Critical Discourse in Gujarati/Introduction essay
Sitanshu Yashaschandra.
A study of critical discourse in Gujarati (or any other) language does not deal with a pre-defined, stabilized and given object of observation. It deals with dynamic, sometimes unstable, cultural and linguistic situations in and around us. These situations or texts have their own and many ways of generating meaning. These texts interact internally among themselves and with their external contexts. Hence the task of its historiographer is to construct carefully a mobile post of observation, matching the mobility of those situations and historical processes.
The present anthology is an effort towards meeting such a task: to understand the dynamics of critical discursive situations in Gujarati literature and to carefully construct a mobile post of observation that matches those dynamics. To avoid any fixed point of view, immobile either at our present moment or at any single moment of the past, and yet to see clearly the doubly moving picture, is not an easy task. That is the objective and the task before us in this anthology and of historiography that underpins it: Historiography of Gujarati literature and of its Critical Discourse.
The phrase ‘history of literature in Gujarati language’ presents its own challenges. ‘Language’, ‘Gujarati’, ‘literature’ and ‘history’, each of these four terms has its own large semiotic orbit, sometimes irregular, that we need to trace carefully. ‘Language’ itself is a polysemic term. From ‘body language’ that business managers learn to read, to ‘the Voice of Soul’ that Gandhi’s cultivated ear was able to hear, significance of this word varies widely. The term ‘language of literature’ is even more open to interpretations, in our context: Is Sanskrit the only language of literature in India? Have the Prakrit and Apabhramsha languages also to be included, by Indian literary culture, in the charmed circle of Pan-Indian languages of literature? What happens when ‘regional’ languages, like Gujarati and Kannada begin to intrude into that category -- and why? What do the early ‘literary’ texts of the ‘vernaculars’ show us, in this regard? From the great Jain savant Hemachandra (12th century), pioneering Gujarati poet Bhalan (15th) and the iconoclast Akho (17th, ) to Narmad, Navalram (19th) and Gandhi (20th), numerous authors and critics have kept alive the dispute on the status of the ‘vernaculars’ as a vehicle of literature. No accurate anthology of Gujarati literature or its critical discourse could begin to be shaped unless and until these and allied questions of historiography have been asked properly and some answers obtained from within the history of Indian literary culture(s). Again, the second of the four terms, ‘Region’, too has a built-in instability. The region with which this anthology is concerned is Gujarat. It has been called, in the long span of its own semiotic history, as ‘Gujarat’, ‘Goojarat’, ‘Gurjara Rashtra’, ‘Gujjarattaa’, ‘Guzrat’, ‘Goozerat’ etc. over the centuries, by natives and foreigners. Again, the region so identified has had fluctuating political and cultural boundaries. Karachi (now in Pakistan) was, in the 19th century, very much within a Gujarati horizon. Not anymore. Names of the railway stations on the suburban lines of Mumbai were written in English, Marathi and Gujarati till the bifurcation of the bilingual Bombay Province into the States of Maharashtra and Gujarat in 1962. Regionality of Gujarat (as of many other regions of India) has an organic fluidity. What is Gujarat is not the only question; where is Gujarat is also an equally daunting one.
Poet Narmad (1833-1886) has famously asked both (and some more) in a composition in verse that, to my mind, forms a part of Gujarat’s critical discourse, even if I is classified as a ‘poem’. The pice in verse is titled: “Koni koni chhe Gujarat?”, i.e. “To whom and how many, does Gujarat belong?” Narmad names Gujaratis of all faiths and ethnicities to answer his crucial question. There has always been a strong centrifugal cultural energy in Gujarati culture. People of Gujarat are a very mobile lot, with a pan-Indian and global spread. This has given rise to their eventually multiple nationalities and varied new locations. The more recent phenomena are the ‘Little Gujarat’ in Jersey City near New York or Wembley and Southall in London, and of course, in many cities and towns in Uganda, Kenya, Mozambique and Tanzania. Gandhi’s Phoenix Settlement (1904) near Natal and Tolstoy Farm (1910) near Johannesburg in South Africa are the two original ‘catchment areas’, sources or Gangotri of the mighty Ganga of literature and literary criticism of the ‘Gandhian Period’ (1915 -1955). The centrifugal forces of Gujarati culture have always influenced the ‘idea of Gujarat’, the way Gujarat’s regionality has been sensed by its people, their literature and their critical discourses.
On the other hand, the centripetal movements, bringing ‘others’ into Gujarat, has also been vigorous over the centuries of its history. From its Kathi people of Scythian origin (who gave the name ‘Kathiawad’ to a large area within Gujarat), and Sidi-s of Africa (who were brought in as slaves but are now known as ‘Sidi Badshah’), to Parsi-s from Iran (who contributed richly to political, industrial, scientific, literary achievements of Gujarat) and the more recent Sindhi-s from Pakistan, have considerably added to and modified the idea of Gujarat. The large Adivasi tribal population of the region (14.23%, 1981 census) includes Bhil, Gamit, Rathva, Varli, Paradhi and several others. The Adivasi population brings in its own political geography and cultural boundaries that straddle the boundaries of the present ‘linguistic’ States of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. Critical discourses in languages and speeches of these States overlap and are interconnected.
The last two of the four terms mentioned above, namely ‘literature’ and ‘history’, add to a critical and helpful destabilization of any facile and false structures and constructs that often mutilate histories of Gujarati Literature and its critical discourse. Literatures from the margins of Gujarati society, including the literatures of Dalits, Tribals and of Women, have emerged in recent times. These new creative expressions have produced corresponding critical discourses. This anthology includes such critical discourses from the erstwhile margins.
This brings us to two interrelated questions. Some of them could be formulated as follows: (1) Has the prevalent historiography of Critical Discourse in Gujarati (and other Indian literatures) been based on a restrictive colonial model of literary criticism? (2) Has such a historiography led to an erasure on the older, indigenous practices of literary criticism? (3) Has it also led to an erroneous genealogy of critical discourse in Gujarati and other India languages? (4) Are the actual practices of literary criticism in Gujarati much older than those with which most anthologies of literary criticism in Gujarat begin (c. 1850)? These and other allied questions help us focus on the long-neglected enigma of fractured genesis of Gujarati literature and of Gujarati literary critical discourse. The issue: While prevalent scholarly historiography locates origins of Gujarati literature in itself in the 12th century, the origins of Gujarati literary critical discourse have been located in the 19th century. This large gap of seven centuries between production of literature and commencement of critical discourse on it needs urgently to be looked into. This problem of fractured genealogy is common to literatures in several regional languages of India. The issue here in not merely chronological, it is a problem in genealogy. Unlike chronology, mainly concerned with a temporal sequence, genealogy has far-reaching implications concerning an entity’s identity. Prevalent historiography accepts that critical discourses in Gujarati and other Indian regional literatures began some six or more centuries after the beginning of creative writing in those literatures. Such a genealogy would raise questions of the identity of critical discourses in Indian literatures. What or who are these much anthologized and historicised ‘Critical Disco'
A review of histories of Gujarati literature, published over a century and more, would show a surprising consensus among historiographers on accepting two genealogies: Genealogy of Gujarati literature and a separate genealogy of Gujarati literary criticism. This consensus in historiography has influenced editors of anthologies. Edited by eminent critics and published by premier literary institutions, all anthologies of Gujarati literary criticism begin with texts from the second half of the 19th century, namely articles by Narmad and Navalaram, ‘the first critic’. Situation in other regional literatures is not dissimilar. It demonstrates a widespread colonial mindset among Indian literary historiographers and editors. Thus, for instance, History of Gujarati Literature, ed. Mansukhlal Jhaveri, Sahitya Akademi, Delhi, 1978, and Gujaraati Saahityano Itihaas, Vol 1, Gujarati Sahitya Parishad, 1967, hold that while literature originated in Gujarati language in around 12th century C.E., literary criticism began to be practiced much later, in mid-19th century. In an ambitious study, taken up through a generous grant by the UGC, New Delhi, Pramodkumar Patel meekly repeats in his GujaratimaM Vivechan tatvavichara (‘Philosophy of Criticism in Gujarati’, 1985), the same view: ‘We have to make one thing clear here that in our Medieval literary tradition the activity of literary criticism was not furrowed [attempted].’ (p. 5.) To accept unquestioningly the master narrative of the misaligned genealogies is to believe that for six centuries, from the 13th to the 18th, a vibrant literary culture had not found its critical voice even while it used its creative energies abundantly, variedly and skilfully. Gujarati literary criticism then assumes identity of being a biproduct of contact that Gujarat had with English literary culture and simultaneous revival of Sanskrit scholarship in Gujarat in the 19th century. Consequently, it has to be believed, as prompted by colonial mentality of the past and present, that the so-called literatures in Gujarati and other regional languages were, for the first seven centuries of their history, incapable of self-reflexivity. In other word, they were no more than some kind of folklorist, spontaneous and collective expressions without simultaneous critical self-appraisals. Amongst others, The Princeton Encyclopaedia of Indian Poetry and Poetics (1974) implicitly promotes such a view.
It is not that erudite editors and eminent historiographers were unaware of this, as two books, an anthology in Gujarati and a monograph in English would show. First, an anthology, Saahitya Charcha, subtitled ‘An Anthology of Critical Writings in Gujarati’. Edited by Prof. Anantarai Raval, an erudite and astute scholar, it was published in 1981 by Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi. It begins with two articles, first by Narmad (Narmadashankar Lalshankar Dave, 1833 - 1886 ) and second by Navalram Lakshmiram Pandya (1836 -1888). This choice confirms a prevailing consensus that Gujarati literary criticism begins at mid-19th century. The editor is not unaware of historiographic and genealogical problems of such a consensus. He defends his position in no uncertain terms. Referring to pre-19th century Gujarati literary culture, Raval emphatically states: ‘In those times the very desire/attitude of looking at and evaluating poetry as a verbal art had not been born.’ ‘કવિતાને વાણીની કલા તરીકે જોવા, આસ્વાદવા, મૂલવવાની વૃત્તિ જ એ કાળે જન્મેલી નહિ.’ ) In defence of his opinion, Raval adds: ‘In those times of absence of any widespread education, it was nearly impossible to . . . do the hard work of reading the ‘Shravana-bogya’ [orally presented for enjoyment of the ear] literary works and, through leisurely and thoughtful close reading, to discern their poetic excellence and notice their limitations. That kind of work found expression in our region only after the beginning of English system of pedagogy and founding of a university. Acquaintance with English and Sanskrit literatures and with literary criticism in both was subsequent to it. In this way it could only be said that Literary Criticism began in our region only in the Modern Age [1850 onwards]’. (Raval, 1981, p. 7.) What is explicit in Raval’s statement, has been implicit in historiography of literature in Gujarati and several other Indian languages.
This view is shared, among many others, by Prof. Ramesh Shukla in a monograph on Navalram Pandya published by Sahitya Akademi in 1988. He predictably describes Navalram Pandya as ‘pioneer in literary criticism in Gujarati’ (Shukla, 1988, p. 7). He, however, brings in an interesting twist to it: ‘Navalram is credited with the reputation of being a pioneer critic of modern Gujarati literature, though poet Narmad preceded him.’ (Shukla, 1988. p.47.) Shukla then makes a curious distinction: ‘Narmad was the first critic to write on the various aspects of poetry and some principles of literary criticism. One of his papers was published as early as 1858. . . But Narmad never tried his pen on book review.’ On the other hand, ‘Navalram published his first book review on the first Gujarati novel Karan Ghelo in 1867.’ Shukla gleefully concludes: ‘Hence the credit of being the first literary critic is earned by the poet Narmad, while Navalram earned the first place as the book reviewer.’ (Ibid.) This neat division might remind us of the Papel Treaty of Tordesillas, 1494, dividing the New World between Spain and Portugal! For Shukla, work of a literary critic (‘to write on the various aspects of poetry and some principles of literary criticism’) is incomplete without his ‘trying his pen on book review’. This model clearly derives from the English model of literary criticism. Positions taken by Raval on historiography and by Shulka on paradigm reinforce each other. Together they represent a position that argues that the authentic model of literary criticism is the one theorised and practiced in English literature. The possibility that there could be other models of critical discourse, has been self-denied by Indian critics self-confined to the post of observation fixed in the 19th century. In the next section, I would present a case study from 17th century Gujarati and Hindi literatures that would offer textual evidences of an indigenous model of critical discourse.
‘Kavipriya’ and ‘Rasikapriya’ vs. ‘Santapriya’ : Indigenous Paradigm of Critical Discourse. Akho ( c. 1615 – 1674 CE), a major Gujarati poet,, an iconoclast, was, like many of his contemporary writers from all over India, a multilingual poet. He wrote in Gujarati as well as Vraja bhasha, a nearly pan-Indian language of his times. He was a follower of Advaita Vedanta and was familiar with other Indian philosophical systems, as his texts like Panchikarana, Guru Shishy Samvada, Akhe Gita etc, amply demonstrate. Our focus here is on Akho’s text, Santapriya. Santapriya, was written in Vraja bhasha. It has an intertextual relationship with two other texts, Kavipriya and Rasikapriya. These texts were written in Vraja bhasha by Keshavadas (1555 – 1617), an eminent Hindi poet and scholar, well versed in Vraja bhasha and Sanskrit. Akho was a Sonaro, a goldsmith by caste and work, from Ahmadabad in western India. Keshavadas Mishra, was of a well-known Brahmin family of Sanskrit scholars from Orcha in central India. That Akho, a goldsmith by birth and profession, joins issues with Keshavadas, a Brahmin and a courtier, provides direct textual evidence that a lively literary critical discourse took place across several boundaries in the 16the and 17th century India literary culture in a language other than Sanskrit. Three words, ‘Kavi’, ‘Rasika’ and ‘Santa’ are key words in this critical contestation. As the title suggests, Keshavadas’s Kavipriya (‘Beloved of a Poet’) was a handbook for ‘Kavi’, i.e. poets, initiating young men and women into the art and craft of composing poetry. Rasikapriya. focused on ‘Rasika’, connoisseurs or readers of poetry, initiating them into the skills of enjoying literature. Keshavadas was a follower of Saguna, Premalakshana Bhakti, in which relationship of a devotee (Bhakta) with her or his sought-after deity (Aradhya) was marked by love (Prema). The aradhya is seen as Saguna Brahma, the Ultimate Reality marked by qualities that are perceivable to human senses. Keshavadas’s poetics in Kavipriya and Rasikapriya, has a strong foundation in Premalakshana Bhakti. Akho, on the other hand, was a Vedanti poet. His poetics was grounded in Jnanalakshana Bhakti, that grounds devotion in Jnana (knowledge), not Prema (Love). It seeks Nirguna not Saguna Brahma. This situation is not unlike our contemporary schools of literary criticism, grounded in different, often conflicting, theories like Marxism, Modernism, Nationalism, etc. Santapriya (beloved of a saint) of Akho presents a conversation with and contestation against the poetics presented in Kavipriya and Rasikapriya of Keshavadas, at many levels. Akho’s Aradhya (Object of worship) was, in his own words, ‘Parapancha para Mahaaraja PuraNa Brahma’, (‘Purna Brahma, beyond all collusions [of Maya and Vani]’. (See: Akhegita. Pada 10.) ‘Prapancha’, of both Maya and of Kavya/Vani, was a key term in Akho. It could remind us of works of Sussane Langer who, following philosophy of Immanuel Kant in a new key of Ernst Cassirer, speaks of ‘Semblance’ and ‘Illusion’ in works of art and literature. Realism, founded in Marxism, has contested it, fiercely at times. The contestation that Akho has here offered to Keshavadas is no less important and valid as a part of Indian literary criticism, though of quite a different paradigm and tradition. Contestations that Santapriya opens up with Kavipriya and Rasikapriya are not confined to sectarian differences between Nirguna and Saguna Bhakti or between Vedanta and Vaishnva philosophies. While they are grounded in them, these contestations are about issues concerning art and craft of poetry, its purposes, the tools and skills of the poets, etc. These two Indian critical theorist of 17th century bring in the question of Image and Reality. They examine prevailing notions of a good reader (Rasika-jana of Keshavadas, Santa of Akho), a good poet, a good text and a good reading. Kavipriya and Rasikapriya impart training in prosody and poetics to fledging poets and readers including young women and boys. (see: ‘समुझै बाला बालकन वर्णन पंथ अगाध / कविप्रिया केशव करी क्षमियहु कवि अपराध.’ कविप्रिया, 3.1). (‘Young women and men should understand that the pathway of description is endless / Keshav has written ‘Kavipriya’, may this offence of a poet be forgiven.’) The openness of Keshavadas’ contestation with his own predecessor’s is indicative of the best qualities of critical discourse in Indian literatures of his times. Keshavadas also sings praise for Krishna, and for his patron, the ruler of Orchha. Contesting this, Akho presents an alternate poetics in his Santapriya. The title itself openly presents a critique. His book is also a handbook, Priya, as the title says, but it is for writers and readers of poetry who could best be described as Santa, not Kavi or Rasika. Akho pointedly clarifies this further: ‘देवता न देवि आराध्य, पिङ्गल न व्याकर्ण साध्य. ( ‘The aim is not to please either gods or goddesses. It is not to teach mere techniques of prosody or grammar.’) And adds: ‘नाहि को रीझवे काव्य, जैसे व्रुथा घन गाज’. (‘Like clouds that rumble in vein [without pouring out any rains] poems [produced through mere techniques of prosody and grammar] please no one.’)
‘Kavi-Anga’, ‘Bhasha-Anga’ etc. by Akho and Many Others: Indian Critical Discourse in Verse. This is not a stray instance of pre-19th century Indian critical discourse. Santapriya is not the only location of Akho’s critical discourse. His Gujarati verses in six couplets, called Chhappa, are divided in several Anga-s (sections or chapters), on issues such as ‘who is a poet?’, ‘what is language?’ and so on. At places Akho chides naïve and exhibitionist audiences of poetry and poets and reciters of poetry, the ‘Vyasa’ class, who are only after money and fame. ‘Kavi Ang’, ‘Section on the Poet’, critiques conventional notion of ‘Kavi’ and discusses true identity of a poet. Other sections like ‘Vichar Anga’, ‘Jnani Anga’, ‘Maaya Anga’ present Akho’s contestations and assertions about other aspects of literary activity, such as the production of a literary text, its circulation among readers/listeners and its use and misuse. These ‘Anga-s’ and ‘Chhapaa-s’ are not a part of his creative work, they clearly are a part of his critical discourse, his critique of culture and literature. Some of these have been included in this anthology. Akho is not an isolated critical voice in pre-19th century Gujarati literary culture. Self-reflexive critical discourse, imbedded within creative literature and written in verse rather than prose, was a norm rather than an exception in pre-19th century period. This anthology includes excerpts from Bhalan 15th (cent.), Mandan (16th), Premanand (17th) and Shamal (18th), from a much larger body of Gujarati critical discourse in verse from the 12th to 19th century. This paradigm was by no means abandoned after 1850. Literary critical discourse in verse was practiced ably by several major critics of Gujarati such as Dalpatram ((1820 -1898), Balvantrai Thakor (1869 -1952), Niranjan Bhagat (1926 -2018) and Labhshankar Thakar (1935 – 2016) and this writer, to mention some.
If a discourse is carried on in verse instead of prose, does it become poetic or lyrical? An unambiguous No. In Indian tradition, critical books on not only philosophy and religion but also on architecture, sculpture, medicine, polity, economy, psychology, sexuality and other disciplines have for centuries been composed in verse, in meticulous verse at that. It was the invention of the printing press that brought prose to the Western culture and the import of an innovations in printing in India popularized prose in Indian regional languages. Printing press prompted critical discourse to be more lengthy and, ironically, sometimes less precise and pointed than it was in verse.
Regional and Pan-Indian Critical Discourses: Life-enhances Contests, Not Fights to Finish. It is my submission here that the historical as well as historiographical error of excluding pre-19th century critical discourse in our understanding of Gujarati (or any other Indian) critical discourse needs to be recognized and corrected. This crucial correction enables us to see more clearly how a ‘young’ Indian language of literature (like Gujarati), makes its first entry into the space reserved for ‘pan-Indian’ languages, Sanskrit-Prakrit-Apabhramsha, till the turn of the first millennium of the common era. The excitement of these ‘new Indian’ authors has been expressed by the 15th century poet, Narasimha Maheta, when he said: “Jagi uthi mari Adya Vani’, ‘My Primordial Speech woke up’. He, then, began to write in his mother tongue, not yet named Gujarati language. Poet Bhalan (Bhalan) names it for the first time in a literary text, as ’Gujarati Bhakha’. Bhalan and Premanand speak engagingly and confidently of the relationship of Gujarati and Sanskrit as vehicles of ‘the literary’ discourse. They claim forcefully a place of honour for Gujarati language in the new Indian pantheon of ‘Languages of Literature’ in addition to Sanskrit. Some of our contemporary Indian critic, for example the well-known Marathi critic Dilip Chitre, see a great opposition and hostility between Sanskrit and the Vernaculars. It is claimed by them that vernacular poets of the medieval period sought to dethrone Sanskrit. Even an initial and brief objective, text-based study of literature in Gujarati and other Modern Indian languages (MILs) would reveal how baseless and erroneous is such a claim. A scrutiny of literary texts of the early centuries of the second millennium of CE would show that Gujarati and other MILs are vivarta-s (variations, advancements, ‘growths’), both in terms of linguistics and poetics, marking new stages of growth of the ‘Prakrit-Sanskrit-Apabhramsha’ trio of ancient Indian linguistic and literary culture. The sheer joy of a young language entering into the arena of ‘the literary’, like a new Gopika entering for Gopala Krishna’s Rasa mandala for the first time, is palpable in the texts of Narasimha, Bhalan and other Indian poets of the early centuries of the second millennium of the Common Era. In the later centuries, many other aspects of the organic growth of Indian literature and Indian literary critical discourse could be observed – if our historiography is not distorted by the colonially imposed notions of what is a critical discourse. This is not to say that there was no rivalry between the two: Premanand (17th C.A.) and Shamal (18th ), both highly popular Gujarati poets of their times, have expressed a strong sense of rivalry against their contemporary story tellers of the Sanskrit tradition. But the Gujarati story tellers were saying that they could do what the traditional Sanskrit story tellers could do – and be better at it. It was an exercise in Vivarta, not Vichchheda, variation not cutting off. The opening section of this anthology gives excerpts from Narasimha Maheta, Bhalan (both 14th - 15th c.), Akho (16th), Premanand (17th) and Shamal (18th), showing how these vivarta-s were produced. Appendices 1 to 4 explore some roots, going back to the 12th century and beyond, of this early Gujarati critical discourse.
Gujarati critical discourse has been nourished by multiple sources. These include Sanskrit, Prakrit and Apabhramsha; Persian, English; and other Western and Asian sources. It also has widely interacted with other Indian regional critical discourses. It did so without permitting any of these discourses to dominate it and subsume its identity. The present anthology is shaped by the dynamics of both autonomy and intertextuality of Gujarati critical discourse. As pointers to that process, four appendices have been included here: Appendix 1 includes a note by Dr Harivallabh Bhayani on literary culture at Valabhi, capital of the Maitraka Kings of Gujarat from the 6th to the 8h centuries C.E., presenting Gujarat’s literary culture in Sanskrit. Appendix 2 includes an excerpt from Dr. Bhogilal Sandesara’s book Literary Circle of Mahamatya Vastupal’, giving an account of Gujarat’s inclusive literary culture of the 12th and 13th centuries. Appendix 3 gives a selection from Acharya Hemachandra, eminent Jain savant (1089-1173.). His trilogy titled Kavyaanushasana, Shabdanushasana and Chandonushasana, on poetics, linguistics and prosody respectively, presents a study of literary works in six languages, Sanskrit, Maharashtri Prakrit, Shauraseni, Maghadhi and Paishachi variants of Prakrit and Gurjara Apabhramsha. There are references to Bhutabhasha or Chulikapaishachi also in these texts. Appendix 4 gives 15 very short notes on cultural back drop of Gujarati literature from 1814 till the present time.
Adhunik kal: Re-imagining and Re-naming the Modern Period. Vikalpa Vacahana or alternate reading of Gujarati critical discourse comes a felt need, not an arbitrary desire. It come from a need to see, understand and correct epistemological distortions discernible in historiography and allied activities of Gujarati world of letters after 1820. Historiographic erasure of critical activities and situations in Gujarati (and other Indian) literature prior to the 19th century, is one major instance of such epistemological distortion. This ‘Introduction’ has already documented this erasure as evident in anthologies, monographs and history books produced in the past century and a half.
Now, two overarching issues need to be noted briefly here, for further discussion: 1. The idea of Renaissance. 2. The idea of Reform. Both of these ideas or concepts arose organically within the cultural history of Europe and of Christianity. Both have been borrowed by, or imposed on, critiques of culture practiced from early 19th century in several parts and languages of India. Phrases like ‘the Bengal Renaissance’ and ‘Sudharak Yug’ (‘Age of Reform’) in Gujarat have been used freely and enthusiastically. Their continued use in the 21st century Indian critical discourse makes it necessary and urgent to inquire whether these rwo ideas or concepts have arisen organically also within the cultural history of India and of the complex web of religions (and within ach of them) in India?
This ‘Introduction’ has not accepted either of these two terms and concepts, even though some Gujarati critics and historians have used them, as noted in relevant Chapters of this Anthology. As documented in Chapter 1 of this Anthology, Gujarati critical discourse has been not merely continues but also vigorous and varied, fluid and dynamic in the centuries preceding the advent of Western Master Narrative in Gujarat. There was no ‘death’ to arrent the use of term ‘Renaissance’ or ‘Re-birth’ in the history of Gujarati literary culture. Hence, an alternate term and concept, that of ‘Vivarta’ or ‘Variation’, suggesting a turning in a continual flow, has been introduced into Gujarati critical discourse through this Introduction by me. I hope and trust that it would be duly noted and discussed. It is time now to undo the erasures, uncover the overlaid layers of palimpsest into which the text of Gujarati critical discourse has been transformed. In the first quarter of the 21st century, there should be no delay in the long process of observing cultural, literary and critical situations and structures, in their complexity and mobility, over the centuries of history. That task would need more space and time than available here. In the context of and space available in this Anthology of Gujarati Critical Discourse, the focus now would be on the time span conventionally called Adhunik Yug or Modern Age of Gujarati literature and its critical discourse. Some of the several issues of the time span of two centuries (1820 to 2022) of Gujarati literary culture that come up are discussed below.
The period commonly called ‘Modern Period’ or ‘Adhunik Yug’ of Gujarati literature, beginning from 1850. It is conventionally divided in to four main segments: (1) ‘Sudharak Yug’ /’Age of Reforms’ (1850 to 1885), (2) ‘Pandit/ Sakshar Yug’ / ‘Age of Erudition’ (1885-1915), (3) Gandhi Yug (1915- 1940) and Anu-Gandhi/Post Gandhian period (1940-1955), (4) ‘Aadhunik Yug’ / ‘Age of Modernism’ (1955-1985) and ‘Anu-Adhunik Yug’ ‘Post-Modern Period’ (1985 till now). I would like to propose here another way to describe this span and to see the entire historical period in three larger segments. Each segment could be seen as a Vivarta or Variation in a long continuous discourse: (1) The first, 1820 - 1915, could be called, Parabodha/Svabodha Kal. – Period of Alien Cognition / Indigenous Cognition. ushered in by the rise of the British colonial power in Gujarat. (2) The second, from 1915 to 1955, could be named ‘Hind Svaraj Kal’, ‘the Period of India’s’, ushered in by the Gandhian movements for political freedom and pervasive socio-economic non-violence. (3) Third, from 1955 till now, could be called ‘Vyapan Shakti Kal’, ‘Period of Energies for Enlargement’, ushered in by Gujarat’s engagements with global cultural forces as well as, equally significantly, with marginalized hinterlands of its own culture. Analytically, the period from 1820 to the present could be divided in the above four or three segments. But perceived synthetically, it has been a single continuous journey. That single journey, with three turns, the three Vivarta-s as above, could be observed as proceeding ceaselessly through various stages.
Prasthan Bindu / Point of Departure: 1820; not 1850. The Arvachin Yug of Gujarati literature begins conventionally at 1850. But its first stirrings go back by several decades, to the first half of the 19th century. British colonial rule reached Gujarat, replacing the Maratha domination, after the third Anglo-Maratha War in 1820. New systems of polity, economy, pedagogy, transportation and technology were established by the British in the next few decades, from 1820 to 1860. (See Appendix 4). Initially, this new power appeared to be better than both the unruly and exploitative Maratha hegemony and often-times tyrannical and arbitrary local Muslim and Hindu rulers. Now, with the Colonial Rupe, there was peace for the common men and women in Gujarat. It took a while for Gujarat, as for the rest of India, to understand that it was peace of the graveyard, not of the homestead. But, then, even the graveyard had become ghostly for a few centuries prior to 1820. It was a complex situation, not easy to understand them and describe now. When the poet Dalpatram wrote, at the beginning of the ‘Modern Age’ of Gujarati literature, “Those who had inflicted dark deeds of poisonous animosity [on us], have been banished now. / Take that to be a favour done by the English [rule] and celebrate it several times, O Hindustan!”, he was recording a general feeling that prevailed -- with a cunning encouragement from the colonial rulers. Dalpatram, like many others, sincerely believed that British rule was more reliable and beneficial than the rule by native rulers of recent past. (See: ‘Svadesh Sudhara Vishe’/ “On Reforms in Our Country”, in Dalapat Granthavali, Vol. 5, ed. Madhusudan Parekh, p. 676-77.)
As early as 1820, the British government of Bombay Province established the Bombay Education Society. New ‘English’ schools were started in Bombay, Surat, Broach (Bharuch), with Gujarati as medium of instruction. Teachers were trained and text books produced to British specifications. In 1925, ‘Native Education Society’ began production of Gujarati text books under supervision of Col. Jarvis. In 1836, medium of instruction was changed to English. Civilians of different hues, ranging from kindly Alexander Kinloch-Forbes to arrogant K. M. Chatfield worked in Gujarat. Râs Mâlâ: Hindoo Annals of the Province of Goozerat, in Western India by Forbes, published in 1856, chronicles history of Gujarat from 8th century to the 18th, and derives its title from the old Gujarati and Rajasthani genre, historiographical literary genre ‘Raso’. It marks productive collaboration between Gujarati and English literary cultures. On the other hand. Mr Chatfield’s interference with the poet Narmad’s Kavicharit (Lives of Poets, 1865), an early, in all likelihood the first literary history written in any modern Indian language, demonstrates how Victorian values were imposed on Gujarati critical discourse. Narmad’s unyielding response to Chatfield’s pressure to rewrite parts of it demonstrates how Gujarati critical tradition resisted, at some locations, the all-pervading colonial pressures. (For details, see my article in Literary cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia, ed. Sheldon Pollock, 2003.)
Gujarati authors and critics had to learn slowly and painfully how to decipher the multi-layered palimpsest of the colonial rule. This was done by Gujarati critical discourse step by step, in three phases, by Narmad (1833-1886), Govardhanram Tripathi (1855- 1907) and Mahatma Gandhi (1886- 1948). It was not unlike the three steps that seemingly puny Vamana took to overpower the mighty King Bali. Step One. Narmad. ‘Svadeshabhiman; and ‘Paradeshi Raj-sambandhi’ (‘Regarding Foreign Rule’. In one of his essays, admonishing and enthusing his contemporary Gujarati readers, Narmad exhorted: ‘O Unworthy fellows! Like cowards you say: “We are happy eating and drinking in our own land”, and have retreated in defeat without pushing the enemies out. You are absolutely thoughtless about questions such as ‘What are your rights as human beings?’, ‘What is this thing called Independence?’, ‘What is Political Administration?’, ‘What is education?’, ‘What is Reform?’ ‘What rights does the present Government has over you and how is it any good to you?’ (‘તમારી ઉપર હાલની સરકારનો શો હક છે ને શી રેહેમ છે?’), ‘What rights did earlier Governments had over you and what good did they do to you?’ ‘And what should that be?’ . . . ‘What is good for [our] country?’ – That [to ask such questions] is what Svadesh Preeti (Love for One’s Country) really means.’ (‘Svadeshabhiman’. An essay in prose. See: Narmagadya. Vol. II. Ed. Ramesh Shukla, 1996. p. 27 -35.) Another text, a long poem titled Hinduoni Padati’ (‘Decline of the Hindu-s’), presents his critique of Hindu society. Composed between 1863 and 1866, barely five years after the 1857 Rising was supressed with fearful cruelty, Narmad does not spare words in enumerating misdeeds of ‘Foreign Rulers’. In the section ‘Paradeshi Raj-sambandhi’ (‘Regarding Foreign Rule’), commenting specifically of the British rule of his time, Narmad writes: ‘When the differences in race and religion, of Black and While skin, are observed / by the Judge [of the British courts], how could his judgment be called right?’. He continues, ‘A White [officer] coming from a lowly family and knowing nothing [of Indian conditions]/ climbs to high positions and raises his eye balls [on the people of India]. // A Black man, even though well educated, coming from a good family and quite in know of [Indian] conditions, / does not get any office of power, just because he is Black.” He adds: ‘The White [rulers] receive monthly pay which are very high, / but he remains dull and gets wrong things dome.’ He concludes his indictment of the White Racist Government by pointing out that ‘when the calamity comes, it is the Black [Indians] who die.’ (For full Gujarati text see Narmakavita. Vol. II. Ed. Ramesh Shukla. 1994. P. 17-44.) Narmad was in contact, as an equal, with many of his distinguished Indian contemporaries. Three of these were Bal Gangadhar Tilak (and G. S. Khaparde), Annie Besant and Dayanand Sarasvati. Narmad’s meetings with Besant and Dayanand Sarasvati and his interest in Arya Samaj, Brahmo Samaj (he translated Devendranath Tagore’s book ‘Brahma Dharma’) and Theosophy call for a close reading. In his book, Dharma Vichar Narmad has identified four categories of cultural activists: Uchchhedaka (‘One who uproots’, Radical Reformers), Rakshaka-Chhedaka (‘One who trims to save’, Liberal Radical), Chhedaka-Rakshaka ; (‘One who saves to trim’, Liberal Conservative) and Prarakshaka (‘Protector’, Conservative). (See Narmad, Dharmavichar, 1885. p. 2.) Tilak’s close associate, Ganesh Shridhar Khaparde was, in his early years, strongly influenced by Narmad. Khaparde called Narmad his ‘Guru’ who gave him both ‘Kavya Diksha’, and Rajya Prakaran Diksha’. (See: Khaparde’s article in English in Narmad Shatabdi Granth ed. Ambalal B. Jani, 1987.) New research and interpretations of Narmad’s interactions with his non-Gujarati contemporaries, both Indian and British, could shed light on new details of India’s transition from 1857 to 1947. Namad’s was the first of the three steps Gujarat and India took towards a renewed self-identity. Step Two: Govardhanram: Gujarati ‘Poet is addressing his own surroundings’. Govardhanram Tripathi’s novel, Sarasvatichandra, (published in four parts in 1887, 1892, 1898, 1901), was the second of the three steps. Part I was published just a year after Narmad’s death. Tripathi was firmly grounded in ancient Indian, medieval Gujarati and modern Western cultures. Yet, he refused to be satisfied with any ‘eclectic combination’ of the three. His was a judiciously interrogative reading of all the three traditions. In his book Classical Poets of Gujarat and Their Influence on Society and Morals, (1892/published posthumously in 1916) Tripathi has argued that Gujarati culture is not an ‘eclectic combination’ of ancient Indian and modern British cultures. He says with admirable clarity: ‘He who would understand a classical poet of Gujarat must start upon this ground alone and none else. He must take it as his axiom that his poet is addressing his own surroundings and not the literary and refined world where the European and Sanskrit poets found themselves. Such is the key to poetry of Gujarat, and anyone who is disposed to unlock the treasures of our poets must, in the first instance, learn to understand and appreciate what in Gujarat, the Brahmin, the Banya, the ascetic, and even the woman is used to treasure up deep within his or her heart, and communicates only to those whom he or she loves or regards as one of his or her own fold.’ (Tripathi, 1916, Pp. 5, 6.) Third Step: Vamana growing into Virata. The third step was the one Gandhi enabled Gujarati critical discourse to take. Gandhi’s critical discourse was indeed a much larger discourse: It was a pan-India, pan-human discourse of courage, compassion and accommodation: Courage in face of brutal powers; compassion for all, ‘unto the last’; and accommodation for all kinds of ‘others’. It was shaped through ceaseless conversations and debates with others with very differing views. Gandhi enabled the seemingly puny people of South Africa, India, America and elsewhere to manifest their inner strength. And, as Gandhi insisted on writing his books in Gujarati and speaking publicly in Gujarati or Hindustani, Gandhi shaped Gujarati (and Indian) critical discourse, transforming it radically.
1820 and 1915 have been critically significant years for Gujarat and its critical discourse. In 1820, the British defeated Maratha Empire in the Third Anglo-Maratha War and East India Company took over political dominance in Gujarat from the Maratha power. In 1815, Gandhi arrived from South Africa to India and Gujarat to begin the end of that British rule over India and founded his first Indian Ashram in Ahmadabad. Our focus here is now on that time span of nearly a century of Gujarati critical discourse. Over the centuries and millennia of continuity, interventions, self-corrections, distortions and reassertions, a process of ‘continual renewal’ (to employs here a phrase from a Conference organized by Dr Kapila Vatsyayan), India has demonstrated its capacity not only to endure but also to grow through its inner resources. There have been many manifestations of Indian Modernity over the course of its millennia-long cultural history. Gujarati ‘literary culture in history’ calls for ‘a reconstruction’ (to employ here a phrase from Prof. Sheldon Pollock’s 2003 book) from Gujarat. Such a critical and hermeneutic reconstruction leads us to inquire into Gujarat’s variation on Indian Modernity. Several issues have in fact come up in writings of Gujarati thinkers and critics of culture since 1820. In the space available in the process of editing this anthology, some of them could be touched upon.
Native Languages and National Language: Gujarat within India. The issue of a pan-Indian or ‘universal’ languages versus regional and native languages has occupied an important place in Indian critical discourse from the ancient times, as the story of genesis of Gunadhya’s Brihadkatha points out. With the advent of English language, this long-standing issue assumed a new significance. This anthology has juxtaposed three articles: Dalpatram’s critical article in verse on ‘Purpose of the Native Language’ (1894), Navalram’s article in prose on ‘One Language in Hindustan’ (1871) and Narmad’s note on ‘Lavani’. Dalpatram pleads for ‘these vernaculars’ Gujarati, Marathi etc., with these persuasive words: ‘Keep close to your heart your own Bhasha’, says Dalpatram. He then explains why: ‘[t]hese vernaculars are the beautiful branches/ [of the tree of Language].’ He adds: ‘Know Sanskrit to be the root of the tree. / The root takes in the juices (Rasa) / From the soil to the tree.’ Granted. But through an Eliot-like ‘but’ Dalpatram adds: ‘But flowers and fruits are given us, today, / only by these beautiful branches.’ Dalpatram acknowledges importance of Sanskrit, puts English away, but pleads for ‘these branches’, and insists on focusing on ‘your own Bhasha’. With a significant deviation, Navalram pleads for ‘One Language for Hindustan’. In his essay, ‘Svabhashana AbhyasanuM Mahattva’ (“Importance of studying one’s own language’, 1888) Navalram pointed out limitations of using English language as medium of instruction at the University level and pleaded for ‘Svabhasha’, i.e. Gujarati, Marathi etc. Narmad’s ‘Svadesh Abhiman’ and Navalram’s ‘Sabhasha Mahattva’ are pointer to Gujarat’s early response to a crisis of identity that had gripped Indian society of the time. But Navalram imagines Hindi to be the ‘one language for Hindustan’. He, thus, is one of the earliest Indian thinkers to plead for Hindi as India’s national language. Narmad’s essay on ‘Lavani’, rarely seen in anthologies but included here, shows a movement to a larger but multilingual ‘Indian’ space. ‘Lavani’ is a form of Marathi poetry that has crossed boundaries between Maharashtra and Gujarat. Narmad translated his abridged version of Homer’s Iliad (Iliadno Sar) in 1870 along with Ramayanano Sar and Mahabharatano Sar, His translation, in Gujarati prose, of Bhagavad Gita, published in 1882.
Narmad Coins the word ‘Svadeshabhimana’ in 1856 and ‘Satyano Agraha’ in 1869. Coupled with the issue of importance of ‘native language’ was the issue of pride for regional and national identity. A key word in Narmad’s entire critical discourse is ‘Svadeshabhiman’, (‘Pride for One’s own Country’) coined very early on by him in an essay with the same title, published in 1856, a year before the Rising of 1857. He distinguishes ‘Svadeshabhiman’ from ‘Kulamotap’ (‘False pride in family lineage’) in another essay published in 1869. In the essay ‘Kulmotap’ Narmad has discussed ways to ‘Deshano Utkarsh’, ‘Progress of the Country.’ This could be achieved, he points out, through ‘Satyano Agrah’ and ‘Karma’. (See: Narmagadya Part II, ed. Ramesh Shukla, Surat, 1996. P. 204.) From Narmad’s ‘Satyano Agraha’ (1869) to Gandhi’s ‘Satyagraha’ (1906), Gujarati discourse expanded its cultural ideals and critical vocabulary in many ways. Narmad’s critical discourse from his essay ‘The Poet and Poetry’ and Navalram’s from his ‘Musing on Poetics’, both included in this anthology, mark a turn and a continuity. Written in 1858, Narmad’s essay refers to Kavi Keshavadas of Vraja bhasha, with whom Akho had a critical dispute. Narmad, however, refers approvingly to Keshavadas’s idea of ‘kavi bani’, i.e. ‘a poet’s speech’. On the other hand, the notion of ‘Josso’, was derived by Narmad from the English critic William Hazlitt’s idea of ‘Passion’. Narmad, Navalram and Dalpatram quote also from Sanskrit poetics, from Dandin (7th century) to Kaviraj Vishvanatha (15th century). A confluence of ancient and medieval Indian critical theories and modern Western critical theories characterizes Gujarati critical discourse of this period. Navalram’s critical discourse takes its position at a mid-point between Dalpatram’s and Narmad’s. Thus, in his essay, ‘Kharo Deshabhiman’ (literally ‘True Pride in [One’s] Country’), he distinguished between ‘Desh Preeti’ and ‘Khoto Abhiman’, i.e., ‘Love for the country’ and ‘Wrong kind of Pride for it’. (See: Navalgranthavali Vol. I, ed. Ramesh Shukla, 2006, p.345.) He points out that through ‘Abhiman’, people of each country think their own country always to be right and other counties to be wrong and this leads to violence. He adds, ‘If a sickness has been produced in our body and we go on claiming that our body is healthy, without any sickness, the result would be death.’ (Ibid, p. 346.) He proposes the word ‘Desh Preeti’, ‘Love for [one’s] country’ (ibid).
New Platforms for a new Gujarat to speak anew: Early Literary Journals of Gujarat. Literary and cultural journals, a product of Gujarat’s contact with the Western world, have been an important site for its critical discourse. Narmad edited the periodical ‘Dandiyo’ (literally ‘Night watchman). Dalpatram edited ‘Budhdhiprakash’ (literally ‘Light of Intelligence’) and Navalram ‘Gujarati Shaalaapatra.’ (‘Journal of Gujarati Schools). ‘Rasta Goftar’ (literally, ‘The Truth Teller’) was edited by Dadabhai Naoroji, one of the founders of Indian National Congress, and Kharshedji Kama, both from Parsi community of Gujarat. ‘Visami Sadi’ (‘Twentieth Century’ 1914 -1921) was edited by Haji Mohammad Allarakha Shivji, a Gujarati Muslim. Gujarat of Hindu, Parsi, Muslim reformers was looking for an age of reason. And more. Soon after the failure of India’s first struggle for independence from the British colonial rule in 1857, a search for other ways to independence began all over India. In Gujarat it had begun in a very Gujarati way. Gujarati journals, mentioned above and many more, were vehicles of this search for new ways to independence. Literary criticism and cultural critical discourse produced on the pages of these journals were central to that search. The first issue of Narmad’s Dandiyo (September 1, 1864), published merely six years after Queen Victoria’s Proclamation of November 1, 1858, declaring Paramountcy of British power in India. Undaunted, Narmad’s Dandio has the following inquiry into the new political order. He wrote: ‘About keeping an eye over Political issues. In this Province [Bombay], reforms on religion, ethics, household matters and education have been attempted to an extent. But there is nothing to let people know anything about political theory and political administration. ‘Bombay Association’ made some noise at the beginning but now, though internal rivalries and through fear of disfavour of the Government, it neither comes to its death nor does it vacate public platform but goes on declaring that it is still living. ‘Rasta Goftar’, ‘Indu Prakash’ and ‘Native Opinion’ publish a few things but it does not come from their own hard work and thinking resulting from their own experiences. It presents things borrowed from others, pretentious and stupid. . . . So, my brother Dandiya, you keep beating your drum of the night watch to keep people awake so that they may come to understand that this is politics, this is bad administration, this is wakefulness, this is the truth and unethical adjustments are these.’ (See: Dandiyo, 63 issues, ed. Ramesh Shukla, Surat, 1996, p. 14.) (Tr. S.Y.) ‘Dandiyo’, ‘Budhdhiprakash’, ‘Shalapatra’ ‘Rast Goftar’ and others initiated a polyphonic critical discourse in which critique of culture and literary criticism were inseparable. Gandhi’s ‘Indian Opinion’ (1904 -1914), published from South Africa, used four languages, Gujarati, Hindustani, Tamil and English, to convey facts, ideas and programs to its multilingual readership. When a literary culture of a language (and the larger , multi-institutional culture of the people of that language) demonstrate a capacity to grow and endure or endure by growing, the process gives rise to many tensions, some productive, some destructive. To grow is to deal with such tensions and critical discourse of a language bears witness to it. Gujarati critical discourse of the ‘modern’ period has done so amply.
Dealing with internal Tensions and Contradictions of Gujarati Culture. Ramanbhai Nilkanth (1868 – 1928) and Manilal Dvivedi (1858 – 1898) have been described as heirs of Narmad: Nilkanth of the younger ‘Purva Narmad’ (‘Earlier Narmad’) and Dvivedi of the later ‘Uttar Narmad’ (‘Later Narmad’). Nilkanth carried forward the reformist zeal of Narmad; Dvivedi championed the conservative spirit and courageous self-audit of Narmad’s later years. Their views on culture and literature clashed with and enhanced each other. Nilkanth’s essay, Svanubhava Rasik and Sarvanubhava Rasik : The Two Worlds of Poetry’, included in this anthology, looks for a literary culture that is capable of larger and objective reality beyond one’s subjective sensibility (Sarvanubhava Rasik). For him it is a move towards a new, modern world; a step ahead of what he considered as a self-absorbed world of medieval Gujarati literature. Dvivedi’s essay included in this anthology, looks for deeper roots of poetry within the ancient Indian world of Sahitya Mimamsa and the Darshanas, especially the Vedanta. Known as ‘abheda marga pravasi’ i.e. a traveller on the path of non-duality, Dvivedi does not accept the duality and dichotomy of the subjective and the objective. Nilkanth, like the young Narmad, was a votary for total change and a new, future for Gujarati people. Dvivedi, like Narmad in his later years, was a votary for a search of rejuvenating sources of strength for Gujarati culture useful in looking for a future that is a continuum of the best of the Indian past.
Anandshankar Dhruv juxtaposes and synthesises these and similar contesting narratives on literature and life. In his essay, titled ‘Saundaryano anubhava: Ek Digdarshan’ ( ‘Experience of Beauty: An Overview’), Dhruv discusses the transient and the permanent aspects of beauty. ‘The spirit of an Age, at some juncture, passes through some deep turbulence. That process of churning brings out the best that the Age has to offer, its cream. The poet who presents that offering in a well-formed composition, comes to be known as the Major Poet, the Mahakavi of that epoch. Whether such a poet, who best represents one Age can become a Major Poet for all the Ages, depends upon the nature of vision of that Age.’ (See: Anandshakar Dhruv Shreni : Vol III. Sahitya Vichar. Ed. Yashavant Shukla et al., 2001. P. 40.) His essay, ‘Poetry: A (Playful) Part of Ātman’, incuded in this anthology, Dhruv’s hermeneutics of harmony, exploring how the permanent and the temporal meet and produce the world of poetry, as understood by Indian Sahitya Mimamsa.
Understanding Aspects of Language as a Substratum of Culture. From Narasimhrao Divetia (1859-1937) to Harivallabh Bhayani (1917 – 2000) and Prabodh Pandit (1923 – 1975), Gujarati linguists have explored structure and function of language as such and of Gujarati language. ‘Wilson Philological Lectures’ given by the polymath Narasimhrao Divetia at Bombay University in 1921 and 1932, are a landmark in study of historical phonology of Gujarati and in Comparative Linguistics. Dr Harivallabh C. Bhayani’s works on Aparbharmasha and Prakrit languages have earned high pan-Indian and global recognition in the field of descriptive linguistics. Dr. Prabodh Pandit, a modern linguist esteemed highly internationally, has explored in his ‘Language in a Plural Society’ (1983) functions of language in a plural culture. Pandit has linked Gujarati critical thought to such thinkers as Noam Chomsky and Charles Filmore.
Gujarati critical discourse on poetry and music has a unique significance. It looks critically into the relations of ‘modern’ period of Gujarati literary culture with the ‘medieval’ period and underlines a continuity across imagined and imposed thresholds between the two periods. ‘Gujarati poetry and Musicality’ by Kavi Nanalal (1877 – 1946) included in this anthology, invites the reader to look at literature as performance. Balvantray Thakor’s insistence on ‘a-geyata’ or ‘non-sing-ability’ of poetry marks the other pole of this discourse. But, as Nanalal points out, the real challenge is to understand how traditional Indian literature fuses poetry and music without subordinating either to the other. In his writings on Lavani songs, popular in south Gujarat and Maharashtra, Narmad had pointed out that ‘musical melody is one way of saying a poem, but musical melody is not poetry.’ Narasimhrao Divetia held that ‘poetry becomes devoid of its lustre without music. Their relationship is an organic relationship, like that of sound and meaning, fragrance and flower, soul and body.’ (Kavitavichar, Narasimharao Divetiya, ed. Bhruguray Anjaria, 1969.) Narasimharao and his father Bholanath were followers of western Indian reformist movement, Prarthana Samaj, with links to Brahmo Samaj of Bengal. Its meetings began with singing of a prayer, as did those of Mahatma Gandhi’s. Gujarati discourse on poetry and music, as it moves from Narmad through Nanalal and Thakore, to the Divetias and Gandhi, is a much nuanced and dynamic discourse that demands further critical attention, especially in our contemporary context of Sugam Sangeet and Cine music. Gujarat has a distinguished tradition of studies in prosody, starting from Hemachandra’s 12th century work Chhandonushasana, a comprehensive study of Sanskrit, Prakrit and Apabhramsha prosody. Ramnarayan Pathak’s Brihadpingal , published in 1955, marks a recent landmark in this long journey that includes works by Dalpatram and Narmad in the 19th century.
Transition From Bombay University to Gujarat Vidyapith: From Haileybury to the Pheonix? Transition from the Age of Erudition to the Gandhian period could be seen a symbolic locational shift from Bombay University to Gujarat Vidyapith. Founded by the British colonial power at the colonial city of Bombay, in the historic year 1857 (when the Sepoy Mutiny/ First War of Freedom began), Bombay University was alma meter of a large number of Gujarati authors of the 19th and 20th century. Gujarat Vidyapith, a National University, was founded by Mahatma Gandhi in1920, first at his newly begun Kochrab Ashram, in the much older traditional city of Ahmadabad. Its teachers and students included some of the best writers of Gujarati literature and critical thought, from ‘Kaka’ Kalelkar, R V Pathak and Gandhi himself, as teachers to students like ‘Sundaram’ and Umashankar Joshi, to mention just a few of many more. But the transition from ‘Bombay University’ to ‘Gujarat Vidyapith’ (to use the names as cyphers) was a long process. It began well before Gandhi’s return to India in 1915 and continues long after assassination of Gandhi, especially in the present time and its anti-Gandhi propaganda, gross and subtle. It involved many complex factors, many other players and several varied locations.
In 1909 Gandhi travelled from London to Durban and to Phoenix Settlement that Gandhi had established in South Africa. London was the centre of British Colonial Power. Phoenix settlement was the centre of Satyagrahas contesting that Colonial Power. The journey of Gujarati literary culture and its critical discourse from Bombay University, established by British Colonial Power in 1857, to Gujarat Vidyapith founded by Gandhi in 1920, resembles Gandhi’s 1909 voyage not only in its symbolism but also its reality and semiology. London and Bombay on the one end and Phoenix and Gujarat Vidyapith at the other end, these locations are separated by distances that have many dimensions: Political, Social, Cultural, Literary and, in a word, semiotic. From 1820, when the British Power founded its rule in Gujarat to 1920, when Gandhi founded Gujarat Vidyapith in Gujarat, it has been a century whose full significance needs to be grasped by Gujarati critical thought a careful and continuous study. This anthology is but a small step to it. In 2019 and ’22, any changes in Gujarat Vidyapith have a huge significance for Gujarati and Indian cultural critical discourse.
Critical discourse of the next phase was stimulated by Gandhi. However, a closer look at the organic fluidity of the literary cultural situations of the period would reveal that Gandhian ethos has proven to be stimulating, rather than stifling, for Gujarati culture, literature and critical discourse of these times. Unlike some Western Ideologies that tend to produce a unicentric space, Gandhian ways led to a multi-centred space for life and letters in Gujarati and other Indian literary cultures. Gandhi came up with sharp critiques and uncomfortable questions, but it was clearly not a Master Narrative, utopian or scientific, that tend to silence all other narratives. This, in a way, was what distinguished Gujarati literary culture and its critical discourses from those of several other languages, Indian and foreign, that were controlled by one or the other Master Narratives, political, economic or social. Gujarati critical discourse of the period was enriched by larger intellectual debates between Gandhi, Tagore, Ambedkar and the proponents, like Savarkar, of violent overthrow of the British Raj.
Gujarati critical discourses of this period is multicentred. It could be said to have formed a kind of Federal Republic of Critical Discourses. Many critical views constantly modified each other and no overwhelming ideology subordinated them. Gandhian period of Gujarati Critical Discourse was prompted on by Gandhi’s life and work, not restricted by it. Gandhi’s ‘Foreword’ to K. M. Munshi’s book, Gujarat and Its Literature, From Early Times to 1852 (published first in1935), points out to such a critical federalism: In that ‘Foreword’, Gandhi raises questions but refrains from imposing his answers on the readers. If dictatorial impatience of political ideologies, from the left and the right, discernible in some literary cultures in India and abroad, has not marred Gujarati literary culture so far, it is because of this Gandhian and Gujarati ways of conducting Vivada and Samvada.
As already observed, the transition from ‘Bombay University’ to ‘Gujarat Vidyapith’ was a long process and it involved many players.
Through a Gandhian perspective, Gujarati cultural energy of this period could be seen as focused on two issues. They could be summed up in two words: Satyagraha and Sarvodaya. One was a hugely shared concern with achieving political freedom for the country through Gandhian ways. The other was an inherited by actively heightened concern for helping Indian society to grow out of its various limitations and shape itself into a fearless and compassionate society. However, when Gujarati Sahitya Parishad met at Rajkot in Gujarat in 1909, there was no reference to either Gandhi or Hind Svaraj, though that book was published in the same year 1909 by Gandhi from Natal in South Africa. The book was banned in 1910 by the British in Bombay. Apparently, Gujarati literature and its critical discourse at Rajkot conference of 1909 did not take Gandhi’s ideas of literature and culture as seriously as the colonial power in Bombay. But, upon a closer look, one discovers that many of the critical concerns highlighted after 1915, were indeed discussed with clarity and depth in Gujarati critical discourse prior to that year. In the same year, 1909, Anandshankar Dhruv, by then one of the most respected Gujarati writers, wrote an article in his well-known journal, “Vasant’, welcoming Gujarati Sahitya Parisha’s third Adhiveshan. It is interesting to note that in that article he pointing out: ‘So long as a literature keeps itself aloof from the country’s religious, social, political and other activities, it would never flourish. Even if it has some juice left it, received earlier through its deep roots, that juice would soon dry up and the tree would soon wither away and die. But when a truly alive literature takes into its body [juices of] the activities of the world around it, it transforms them and gives them its own characteristic form.’ (Anandshankar Dhruv Sahitya Vichar, Part 3, ed. Yashvant Shukta et al. 2001, p. 132.) (Tr. S. Y.) Four concerns shaped Gujarati critical discourse in this period: First, a concern for independence of India from the colonial rule and colonial mentality. Second, a concern for the marginalized and the down-trodden sections of society. Third, a concern for morality and ethics in personal and public life. Fourth, a concern for a language capable of taking literature to all sections of Gujarati society; even to ‘the farm-hand’/‘Koshiyo’, as Gandhi famous insisted in his Presidential lecture at Gujarati Sahitya Parishad’s Annual Conference in 1936. Gandhi’s own views on these issues have been recorded by Mahadev Desai : કલાને જીવનમાં સ્થાન છે . . . પણ આપણે બધાંએ જે મારગ કાપવો છે તેમાં કલા વગેરે સાધનમાત્ર છે. એ જ જ્યારે સાધ્ય થઈ જાય ત્યારે બંધન રૂપ થઈ મનુષ્યને ઉતારે છે. હા. કોઈ ચિત્ર જોઈ મનમાં બિભત્સ વિચારો જ આવે તેને હું કલા નહીં કહું. માણસને નીતિમાં એક પગલું આગળ વધારે, એના આદર્શ ઊંચા કરે, એ કલા. એની નીતિને ઉતારે એ કલા નહીં પણ બિભત્સતા.’ (મહાદેવભાઈની ડાયરી, ભાગ 1.) (‘Art does have a place in life. . . . But in the journey that we have undertaken, art and allied things are only our means. When they turn into objective, they become fetters and demean human beings. Yes, I would not call it an art if a painting brings only obscene thoughts to the mind. That which advances human beings by a step ethically and morally, and uplifts ideals, is art. That which lowers its ethics and morality is not art, it is obscenity. (Diary of Mahadev Desai. Part 1.) (tr. S.Y.). Gandhi’s insistence on morality and ethics was an organic part of his larger struggle for Independence, national, social and spiritual. In his vocabulary, Mukti of a Soul, Naitikata of a Society and Svatantrata of a Nation were inseparable.
However, the strength of Gujarati critical discourse of the ‘Gandhian’ period has been demonstrated by a lively debate of the relationship of morality and ethics with literature and other arts. There was a space for deviation and dissent within the long tradition of Gujarati Critical Discourse from the times of Narasimha Maheta and Akho.. The deviant views during the first half of the twentieth century have been formulated by serval critics including Balvantray Thakor (1869 – 1952), K. M. Munshi (1887 – 1971), Ramnarayan Pathak (1887 -1955), Jhaverchand Meghani (1896 -1947), ‘Sundaram’ (1908 -1991) and Umashankar Joshi (1911 -1988). Munshi was the most deviant of them all. His book, Glory that was Gurjara Desha, (1944), written in English, historically documents and described glory of imperial Gurjara rulers from 550 to 1300 of CE. Like Narmad whom he admired, Munshi aimed at evoking a sense of pride in the people. Munshi presented the idea of ‘Selfhood of Gujarat’, ‘Gujarat.ni Asmita’. But there was more to Munshi than that. He also evoked, in his own way, the word ‘Rasa’ from Sanskrit aesthetics. He did so, unlike his predecessors like Dhruv and Nanalal, to counter excessive claims on morality on literature. Munshi insisted on ‘[only] a narrative that makes a great impact and addresses the needs of rasiakata is literature.’ (tr. S.Y.) (Thodank Rasa darshano, Sahitya ane BhaktinaM p. 13.) Munshi here counters Gandhian over-emphasis on ‘Neeti’ with the notion of ‘Rasikata’ from ancient Indian aesthetics. In ‘Rasasvaadano Adhikar’ (1926), he says: ‘God, Truth and Ethics are very good, very useful, very necessary and very revered things; but in a place where being full of Rasa is the only Supreme Reality, where capacity to enjoy Rasa is the only Guru, where enjoyment of Rasa alone authorises the worshiper [to enter], in such a temple of Art and Literature, worship of any other deities is out of place and comes in the way of continuing to experience bliss (Ananda). And however much attractive and sweet a conversation with this Poison-Maiden (Visha-kanya) seem, her touch spreads poison and that poison benumbs both the experience of Rasa and capacity to experience it.’ (tr. S.Y.)
A more nuanced inquiry into the relationship of literature with ethical life was presented by Ramnarayan Pathak, a practicing lawyer, an active Satyagrahi and a teacher at Gujarat Vidyapith. He pointed out in his book Sahityavimarsh (1939): ‘Though literature is independent, its relationship with life is subtle. That relationship is based on [four points of contact, namely] Bhavak, Bhasha, Vastu ane Kavi (Connoisseur, Language, Themes and Poet). Such a relationship with life permeates literature inside out, everywhere, in each of its atoms.’ (P. 6). From this position, he argues: ‘While it is true that art should be looked at only through the point of view of art, of Rasa, but that does not mean that art could take interest in immorality. Art that takes an interest in immorality is the worst kind of curse on the society.’ (Kavyani Shakti, p. 27). And asserts: “While it is true that literature is an art . . . but it should be faithful to ethics, truth and so on.’ (Sahityalok, p. 27.) Kaka Kalelkar (D.B.Kalelkar), a staunch Gandhian, has no problem to insist: ‘If we want a literature that could fascinate our hearts and immortalize all our emotions, then it will not suffice to worship the world of words. . . . If life is deep and forceful, literature would automatically become nourishing and full of life.’ (Kalelkar Granthavali, ed. Sundaram, Umashankar Joshi et al. 1984, P. 503). There are other voices and tones that are woven into the polyphony of critical discourse of this span. Balvantray Thakor, a major critic and poet, who was not too much of a Gandhian himself, offers an interesting metaphor to comment on life and letters. In Vividh Vyakhyano Vol. 1 (1945), he says: ‘Life of a language and life of a people are very closely interlinked with one another. Life of Language blows gently over the flow of the life of the people.’ Explaining this metaphor, Thakor says: ‘The past literature breathed out by our ancestors has been shaping and guiding our own lives in many ways. And, similarly, our own [contemporary] literature would become the subtle force in shaping the life of future generations of Gujarati people.’ (p.2-3.). He concludes: ‘Art is not a biproduct or ancillary stream of the main flow of life. Artist is not a cowardly person running away from the battles of life. He is, rather, a real warrior who presents in his writings the experience arising from those . . . battels.’ (p. 25-26. Tr. S.Y.) Differences between Pathak’s and Thakor’s formulations are subtle yet substantial: For Pathak, it is life that permeates every atom of literature. For Thakor, it is literature that nourishes life. This would remind us of Anandshankar Dhruv’s comment that ‘Art is an expression of life. It does not come to light until life becomes self-conscious, self-reflective, capable of looking at its own face.’ (Anandshankar Dhruv Shreni, Vol. 3, p. 20). Dhruv points out the difference between ‘Rasanubhava’ and ‘Rasabhasa’ (Experience of Rasa and Mistaken Cognition or Illation of Rasa) and argues that Dharma, Neeti and Satya increase sublimity of the soul and prevent Rasanubhava, an experience of Rasa, from degenerating into Rasabhaasa, an illusion of Rasa.
Gandhi Presidential Address at Gujarati Sahitya Parishad’s Annual Conference in 1936 often reminds me of Pablo Picasso’s famous painting, ‘Guernica’ that he painted in 1937. Both share a deep and moving compassion for people tortured by tyrannical and violent political powers and both look/sound quite disjointed for a while before the great inner structure (cubist in Picasso, strikingly non-Gandhi-like in Gandhi) slowly emerges before us. Gandhi’s writings are always clearly structured and present their critical discourses in a most ordered, minimalist way. Not so this Presidential Address to Gujarati Sahitya Parishad. Gandhi began by emphasising that he could not find time to prepare that Presidential Address, in the midst of all his other work! He then gave reasons why he did not have time for his Address to this literary Conference. He said: ‘I had hoped that before coming to the Conference I would gather all the literature and read it and prepare my speech after reading it all. . .. Today, however, I am bankrupt.’ Then Gandhi gives two specific reasons why he went ‘bankrupt’ in his time-economy: ‘At Segaon, I could not leave my patients unattended. ... When I came here ( Rajkot) I learnt that there was a conflagration --- the dispute between mill-owners and the labour was raging.... I was engaged in important matters right up to the time of my arrival here.’ Two commitments held priority: One, ‘my patients’ and two ‘the labour’. Having said this bluntly, he confesses: ‘Hence I have not even made the necessary preparation for an impromptu speech.’ He could not have made clearer where literary activities stood in his list of priorities. He concludes: ‘Has the conference ever made a worse choice?’ Gujarati literary culture had to answer that question then, as now.
Gandhi’s Address, included in this anthology of Gujarat Critical Discourse, began right at the beginning. It begins by saying that Literature begins at the margins of the society in which it exists. Gandhi had no time for this Address because his time was given t the sick at Segaon and the mill-labours at Ahmadabad. The subtext of this Adress urges Gujarati authors to follow the suite. He went on to make a strong and emotional plea for simplicity and directness of language of literature and for a more compassionate and committed relationship of literature with the plight of the marginalized majority of contemporary society. He insisted upon communicability of the language of literature. Even a farm-hand, ‘Koshio’, should be able to sing along and understand your songs. Then Gandhi famously admonished the writers and told them that they should not write for the leaders of industry and commerce who were seated on the dais with him. He also insisted upon ethical and moral correctness of content of literary works. Gujarati writers and critics adored Gandhi, followed him fearlessly in the Satyagrahas and into the British prisons, but wrote in ways that were more complex at times than the hypothetical farmhand could easily follow. Gujarati Critical Discourse and Creative writing even of this period was not merely ‘Gandhian’, though it was profoundly so.
Sundaram, a major poet of the Gandhian period and a representative of Socialist and Marxian trends of the Gandhian period, and later in his life a prominent Sadhaka at Sri Aurobindo Ashram at Pondicherry, warmly endorsed this, candidly saying: ‘An unconscious disgust for the language of the entire society of the people, and partiality for their own culture and style of language prevents them [writers of the time] to understanding the power of language that carries in itself the strength of the wider life of the people.’ (Sahitya Chintan, p. 100.) He, however, cautions against didactic and propagandist use of language in ‘[a] large number of literary texts, that quickly enumerate religious values like love, pity or renunciation, or simply repeating commandments of ethics, or singing of Veera Rasa of Nationalism and Bhayanaka Rasa of sacrifice [on battlefields].’ (tr. S.Y.)
In the article titled ‘Spirituality and Literature’ Ramprasad Bakshi, a profound scholar of Sanskrit literature and Indian philosophy, brings out, unexpectedly (if the title is read conventionally) a deep relevance of ancient India to the present times. Folklore and Literature: Meghani’s Discourse. Jhaverchand Meghani, an excellent folklorist, knew well what Sundaram called ‘the language of the entire society’ and what Gandhi meant by literature ‘that could be understood by the farm-hand.’ Meghani focuses sharply on binaries such as ‘Boli’, against ‘Bhasha’, ‘lokavidya’ as against ‘paravidya’, the urban against the rural and so on. IN 1941-42, on the eve of the Quit India Movement, Meghani, whom Gandhi called a National Bard, ‘Rashtriya Shayar’, was invited by Bombay University to give its prestigious annual lectures, the ‘Thakkar Vasanji Madhavji Vyakhyanamala’. Meghani masterfully presented his exposition of Lokavidya, Lokabhasha and Lokasahitya, before huge audiences flooding the august hall of the British-established University. At times, he climbed up on the table placed in front of the speaker’s chair and sang folk songs to illustrate his critical points, to the delight of most and dismay of many. Meghani pointed out that it is not the language of high literature that could ‘save’ the ‘dying’ language of folklore. Quite the opposite, he argued, and asserted that it was folk culture that could save the high culture from extinction. Under the subtitle ‘Bolati Vani Sanjivani chhe’ (‘Spoken speech is the elixir’), Megani says: ‘Greatness of the spoken language is that it sprinkles the waters of life on the skeletons of dying languages of literature and, age after age, it brings up a renewed language. Folk literature is culmination of the spoken words of the people. By providing a liberal drink of fresh waters of its own monsoon clouds, people’s speech has kept the [river of] literary language flowing,’ (ibid. p. 33.) He adds, ‘Language of oral literature has always been the speech used for daily transactions by the people. It roots were not in Sanskrit, over-structured through restrictions of grammar, it had its roots in the various Prakrit speeches spoken in different regions in the Vidic times.’ (Ibid. p. 34). Eminent critic Balvatray Thakor, an alumnus of Pune’s Deccan College Post Graduate and Research Institute, present in audience and seated in the front row, was reported to leave hall halfway during the lecture, muttering ‘This one was not invited here to sing songs!’
The Progressive Discourse. Poet ‘Sundaram’, novelist Jayanti Dalal and short story writer Jayant Khatri let the Progressive critical discourse in Gujarati literature. Dalal and Khatri were able social activists, Dalal in Ahmedabad area and Khatri in the Kutch region. Radicality of Gandhi’s thought and action influenced the Progressive voice of Gujarati critical discourse and the Gandhian critical discourse had space within it to accommodate the Progressive stream. ‘Sundaram’ and Umashankar Joshi, Dalal and Meghani, Khatri and Kaka Kalelkar, were linked through a relationship of variation rather than opposition. Gandhian critical discourse was large ad polysemic enough to enhance within it the basics of the Progressive critical discourse that was, elsewhere, a distinct, counter-narrative to liberal discourse and ended up developing its own conflicting trends of various types of Progressive discourses.
The Vedic and the Folk. Ramprasad Bakshi’s article, titled ‘Spirituality and Literature’, would surprise us if we fail to read the word ‘Spirituality’ in the way in which this unconventional thinker uses it. Ramprasad Bakshi (who once politely declined to accept the title of ‘Mahamahimopadhyaha’, offered by an institution from Varanasi) takes us to those aspects of Vedic poetry that are intimately connected with lived life. As he points out, quoting from a Bengali scholar, ‘Vedic poetry came out of a joyous and radiant spirit, overflowing with love of life and energy for action, and looking up with serene faith to the Divine for support and inspiration. Because the Vedic sages loved life as well as God, every wish of theirs for the good things of the earth took the form of an ardent prayer. And the prayer often took the form of song which tried to reach “the Supreme Lover of Songs”.’ It is this capacity of Gujarati critical discourse to go beyond facile binaries putting ‘the past’ against ‘the Progressive’, that makes it interesting and enlightening.
Vishnuprasad Trivedi (1899 – 1991), Vijayray Vaidya (1897 – 1974) and Vishvanath Bhatt (1898 – 1968) form among themselves a diligent trio of the Gandhian period. They are among the stars that shine in the twilight zone of transition from the times of Hind Svaraj to the next.
The next section attempts to see how, from around 1955, Gujarati critical discourse transited from the Gandhian period to the next. It is interesting to observe how Gujarati critical gaze explored Gujarat’s global contexts beyond the Colonial to the Continental Europe and to Africa, America and the rest of Asia. During this period, Gujarati critical discourse was hand in hand with its creative literature in exploring into Gujarat’s own marginalized realities: the boli speeches beyond its standard language and realities of its tribal, Dalit and women’s lives beyond the life of urban Gujarat. Two ‘Preparatory Notes’, below, would be useful at this juncture. Naming the Period: Should this period be called ‘Adhunik Yug’/ ‘Modern/ Post Modern Age’? I had argued earlier in this ‘Introduction’ that it was a major genealogical mistake of Indian literary historiography to assert that critical discourses in most of the Indian literatures had begun as late as the mid-19th century. This distortion has resulted from a certain mindlessness, anavadhana, induced mainly by the colonial political power. I would now argue that the same mindlessness, induced by a larger and more complex economic powers of the 21st century, has induced Indian literary historiography to name periods beginning around 1960’s as ‘Modern’ (and then ‘Post Modern’) periods of Indian literatures. This Euro-centric nomenclature, or mis-nomenclature, requires to be examined in view of the concerns, aspirations, anxieties; tools, methods and the spirit of Indian discourses in contemporary Indian languages of the period. Naming of the Critics: The issue of inclusion comes up in each of the time periods of Gujarati critical discourse. The overall space available in this single volume anthology is limited. For the most recent phase, beginning at 1955, this anthology has selected articles by 12 critic. That leaves out a good number of good critics. Eminent critics like Nagindas Parekh, Rasiklal Parikh, Muni Jinavijaya.ji, Muni Punyavijay.ji, Manubhai Pancholi ‘Darshak’, Keshavram Shastri, Gulabdas Broker, Chunilal Madia, Raghuvir Chaudhuri, Bholabhai Patel, Jayant Kothari, Rasik Shah, Jayat Pathak, ‘Ushanas’, Suresh Dalal, Suman Shah, Jayesh Bhogayata, Urmi Desai, Raman Soni, Nitin Mehta (and several more) have not been represented here through their critical works. Critical writings of eleven critics, Umashankar Joshi, Suresh Joshi, Harivallabh Bhayani, Niranjan Bhagat, Chandrakant Topiwala, Chandrakant Sheth, Shirish Panchal, Bhagvandas Patel, Himanshi Shelat, Babu Suthar and Kanti Malsatar, have been included in this anthology. These writings serve two purposes: They embody various aspects important critical concern of this period. Secondly, these eleven articles serve as pointers to critical writings of other important authors of this period.
Reaching out to both the Cosmopolitan and the Marginal. Vivarta or variation of the critical discourse in Gujarati, that leads to what we would like to name as Vyapan Kal or Period of Expansion, begins in around 1955. On August 15, 1947, India won its independence and on January 26, 1950, it formed itself as Federal Republic of India. This altered its place in the community of nations and restored, with due modifications, its ancient identity as a unique civilization. By 1955, Indian literature and its critical discourse shaped itself anew in this context. Gujarati Critical discourse of the past nearly seven decades, represented here through writings of some of the thinkers and researchers of this period, embodies that Indian identity. What kind of understandings and practices of life and literature distinguished this period from the previous one? This question could be answered in many ways. These possible answers could be grouped in two main types: (1) What initiated the Vivarta was a search for modernity and literary modernism, moving away from the Gandhian ideals and ideas on literature associated with them. This modernism was, in turn, was opposed by Nativism and other concerns for the marginalized and othered. This led, according this option, to the Post-modern phase in 1980s. (2) Optionally it could be argued that this Vivarta was initiated by a deep desire for growth experienced by people of Independent India. This desire for Vyapana encompassed both life and literature. The Vyapana was both inward and outward. It harmonized both the tendencies of Gujarati critical discourse: A vast Gujarati diaspora had begun to take shape from the 1960’s and 70’s. Gujarati societies, living in Gujarat and elsewhere around the globe, had begun to come in lively contact with literature, cinema and other arts from all over the world. This helped Gujarati mind to move towards a Cosmopolitan spirit. Simultaneously, new systems, legal and political, had begun to empower the hinterlands of Gujarat and the margins of Gujarati society. Gujarati critical discourse, hence, began to expand organically towards realities and aspirations of those hinterlands and margins. This anthology presents critical discourse that embody both these Vyapana movements of Gujarati culture.
This period has sometimes been named Modern (till around 1990) and Post-modern (then on). It is, I believe, not a happy choice. In doing so, the two terms, ‘Modern’ and ‘Post-modern’ have often been used, at microlevel, as binary opposites to each other. And at macro level, the two terms jointly produce a binary opposite to the Gandhian period, its cultural ideology and its literary theory. This model is linked to many more divides, including those between Sanskrit and Gujarati, Content-oriented literature and Form-oriented, Urban and Rural realities, Westernised and Desi modes of living and expression, etc. – A close reading of both creative and critical writings of these two periods would show clearly that this Euro-centric model, describing the period from 1955 onwards as ‘Modern-Post Modern’ does not correspond to the actualities or the spirit of Gujarati creative and critical works of that period. To call this time span as ‘Modern – Post-modern Age’ is to theorize an opposition between Content or Anatastattva (seen as remnants of the Gandhian age) and Form or Roop Rachana (seen as a characteristic feature of the Modern age). It also emphasises apposition between the Psychological and the Sociological aspects of reality, assigning the former to the Modern period and that latter to the Gandhian period. In this oversimplified theoretic and historiographic schema, indigenous concerns for Dalits, Tribals, OBCs, Women and the Poor are reserved for the Post-modernists while the foreign-inspired formal experiments are taken as domain of the Modernists. This appears to be the case in literary historiography not only of Gujarati but also of many Indian languages. Such a theory and such a historiography repeats the grave theoretic and historiographic mistake that insisted upon total absence of critical discourse in Gujarati before the beginning of colonial rule in Gujarat. Creative writing and critical discourse in Gujarati from 1955 till now needs to be imagined and theorized not in Euro-centric terms of ‘Modern-Post Modern’ but in the context of the two-fold Vyapana that has been progress in Gujarati culture.
Vyapan as Organic Growth rather than Fashionable Foreign Tours or Ford Foundation Projects on Indigenous India. A clearer and larger picture of critical discourse and creative works of this time span could emerge if the paradigm of Modern – Post-modern or Urban – Desi, is replaced by a paradigm of Vyapan. This is not to suggest that explorations in Gujarati critical discourse of this period have been uniform and without internal contestations. Far from it. But these contestations, some of which are represented here in the excerpts from several contemporary critics, do not promote binary divides; they reveal interesting dynamics of a polyphonic and polysemic discourse.
Conversations, if not quite contestations, among Umashankar Joshi, Suresh Joshi, Niranjan Bhagat and Harivallabh Bhayani, especially in the early decades of this period, mark the beginnings of critical discourse of Vyapan. The term ‘Vyapan’ acquires its multiple significance in writings of Umashankar Joshi (1911-1988), one among a few most celebrated, creative and erudite Indian writers of the 20th century. As an author and thinker, he was firmly grounded in Gandhian thought, Sanskrit literature, Indian philosophy and contemporary Indian socio-political realities. He was fully at home with Western literature and thought. An Idea of Indian Literature (1988) and Indian Literature: Personal Encounters (1988) (both in English) present his comprehensive theory of Indian literature and his intimate and illuminative exchanges with some of his contemporary Indian writers. His studies in writings of Tagore, Buddhadeb Basu, Bibhutibhushan Banerjee, Phanishvarnath Renu, Maitreyi Devi, Isamu Shida, Shakespeare, Tolstoy, Eliot, Auden, Samuel Beckett and many others, indicate the depth and width of his critical discourse. He was equally deep rooted into socio-political realities of his contemporary India. An active Satyagrahi from his early years in India’s freedom struggle, Joshi was imprisoned for his part in the Satyagrahas in 1930 and 1932 at Sabarmati and Yeravda Jails. As Member of Parliament, appointed to the Rajya Sabha, he courageously opposed imposition of Emergency in 1975, eloquently speaking at the Parliament in session. His critical understanding of realism in literature is nuanced and deep. In the book Samasamvedan (1948), he wrote: ‘Creative artist tries to express his own vision of the real world. For that very reality, which acquires artform through his individuality, and indeed for the body of language, he is indebted to the society to which he belongs. But to ask him, in the name of social responsibility, to include in his creation such a reality as wished by society or its leadership, amounts to simply being unable to understand identity of artistic creation.’ (Samasamvedan, p. 104). This anthology includes Umashankar Joshi’s article on significance of ‘Shaili’, Style, in literature from his book ‘Shaili ane Svarup’ (1960). It explores many issues of Form in literature and its larger context in life. It elucidates, thorough a comparative evaluation of both ancient Indian and modern Western theories of ‘Style/Shaili’. Suresh Joshi (1921 – 1986), a widely celebrated Gujarati author and thinker, was similarly well grounded in Sanskrit poetics as in modern Western thought, ranging from Existentialism and Phenomenology to the Marxism and Structuralism. He was a voracious reader. Gulam Mahammad Sheikh, renowned painter and Gujarati poet has given an endearing account of this. In a recent article Sheikh has described his interactions, as a young student of Fine Arts, with Suresh Joshi, then a professor of literature, at the M. S. University of Baroda. He says: ‘Even earlier, his [Suresh Joshi’s] reading was extensive. But now [when he settled down at the University in Vadodara] as newer book were available to him, he began to read voraciously European, American and Latin American literatures. He plumbed Chines and Japanese literatures too. Baudelaire, Mallarme, St John Pearce and Albert Camus from French, Kafka and Rilke from German, Lorca and Jiménez from Spanish and Pablo Neruda and Octavio Paz from the Latins, Tao Chi-en, the Chinese and the famous Haiku poet Basho, fiction writers Kawabata Yasunari, Osamu Dazai and Yukio Mishima, also the world renowned American writers Hemingway and Faulkner, Robert Frost and Walt Whitman, from Tolstoy to Bosir Pasternak and Alexander Solzhenitsyn from Russia, the Italians Alberto Moravia and Luigi Pirandello – all were included.’ (See. The journal ‘Samipe’, ed. Shirish Panchal et al. Jan-March, April-June 2021, p. 20-21.) (tr. S.Y.) Suresh Joshi’s contribution to the Vyapan of Gujarati critical discourse is not only huge in terms of newer authors, books and trends that he introduced into Gujarati literary culture, but in terms of a change in understanding what is ‘literary’, Discussing the process of ‘Roop Nirmiti’, i.e., creation of art form, he says: ‘[W]e do get experiences [of life and reality] directly or could imaging them. But that is only the raw material. For it to become a work of literature, it has to undergo certain Sanskar [ceremony of initiation]. I would call it the Sanskar of Samvidhan [ceremony of initiation into a Form]. That which is one and matchless can neither be subjected to variations nor can it provide asvad [aesthetic pleasure]. But as soon as a prapancha [production of aesthetic form] of many results through leela [playfulness] of the One, then without any delay the question of production of Form [Samvidhana] through mutual relationships of parts [ang-s] comes up. If any [literary] value or mystery [mulya, rahasya] of experience [of life and reality], it comes only through the Samskar that the creative writer performs on it.’ (Joshi. 1960. Kimchit. P.132.) (tr. S.Y.) The article included in this anthology, ‘Our Literary Criticism’, shows how he interrogated Gujarati critical discourse of this period and raised important questions about both its metalanguage and its concerns..
But it is in the critical writing of Niranjan Bhagat that Gujarati critical discourse came to have an unmediated vision of Cosmopolitan spirit and letters. He was a truly cosmopolitan thinker and poet, who read, interpreted and translated directly from Baudelaire and Mallarme, Sartre and Camus and Backet and Ionesco from French originals, and was at home in Paris, a city he walked through several times in several years, on foot. He was equally at home with English and Bengali languages and literatures. Niranjan Bhagat taught English literature and knew Bengali language and literature intimately. He wrote insightfully and comprehensively on Eliot, Auden and John Donne in English and Tagore, Jibananand Das and Buddhadev Bose in Bengali, to mention some. His talks and lectures, put together by others in a multivolume series titled ‘Svadhyay Lok’ (‘World of Self-instruction’) brought in not only a large number of literary texts but also a hermeneutic capable of reading those texts in their political, economic, social and spiritual contexts, not only in any one but in many different cultures. While Niranjan Bhagat helped contemporary Gujarati culture to greatly expand its hermeneutic horizon, he always made sure that in doing so the literary texts were never subordinated to the cultural contexts. Bhagat argued: ‘Poetry is not a replacement for mysticism, ethics, sociology or political thought. Poetry [literature] is autonomous. Poetry is not a means for the poet, it is an object to be achieved. All the sciences mentioned above are means for the poet, but then the poet transforms them into poetry through his particular genius, or Imagination, or creativity, call it by any name you wish. And if the poet cannot transform them [cannot perform their Roopantar ], then mahati vinashti [utter destruction]. ( Bhagat. Svadhayalok: 6, p. 8). (tr. S.Y.)
This anthology incudes excerpts from critical writings by Harivallabh Bhayani, internationally renowned linguist and researcher into Prakrit and Apabramsha literatures, as well as into modern critical theories. The piece included here ‘Stylistics Approaches - Western and Indian’ forms only a small part of his vast scholarship. Juxtaposed with Umashankar Joshi’s article on ‘Shaili’ and Ramprasad Bakshi’s article on, a great scholar of Sanskrit literature and poetics, who interpreted contemporary Gujarati literary works in the light of Indian poetics, point out to a rich site of Indian hermeneutics, that gives Gujarati critical discourse a historical depth.
Vyapan that Gujarati critical discourse has achieved through Niranjan Bhagat, Harivallabh Bhayani and Ramprasad Bakshi provides it with a width and a depth that can never be overstated. It only reminds us of many great savants whose works have not been included here: from Muni Jinavijayaji, Muni Punyavijayaji, Pandit Sukhlal.ji, Dr Hasmukh Sanskaliya, Dr Prabodh Pandit, Dr Madhusudan Dhanki, Prof G C Jhala, Dr Arunoday Jani, to mention some most eminent scholars of Sanskrit who contributed to critical discourse in Gujarati, their mother tongue.
Past four decades, from around 1980, have been a time span of momentous changes globally but also at grass roots. Collapse of so many structures and institutions, of society, polity, economy and language is matched by new construction of equally numerous structures and institutions in each of these fields of human endeavours. Gujarati critical discourse has reflected with vigour and sincerity if with trepidation and tentativeness that enhance its sincerity. These contemporary critical voices could be grouped into three categories: Some explore the Cosmopolitan character of contemporary life and literature. Some, on the other hand, focus on exploring the indigenous traditions of Sanskrit, Prakrit, Apabhramsha and Old Gujarati literature and poetics. Then there is a critical (and creative) exploration into the large marginalized areas of Gujarati life and letters: Those of the Dalits, the Tribal and Women. Space available for this anthology allowed inclusion of only some representatives of this manyfold critical exploration. Thus, contemporary critics whose works have been included here, in addition to Umashankar Joshi and Suresh Joshi, are Niranjan Bhagat, Chandrakant Topiwala, Chandrakant Sheth, Shirish Panchal, Babu Suthar, Bhagvandas Patel, Himanshi Shelat and Kanti Malsatar. But a large number of contemporary critics, mentioned below, have hugely contributed to contemporary Gujarati critical discourse in the different categories mentioned above.
This would, we trust, encourage readers, researchers and translators of Gujarati literature and critical discourse, towards critical work by many other authors of this period, including Rasik Shah (1922 - 2016), Varis Alvi (1928-, 2014) Pramodkumar Patel (1933-1996), Labhshankar Thakar (1935 – 2016), Raghuvir Chaudhuri (1938), Jayant Gadit (1938-2009), Suman Shah (b.1939), Nitin Mehta (1944 - ), Raman Soni (1946), Jayesh Bhogayata (1954) Rajesh Pandya (19 ) Hemant Dave (19 ); critics of theatre and cinema including Amrit Gangar (1949) Mahesh Champaklal (1951), Utpal Bhayani (1953 -); exponents of the metaphysical literature, including Makarand Dave (1922 – 2005), Harindra Dave (1930 - 1995), , Balvant Jani (1951), Niranjan Rajyaguru(1954); researchers into Charani culture and literature, like Ambadan Rohadiya (1959); researchers into tribal literature of Gujarat including Bhagavandas Patel (1943), Shankarbhai (1927) and Revabahen Tadvi (1929); researchers into Sanskrit, Prakrit, Apabhramsha and Old Gujarati literature, from this period, including Bhogilal Sandesara (1917 -11995), Jayant Kothari (1930-2001), Tapasvi Nandi (1933), Gautam Patel (1936), Rajendra Nanavati (1939), Vijay Pandya (1943), Vasant Bhatt (1953); critics exploring Dalit literature, Bhi. Na. Vankar (1942), Mohan Parmar (1948), B. Keshar Shivam, Chandu Maheriya, Harish Mangalam (1952), Dalpat Chauhan (1940), Madhukant Kalpit (1945); critics of Women’s literature, including Dhirubahen Patel (1926) Himanshi Shelat (1947), Bindu Bhatt (1954), Varsha Adalaja (1940), Ila Arab Mehta (1938), Sarup Dhruv (1948) ; critics on other arts, dance, painting, architecture and sculpture and photography, Sunil Kothari (1933 -2020), Gulam Mohammad Sheikh (1937), Madhusudan Dhanki (1927 -2016), Narottam Palan (1935), Jyoti Bhatt (1934) and some other equally eminent writers, practitioners. Had this been a multi-volume anthology it could have included many of these seminal critics in English translation.
Articles selected for inclusion here trace main contours of Gujarati critical discourse in progress at present: Shirish Panchal’s article, ‘Crisis in Literary Criticism’ introduces comprehensively issues and enigmas of contemporary critical discourse, Gujarati and global. His comprehensive study in Bharatiya Katha Vishva (Vols 1 to 5. 2020) is a landmark in contemporary Gujarati critical discourse, it expand the horizon of Gujarati critical discourse to ancient Vedic, Bauddh, Jain world of Katha, to Kathasaritsagara and the later world of medieval Indian Katha Vishva. Chnadrakant Topiwala’s article explores a vast topography through tools and methods of Comparative Literature. His central concern, presented masterfully in 16 books, is with frontiers of critical theories of Western, East European and Russian thinkers and with worldwide contemporary creative writing. Chnadrakant Sheth’s article gives an insider’s account of how to explore the creative and critical situation in Gujarat. Babu Suthar, a linguist by training, explores, on the other hand, the outer reaches of contemporary global critical theories. Kanti Malsatar’s article presents promises and promises of Gujarat’s contemporary literature of the marginalised in Gujarat, especially of the Dalit and OBC. Bhagvandas Patel’s work on tribal culture of Gujarat, especially the Bhil community that straddles several states including Gujarat, explores the desi dimension of Gujarati culture. Himansh Shelat explores, with courage and deep understanding, both psychological and political-economic dimensions of the world of women in contemporary times. Readers might like to see elsewhere my critical work on the literature of the disabled and on Comparative Literature and contemporary Indian literature not included in this anthology.
Umashankar Joshi often pointed out that Gujarati language has a special pronoun, AapaNe, a unique form of the first-person plural, that neither English nor other Indian languages have. ‘We’, ‘Hum’ etc. indicate the plural of ‘I’, but do not quite specify what they include: English ‘We’ has many hues: ‘We’ could either include ‘You’ or exclude ‘You’. (Consider ‘We stand united against You or Them’.) Again, ‘We’ is used as self-identification of the Powerful Individual or Institution. Gujarati first person plural ‘AapaNe’ is inclusive of both the plurals, of ‘I’ and of ‘Thou’. That plurality and inclusiveness in that Gujarati pronoun represents the best in Gujarati culture. And, indeed, it points out to the best in Indian culture and in culture as such, anywhere. It was this quality that illuminated creative and critical works of Gujarati authors from Narasimha Maheta to Mohandas Gandhi and, hopefully, then on. In fact, it goes back a good three centuries before Narasimha, all the way to the Apabhramsha stage of Gujarati language, in Gurjara Apabramsha as described by Hemachandra in the 12th century. In one of his well-known anushasana trilogy, namely in his Kavyanushasana, Hemachadra holds that Mahakavya could be written not only in Sanskrit, Prakrit and Apabhamsha languages (as per the long older convention) but also in what he called ‘Bhuta Bhasha’. Two of younger monks from amongst his or his fellow monk’s pupils, namely Vajrasen and Shalibhadra, began the practice of writing poetry in the local, regional language that was to acquire the name of Gujarati a little later. When Gujarati became a language of literature, it added to the three traditional languages of literature, it did not banish them. ‘Sarva bhasha parinata jaini vak’, ‘language of the Jina, which is capable of resulting into all languages [of humans, animals, plants]’, is how Hemachandra describes language of the Tirthankara. ‘AapaNe’ was the spirit, as Hemachandra and Gandhi practiced, of Gujarati poetry and poetics. It guided Gujarati literature and critical understanding of literature. The pronoun ‘ApaNe’, the verb ‘Vyap’ and the noun ‘Vyapana’, understood in this dynamic and cohesive sense, are, I submit, good indicators for further exploration into Gujarati culture, literature and critical discourse.
This inquiry into Gujarati critical discourse, its vivarta leela (to use a term employed by Narasimharao Divetia) could best rested here with words of Pandit Sukhlal Sanghavi (1880-1978), a profound anekantavadi thinker. As he has affirmed: ‘Life is truly unfathomable. . . . One might think about and imagine life at any level, but those thoughts and imaginations would always seem inadequate. Thought and imagination would never be able to get hold of life in its fulness and reality. It would retain as distant and as untouched as it was before the first grasp [by the mind] over it. . . . Even then, man is always at his search for life-stuff (Jivanatattva) and the various camp-sites of that search are the different pathways of religions. . . . It could be said that whatever of Indian Literature or World Literature is available now, is a direct proof of that search.’ (Pandit Sukhlalji: Darshan ane Chintan, Part 1, ed Dalsukh Malvania et l. 1956. P. 20.)
March 6, 2022.
Sama, Vadodara.