Books and Authors

When does all epic emerge and how? In the midst of, or at the end of a great age? Of course, through the creative response to it of a great poet. Is it enough if he has an imaginative response to it or should he have a more active involvement in the action and achievement of that age? Should it always be in verse or some kind of rhyme, or can it be in prose as well?

All these and like questions arise in our minds when we try to ask ourselves if the era of struggle for freedom had produced epics in the various Indian languages. (Whether the Five-Year Plans and the 20-Point Programme could also be fit theme for a modern epic, suitably commissioned by competent authority, is a different question.) Are we now long past the age of an epic – its conception and its composition? Or, is the modern epic more likely to be in prose rather than in verse? Can we, in this context, call the voluminous Malayalam novel, Avakasigalan epic in prose? Or the prestigious award-winning, Assamese novel, Mrityunjaya(by B. K. Bhattacharya)? Or the much older Veyi padagalu in Telugu by Viswanatha Satyanarayana for that matter?

But, then, is it not time that we went to the beginning to answer the question, “What exactly is an epic?” How far do the Indian and European traditions agree in the definition or atleast the description of an epic? For the general reader, the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English explains the “epic” as “a long poem telling the story of the deeds of gods and great men, or the early history of a nation.” According to the great Samskrit Alamkarika, Dandin (whose ideas are succinctly and lucidly summed up by Dr. S. Ramakrishnan in The Epic Muse.)“An epic is a long poem with a unified plot made out of a significant story, featuring a protagonist of lofty personal traits whose deeds are of decisive importance to the community, and distinguished by spaciousness, seriousness and emotional appeal.

On the issue of unity of plot, there seems to be a surprising degree of agreement between Dandin and Aristotle, who has this to say on the epic plot (in his Poetics):

“It is necessary to construct the plot in it, as in a tragedy in a dramatic fashion, and concerning a single action that is whole and complete (having a beginning, middle and end) so that, like a single, integrated organism, it achieves the pleasure natural to it.”

There must have been many poets and scholar-critics, through the ages, who had contributed to the evolution, or at least the understanding, of the epic technique. Horace is known, in this connection, for the significant phrase in medias res (in the midst of things) used in his work Ars poetica (Art of Poetry). It is explained by scholars who feel that to begin in medias res is to begin in the middle of the history of a man’s life but at the beginning of an action in that life. One is not sure if this had actually been the source of inspiration for the film director of today in adopting the flashtechnique which has become so popular.

A useful dictum this in certain situations. But it is not found to be one of universal application. The two Indian epics, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata, for instance, do not seem to follow this, though it may undoubtedly add to their psychological impact and artistic effect. The Iliad and The Odessey, perhaps, do with advantage and their example is emulated by later European poets, like Vergil and Milton. V. V. S. Iyer, among other Indian students of the classics, is at great pains to argue the point that the chronological, rather than the logical (at least to the European and the modern mind) order, followed in narrating the story of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata is by no means inappropriate to their milieu and their tradition and is far from being inferior to the Homeric technique in artistic effect.

Whether a particular artistic technique or literary device is superior or inferior to another is, however, not so important as the totality of the impact of the epic. A comparative study of two or more epics, from different cultural traditions, with varying social milieus and historical grounds, could yield new insights. The Ramayana had, in the past, been compared to the Iliad by research scholars in pursuit of doctoral theses. As for the Mahabharata, which is a vast, rambling and unwieldy complex of plots and subplots, of stories within stories, and anecdotes galore, it has, in whole or in part, been compared to many epics the world over, more aptly or less, as the case may be, by a vast variety of critics from time to time.

In his recent study of Milton (under the apt title Things Unattempted, an expressive phrase happily borrowed from the line in Paradise Lost –  “Things unattempted yet in Prose or Rhyme”), Prof. M. V. Rama Sarma, the distinguished Milton scholar (presently Vice-Chancellor, S. V. University, Tirupati), himself strives to do things unattempted. He, of course, makes an in­depth study of the three great poetical works of Milton – Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes – which in itself may be nothing new, on the face of it. What is new is the Indian sensibility that he brings to bear upon his study, which he manages to do, without making any concessions to popular taste or patriotic sentiment, and maintaining the highest standards of scholarly objectivity and critical analysis, all the time.

While the whole book is bound to prove useful to any serious student of Milton, the concluding chapter is of special interest to the critical student of comparative literature, in India and abroad. It strikes a parallel between Paradise Lost and the Mahabharata, viewing them both, in the final analysis, as epics of righteousness and justice. The parallel is along various lines ­relating to the basic plot, characterisation, the philosophy of life that can be derived from them and the Rasa that flows from them.

In both, it is man who is the hero, not God – Adam in one and Arjuna and Yudhishtira in the other–both of whom are seen to be contemplative characters. Even the conception of God as the Supreme spirit is almost. identical. Krishna to Arjuna, for example–

“I am the essence of waters
The shining of the Sun and the Moon:
OM in all the Vedas,
The world that is God.
It is I who resound in the ether
And am potent in man.

And Raphael to Adam­–

O Adam, one almighty is, from whom
All things proceed, and up to him return,
If not depraved from good, created all
Such to perfection, and first matter all,
Imbued with various forms, various degrees
Of substance, and in things that live, of life.

The divine purpose of testing the virtuous and the devout, of allowing the machinations of the vicious to succeed for the time being holds good in both the epics. In the words of Prof. Sarma:

“Adam of the concluding section of Paradise Lost attains philosophic calm and spiritual enlightenment. Yudhishtira and Adam belong to the category of non-violent heroes and attain exalted eminence through their perception and understanding of God’s ways.”

If Satan is a central character of Paradise Lost, with a terrible fascination of his own, eloquent and imposing, Duryodhana in the Mahabharata, is full of dignity, not without the virtues of loyalty and courage. In neither of the epics, the other villains are of the crude, cardboard variety. It may be recalled that the Ramayana characters are seen to be idealised images of unalloyed virtue or symbols of evil. Not so the Mahabharata characters who present a realistic mixture of virtue and weakness, of villainy and valour, etc. So is the case with those from Paradise Lost.

Didactic in tone, both the epics are shown to have a philosophic ground, highlighting man’s exaltation from a purely mundane existence to      spiritual enlightenment. Prof. Sarma sees the dominating Rasa in both to be Santa, with the emphasis on patience, forgiveness and fortitude and peace, leading to “calm of spirit all passion spent.”

Some years earlier, a comparative study of Paradise Lost and the Ramayana (with special reference to the work of Kamban was essayed by Dr. S. Ramakrishnan, Marxist intellectual and man of letters, who took care not to allow his ideological leanings to interfere too much with his aesthetic sensibility. The result was a keenly perceptive apprehension of the Epic muse, refreshingly different from academic exercises in comparative literature, of the common or garden variety. Wide-ranging study and mature understanding of the first principles of classical literatures, European and Dravidian, had yielded him quite a few new insights.

The two epics are viewed in the light of their social milieus and literary traditions, critical as well as creative. The three mythological settings of Earth, Olympus and the Nether world, with chaos added on to them, in a cosmography of Miltonic ethics, are shown to have distant parallels in Kosala, Kishkindha, Chitrakoota (forest hermitages) and Lanka – though not exactly in that order.

Among the characters, Raphael educating Adam is compared to Viswamitra educating Rama and Lakshmana. The malevolent dynamism of Satan is compared to the sinister majesty of Ravana –­ both of whom are powerful beings destroyed by a fatal weakness.

As a student of the Tamil classics, Dr. Ramakrishnan cannot help pointing out the superiority of Kamban in many places. Kamban, according to him, uses the standard of amoral heroism not only to show Ravana’s falling off from it, as Milton uses it to expose Belial and spotlight Satan’s degeneration, but also to demonstrate its spiritual strength which enables Kumbhakarna, Indrajit and even Ravana in the last lap of the war to emerge as tragic characters.

Problems of rising action, gathering crisis and climax and denoument of the two epics are carefully analysed with points of similarity and difference. Kamban’s Kosala is a “communist” Utopia (sic) challenging comparison with Milton’s Paradise.

One might add here, that just as there are “Satanists” who swear by Satan as the main source of the literary power and aesthetic appeal of Paradise Lost, there are ardent admirers of Ravana and Duryodhana, who cannot be dismissed as devil’s advocates; which, incidentally, is a tribute, however unexpected, to Valmiki and Vyasa.

Tribute to Valmiki is paid in more direct and devotional ways by scholars and laymen alike. Prof. K. R. Srinivasa Iyengar does so by his rendering in English verse of the Sundara Kanda as the “Epic Beautiful,” which is a happy translation (recently brought out by Sahitya Akademi). Beauty of every possible description, spiritual no less than temporal, of sound as well as of sense, is felt by those who have eyes to see, ears to hear and mind to perceive.

In the translation of this epic in miniature; celebrating the exploits of Hanuman, the Professor, for whom it has been a labour of love and devotion, hopes, in the words of Sri Aurobindo, that “Their tread one day shall change the suffering earth, and justify the light on nature’s face.”

Without caring too much about the orthodox requirements of metre and rhyme, the author achieves a free and natural flow of verse as in:

The speed of Hanuman’s fight drew the clouds
as well, with their lightning streaks;
And the sky with its massing clouds was like
the sea with its heaving waves.
Hanuman’s experiments in metamorphosis, during and after the leap across the sea, so brilliantly evoked in a spiritual simile by Valmiki are skillfully captured in the translation:

Like the awakened soul casting away
its burden of attachments,
Hanuman shed his huge bulk and returned
to his ordinary form.

Finally, in the Aditya Hridayam (The Heart of the Sun) cherished for its incantatory power and benedictory character, the Sun God is invoked with a beautiful awe-inspiring ecstasy, as in­–

To the swift-winged sojourner of the sky,
to the breaker and maker
to the awakener of the lotus
our repeated obeisance

Drastic avenger of the ungrateful,
O Monarch of Resplendence!
and the home of all iridiscences!
our unfailing obeisance!

In the socio-cultural tradition of the Tamils, the realm of the spirit has always had a high place, distinctly higher than the mundane world of kings and ministers. Appar, also known as Tirunavukkarasar, was one of the big four among the Saivite saints. His muse and message are presented with devotion and diligence by Mr. G. Vanmikanathan in his booklet, which forms one of the latest releases in the Sahitya Akademi’s “Makers of India Literature Series.” “Ich Dien”(“I serve”) is the motto of the saint-singer, ably illustrated in chapter and verse.

Almost twenty years after his death, Nehru the freedom fighter, and Nehru the Prime Minister, are apt to be forgotten by a generation not old enough to have watched him in action. But Nehru the writer and the historian, Nehru the humanist and the scientist (in the broad sense of architect of free India’s science policy) are likely to have a relevance for thinking Indians for a long time to come.

If Nehru gave us delightful glimpses of world history, Mr. A. Ranganathan gives us perceptive glimpses of Nehru, in his neat collection of six radio talks recently brought out by the Christian Literature Society, Madras. There was something of epic grandeur in Nehru’s struggle for freedom not only of the people of India, but those of the world outside; there is something lyrical in his attempt to recapture the elusive beauty and infinite variety of life in India, of the present and the past. An earnest student of Nehru’s work in its many facets, Mr. Ranganathan does ample justice to this lyrical exercise.