The Exceptional

The Exceptional
The News, Lahore, 28 November 1999

Nadir Ali
Guthlee is a selection from two of Amarjit Chandan’s collections published in India. The selection has been made by Zubair Ahmed, himself a poet and critic, and can be considered a representative selection of the author’s poetry. The author started his poetic and political career as a young Naxalite. He also edited a research magazine of the left in Punjabi Dastawez (The Document). But at the age of thirty he changed his creed; the times too had changed!
He explicated in his interview published in the News on Sunday last year, that being a leftist was a part of the hot-blooded young age. Now in his own words, he is busy "exploring self and sex". There are still traces of the left in this collection for those who read it closely; the two poems on Pash pp. 58-60, Kasa on pg 116 to name a few. The claimed sexuality although explicit has no element of the erotic; it is deadly serious business for Amarjit.

Guthlee, (The Pouch) Punjabi Poetry
Author: Amarjit Chandan
Pages 175 Rs 100/-(hard cover)
Publisher: Rut Lekha, Lahore
Distributors: Kitab Trinjan
Mian Chambers, 3 Temple Road, Lahore
Two shadows move on the wall in the candlelight / Dhareja is kneading the body of his companion, with his drunken hands / His field is ready to be ploughed today. He is ploughing the field / He puts the seeds uncountable of scented sandalwood. He now levels it (leveling of the land and ‘nuptials’ – ‘Suhāg’ – is one word in Punjabi). And now he puts his hand on the heart of the Mother! (page 19)
I consider Amarjit Chandan’s poetry a very important work for the understanding of Punjabi poetics of today, especially in East Punjab. But the collection also includes poems with rhythm and rhyme including one written purportedly in "Raag Sohni" (page 53) Jan gai meri jan gai.
He is a serious poet with immense poetic potential. But the so-called modernism has taken such a grip over poetry writing in East Punjab that they are becoming very obscure, if not outright nonsensical. Chandan is an exception among this lot but one could take issue with his poetics.

I feel every human being is a poet but, fortunately, most of us do not know it. The expression of our yearnings and the dance of our yearnings and the dance of our dreams and desires will, naturally, be very individual. But language by its very nature is a shared heritage and experience. Its symbolism unlike the visual arts cannot be entirely abstract. Our own tradition of song and poetry in Punjabi may be too straight-jacketed by the meter and rhyme but this constraint in the hands of the masters, facilitates, rather than handicapping, the poetic expression.
Amarjit Chandan at the other end of the spectrum is very modern but so rooted in the history and experience of the Punjab, that you are taken along on his distant flights. The poem I liked best in his collection is Aa jao (Come On). The poet’s father suffered from  dementia and he forgot all language except the phrase Aa jao . Chandan makes it a poetic metaphor and wrote a beautiful poignant poem.
Come on fathers!
Come home from alien lands!
Come back again, to die!
The tracks found their feet,
The light found its candle,
But- the music missed its instrument!
Come on fathers! Come on memory!
Amarjit Chandan’s only failure is his utter faith in spontaneity. Not that anyone is going to make out that some of these poems were written in their entirety while running about on the humdrum business of the day. I feel the poetic craft needs some polishing even among the best of poets. Nobody can deny what is called ‘aamed’ in Urdu. Many world masterpieces have been written in this creative surge. Chandan is a craftsman par excellence.
Last year while reading selections from his book, he took the Lahore Press Club audience by storm. Poetry can be performed. Most of the classic poetry of Punjabi was sung and performed but now printed poetry is a different genre.
In cold print you may not be able to breathe the life that one feels in a live reading. There is also a vision that you can feel and may not be able to convey in words; something that a painter may be able to do but a poet may not.
In Punjab and in the Punjabi language our experience is so well shared and symbiotic, that we do not need the abstraction that an alienated western poet needs. The shared words, metaphors and experiences in Punjabi are endlessly evocative. The failure to see this difference is common among the East Punjabi poets. The idiom of some of them is also excessively ‘Sanskritised’ and ‘Hindi-ised’ as it is ‘Persianised’ and ‘Arabised’ in Pakistan.
But Chandan is an exception on this score too. Barring some quotations from Granth Sahib, it is our misfortune that we haven’t read its great poetry; the rest of Chandan is easy to follow.
His poetry is a veritable feast of a variety of experiences. One of his recurrent metaphors is ‘Dhareja’ a long dead distant forefather of Amarjit Chandan, who is of the ‘Dhareja’ clan. The play of shifting focus from the forefather to the scion, that is the poet, is a powerful symbol. Family and clan are a very apt metaphor for the immigrant poet for whom it is memory and pain as well as joy, hope and continuity. He contemplates some very unusual themes in a style that is very individual and new in the Punjabi poetry.
I quote from one of his more personal poems, In Memory of Kewal Kaur (a revolutionary leftist who committed suicide).
Death
Is like the screen of a TV turned off
In which I only see my own face.
Death
Is like a broken goblet,
Like a shaking hand that held the cup,
The wine is already spilt and absorbed in the ground. (pg27)
The experimentation with a variety of themes and forms is a hallmark of Amarjit’s poetry. He contemplates the muse (pg 111), the word (pg 144-147) the rhythm (pg 157) the nature of memory and remembrance in numerous poems. Here is one in which he contemplates the nature of the muse:-
The poet reads his just written lines
Backwards from the end
The eye moving from right to left
Is surprised at his choice of words
The eye had never seen it like this before.
When the word reaches the poet
He laughs; he is not surprised,
Sometimes, when the word gone awry, falls in place,
He is dumbfounded! (pg 111)
The muse is of the nature of revelation to Amarjit as he reiterates in a number of poems. I do not entirely agree with him; but then everyone is not as gifted as he is. Even this very prosaic piece has made me plod hard. I wrote this piece with trepidation and now while I read it backwards, unlike Amarjit, I am not laughing!
I hope I will do better while reviewing his next book, that he wrote during his two week visit to Lahore. All the poems are about Lahore or inspired by Lahore; that is the immigrant poet in Amarjit. Not that London moves him any less. He is a poet of love, peace and freedom. His weaker themes are Punjabi pride and its nature. Finally, in this kaleidoscopic labyrinth the real Amarjit seems to stand up; a bitter, immigrant, Punjabi!
What a condemned land Punjab is
Where mothers gift their sons to the pain of alien lands
What a condemned land Punjab is
Where parents dispatch their sons
And then come home and cry
A day finally comes when the locks of silence seal the doors!
What a condemned land Punjab is
It is ever lost in repentance,
There is no dream in the eyes,
Where even death brings no reunion – of the friends.
And the dear children are no more! (pg 165)
[Courtesy: The News, Lahore, 28 November 1999]

Review Article

Of Light Essays and Terrible Lightness of Being

Nadir Ali
_____________________________________________________________________

Nukta (Essays in Punjabi) by
Amarjit Chandan. 156pp.
Kitab Trinjan Lahore, Rs 125

Likhtam Parhtam (Essays in Punjabi) by
Amarjit Chandan. 88pp. Kitab Trinjan, Rs 100 Available from Saanjh Publishers 46/2 Mozang Rd Lahore. Suchet Kitab Ghar
1 Book St, 11 Sharaf Mansion,
Chowk Ganga Ram Lahore

_____________________________________________________________________

R to L: Amarjit, Najm Hosain Syed, Samina Hassan, Zubair, Akram

Genius in the arts, visual, performing or literary, is different from the Mensa variety. It is about sensitivity and sensibility. These two sterling qualities with an energetic and restless nature are Amarjit Chandan’s forte: what else would make a creative genius. He does not adhere to form and format in his poetry, like all moderns,
but he quotes often from folk, classical and most often from Granth Sahib, where meters and rhymes are a rule. Why did he choose to put the title “Light Essays” i.e. “Komal Lekh” in Punjabi. Komal in Sanskrit means soft, tender, young, delicate, immature, fragile, brittle, sleek, supple, placid, mild, gentle, pleasing, agreeable,
sweet or low (as in a musical note) etc. Chandan has all of those but he is also a serious, earnest, vital, robust, perceptive and knowledgeable writer. He is a veritable one man bridge between East and West Punjab writings in Punjabi; also between the old, classical and modern writings in Punjabi. Light essay or ‘Komal Lekh’ is some silly Punjabi professor’s idea of a fixing a format, which may be akin to ‘causerie’ (babble in French) format. Occasionally he does tip his hat to the format, but since he wears pugree, he does not quite stoop to that. These are essays – imaginative, interpretive and speculative, often profound and poetic.

Amarjit Chandan. By his son Sukant (aged 5). 1983

Chandan’s experience and subject matter is quintessential Punjabi history. He
was in the 1970s a Naxalite leftist activist, who also edited an underground magazine Dastāvez. After suffering solitary confinement, harassment and constant threat to his life he fled to England in 1980 and has lived there ever since. He is a professional full time writer and photographer. He worked in the related fields in Punjab and England. He is a renowned and very prolific poet in Punjabi and his poetry as well as prose books have been published in India and Pakistan. Two poetry books and two prose books – under review – have been published in Pakistan. He visits Lahore often and has many friends there.

First major essay Rut Lekha in the first book, repeated in the second book is an essay about a poem of Najm Hosain Syed, arguably the best Punjabi writer of our times. Chandan obviously wants this essay to be highlighted. Najm says: KattaiN charh gaya aye. (The month of “Kartik” – mid October mid November – is here.). Chandan’s interpretation is subtle and spiritual, which is the essence of poetry writing and reading. But criticism/interpretation has to be more. The poem seems to hint at the Soviet October Revolution. “In this month I heard cranes used to come” and “City is once again on edge” is Marxist optimism. Two rain drops – tears? – falling on window pane joining and moving on… is a very obvious lament and hope of a revolutionary. I do hope Chandan is not a renegade Marxist. Or am I a zealot?  

There is a long definitive essay on political poetry and on Pash, one of the best poets in Punjabi of the last century, again a Marxist. Pash was also an admirer of Najm’s. A friend Ijaz Syed when he told Pash that he had met Najm’s at Lahore, Pash kissed the hand that had touched Najm’s. Be that as it may, for a believer like me, I liked best an unknown widow Satwant Kaur’s interview in Nukta – a lady who saw her husband after more than eleven years, with an eleven year old son. I would make that a must read for every Punjabi. It encapsulated the Punjabi history and experience of a century. Only Chandan could bring such a gift for us.

Apparently the sensual writings and pieces celebrating the human body are Chandan’s favourites. He calls writing one of his favourite love poems among dozens of long and short pieces, a “Ghatna” – happening. It is a very simple, down-to-earth love poem of Santokh Singh Dheer Prem Sumārg (Path of Love), a fine poet and short-story writer of Punjabi. But down-to-earth and simple is the most complex exercise in poetry.

How do I cover more than twenty-nine many layered essays and photos that are essays too, in a thousand words? I will wind up the first book with trivia, a piece on Raj Kapoor. No, Chandan is a serious fan. Only I am being trivial when correcting him that Nargis (my favorite) and Raj Kapoor appeared in fifteen and not eighteen movies together, as Chandan wrote. Raj Kapoor is not a Punjabi. He belongs to and was born in Peshawar. His grandfather was tehsildār of Samundari (district Faisalabad), where Prithvi Raj was born. Films are my “Ghatna” too. We shouldn’t take away Dilip Kumar and Raj Kapoor from Peshawar; two of the brightest stars in the film firmament.

In the second book Likhtam Parhtam he has repeated his piece on Najm Hosain. The opening long piece is about Dheer’s poem, already mentioned above. There is an essay on a short story by Zubair Ahmad, a good upcoming writer of Punjabi from Lahore. He is a friend of Chandan’s and mine. Why not? RL Stevenson said: “Our writings are secret letters to our friends. Public is just a generous patron that (hopefully) defrays the cost of mailing”. Knowing Zubair Ahmad’s work, these are the best pieces that were ever written about him.

Chandan is open and candid about everything. His quotes from Punjabi folk too risqué to be quoted in a newspaper. Chandan criticises both the priests and Marxists for being hung up about sex. Not quite! Lenin said when someone complained about peccadilloes of a comrade: “What are we fighting for in our revolutionary struggle?” Mao ditto. “I haven’t looked at a woman without lust in my heart”. That won’t impress a Naxalite like Pash or Chandan. Even the books of religion have some very explicit passages, so have Rumi and Waris. Pash too showed some naïveté when he said that cadaver of Waris Shah should be removed from Punjabi. Or did he as well as Chandan only read the old admixtures version of Heer Waris Shah or some version in which, like Dr Baqir’s edition, they removed the risqué passages of Waris Shah?

The best and longest piece in the second book is Dhee (Daughter). He condemns Punjabis’ preference for having sons and female foeticide and glorifies daughterhood. He quotes some of the best poetry on the subject. The longest poem is Parul from the great folklorist of the South Asian sub-continent, Devinder Satyarthi. Parul is a Bengali name of girls, which among other things means a sister of seven brothers.

Amarjit Singh Chandan is a true “daughter” of the soil, “A son is like seven daughters” as they say in Punjabi. He is a militant feminist. There is a rite in the West Punjab called “Dheean” (a rite of daughterhood). Here we have frequent cross marriages among villages. “Dheean” means gifts from a bride to all the brides, old and young, from the paternal village. As an honorary “daughter of Lahore” (hereby conferred) Chandan in these two prose books and two previous books of poetry has paid his “Dheean” to fellow “honorary daughter” and real daughters of Lahore. We two, Chandan and I, belong to this sorority of Punjabi writers. I only quote a brief piece from a poem Gārgi by Puran Singh about his daughter:

Naked is the water lily is,

Naked is the sun naked am I, naked is the sky.

This is the Land of Spirits,

Only nakedness becomes here,

Naked is all beauty and naked (Manifest) is God alone

Naked am I, the Whole Truth, the flood of fire.

There is a long piece on a poem Oorha Roti of Surjit Paatar, who after Pash’s martyrdom, is a major poet in East Punjab. This a very moving story poem, also very socialist. Story poem is characteristic of our epic poems and generally of Punjabi poetry; it sets it apart from ghazal like poetry that only plays with rhymes. The story shortly says that a Bihari immigrant labourer’s daughter is going to school to learn Punjabi, while the Punjabi village head’s grand children are riding their car to go to the city English school. How language follows money. How the alphabet is related with the bread.

There is also Ajmer Rode’s beautiful poem Surtie in the piece on Dhee. But I feel Chandan’s favourite would be Wasal Pura of Kailash Puri. Wasal is lovers meeting, physically and spiritually consummated.

Yesterday we two had died.

Our lips our breaths joined and played the flute... .

You may find difficulty with the Sanskrit words. The language of the Sikh scriptures uses the same idiom. You will miss some the best poetry in the world if you are daunted. Read on and it becomes easy. Chandan helps with Bhai Kahn Singh’s Encyclopaedia Mahān Kosh in foot notes.

There is a short poem of Chandan’s that has been put on a 40-foot granite in a public square in a London suburb by the Poetry Society of England. With this I sum up:

ਦੂਰ ਬਹੁਤ ਦੂਰ ਕਿਸੇ ਨਛੱਤਰ ਉੱਤੇ

ਪਿਆ ਹੈ ਪੱਥਰ ਗੀਟਾ

ਜੋ ਕਿਸੇ ਨਾ ਡੀਠਾ ਨ ਹੀ ਛੁਹਿਆ

ਇਸ ਨੂੰ ਅੱਖਾਂ ਮੁੰਦ ਕੇ ਤੱਕਣਾ ਪੈਂਦਾ

ਜਿਉਂ ਚੇਤੇ ਆਉਂਦਾ ਸੁਹਣਾ ਮੁੱਖ ਸੱਜਣਾਂ ਦਾ

Dür bahut dür kisey nachhatar uttey

piaa hai pathar geeta

jo kisey na dittha na hee choohiyā

is nu akhāN muNd ke takn*aa paiNda

join chetey āvey sohna mukh sajjnaN da

Far far away on a distant planet
There lies a stone unseen unturned
It can only be seen with closed eyes
As you see your loved ones.

