ENCOUNTERS
Poetic reminiscences
DEEPA ONKAR
|
On the occasion of National Poetry day in the US on April 25, celebrating the poets of New England.
|
PHOTO: V. GANESAN
Bringing cultures together: Through ‘leaves of poetry.’
The term ‘Indian themes – to the popular Western imagination – could suggest fragments of words and images – an ancient civilization, vast, colourful, confusing in its diversity of cultures. Looking a little further than popul
ar images, into literary works, images of mango groves, clouds gathering darkly before the rains, and strange meditative practices proliferate. Literature and philosophy flourished in ancient India at a time when wandering monks and yogis debated with each other liberation from a world they considered unsatisfactory.
Interconnected
Just to what an extent classical Indian thought had an impact on American literature, and especially poetry, was brought out by the talk and interactive session on ‘Indian themes in American Poetry’ by Dr. Kris Fresonke, a Ph.d in American Literature , and Ms. Kelly Kopical, an admissions officer at Washington University with a Masters in English Literature from Middlebury College, held at the US Consulate, Chennai. The participants got a glimpse of the evolution of poetry in the cultural context of nineteenth century New England and the origins of that poetry—inspired by the philosophy and thought of the Transcendentalists . The inter-connectedness between the lives, poetry and thought of the of the times were traced out in a detailed and vivid manner. Dr. Fresonke dwelt at length on the poem Passage to India – Whitman’s representations of India – as a faraway place with vast questions, drawn mostly from his readings of the Transcendentalists . He knew no Sanskrit … but there’s a mantra- like quality to his verse. His verse is not terse – it reaches out to embrace the reader into the expanses of his thought. The reader journeys along with the poet – as Dr. Fresonke put it ’the poem becomes an occasion for travel and meditation’:
The old, most populous of wealthiest of Earth’s lands,
The streams of the Indus and the Ganges and their many affluents,
(I my shores of America walking today, beholding, resuming all)
The tale of Alexander, on his warlike marches, suddenly dying,….
Move over quickly… from the celebration of mythical grandeur in Whitman’s meditations to the live-wire immediacy of the poetry of Allen Ginsberg. In the second part of the talk, Ms Kopical gave an overview of the life and poetry of Ginsberg – information that many students of American literature would be eager to snap up.
The lofty Brahma and the Ganges ( of Whitman) give way to watching:
As the leper looked up and rested, conversing curiously can by his side, approaching a puddle.
Kali had pissed standing up and then felt her way back to the Shop Steps on
Thin brown legs…
As a cow busied its mouth chewing her rags left wet on the ground for five
minutes digesting ( From Describe: The Rain on Dasaswamedh Ghat)
There is a similarity in the incantatory quality of the poetry of Ginsberg and Whitman; Ginsberg learnt to play the harmonium, took ideas from Bengali poets and wove together the music, poetry, and spiritualism that he encountered during his sojourns in Calcutta. He constantly experimented with rhythms, melodies, and...drugs. The beginnings of the counter-culture of the beatniks are to be found in the life and poetry of Ginsberg.
Hang on... what does experimentation with philosophy and aesthetics have to do with a sense of belonging? The poems of Agha Shahid Ali, a Kashmiri poet, mimic the structure and cadence of the ghazal, bringing to them the intimacy of an insider’s knowledge and a close appreciation of its aesthetics. They are set in contemporary New England, and are a search for cultural identity, through the experience of living in the two cultures.
Newer definitions of identity that push at cultural boundaries....
Printer friendly
page
Send this article to Friends by
E-Mail
Literary Review
