~ RASHMI BAJAJ
“He was not of an age but for All time”- the veracity of Ben Johnson’s celebrated comment on Shakespeare is amply validated by India’s long and fruitful
tryst with Shakespeare. From the colonial curricula and colonial Indian classrooms to the post- colonial literature, Art, Theatre and finally the world of Celluloid, Shakespeare has inspired and influenced the entire gamut.Initially introduced in Indian curricula for promoting English language, producing small Anglophile elite and representing the essential core values of the Western tradition, Shakespeare today stands indigenized, indianized and transculturated in Indian creative expression.
Be it the early major Indian authors of all languages, the Parsi theatre or India’s cinema, Shakespeare’s impact on Indian literature, culture and popular culture is strongly felt. Relationship between India and Shakespeare is the longest and the most widespread one outside of Europe. It is not mere coincidence that Shakespeare began being performed in India earlier than in Australia, Newzealand or African countries. 1852 onwards all 17 Indian languages have translated Shakespeare and all over the country, especially in the South, smaller towns and universities, some Shakespeare is performed every year in English, in translation or adaptation. As of today, Shakespeare studies have diversified to include so many areas- performance studies, film studies, cultural and intercultural studies, transnational and post-colonial studies.
In India, from the time Shakespeare was introduced, his work was translated, indigenized, adapted and performed. Indian psyche was never hostile or averse to Adaptations or Appropriations of Shakespeare's works. Infact, Adaptation is intuitive and acceptable for Indians as Indian tradition has precedents of numerous retellings ,translations and adaptation of Hindu epics, Arabic and Persian indigenous sources. Christina Mangala Frost has thus pointed out the distinctive reception of Shakespeare in India.
“The ready acceptance of Shakespeare during Raj cannot be adequately accounted for either in terms of cultural crawling or imperialist coercion.”1
Infact, there were people in India who were willing to indigenize Shakespeare. Indian context of Shakespeare's reception does not fall in line with Fanonion historical trajectory of reception where whole-hearted emulation of the colonized's culture in the earlier stages is later followed by intense rejection, finally leading to colonized culture's balanced engagement with colonizer's culture. Here we don't hove 'mimic men' but cross-cultural adaptators and transculturators, open to larger process of creating a world vision.
Localizing or indigenizing Shakespeare seems to have brought him closer, made him feel our own and it also facilitates better comprehension of the originals. At times, such an indigenized interaction with Shakespeare has been instrumental in even transforming real lived life. Here I am citing an amazing experience reported by Lindsay Pereira from her conversation with Dr. Poonam Trivedi and Dennis Bartholomesusz , the authors of “India's Shakespeare: Translation, Interpretation and Performance”. The author reports performance of Kannada adaptation of Macbeth entitled "Maranayaka Drishtranta" by inmates of the Mysore jail in rehabilitation workshop conducted by actor- director Kattimani The prison-actor who played Macbeth narrated his experience how the acting made him see his life very differently and filled him with remorse and repentance. The prisoner was transformed, left on parole for good behaviour and is now a respected member of his village. This is an instance of consequential social and moral transformation and rehabilitation. It also illustrates the close relationship between life and literature and also the purgatory, purifying and elevating impact of Shakespeare's plays.
Besides being a strong influence on literature and theatre,Shakespeare also holds the distinction to be the darling of Indian cinemakers and Bollywood from 1920 till date.
The earliest Indian cinematic engagement with Shakespeare goes back to the silent Era to 'Dilfarosh' (1927) movie based on popular stage adaptation of “The Merchant of Venice”, 'Khoon-e-Nahak' (1928), based on “Hamlet”, 'Mitha Zahar' (1930) based on “Cymbeline”. In the talkies of 30s &40s, translation and transmission of Shakespeare's rhetoric in Urdu was adopted for the screen in 'Hathili Dulhan' (1932- The Taming of the Shrew), 'Khudabad' (1935-Pericles), 'Khoon-Ka-Khoon' (1935-Hamlet), 'Said-E-Havas' (1936- Richard III), 'Zan Mureed' (1936- Antony & Cleopatra), 'Pak Daman' (1970_ Measure for Measure) and 'Zaalim Saudagar' (1941- The Merchant of Venice).
In the post- independence India cinema has emerged as the most powerful Art form of creative expression. In fact, the credit for reviving Shakespeare and making him widely admired goes much more to Indian cinema than Shakespearean critics or scholars .Adapting shakespear's works or Indianzing them is the latest fad and in-thing in today's Indian celluloid world .Since very long Bollywood has been Shakespearesque in myriad ways- Music, dance, diologues, dilemmas, comedy, melodrama, Love-triangles and obstacles ,disguised identities, villains and so on. Some of the famous Indian cinematic engagements with Shakespeare are adaptation of “The Comedy of Errors” in "Do Duni Chaar" (1968) and 'Angoor' (1982). Less explicitly influenced movies based on “Romeo & Juliet “are 'Ishqzaade', 'Isaaq', 'Goliyon ki Ras Leela Ramlila', 'Qayamat se Qayamat Tak' whereas “Twelfth Night “seems to inspire antics in 'Dil Bole Hadippa'.
However, Shakespeare's influence on Bollywood movies has majorly continued to be unacknowledged till recently when Vishal Bhardwaj openly acknowledged Shakespeare as the inspiration and source text for his internationally celebrated cine-trilogy of 'Maqbool' (2003) , 'Omkara' (2006) and 'Haider' (2014) based on “Macbeth “,”Othello” and “Hamlet” respectively. Now in the cine-world, it is no more the 'secret plagiarism' of earlier times, but an open acceptance and admiration of Shakespeare's incorporation in post-colonial Indian world. William Shakespeare is India's Heritage too!
Vishal Bhardwaj's adaptations of Shakespeare have received wide critical attention and have been screened at several international film festivals. Through creatively and successfully indianizing and Indigenizing Shakespeare's originals, the movies take the viewers beyond the purely Indian context and emerge as most ambitious post-colonial adaptations of Shakespeare into film internationally made in recent years. These films have been discussed in Daniel Rosenthal's “100 Shakespeare Films “published by British FIlm Institute and serious Shakespeare scholars and critics such as Douglas lanier, Anthony R. Gunerate, Carolyn Jess-Cooke, Nandi Bhatia, Poonam Trivedi have noted studied and commented on them. Keeping in view the appreciable success of Shakespeare_ influenced movies, one can remark that not withstanding the hazards of violation of original text's impact and intensity, dilution of original emotions and flavour of Shakespeare, the celluloid world in India still seems to be a promising platform for further exploration and presentation of the transculturated Shakespeare.
All the world is Shakespeare's stage and more so India.The Bard _of _Avon has really stayed on even more than seven decades after the Brits(Britishers)left.Indian literature,Theatre and Cinema have claimed Shakespeare as their own.The increased interest in cinematic engagement with Shakespeare augurs well for the future Shakespeare _India involvement and it ensures for the Bard much more space in the Indian Cultural and Literary Discourse. Unlike many other post-colonial writings, 'writing back' to Shakespeare, in powerfully subversive counter_ narratives or rejecting Master's narratives, India's response to Shakespeare is one of delightful intercultural exchange. Indianized, Indigenized, Localized, Transculturated Shakespeare is the New Love of India!
REFERENCES
1. Quoted by Poonam Trivedi, 'Introuction”,”India's Shakespeare: Translation Interpretation and Performance” eds. Poonam Trivedi and Dennis Bartholomeusez Newark: University Of Delaware, 2015)
2. Pereira Lindsay, "William Shakespeare is Our Heritage too"
http:/www.rediff.com/news/2006/sep/26/inter.htm
Friday, 28 June 2019
INDIGENIZED SHAKESPEARE:INDIA'S POST_COLONIAL LOVE
Tuesday, 25 June 2019
RASHMI BAJAJ FEMINIST POEMS
1.A WOMAN’S METAMORPHOSIS
No more
Helpless hopeless
Dreaming of
The ever_elusive
Golden dawn
With eyes
Drenched in
Gloom and remorse
She has
Worked out
Her own
Metamorphosis
Numerous suns
Now explode
Inside her
Effulgating
Illuminating
The entire cosmos!
2.VAGINA AND BREASTS
Ever Since
I was conceived
I was
Not a foetus
But a Female Foetus
Came out
From the womb
A Female Infant
A Girl child
I grew up
Straight into
A WOMAN
Never ever
Made to feel
A HUMAN
All days
All nites
Forced to
Live my BODY
Body has become
My only identity
I often wonder
When the bell tolls
And Final Darkness falls
when the bodys drops
And my soul
In hell/heaven rests
How will the soul
look like__
Ethereal formless
Or it too
Would have grown
VAGINA AND BREASTS?
3. THE NEW INDIAN WOMAN
Daring defiant
She marches past
Not only Manu
The ancient scripter
But Modern messiah
Marx too
All her crutches
Thrown aside
She bursts into
Ecstatic
Dance of Life
Disowned by All
The Rights n Lefts
Wooed by Unknown
Vistas umpteen
Sanguine smiling
Moves she on
The Unstoppable
New Indian woman…
_ RASHMI BAJAJ
Sunday, 21 April 2019
SABRIMALA TEMPLE N MOSQUE ENTRY FOR WOMEN:'NAI AZAAN,NAI AARTI' A POEM BY RASHMI BAJAJ
जान लो-
एक दिन
खोलने ही होँगे
सब दरवाज़े,
सारे द्वार,
मस्जिदों,मन्दिरों के!
देख लो-
बन चले हैं
परचम,झंडे
ये घूंघट,ये बुर्के!
दरकने लगी हैं मीनारें!!
थरकने लगी है दीवारें!!
लिए नई अज़ानें
नई आरतियां
वक्त के
गर्भ से
जन्म लेने को
छटपटा रहा है
हमारा नया सूरज...
- रश्मि 'कबीरन'
Sunday, 8 April 2018
RASHMI BAJAJ ON ANTI_HUMAN,ANTI_DEMOCRATIC REALITY OF COMMUNISM _ CHINA
COMMUNIST STATE'S DIKTAT TO CONTROL EVEN HUMAN GENES AND DNA!😢_ONLY XI_PING'S FAITHFULS WILL BE ALLOWED TO DONATE SPERMS!AMBEDKAR'S APPREHENSIONS TURNING OUT TO BE TRUE...
Having always believed in "liberty,equality and fraternity",I have often felt fascinated by the communist ideology in one way or the other.Their support to pro _gender_movement and pro_opressed_movement definitely deserves kudos.It ,therefore ,really pains my head and heart when I look at the current China State usurping and devouring all types of freedom and space to her citizens.Tianamen Square,oppression of Muslims,victimization of any democratic spirit with clampdown on artists ,bans on social media and writers_all this was already in place.And now the more fiercer and horrifying scenario _With approval of almost totalitarian dictatorship with the Chinese premier sanctioned a lifelong leadership of the country.That is ,of course,a Chinese prerogative but the recent tidings from China are really appaling and alarming._Now they are planning to manufacture and multiply 'COMMUNIST GENES' by accepting the sperms of the 'faithful 'and 'nationslist'only!
The ideology professing 'Azaadi' _ _'Freedom' and equality as the most cherished goal in the most forceful way should thus fall flat and rather be such a big instrument of crushing of free human spirit !Friends,How huge and disastrous can be the hiatus between Dream and Reality,Theory and Practical shape!IT REALLY HURTS ,PAINS AND DISILLUSIONS.
Keeping in view such dismal ground realities where excesses are now threatening the very human 'free space'which they set out to create,Marx_Lenin_Mao theorists and advocates of ruthless "harmonious socialist society"(that's what China calls herself today) and practitioners today really need to introspect, reinvent and reorient themselves to recreate themselves as a more democratic and humanitarian entity.
How insightful and farsighted was Respected Baba Saheb Ambedkar as he could foresee the dangers:
"The condemnation of the Constitution largely comes from two quarters, the Communist Party and the Socialist Party. Why do they condemn the Constitution? Is it because it is really a bad Constitution? I venture to say no’. The Communist Party want a Constitution based upon the principle of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat. They condemn the Constitution because it is based upon parliamentary democracy"– Dr.B. R. Ambedkar
Comrade friends,in all good faith and with all my love ,a well_meaning , sincere request_pl look in ,reinvent and recreate.Its need of the hour_much human benefit can accrue from 'reborn'communism !
(जाएं तो जाएं कहां?"आज़ादी","समानता" के पैरोकार भी जब न दे पाएं आज़ादी,बराबरी,तो कहां जाया जाए।हर दिन भयानक ,मानवता-विरोधी होता कम्युनिस्ट चीन का ये रूप सच ही एक बड़े ,महान स्वप्न का दुःस्वप्न में तब्दील होना है:
लगता है
देखा जाए
कोई ख़्वाब
अब नया..
हो रास्ता नया
हो रहनुमा नया...
है तड़प रही
ज़ख़्मी,प्यासी
लहूलुहाँ रूह
हो जाम अब नया..
हो मयकदा नया..
'कबीरन')
Sunday, 1 April 2018
शाहबानो की नवासी,तसलीमा की बेटी
*शाहबानो की नवासी,तसलीमा की बेटी*
शाह -बानो की नवासी
तस्लीमा नसरीन की बेटी
मैं नफीसा बी-
निकाह,तलाक,हलाला
शरीयत,हदीथ,कुरान-
सदियों से
मकबरे के नीचे
दफ़्न है मेरी
ज़िंदा लाश!
लौट आती हैं
मेरी चीखें
कफ़न की
पथरीली दीवारों से
सर टकरा कर,
मेरी परवाज़ें
मस्जिद के
नुकीले बन्द
दरवाज़ों से
पर कटवा कर!
नहीं बोलता
कोई रूमी
बुल्लेशाह,चिश्ती
मेरे खातर,
नहीं जलता
किसी मज़ार पर
मेरी ख़ुशनसीबी का
कोई दिया,
नही चढ़ती
मेरे नाम की
कोई झीनी-भीनी
चदरिया!
ख़ौफ़ज़दा कायनात...
ख़ामोश फ़िज़ा...
ज़िन्दगी जैसे
इक मर्सिया...
कैसा खेला
मेरा अल्लाह
तू है रचा!
काफ़िर तक यां
साथ न देता
औरत का!
- रश्मि बजाज
Friday, 23 March 2018
RASHMI BAJAJ HINDI POEM 'YO BHAGAT SIGH KAUN JAAT THA JI'
यो भगतसिंह कौन जात था जी?
शहीदे-आज़म!
शहीदी दिवस पर
हो रहे हैं
भारी-भरकम
आयोजन,
चल रहे हैं
धुआंधार भाषण,
पहनाये जा रहे हैं
तुम्हारी प्रतिमाओं को
लाल,नीले
हरे,केसरिया
वस्त्र-आभूषण,
'बम-वालों' से
'बम-बम लहरी' वालों तक
कर रहे हैं सब
तुम्हारा महिमा-मंडन
पूजन-वंदन!
अनजानी आज़ादी के
तराने गाने वाले,
भारत के हों सौ टुकड़े
चिल्लाने वाले,
भारत माता की जय
नारे लगाने वाले,
पत्थर,राइफलें
उठाने वाले,
त्रिशूल,फरसे
चलाने वाले,
समितियां,एन-जी-ओ
बनाने वाले,
सारे जियाले
क्रांति-दूत,भ्रांति-पूत
कह रहे हैं
खुद को
तुम्हारा होनहार वंशज!
सोचती हूँ
मेरे भगतसिंह,
गर आज तुम्हें
बहरों को
सुनाने के लिए
फैंकना होता बम
तो कहाँ-कहाँ
और कितने बम
फैंकते तुम-
अमानवीय,षड़यंत्री-अड्डों
असेम्बलियों में
या फिर
अंधे,गूंगे, बहरे बने
स्वार्थ-निद्रा लीन
शहरों,गाँवों
जनपदों में भी
जो जब भी
आंख खोलते हैं
तो बोलते हैं
सिर्फ कुछ
चुनिंदा शब्द-
मैं, मेरा धर्म
मेरी जाति, मेरा वर्ग
लगी है जहां
अंधी दौड़,होड़
कहलाने की
पिछड़ा,अल्पसंख्यक!
आहत-मना मैंने
आज निश्चय कर
विस्तार से
सभाओं में ,मंचों से
किये हैं सांझे-
तुम्हारा दर्शन
तुम्हारा स्वप्न
तुम्हारी दृष्टि!
और अभी-अभी
एक नए उगते
युवा क्रांतिकारी
छात्र-नेता ने
पूछा है मुझसे
"न्यों तो बतलाओ
यो भगतसिंह
कौण जात था जी?"
(मेरे पास कोई उत्तर नहीं है-
आपके पास हो तो अवश्य बतलाइयेगा मित्रो)