Parajuli's Fiction: Nepali Diaspora in the Context of Globalization
HB Bhandari Prabhat
Washington DC, USA
Much has been written on Indian Diaspora, but surprisingly very little has been examined on that of the Nepali people. In spite of some resemblance regarding certain issues, the histories of these nations are quite different. Nepal was never under foreign control. By contrast, India was colonized and only gained freedom in 1947 from British imperialism. This state of colonial independence has been the creative force of Nepali writers of all times, to explore family saga. Currently, due to the failure to adroit handling of conundrum situations (internal issues), geographical constraint and hegemony of neighboring countries, the situation of the nation has become horrendous. At this juncture, Nepali authors from every location feel the diaspora of a happy past in the present context, at a time when the entire wall has tumbled down. Hence this paper seeks to establish both the space and pain explored in the fiction of Gopal Parajuli, one of the foremost Nepali literary figures in this age, where the fall of all types of different barriers all over the world has made this era of globalization and integration possible. The combined exploitative forces of inner human instincts and their counter-assaults are the objects of Parajuli's social criticism. Full of the mixing of genres, his satire focuses on the chaos of the modern world, which initiates when people are not sensitive to their duties and ethics. The venture of modern people proves fickle for both society and the individual. His characters are an actual and symbolic representation of the suppressed and the oppressed beings of the world. In his later period, dating from publication of Nayan Ishwarko Ghosana (Declaration of a New God), Madan Prize and INLS best award US winning epic poem, Parajuli has garnered much public appreciation. Parajuli's other publications include Golardhaka Dui Chheu (The Two Extremes), a collection of one act plays, Sadakpachhi Sadak (Road after Road), a play, Prithibimathi Alekh (The Mother Figure), an epic poem, Himalmathi Alekh( Mark on the summit), an epic poem, Deshmathi Alekh (A Salute to the Nation), an epic poem, Shabda Shatabdi (The Lost Century), an epic poem and collection of short stories Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction). For his short stories he won the Bhanu Anniversary Prize in 1976, Sajha Award in 1993 and Mainali Katha Puraskar in 2004. The motif, settings, and characters help to make these books acclaimed works of creativity. Parajuli fundamentally writes about the tragedy of the fall of civilization and the failure of fraternity. In fact, we do not live in the heroic era of Ram and Buddha, but rather in a grubby age of commerce, mafia, gangs and wars. Parajuli, a strong supporter of democratic vision in his writing creates various characters to demonstrate the chaos of the modern world. His writings are inventive in language and innovative in subject matter. Some of his works have been criticized as being too obscure and are often observed as serious, absurd and experimental by many of his readers. In extremely simplified terms, his writings are a window to see from both a universal perspective whilst at the same time watching a realistic close-up vision of it all. Almost all his story titles are thematically pregnant with the meaning - without love all that is left for us is destruction. Illuminating the theme of his writings, Parajuli, in an interview with Sarup, Kamala for “Nepal Forum.Com” affirms: “The themes in my works vary as freedom, peace, law and order, love and above all nostalgia for past glorious times. Through my more recent writings I would like to convey the message of hope more forcefully than in the style I applied to other works like Himalmathi Alekh, Sabda Satabdi and Samayako Prasthan” (4) His interview reminds us of Martin Luther King's catch phrase, ‘I have a dream’. It is not only the dream and hope of idealism, but also about commitment to an equipoise state of peace. We can be fully satisfied with Parajuli's vision regarding the present situation in which he shows that those who sold history and turned this age into concentration camps have been smiling. He further says, ‘Observing the dramatic change of the present, I am writing to see at what point the world will be changed into a place of peace, pleasure and happiness’ (9). His stories open with a description of some particular character's idiosyncrasies that interweave his past and present. He has employed it in a very profound way. His fiction deals with the problem of modern times. Parajuli once remarked: “In Acton, London, I put forward three points. These were – ‘I destroyed the plot, I destroyed characterization, I destroyed the traditional, foundational world. I involved myself in the creation of style and thought and in the restructuring of literary forms without using explanations and interpretations’.” He has deconstructed the plot of fiction. Therefore, his writings hold an anti-traditional vision in both content and form. His single feeling provides a comprehensive relationship with a person’s entire personality and thinking, juxtaposed with the hideous contradiction of falsehood and truth. Parajuli has given his best as a consummate storyteller and stylist in his short stories. Passions and crazes are personified in the collection of short stories Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction). There are a lot of villains in one single story. Many kinds of infernal actions of these characters present a vivid picture of the hatred, revenge, mediocrity, vulgarity and uprootedness prevailing in contemporary society. These demons embedded in human instincts are not only graphic literary symbols but are also real, tangible forces. This is where Parajuli's narrative art with an intrusive narrator celebrates its greatest triumphs and bestows a reading experience of a deeply original kind, harrowing but also stimulating and edifying. In fiction, Parajuli broadens his attempts to represent the individual’s life by welding together the interior and exterior lives of many characters. In addition, and perhaps more importantly, he has formed a distinct philosophy of life, which is intimately connected with his ideas. When we read his stories, we live every aspect of them along with his fictional characters. He experiments with language by combining traditions of heroic poetry with comic prose. It is an attempt to embody a theory of history and dramatic elements within fiction where everything is cyclical, repeating itself over and over again as in the story, 'It is not magic’: He has no Job. He could be so lucky to win the lottery. (56) The use of such a semi-poetic line in fiction is a new experiment in Nepali literature. Moreover, his fiction is molded in the cultural texture of the superb glory of forefathers, where the representation of the root’s image is both momentary as well as fixed. His acquaintances with marginalized characters symbolize a humanistic sense of meaning and mission blending with one another as well as with various historical and mythical figures. In the face of modern cruelty, nothing can be left for pride and self-respect to hand over to the coming generations. More covertly, he has been creating space for grotesque, comic, touching, honest and wonderful characters, whilst proclaiming unity and fraternity to restore the glorious Indus valley, Vedic as well as many other civilizations of the Ancient East. Parajuli paints a dark and powerful portrait of the dehumanizing effects of exploitation. Inspired by modern world chaos, Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction) knit together the story of marginalized people. In fragmented narrative, his fiction examines the mental and physical trauma caused by exploitation. Parajuli addresses several reoccurring diasporas: the quest for self-representation, spiritual values and cultural identity of the past in the context of globalization. Globalization versus Localization Globalization is the social, economic and political progression that has created room for modern-day subsistence and the whole world has thus become connected in a historically unparalleled manner. Moreover, it constitutes a stable community of people formed on the basis of common language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up. According to Anthony Giddens, a cultural critic, globalization has been exemplified as ‘the intensification of world-wide social relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away’. And for David Harvey it is ‘Time-Space compression’. In a nutshell, globalization as the solidarity and integrated consciousness of the globe has become an omnipresent term in a wide range of academic discourses. After global modernity entered local culture, some critics doubt that such a hybrid mass-culture could ever serve to continue and strengthen western imperialism after postcolonial nationalism. Showing the possibility of world culture and new global order long ago in the Wealth of Nations (1776), Adam Smith recognizes it as ‘mutual communication of knowledge’ and extensive commerce from all countries to all countries. And in the same vein, for Marx and Engels, the spread of capitalism to the production of a global culture has meant that ‘national one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from numerous works of national and local literature there arises a world literature’. Despite their other differences, Smith, Marx and Engels observed the process of globalization as a leading phenomenon towards genuine universalism. Globalization, however, must be seen as a complex and multi-dimensional phenomenon that involves different levels of tension and conflict. Replacing imperialism, it could focus on the domination of developing countries by developed ones, or of national and local literature and economy. For Marxists and multi-culturalists, globalization is bringing about the devastating destruction of local culture and traditions, the subordination of poorer nations by richer ones and the homogenization of culture and everyday life. It holds a definite potential for greater freedom and democratization, but also holds the danger of domination by the stronger over the weaker. Globalization mixes new and old, innovation and destruction at both a global and local scale. A new global culture is emerging as a result of computers and communication technology. What cannot be denied is that the expansion of private cable and satellite systems has been aggressively promoting a commercial culture throughout the world. In this sense, local and national cultures are bastions of their identities. However, tension rejects jeopardizing and romanticizing the creation of new local identities, which makes it able to challenge all the paradoxes and complications of identity formation. It is for this reason that Arjun Appadurai, the Indian ethnologist and sociologist, living in the USA has claimed, “The imagination that is now central to all forms of agency is itself a social fact, and it is the key component of the new global order. The relationship between global and local is sometimes thorny and confusing as culture has been precisely the localizing force that distinguished societies and people from each other. It is, moreover, such a particularizing force that local identities, practices and modes of everyday life depend on it. The concept of globalization should not be seen cynically and hopelessly as inexorably destroying entire local forces, the world's entry into the phantasmagoria of consumer capitalism.” Living in multicultural societies and being characterized by a certain ethnic identity, Nepali communities abroad and within the country itself need to talk about the problem of ethnicity. They are engaged in active economic and cultural competitions and have experienced ethnic discrimination, both explicitly and covertly. Sometimes, they are scapegoats in ethnic and political conflict too. For example, the killing of 12 Nepali men by militants in Iraq in 2004 has inspired the film Manche ko Maya (The love of Mankind), a film by the Nepali film director Narayan Puri. The film depicts the obstacles faced by Nepali workers to get jobs in the Middle East, and the cultural shock they experience. Root always resists in the end, making its identity fight against contradictory forces of colonization and homogenization regarding local identity - blood, nation and affection. The film describes Nepali local tradition to the world in forms of divergent wars and finds some negotiable point for the coexistence of both local and global. The culture is described as global: the new world order involves promoting lifestyle, consumer products and local identities. Local literature and culture at this point and era of clash of contradiction, promote themselves to the point of mutual understanding and negotiation. Samuel Huntington, in the context of his widely discussed and much criticized theories about the ‘clash of civilizations’ claims that the main axis of international conflict on a world scale will be the difference of cultures rather than of nations, political and economic systems or standards of development: “For the relevant future, there will be no universal civilization, but instead a world of different civilizations, each of which will have to learn to coexist with each other.” His vision rightly strengthens lines appearing in the same issue of Garima: “We must not hold the concept that only participating in the global market makes society strong and healthy. If such participation comes at the price of identity, the root suffers and revolts. On the contrary, literature, which does not reach an international readership, can never expand its horizon by introducing the same root. Therefore, writers writing in English such as Abhi Subedi, Samrat Upadhaya, D.B. Gurung, Shreedhar Gautam, Arun Gupto, Sanjib Upreti, Manjushree Thapa and many others have faced the challenge to maintain a healthy balance between their root and globalization, which has become a new international system nourishing and rearing a sense of community, identity and nationhood in the broad sense.” (199) Questions of identity, diaspora and a sense of nationhood have been themes of Nepali literature for a long time. Many writers in the vein of Gopal Parajuli write about such sense of loss even though they are residing within their national boundary. In all of Parajuli’s writings we find such a healthy balance. For example, universal pain has been spread from the mourning of Narayanhiti blood to the Pentagon in Parajuli’s epic poem The Departure of Time: In reporting the News of Nayanhiti massacre ………………….. To congregate the collection of Pentagon the world …………………………………….. It impairs Himalayas Hurts soil and stone Aches even more to Lately born infant. (10) His writings that range from the plangent and heart breaking to the truly horrific in some stories, in the end maintain equality regarding the scope of common law and opportunity. On this basis he creates emotion and provides the setting in which people, such as those so lovingly portrayed here, can maintain the balance between global and local values and realize the déjà-vu the author experiences in his imagination. Social Sensitivity: Crisis in Human Values A short story is a condensed fictional narrative in prose. A novel, by contrast, typically presents many characters that more leisurely develop through several interconnecting story lines and conflicts, evoking a multiplicity of emotional reactions. Parajuli’s major themes are quintessential to the 20th century: human isolation, anxiety, and the relationship between life and art. Fantastic and realistic elements are perfectly blended in his experimental, mythic stories. The underlying theme involves the unifying power of love and equality. The writer feels that only love for one another can bind together the world’s diverse racial groups and allow them to overcome their trepidation and suspicion of one another. The effect created with such high sensibility in fiction is cumulative and not dependent upon one particular event. Pouring over the precarious world of the future, his characters are caught up in the cyclone of mental conflict between the opposite forces of love and hate. The character 'I' has an ambivalent relationship with these two and is indecisive. With this, he indicates convoluted exploitation and antagonism in the wake of this big chasm through which characters are alienated and thrown into a state of Hamletian dilemma: "A picture that was being drawn and rubbed out on the canvas during the past hours arises. I'm standing with all my limbs bursting with eagerness. Her look abandons the earth and turns towards me. Mine abandons the sky and turns towards her. As she continues looking, a hint of shyness bursts out from the corner of her lips. "I am devoted to you." I can keep on reading her. I can keep on listening to her. I cannot say ‘Yes’, I cannot say ‘No’. I have this thing with personality."(172) The human condition is very much pathetic and fragmented. Moreover, the narrator structures the story in such a way that past events explain the present. Throughout his fictional narrative, there is such motif repeated with regularity and description of the characters' difference between appearance and reality. In the story entitled ‘Innocents in crowd', various characters prove it: Ratne- always flaunts the latest fashion. Passne- wears his wife's Patuka expecting to win at gambling. Bale- enjoys the sight of Dille's wife wearing bangles. Mukhiyaa- gives the assurance of property to common folk if he gets the opportunity to be a minister. Masine- denounces his son's wedding getting a measly dowry. Annare- selects a rich boy as a tutor and sends his daughter to his home Deve- enjoys double-dealing Kapali- constructs buildings on Homnath's property -------------- ---------------- ------------- Kale.Gore.Kaile have vanished in the jungle of mankind. They do not have their own identities. (23) Parajuli represents the voice of unity, compassion, and a straightforward yearning for a just and equitable society, sometimes changing himself into them and speaking from their perspective. Through metaphorical language such as 'He's been coughing because the pain may be blocked in the throat', Parajuli reveals a sense of surrogate reality and tormented feelings of the prostitute: “Whore! Where is my future, where is my history, where is my present, can you tell me whore --- I would like to walk alone. Society follows me in every corridor. You hate me, branding me a whore yet love me immediately.” It is a cosmic irony. He relates the character's psyche so spontaneously that it is very difficult to penetrate our own conscience. He shows the dilemma of life via such a character. In the story, The Bifurcated Road, he indicates the road split into two directions and tells the philosophy of life by positioning his character in an indecisive mood. ‘I am dedicated to myself - I assure and look towards the bifurcated road.’ In the short story Sahili, the central character, Sahili has a very popular inn. She does not keep any stone unturned for the sake of her business. It shows how people are compelled to survive. Characters like Sahili in our society are in a terrible predicament. Through the suffering of such characters, the author projects abject poverty in her celerity. The wonderful challenge depicted on the way is like the icing on the cake. There are no 'ifs' and 'buts' in the life of undefined characters, such as ' Dhap'. The character does not capitulate to anything. With pain he becomes the spitting image of struggle. He struggles, hoping to see light at the end of the tunnel. He thinks himself under the heel of obstacles. He could not perform a momentous ritual due to lack of money. Collecting money by selling wood becomes a distant dream. Characters are cadaverous, outwardly, due to implanted chaos. They do not like to see any type of collusion between people. Firstly, they try to change themselves in order to bring rapid change to the globe. In this sense, his characters are not lackadaisical. Their journeys are like a labyrinth of the whole mystery of creation. After this everyone sees man with lachrymose, which is superabundant to understanding the mystery of creation in his story Smelling the Horizon. In most of his stories the narrator is very wary, one from waylay, even a whit it seems can damage it erelong. The odor does not leave the crowd neither outside nor inside. 'Hanging the crowd on my eye I have been seeking a man. Tying odors on my nose I have been smelling the horizon' (12). Without eternal truth a man can’t be a real man. His characters, who do not only wander in a dreamlike state, are well acquainted with this fact. They keep their finger on the pulse of the situation. Batty natures and envious attitudes of the world engage them in an exploration of the beacon of life: the proper combination of mind and soul. They try to bedeck their lives through their toil. The external relationship of the characters turns to bay leaves. They are duly deceived as the character 'He' is sent away with a flea in his ear while begging for help. Therefore, they are flat broke in many senses. He says, 'Why does a cheater worship in a temple of mine' (119). This romantic irony enraptures the author and arouses the first flush of enthusiasm, which is more than flesh and blood can stand. The characteristics of 'He' characters are very unusual in the story, Ashtray - 'He' is as cold as a dog and as cheap as dirt. He cannot fight with imbroglio. While handling such characters, Parajuli's voice is imbued with an unusual seriousness, containing social sensibility. Some characters seem 'barking-mad' for money. Yet Parajuli appears as brave as Achilles and as boundless as the ocean. He exhorts fraternity and truth in the world, which has become as arid as the sands of the Sahara due to each other’s belligerence. Different idiosyncrasies of characters are exploited to present the unusual enigma of modern day people: 'Manoj speaks in English after drinking alcohol; Sushil is merely a Dr rather than a man. Loke – a drunkard, has the habit of dropping names. Everywhere Manoj speaks…..he has dominated.' (67). What is nebulous is the author's sorrow regarding present society and his urge for tremulous evolution as the space of diligent people has been occupied by such characters that fire all cylinders and change societies into curate's eggs. In his stories, despots and blue-blooded people themselves are living a life of depravity. A hankering after betterment without toil is futile. The life of such characters proves life as cairn of struggle in the real sense. From the bootee era they don't get better nourishment and a proper environment for better understanding. Thus, they can’t come up with new ideas and therefore botch up their duties completely as well as their responsibilities and regrets: ‘”Biraj!” I cry seeing the army at the Boarder. “You did not hear. I do not speak with you.”’(136). The author blushes at such activities and presents various logical arguments to bolster his sense of loss and love. The time has been conspiring against such an innocent country and its people. Open Border, furthermore, is a highly symbolic work that looks at social and psychological disorder through the central metaphor of the present day scenario. The interplay between the narrators' perception and characters’ fragmented journey on diverging roads have established ivory in both style of narrative and point of view. Chaos and disorder are aptly reflected by the characters Tile, Yagya, Purne and Kalu. In suffering, the character ‘He’ explores ‘conscience’ in a story entitled. Inside Fire. The character 'He' is displaced and searches 'man' in an ambiguous universe. The isolation of self in an alienating society develops in one a state of schizophrenia and broadens the chasm between appearance and reality, civilization and savagery, innocence and experience. Man is living dead in the heart of the city. In the canvass of Road and Attitude, momentous changes of attitude and divisions in the road of existence have been painted, whilst Other Direction seeks the direction of commitment, conviction, courtesy and courage. Unlike sophisticated people, however, the more grotesque characters seek ways to escape from their terrible predicaments in one way or the other. As a phlegmatic writer, Parajuli envisages a better future, categorically rejecting the chameleon nature of such people. He is unhappy with the abstruse nature of politics, where the voice of the plebian mind has become a distant dream. He explores this theme again and again in all his writings, including poems: ' From here From there From that side as well Do not fence in the country with bullets If you cannot stand In this country To welcome those, Those who are waiting in their mother's wombs To be born.' (12) Illiberal people wait for the time to pour oil on troubled waters and are capricious. One persecutes the other who does not toe his/her line. Bestial people are also the product of our times. One ghastly one deceives the other, whilst the other tries to cut down their fellow being just like the bough of a tree. People are arrested for dereliction of duty. It has become quite impossible to desalinate, because even the sea is polluted. In every walk of life, honest people have to face obstacles from such 'dewy-eyed' persons. Therefore, Parajuli lunches a bitter diatribe of stable irony against the black sheep of society. The author has become increasingly despondent about the way things are going on in the world. His courage and clarity in voicing all-inclusive and all pervading love, gives the best example of democratic nature in writing that corrugates with the modern bifurcated road. His fiction has got no particular setting. We find a blend of microcosm and macrocosm. The contrast between simplicity and cruelty is among the stories' key themes. Eventually the character manages to restore some faith. This restoration suggests hope for the renewal of fresh values and the dignity of the present generation as well as the world in its entirety. He avidly reads about world problems and sets a premium on brotherhood, sincerity and faith. A Tragic Lament beyond Post Modernist Trauma: Diaspora Immigration and dispersion are normal phenomena in modern day society. During the evolution of communities, human beings have been experiencing temporary, seasonal or permanent migration from their original habitats. In human migration two unique factors need to be recognized. Firstly, migration does not mean the mere physical movement of people. Migrants carry with them a socio-cultural luggage, which consists of a predefined social identity, as well as a set of religious beliefs and practices. Because of various socio-economic problems, such migrants are rampant today. The pain in departure from Nepal to the West and lands in the remoter parts of Nepal to Kathmandu generates an identical type of trauma. Parajuli, in his stories, travels again and again around the reality that migrants are never permanently cut off from their birthplace. They themselves may keep in touch physically and/or mentally with their homeland. In the same vein, writers within the geographical boundary of a certain country are also haunted by a sense of loss. Such writers like Parajuli create fiction that is in touch with its root. They create imaginary homelands of the past upholding peace and fraternity in their writings. Parajuli projects his own cultural identity and laments it in The Broken Sky that has been disjointed by war and conflict between people, whereby he reconstructs it. He wants to restore the past to its glory in his next acclaimed collection of short stories The New Direction. Showing the pathetic condition of various characters in the contemporary world, he paints a picture of the suffering of people. Because of chaos and anarchy, marginalized people are compelled to move from one place to another. For example, the personification of ‘path’ in the story, The Road explores the same sagacity in a highly philosophical mode. The road itself symbolizes the diasporic conscience. Diaspora is often associated with Zionism, which is the belief in Jews' legitimate claim to a homeland (Palestine). Historically, the Jewish Diaspora has undergone different phases. The first significant one occurred in 586 BCE when the Babylonians conquered Judah, leading to the enslavement of the Jews. The largest Diaspora, which occurred during the first century BCE and lasted 1800 years, led to the displacement of five million Jews. The numerous diasporas that have taken place have not necessarily lead to Jews returning to Palestine, even after the initial cause of exile had disappeared. In their celebrated book Key Concepts in Post-colonial Studies, Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin have addressed the issue of diaspora: ‘The ‘temporary or permanent’ movement of Europeans all over the world, led to colonial settlements. Consequently, the ensuing economic exploitation of settled areas necessitated large amounts of labour that could not be met by the local populace. This led to diaspora, resulting in the enslavement of Africans and their relocation to places like the British colonies. After slavery was outlawed, the continued demand for workers created indentured labour. This produced large bodies of people from poor areas of India, China (and others) to the West Indies, Malaya, Fiji, Eastern and Southern Africa, and South East Asia, etc.’ (68-70) These critics underline a particular ground of exodus usually allied with particular groups of people. Indeed, large numbers of peoples migrated as ‘labour’ to serve colonial masters’ plans and desires in the past. In modern times, the cause of dispersion is convoluted with many political, social as well as economical aspects. Against all odds, modern day people are surviving in devilment. Some people make overtures to others and some show themselves against it. At this juncture, his characters follow the bogus claim of fellow beings, exhibiting their own feeble mental abilities. Characters like Riddhi, who repeatedly asks the question “Who desecrated it?” (140), prove the same fact. Rich cultural details and colloquial speeches shed light upon Parajuli's instinctual affection for Nepali culture. He envisions an equal society, free from poverty, chaos and anarchy and replenishes rich Nepali tradition throughout his work. Especially feasts and festivals are often the identity transplanted to contemporary settings of our modern day world. In Title of My Own Stories, the issues raised due to the marriage of the daughter have got a sole flavor of Nepali tradition: ‘The daughter is already grown up. The marriage after ………. cannot be pleasurable’ (7). Fredric Jameson speaks of ‘culture’ as a vehicle that defines the relationship between groups. He writes: ‘No group has ‘culture’ when it stands alone. Culture is the nimbus perceived by one group when it comes into contact with and observes another . . . then a culture is the objectification of everything alien and strange for the contact group.’ (271) Considering Jameson’s observation, it can be said that all members of society collectively create and maintain culture. It is preserved in the forms of knowledge, such as works of art and various traditions. Culture, thus, is the pattern of behavior and thinking that people living in social groups learn, create, and share. Culture distinguishes one human group from another. It also distinguishes humans from animals. A people’s culture includes their beliefs, rules of behavior, styles of dress, ways of producing and cooking food, political and economic systems and their identity in general. In the story What is your name, the narrator encounters a different sort of people and after narrating the eccentricities of all the characters he asks Shyam Prasad “What is your name?” Broadly speaking, this rhetorical question depicts the modern day identity crisis in this vast cosmos and craves for the root to stand within it. Therefore, self-identity and the regenerative power of a person often depend on culture. Smadar Lavie and Ted Swedenburg in their book, Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity (1996), have argued that there is no ‘immutable link’ between cultures, peoples, or identities and specific places. Yet the most common manifestation of one’s other-ness in an alien culture is a question one encounters from time to time: ‘Where are you from?’ not ‘Who/what are you?’ Its follow-up is often ‘No, I mean where you are really from?’ An explanation of one’s being ‘by origin/birth’ leads to an ambivalent rejoinder such as ‘What brought you here from there?’ signifying sometimes a naive curiosity, but often just a resigned resentment. Such common diasporic identities can be better understood through reference to Trishanku, the character from the Nepali epic Ramayana who went embodied to heaven but had to settle at a place midway between the earth and paradise. It serves as a metaphor for the modern expatriate/immigrant inhabiting the contested global-local space. These critics further note that diasporas are of importance to post-colonial studies, since the descendents of these people have come to produce highly unique cultures that both maintain and build their original cultures within the country and abroad. People from Nepal are known to have migrated to different countries for various reasons at various times. Amongst immigrants of diverse nationalities, overseas Nepalis constitute a sizeable segment. Due to an almost unique socio-cultural history and having been subjected to different economic and political situations, Nepali communities abroad have evolved as distinct diasporic entities. They, whose roots and substance can be traced to a Nepal with a glorious past, always suffer from loss of roots, linguistic dislocation and social disruption. Gopal Parajuli’s attachment to the land of Nepal creates his home, culture and identity in his collection of short stories entitled Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction) In fact, Hasina and mimosas are head and shoulder above many other things. In the story, Mode, a fastidious character, 'He' searches new avenues of life. As he does not perceive the original scent of flowers in a world that is being rented by hatred and war, he stays in creative recluse. He is compelled to be far away from his fellow beings and feels the pain of alienation instantaneously. The world for him becomes as solitary as a tomb. 'He' yearns his childhood days. The small world of byre and sty has been changed to a vast world. His life is buffeted by a wave of suffering, its bole ever increasing. Such life is a thoroughfare. Thus the journey of the mineshaft has to be crossed - lonely and tough though it is. Knowing this challenge in his heart of hearts, he joins all forgotten ways and explores new ones forgetting negation and obsessive hatred. In many diasporic situations, especially in multiethnic societies and where people of Nepali origin are numerically significant, the question of their image and identity has remained critical. The British stereotyped Indian emigrants as ‘coolies’ in the colonial phase. During that time Nepal was independent, recognized as the ‘kingdom of the brave’. It was not in the clutches of colonialism. In South Africa, M.K. Gandhi was often called ‘The Coolie Lawyer’. Similarly, the traders of the East African coastline were called ‘Passenger Indians’. “The meaning was that they came to Africa on their own initiative as passengers paying their own fares; and yet, the nickname seemed to have an implication that they were travelers, not settlers or immigrants.” (Tinker 1977:3). In modern times Nepalis have also set out to far off lands. They are facing difficulties. Within Nepal itself, its citizens migrate from one place to another in search of peace, security and better opportunities, including higher studies. Even the aboriginal Nepalis in India have been fighting to retain Nepali language and culture. This too is felt in the actions of the Bhutanese King to the Lhtotshampa of south Bhutan as well as Teknath Rizal, author and expatriate from Bhutan, due to their Nepali origin. Rijal fluctuates between celebrating and criticizing of competing versions of the Bhutanese nation. Written in the aftermath of the harmful actions of the Bhutanese government towards the Nepali speaking community in Bhutan, it evokes the vision of intercultural tolerance, a hybrid Bhutan: “We Bhutanese who speak Nepali used to read and listen to stories of racial discrepancies and displacement abroad as just fairy tales before showers of iron rods fell on us on the basis of racial discrimination. In our view, Bhutan was the best example of intercultural tolerance. It was almost impossible to think that the cruel hand of injustice would come into our yard and knock on the door from the pages of newspaper and television screens.” (Preface) Such writers always display the pain of displacement. Their literature and avenues of life have been filled with some type of scarcity. The writer does so to be in touch with his original culture. With reference to countries where cultural relations have become complicated, Tinker raises the following key questions: “ . . .do Asians create their own difficulties by their mode of living, and by remaining separate from their host society; or do their troubles arise mainly from excess of chauvinism or racism in the country of their adoption? Do they offend because they are, visibly, both pariahs and exploiters of alien societies? Or are they scapegoats, singled out for victimization because their adopted country (or its Government) needs an alibi for poor performance in the national sphere?” (138-139) Migrants feel alienation and difficulties due to loss of culture. Sometimes they are offended when they are dominated. Here, Tinker raises the very important question about the way of life of migrants in host countries as according to him, the vision of expatriates has become very much complicated. An author like Parajuli is ever conscious with prismatic eyes to write the history and suffering of its people, no matter where they live. At the same time he delineates corruption as changing the face of society. There also exists a sentiment of pain and conscious displacement of happy past times. As a brilliant storyteller and a great tragic thinker, Parajuli shows the suffering of the people as they are corrugated with the desultory act in The Broken Sky. The story titled 'Mukti Prasad' shows the painful confusion of continuous dislocation at a period when people’s rights have been snatched away. After receiving unalienable rights, almost all characters such as Ram Bdr, Prabin, Ashok Dinesh were content. Every season and each day is tumultuous. Characters are living with the feeling of retaliation, resulting every time in despicable torture. Some characters are saying that freedom is not just an inherent right, but instinctual, as basic as breathing. They are marooned in a deep furrow of suffering in a different spatial location. Brooding over their suffering he tries to darn them with words. At this juncture the author is dejected, visibly angry and alert for force majeure. Therefore he searches a new direction. The direction is a Nepali family saga and at the same time, the amalgamation of many cultures in the broader sense. In this respect, we find the same type of painful story in dispersion and immigration occurring in either internal or external diaspora. For instance, Govindaraj Bhattarai, a prominent critic and novelist explores a sense of external diaspora in his most acclaimed novel Mugalan. The novel comprises stories of Sutar and Thule, the protagonists of the novel. They stand for the marginalized people of Nepali society. After a long journey through lonely places, passing nights under the open sky, when Sutar encounters a shepherd he narrates: “What to say, heart misses a beat. After ten days, I first saw a man, you. We were great friends and worked together for two years. In despair we could not think about life….in the remembrance of a friend.”(84). In this way Nepali writers from every location and perspective write down the pain and suffering felt by their people. Parajuli’s writing, moreover, is marked by expressions of ethnic identity and articulations of intercultural tolerance with a humanist sense of meaning and mission. With the vision of a better Nepal and world, Parajuli, a citizen of Nepal, envisages it in his writings. The image that a Nepali author like Gopal Parajuli projects in his writings is based solely on Nepali culture. In this matter, short story author Kamala Sarup comments: “Gopal Parajuli's writing contemplates the stretch of nationalism, society, love of the human relationship and happiness.” A blinkered act is an ominous signal of days to come. The sky around the author is bone dry. People look around devastated, but are silent. It is a big shock to the author in the cultural texture of a glorious civilization and he yearns for the roots. Freedom serves as bracing air for equanimity. Parajuli, an author with sharp, sensitive antennae, celebrates freedom and fidelity in the midst of a tragic lament beyond post-modernist trauma. A Search for Asylum Identity, which depends on culture and individual attributes, sometimes creates confusion and disorients us into counter-culture. This unshared form of culture paves the way for tension. Everyone has got personal interest and a destination in life. The same is projected in Parajuli’s fiction. In his short stories, marginalized people often suffer hostility from a well-to-do person of the same nation. After all, the characters have internal negotiations going on with regards to what is right and what is wrong. Characters are as such because of their ignorant and poor economic condition. Certainly, some characters create social unsteadiness and exude a sense of supremacy. In this regard, some discrepancies have been noticed so far. However, the author finds the solution for everything in peace and brotherhood. Due to such imposture, Parajuli's characters suffer heavily. There are a lot of villains in one single story. Their identity is jeopardized by an opulent, urban elite. Compared to western hegemonial culture and imitation, Parajuli communicates in a different mode, highlighting issues of his own tradition. At this juncture, he returns to his cultural home and searches asylum. Therefore, the communities created in his fiction unite together to protect their heritage. No character, in spite of negative feelings, indulges in violence and murder with any type of aggressive feelings. Almost all the feasts and festivals articulated in the plot of his stories are relating to the question of identity. What is interesting about Nepalis is their sense of a negotiated cultural identity. Knowing the power of ethnocentrism and intercultural tolerance, Parajuli, a campaigner for social change with a cross-cultural understanding, has a profound sense of cultural relativism. A person with a sense of cultural relativism tries to respect all cultures and people equally, whilst at the same time strengthening one’s own. Parajuli, thus, in many ways, adores family culture. Culture, in this way, is a defining principal of people’s identity. Gopal Parajuli from a non-western location seeks his identity within his own culture and glorifies his home in his writings, affirming peace, fraternity and happiness. This interview, conducted by Sarup Kamala and Suresh Hachekali for Cubed, shows how a writer embodies and builds up the whole nation in an extraordinarily evocative way: “Literature searches the true space of sentiment and feeling. Feelings and sentiments connect one person with another. Science and technology can aid this, but cannot directly perceive this connection in the same way and no age can ignore the feeling and sensibility of creation. Heartless objects of science and technology can never challenge the truth of creation. In this age of science too, Milton is known as England, Homer is known as Greece, Vergil is known as Rome, Frost is known as America, Bhanubhakta is known as Nepal. A writer writes simply because he can implant emotion, sentiment and feeling into his creation.” (23) Outsiders distort Nepali culture and try to blur their identity. The centripetal force of family members’ affection to each other paves the way for the happiness of the whole country and of the entire globe as a whole. More covertly, what Parajuli looks at in his stories is Nepali cultural identity and the distinctiveness of people's mutual ways of living. His posturing characters of abject poverty feel their identity as vulnerable and insecure. In the beginning of every story, thus, a hopeless and frustrated life is projected and the stories end with the vision of the poet. Characters are content when they position themselves in their Nepali roots. This sense of belonging gives them the strength to protect their community. Mutual understanding of fraternity, intercultural tolerance, freedom and peace are some of the major themes of Parjuli's writing. Isolated people make soulful alliances and subtle acts of kindness counter-balance hellish violence. However, in the end, goodness is no match for any aspect of fury. In this way, there is tension between personal errands and private passions, social expectation and individual dreams, but human values and ethos triumph over everything. All the more so, transforming family conflict into peace emerges as the fundamental prerequisite to strength. And it also succeeds in bringing social stability, strengthening nations and global security. Making an inventory of conflict and crisis, every character in Parajuli's fiction feels life and the responsibilities it naturally holds. Parajuli claims that diasporic situations enable us to trace and analyze certain key social processes, like the formation of own identity. And it shows his search of asylum in the glory of past times. On the whole, diaspora in the context of globalization is the staying force in the novel. It glorifies Nepali culture. Nepal can be filthy and tedious in the eyes of outsiders, but it is stunning for them in the sense of its own cultural and social values as well as identity. Though, there is no traditional ending to any of his stories, Parajuli always goes for member fortification, camaraderie, precautions, and socialization, exploring the heart-rending and highly philosophical family saga of a happy past and future as an intrusive narrator.
HB Bhandari Prabhat
Washington DC, USA
Much has been written on Indian Diaspora, but surprisingly very little has been examined on that of the Nepali people. In spite of some resemblance regarding certain issues, the histories of these nations are quite different. Nepal was never under foreign control. By contrast, India was colonized and only gained freedom in 1947 from British imperialism. This state of colonial independence has been the creative force of Nepali writers of all times, to explore family saga. Currently, due to the failure to adroit handling of conundrum situations (internal issues), geographical constraint and hegemony of neighboring countries, the situation of the nation has become horrendous. At this juncture, Nepali authors from every location feel the diaspora of a happy past in the present context, at a time when the entire wall has tumbled down. Hence this paper seeks to establish both the space and pain explored in the fiction of Gopal Parajuli, one of the foremost Nepali literary figures in this age, where the fall of all types of different barriers all over the world has made this era of globalization and integration possible. The combined exploitative forces of inner human instincts and their counter-assaults are the objects of Parajuli's social criticism. Full of the mixing of genres, his satire focuses on the chaos of the modern world, which initiates when people are not sensitive to their duties and ethics. The venture of modern people proves fickle for both society and the individual. His characters are an actual and symbolic representation of the suppressed and the oppressed beings of the world. In his later period, dating from publication of Nayan Ishwarko Ghosana (Declaration of a New God), Madan Prize and INLS best award US winning epic poem, Parajuli has garnered much public appreciation. Parajuli's other publications include Golardhaka Dui Chheu (The Two Extremes), a collection of one act plays, Sadakpachhi Sadak (Road after Road), a play, Prithibimathi Alekh (The Mother Figure), an epic poem, Himalmathi Alekh( Mark on the summit), an epic poem, Deshmathi Alekh (A Salute to the Nation), an epic poem, Shabda Shatabdi (The Lost Century), an epic poem and collection of short stories Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction). For his short stories he won the Bhanu Anniversary Prize in 1976, Sajha Award in 1993 and Mainali Katha Puraskar in 2004. The motif, settings, and characters help to make these books acclaimed works of creativity. Parajuli fundamentally writes about the tragedy of the fall of civilization and the failure of fraternity. In fact, we do not live in the heroic era of Ram and Buddha, but rather in a grubby age of commerce, mafia, gangs and wars. Parajuli, a strong supporter of democratic vision in his writing creates various characters to demonstrate the chaos of the modern world. His writings are inventive in language and innovative in subject matter. Some of his works have been criticized as being too obscure and are often observed as serious, absurd and experimental by many of his readers. In extremely simplified terms, his writings are a window to see from both a universal perspective whilst at the same time watching a realistic close-up vision of it all. Almost all his story titles are thematically pregnant with the meaning - without love all that is left for us is destruction. Illuminating the theme of his writings, Parajuli, in an interview with Sarup, Kamala for “Nepal Forum.Com” affirms: “The themes in my works vary as freedom, peace, law and order, love and above all nostalgia for past glorious times. Through my more recent writings I would like to convey the message of hope more forcefully than in the style I applied to other works like Himalmathi Alekh, Sabda Satabdi and Samayako Prasthan” (4) His interview reminds us of Martin Luther King's catch phrase, ‘I have a dream’. It is not only the dream and hope of idealism, but also about commitment to an equipoise state of peace. We can be fully satisfied with Parajuli's vision regarding the present situation in which he shows that those who sold history and turned this age into concentration camps have been smiling. He further says, ‘Observing the dramatic change of the present, I am writing to see at what point the world will be changed into a place of peace, pleasure and happiness’ (9). His stories open with a description of some particular character's idiosyncrasies that interweave his past and present. He has employed it in a very profound way. His fiction deals with the problem of modern times. Parajuli once remarked: “In Acton, London, I put forward three points. These were – ‘I destroyed the plot, I destroyed characterization, I destroyed the traditional, foundational world. I involved myself in the creation of style and thought and in the restructuring of literary forms without using explanations and interpretations’.” He has deconstructed the plot of fiction. Therefore, his writings hold an anti-traditional vision in both content and form. His single feeling provides a comprehensive relationship with a person’s entire personality and thinking, juxtaposed with the hideous contradiction of falsehood and truth. Parajuli has given his best as a consummate storyteller and stylist in his short stories. Passions and crazes are personified in the collection of short stories Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction). There are a lot of villains in one single story. Many kinds of infernal actions of these characters present a vivid picture of the hatred, revenge, mediocrity, vulgarity and uprootedness prevailing in contemporary society. These demons embedded in human instincts are not only graphic literary symbols but are also real, tangible forces. This is where Parajuli's narrative art with an intrusive narrator celebrates its greatest triumphs and bestows a reading experience of a deeply original kind, harrowing but also stimulating and edifying. In fiction, Parajuli broadens his attempts to represent the individual’s life by welding together the interior and exterior lives of many characters. In addition, and perhaps more importantly, he has formed a distinct philosophy of life, which is intimately connected with his ideas. When we read his stories, we live every aspect of them along with his fictional characters. He experiments with language by combining traditions of heroic poetry with comic prose. It is an attempt to embody a theory of history and dramatic elements within fiction where everything is cyclical, repeating itself over and over again as in the story, 'It is not magic’: He has no Job. He could be so lucky to win the lottery. (56) The use of such a semi-poetic line in fiction is a new experiment in Nepali literature. Moreover, his fiction is molded in the cultural texture of the superb glory of forefathers, where the representation of the root’s image is both momentary as well as fixed. His acquaintances with marginalized characters symbolize a humanistic sense of meaning and mission blending with one another as well as with various historical and mythical figures. In the face of modern cruelty, nothing can be left for pride and self-respect to hand over to the coming generations. More covertly, he has been creating space for grotesque, comic, touching, honest and wonderful characters, whilst proclaiming unity and fraternity to restore the glorious Indus valley, Vedic as well as many other civilizations of the Ancient East. Parajuli paints a dark and powerful portrait of the dehumanizing effects of exploitation. Inspired by modern world chaos, Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction) knit together the story of marginalized people. In fragmented narrative, his fiction examines the mental and physical trauma caused by exploitation. Parajuli addresses several reoccurring diasporas: the quest for self-representation, spiritual values and cultural identity of the past in the context of globalization. Globalization versus Localization Globalization is the social, economic and political progression that has created room for modern-day subsistence and the whole world has thus become connected in a historically unparalleled manner. Moreover, it constitutes a stable community of people formed on the basis of common language, territory, economic life and psychological make-up. According to Anthony Giddens, a cultural critic, globalization has been exemplified as ‘the intensification of world-wide social relations which link distant localities in such a way that local happenings are shaped by events occurring many miles away’. And for David Harvey it is ‘Time-Space compression’. In a nutshell, globalization as the solidarity and integrated consciousness of the globe has become an omnipresent term in a wide range of academic discourses. After global modernity entered local culture, some critics doubt that such a hybrid mass-culture could ever serve to continue and strengthen western imperialism after postcolonial nationalism. Showing the possibility of world culture and new global order long ago in the Wealth of Nations (1776), Adam Smith recognizes it as ‘mutual communication of knowledge’ and extensive commerce from all countries to all countries. And in the same vein, for Marx and Engels, the spread of capitalism to the production of a global culture has meant that ‘national one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from numerous works of national and local literature there arises a world literature’. Despite their other differences, Smith, Marx and Engels observed the process of globalization as a leading phenomenon towards genuine universalism. Globalization, however, must be seen as a complex and multi-dimensional phenomenon that involves different levels of tension and conflict. Replacing imperialism, it could focus on the domination of developing countries by developed ones, or of national and local literature and economy. For Marxists and multi-culturalists, globalization is bringing about the devastating destruction of local culture and traditions, the subordination of poorer nations by richer ones and the homogenization of culture and everyday life. It holds a definite potential for greater freedom and democratization, but also holds the danger of domination by the stronger over the weaker. Globalization mixes new and old, innovation and destruction at both a global and local scale. A new global culture is emerging as a result of computers and communication technology. What cannot be denied is that the expansion of private cable and satellite systems has been aggressively promoting a commercial culture throughout the world. In this sense, local and national cultures are bastions of their identities. However, tension rejects jeopardizing and romanticizing the creation of new local identities, which makes it able to challenge all the paradoxes and complications of identity formation. It is for this reason that Arjun Appadurai, the Indian ethnologist and sociologist, living in the USA has claimed, “The imagination that is now central to all forms of agency is itself a social fact, and it is the key component of the new global order. The relationship between global and local is sometimes thorny and confusing as culture has been precisely the localizing force that distinguished societies and people from each other. It is, moreover, such a particularizing force that local identities, practices and modes of everyday life depend on it. The concept of globalization should not be seen cynically and hopelessly as inexorably destroying entire local forces, the world's entry into the phantasmagoria of consumer capitalism.” Living in multicultural societies and being characterized by a certain ethnic identity, Nepali communities abroad and within the country itself need to talk about the problem of ethnicity. They are engaged in active economic and cultural competitions and have experienced ethnic discrimination, both explicitly and covertly. Sometimes, they are scapegoats in ethnic and political conflict too. For example, the killing of 12 Nepali men by militants in Iraq in 2004 has inspired the film Manche ko Maya (The love of Mankind), a film by the Nepali film director Narayan Puri. The film depicts the obstacles faced by Nepali workers to get jobs in the Middle East, and the cultural shock they experience. Root always resists in the end, making its identity fight against contradictory forces of colonization and homogenization regarding local identity - blood, nation and affection. The film describes Nepali local tradition to the world in forms of divergent wars and finds some negotiable point for the coexistence of both local and global. The culture is described as global: the new world order involves promoting lifestyle, consumer products and local identities. Local literature and culture at this point and era of clash of contradiction, promote themselves to the point of mutual understanding and negotiation. Samuel Huntington, in the context of his widely discussed and much criticized theories about the ‘clash of civilizations’ claims that the main axis of international conflict on a world scale will be the difference of cultures rather than of nations, political and economic systems or standards of development: “For the relevant future, there will be no universal civilization, but instead a world of different civilizations, each of which will have to learn to coexist with each other.” His vision rightly strengthens lines appearing in the same issue of Garima: “We must not hold the concept that only participating in the global market makes society strong and healthy. If such participation comes at the price of identity, the root suffers and revolts. On the contrary, literature, which does not reach an international readership, can never expand its horizon by introducing the same root. Therefore, writers writing in English such as Abhi Subedi, Samrat Upadhaya, D.B. Gurung, Shreedhar Gautam, Arun Gupto, Sanjib Upreti, Manjushree Thapa and many others have faced the challenge to maintain a healthy balance between their root and globalization, which has become a new international system nourishing and rearing a sense of community, identity and nationhood in the broad sense.” (199) Questions of identity, diaspora and a sense of nationhood have been themes of Nepali literature for a long time. Many writers in the vein of Gopal Parajuli write about such sense of loss even though they are residing within their national boundary. In all of Parajuli’s writings we find such a healthy balance. For example, universal pain has been spread from the mourning of Narayanhiti blood to the Pentagon in Parajuli’s epic poem The Departure of Time: In reporting the News of Nayanhiti massacre ………………….. To congregate the collection of Pentagon the world …………………………………….. It impairs Himalayas Hurts soil and stone Aches even more to Lately born infant. (10) His writings that range from the plangent and heart breaking to the truly horrific in some stories, in the end maintain equality regarding the scope of common law and opportunity. On this basis he creates emotion and provides the setting in which people, such as those so lovingly portrayed here, can maintain the balance between global and local values and realize the déjà-vu the author experiences in his imagination. Social Sensitivity: Crisis in Human Values A short story is a condensed fictional narrative in prose. A novel, by contrast, typically presents many characters that more leisurely develop through several interconnecting story lines and conflicts, evoking a multiplicity of emotional reactions. Parajuli’s major themes are quintessential to the 20th century: human isolation, anxiety, and the relationship between life and art. Fantastic and realistic elements are perfectly blended in his experimental, mythic stories. The underlying theme involves the unifying power of love and equality. The writer feels that only love for one another can bind together the world’s diverse racial groups and allow them to overcome their trepidation and suspicion of one another. The effect created with such high sensibility in fiction is cumulative and not dependent upon one particular event. Pouring over the precarious world of the future, his characters are caught up in the cyclone of mental conflict between the opposite forces of love and hate. The character 'I' has an ambivalent relationship with these two and is indecisive. With this, he indicates convoluted exploitation and antagonism in the wake of this big chasm through which characters are alienated and thrown into a state of Hamletian dilemma: "A picture that was being drawn and rubbed out on the canvas during the past hours arises. I'm standing with all my limbs bursting with eagerness. Her look abandons the earth and turns towards me. Mine abandons the sky and turns towards her. As she continues looking, a hint of shyness bursts out from the corner of her lips. "I am devoted to you." I can keep on reading her. I can keep on listening to her. I cannot say ‘Yes’, I cannot say ‘No’. I have this thing with personality."(172) The human condition is very much pathetic and fragmented. Moreover, the narrator structures the story in such a way that past events explain the present. Throughout his fictional narrative, there is such motif repeated with regularity and description of the characters' difference between appearance and reality. In the story entitled ‘Innocents in crowd', various characters prove it: Ratne- always flaunts the latest fashion. Passne- wears his wife's Patuka expecting to win at gambling. Bale- enjoys the sight of Dille's wife wearing bangles. Mukhiyaa- gives the assurance of property to common folk if he gets the opportunity to be a minister. Masine- denounces his son's wedding getting a measly dowry. Annare- selects a rich boy as a tutor and sends his daughter to his home Deve- enjoys double-dealing Kapali- constructs buildings on Homnath's property -------------- ---------------- ------------- Kale.Gore.Kaile have vanished in the jungle of mankind. They do not have their own identities. (23) Parajuli represents the voice of unity, compassion, and a straightforward yearning for a just and equitable society, sometimes changing himself into them and speaking from their perspective. Through metaphorical language such as 'He's been coughing because the pain may be blocked in the throat', Parajuli reveals a sense of surrogate reality and tormented feelings of the prostitute: “Whore! Where is my future, where is my history, where is my present, can you tell me whore --- I would like to walk alone. Society follows me in every corridor. You hate me, branding me a whore yet love me immediately.” It is a cosmic irony. He relates the character's psyche so spontaneously that it is very difficult to penetrate our own conscience. He shows the dilemma of life via such a character. In the story, The Bifurcated Road, he indicates the road split into two directions and tells the philosophy of life by positioning his character in an indecisive mood. ‘I am dedicated to myself - I assure and look towards the bifurcated road.’ In the short story Sahili, the central character, Sahili has a very popular inn. She does not keep any stone unturned for the sake of her business. It shows how people are compelled to survive. Characters like Sahili in our society are in a terrible predicament. Through the suffering of such characters, the author projects abject poverty in her celerity. The wonderful challenge depicted on the way is like the icing on the cake. There are no 'ifs' and 'buts' in the life of undefined characters, such as ' Dhap'. The character does not capitulate to anything. With pain he becomes the spitting image of struggle. He struggles, hoping to see light at the end of the tunnel. He thinks himself under the heel of obstacles. He could not perform a momentous ritual due to lack of money. Collecting money by selling wood becomes a distant dream. Characters are cadaverous, outwardly, due to implanted chaos. They do not like to see any type of collusion between people. Firstly, they try to change themselves in order to bring rapid change to the globe. In this sense, his characters are not lackadaisical. Their journeys are like a labyrinth of the whole mystery of creation. After this everyone sees man with lachrymose, which is superabundant to understanding the mystery of creation in his story Smelling the Horizon. In most of his stories the narrator is very wary, one from waylay, even a whit it seems can damage it erelong. The odor does not leave the crowd neither outside nor inside. 'Hanging the crowd on my eye I have been seeking a man. Tying odors on my nose I have been smelling the horizon' (12). Without eternal truth a man can’t be a real man. His characters, who do not only wander in a dreamlike state, are well acquainted with this fact. They keep their finger on the pulse of the situation. Batty natures and envious attitudes of the world engage them in an exploration of the beacon of life: the proper combination of mind and soul. They try to bedeck their lives through their toil. The external relationship of the characters turns to bay leaves. They are duly deceived as the character 'He' is sent away with a flea in his ear while begging for help. Therefore, they are flat broke in many senses. He says, 'Why does a cheater worship in a temple of mine' (119). This romantic irony enraptures the author and arouses the first flush of enthusiasm, which is more than flesh and blood can stand. The characteristics of 'He' characters are very unusual in the story, Ashtray - 'He' is as cold as a dog and as cheap as dirt. He cannot fight with imbroglio. While handling such characters, Parajuli's voice is imbued with an unusual seriousness, containing social sensibility. Some characters seem 'barking-mad' for money. Yet Parajuli appears as brave as Achilles and as boundless as the ocean. He exhorts fraternity and truth in the world, which has become as arid as the sands of the Sahara due to each other’s belligerence. Different idiosyncrasies of characters are exploited to present the unusual enigma of modern day people: 'Manoj speaks in English after drinking alcohol; Sushil is merely a Dr rather than a man. Loke – a drunkard, has the habit of dropping names. Everywhere Manoj speaks…..he has dominated.' (67). What is nebulous is the author's sorrow regarding present society and his urge for tremulous evolution as the space of diligent people has been occupied by such characters that fire all cylinders and change societies into curate's eggs. In his stories, despots and blue-blooded people themselves are living a life of depravity. A hankering after betterment without toil is futile. The life of such characters proves life as cairn of struggle in the real sense. From the bootee era they don't get better nourishment and a proper environment for better understanding. Thus, they can’t come up with new ideas and therefore botch up their duties completely as well as their responsibilities and regrets: ‘”Biraj!” I cry seeing the army at the Boarder. “You did not hear. I do not speak with you.”’(136). The author blushes at such activities and presents various logical arguments to bolster his sense of loss and love. The time has been conspiring against such an innocent country and its people. Open Border, furthermore, is a highly symbolic work that looks at social and psychological disorder through the central metaphor of the present day scenario. The interplay between the narrators' perception and characters’ fragmented journey on diverging roads have established ivory in both style of narrative and point of view. Chaos and disorder are aptly reflected by the characters Tile, Yagya, Purne and Kalu. In suffering, the character ‘He’ explores ‘conscience’ in a story entitled. Inside Fire. The character 'He' is displaced and searches 'man' in an ambiguous universe. The isolation of self in an alienating society develops in one a state of schizophrenia and broadens the chasm between appearance and reality, civilization and savagery, innocence and experience. Man is living dead in the heart of the city. In the canvass of Road and Attitude, momentous changes of attitude and divisions in the road of existence have been painted, whilst Other Direction seeks the direction of commitment, conviction, courtesy and courage. Unlike sophisticated people, however, the more grotesque characters seek ways to escape from their terrible predicaments in one way or the other. As a phlegmatic writer, Parajuli envisages a better future, categorically rejecting the chameleon nature of such people. He is unhappy with the abstruse nature of politics, where the voice of the plebian mind has become a distant dream. He explores this theme again and again in all his writings, including poems: ' From here From there From that side as well Do not fence in the country with bullets If you cannot stand In this country To welcome those, Those who are waiting in their mother's wombs To be born.' (12) Illiberal people wait for the time to pour oil on troubled waters and are capricious. One persecutes the other who does not toe his/her line. Bestial people are also the product of our times. One ghastly one deceives the other, whilst the other tries to cut down their fellow being just like the bough of a tree. People are arrested for dereliction of duty. It has become quite impossible to desalinate, because even the sea is polluted. In every walk of life, honest people have to face obstacles from such 'dewy-eyed' persons. Therefore, Parajuli lunches a bitter diatribe of stable irony against the black sheep of society. The author has become increasingly despondent about the way things are going on in the world. His courage and clarity in voicing all-inclusive and all pervading love, gives the best example of democratic nature in writing that corrugates with the modern bifurcated road. His fiction has got no particular setting. We find a blend of microcosm and macrocosm. The contrast between simplicity and cruelty is among the stories' key themes. Eventually the character manages to restore some faith. This restoration suggests hope for the renewal of fresh values and the dignity of the present generation as well as the world in its entirety. He avidly reads about world problems and sets a premium on brotherhood, sincerity and faith. A Tragic Lament beyond Post Modernist Trauma: Diaspora Immigration and dispersion are normal phenomena in modern day society. During the evolution of communities, human beings have been experiencing temporary, seasonal or permanent migration from their original habitats. In human migration two unique factors need to be recognized. Firstly, migration does not mean the mere physical movement of people. Migrants carry with them a socio-cultural luggage, which consists of a predefined social identity, as well as a set of religious beliefs and practices. Because of various socio-economic problems, such migrants are rampant today. The pain in departure from Nepal to the West and lands in the remoter parts of Nepal to Kathmandu generates an identical type of trauma. Parajuli, in his stories, travels again and again around the reality that migrants are never permanently cut off from their birthplace. They themselves may keep in touch physically and/or mentally with their homeland. In the same vein, writers within the geographical boundary of a certain country are also haunted by a sense of loss. Such writers like Parajuli create fiction that is in touch with its root. They create imaginary homelands of the past upholding peace and fraternity in their writings. Parajuli projects his own cultural identity and laments it in The Broken Sky that has been disjointed by war and conflict between people, whereby he reconstructs it. He wants to restore the past to its glory in his next acclaimed collection of short stories The New Direction. Showing the pathetic condition of various characters in the contemporary world, he paints a picture of the suffering of people. Because of chaos and anarchy, marginalized people are compelled to move from one place to another. For example, the personification of ‘path’ in the story, The Road explores the same sagacity in a highly philosophical mode. The road itself symbolizes the diasporic conscience. Diaspora is often associated with Zionism, which is the belief in Jews' legitimate claim to a homeland (Palestine). Historically, the Jewish Diaspora has undergone different phases. The first significant one occurred in 586 BCE when the Babylonians conquered Judah, leading to the enslavement of the Jews. The largest Diaspora, which occurred during the first century BCE and lasted 1800 years, led to the displacement of five million Jews. The numerous diasporas that have taken place have not necessarily lead to Jews returning to Palestine, even after the initial cause of exile had disappeared. In their celebrated book Key Concepts in Post-colonial Studies, Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin have addressed the issue of diaspora: ‘The ‘temporary or permanent’ movement of Europeans all over the world, led to colonial settlements. Consequently, the ensuing economic exploitation of settled areas necessitated large amounts of labour that could not be met by the local populace. This led to diaspora, resulting in the enslavement of Africans and their relocation to places like the British colonies. After slavery was outlawed, the continued demand for workers created indentured labour. This produced large bodies of people from poor areas of India, China (and others) to the West Indies, Malaya, Fiji, Eastern and Southern Africa, and South East Asia, etc.’ (68-70) These critics underline a particular ground of exodus usually allied with particular groups of people. Indeed, large numbers of peoples migrated as ‘labour’ to serve colonial masters’ plans and desires in the past. In modern times, the cause of dispersion is convoluted with many political, social as well as economical aspects. Against all odds, modern day people are surviving in devilment. Some people make overtures to others and some show themselves against it. At this juncture, his characters follow the bogus claim of fellow beings, exhibiting their own feeble mental abilities. Characters like Riddhi, who repeatedly asks the question “Who desecrated it?” (140), prove the same fact. Rich cultural details and colloquial speeches shed light upon Parajuli's instinctual affection for Nepali culture. He envisions an equal society, free from poverty, chaos and anarchy and replenishes rich Nepali tradition throughout his work. Especially feasts and festivals are often the identity transplanted to contemporary settings of our modern day world. In Title of My Own Stories, the issues raised due to the marriage of the daughter have got a sole flavor of Nepali tradition: ‘The daughter is already grown up. The marriage after ………. cannot be pleasurable’ (7). Fredric Jameson speaks of ‘culture’ as a vehicle that defines the relationship between groups. He writes: ‘No group has ‘culture’ when it stands alone. Culture is the nimbus perceived by one group when it comes into contact with and observes another . . . then a culture is the objectification of everything alien and strange for the contact group.’ (271) Considering Jameson’s observation, it can be said that all members of society collectively create and maintain culture. It is preserved in the forms of knowledge, such as works of art and various traditions. Culture, thus, is the pattern of behavior and thinking that people living in social groups learn, create, and share. Culture distinguishes one human group from another. It also distinguishes humans from animals. A people’s culture includes their beliefs, rules of behavior, styles of dress, ways of producing and cooking food, political and economic systems and their identity in general. In the story What is your name, the narrator encounters a different sort of people and after narrating the eccentricities of all the characters he asks Shyam Prasad “What is your name?” Broadly speaking, this rhetorical question depicts the modern day identity crisis in this vast cosmos and craves for the root to stand within it. Therefore, self-identity and the regenerative power of a person often depend on culture. Smadar Lavie and Ted Swedenburg in their book, Displacement, Diaspora, and Geographies of Identity (1996), have argued that there is no ‘immutable link’ between cultures, peoples, or identities and specific places. Yet the most common manifestation of one’s other-ness in an alien culture is a question one encounters from time to time: ‘Where are you from?’ not ‘Who/what are you?’ Its follow-up is often ‘No, I mean where you are really from?’ An explanation of one’s being ‘by origin/birth’ leads to an ambivalent rejoinder such as ‘What brought you here from there?’ signifying sometimes a naive curiosity, but often just a resigned resentment. Such common diasporic identities can be better understood through reference to Trishanku, the character from the Nepali epic Ramayana who went embodied to heaven but had to settle at a place midway between the earth and paradise. It serves as a metaphor for the modern expatriate/immigrant inhabiting the contested global-local space. These critics further note that diasporas are of importance to post-colonial studies, since the descendents of these people have come to produce highly unique cultures that both maintain and build their original cultures within the country and abroad. People from Nepal are known to have migrated to different countries for various reasons at various times. Amongst immigrants of diverse nationalities, overseas Nepalis constitute a sizeable segment. Due to an almost unique socio-cultural history and having been subjected to different economic and political situations, Nepali communities abroad have evolved as distinct diasporic entities. They, whose roots and substance can be traced to a Nepal with a glorious past, always suffer from loss of roots, linguistic dislocation and social disruption. Gopal Parajuli’s attachment to the land of Nepal creates his home, culture and identity in his collection of short stories entitled Dishahin Akash (The Broken Sky) and Arko Disha (The New Direction) In fact, Hasina and mimosas are head and shoulder above many other things. In the story, Mode, a fastidious character, 'He' searches new avenues of life. As he does not perceive the original scent of flowers in a world that is being rented by hatred and war, he stays in creative recluse. He is compelled to be far away from his fellow beings and feels the pain of alienation instantaneously. The world for him becomes as solitary as a tomb. 'He' yearns his childhood days. The small world of byre and sty has been changed to a vast world. His life is buffeted by a wave of suffering, its bole ever increasing. Such life is a thoroughfare. Thus the journey of the mineshaft has to be crossed - lonely and tough though it is. Knowing this challenge in his heart of hearts, he joins all forgotten ways and explores new ones forgetting negation and obsessive hatred. In many diasporic situations, especially in multiethnic societies and where people of Nepali origin are numerically significant, the question of their image and identity has remained critical. The British stereotyped Indian emigrants as ‘coolies’ in the colonial phase. During that time Nepal was independent, recognized as the ‘kingdom of the brave’. It was not in the clutches of colonialism. In South Africa, M.K. Gandhi was often called ‘The Coolie Lawyer’. Similarly, the traders of the East African coastline were called ‘Passenger Indians’. “The meaning was that they came to Africa on their own initiative as passengers paying their own fares; and yet, the nickname seemed to have an implication that they were travelers, not settlers or immigrants.” (Tinker 1977:3). In modern times Nepalis have also set out to far off lands. They are facing difficulties. Within Nepal itself, its citizens migrate from one place to another in search of peace, security and better opportunities, including higher studies. Even the aboriginal Nepalis in India have been fighting to retain Nepali language and culture. This too is felt in the actions of the Bhutanese King to the Lhtotshampa of south Bhutan as well as Teknath Rizal, author and expatriate from Bhutan, due to their Nepali origin. Rijal fluctuates between celebrating and criticizing of competing versions of the Bhutanese nation. Written in the aftermath of the harmful actions of the Bhutanese government towards the Nepali speaking community in Bhutan, it evokes the vision of intercultural tolerance, a hybrid Bhutan: “We Bhutanese who speak Nepali used to read and listen to stories of racial discrepancies and displacement abroad as just fairy tales before showers of iron rods fell on us on the basis of racial discrimination. In our view, Bhutan was the best example of intercultural tolerance. It was almost impossible to think that the cruel hand of injustice would come into our yard and knock on the door from the pages of newspaper and television screens.” (Preface) Such writers always display the pain of displacement. Their literature and avenues of life have been filled with some type of scarcity. The writer does so to be in touch with his original culture. With reference to countries where cultural relations have become complicated, Tinker raises the following key questions: “ . . .do Asians create their own difficulties by their mode of living, and by remaining separate from their host society; or do their troubles arise mainly from excess of chauvinism or racism in the country of their adoption? Do they offend because they are, visibly, both pariahs and exploiters of alien societies? Or are they scapegoats, singled out for victimization because their adopted country (or its Government) needs an alibi for poor performance in the national sphere?” (138-139) Migrants feel alienation and difficulties due to loss of culture. Sometimes they are offended when they are dominated. Here, Tinker raises the very important question about the way of life of migrants in host countries as according to him, the vision of expatriates has become very much complicated. An author like Parajuli is ever conscious with prismatic eyes to write the history and suffering of its people, no matter where they live. At the same time he delineates corruption as changing the face of society. There also exists a sentiment of pain and conscious displacement of happy past times. As a brilliant storyteller and a great tragic thinker, Parajuli shows the suffering of the people as they are corrugated with the desultory act in The Broken Sky. The story titled 'Mukti Prasad' shows the painful confusion of continuous dislocation at a period when people’s rights have been snatched away. After receiving unalienable rights, almost all characters such as Ram Bdr, Prabin, Ashok Dinesh were content. Every season and each day is tumultuous. Characters are living with the feeling of retaliation, resulting every time in despicable torture. Some characters are saying that freedom is not just an inherent right, but instinctual, as basic as breathing. They are marooned in a deep furrow of suffering in a different spatial location. Brooding over their suffering he tries to darn them with words. At this juncture the author is dejected, visibly angry and alert for force majeure. Therefore he searches a new direction. The direction is a Nepali family saga and at the same time, the amalgamation of many cultures in the broader sense. In this respect, we find the same type of painful story in dispersion and immigration occurring in either internal or external diaspora. For instance, Govindaraj Bhattarai, a prominent critic and novelist explores a sense of external diaspora in his most acclaimed novel Mugalan. The novel comprises stories of Sutar and Thule, the protagonists of the novel. They stand for the marginalized people of Nepali society. After a long journey through lonely places, passing nights under the open sky, when Sutar encounters a shepherd he narrates: “What to say, heart misses a beat. After ten days, I first saw a man, you. We were great friends and worked together for two years. In despair we could not think about life….in the remembrance of a friend.”(84). In this way Nepali writers from every location and perspective write down the pain and suffering felt by their people. Parajuli’s writing, moreover, is marked by expressions of ethnic identity and articulations of intercultural tolerance with a humanist sense of meaning and mission. With the vision of a better Nepal and world, Parajuli, a citizen of Nepal, envisages it in his writings. The image that a Nepali author like Gopal Parajuli projects in his writings is based solely on Nepali culture. In this matter, short story author Kamala Sarup comments: “Gopal Parajuli's writing contemplates the stretch of nationalism, society, love of the human relationship and happiness.” A blinkered act is an ominous signal of days to come. The sky around the author is bone dry. People look around devastated, but are silent. It is a big shock to the author in the cultural texture of a glorious civilization and he yearns for the roots. Freedom serves as bracing air for equanimity. Parajuli, an author with sharp, sensitive antennae, celebrates freedom and fidelity in the midst of a tragic lament beyond post-modernist trauma. A Search for Asylum Identity, which depends on culture and individual attributes, sometimes creates confusion and disorients us into counter-culture. This unshared form of culture paves the way for tension. Everyone has got personal interest and a destination in life. The same is projected in Parajuli’s fiction. In his short stories, marginalized people often suffer hostility from a well-to-do person of the same nation. After all, the characters have internal negotiations going on with regards to what is right and what is wrong. Characters are as such because of their ignorant and poor economic condition. Certainly, some characters create social unsteadiness and exude a sense of supremacy. In this regard, some discrepancies have been noticed so far. However, the author finds the solution for everything in peace and brotherhood. Due to such imposture, Parajuli's characters suffer heavily. There are a lot of villains in one single story. Their identity is jeopardized by an opulent, urban elite. Compared to western hegemonial culture and imitation, Parajuli communicates in a different mode, highlighting issues of his own tradition. At this juncture, he returns to his cultural home and searches asylum. Therefore, the communities created in his fiction unite together to protect their heritage. No character, in spite of negative feelings, indulges in violence and murder with any type of aggressive feelings. Almost all the feasts and festivals articulated in the plot of his stories are relating to the question of identity. What is interesting about Nepalis is their sense of a negotiated cultural identity. Knowing the power of ethnocentrism and intercultural tolerance, Parajuli, a campaigner for social change with a cross-cultural understanding, has a profound sense of cultural relativism. A person with a sense of cultural relativism tries to respect all cultures and people equally, whilst at the same time strengthening one’s own. Parajuli, thus, in many ways, adores family culture. Culture, in this way, is a defining principal of people’s identity. Gopal Parajuli from a non-western location seeks his identity within his own culture and glorifies his home in his writings, affirming peace, fraternity and happiness. This interview, conducted by Sarup Kamala and Suresh Hachekali for Cubed, shows how a writer embodies and builds up the whole nation in an extraordinarily evocative way: “Literature searches the true space of sentiment and feeling. Feelings and sentiments connect one person with another. Science and technology can aid this, but cannot directly perceive this connection in the same way and no age can ignore the feeling and sensibility of creation. Heartless objects of science and technology can never challenge the truth of creation. In this age of science too, Milton is known as England, Homer is known as Greece, Vergil is known as Rome, Frost is known as America, Bhanubhakta is known as Nepal. A writer writes simply because he can implant emotion, sentiment and feeling into his creation.” (23) Outsiders distort Nepali culture and try to blur their identity. The centripetal force of family members’ affection to each other paves the way for the happiness of the whole country and of the entire globe as a whole. More covertly, what Parajuli looks at in his stories is Nepali cultural identity and the distinctiveness of people's mutual ways of living. His posturing characters of abject poverty feel their identity as vulnerable and insecure. In the beginning of every story, thus, a hopeless and frustrated life is projected and the stories end with the vision of the poet. Characters are content when they position themselves in their Nepali roots. This sense of belonging gives them the strength to protect their community. Mutual understanding of fraternity, intercultural tolerance, freedom and peace are some of the major themes of Parjuli's writing. Isolated people make soulful alliances and subtle acts of kindness counter-balance hellish violence. However, in the end, goodness is no match for any aspect of fury. In this way, there is tension between personal errands and private passions, social expectation and individual dreams, but human values and ethos triumph over everything. All the more so, transforming family conflict into peace emerges as the fundamental prerequisite to strength. And it also succeeds in bringing social stability, strengthening nations and global security. Making an inventory of conflict and crisis, every character in Parajuli's fiction feels life and the responsibilities it naturally holds. Parajuli claims that diasporic situations enable us to trace and analyze certain key social processes, like the formation of own identity. And it shows his search of asylum in the glory of past times. On the whole, diaspora in the context of globalization is the staying force in the novel. It glorifies Nepali culture. Nepal can be filthy and tedious in the eyes of outsiders, but it is stunning for them in the sense of its own cultural and social values as well as identity. Though, there is no traditional ending to any of his stories, Parajuli always goes for member fortification, camaraderie, precautions, and socialization, exploring the heart-rending and highly philosophical family saga of a happy past and future as an intrusive narrator.
Non-western Studies in Global Context
HB Bhandari Prabhat
Suresh Hachekali
HB Bhandari Prabhat
Suresh Hachekali
Published in most prestigious and old National monthly Nepali literary magazine ‘Garima’ in June 2003 Issue
The English translation is in Progress. You are reading the first draft at this time.
Aftermath of Second World War, the modern civilization was replaced by postmodern tendencies. After 1945, the geographical colonization came to an end though cultural and mental colonization still prevails. In 1960s French critic Jacques Derrida presented the concept of deconstruction attacking entire foundation of structuralism. Deconstruction accepts the pluralism in meaning and abnegates the position of absolute truth. Blaming entire western academic logo centric concept Derrida revealed the reality of pluralism of meaning of a word. Before the presence of Derridian concept every marginalized things were not only undermined even their address was unbearable.
Basically after the decade of 1970 many theories and principals came in existence following main principal propounded by Derrida. The theory highly contributed for the rise of feminism, gay and lesbian study along with subaltern study. In the same vein of Derrida in 1980s other; French philosopher Michel Foucault presented new structure of power before the globe.
According Foucauldian concept, the power is relative. He presented the horizontal model of power denying then existed vertical model. As a result, the tradition of studying English civilization, culture and literature in the explicit rank has been slowly swept away. Consequently, there arises new world of multilingual, multicultural and multinational world.
Coming up to this mode, English language did not remain the colonial and specific language of European. English moved ahead as means of communication in the entire world. Slowly, English language has been widely used against the colonial culture. Two types of tendencies existed in third world in front of the western culture and civilization. Some writers write standing them either in support or against of western civilization and some other writers explore own culture and civilization without referring to western writers. Particularly, non-western world wraps the Indian subcontinent, china, Korea, Japan, Persian, Arabian countries, Africa to Caribbean Island and Native American. Non-western studies which came in existence to study literature other than European culture and literature studies different marginalized, culture, religion, politics and other mode of life.
In Nepali context non-western Studies entered in the Tribhuvan University Master Degree English course from 2000. Instead of non-western literature its name is non-western studies because it studies culture, humanity, geography, society along with religion. It is the rise of tradition to study other than only canonical writers. Translation, the concept of literature and culture of third world, marginalized culture and the study of third word are the major domains of this discipline. Non-western studies give emphasis to the proposonate representation of all the cultures of entire world rejecting the domination of single culture and literature. According to the critic and Columbian University Professor Edward Said, the western academic tradition hesitates to translate non-western text.
Shreedhar Lohani, Nepali Professor in English avows that the birth of non-western studies was inevitable, as grand narrative of western tradition could not cover entire race, community, and culture and literature extended around the world. In his view, a non-wertern study is not division in geographical level. Renowned poet and critic Dr Abhi Subedi asserts
“ There shouldn’t be any type of prejudice in translating the third world literature.” Further, he stands for the interior essence of text in translation. He sees the diasporas in some of the non-western text and says their text projects twilight conscience. A translator, in his notion, must be equipped with the first and second language of translation. Prof, Padma Prasad Devkota, further emphasized for the strong representation of culture using English as medium language. In the absence of such representation, he further observes no values of non-western text written in English language.
Dr Arun Gupto, a brilliant theorist, defines games as cultural text. He reads conflict between western and eastern world in all aspects such as games, advertisement, and cinema to mountaineering. Sangita Rayamajhi, a feminist critic, does not like to take her conception as radical feminist idea. She puts forwards opinion that the text of women writers shouldn’t be categorized only in two parts: Submissive and Radical. The issues related with woman in her view are generalized and she does not agree with this tendency. The text of women writers, she asserts, has to be analyzed in terms of race, religion, culture and historical references. For Marxist critic Dr Krishna chandara Sharma non-western studies is the representation of African and Asian academic and cultural tradition. Some texts of Nonwestern studies, he further argues, are based on mythical background and rest of other includes different subjects such as politics, social and other issues of national concerns. Postcolonial theorist and Brown University Scholar Dr Sanjeev Upreti analyses nonwestern studies as defense to establish intellectual and cultural tradition and states non-western as discourse related with the exercise of power. On the contrary to it, Hrisikesh Upadhaya says non-western studies as the continuation of western colonial studies .In addition, he articulates that the modern philosophy, literature and scientific thoughts are highly influenced by western world for past 300 years. In the later five decades, non-western studies have become subject of study, analysis and investigation. In Nepal too non-western studies has become marginalized subject in major stream of English literature. Dr Shreedhar Gautam gives importance for the original non-western models in order to study these texts.
Scholar Nagendra Bhattarai affirms that non-western study shouldn’t be limited itself to project the weaknesses of western academic tradition. It has to explore own shortcomings and move a head finding out new dimension. In this context, referring to the controversial writer Salman Rushdie he says a great text has to bear entire responsibilities of shortcomings of short comings too. From middle path young scholar Bishnu Sapkota perceives nonwestern studies as common platform to understand each other’s text, culture and literature. In his view it has come in existence in irony to western colonial master culture. Recalling George Bernard Shaw saying that western world has to learn from eastern English scholar, Tika Lamsal asserts non-western studies uncovers stereotypes of eastern world.
On a whole, there is narrow vision to perceive language in Nepali academic tradition. Many people take Sanskrit as language of Brahmin and English as colonial language. Language cannot be sole property of any geography, community and religion though it originality goes to particular community and geography. In the same context, a non-western study has come in existence. In his era of globalization, Tribhuvan University has opened new academic horizon by prescribing non-western studies in Master Degree course of English Department. It has established the study of intercultural voyage discarding created discrepancies between western and eastern academic tradition.
The English translation is in Progress. You are reading the first draft at this time.
Aftermath of Second World War, the modern civilization was replaced by postmodern tendencies. After 1945, the geographical colonization came to an end though cultural and mental colonization still prevails. In 1960s French critic Jacques Derrida presented the concept of deconstruction attacking entire foundation of structuralism. Deconstruction accepts the pluralism in meaning and abnegates the position of absolute truth. Blaming entire western academic logo centric concept Derrida revealed the reality of pluralism of meaning of a word. Before the presence of Derridian concept every marginalized things were not only undermined even their address was unbearable.
Basically after the decade of 1970 many theories and principals came in existence following main principal propounded by Derrida. The theory highly contributed for the rise of feminism, gay and lesbian study along with subaltern study. In the same vein of Derrida in 1980s other; French philosopher Michel Foucault presented new structure of power before the globe.
According Foucauldian concept, the power is relative. He presented the horizontal model of power denying then existed vertical model. As a result, the tradition of studying English civilization, culture and literature in the explicit rank has been slowly swept away. Consequently, there arises new world of multilingual, multicultural and multinational world.
Coming up to this mode, English language did not remain the colonial and specific language of European. English moved ahead as means of communication in the entire world. Slowly, English language has been widely used against the colonial culture. Two types of tendencies existed in third world in front of the western culture and civilization. Some writers write standing them either in support or against of western civilization and some other writers explore own culture and civilization without referring to western writers. Particularly, non-western world wraps the Indian subcontinent, china, Korea, Japan, Persian, Arabian countries, Africa to Caribbean Island and Native American. Non-western studies which came in existence to study literature other than European culture and literature studies different marginalized, culture, religion, politics and other mode of life.
In Nepali context non-western Studies entered in the Tribhuvan University Master Degree English course from 2000. Instead of non-western literature its name is non-western studies because it studies culture, humanity, geography, society along with religion. It is the rise of tradition to study other than only canonical writers. Translation, the concept of literature and culture of third world, marginalized culture and the study of third word are the major domains of this discipline. Non-western studies give emphasis to the proposonate representation of all the cultures of entire world rejecting the domination of single culture and literature. According to the critic and Columbian University Professor Edward Said, the western academic tradition hesitates to translate non-western text.
Shreedhar Lohani, Nepali Professor in English avows that the birth of non-western studies was inevitable, as grand narrative of western tradition could not cover entire race, community, and culture and literature extended around the world. In his view, a non-wertern study is not division in geographical level. Renowned poet and critic Dr Abhi Subedi asserts
“ There shouldn’t be any type of prejudice in translating the third world literature.” Further, he stands for the interior essence of text in translation. He sees the diasporas in some of the non-western text and says their text projects twilight conscience. A translator, in his notion, must be equipped with the first and second language of translation. Prof, Padma Prasad Devkota, further emphasized for the strong representation of culture using English as medium language. In the absence of such representation, he further observes no values of non-western text written in English language.
Dr Arun Gupto, a brilliant theorist, defines games as cultural text. He reads conflict between western and eastern world in all aspects such as games, advertisement, and cinema to mountaineering. Sangita Rayamajhi, a feminist critic, does not like to take her conception as radical feminist idea. She puts forwards opinion that the text of women writers shouldn’t be categorized only in two parts: Submissive and Radical. The issues related with woman in her view are generalized and she does not agree with this tendency. The text of women writers, she asserts, has to be analyzed in terms of race, religion, culture and historical references. For Marxist critic Dr Krishna chandara Sharma non-western studies is the representation of African and Asian academic and cultural tradition. Some texts of Nonwestern studies, he further argues, are based on mythical background and rest of other includes different subjects such as politics, social and other issues of national concerns. Postcolonial theorist and Brown University Scholar Dr Sanjeev Upreti analyses nonwestern studies as defense to establish intellectual and cultural tradition and states non-western as discourse related with the exercise of power. On the contrary to it, Hrisikesh Upadhaya says non-western studies as the continuation of western colonial studies .In addition, he articulates that the modern philosophy, literature and scientific thoughts are highly influenced by western world for past 300 years. In the later five decades, non-western studies have become subject of study, analysis and investigation. In Nepal too non-western studies has become marginalized subject in major stream of English literature. Dr Shreedhar Gautam gives importance for the original non-western models in order to study these texts.
Scholar Nagendra Bhattarai affirms that non-western study shouldn’t be limited itself to project the weaknesses of western academic tradition. It has to explore own shortcomings and move a head finding out new dimension. In this context, referring to the controversial writer Salman Rushdie he says a great text has to bear entire responsibilities of shortcomings of short comings too. From middle path young scholar Bishnu Sapkota perceives nonwestern studies as common platform to understand each other’s text, culture and literature. In his view it has come in existence in irony to western colonial master culture. Recalling George Bernard Shaw saying that western world has to learn from eastern English scholar, Tika Lamsal asserts non-western studies uncovers stereotypes of eastern world.
On a whole, there is narrow vision to perceive language in Nepali academic tradition. Many people take Sanskrit as language of Brahmin and English as colonial language. Language cannot be sole property of any geography, community and religion though it originality goes to particular community and geography. In the same context, a non-western study has come in existence. In his era of globalization, Tribhuvan University has opened new academic horizon by prescribing non-western studies in Master Degree course of English Department. It has established the study of intercultural voyage discarding created discrepancies between western and eastern academic tradition.
The Assertion of New Movement
By Anmol Madi Poudel
Published in Nepal Samacharpatra’s Special feature ‘Creativity’ in March 4th 2004
Translation in progress by Bhandari (first draft)
The new generation has emerged in the field of literature to make the poem readable and popular at the context where many readers were desperately biding their time. We can call it either with the name of Modernism or Postmodernism. The Litteratures unfamiliar with the contemporary writing may be unaware of their ingenuity and new concept but the intellectual who are reading them are conscious of it. The new generation with innovative thought is miles ahead then the generation who is just driven by tradition and snobbery.
The generation who has been reading the latest movement and mode of new generation has already approved and accepted this as pioneering act in the field of literature. The latest movement of HB Bhandari Prabhat that came in existence with long debated manifesto Labyrinth Conscience and Narayans' poem collection Deceased Portrait filled the heart of dogmatic writer jealous with the happiness. Deceased Portrait shows the maturity and clear vision of young generation in literature and at the same time give hopes to such readers who are frustrated due to the excessive use of slogan and mantra in poem.
The new theory of criticism Labyrinth Conscience advocates for minimal affirmations.
This theory denies the concept of 'Third Dimension’ that emphasize on seeing whole thing at a glance. And the new generation exemplifies that the poet does not come only to create for nothing but has to innovate something creative in firm determination. In this vein, Shrestha comes representing the new generation. In the same way, the new theory and critic should not analyses things in one perspective such Marxism, New Marxism or socialism or new Historicism. No one can know every element of things at first sight as proposed by Third Dimension. Therefore, to complete the look; the new generation started looking through the conscience that is labyrinth.
At this juncture, critic Bhandari relates Narayan’s poems with existentialism. He tries to explore oneness just like Parijat’s Suyog Bir, Yangey’s Yoke or Camu’s Marsolt. There is collage of hate and depression. The reader feels pains with the protagonist while going through his poems. He addresses throbbing elevated by globalization and discontent in a mild and soft voice.
The existentialism moved from Yespers, Heidegger, Unomuno, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and Kafka through Satre and Camu to entire world. The major objective of existentialism is to explore the paraphernalia in absurd world. The existential thought between Dostoevsky and Camus differs with other existential philosophers in the sense that they project demolition of human beauty and sanguinity. Narayan’s existentialism exploited in his book Deceased Portrait shares proximity with Camu and Kafka as his poems are projection of absurd and hopeless picture of human survival:
How horrific is this night
Enters room with unforeseen tension
To get relief and behold picture out of it
Undeniably the respite has to be in the same way
The infinite present enters to the patches of cloud in the same.
The Deceased Portrait, published by Bibek Srijanshil Publication, Kathmandu consists of 29 poems where the hurt on human existence as well as the shadow of politics is exposed. ‘The prior memory of Last episode’ is one of the best poems in this collection and other long narrative poems such as ‘The Old Image of 25 years old,’ ‘The Dream of Illusion,’ ‘One day Remembering Poem’ are equally beautiful where the sense of existentialisms have been exploited in optimum level. The poem ‘Bilom’ poles apart from other as it has got political theme. In poet’s experience, the entire pictures around him are faded and tedious and his poems are projection of the same.
“The new form of existentialism via labyrinth conscience is seen in his poems” said Critic HB Bhandari Prabhat. Indeed, the poet leaves aside the crowd of market poets, by his admirable poetic sentiments. The poet is equally famous for his sonorous voice in Radio Sagarmatha. In the book released programme Poet Ishwor Ballav, Dr D.P. Bhandari, Toya Gurung and Dr Govindaraj Bhattarai were highly surprised due to his poetic genius. However, his poems directly are not able to contact with society and reader. His poems talk to oneself in deeper level:
Squeezed by heavy pressure
I did inquire with you
In the state of
My space without qualm
With incentive of acceptance.
By Anmol Madi Poudel
Published in Nepal Samacharpatra’s Special feature ‘Creativity’ in March 4th 2004
Translation in progress by Bhandari (first draft)
The new generation has emerged in the field of literature to make the poem readable and popular at the context where many readers were desperately biding their time. We can call it either with the name of Modernism or Postmodernism. The Litteratures unfamiliar with the contemporary writing may be unaware of their ingenuity and new concept but the intellectual who are reading them are conscious of it. The new generation with innovative thought is miles ahead then the generation who is just driven by tradition and snobbery.
The generation who has been reading the latest movement and mode of new generation has already approved and accepted this as pioneering act in the field of literature. The latest movement of HB Bhandari Prabhat that came in existence with long debated manifesto Labyrinth Conscience and Narayans' poem collection Deceased Portrait filled the heart of dogmatic writer jealous with the happiness. Deceased Portrait shows the maturity and clear vision of young generation in literature and at the same time give hopes to such readers who are frustrated due to the excessive use of slogan and mantra in poem.
The new theory of criticism Labyrinth Conscience advocates for minimal affirmations.
This theory denies the concept of 'Third Dimension’ that emphasize on seeing whole thing at a glance. And the new generation exemplifies that the poet does not come only to create for nothing but has to innovate something creative in firm determination. In this vein, Shrestha comes representing the new generation. In the same way, the new theory and critic should not analyses things in one perspective such Marxism, New Marxism or socialism or new Historicism. No one can know every element of things at first sight as proposed by Third Dimension. Therefore, to complete the look; the new generation started looking through the conscience that is labyrinth.
At this juncture, critic Bhandari relates Narayan’s poems with existentialism. He tries to explore oneness just like Parijat’s Suyog Bir, Yangey’s Yoke or Camu’s Marsolt. There is collage of hate and depression. The reader feels pains with the protagonist while going through his poems. He addresses throbbing elevated by globalization and discontent in a mild and soft voice.
The existentialism moved from Yespers, Heidegger, Unomuno, Kierkegaard, Dostoevsky, and Kafka through Satre and Camu to entire world. The major objective of existentialism is to explore the paraphernalia in absurd world. The existential thought between Dostoevsky and Camus differs with other existential philosophers in the sense that they project demolition of human beauty and sanguinity. Narayan’s existentialism exploited in his book Deceased Portrait shares proximity with Camu and Kafka as his poems are projection of absurd and hopeless picture of human survival:
How horrific is this night
Enters room with unforeseen tension
To get relief and behold picture out of it
Undeniably the respite has to be in the same way
The infinite present enters to the patches of cloud in the same.
The Deceased Portrait, published by Bibek Srijanshil Publication, Kathmandu consists of 29 poems where the hurt on human existence as well as the shadow of politics is exposed. ‘The prior memory of Last episode’ is one of the best poems in this collection and other long narrative poems such as ‘The Old Image of 25 years old,’ ‘The Dream of Illusion,’ ‘One day Remembering Poem’ are equally beautiful where the sense of existentialisms have been exploited in optimum level. The poem ‘Bilom’ poles apart from other as it has got political theme. In poet’s experience, the entire pictures around him are faded and tedious and his poems are projection of the same.
“The new form of existentialism via labyrinth conscience is seen in his poems” said Critic HB Bhandari Prabhat. Indeed, the poet leaves aside the crowd of market poets, by his admirable poetic sentiments. The poet is equally famous for his sonorous voice in Radio Sagarmatha. In the book released programme Poet Ishwor Ballav, Dr D.P. Bhandari, Toya Gurung and Dr Govindaraj Bhattarai were highly surprised due to his poetic genius. However, his poems directly are not able to contact with society and reader. His poems talk to oneself in deeper level:
Squeezed by heavy pressure
I did inquire with you
In the state of
My space without qualm
With incentive of acceptance.
Mistry, Family Matters and Revisiting
By HB Bhandari Prabhat
Published in Kantipur Nepali Daily on Sunday, May 25, 2003
By HB Bhandari Prabhat
Published in Kantipur Nepali Daily on Sunday, May 25, 2003
You are reading the first draft at this time.
Rohinton Mistry, born in 1952 in Bombay is a migrant Canadian English writer has become the pride of entire south Asia. After finishing graduation in Bombay Mistry from Parsi community reaches to Canada for higher study. Parsies were escaped from Persia due to the torture of Muslims. Zoroastrianism is very close to Parsi people in many ways. Family Matters a selected novel for the Booker Prize by Mistry projects the pain and suffering of his family along with the norms and values of Indian Subcontinent.
The pain of Bombay has touched has touched him rather than modernization of Canada. The pain of his motherland is greater to him. The writer from non-western location writes about their suffering taking English as medium language. Criticizing the bad aspect of their culture such writers shows the path of improvement as well. The projection of injustice, cruelty, chaos and anarchy is not major themes of his writing as read by critic. The essence of his writing is fraternity, intercultural tolerance and love for root culture. This is satire against the master culture as well. In Family Matters Mistry asserts to lose home means losing everything.
The plot of Family Matters revolves round the pain and suffering of 89 years old Nariman Vakeel, English professor. Parkinson disease torched him on the onehand and love affair of Lucy on the other. He could not present himself against his parentage culture. Ultimately, he got loveless marriage with a widow, mother of Jal and Coomy. She died untimely and the blame of her death goes to Nariman Vakeel. Jal and Coomy take Vakeel to the home his daughter, Roxana. It was very difficult to his son in law to look entire family with little sum of money from small cloth business. Vakeel presents himself unkindly with Nariman, however he loves father in law very much in deeper level. In this way, Mistry has included family problems and hope side by side.
Mistry’s characters suffer in economic, cultural and racial pressures. All this suffering gets transformed to power when all family negotiates their problems. Eventually, they come with solution. The plot of novel which is limited within the boundary of two rooms of a apartments in Bombay is successful to project the south Asian cultural, economical and racial conflict. Mistry whose writing style shares proximity with Charles Dickinson, 19th century English novelist shows picture of intact world in. Popular Hindi songs, Kashmir conflict, Cricket game, band good aspect of Vajpayee government etc are some issues in the plot. Nepal is projected as a beautiful Himalayan country.
Roxana looses many things for the integration of family norms and values. Comparatively in eastern world the family is taken as an institution. Some references such as envelop collection by Roxana to assuage the economic pain of her husband; Narimans’ treatment with the money saving from meat expenditure, children spooning rice to grandfather etc proves this. These are the real stories of eastern world. The incident where Roxana’s Nine years son walks on foot to save bus fair to buy chrismas present to his brother is the best example of fraternity. The novel, therefore, acts as canvass of eastern culture in which Mistry painted a beautiful picture of culture and civilization through various characters.
Truth, beauty and religion do not hide in castle like temple rather dwell inside the life of honest poor people who are always hated and discriminated. Mistry who bagged different international prizes such as Grller, Common Wealth and Dublin presents love of Nariman and Lucy akin to that of Romeo and Juliet. However, Nariman at last hurled himself to the lap of own daughter. This is a symbolic return of Mistry to his home via his fictional character Nariman. At the moment of death, home, affection and someone to drop some tears are desired no matter how he/she reaches anywhere in course of life. In this role of relative, Mistry presents Nariman’s entire family members. The alter image experienced by Nariman at grandchildren faces becomes far better superior and pleasurable than remembrance past love affair with Lucy. Lucy love affair could trembles the foundation of Mistry‘s home but could not toppled down it.
Various obstacles, discontent and disagreement etc exist in family but everything can easily be resolved and assuaged by affection and love. In such a home, a person becomes happy, as this love is truth, which is beautiful. A person who forgets root remembers nothing. Mistry’s Family Matters affirm the strength of entire globe via community and family. Mistry’s own pain of displacement has come in corrugation through fictional characters. Family Matters, therefore, it is an attempt and desire to return to root. In other words, it is Mistry’s literary voyage to own motherland.
The pain of Bombay has touched has touched him rather than modernization of Canada. The pain of his motherland is greater to him. The writer from non-western location writes about their suffering taking English as medium language. Criticizing the bad aspect of their culture such writers shows the path of improvement as well. The projection of injustice, cruelty, chaos and anarchy is not major themes of his writing as read by critic. The essence of his writing is fraternity, intercultural tolerance and love for root culture. This is satire against the master culture as well. In Family Matters Mistry asserts to lose home means losing everything.
The plot of Family Matters revolves round the pain and suffering of 89 years old Nariman Vakeel, English professor. Parkinson disease torched him on the onehand and love affair of Lucy on the other. He could not present himself against his parentage culture. Ultimately, he got loveless marriage with a widow, mother of Jal and Coomy. She died untimely and the blame of her death goes to Nariman Vakeel. Jal and Coomy take Vakeel to the home his daughter, Roxana. It was very difficult to his son in law to look entire family with little sum of money from small cloth business. Vakeel presents himself unkindly with Nariman, however he loves father in law very much in deeper level. In this way, Mistry has included family problems and hope side by side.
Mistry’s characters suffer in economic, cultural and racial pressures. All this suffering gets transformed to power when all family negotiates their problems. Eventually, they come with solution. The plot of novel which is limited within the boundary of two rooms of a apartments in Bombay is successful to project the south Asian cultural, economical and racial conflict. Mistry whose writing style shares proximity with Charles Dickinson, 19th century English novelist shows picture of intact world in. Popular Hindi songs, Kashmir conflict, Cricket game, band good aspect of Vajpayee government etc are some issues in the plot. Nepal is projected as a beautiful Himalayan country.
Roxana looses many things for the integration of family norms and values. Comparatively in eastern world the family is taken as an institution. Some references such as envelop collection by Roxana to assuage the economic pain of her husband; Narimans’ treatment with the money saving from meat expenditure, children spooning rice to grandfather etc proves this. These are the real stories of eastern world. The incident where Roxana’s Nine years son walks on foot to save bus fair to buy chrismas present to his brother is the best example of fraternity. The novel, therefore, acts as canvass of eastern culture in which Mistry painted a beautiful picture of culture and civilization through various characters.
Truth, beauty and religion do not hide in castle like temple rather dwell inside the life of honest poor people who are always hated and discriminated. Mistry who bagged different international prizes such as Grller, Common Wealth and Dublin presents love of Nariman and Lucy akin to that of Romeo and Juliet. However, Nariman at last hurled himself to the lap of own daughter. This is a symbolic return of Mistry to his home via his fictional character Nariman. At the moment of death, home, affection and someone to drop some tears are desired no matter how he/she reaches anywhere in course of life. In this role of relative, Mistry presents Nariman’s entire family members. The alter image experienced by Nariman at grandchildren faces becomes far better superior and pleasurable than remembrance past love affair with Lucy. Lucy love affair could trembles the foundation of Mistry‘s home but could not toppled down it.
Various obstacles, discontent and disagreement etc exist in family but everything can easily be resolved and assuaged by affection and love. In such a home, a person becomes happy, as this love is truth, which is beautiful. A person who forgets root remembers nothing. Mistry’s Family Matters affirm the strength of entire globe via community and family. Mistry’s own pain of displacement has come in corrugation through fictional characters. Family Matters, therefore, it is an attempt and desire to return to root. In other words, it is Mistry’s literary voyage to own motherland.
Departure Of Time Within the Labyrinth Conscience
HB Bhadari Prabhat
Published in Monthly National Nepali Literary Magazine Garima Published by Sajha Publication in March 2003 issue
(Note:English translation is in progress. This is not a final version.)
English poet and critic Sydney to Levis all the literary text that has been produced shows interrelationship between literature and life. Moreover, they have kept in a frame of fixity. Nepali criticism on the one hand went through such disasters and in later century it could not flourish due to the biographical criticism. In this context me in collaboration of two friends propounded the theory of labyrinth conscience and at the same time the epic The Departure of time appeared.
Literature expresses the feeling of life rather than expressing anything directly. Such text is expressed via the medium of labyrinth conscience. Pluralism in meaning and unitary analyzing Parajuli’s Departure of time in terms of Pluralism and unitary method we see the presence of godly conscience. However, this look is not a perfect look. Such innovation text comes with new possibilities.
Greek literature could display the permanent passion of human being on the one hand and covers values and norms of society on the other. In the same way Parajuli accepts some social norms as universal one. Parajuli enters into the pleasure of labyrinth connecting view with moral and aesthetics beauty. He further supposes moral and spiritual conscience as Hellenic conscience and gives emphasis for the high seriousness in poetry. He tries for mass civilization. In this epic, he treats morality as an ingredient part of social consciousness and universal humanity. Furthermore, the present epic gives emphasis for the search of possibilities within oneself to be sovereign of oneself. Consequently one easily can discard pessimism and chaos by objective evaluation. Therefore, the text shows possibilities of salvation of worldly people from this world itself. With new platonic concept the author projects time, human being and God in terms of God, Godfather and son. The epic starts voyage to the conscience of God as the departure of time brings death of humanity.
The epic searches intercultural tolerance, humanity and tradition. In the absence of center he laments in the first declaration of scene:
Whose hand can we hold
Of a person?
In a street
Whom to look for in temple?
Own mind does not speak
Tradition has been changed
Of this beautiful country!
Endless world pictures are seen in this epic, which move from ‘Declaration Of First Sight’ to ‘Last Obedient Letter’. In the first sight the world is changed in indecisive mood and search a creator that can save God who is wounded badly:
To save God,
God is needed this time
A mother has to give birth
To a God.
Faith, honesty, truth and morality are created truth rather than tangible in this situation where time is also not secure. In this fearful point, were everything has been made truth by power, the pet feels the sense of responsibility due to the suffocation of the world. The protagonist of epic ‘time’ is successful to produce double conscience: Fear and responsibility side by side.
The short lines have come to show instability of mind: On whose direction we move?
The alternative name of this time in his view is disorder, chaos and anarchy. He attempts to return to the happy, natural and peaceful past. The waiting geography of time has become the geography of obstacles. The question whose answer comes orally and western form are not genuine question. His question such as the plot for the continuity of creation is valid or not, etc are unanswerable, and open question. For this solution the poet moves himself from physical world to metaphysical world and constructs a cycle.
He joins hill of Swambhunath and Washington DC easily to project world as small global village. In the same vein of Walt Whitman who could see the godly consciousness even in the blade of grass, Poet Parajuli gazes the pain in Himal, rock and even in newly born child. As grass germinates from grave to beautiful garden the poet’s conscience has been tormented in world pain in Naryanhit’s blood to screaming in Pentagon along with worldwide pain:
To collect news of Narayanhiti
………. …………………
It hurts to Himalayas
Equally hurts to rock
Even it hurts more to newly born child.
In this way, poetic conscience goes a head transforming himself from other actively sharing the pain of poor people to the grave and brings clouds down. The modern man in his view has been moving from opposite direction and betrays life style. He projects loneliness of modern man in minimal affirmation:
People drink wind with no water
Own people betray their man
The friend of people
Departs like train
Parjauli who prefers rhythm of thoughts rather than rhythm of word experiments time humanizing it:
The time does not like to survive
Moves room to room
And tries to sacrifice
In order to present the sad moment, that has been created to explore happiest flash by some people he makes proper balance between mind and heart.
The man changes to Cartoon
While seeing it.
The crisis of identity and agony has been transformed through sense organ and used symbol through verbs:
One nation
Falls down in water
Sound dwells in sound
… …..
Fragmenting dream in midnight the poet ponders with difficult question. The poet’s soul can differentiates truth and false is very imaginative and powerful but does not forget morality. In dream, he ponders on exploitation agony and depression and seeks way to get rid from it. He looks time in a peaceful state and gets pleasure splintering reality. All the abstract paintings drawn in front page of poem appeals reader to be imaginative. The happiness which is formed by imaginations is both beautiful and truth. Parajuli creates superior world where there is no voice of chaos and anarchy:
Entire life
I encounter
A question
I opened eye
There was no moon
No star
Falling star
The poet envisages beautiful world out of very chaotic world in imagination. With consciousness in liquidity he can see falling sky and his own death too.
In the day of my death
The sky above me
The poet should see beautiful world in each elements with the help of imaginary eyes where as many people pollutes the time. It is the glorification of poem and a way to freedom from Slavery on the other:
What time
Man declares himself to free?
Among negative and positive instincts prompted within us, the negative instinct has become the enemy of man. Further, he shows big chasm between appearance and reality:
What Guitar plays
Difference inside
And outside
In the same way, he asserts the cause of monstrous quality in modern people as the result of mechanical love.
A beloved exchanges
Lover
And a Lover exchanges
Beloved
Playing with the images of Buddha, God, affection and imagination he shows the pain of his country in this way:
Holding cap in one hand
The nation walks
On the way
Poet Parajuli writes the name of his country in his chest in this most difficult period of time where the history of country has been dying and there is no place to keep the history of country safely.
He registers proposal of peace to raise disturbed Buddha and fallen Pasang.
I want to fix in Lumbini
To my trembling country
There is heavy blow against culture, human norms and values. He listens the slow sound within this blow as the voice of God, voice of power and voice of conscience. He further recognizes slow sound in the midst of blow as the sound of God maintaining healthy balance between science and religion. The world will surely be handicapped if the ratio of betraying, killing and murdering keep on going in the world. Walking merely on scientific leg forgetting leg of conscience the poet asserts it as the cause of handicapped and gives emphasis on both of their healthy balance. He, at this juncture, presents democratic vision of labyrinth conscience.
Pulling the world to and fro
In the absence of God
Pressing the remote control
One has been biding time
To write new history
‘I’ stands for entire world and God himself. Before doing this, he searches God, challenge openly and construct within himself. In this respect, the poet is the greatest creator. Moving through various stages such as weeping, lamenting and at last persuading poets goes through and invents new god within himself where lies his philosophy, godly conscience and experimentation.
I desperately seek my poem in meditation
In meditation I seek a man
I have been waiting
Declaring my soul as God.
The Departure of time gives the identification, maturity, patience and passing time into a upward movement. To keep glorious history of human being set by Adam and Eve by eating apple of knowledge betraying God poet assets should be with full of patience and conscience. Most of the poems avows that suffering make person mature and to sow suffering in present mean to get happiness further. He presents himself strongly against traditional God by exploring the fact that inspite of pain we should not give up our courage:
I do not accept death
Due to the fear of death
I have entered into the sector
Where death is prohibited
Until and unless being deceived by god.
With docile nature
With dilemma and shattered dream
I will not take out confidence
From God
In own grave
I have to die alone
I should not kill god.
In our grave let’s die alone
We should not kill god.
The separate river is a must inside a river to mark world as movable. A river has to leave edge spite love and affection. Much water disperses in merrymaking out of the edge. Water that keeps identity of river has to move. The river is another form in the labyrinth conscience. Trying to be river means to be civilized and teach the knowledge of civilization to entire globe. Moreover, it is recognition of own god to meet peace.
Poet is not separated from society in spite of some frustrations. It is the pain that shows him little bit romanticists. The poet identifies hurts and invents medicine as well. This is the challenge to those who composes epic for. This epic has got distinct identity that paves the way to salvation.
In conclusion, The Departure Of Time by Gopal Parajuli is the mirror of this decade that is created in labyrinth conscience. Finding out world’s pain in every element he composes god for the peace and fraternity in the world. Further, it asserts literature is not a only medium to project pain and agony further it shows the failure of nihilism and concept of understanding art and literature in cursory look.
HB Bhadari Prabhat
Published in Monthly National Nepali Literary Magazine Garima Published by Sajha Publication in March 2003 issue
(Note:English translation is in progress. This is not a final version.)
English poet and critic Sydney to Levis all the literary text that has been produced shows interrelationship between literature and life. Moreover, they have kept in a frame of fixity. Nepali criticism on the one hand went through such disasters and in later century it could not flourish due to the biographical criticism. In this context me in collaboration of two friends propounded the theory of labyrinth conscience and at the same time the epic The Departure of time appeared.
Literature expresses the feeling of life rather than expressing anything directly. Such text is expressed via the medium of labyrinth conscience. Pluralism in meaning and unitary analyzing Parajuli’s Departure of time in terms of Pluralism and unitary method we see the presence of godly conscience. However, this look is not a perfect look. Such innovation text comes with new possibilities.
Greek literature could display the permanent passion of human being on the one hand and covers values and norms of society on the other. In the same way Parajuli accepts some social norms as universal one. Parajuli enters into the pleasure of labyrinth connecting view with moral and aesthetics beauty. He further supposes moral and spiritual conscience as Hellenic conscience and gives emphasis for the high seriousness in poetry. He tries for mass civilization. In this epic, he treats morality as an ingredient part of social consciousness and universal humanity. Furthermore, the present epic gives emphasis for the search of possibilities within oneself to be sovereign of oneself. Consequently one easily can discard pessimism and chaos by objective evaluation. Therefore, the text shows possibilities of salvation of worldly people from this world itself. With new platonic concept the author projects time, human being and God in terms of God, Godfather and son. The epic starts voyage to the conscience of God as the departure of time brings death of humanity.
The epic searches intercultural tolerance, humanity and tradition. In the absence of center he laments in the first declaration of scene:
Whose hand can we hold
Of a person?
In a street
Whom to look for in temple?
Own mind does not speak
Tradition has been changed
Of this beautiful country!
Endless world pictures are seen in this epic, which move from ‘Declaration Of First Sight’ to ‘Last Obedient Letter’. In the first sight the world is changed in indecisive mood and search a creator that can save God who is wounded badly:
To save God,
God is needed this time
A mother has to give birth
To a God.
Faith, honesty, truth and morality are created truth rather than tangible in this situation where time is also not secure. In this fearful point, were everything has been made truth by power, the pet feels the sense of responsibility due to the suffocation of the world. The protagonist of epic ‘time’ is successful to produce double conscience: Fear and responsibility side by side.
The short lines have come to show instability of mind: On whose direction we move?
The alternative name of this time in his view is disorder, chaos and anarchy. He attempts to return to the happy, natural and peaceful past. The waiting geography of time has become the geography of obstacles. The question whose answer comes orally and western form are not genuine question. His question such as the plot for the continuity of creation is valid or not, etc are unanswerable, and open question. For this solution the poet moves himself from physical world to metaphysical world and constructs a cycle.
He joins hill of Swambhunath and Washington DC easily to project world as small global village. In the same vein of Walt Whitman who could see the godly consciousness even in the blade of grass, Poet Parajuli gazes the pain in Himal, rock and even in newly born child. As grass germinates from grave to beautiful garden the poet’s conscience has been tormented in world pain in Naryanhit’s blood to screaming in Pentagon along with worldwide pain:
To collect news of Narayanhiti
………. …………………
It hurts to Himalayas
Equally hurts to rock
Even it hurts more to newly born child.
In this way, poetic conscience goes a head transforming himself from other actively sharing the pain of poor people to the grave and brings clouds down. The modern man in his view has been moving from opposite direction and betrays life style. He projects loneliness of modern man in minimal affirmation:
People drink wind with no water
Own people betray their man
The friend of people
Departs like train
Parjauli who prefers rhythm of thoughts rather than rhythm of word experiments time humanizing it:
The time does not like to survive
Moves room to room
And tries to sacrifice
In order to present the sad moment, that has been created to explore happiest flash by some people he makes proper balance between mind and heart.
The man changes to Cartoon
While seeing it.
The crisis of identity and agony has been transformed through sense organ and used symbol through verbs:
One nation
Falls down in water
Sound dwells in sound
… …..
Fragmenting dream in midnight the poet ponders with difficult question. The poet’s soul can differentiates truth and false is very imaginative and powerful but does not forget morality. In dream, he ponders on exploitation agony and depression and seeks way to get rid from it. He looks time in a peaceful state and gets pleasure splintering reality. All the abstract paintings drawn in front page of poem appeals reader to be imaginative. The happiness which is formed by imaginations is both beautiful and truth. Parajuli creates superior world where there is no voice of chaos and anarchy:
Entire life
I encounter
A question
I opened eye
There was no moon
No star
Falling star
The poet envisages beautiful world out of very chaotic world in imagination. With consciousness in liquidity he can see falling sky and his own death too.
In the day of my death
The sky above me
The poet should see beautiful world in each elements with the help of imaginary eyes where as many people pollutes the time. It is the glorification of poem and a way to freedom from Slavery on the other:
What time
Man declares himself to free?
Among negative and positive instincts prompted within us, the negative instinct has become the enemy of man. Further, he shows big chasm between appearance and reality:
What Guitar plays
Difference inside
And outside
In the same way, he asserts the cause of monstrous quality in modern people as the result of mechanical love.
A beloved exchanges
Lover
And a Lover exchanges
Beloved
Playing with the images of Buddha, God, affection and imagination he shows the pain of his country in this way:
Holding cap in one hand
The nation walks
On the way
Poet Parajuli writes the name of his country in his chest in this most difficult period of time where the history of country has been dying and there is no place to keep the history of country safely.
He registers proposal of peace to raise disturbed Buddha and fallen Pasang.
I want to fix in Lumbini
To my trembling country
There is heavy blow against culture, human norms and values. He listens the slow sound within this blow as the voice of God, voice of power and voice of conscience. He further recognizes slow sound in the midst of blow as the sound of God maintaining healthy balance between science and religion. The world will surely be handicapped if the ratio of betraying, killing and murdering keep on going in the world. Walking merely on scientific leg forgetting leg of conscience the poet asserts it as the cause of handicapped and gives emphasis on both of their healthy balance. He, at this juncture, presents democratic vision of labyrinth conscience.
Pulling the world to and fro
In the absence of God
Pressing the remote control
One has been biding time
To write new history
‘I’ stands for entire world and God himself. Before doing this, he searches God, challenge openly and construct within himself. In this respect, the poet is the greatest creator. Moving through various stages such as weeping, lamenting and at last persuading poets goes through and invents new god within himself where lies his philosophy, godly conscience and experimentation.
I desperately seek my poem in meditation
In meditation I seek a man
I have been waiting
Declaring my soul as God.
The Departure of time gives the identification, maturity, patience and passing time into a upward movement. To keep glorious history of human being set by Adam and Eve by eating apple of knowledge betraying God poet assets should be with full of patience and conscience. Most of the poems avows that suffering make person mature and to sow suffering in present mean to get happiness further. He presents himself strongly against traditional God by exploring the fact that inspite of pain we should not give up our courage:
I do not accept death
Due to the fear of death
I have entered into the sector
Where death is prohibited
Until and unless being deceived by god.
With docile nature
With dilemma and shattered dream
I will not take out confidence
From God
In own grave
I have to die alone
I should not kill god.
In our grave let’s die alone
We should not kill god.
The separate river is a must inside a river to mark world as movable. A river has to leave edge spite love and affection. Much water disperses in merrymaking out of the edge. Water that keeps identity of river has to move. The river is another form in the labyrinth conscience. Trying to be river means to be civilized and teach the knowledge of civilization to entire globe. Moreover, it is recognition of own god to meet peace.
Poet is not separated from society in spite of some frustrations. It is the pain that shows him little bit romanticists. The poet identifies hurts and invents medicine as well. This is the challenge to those who composes epic for. This epic has got distinct identity that paves the way to salvation.
In conclusion, The Departure Of Time by Gopal Parajuli is the mirror of this decade that is created in labyrinth conscience. Finding out world’s pain in every element he composes god for the peace and fraternity in the world. Further, it asserts literature is not a only medium to project pain and agony further it shows the failure of nihilism and concept of understanding art and literature in cursory look.
Bill Clinton and Freudian Psychology
Published in Nepali Lg Adarsh Samaj, National Daily on Sunday, May 2 1994
English translation in Progress.
Published in Nepali Lg Adarsh Samaj, National Daily on Sunday, May 2 1994
English translation in Progress.
You are reading the first draft at this time.
From the hitherto society, all the creature are in existence due to the mutual understanding. The creature that cannot change according to the change in environment can exist no more.
Darwin’s theory, survival of fittest, captures this sense extensively. In this race man is the most superior in nature. Observing this creature scrupulously it has been known that sometimes the animalistic instinct prompted on him becomes the cause of his downfall.
Man commits mistake and regrets very soon. Natural instincts like affection and ego dwell side by side on every animal. Man also cannot be exception to this. Every creature shows action and counter action with the matter they come across When domestic animal observes yummy grass he follows breaking all the bondage. Correspondingly, the study has shown that the modern man also breaks every thing to acquire the thing of his interest. Regardless of all the similarity, the conscience has made man different and superior to other creature. At the state of loosing, the sense he behaves in horrible way. Because of this prevails chaos and anarchy. Why the same good people become sometimes so bad? Why man losses sensibility? Why common man and the leaders of entire globe pander to such scandal? Why human mind changes in a minute?
Sigmund Freud, a prominent name in modern theory of human psychology, has replied many of the above questions related with the human folly. During his eighty three years long life history he explored effect of many repressed desire observing people scrupulously in different states. It a very notable contribution to make this postmodern era possible. The actuality and his concept concerning the sexual characteristics have been explored in his book and article in very impressive way.
The thought moves faster than the speed of light. Therefore man ponders on many things with in a second. He/she sometimes sees value of money more and sometime of money. Sometimes man presents himself as monstrous like Hitler and sometimes becomes very innocent sages. At this juncture it is proved that human mind is moved by other factors. Freud has divided human mind into three zones. These three zones conscious zone, Unconscious Zone and Subconscious Zone do fight in co existence. When one wins over another man also changes himself according to the instinct of the zones. In the state of unconsciousness, man presents himself f in other way. In the state of sub consciousness, man moves far away in the dream. However, psychologist like Lucretus and Hansacus has supposed the outcome of dream and has the excessive role of human conscience. The conscience pushes man in to egoist state. Man says I am still alive when he alive even though he/she has broken legs and hands. According to the Freud, the conscience remains for a while and at the moment it changes to latent form. Therefore we can say that most of the mental works are unconsciousness too. In the state of unconsciousness he becomes so active and to do anything that without caring the consequence of his work.
According to the Freudian Psychology human activities are instructed by the latent power. It is called sexuality in human language. From the child to the grown up man this desire remains on man. The only difference is that some people take it easy and some make it big issue. The concept in every human being is the same but only difference lies in its expression. Freud asserts that a father loves his daughter comparatively higher than the son and Mother in the same way to son rather than daughter are the outcome of the attraction of opposite sex. 4u\
..hl;hmh=0-]k;,o4m55/
Moreover, a child play with the next breast of his/her mother while suckling it. All these feelings and emotions are repressed because of our strong social norms and values. By contrast, it explodes outside in a very dangerous way. Recently the President of America became the scapegoat of this explosion. While looking via the perspective of Freud, it can be said that the first meeting with the Monica was very much egoist. Slowly and gradually, their meeting changes the form of ego to the sub Consciousness state changes itself into the sexuality. Because of the state of unconsciousness, the president could not think his status and its consequences. Therefore, he president slipped because of the weakness of human being. In this respect he should be excused for this time from the humanitarian perspective. On the other hand there is ego within us. Therefore, his friends including Starr advocated it differently.
No matter how is the psychology of Freud the man falls down when he does cross the social boundary and coexistence? Of course, the question marks came in his personality.
HB Bhandari Prabhat, Prithivi Narayan Campus Pokhara.
Darwin’s theory, survival of fittest, captures this sense extensively. In this race man is the most superior in nature. Observing this creature scrupulously it has been known that sometimes the animalistic instinct prompted on him becomes the cause of his downfall.
Man commits mistake and regrets very soon. Natural instincts like affection and ego dwell side by side on every animal. Man also cannot be exception to this. Every creature shows action and counter action with the matter they come across When domestic animal observes yummy grass he follows breaking all the bondage. Correspondingly, the study has shown that the modern man also breaks every thing to acquire the thing of his interest. Regardless of all the similarity, the conscience has made man different and superior to other creature. At the state of loosing, the sense he behaves in horrible way. Because of this prevails chaos and anarchy. Why the same good people become sometimes so bad? Why man losses sensibility? Why common man and the leaders of entire globe pander to such scandal? Why human mind changes in a minute?
Sigmund Freud, a prominent name in modern theory of human psychology, has replied many of the above questions related with the human folly. During his eighty three years long life history he explored effect of many repressed desire observing people scrupulously in different states. It a very notable contribution to make this postmodern era possible. The actuality and his concept concerning the sexual characteristics have been explored in his book and article in very impressive way.
The thought moves faster than the speed of light. Therefore man ponders on many things with in a second. He/she sometimes sees value of money more and sometime of money. Sometimes man presents himself as monstrous like Hitler and sometimes becomes very innocent sages. At this juncture it is proved that human mind is moved by other factors. Freud has divided human mind into three zones. These three zones conscious zone, Unconscious Zone and Subconscious Zone do fight in co existence. When one wins over another man also changes himself according to the instinct of the zones. In the state of unconsciousness, man presents himself f in other way. In the state of sub consciousness, man moves far away in the dream. However, psychologist like Lucretus and Hansacus has supposed the outcome of dream and has the excessive role of human conscience. The conscience pushes man in to egoist state. Man says I am still alive when he alive even though he/she has broken legs and hands. According to the Freud, the conscience remains for a while and at the moment it changes to latent form. Therefore we can say that most of the mental works are unconsciousness too. In the state of unconsciousness he becomes so active and to do anything that without caring the consequence of his work.
According to the Freudian Psychology human activities are instructed by the latent power. It is called sexuality in human language. From the child to the grown up man this desire remains on man. The only difference is that some people take it easy and some make it big issue. The concept in every human being is the same but only difference lies in its expression. Freud asserts that a father loves his daughter comparatively higher than the son and Mother in the same way to son rather than daughter are the outcome of the attraction of opposite sex. 4u\
..hl;hmh=0-]k;,o4m55/
Moreover, a child play with the next breast of his/her mother while suckling it. All these feelings and emotions are repressed because of our strong social norms and values. By contrast, it explodes outside in a very dangerous way. Recently the President of America became the scapegoat of this explosion. While looking via the perspective of Freud, it can be said that the first meeting with the Monica was very much egoist. Slowly and gradually, their meeting changes the form of ego to the sub Consciousness state changes itself into the sexuality. Because of the state of unconsciousness, the president could not think his status and its consequences. Therefore, he president slipped because of the weakness of human being. In this respect he should be excused for this time from the humanitarian perspective. On the other hand there is ego within us. Therefore, his friends including Starr advocated it differently.
No matter how is the psychology of Freud the man falls down when he does cross the social boundary and coexistence? Of course, the question marks came in his personality.
HB Bhandari Prabhat, Prithivi Narayan Campus Pokhara.
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