Viswanatha Satyanarayana: An Estimate
By
SALVA KRISHNAMURTHI, M.A.
(Lecturer,
The
Shashtyabdapurthi of Kavisamrat Viswanatha Satyanarayana
was celebrated recently. A deep thinker and a creative genius, he has been a
unique force in Telugu literature for over twenty years. He represents certain
important aspects of the Renaissance Movement in Andhra, rooted in the native
soil. He stands for the Indian counterpart of the spirit of Hellenism in
English literature. He goes back to Sanskritic
traditions, and proves how real and live they are. He is a prolific writer, and
he tried all the media of poetry, drama and fiction. He even tried satire and
criticism. He is among the foremost writers of today, and commands a reading
public having a sustained interest in his work. It is true that he provoked
criticism, disapproval, and sometimes pointed antipathy. But even when he does
not exert himself, even at his most pedestrian, his writing has a peculiar
quality of robustness and appealing resonance. This is his distinguishing
trait, and it moves forward like a Titan against heavy opposition. He is a
crusader fighting for the cause of ancient values which, to him, constitute the
fundamental core of life and death. He is conscious that he is fighting against
the times. But his is an insatiable quest for new
values too, and he pursues it in the very process of defending the older ones.
He is not tired of growing and gathering new flowers in the old garden of man’s
experience and imagination.
As
a literary phenomenon he grew in his own way, and all by himself. He
experimented with different media of expression in his early days of querulous
worship, and for a time dabbled with imported romanticism. But he found himself
ill at ease with it and left it for good. Having evolved his own style and
expression he finally turned classicist. It is easy to find the beginnings of
this tendency in his earliest works. His is a voice fit to sing epic tales, not
to celebrate little amours in verse.
Viswanatha
achieved a rare combination of scholastic erudition and creative imagination. Kinnerasani and Girikumaruni
Prema Geethalu, two of
his earliest poetical efforts, while providing the evidence for his early
preoccupation with romanticism, at once highlight the regions of his success
and of his failure. For, much as the Andhras love his Kinnerasani for its lyrical charm and
delicate phrase, Viswanatha, as an artist, had to turn to classicism by the
compelling necessity of his own intellect and imagination.
It
was in the classic vein that he could exploit his potentialities to their
fullest. He celebrated Love in that slender volume, Girikumaruni
Prema Geethalu, but it
was sacramental love, born of wedlock, and fostered by common and
equally-shared religious duties. The uneasiness he experienced in this mode of
writing is clearly revealed. Later, at a time when Indian nationalism was
petulant and strong, Viswanatha emerged into the limelight with his Andhra prasasti, a panegyric to Andhra culture and heroism.
With all its exuberant emotion and soaring phrase, the poem is sung in a
trembling voice, but throws out a challenging, scintillating charm. In Kondaveeti poga Mabbulu (The Curling Clouds of Kondaveedu),
the author is up in the clouds, but his message is clear. The poem shows the
spontaneity and the infectious imagination of the poet. Madhava
Varma is yet another poem very much appreciated
for the manner of treatment of the theme and the flow of narration.
Among
other poetical works that followed, Ritu Samhara and Sringara
Veedhi are important as they tell us of the
exploits and the experiments that the poet ventured on, while Ma
Swami, a Sataka, maintains Viswanatha’s classicism. Ritu
Samhara describes the six seasons in Andhra, and
is evidently planned as a parallel to Kalidasa’s poem
of the same name. The strength and the weakness of Viswanatha’s
poem lies in the fact that it ‘belongs’ to Andhra. What he lost as a poet, by
deliberately writing what he knew would have only a limited appeal, he gained
in vividness and intensity in an unlimited measure. A beautiful poem for the
Telugus, it can, at best, be but of exotic interest to others. For some unknown
reason, Viswanatha, for the second time, turned to romanticism
in Sringara Veedhi.
Only, this time, it was garbed in classical attire. For, he says: ‘O Visala jaghana! my poem is but bare; bare without observing any propriety, apt
diction or suitable form. Engrossed, I simply melt away.’ And these are
qualities that are comparatively absent in romanticism when judged by classical
standards. This proves that at some important point of his poetic being, he was
a romantic still. His Sasi Dutam is another luminous little star known for its
sophistication and enchantment. With his classic taste and colossal
stature, Viswanatha, it appears, was preparing all through the years to take up
his major work, Ramayana, which
is still in progress. He has named it Srimad
Ramayana Kalpa Vriksha, rather
grandiosely, but the elaborate plan of the work justifies it. One is reminded
of that grand master, Milton, and one is struck by the similarities between
these two in scholarship, sobriety, ornament and orthodoxy, Both
are intensely religious. A grandiloquent style and Gothic galvanism are Viswanatha’s forte as well as
We
have in Viswanatha a poet of rare merit and of imperious imagination, after a
dry and desiccated period of over a century. A critic ventured to remark that
classicism is classicism attained and romanticism is classicism attempted. In
the case of Telugu literature, at any rate, the opinion holds good. And with
Viswanatha on one side and the other lesser luminaries of romanticism on the
other, it is I suppose, amply proved. But Viswanatha, I venture to say, too
classical for this age.
He,
however, found compensation in his fiction which made him far more popular than
his poetry. It should be mentioned that Viswanatha created a branch of real and
original fiction in Telugu. His novels, and the variety of subjects he dealt
with in them, are sufficient in number to justify this claim. It is a rare
privilege and honour that one’s novels should become
classics in one’s own life time. In this respect Viswanatha has been lucky. The
best known three novels of his have already become classics. This trio, Veyipadagalu, Eka Veera and Cheliyali
Katta, forms the best part of his achievement in
the art of fiction.
It
was not fortuitous that Viswanatha achieved fame by his, magnum opus, Veyipadagalu. It is a monumental took,
a great work of art. It runs almost to a thousand pages in print, and was
produced in record time. There are, indeed, some who argue that Viswanatha’s sole claim with posterity rests on this book.
But it should be noted here that such a claim, however unintentionally, throws
doubt on his other achievements as a great poet and dramatist. The novel in
question would, I suppose, always split critical opinion. The orthodox are
satisfied more than they need be with its reviving sense of values, while the
others read in it the dull saga of a dying culture. In this book the author
celebrates Time. It is this fact that really explains the cause of its
greatness. Scott in ‘The Antiquary’ and Bennett in his novel, ‘Old Wives’
Tale’, celebrated Time. Viswanatha joins Bennett in that he celebrates Time
consciously as distinct from Scott. In the ‘Old Wives’ Tale’ all the characters
die. Only the dog is left, and it walks up to see if anything remains in the
saucer. Similar in significance is the ending in Veyipadagalu.
But here all the characters do not die. Dharmarao,
the hero of the novel, left to assess undestroyed values after Time had had its
terrible spell for a number of years over his personal life as well as over the
life of his village, finally sees Indian womanhood (the symbol of which is Arundhati) as the only thing that Time had not really
corrupted or destroyed. The book celebrates a heroic quality throughout, and
gives us a glimpse of the cosmic concept of Time, fierce in the moment, yet
calm in eternity. It is this quality that exalts this novel to its rare
heights. The greatness of Tolstoy’s War and Peace, it is said, consists
in its extension not only of Time but of Space. And here is Viswanatha rising
to the ranks of the universally great. It is not suggested even for a moment
that these two novels can be compared. They are so different, and no comparison
should be made. Nor could one call Viswanatha as great a writer as Tolstoy, for
indeed greatness is so differently achieved by several writers and does not
yield to comparison.
Viswanatha
has readily seized the ever-expanding dimensions of the story to fill Veyipadagalu with all his creative energy,
with his criticism of life, of culture, of society, of civilisation,
of relation, of art and of literature. Hence the
justification of its symbolic title, Veyipadagalu,
‘The Thousand Hoods.’ Again, it is clear to a discerning eye that
the author concentrated more on life as he saw it than on upholding a feudal
pattern of society which, the author knew very well, was crumbling
under his very eyes.
Eka Veera and Cheliyali
Katta are novels of great charm. A historical
romance, Eka Veera
is a masterly creation with a perfect plot and technique. The bold pattern
of the novel gives its characters their vividness and
advantage. While D. H. Lawrence, in his novels like Lady Chatterly’s
Lover, made an amoral cult of sex, which was in his view applicable in
common to all mankind, the author of Eka Veera seems to make out an individual case of
amoral life for his sensitive heroine. But Viswanatha’s
classic universe moves round the pivot of morality, and even his
heroine, Eka Veera, falls
dead at the touch of the other man.
The
attitudes of the characters are essentially cultured, and the characters do not
give sex an overpowering role in their lives. Viswanatha instilled in his
characters a subtle underlying concept of Hindu morality and culture.
Cheliyali
Katta is a simple novel. It
is like a parable told for the moderns. It is a story of wrong and retribution,
of natural sin and nemesis.
Both
these novels contain a fine lot of colourful vivid
and beautifully imaginative descriptions. These two tales could very well go
into the English language if only somebody could translate them
properly, particularly in view of their brevity and their bold pattern.
While
Veera Valladu and
Baddanna Senani turn
the scales and save the author from the charge of pro-Brahminism
which opponents glimpsed in Veyipadagalu and
Vena Raju, Jebu Dongalu is a lucid study, in
environment and psychology. Baddanna Senani deals with a political upheaval. swarganiki Nichenalu, ‘Ladders to Heaven,’ is significant for its
survey of necromancy and its scathing criticism of religious dogma. The author,
in his latest novel, Therachiraju, delves
deep into the evil of empty cleverness and unravels the mystery of such a mind,
its baseness and its intrigue.
These
are Viswanatha’s important works, and it would need
far more space to refer to the rest of his works even briefly. Two things are,
however, markedly noticeable in the author of these novels. Firstly
he is seen gradually drifting away from his sapped characters of synthetic
creation. He appears to move towards a cold study of their psychical anatomy.
Secondly, there is a growing effect on his prose caused by the
satirical turn his mind is taking. It is difficult to say whether these two
have any possible nexus. Though we can dismiss Ha Ha
Hoo Hoo, a biting
satire directed against modern linguistics and Western music, as delightful
nonsense, we cannot avoid observing the spirit of trenchant sarcasm that raises
its head in swarganiki Nichenalu
and in Therachiraju. There are
signs that Viswanatha can be a Defoe or a Swift, if
he likes, in the coming years.
His
dramas are not many compared to the number of his novels. And they do not seem
to have ever been a success on the stage. For one thing, the author was too
classical and too rigid in most of his plays. Where he was not classical or
rigid he was in the stage of experiment, not of achievement. Narthana Sala, the
story of Keechaka and Draupadi,
belied the hopes of the author because of the attitude of the public towards
its rigid classical pattern. Yet, it is a readable play, full of excellent
poetry. To be excellent drama, it had to be more. Anarkali
is another play where the author experimented with his technique, bringing
to it a new lyrical charm. But lyric is not drama. Trisulam
is historical drama loaded with religious issues. Deep religious thought
destroys the tempo of drama.
Of
all the plays that Viswanatha wrote, Vena Raju is
perhaps the best. It is the story of the atheist king, Vena, mentioned in the Bhagavata. In its inevitable wake, the drama
brought the author only immense notoriety instead of popularity, because of its
easy target of pro-Brahminism. It is not a drama with
a plot or a theme. It is a drama of ideas. The aesthetic mind of the atheist
king is delineated with care though not with formal sympathy. It was the
dramatist’s purpose to show that Vena was too far ahead of his times, and that
this factor brought him to his tragedy.
Viswanatha
has always been a champion of difficult causes. He has unshakable faith in Dharma.
As a pondering soul he is impatient with the fleeting values of time, and
he is constantly trying to check their overpowering influence on men. He
beckons to us to return to the permanent values of life. As a thinker, he
believes in the greatness of Man and eloquently praises his heroism, though he
is constantly aware of attendant baseness and cowardice in men. He wants us to
join in his struggle against evil. The cure he suggests is religion. Even here
it is not dogma that draws him. His religion is eclecticism having its source
in objective reality, in real things and in real thoughts. He has always a
mission in life, and he always writes with a purpose. To him knowledge is God,
and knowledge to him is what is experienced, and tested and realised,
in a word Vijnana. Those who think of
knowledge as hidden in texts cannot understand him or appreciate him. Likewise
not understood is he by those who neglect the roots of bygone centuries.