India in Translation through Hindi Literature
A Plurality of Voices
maya burger & nicola pozza (EDS)
Offprint
peter lang Bern • Berlin • Bruxelles • Frankfurt am Main • New York • Oxford • Wien ISBN 978-3-0343-0564-8 © Peter Lang AG, International Academic Publishers, Bern 2010 Hochfeldstrasse 32, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland; [email protected], www.peterlang.com, www.peterlang.net
Contents
Acknowledgements ...... 7 Note on Transliteration ...... 8
MAYA BURGER AND NICOLA POZZA Editors’ Introduction ...... 9
Part I: Selection and Issues of Translation
MAYA BURGER Encountering Translation: Translational Historiography in the Connected History of India and Europe ...... 25
SUDHIR CHANDRA Translations and the Making of Colonial Indian Consciousness ...... 47
MADAN SONI Before the Translation ...... 65
THOMAS DE BRUIJN Lost Voices: The Creation of Images of India through Translation ...... 77
ANNIE MONTAUT Translating a Literary Text as Voicing Its Poetics Without Metalanguage: With Reference to Nirmal Verma and Krishna Baldev Vaid ...... 103
NICOLA POZZA Translating from India and the Moving Space of Translation (Illustrated by the Works of Ajñeya) ...... 127
Part II: Reception and Book History
ULRIKE STARK Translation, Book History, and the Afterlife of a Text: Growse’s The Rámáyana of Tulsi Dás ...... 155
PURUSHOTTAM AGRAWAL “Something Will Ring …” Translating Kabir and His “Life” ...... 181
FLORENCE PASCHE GUIGNARD Go West, Mira! Translating Medieval Bhakti Poetry ...... 195
GALINA ROUSSEVA-SOKOLOVA Behind and Beyond the Iron Curtain: Reception of Hindi Literature in Eastern and Central Europe ...... 235
Part III: Practices of Translation and Writing Experiences
SUSHAM BEDI Looking in from the Outside: Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting ...... 249
GEETANJALI SHREE Writing Is Translating Is Writing Is Translating Is … ...... 267
GIRDHAR RATHI Compunctions in the Act of Translation ...... 277
RAINER KIMMIG “… The Savage Silence of Different Languages” or Translating from South Asian Literatures ...... 285
Contributors ...... 293 Index ...... 297
SUSHAM BEDI
Looking in from the Outside: Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting
This paper looks into certain questions related to translating and imparting culture as a writer and educator. It focuses on the dual role of a diaspora writer in translating her culture to the adopted country as well as exporting the re- constituted culture back to her native country. It raises questions about Indianness, cultural and linguistic identity, gender and societal issues and changes caused by living in a different geographical space. I am looking at these questions as an outsider trying at the same time to be an insider, as an observer as well as a participant. In other words, being at “home and in the world,” while playing many roles. Being a writer also affects my teaching and both conditions are in a way interconnected as I bring a sense of telling and getting a story in the classroom. It also effects the selection of materials – a preference for historical, political and literary. I have looked into my own no- vels and short stories and into my experience as a Hindi teacher at Columbia University to answer some of these questions.
A writer reveals multifaceted truths of her/his times and her/his society; the main challenge lies in authentically depicting those truths. A diaspora writer must unearth and excavate the truths of two societies, her current one and that of her/his place of origin. Thus, as a diaspora writer, my responsibility is twofold: to the place where I now live as well as towards my birthplace. Whether I like it or not, I can never escape the imprints left upon me in the formative years of my life; miles and decades of separation from my birthplace will nev- er erase those first influences. Language connects me to my birthplace. I remain intimately in- volved with Hindi, my native language, both by writing in it and by teaching it. Teaching Hindi supports my writing economically, linguisti- cally, emotionally and creatively. But the cultural ethos of what has become home invariably leaves its own imprint and colors on the creative process. One becomes cognizant 250 Susham Bedi of these influences slowly, sometimes after many years and only through gauging their effect on one’s writing; sometimes others draw our atten- tion to these changes and sometimes we notice them ourselves. Whatever one becomes is a product of various degrees of adaptation. Just as we differ from each other as individuals, so too do the adaptations we make. What is claimed, retained, given up, assimilated, adopted is a matter of individual difference. This is true for all immigrants but especially so for sensitive souls. Some may protest, others indulge in denial, but the process is inevitable. What is “my India” or “my Indian culture”? These are important questions and so is the question of how much of the West, of America has permeated my Indianness. In this paper, I will try to address the issue of how the two, my Indianness and my North American experience, are reflected in and inform my writing and teaching. So what is my India? Which India am I trying to construct in my writing and teaching? What is that culture that gives me my self-image of being an Indian? My dress? My language? My Hindi teaching? My thought processes, my values, or my opinions? Certainly my appearance, that is my clothes and style of dressing, is a part of this self-image. I came to this country as a wife of a diplomat, representing India; wearing a sari was obligatory at official functions. When I started teaching at Columbia University, the same seemed natu- ral to me in the formal setting of a classroom. Wearing Western clothes or dressing in a Western way was neither required of me nor was it natu- ral. In time I made all sorts of changes in my dressing style; I still wear saris and salwar kameez but I have found a sort of “fusion dress” – long skirts – works best for me. All these aspects of my Indian self play an important part in my role as a teacher. The students in my classes are of Indian origin as well as of European descent. My choice of dress may initially alienate some of my students, but as the semester progresses they feel comfortable with me in class as well as outside the classroom. I become a representative of my culture to them; they ask me a variety of questions that deal with Indian dress. Some students have even wanted to learn how to tie a sari! In the past I have had gatherings at my home where female students tried on my saris and salwar kameez. At the end of every semester we host a par- ty at my home where we cook together and discuss spices and recipes. A Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 251 number of times the party has become a potluck when students cooked and brought Indian dishes. More important than dress and food are my values, my thinking, and what is called sa sk r: the relevance of social and familial context and the particularity of time and space in which I grew up. My sa sk ra given to me by my native land has constructed and framed my thinking and my attitudes. So what were those values and mores? This is a vast topic but I can shed light on some aspects of it. I will consider here my life experiences, the circumstances that have shaped my individuality and how they have impacted my writing and teaching. Needless to say, there is no one “India”; many strands, from differ- ent eras, regions, religions and cultures exist simultaneously: there is rural India and there is the urban expanse, there is the North and there is the South, and so on. Diversity of all kinds is a fact of Indian life. I am a woman, born and raised in India. What does it mean to be that kind of a woman? Family, values (sa sk ra), instructions, taboos, expectations of self-control, suppression and inferior status as compared to that of a boy all play a part in the creation of self and identity. My family belonged to a sect called Arya Samaj. Education for all, social reforms, rejection of idol worship and centrality of the Vedas and recitation of mantras are all central tenets of this sect. At the same time, the contemporary social and political movements also cast their spell on my development. Secularism and non-alignment propagated by Nehru, the national movement for independence, an em- phasis on progressivism as well as Western romanticism and orientation to sciences, particularly psychology, were revelations for me. What per- meated every aspect of our lives was modernity. But this was not the modernity that rejected tradition outright; it sought to create a balance between the two. Coming to my adult life, what accounts for a difference from other Indian women is my having lived in the US for the last three decades. This has granted me another kind of freedom, free from taboos and ri- tuals of an Indian woman’s life. This freedom has been very influential in my teaching practice. It has enabled me to choose topics to teach that highlight and enhance the role and place of women in society and that interrogate the position that women occupy in Indian culture. 252 Susham Bedi
Women’s writing has taken an important place in today’s writing and since the 90’s it has taken over the Hindi world. I find it important to introduce it to my students. I have included women writers in my teach- ing and have prepared a website on Hindi women writers.1 What values have I chosen to adopt and/or give up? What are those that I can never be free of? On what basis did I make those choices? How did and do my choices affect my teaching practice? These are the questions I will attempt to investigate in this paper. The question I have been asked to explore is: “What does it cultural- ly mean to write in Hindi outside India? How does teaching Hindi affect your own representation – and “translation” – of Indian culture and how does it influence the perceptions your American students may have of it?” My teaching philosophy includes encouraging student participation, role-playing and story-telling often from my students’ own life expe- riences; connecting Hindi language to students’ lives in this way promotes linguistic retention and strengthens multicultural understanding in the classroom. In the context of modernity I choose literature to teach that concerns itself with today’s values, struggles and some basic issues and problems of Indian society. For example, I have, in the past, selected Shrilal Shukla for his fine portrayal of the changing mores of Indian vil- lages, suburbs and society after Independence. He deftly delineates how political corruption has destroyed the simplicity of a village. In the same manner, I choose the “New Poets” for one of my courses, as they too concerned themselves with social issues. For exam- ple, Muktibodh’s poetry provided a new and heretofore unexplored look at India. In order to keep my classes authentic, I prefer to select those writers who use a Hindi-Urdu mixed style or spoken Hindi, where words from Arabic or Farsi keep the natural flow of the language and where com- monly used words are not discarded as Urdu words. The writers I teach, Mohan Rakesh, Rajendra Yadav, Mannu Bhandari, Krishna Sobti, or Uday Prakash among others, share this orientation to language. Hindi fiction aims at portraying realities of day-to-day life. The lit- erary tradition of depicting social reality started with Premchand; a
1 See
2 JAIN, 1968:43. 3 AGARWAL, 2007:189–90 (my translation). 254 Susham Bedi
For example, in my essays and short stories I depict how Indian immigrants put too much pressure on their children to succeed, a feature they share with other immigrant groups but to a far greater degree. The development of the next generation appears to lack spontaneity. In my essay, “P &hiyo k s &hiy ” (“The generational ladder”) this issue is a major focus.4 Similarly in my short story “N te,”5 the character of the father says that the expectations of Indian parents to be looked after by their children in old age are coercive and inappropriate. The central cha- racter in this story, the father, tells his son,
[ S J7 ! S< ư D 7 ][ 7H J D } I : M ][ T 9 I' ư [ ; : X _ I ` , ,: _ : < , X : X _ ư , [ Ú `] < N` D< ] , SD < 7 ! ư ( .; )
Remember, I never want to see myself as one of your duties. That is unacceptable. If the feeling of love does not spring within, you shouldn’t feel guilty about it. This is the nature of love. Like water, it always flows downwards. Love always flows towards one’s children. To change that flow is only part of social conditioning, not a reality of life.6
It is very likely that I could not have written this story had I continued to live in India. When “N te” was published in Dharmyug in 1989, I re- ceived a number of letters from Indian parents challenging me on writing that parents should not burden their children, with “who then is going to look after them?” In the Hindi stories that I read, the children are often shown as mon- sters, unconcerned about their parents. One of Dronvir Kohli’s novels N n (2001) is about how in America, “N n ” (maternal grandmother) is made into a Nanny, a baby sitter. She ends up working for her children and serving them. There are a number of such stories showing the irres- ponsible behavior of the younger generation.
4 BEDI, 2002a. 5 BEDI, 1989b. Hindi quotation from BEDI, 1995. 6 All English translations by the author, except otherwise specified. Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 255
Religion also becomes an obstacle to intellectual freedom, to open thought and dialogue. This is why my novel Itar provides a critical look at so-called “gurus”.7 In this novel I have provided a vigorous criticism of those who use religion as an object of barter. In Itar, Alpana conti- nuously stresses that gurus and ashrams are false idols; the true divinity can only be found within oneself. There is no need to seek god in any mortal man, group or blind belief. Like my other novels, Itar is set around Indians living in America. But these characters are immersed in their corporeality while, at the same time, desperately trying to find intellectual and spiritual equili- brium; for help they turn to gurus and ashrams. This novel delineates that part of culture which has religion as its sole descriptive vehicle. The reader will only find deep criticism of the hypocrisy of religion that is manifested by rigid rite and ritual, rituals that mask the true nature of false prophets. There is no vindication of religion here. God can be the object of personal, individual devotion and searching but when that search becomes part and parcel of the societal makeup then society be- comes unhealthy and oppressive. This is the main thrust of Itar, the novel. Women’s emancipation and issues dealing with their lives are issues that many writers have addressed. Although some writers like Matreyi Pushpa, Mridula Garg among others have women’s discourse as the cen- tre of their writing, others have larger humanity as their focus. My viewpoint has evolved differently towards women, probably be- cause of my continued stay outside India. There are two things to take into account here: the influence of American feminism and the fact that I have mostly dealt with Indian women of the 1980’s (I left India at about that time). Therefore, questions I raise about women reflect the impact of these peculiarities. Looking at my own work, I have not accepted Indianness blindly. Indian values were not always ideals for me. I looked at them critically and questioned some. For example, I do not abide by the precepts of Hindu scriptures about widowhood; I do not believe that a woman should spend all her life with the memories of a dead husband and that
7 BEDI, 1997. 256 Susham Bedi she should be dependent on others. Havan’s8 protagonist, Guddo, a wi- dow, wants to rely on her own self, for which she does take support from other men but ultimately for her own independence. Guddo is attracted to other men after coming to the United States. She has a relationship with one of them and feels secure that no one is going to question her character and malign her morals in this country. But even so, she is not free of guilt and inner struggle. She is not com- pletely free of her Indian mores that demand purity. She does not fear social scorn or strictures but her tradition weighs heavily on her. Indian literature written about widows mostly focuses on their social oppression and expectation of chaste behavior. One much discussed Hindi novel about widowhood is Raji Seth’s Tatsam (1983). Here the widow belongs to changing times where her family wants her to remarry but her inner compulsion does not allow her. She is not able to get over her sa sk r and wants to remain with the memories of her dead husband. However, towards the end, she does ac- cept someone who had taken care of her when she was totally helpless. By contrast, Guddo has been able to get rid of these sa sk r. She does not remarry either, but she uses men to some extent for her benefit as well as that of her children. I wonder if I could have conceived of such a character had I not lived away from India. Guddo is making sacrifices but extremely selfish. A Hindi writer will not allow her chastity to be voluntarily compro- mised, as I have shown in Havan. Many of my Indian readers have appreciated Guddo’s struggle for her children but they condemn Guddo’s relationship with another man, in spite of their knowledge of North American society. Another much discussed novel about divorce, Mannu Bhandari’s pk Ba (1971), focuses on the loss of direction in the life of a child as well as childhood itself and social interference in the protagonist Sha- kun’s life. Shakun is invariably bothered by bitter comments of her next- door neighbor who is constantly keeping an eye on comings and goings in her house. I have also raised the issue of divorce in my novel Morce.9 The pain of Tanu, Morce’s protagonist, stems from losing the custody of
8 BEDI, 1989a. 9 BEDI, 2006a. Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 257 her children and being lonely, unlike Shakun, who is pained by social commentary. In Indian writing, social interferences, expectations, and criticism from reference groups, or merely the anticipation of strictures play a very important role in how a person handles life situations. That sensitiv- ity diminishes in United States, away from the social context, and what becomes relevant and determinative are a person’s inner workings, trans- formations, dilemmas, and the ups and downs of a person’s own life circumstances. Social supports and reference groups are potent forces everywhere, but the way a person in India is subject to social scrutiny, with a well cultivated and responsive social conscience (lok-l j) in India changes the nature of social transactions and their impact on a person’s feelings, thoughts and behavior. This then becomes reflected or picked up in the diaspora literature. Sa sk r, the accumulation of cultural imprints, played a role in ab- sentia, that is, from a distance, in the characters of Havan; Guddo, for example, feels humiliated by the loss of social status in the United States. She was the wife of a high government official back in India with the social esteem that goes with it, and here she is only a clerk in a bank, having to shoulder the arrangements to get suitable grooms for her daughters. Guddo wavers between tradition and modernity; she believes, like Aryasamajis, in the importance of higher education for her daughters but also wants them to have their marriages arranged and on time. Her daughter, Anima, is not permitted to choose her own spouse; Guddo is unprepared to wait until that might occur, and she marries her off to a doctor in India. The freedom to chart one’s own course has its own problems, as is the case with another character, Radhika, of Havan. She loses her bear- ings, and her life course becomes disastrous for her and a big embarrassment for her family. My attempt here was to focus on dilem- mas faced by immigrant Indians, and a voice from within raising a red flag in the form of this character. Radhika drifts into a world of sex and drugs, as if the Indian voice was saying, “See, I told you. Social controls are vital; freedom is a recipe for disaster”. When there is no supervision and direction from a parent, young ones are likely to lose their way. In “B c k bh ke ,” a short story, the protagonist, Veena, raises questions of liberation and its limits. She says, “There is only aimless wandering 258 Susham Bedi on this path.”10 My intent was to highlight the Indian immigrant mindset, an inclination to be tempted by liberty but not allowing oneself to fall headlong blindfolded into a well. It seeks to find new standards for de- termining right from wrong. Whether it is Mira of Lau n 11 or Neha of “Sa ak k lay”12 they need to check the new barometers of pressures, in- ner and outer, against the old. Neha’s dilemma in “Sa ak k lay” is that, on the one hand, her par- ents have given her freedom to spend time with her friends, but, on the other hand, when it comes to physical relationships she gets opposite signals. She is not able to judge what is right for her. The contradictions between the degrees of freedom and the extent of self-control are preva- lent in all these female characters. In this story the narrator says:
S7 ư S` % X [`S 7 ` S Þ X : X D I _ EX : I D I : < 9 * : ! D < __ X : ] S5 ư X % L I [D 9 D 9 I : ][ R [ 7H : N _ ] R D [ D ư I [ D ` D 7 I : X Õ [ ` I : S[ ` % : ]J % ? ]J ` 7_ : q; : […] _] ` q; ][ ` S XT < I J] X ư ) ư SD _ ? ( .; - )
Neha does not know herself what the right course of action is. Going for an ar- ranged marriage is beyond her comprehension and she is afraid to have a relationship with any and all, with freedom to experiment with whosoever physical intimacy as a trial of suitability to each other only after which a serious considera- tion of marriage can undertake. And who knows in reaching that climax what might break on the way, and the relationship might disintegrate. This is exactly what has
10 BEDI, 1995:17. 11 BEDI, 1994. 12 BEDI, 2000. Quotation from “Su am Bed k das kah niy ”
happened with her friends. From this fear she has not been able to be physically in- timate with any man. How can one keep the mind and body separate? In fact when one is fully committed and has let oneself give mentally completely, what is so spe- cial about the body to hold it back? Why to hesitate? She remains a virgin, unfulfilled from this dilemma. […] [But then Neha thinks that] it is silly to marry for the satisfaction of one’s body. She will not let that happen.
The protagonist of Lau n ,13 a married woman who has chosen to be childless to preserve her dancing figure, rejects this embrace of the value of purity. She tells her husband Vijay,
Ñ7 } '< , 7 I _ < ư ô ` 7H D D … 7 X … 7 L … 7 I _ T 7 ư X I _ T 7 N LL : … Ľ : … J7 Ñ 7 ' : I Ñ7 ( .; )
However much I love you, you can not be the ultimate truth of my life. My self will always demand more, beyond you, different from you, you cannot be the centre of my life. My center is my own identity, but I still need you as much as you need me. (p. 51)
At another place she thinks,
(sic) Ñ 7 9 T ư I … D ` Į 7 I : % X ? ]D ]D ] D ]D ]D X 7 : I X 7 … [ _ S7 X [ [ 7 : ( .; )
No one can be the owner custodian of one’s body and mind just because he is your husband, and if that is what some stra demands why should [she] be captive to it? Different authorities have said different things, she will pick what suits her, and she must go by her own rules. (p. 68)
Mira wants to shape her own life. She does not go by life-limiting condi- tions of marriage; which she says limit life’s possibilities, progress and vastness.
13 BEDI, 1994. Translation in BEDI, 2006b. 260 Susham Bedi
In starkly different circumstances, Tanu, of Morce,14 is also restless to be freed from ideals of purity. She had received the value of devotion towards one’s husband from her mother. Once she becomes sexually in- volved with her would-be husband, she feels bound to marry him despite seeing a number of problematic traits in him. In her marital relationship she is constantly demanding equality, and what she receives is a divorce. She cannot fathom leaving her husband even after being physically abused by him and what she suspected was his philandering. She feels shame in being a divorced woman, but, once her husband leaves her any- way, she feels liberated. When she has a first physical encounter with a man after divorce, she tells her mother. The first thing Tanu did after returning from Florida was to an- nounce the abandoning of the wifely dharma. While she was talking to her mother, Tanu felt as though she had become a virgin again after leav- ing her long-time husband. During the years she had been married, she had never even fantasized about being with another man. Closeness to Ragino, her new boyfriend, made her feel as though she experienced sexual pleasure for the first time. She shook her mother by the shoulders and exclaimed,
+ 5 [ D< E P ( .; )
I am telling you about the loss of my virginity.
And, as she discards the values nourished in her by her mother, she says,
ư ư X X J L : I : ' X R E ] J7 7 ]D R [ X* Č R I7 ] X S SD < S 9 I [D " ] DI 7 D … X S 7 D[ + I ] ( .; )
You cannot imagine how unburdened I feel. The way you had instilled husband- worship in me, it had seemed impossible to get out of it. It had seemed that after di- vorce with Anuj my life will be desolate and I will be spending all my life alone like you but now I am relieved of that web.
14 BEDI, 2006a. Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 261
When her mother talks about social shame, Tanu replies,
[ X 7 : X XS N ]D : … 7 ] I[ S` _ I ]D S [ ) D , NL ' D ! I È S + ( .; )
This is the problem. You are always afraid of a bad name (badn m ) in society. But listen, the customs in this country are different. I am going to meet men, date them and then hope to find someone right for me.
Of course her mother suggests to her that she should marry an Indian, to which Tanu replies,
ůĪ ` S ư ' D I Ľ L ]D, S < _ S [ ,9 D Ĩ ( .; )
I will never marry an Indian. They look smart from the outside but inside they are conservative and egoistical.
Then Tanu declares,
X S R S D 9 I D ,9 D ,9 ` S : ] ' D ( .; )
Now I am going to live with a man and get to know him well and then decide about marriage.
Such direct, straight talk from Tanu disturbs Indian readers. One critic called this ugly and unsophisticated language. But in my view, this is the truth of Indo-American society; they are the true feelings of the generation growing up here. When I raise the subject of love in my novels like Nav bh m k raskth ,15 it is not the family or social hurdles that get in the way of love that inform my work. It is the individual’s inner fears, uncertainties, nagging doubts, which hold sway. Ajñeya’s Nad ke dv p (1951) is also an individualistic novel, and the characters in that novel are like islands surrounded by their personal concerns. Nav bh m k raskath falls in that
15 BEDI, 2002b. 262 Susham Bedi same tradition of novel writing, but Nad ke dv p also deals with a trian- gle and is affected by social qualms, whereas Nav bh m k raskath is conceived on American land and treats its characters differently. The protagonist of Nav bh m k raskth also carries the baggage of Indian values that she has been able to shed only partially and is restless to take off the rest. She is in love but afraid to commit because the condi- tions of an Indian marriage do not agree with her. She says,
` S ) : ! Ì , [ S [ T P J Ì , ] T SX ` S ]9 SS9 I ] D S : [ I [, % S[ I [, E : X [ I [ [ X I I S ô ][ X Q[ S P9 , I 9 _D Rư, X _ X X Ŀ X I ô SD < L S ' X X I : I R X Q[ S : [ I R _I < ` S I 7 : ( .; )
Marriages are like that. However desirable or lovable a person may be, the burdens of ordinary routine crush the loveliness and desirability. The issues that matter are how to deal with a certain relative, who should be given what, how the house should be decorated, etc. The two people who are most important to each other, whose wishes and desires have to be paramount, they end up becoming the thorny problem. One needs to cut off from that very person with whom intimacy was the most important thing in life, the very reason for which one accepted the bondage of marriage.
In the 1970’s, a number of women writers wrote novels with romantic themes. According to Indu Prakash Pandey,
The protagonists of most of these novels fall in love in order to free themselves and take care of their pain and pleasures themselves. Most women writers have written stories of successful or failed love.16
My novel is an attempt to understand the inner face of love, not to show the success or failure of a relationship on account of social strictures and impediments.
16 PANDEY, 1989:17. Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 263
The tensions between tradition and change are the key issues of our time. Hindi writers have challenged tradition at many levels. Love is one, but there are other areas too. These writers have raised a number of issues that I do not address, as they are not part of my reality. For example Chitra Mudgal’s v (1999), Maitreyi Pushpa’s Idannamam (1994), Shrilal Shukla’s R g darb r (1968), or Panishwar Nath Renu’s Mail cal all deal with Indian issues, whereas I deal with the issues of the Indian diaspora. All aspects of social reality are being explored by many of Hindi writers. Mannu Bhandari has written a narrative of political corruption and crooked moves of politicians, Prabha Khetan and Alka Saraogi have opened the Marwari life to readers, Geetanjali Shree deals with com- munal strife in Ham r ahar us baras (1998), and Maitreyi Pushpa has brought village women to the front stage. Only a writer living in that mi- lieu can present changing India, its changing villages, women or labourers, and their lives authentically. It is true that a number of diaspora English writers have depicted In- dian realities; for example, Rohinton Mistry, portrays Parsi life in Mumbai in an authentic manner, but I feel that my arena is the immi- grant mind, and that is why I pick my stories from the life and surround- ings in which I live. This dilemma, of changing and still sometimes finding shelter in tradition, is shown in my short story “Avs n,”17 an entirely new dimen- sion in my repertoire. Shankar’s friend has died and his funeral is being held in a church setting:
` < 5] X <7 M R X ! ư R _ [ I Č R 7H X L ư R 7H R S X I ] R ` < D _ E 9 D[ ( .; )
Shankar felt very uncomfortable in this environment. Nowhere did he find expres- sion of his own feelings. He was like an observer in this arrangement; he could not share his feelings with anyone else nor share theirs. There was so much alive still between the two friends and Shankar revisits his memories of him.
17 BEDI, 1996. Quotation from “Su am Bed k das kah niy ”
Eventually, he is not able to resist and with lokas from the G t , bids farewell to his friend. “Avs n” could not have been written without the experience of liv- ing in foreign land; it was a product of American reality. Every writer has his/her own version of Indianness. While living an immigrant life, one is constantly translating oneself. One understands the adopted country’s culture through translation and explains one’s own culture, too, in the same manner. English literature written in India is also a translation of Indianness; that is what R.K. Narayan has done through his novels, explaining what Indian culture is. But then everyone’s translation also represents his/her own version. R. K. Narayan, on the one hand, tries to put philosophical and spiritual aspects of Indian culture, where as Arundhati Roy explains the humanity in the shackles of castism. Salman Rushdie has tried to capture the con- tradictions within Indian society as a consequence of the experience of colonialism and tries to delineate the inner conflicts and upheavals of Indian immigrants burdened by the experience of having been colonized. To put it another way, we keep experiencing our lives as immigrants in translation: pita bread becomes Indian roti for us; a kurta becomes a short kurt to replace the Western blouse; tofu or cottage cheese replaces pan r in s g pan r. Similarly at the wedding in Havan, the bride and groom kiss an act that is borrowed from Western culture. We still attend and perform the rituals of the virgin bride even though we know that the bride and the groom have been living together for years. In this process, we adjust our rituals and traditions to suit the new environment in the same manner, as one adapts a word to fit in the translation. Whether it is food, clothes, rituals of death, birth and weddings, we try to find a way to make meaning. We keep finding new words, symbols and images. I found the metaphor of Havan in my own life lived in the United States; similarly “Sa&ak k lay” could have been conceived only after experienc- ing Manhattan streets. Let me stress that my basic value system developed in India. My roots in Hindi language and literature were developed in India, but their full development took place on the American soil. I have also been asked whether I put myself in the tradition of Hindi writers, and my answer is both yes and no. Like Rushdie is in the mainstream of English literature but also has a special place in the tradition of diaspora literature; in the Writing and Teaching in the Diasporic Setting 265 same manner, even though I belong to the Indian lineage of writers, my identification as a diaspora writer cannot be denied. It is also true that Indian culture that I project is my own version. Thus, what form of that culture will take, when and where will unfold in time? The same can be said about the American culture that I portray. What I see and imagine as India or Indian may be seen by others as American or something else. Therefore, whether I feel that I am looking as an insider or not, others, especially Indians, may say that I am an out- sider, and I am looking at India from the outside. There is sensitivity in India about what the expatriates have to say about India, especially if it appears to them as critical and coming from those in the West. When Havan’s English translation was published in England,18 I was seen as an American writer. The novel is about an immigrant’s life in America, but in my own mind, I felt that I had approached that as an Indian writer in especially so since I wrote in Hindi, and since my novel was chosen for publication as South Asian literature. So it is not simply a question of how I look at my work but also how others see it as well. India is also changing fast, like cultures and societies do, more so in this globalized world. There are new versions of India itself. It is also true that some things will be more resilient and refractory, but nothing is permanent and static. Inasmuch as I see myself as an insider, I also know that I am an out- sider. The India I imagine and am a carrier of that tradition, the knowledge I impart to my readers and students is a transformation of my understanding and intuition, my personal and cultural past, my sa sk r, and how that plays within me that have been tested in the crucible of time and motion. The India that flows in this version is flowing in the veins of many like me, of my times and will continue to flow. Culture itself is dynamic and countries too. The way India and its culture are dy- namic and moving with time, so will its culture find various versions with time. The main influence on my teaching of my being a storywriter is that I love to pick stories to teach at all levels – Pañcatantra stories at the beginner level and modern literary stories at higher levels. Not surpri- singly, my students become part of my own stories. In this way they
18 BEDI, 1993. 266 Susham Bedi learn about my idea of India, and I find a new Diasporic culture by un- derstanding their lives. So, on the one hand, I represent Indian culture for them, on the other, I see new patterns of Indian culture emerging from my students who are of Indian origin. The processes of my teaching and writing thus enable me to simultaneously be an insider looking out and an outsider looking in. However much they get to experience Indian culture in my class, what my students ultimately take with them is a fusion of the totality of their experiences.
References
AGARWAL, Rohini (2007): Samk l n kath s hitya: Sarhade aur sarok r. Panchkula: Adhar Prakashan. BEDI, Susham (1989a): Havan. Delhi: Parag Prakashan. BEDI, Susham (1989b): “N te”. In: Dharmyug, Oct. 8. BEDI, Susham (1993): The Fire Sacrifice. David Rubin (tr.). Oxford: Heinemann. BEDI, Susham (1994): Lau n . Delhi: Parag Prakashan. BEDI, Susham (1995): Ci&iy aur c l. Delhi: Parag Prakashan. BEDI, Susham (1996): “Avs n”. In: Sa kalin bh rt ya s hitya 66:151–56. BEDI, Susham (1997): Itar. Delhi: National Publishing House. BEDI, Susham (2000): “Sa ak k lay”. In: Ha s 162/8:36–41. BEDI, Susham (2002a): “P &hiyo k s &hiy ”. In: Di ntar. Dhananjay Kumar, Gul- shan Madhur and Madhu Maheshwari (eds). Delhi: Shilalekh Prakashan:286–93. BEDI, Susham (2002b): Nav bh m k raskath . Delhi: National Publishing House. BEDI, Susham (2006a): Morce. Delhi: Vani Prakashan. BEDI, Susham (2006b): Portrait of Mira. David Rubin (tr.). New Delhi: National Paperbacks. JAIN, Nemichandra (1968): Changing Perspectives. New Delhi: Rajkamal Prakashan. PANDEY, Indu Prakash (1989): Romantic Feminism in Hindi Novels Written by Women. New Delhi: House of Letters.