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It's Tagore next
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Gulzar, the poet with a poignant pen, has moved on to a new project
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— Photo: P.V. Sivakumar
From Munshi Premchand to Tagore... Gulzar in new shades
HE HAS been a sort of an enigma. Adored, envied, criticised, ridiculed. Called mediocre, opportunist and even a fraud at times. But he has endured it all, and managed to stand apart, spotless like the trademark white kurta-pyjama he always sports. A poet, lyricist, short story writer , playwright, scriptwriter, documentary and film producer and director, Gulzar seems to have indulged in almost all areas of creative communication, and has carved a niche for himself. In the eye of the proverbial storm, for his recent adaptation of Premchand's works on Doordarshan, and the commemorative film he is making for the Sahitya Akademi, he shares here a few words.
How do you manage to indulge in so many forms of creative expression?
Basically, it is the need for expression. Sometimes you manage to say what you want to through a poem, but when you find the form inadequate, you resort to fiction, so the same thing becomes a short story. When that expands further it takes the form of a screenplay, though it sometimes becomes a long short story. This is because I haven't learnt the art of writing a novel.
You have been trying to resurrect literary classics into cinema. Beginning with Mirza Ghalib, Tehreer Munshi Premchand Ki, and now one understands you plan to work on Tagore. Tell us the kind of difficulties one faces in translating written text?
Ghalib is different from Munshi Premchand and Rabindranath Tagore. Working on Ghalib was like scratching under the skin to discover the man behind the name. To try and trace the steps that led him to the greatness, the man went on to achieve. To trace the environment of a personality, their thinking and psyche, have been matters of curiosity, and this interest has been with me for a long time, in fact, right from the beginning. I did a lot of research on Mirabai for example.
Coming to Premchand, were you apprehensive about the responses, considering he was a comparatively modern writer?
Not particularly. I have never bothered about how people will react to my films. The important thing has been how I feel about it and then how I convey it or share it with others. The audience comes later. With Premchand, there was another motivation also. I have been writing a lot for children. I felt we have been a little unfair to this generation whom we accuse of not reading. In our times, the medium was only books, and a little bit of radio. . This generation has computer, television, cinema and other mediums. So expecting them to stick to books alone is very unfair. I thought literature has to go to themin their medium because future literature will be available through those mediums.
But the classics that we talk about, well very little of it is available except for a few films that exist. Every language in this country is a treasure house of immortal literature.
How did the idea come up?
It cropped up during an interaction with the Doordarshan authorities. Somebody had to take the plunge. So I took it. I wanted to do Tagore. But they said you first do it in Hindi, because the Bengali directors won't be able to do justice to that language. So I took it up as a mission. I did Tehreer Munshi Premchand Ki, which is doing very well. There is no space for any more ads in the programme. They have eliminated the titles and the recaps to accommodate ads. Now I wish they bring out DVDs, or whatever other medium they can think of. The programme must reach the students; otherwise the very purpose will be defeated.
SURESH KOHLI
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