Melisew Shibabaw Et Al., International Journal of Research in Engineering

Arjun V, International Journal of Research in Engineering, IT and Social Sciences, ISSN 2250-0588, Impact Factor: 6.452, Volume 08 Issue 08, August 2018, Page 340-344 A Text on Screen Creates a Carnival of Dreams: Analysis of Hamlet in the Indian Reel of Kashmir

Arjun V (Guest Faculty, English, St Cyril’s College Adoor, Kerala University, India)

Abstract: Shakespeare’s Hamlet, written around 1600, is one of the most problematic texts in all of literature. With the exception of certain Biblical texts, no other work has produced such a continuing, lively, and contentious debate about how we are supposed to understand it. In fact, one could very easily construct a thorough and intriguing history of modern literary criticism based upon nothing other than various interpretative takes on Hamlet. Haider movie directed by Vishal Bharadwaj is an adaptation of Hamlet and it politicizes the whole context by putting Kashmir instead of Denmark. Adaptations are one of the common techniques employed in literature and cinema and it always give birth to a novel thought and creations. Walter Benjamin in his idea of “after life of a text” talks about the rebirth of the original text in the form of adaptations Keywords: After life of a text, AFSPA, Azadi, Catharsis, Chutzpah, Dream land, Non –violence

Walter Benjamin in his famous essay ‘The task of the translator’ (1929) suggests that a translation is part of the ‘afterlife’ of a text and the interpretation of the latter should be informed by a history of reception (which he defines as ‘the age of fame’). As a text in its own right, a translation does not only carry messages; it recreates the value given to the text throughout the ages. Moreover a translation appears as something unique in Benjamin’s words for it has the potential to convey what he calls a ‘pure language’, where the ‘mutually exclusive’ differences among two languages can coexist and where the ‘complementary intentions’ of these languages can be communicated.. To conclude one last point should be made about Benjamin’s analysis of the issues surrounding translation. It is also interesting to observe that for Benjamin, a translation also remains something provisional because ‘in its afterlife the original undergoes a change. Even words with fixed meaning can undergo a maturing process’ and in the meantime ‘the mother tongue of the translator is transformed as well’ so ‘what sounded fresh once may sound hackneyed later.’ Thus a translator should consider the significance of a text in its context and in the light on the changes it has to undergo throughout the ages because this text will not have the same impact today than it had fifty years ago for instance Hamlet is Shakespeare's longest play, and is among the most powerful and influential tragedies in English literature, with a story capable of "seemingly endless retelling and adaptation by others." The play likely was one of Shakespeare's most popular works during his lifetime. The dramatic form of classical tragedy derives from the tragic plays of ancient Athens, which depicted the downfall of a hero or famous character of Greek legend. The hero would struggle against overwhelming fate, and his defeat would be so noble that he wins the moral victory over the forces that destroy him. A tragedy evoked pity and terror in the audience; it was a catharsis, or washing clean of the soul. Shakespearean tragedy is the classification of drama written by William Shakespeare which has a noble protagonist, who is flawed in some way, placed in a stressful heightened situation and ends with a fatal conclusion. The plots of Shakespearean tragedy focus on the reversal of fortune of the central character(s) which leads to their ruin and ultimately, death. Shakespeare wrote several different classifications of plays throughout his career and the labelling of his plays into categories is disputed amongst different sources and scholars. There are 10 Shakespeare plays which are always classified as tragedies and several others which are disputed; there are also Shakespeare plays which fall into the classifications of comedy, history, or romance/tragicomedy that share fundamental attributes of a Shakespeare tragedy but do not wholly fit in to the category. The plays which provide the strongest fundamental examples of the genre of Shakespearean tragedy are Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth and Antony and Cleopatra. A. C. Bradley saw Shakespearean tragedy characterized by the "tragic flaw," the internal imperfection in the hero that brings him down. His downfall becomes his own doing, and he is no longer, as in classical tragedy, the helpless victim of fate. Shakespearean tragedy usually works on a five-part structure, corresponding to the five acts: Part One, the exposition, outlines the situation, introduces the main characters, and begins the action. Part Two, the development, continues the action and introduces complications. Part Three, the crisis (or climax), brings everything to a head. In this part, a change of direction occurs or understanding is precipitated. Part Four http://indusedu.org Page 340

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License Arjun V, International Journal of Research in Engineering, IT and Social Sciences, ISSN 2250-0588, Impact Factor: 6.452, Volume 08 Issue 08, August 2018, Page 340-344 includes further developments leading inevitably to Part Five, in which the final crisis of action or revelation and resolution are explained. The primary characters in a Shakespearean tragedy are of high status, either by class like King Lear and Hamlet or by military rank like Othello and Macbeth. The main character(s) in a Shakespearean tragedy further the central conflict of the play to the point that their lives, families, and/or socio-political structures are destroyed. The title character(s) along with many other characters in Shakespeare's tragedies die as part of the story of the play. Many of Shakespeare's history plays share the qualifiers of a Shakespearean tragedy, but because they are based on real figures throughout the History of England, they were classified as 'histories' in the First Folio. The Roman tragedies — Julius Ceasar, Antony and Cleopatra and Coriolanus — are also based on historical figures, but because their source stories were foreign and ancient they are almost always classified as tragedies rather than histories. Shakespeare's romances or tragicomic plays were written late in his career and published originally under either tragedy or comedy share some elements of tragedy featuring a high status central character but end happily like Shakespearean comedies. Several hundred years after Shakespeare's death, scholar F.S. Boas also coined a fifth category, Shakespearean problem play, for plays that don't fit neatly into a single classification because of their subject matter, setting, or ending. The classifications of certain Shakespeare plays are still debated among scholars. If one of the really important functions of great literature is to stimulate thought-provoking conversations which force us to come to grips with many things about the text and about ourselves, then Hamlet is a particularly valuable work. There is so much ambiguity and uncertainly about many key elements, Hamlet offers a director a great deal of creative scope, and hence the variety in productions of this play is unmatched in all of Shakespeare, perhaps in all tragic drama. Over fifty films of William Shakespeare's Hamlet have been made since 1900.[1] Seven post-war Hamlet films have had a theatrical release: Laurence Olivier's Hamlet of 1948; Grigori Kozintsev's 1964 Russian adaptation; a film of the John Gielgud-directed 1964 Broadway production, Richard Burton's Hamlet, which played limited engagements that same year; Tony Richardson's 1969 version (the first in color) featuring Nicol Williamson as Hamlet and Anthony Hopkins as Claudius; Franco Zeffirelli's 1990 version starring Mel Gibson; Kenneth Branagh's full-text 1996 version; and Michael Almereyda's 2000 modernisation, starring Ethan Hawke. Haider is a 2014 Bollywood film directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, and written by Basharat Peer and Bhardwaj. It is an adaptation of Hamlet, and is set in Kashmir. It is a common trend in the history of Bollywood cinema to adapt stories of popular novel and dramas into films and so Shakespearean dramas are spare from this. Haider is a 2014 Indian crime drama film directed by Vishal Bhardwaj, and co-written by Basharat Peer and Bhardwaj. It stars Shahid Kapoor as the titular protagonist, and co-stars Tabu, Shraddha Kapoor and Kay Kay Menon. Irrfan Khan appears in an extended special appearance. The film is a modern-day adaptation of William Shakespeare's tragedy Hamlet, set amidst the insurgency-hit Kashmir conflicts of 1995 and civilian disappearances. Haider an adaptation of Shakespearean Hamlet which is considered as “one of the most important movie of the year 2014.” It is based in the Indian-administered Kashmir in the 1990’s, a time when militancy was at its peak. Shahid Kapoor, playing the role of Prince Hamlet is named as Haider Mir, who is a student and a poet, comes back to Sri Nagar after his father’s death. Shraddha Kapoor is playing the part of Hamlet’s beloved Ophelia named as Arshia in the film; Tabu playing the role of Hamlet’s mother Gertrude called Ghazala and Kay Kay Menon as Hamlet’s Uncle, Claudius. Set in the backdrop of Kashmir in the times of turbulence, movie has successfully adapted the play’s well-known twists and turns into the lives of the characters in the movie. After his father disappearance, in order to search for him, Haider leaves his studies and comes back to Kashmir. It was the time when insurgency was at height, his father, who was a doctor by profession was found guilty of helping militants and was carried away by the armed forces. He is disappointed and dejected to finds his mother in an illegal relationship with his uncle, whom he later discovered to be a traitor and responsible for his father’s ill-fate. The film is all about Haider as the play is about Prince Hamlet and as he wanted to take revenge of his father’s death in the same way Haider decides to take revenge against his Uncle and armed forces resulting in ruining his own personality. In his voyage to revenge he is being dragged up into the wrong hands and in the wrong way. If he believed his father was not guilty, he should have fought a legal battle which would have not ruined his life, his beloved and his family. ‘Revenge is a wild justice’, as Bacon says same is portrayed in the movie, Haider. There is, probably, always something tragic and twisted in “the world’s most filmed story, Hamlet,” and Haider is the latest. To contextualize Hamlet after four centuries that, too, with complex Freudian concept (though kept subtle) is indeed a herculean task. As a strikingly revenge melodrama, Haider's plot outline, according to many analysts is similar, though not same to that of Hamlet. Following the Revenge Tragedy genre, Bhardwaj’s attempt to depict staple emotions of Hamlet while keeping his focus firmly on Kashmir is praise worthy. It would not be an exaggeration to consider Haider a remarkable adaptation of Hamlet, intertwined in a story that encompasses Kashmir, militants, politics, power, lust, love and the concept of http://indusedu.org Page 341

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License Arjun V, International Journal of Research in Engineering, IT and Social Sciences, ISSN 2250-0588, Impact Factor: 6.452, Volume 08 Issue 08, August 2018, Page 340-344 chutzpah. As Walter Benjamin says ‘the translation is the new birth of a text’ here Haider give new meanings and interpretations to Hamlet Being set in Kashmir during 1995 it upholds a mirror to the armed insurgency in Kashmir. The position of the Indian army has also been questioned here. When we see the army destroying the house of the local, it certainly questions the power and brutality of the Indian Army that they could practice on the locals. Throughout this film several Army concentration camps has been shown where peoples are being detained and inhumanly tortured on the suspect of being related with the pro-separatist group. Another important issue that has been questioned through the film is the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA). The AFSPA is an Act of the Parliament of India which was passed on 11 September 1958. It is a much debated law which grants special powers to the Indian Armed Forces. Most of the Shakespearean tragedies follow certain set patterns and elements. These include vengeful ghosts, mad scenes; play within a play, gory scenes and above all the protagonist has a grave grumble against an alarming opponent. Vishal Bhardwaj with the help of his innovative and ingenious team has productively tailored a Shakespearian tragedy into a Hindi movie pursuing all the traditional essentials and the brass tacks of Kashmir conflict in the history of Indian cinema. To keep the rotten Kashmir pot blazing, elements like war hysteria, fanatic patriotism and jingoism are thoroughly stimulated in the name of commercial entertainment. So far Indian cinema has only glamorized and romanticized the cooked up scripts when the fierce and bleak reality of Kashmir imbroglio is dealt in a movie. The political re- contextualization has been done tactfully in this film where Danish political turmoil and conspiracy has been relocated through the socio-political unrest in Kashmir during late twentieth century. Haider was caught between sanity and insanity when he was talking to Arshia; there came the central confusion of this film, the English subtitle goes thus: “To trust the surging beats of the heart / or to heed the caution of sober mind / to kill or to die / to be or not to be.” Another important aspect of the play Hamlet is ‘the play within a play’ i.e. "The Mousetrap" where hamlet presents a play of murder and treachery just to record the reaction and uneasiness of Claudius to confirm his treachery. In the same way the text of Haider brings forth this play within a play to confirm his suspicion of his father’s murder by his uncle Khurram. It has been done in the movie through the song ‘Bismil’ where through the metonymic representation of nightingale and falcon the conspiracy has been presented before Khurram. Although coincidental, there seems a strong parallelism of the dynamics of changes between the writings of Shakespeare and socio-political discourses of Kashmir. Around four centuries ago, it seems as if Shakespeare knew how Kashmir, like his plays, would turn from an idealistic tour destination to a tragic spot (from “most beautiful to most dangerous place on earth”). The state of affairs unfolding empower the protagonist Haider to take the affairs into his own hands and hunt for vengeance secretly much in the same line as Hamlet does when he finds King Hamlet dead on his returning Denmark after fair dealing has failed both of them in the state of Denmark and community and power corridors of Kashmir. The movie Haider is not only anticipated to the exterior world but it also reveals the reflection of the individuals of disastrous land where we still have the plentiful yield of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern always waiting and watching in the group to bleed their own people. The Claudius like diabolical characters in the movie are still wandering without restraint in the cloak of civil servants and politicians playing the game of ‘Chutzpah’ with the feelings and emotions of Kashmiri people. In this movie the game of ‘Chutzpah’ is associated with the AFSPA; an additional executioner game accountable for the horrific human rights violation in the valley of Kashmir. “Chutzpah” artistically adopted by Haider, is a Hebrew word meaning the quality of audacity for good or for bad, could be the title of the History of Kashmir. The most intriguing feature of the film according to ‘The Dawn’ is perhaps the scriptwriter's fixation with the metaphor 'chutzpah' to entwine the 'separatist militancy' of 1995 in Kashmir and military excesses inflicted upon the masses through the AFSPA (Armed Forces Special Power Act). Pronounced incorrectly but deliberately to make it sound like a local cuss word’s the figure of speech somehow becomes the punch line of Haider's conflict or the situation of Kashmir. Focusing this "chutzpah" through his lens, the director, inadvertently reveals not only the subtext of his own adapted plot but the ruthlessly capitalized tragedy of Kashmir by Bollywood directors, as well as the political actors of India and Pakistan. Haider, according to its director Vishal Bhardwaj, is the first film where we see Kashmir from the inside. The controversies it invited were mainly based on two issues. The first, it attempted to ‘feed’ the viewer with new [real] senses about Kashmir, which many viewers treat unusual and non-intersecting with their understanding vis-à-vis Kashmir. Moreover, the way Plato proposed to ban poets from his ideal republic because he feared that their aesthetic ability to construct attractive narratives about immoral behavior would corrupt young minds. In the same manner, some self-styled hyper nationalists assume it might ‘corrupt’ the minds of many less-informed Indian masses, thereby exposing the ‘real’ picture of Kashmir and Kashmiris. The realist cinema, like naked art is always disturbing, and Haider being realistic is mainly because it engaged a well-informed insider, Basharat Peer, to frame its screenplay. Apart from the controversies, it is essential to understand what ‘Haider’ offers different from the Bollywood’s earlier discourses depicting Kashmir. http://indusedu.org Page 342

Haider starts from where Hamlet ends, at the last scene of the play Hamlet dies by telling his best friend Horatio to narrate this story through generations and in Haider we find the absence of Horatio. In other words the Director Vishal Bharadwaj as a narrator weaves the plot, narrates the story and becomes the real Horatio. The brilliance of this movie is how its director Vishal Bharadwaj has handled to adapt Hamlet to an entire new setting and yet, as an audience, one speculates if they are watching a completely new story. Bharadwaj has skilfully used the ‘show but do not tell’ procedure to provide us an implied peep into the lives of common Kashmiri’s who have borne the burden of the Indo- Pakistan line of control conflicts. This is the huge achievement of the movie. Though the political milieu often overpowers and twists the family tragedy, Bhardwaj supplies the sporadic intelligent reminder of how cinematically he can assemble Shakespearean flashes. When Haider first returns home, we observe him as he spies, through a scrim of shining gauze, a friendly, mischievous moment between his uncle and his mother who sings a Kashmiri folk song. Watching all this Haider directly recognize the score while in Hamlet, Hamlet has to wait for next proof of his uncle’s guilt. In comparison with Hamlet, Haider is an uncomplicated fellow he knows what he wants i.e. to avenge his father and cleverly goes after it but Hamlet was a philosophical man who was confused what to do. This difference between Hamlet and Haider is the result of their upbringing environments. TS Eliot famously described the play Hamlet as "most certainly an artistic failure": Eliot felt that Hamlet's strong emotions "exceeded the facts" of the play, which is to say they were not supported by an "objective correlative." He acknowledged that such a circumstance is "something which every person of sensibility has known"; but felt that in trying to represent it dramatically, "Shakespeare tackled a problem which proved too much for him." This argument is because of the unstable nature of Hamlet with respect to his country but in haider the things are different here the landscape of Kashmir which is affected by war itself justifies the doings of Hider. In fact the landscape of Kashmir joins the mindscape of haider and to some extent we can suggest that the movie Haider shows an ‘objective co relative’. An Unfulfilled Dream Land Right from the beginning of our freedom Kashmir is an Indo-Pak confrontation. “Do haathi jab ladhte hai to ghass hee kuchali jati hai”, which literally translates ‘India and Pakistan are fighting and Kashmiris like grass are being unnecessarily ground in between’. He tries to convince Haider to forget asking about his disappeared father, which otherwise would invite danger. Unlike the police officer’s suggestion to forget ‘aazadi’ and unfulfilled promises, the film acknowledges that there are people who do not consider seeking aazadi a problem, but the strategy to seek it is the problem. Haider’s family friend tries to convince Haider by saying “Hindustan ki aazadi be laathiwala laya tha”, that ‘India’s freedom was also achieved by peaceful means by non-violent man Gandhi’. In other words, Haider infers that to seek freedom is not a problem but to use violence as a tool is unjustifiable ‘Disappearing of People’ was one of the major issue happened in Kashmir in 1995, and in the movie it represents with the shade of “a ghost”- appearing and disappearing out of nowhere, and calls himself the ‘doctor’s ghost’. Because Haider’s father, the doctor had disappeared, and forcing Haider to assume he may appear or disappear somewhere. In the last scene, it tries to present violence as a form of expressive art filming ‘the burning of snow,’ which symbolises unforeseen tragedy. Snow, in Kashmir has many axioms associated with it. For example, ‘kruhun sheen’ ‘black snow’ which infers impossible or oxymoron. Haider shows that Kashmir is a place where snow literally catches fire and burns. It perhaps symbolises that when enough blood has spilled on the blemish less snow, limbs are severed and flesh burned. It ends with graveyard, blood, guilt, death and regrets, perhaps the outcome of every tragic conflict. Haider’s famous monologue “‘Hum hain ki hum nahin” actually makes us understand the crawl of Kashmir and suggests that the real ghost in the movie is none other than ‘Kashmir’ itself.

CONCLUSION Despite all the criticism from nationalist Indian community, Bharadwaj’s Haider succeeded in gaining warm welcome from the audiences not only from across the borders but also from within the India. Bharadwaj succeeded in transporting Shakespeare’s Hamlet from Denmark to Kashmir. As the rotten state of Denmark was the best place from the development of Hamlet the same rotten state of Kashmir proved to be the breeding place for Haider’s revenge on his uncle and the authorities of Kashmir. This was an honest and bold attempt of Bharadwaj to unveil the miseries of Kashmiris through the lens of Shakespeare’s adaptation. This is a contribution, on his part, to give voice to the Kashmiris against the tyranny of Indian forces in films which is one of the biggest industries of India. The best thing about Haider is that at the end we can find a Gandhian Nonviolent agenda of forgiveness as the real solution for Existence of Kashmir. Intekam is the voice that drives the film forward, but the film ends with last hope words possibly looking for a hope by giving up revenge by closing words “Revenge only results in revenge.” http://indusedu.org Page 343

Like the song in the movie Gulon mein rang bhare baad-e-naubahaar chale Chale bhi aao ke gulshan ka karobaar chale Let there be colours in the flowers, and the breeze of new spring would come. Come, so that the daily business of garden can go on. ‘Human beings all possess reason, but they are generally ruled by passions and emotions (the ‘lower’ and ‘irrational’ parts of the human psyche). Literary texts disseminate ideas, but they do so by playing on our emotions and desires. After reading the plays of Shakespeare and watching all these adaptations by Vishal Bhardwaj, we can believe so.

REFERENCES [1] Ashok, G. (2014, Oct 13). Haider: Shakespeare in Kashmir. [Review of the movie Haider] [2] Benjamin, Walter. Walter Benjamin Selected Writings. Howard Eiland, 1984. Print. [3] Bharadwaj, V. (Producer & Director). Haider. [Motion Picture]. Bombay, India: UTV Motion Pictures. [4] Crowl, Samuel. Shakespeare and Film: A Norton Guide. NY: W.W. Norton & Co., 2008. [5] Hamlin, William M. Tragedy and Scepticism in Shakespeare's England. NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005. [6] Ramnath, N. (2014, Oct 1). Haider: Desperately Seeking Hamlet in the valley of Kashmir. [Review of the movie Haider] [7] Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. Ed. Harold Jenkins. London: Methuen, 1982. Print. [8] Shakespeare, William. Hamlet (The New Folger Library Shakespeare). Simon & Schuster; New Folger Edition, 2003

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