.N kii kahaanii ko_ii likho
jismo.n ko barf Khuun ko paanii ko_ii likho
ko_ii kaho ki haath qalam kis tarah hue
kyuu.N ruk ga_ii qalam kii ravaanii ko_ii likho
kyo.n ahal-e-shauq sar-va-garebaa.N hai.n dosto
kyo.n Khuu.N-ba-dil hai ahad-e-javaanii ko_ii likho
kyo.n surmaa-dar-guluu hai har ek taayar-e-suKhan
kyo.n gul_sitaa.N qafas kaa hai saanii ko_ii likho
haa.N taazaa saaneho.n kaa kare kaun intazaar
haa.N dil kii vaaradaat puraanii ko_ii likho
jismo.n ko barf Khuun ko paanii ko_ii likho
ko_ii kaho ki haath qalam kis tarah hue
kyuu.N ruk ga_ii qalam kii ravaanii ko_ii likho
kyo.n ahal-e-shauq sar-va-garebaa.N hai.n dosto
kyo.n Khuu.N-ba-dil hai ahad-e-javaanii ko_ii likho
kyo.n surmaa-dar-guluu hai har ek taayar-e-suKhan
kyo.n gul_sitaa.N qafas kaa hai saanii ko_ii likho
haa.N taazaa saaneho.n kaa kare kaun intazaar
haa.N dil kii vaaradaat puraanii ko_ii likho
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