REVIEWS
The Making of the
Mahatma by
Dr. Chandran D.
This
volume is the expansion of a thesis which the author submitted for his
doctorate to the Department of History of the
In
tracing the history of Gandhiji’s forebears and their antecedents as well as
their upbringing in the religious atmosphere of those periods of
Gandhiji’s
stay in
There
were many other fields of interest for him while in England, such as vegetarianism,
temperance, trade unionism, etc., which provided the background for some of his
later theories on these subjects. But it was in
The
eventful career of the Mahatma as an able organiser
and propagandist of worthy causes was born of his indomitable courage and
conviction to stand against all disadvantages
of belonging to a subject race.
He felt, on the eve of his departure for
The
anxiety for his countrymen frequently goaded Gandhiji to argue “that the
Indians were not in
The
final chapter of the book deals with the book Hind Swaraj which the author calls the ‘Manifesto of Gandhian Revolution.’
The kernel of Gandhiji’s
philosophy has been stated in
the few sentences of his: “Who is the true warrior–he who keeps death always as
a bosom friend or he who controls death
of others.” In giving the brief contents of that seminal book of Gandhiji’s
constructive ideas for the regeneration of his country, the author
here makes the reader alive to what from early times gathered momentum and
force to result in a
strong conviction which stood
the test of time. For, even as late as 1938 when the ‘Aryan Path’ invited opinions regarding the publication
in a fresh edition, Gandhiji was
only saying that despite the
intervening years since its first appearance in 1909, there was little need
to change his views which he had already expressed.
Dr.
Chandran Devanesen has made
enormous researches in trying to gain a lot
of information from many sources to prove how for many of the Mahatma’s
later doctrines and well-established principles
there had been enough influences both environmental as well as ideological from the time of his
early emergence into a wider world.
On the whole the volume under review has added much thoughtful material to the
existing literature on Gandhiji. A glance
at the Bibliography towards the last, can give the reader what amount of
reading of other books and cogitation had gone into the making of this volume
itself.
The
publishers have to be congratulated on their not only producing a fine book,
but on their efficiency in seeing to no printers’ devils marring the pages of a
useful, substantial edition to the Gandhian
literature.
–K. CHANDRASEKHARAN
Philosophical Foundations of
In
this scholarly study of the philosophical bases and implications of the Vaishnava movement in
He
concludes: “As a philosophy Bengal Vaishnavism is a
form of idealistic monism that reconciles all differences and dualities in a supralogical unity. It is neither pure dualism nor pure
non-dualism, but dualistic non-dualism closely resembling the system of Nimbaarka. What is peculiar to it is its emphasis on the
inscrutable power of
A standard book on a much misunderstood subject.
–M. P. PANDIT
Kingsley Martin - Portrait and Self-Portrait: Edited by Mervyn Jones. Barrie & Jenkins (Barrie Books Ltd.), 2, Clement’s
Kasturi Srinivasan: By V. K. Narasimhan. Popular Prakashan,
35,
With
the growth of the newspaper as an industry and a trade, one thinks less and
less of journalism as a mission or as an art. The idealist in this field, where
he manages to survive at all, is taken for an eccentric–the more uncompromising
he is the more cranky he would be deemed to be. Nor should it be a matter for
wonder to anyone who keeps his eyes and ears open. Gone by are the days of
great editors in
But,
perhaps now, even these press bosses, who seemed so invincible till the other
day, are driven to be on the defensive, confronted as they are by the threat of
a greater force, of regimentation in the name of popular will, as is the
practice of our “progressive” mentors. They are no longer overly eager to lay
down the law for others. They are just content to survive in affluence, making
their pile on the sly, as best as they could.
There
is, or at least used to be, another kind of editor more closely identified with
his paper than the average working journalist and less commercial in his
attitude than the ordinary proprietor. His idealism was never so unworldly as
to endanger the existence of the paper. His material success, where it was
achieved, was so tempered by a sense of value as not to make it soul-less. At
first sight, there might be little in common between Kingsley Martin of New
Statesman and Kasturi Srinivasan of The Hindu. Any comparison between them might
seem rather far-fetched, as the points of difference could be more glaring than
the similarities.
Martin
was an intellectual who left the grooves of academy for the wider field of
journalism, with its share of adventures. Srinivasan might have been a medical
doctor if he had his way. He came into the newspaper line because it was a
family business and his father left him little choice in the matter. But he
grew with the job on hand, as if to the manner born. It would be hard to think
of two other editors who meant so much for their papers and for so long. Their
tenure of editorship, lasting nearly three decades, roughly covered the same
period, starting from the early Thirties of this century.
It
is futile to speculate what Martin would have done if he had not been selected
as Editor of New Statesman in 1931, when he was practically out of job,
after leaving C. P. Scott’s’ Manchester Guardian. The young Radical found
himself a square peg in the round hole of a conservative sort of liberal
newspaper, whose self-righteousness he could not share. Lucky it was that the
Directors of New Statesman (J. Maynard Keynes and Arnold Bennett,
besides Shaw and the Webbs, who were the founders)
were looking for a successor to Clifford Sharp who had drunk himself out of the
job and Martin was badly in need of it just at that time. But, as it so
happened, it was not merely a professional job for him. He ate, drank, slept
and lived with it till 1960, when he retired from the paper. He retired from
the editorship, but he continued to write for it till almost his dying day in
1969.
The
struggling, highbrow periodical that he took over was transformed by Martin,
through the years, into a vigorous and flourishing institution. Its losses were
soon wiped out and it began to pay its way. Circulation figures were
multiplied. But that was not his only, or even the main, achievement.
Commercial success, however, came to it as a natural by-product and not worked
for as the only end in its life. New Statesman established itself as the
voice of Radicalism and dissent in
Of
no other journal could it be said with equal justice that in the ‘Thirties and
the Forties, and to a lesser extent in the Fifties it was a sort of weekly
political bible for the conscience-stricken nonconformist. It was to the credit
of Kingsley Martin that he gathered round him, on his editorial staff, a
brilliant band of writers. Not all of them were drawn to him for the material
rewards involved in the bargain, which were not comparable to those available
in the mass-circulation dailies or the popular Sunday papers. Some of them
could easily outshine their chief in sheer writing ability or depth of
scholarship, Mr. Richard Crossman, for instance. But none of them was known for
his eagerness to replace him, at the earliest opportunity.
Discussing
the political philosophy and editorial policy of Kingsley Martin, Mr. Crossman,
closely connected with both the New Statesman and the Labour leadership,
says in a reminiscential tribute:
“...He
(Kingsley Martin) felt that the aim of a speech is not to persuade people to
agree with you, but to persuade people to disagree in order to think better.
This was the quality of the New Statesman as a paper. It said: ‘We don’t
really mind as long as we provoke disagreement.’ This was the bump of
irreverence which I loved best of all in Kingsley...”
“This
is what made the New Statesman such a difficult and interesting paper to
work for, if one was on the National Executive as well. It made a nice and
precise conflict of loyalty between truth and ideas on the one side, and
practical possibilities on the other. These are, of course, the essence of
politics; and this dialectic of Kingsley’s between idea and practice is the
central problem of politics. He was in on the central problem, and yet he was
tackling it in a way that bore no relation to what we thought practical, and in
so doing he was helping to create a social climate, within which change could
take place. This was the art of Kingsley: ideas as a solvent of the
establishment, ideas to debunk, ideas to corrode established authority...This
was the attitude that made the New Statesman the most exciting paper to
write for. I think myself, therefore, that he was the greatest of our
journalists. He lived with the Zeitgeist and he expressed the Zeitgeist.”
To
the portrait of the man and the editor, that forms part of the well-planned
volume, edited by Mervyn Jones sketches are
contributed by friends and colleagues, as well as admirers, who had known this
subject at close quarters and are under no compunction to be uncritical about
it. V. S. Pritchett has a special tribute, in which he looks upon Martin as a
heroic figure of the seventeenth century, who had gone through all the
political and intellectual movements till the present day. Janet Adam Smith,
who had worked on the literary side of the paper
throws light on the human side of a man with all his foibles--parsimonious as
well as generous, flippant as well as serious and scholarly. The two Indian
contributors are Professor Humayun Kabir and Mr. Apa B. Pant, India’s Envoy in Cairo, with whom Martin
stayed at the time of his death, while on a visit to the U. A. R. Lord Francis
Williams, and Messrs. Michael Foot, Tom Drieberg,
John Freeman and Norman Mackenzie reveal different aspects of a personality
lovable and always full of life.
The
second part of the book seeks to present a self-portrait of Martin, through a
selection of his varied writings, including extracts from Critic’s London
Diary and other articles and reviews. “Journey round my room” brings
together three of his radio talks, in a condensed form, in which he recalls his
travels around the world and muses on many things. In some ways, the most
revealing single contribution in this section is a brief note, not previously
published, written by Martin on a sheet of paper in 1948. All the unfulfilled
longings find expression in the whimsical, almost Lamb-like piece, not without
its touch of irony, at the author’s own expense:
“I
must really simplify my life, I said. I do too many things. I diffuse my
activities; I wear myself out with conflicting ambitions, and disharmonious endeavours. I allow the strain of the external world, the
speed of a mechanical age to dictate to my mental and nervous system. In a
simpler life I could achieve a more healthy rhythm...If I had leisure. I could
travel to the countries I had always wanted to understand and become a
specialist in the Turkish and Chinese Revolutions. I could lecture about them
in
Many
a fraternal heart would beat in unison with his, for this were the most natural
of cravings in a crowded life. But, one can’t help feeling that the “simplified
life” of his imagination does not, after all, seem any the simpler than the
life that he actually led. He would, perhaps, have the reader see the innocent
joke in all this. The gentle dig at The Times is rather undeserved, in
this instance, as the reviewer has no doubt that Kingsley Martin would have got
a lot more than the six inches expected by him (though he has not seen the
review). There are a number of good photographs to go with the portrait
and the self-portrait that go to make up a book, which every general reader
would love to go through and no journalist should do without.
One
cannot, in fairness, expect the life of Kasturi
Srinivasan to be as exciting as that of Kingsley Martin. For one thing, The
Hindu never tried to be exciting, in the presentation of news or the
expression of its views. It was content to be reliable and was not afraid to be
dull, where it was unavoidable. It could always be proud of being authoritative
and unimpeachable. To the stewardship of an institution, which has attained the
status of a public trust without ceasing to be a family concern, Srinivasan
brought the qualities of quiet courage and high public spirit, as well as
cautious enterprise and shrewd business acumen. It was through the management
line that he came to the editorship. He had a high conception of editorial
office, whose independence he never allowed to be interfered with by any outside
agency–be it the British rulers or the Indian leaders, the Dewans
of Native States or the heads of rich and powerful business houses. A stickler
for standards, he was happy that the world thought well of his paper.
Mr.
V. K. Narasimhan, the author, who had spent a
lifetime on the paper, and in a responsible position, surveys the period of
expansion and consolidation of The Hindu under the editorship of
Srinivasan. The latter’s qualities of courage and moderation in his role of
leader of the Indian Press (as President of AINEC during war-time) in dealing
with the Government and later as a negotiator of the agreement with the Reuters
are well brought out.
Srinivasan
was not a writing editor. But he knew where to look for talent and how to
encourage it. He valued efficiency, but honesty and dependability even more. It
was not a little due to him that The Hindu has been a name to reckon with rather like the Guardian and The
Times of England, The New York Times of America and Le Monde of
France. He was indeed a benevolent patriarch who was also a great editor–always
a rare species, now becoming rarer still.
–D. ANJANEYULU
The Brahmanical
Culture and Modernity: A. D. Moddie. Asia
Publishing House,
Why
is not India, like a rickety child, progressing satisfactorily even after
twenty years of independence and in spite of three five-year plans? Mr. Moddie has a ready answer. It is the Brahmanical
culture of the Indian intellectuals that is making all the plans ineffective and
retarding the growth of the nation. It is the wide gulf among the elite,
between the traditional Indian Brahmanical culture
and the modern industrial culture, that is at the root
of this pathetic picture. The term Brahmanical
culture here stands for “the essence of the traditional culture in India at the
end of Indo-British convection, a culture of rigid and narrow caste or class
superiority, subservient attitudes to authority, and static attitudes towards
change in thought, systems and relationships. Its roots are partly in Hindu
History and partly in Muslim and British Governments in
In
the first part of the book entitled “Aspects of Brahmanical
Culture” the author like a psychiatrist, makes a psycho-analysis of the case
and concludes, that our traditional concepts like status and authority, ‘Thyaga’ and ‘Maya’ (renunciation and illusion) and our
attitudes to time, work and wealth (we only amend this as misunderstood and
wrongly applied concepts etc.,) are solely responsible for the sordid picture
of our present state of affairs. He ably shows how the modern Indian
politician, administrator, businessman and academecian,
including even Pandit Nehru, among whom there is no co-ordination, are not
immune from the influences of these concepts. He rightly believes that “one has
to travel far in India to find a teacher with a passion for his subject, a
teacher who infects his students with a bit of his own love for his branch of
study, or who is alive to the latest developments in his field Like the politicians,
most teachers’ minds are at least a generation out of date, if not more.”
In
the second part the author deals with the varied aspects of modern culture. He
points out that restoration of the intellect to fill up the gaping gulf is the
dire need of the day. The author is at his best while discussing some important
topics like Science and Technology, Decision making, Inter-disciplinary skills,
Organisation building and Mass communications, wherein he draws our attention
to the drawbacks in our modern set-up. Many of his remarks are noteworthy. “They
put political or policy decisions first and leave the technical work to suit
those decisions.” “Political attitudes have substituted scientific ones.” “The
planners have failed to see that there can be economic growth without macro-
economics, but with a great deal of micro-economics as in
–B. KUTUMBA RAO
The Image of Nehru: Edited by G. S. Jolly. Prabhu Book Service,
This
anthology of essays written by eminent leaders of opinion like Dr. Radhakrishnan, Jayaprakash Narayan, Frank Moraes, and
others, presents an interesting variety of approach and appraisal. Each writer looks at this most interesting figure
of modern times from his standpoint and reacts in his own way. Out of these divergent evaluations the shining
image of Nehru emerges with multi-faceted glory. As an intrepid fighter in the
battle for freedom, as a fervent lover of peace and international amity, as the
propounder of the doctrine of non-alignment, as an
arch idealist and visionary, and above all as a towering personality who made
secular democracy a vital reality in modern India, Jawaharlal Nehru stands out
in these pages. Less recognised aspects like his love of beauty, zeal
for knowledge and interest in culture as well as history are revealed by
the contributors. The multi-dimensional Nehru was the most lovable of human beings to those who
had the privilege of seeing him at close
quarters. As one who loved
–DR. C. N. SASTRI
Ganadevata by Tarasankar
Banerjee. Translated into English by
Lila Ray. Pearl Publications Private Ltd.,
The present book by one of Bengal’s “greatest literary figures, the
powerful poet, dramatiser and novelist portrays in a
vivid and moving manner the life of a village community in
There
are numerous characters but hardly anyone of them can be dismissed as
superfluous or unnecessary. In fact, nearly every profession has a vital role
to play and all occupations are more or less intertwined in the compact
community.
The
temple pavilion (which name, incidentally, is the sub-title of the book) is the
nucleus of many types of congregation–teaching, Council of Five, and offering
oblations to the presiding deity. The story
does not centre round any particular individual, although the author
seems to have made Devu alias Devendranath
Ghosh the cynosure of other characters. For he is
young, handsome, educated (he does teaching for a time) and well-off. For his
age he is incredibly compassionate, soft-spoken and highly helpful to fellow-citizens.
He is so passionately devoted to social service that, utterly unmindful of his
own personal health, he helps in the cremation of victims of cholera, even
though they are untouchables. His confidence that God does not render undue
harm to him is shattered by the death of his own beautiful young wife and child
who contract the same disease. Yet, by and by, he recovers composure and faith
in humanity.
Among
the other characters that stand out are Chiru alias Srihari Pal and Durga. Chiru is a scoundrel and is responsible for the misery of
many a poor villager. One of the main victims of his scurrilous behaviour is Aniruddha, the
blacksmith.
Durga is the village prostitute. Though fallen physically,
she is superior to many so-called big-wigs mentally and sentimentally. She is
dynamic if coquetish and acts as dare-devil in saving
innocent sufferers. The induction of Jatin, the
political detenu, into the village contributes not a
little to the high drama of the village. Nyaratna’s
allegorical accounts of the vagaries of Lakshmi, the Goddess of Fortune, are
highly entertaining.
The
fame of journalists is usually well-deserved, and famous writers do not
generally disappoint. However, all the works that come out of a reputed writer’s
pen need not invariably be great. The author richly
deserves the Jnanpith Award for his great
contribution to Bengali literature, though this novel of his can’t be adjudged
as his best work.
–K. V. SATYANARAYANA
Facets of Gandhi: Edited by B. K. Ahluwalia. Lakshmi Book Store.
Mahatma
Gandhi has an honoured place in the history of modern
It
is not generally known that Gandhiji was a man of taste. For example, Nehru’s
comment on Gandhi is less than fair: “Gandhiji had little sense of beauty or
artistry in man-made objects, though he admired natural beauty.” “My room may
have blank walls,” he wrote, “and I may even dispense with the roof so that I
may gaze upon the starry heavens overhead that stretch in an unending star
expanse of beauty. What conscious art of man can give me the panoramic scenes
that open out before me when I look to the sky above?” “This, however,” he
added, “does not mean that I refuse to accept the value of productions of art
but only that I personally feel how inadequate they are compared with the
eternal symbols of beauty in Nature.” It is this feeling for beauty which he
expressed in his impassioned response to the
Gandhi’s
technophobia was based on an aesthetic view of ancient and mediaeval Indian
civilization. He believes that earthen lamps were beautiful than electric
lights. This approach is reminiscent of Coomaraswamy’s
nostalgia for “the beauty and the logic” of the authentically Indian way of
life. It is hardly surprising that Gandhiji was critical of the factory age which
ushered in an era of ugliness and alienation. It is a view of life which has been
analysed in depth by Ananda
Coomaraswamy. For Coomaraswamy’s
thesis is based on the argument that the cultural cleavage between East and
West became pronounced in the wake of the Renaissance. Indeed Coomaraswamy’s world view which encompassed the insights of
Plato, Meister Eckhart, Buddha and Anandavardhana, was a more sophisticated version of Gandhi’s emphasis on teraditional Indian view which did not set up barriers
between arts and crafts. In the ultimate analysis, Gandhi’s aesthetic approach
to life was derived from ethical foundations. For he defined
art as “the mirror of truth “. Furthermore he explained that “when man begins
to see beauty in truth, true art arises.” And just as Gandhi’s non-violence was
inspired by the ethical idealism the of the Buddha, so
was Gandhi’s aesthetic view influenced by the Buddha who observed that the
essence of the good life consists of the “contemplation of the beautiful.”
–A. RANGANATHAN