Post – Modern Literature

 

Dr. Vinay Kumar Pandey

 

Literary literature in its real mission and meaning, voice and message, substance and shape, old and new, always reflects the world around it inside it. It may at times become just a shadow, or rusty dusty mission, at times a phantom or abberation or deflection and at last just often some sound and fury, disappears from the scene, from the memory, from  history and turns into a fossil. And another abiding identity individuality, utility, quality, timeless brand of tested trade mark as it goes on changing from the past to the present and awaiting, at times, awakening to the future to arrive in the continuous flow of time. The division or classification of literature into past and present or into era and generation age and period is just for convenience of study, assessment analysis, comparison and evaluation but the common element or pursuit remain the same through the transition, transit points band in the river of time, flowing from unknown beginning to unknown eternity.

 

Dr. Prabhakar Shrotria, well known scholar and writer of Hindi literature in particular and  world literature in general, quotes a memorable, couplet of great Sanskrit poet Bhamah which is in his famous book ‘Kawyalankar’ is his editorial of “vaqartha -lok kishi sashi ka Bharishy” issue : The quote is

“Na sa sabdone no tadvachyone no sa vidya no sa kalo

Jayase yanna ka vyangyan aho bharah mehan kave”

 

Bhamah holds that no word, no knowledge, no art is beyond the focus of literature. This is the life-line, life-force, the essence for continuance of literature provided it includes the whole of life, the life around, the life inside, the life beyond, the life with all its truth, beauty and light, life with its totality, its continuity.

 

And herein lies the context of Post-Modern Literature. After post literature comes present literature then more present-Modern literature and a step forward, Post-Modern literature which too is to be replaced by the post post-modern literature, a voice being heard in the atmosphere with in 21st century.

 

Long long ago the Vedas offered hymns to the Kalchakra, the wheel of time, that moves on leaving behind it some milestones in the form of books of poetry, drama, fiction and some other stray writings. Those creative works which survive through ages are called ‘Classics’, those which grow dim or dusted deserve just historical references only.

 

One very prominent and pertinent feature of literature is that no change takes place, suddenly, nothing explodes in a twinkling of eye, some forces, though very subtle and mysterious to common viewers, start operating behind the change in theme, technique, phraseology, sound and significance of the new literature, new age, new phrase, new name, like old, new, modern, post-modern or post post-modern literature.

 

This very silent, slow, subtle change has presented before us which we call ‘Post-Modern Literature’. That mysterious working force did not receive adequate attention when Mathew Arnold, a conservative, a catholic, a moralist, a custodian of culture and crusader against anarchy of any sort, dared to declare that the holy ‘Bible’ was more a book of poetry than religion. That was the toll of bell for all that was operating in literature in human life and society, inside and out side the globe. Then appeared on the stage – Darwin, Marx, Fraud, Haideggar, Jung, Adler, William James, Nietzsche, Camus, Kapaka, Keirkeggard, Sartre, Jesperson and some others toppling the Roman Empire of a sort to a shambles. And  out of the debris emerged-Modern literature in almost all the literatures of all the living languages – English, French, German, Russian, Arabic, Persian and Indian to name the few famous ones. The English world that had imprisoned Oscar Wilde for his ‘The picture of Dorian Gray’ and proscribed Lawrence’s novel ‘Lady Chatterly’s Lover’ went amuck with ‘Lolita’ awarded Nobel Prize to Ernest Hemingway, condoning all the brutalities, bohemeanism and beastliness of his previous novels. Hindi world that had raised hue and cry over Dharmbir Bharti’s novel Gunaloka Devta ‘Bhagawati Charan Verma’s novel Chitralekha Ageya’s novel Sekhar, Ek Jeevani agog with Bachchan’s Madhu Shala, Dinkar’s
Urvasi Ugra’s novels and stray writings of Urdu World that abused and exiled Krishna Chandra and Monto exalted Fahmina Durrani for ‘Qufra’ and Taslima Nasreen for her ‘Lajja’ and the Bhadra Lok of Bengali that disclaimed Bhuddeo for his ‘Rain throughout the Night’ declared Bimal Mitras novels Koudi Diye Keen lam and Ekayi Dahayi Soukda as the best seller and honoured Sunil Gangopadhayaya with Patron of the literary and cultural wing whom once the Bhadralok had denigrated as Bengali counter part of Baudelaire and made him the whipping boy for his describing the Kali Ma at Kalighat as a haggard tribal woman. It is just the fast changing wheel of time that such prestigious as well as priceless award as ‘Nobel Prize’ was awarded in 18th Century  to Marques for his novel ‘One hundred Years of Solitude’. Which is difficult to read without feeling sexual titilation even by old people. Just in this series of strange happenings caused by the change of time, it is a citable example that Arundhati Roy was awarded Booker’s Prize for her first and only novel ‘The God of Small Things’, the last chapter of which has no parallel in depicting the act of fornication, so far in any fiction of any language. And the craze for Shoba De’s novels ‘Starry Nights’ and ‘Strange Obsessions’ frightfully prove  the brake of the wheel of time that felt leading to what God alone knows.

 

Even Hindi literature, one of the richest languages, inheriting a grand tradition  has caught serious infection of Post Modernism. With Independence under the leadership of western educated politicians, in haste for economic growth, social change, educational reforms and modern way of life, this infection has spread to Hindi literature also. However, only a few Hindi writers suffer from this infection. As a creative writer, Manohar Shyam Joshi and as a critic Dr. Sudhish Pachauri are the worst, almost incurable victims to this infection. In Urdu Dr. Gopichand Narang is a victim of the same nature. Being tempted by the amount of the prize received by Miss Roy, some Hindi creative writers such as Dr.Surendra Verma, Smt. Pushpa Maitriyee, Manohar Shyam Joshi, Chitra Mukdal are writing in the same vein.

 

The Post-Modernism in literature is such a vast and vociferous topic today that it requires a brief reference to its major points of reference. If the first phase of 20th Century was the peak period of Modernism, then the last phase would be called ‘Post-Modernism’.

 

The first trace was detected in the painting in 1880 and since then it embraced all the fields of human life-literature, fine arts, science, philosophy, religion, politics, economics, sociology and ethics.

 

This concept in literature began to die out in the last decade of 20th Century though its decline started even before.

 

In 1915-17 Rodolph Wenvitz, a German author, while criticising this concept, had called it a pathetic fall of the Radical Revolution of European Nihilism.

 

It is a very difficult concept to comprehend. The seeds of this concept were shown by those liberating unrest in the sixties which questioned any commanding centre in any field of human life. This concept was a serious assault on all the institutions supporting the human world. Its only aim was to destroy, deconstruct all the values. It questions the hold of religion, mythology, culture, sanity, morality and all the bonds holding together the human society so far.

 

Some literary scholars, teachers, creative writers and critics, call Post-Modernism just a trend or perspective, some political, sociological, economic thinkers and indeologues assess it as well planned. Some serious and sane thinkers conclude that it is a natural and logical result of the global ‘power-shifts’-shifts of power from the powerful to the powerless, from the big empires to the small colonies, from the pseudo moralists and religious priests to the suppressed, from the main focus to the marginalised from the rulers of all ilks to the freedom seekers of all sorts all over the world. The over all situation is, whatever be the cause or causes, the post modern literary scene all over the world is positively different from that of the Modernism to the first phase of 20th Century. The Post-Modern wave has swept all-literature, culture, religion, philosophy, sociology, political science, economic principles, psychology, youth and the general mass-off their feet.

 

To come to literature, only the Post-Modern has affected all generes of literature. The low, the suppressed, the neglected, the disinherited  class and community are on the front stage of literature, the high, the haves, the hallowed are either extras or eliminated in this drama.

 

The Dalits, the females, the silenced youth, have risen out of the dark caves to the scare of all those who had denied them their voice and assertion. In the novels, plays, short stories, poems, satirical pieces, horribly free women, terrifyingly angry youth, horrifyingly sex-ogries, beastly rage against the communities of different caste, colour, creed and ways of life dominated the scene. Sex has been a permanent element in literature but not in the form as it is in post modern literature. In the creative works of almost all the languages it is sex, rather sensuality, naked and beastly that finds loudest treatment. Such a horrid free play of sensuality creates a kind of nausea.

 

In Post-Modern fiction of all languages this element would be easily confronted hurting the human sense. The strange scene of sexual perversion at the cinema, the last chapter of ‘The God of Small Things’ the flesh-trade by a hardly young bloodless, frog-like naked girl before the customer in Marque’s novel ‘One Hundred Years of Solitude’, sex-orgies in Manohar Shaym Joshi’s novel ‘Hamjad’ in Dr.Surendra Verma’s novel “Mujhe Chand Chahiye” in Kamleshwar’s novel “Kitne Pakistan” are some of the examples.

 

Yes, Post-Modern literature has added much to the stuff, technique, imagery etc but it has failed miserably  in its prime aim-sublimating passions, ennobling mankind creating human society guiding ‘The way of the Flesh’ creating a human world of love, beauty, light and sweetness.

 

That is why no critic of any literature has taken serious note of Post Modern literature while commenting on “Hamdad” Rohini in the Hindi monthly magazine “Vaagardha” cries out “We don’t want Western Culture” perhaps it is a co-incidence that the loudest critic Derrida has come out with his critical theory ‘Deconstruction’ in support of post Modern Literature and it is good for literature that his theory has died out unsung, unwept, and unhonoured. There some literary critics, social thinkers and political thinkers who have written chapters in their books on Post Modern-literature such as ‘Orientalism’ by Edward Sayeed, ‘Derrida and Indian Philosophy’ by Harold Kobarrd, ‘Blindness and Insight’ by Palade Man, ‘On Deconstruction by Jonathan Kuller, ‘Course in general Linguistics by Sauseer’, ‘The World, The Text and The Critic by Edward Sayeed, ‘Modern Criticism and Theory’ edited by David Lodge ‘Of Grammatology’ by Derrida translated by Gaytri Chakravarti “Deriha Ka Vikandan Aur Sahitya Alochana Se Aage” by Dr. Sudhis Pachauri “Nayi Sadi Aur Sahitya” by Debendra Ishwar. Such books throw adequate light on Post-Modern literature and its bright as well dark aspects.

 

The correct assessment of and final judgement on Post Modern literature is difficult because there are some books of criticism but these are not easily and chiefly available. There are some stray essays published in ‘The Telegraph’, ‘The Times of India’, ‘The Hindu’, ‘The Hinudstan’, “Vagardha”, “Sahitya”, “Amrit”, “Hans”, “Aajkal” monthly Hindi Magazine which help us reach Post-Modern literature.

 

In Hindi, Dr. Sudhish Pachauri has written two books with chapters on Post-Modern literature and one book by Dwendra Ishwra, one book in Urdu by Dr.Gopichand Narge which throw enough light on Post-Modern literature.

 

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