Storm in purple by Arina Tcherem. From Public Domain
If we take a look at our civilisation, there are multiple kinds of storms that threaten to annihilate our way of life and our own existence as we know it. The Earth and the human world face twin threats presented by climate change and wars. While on screen, we watch Gaza and Ukraine being sharded out of life by human-made conflicts over constructs made by our own ‘civilisations’, we also see many of the cities and humankind ravaged by floods, fires, rising sea levels and global warming. Along with that come divides created by economics and technology. Many of these themes reverberate in this month’s issue.
From South Australia, Meredith Stephens writes of marine life dying due to algal growth caused by rising water temperatures in the oceans — impact of global warming. She has even seen a dead dolphin and a variety of fishes swept up on the beach, victims of the toxins that make the ocean unfriendly for current marine life. One wonders how much we will be impacted by such changes! And then there is technology and the chatbot taking over normal human interactions as described by Farouk Gulsara. Is that good for us? If we perhaps stop letting technology take over lives as Gulsara and Jun A. Alindogan have contended, it might help us interact to find indigenous solutions, which could impact the larger framework of our planet. Alindogan has also pointed out the technological divide in Philippines, where some areas get intermittent or no electricity. And that is a truth worldwide — lack of basic resources and this technological divide.
On the affluent side of such divides are moving to a new planet, discussions on immortality — Amortals[1] by Harari’s definition, life and death by euthanasia. Ratnottama Sengupta brings to us a discussion on death by choice — a privilege of the wealthy who pay to die painlessly. The discussion on whether people can afford to live or die by choice lies on the side of the divide where basic needs are not an issue, where homes have not been destroyed by bombs and where starvation is a myth, where climate change is not wrecking villages with cloudbursts. In Kashmir, we can find a world where many issues exist and violences are a way of life. In the midst of such darkness, a bit of kindness and more human interactions as described by Gower Bhat in ‘The Man from Pulwama’ goes some way in alleviating suffering. Perhaps, we can take a page of the life of such a man. In the middle of all the raging storms, Devraj Singh Kalsi brings in a bit of humour or rather irony with his strange piece on his penchant for syrups, a little island removed from conflicts which seem to rage through this edition though it does raise concerns that affect our well-being.
Parichha has also reviewed a book by another contemporary Odia woman author, Snehaprava Das. The collection of short stories is called Keep it Secret. Madhuri Kankipati has discussed O Jungio’s The Kite of Farewells: Stories from Nagaland and Somdatta Mandal has written about Chhimi Tenduf-La’s A Hiding to Nothing, a novel by a global Tibetan living in Sri Lanka with the narrative between various countries. We have an interview with a global nomad too, Neeman Sobhan, who finds words help her override borders. In her musing on Ostia Antica, a historic seaside outside Rome, Sobhan mentions how the town was abandoned because of the onset of anopheles mosquitos. Will our cities also get impacted in similar ways because of the onset of global ravages induced by climate change? This musing can be found as a book excerpt from Abiding City: Ruminations from Rome, her book on her life as a global nomad. The other book excerpt is by a well-known writer who has also lived far from where he was born, MA Aldrich. His book,From Rasa to Lhasa: The Sacred Center of the Mandala is said to be “A sweeping, magnificent biography—which combines historical research, travel-writing and discussion of religion and everyday culture—Old Lhasa is the most comprehensive account of the fabled city ever written in English.”
With that, we come to our fiction section. This time we truly have stories from around the globe with Suzanne Kamata sending a story set in the Bon festival that’s being celebrated in Japan this week for her column. From there, we move to Taiwan with C. J. Anderson-Wu’s narrative reflecting disappearances during the White Terror (1947-1987), a frightening period for people stretched across almost four decades. Gigi Gosnell writes of the horrific abuse faced by a young Filipino girl as the mother works as a domestic helper in Dubai. Paul Mirabile gives us a cross-cultural narrative about a British who opts to become a dervish. While Hema R touches on women’s issues from within India, Sahitya Akademi Award Winner, Naramsetti Umamaheshwararao, writes a story about children.
With such hope growing out of a neolithic burial chamber, maybe there is hope for life to survive despite all the bleakness we see around us. Maybe, with a touch of magic and a sprinkle of realism – our sense of hope, faith and our ability to adapt to changes, we will survive for yet another millennia.
We wind up our content for the August issue with the eternal bait for our species — hope. Huge thanks to the fantastic team at Borderless and to all our wonderful writers. Truly grateful to Sohana Manzoor for her artwork and many thanks to all our wonderful readers for their time…
How often have we, as fully realised human beings, found ourselves in the ironic situation of proving our human status to a computer programme? We have ticked boxes to identify zebra crossings, traffic lights, and buses, only to be told we were wrong, as if we did not know what a bus was. It is as if our fingers were too stubby to press the right keys or too daft to understand. And now, we are deciphering distorted words, as only a human could read wavy or cursive writing.
Now we understand. The verification exercises did not just stop automatons from spying on our data. They were meant to aid computers in digitising old books[1]. Computers sometimes struggle with old pages when converting physical books into digital versions. Due to wear and tear and fading caused by oxidation, the text may appear distorted. Computers use this mundane verification process by making humans interpret these unreadable texts. We play a crucial role in this process, creating a training module to help identify issues and errors to improve digitisation.
While CAPTCHA[2] (acronym for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) was initially designed to prevent bot attacks and spam, it is now used by computers to distinguish between humans and bots among users. Alan Turing, the father of theoretical computer science, proposed a test[3] which was later named after him to evaluate a machine’s ability to exhibit intelligent behaviour indistinguishable from a human. Although many machines and AI programmes have passed this test, humans now face a reverse Turing Test to prove our organic status.
The funny thing is, while all this is happening, with automation and the diminishing need for human interaction, humans are gradually losing their humanity. We have lost the ability to look into each other’s eyes and start a conversation just for fun. Suppose Alan Turing proposed the test to gauge machine intelligence, and modern computers give a reverse Turing Test[4] to exclude unwanted chatbots. In that case, humans perhaps need a Turing-like test to confirm they still have some grey cells. We are increasingly losing our capacity for idle chats. We are all just prisoners, best left to our own devices.
Talking about looking into each other’s eyes and melting into the passion of each other’s aura, the dating scene these days is no longer like that. Enter any dimly-lit romantic restaurant, couples are not lost looking at one another but lost in the abyss of cyberspace, looking at the digital restaurant menu or perhaps into each other’s social media or Tinder hits to see what the other half has been up to.
While it is true that automation is changing the job market, it’s also creating new opportunities. My son, for instance, worries about his job, but I remind him that the world has created jobs that were non-existent just half a century ago. Who has heard of social media managers, cloud architects, or veterinary psychologists? My mother told me that my grandfather worked in a printing press. He used to come back smelling of turpentine, which he used to clean off the ink that stuck on his body. Nowadays, printing is done at home with a button, a slight whirring and a whooshing, and out comes a printed document at one’s convenience.
My grandfather later became a chauffeur to a successful business magnate. Once we have sorted out the finer points of bringing self-driving cars to market, we may not need drivers in the future. Now, many self-proclaimed gig entrepreneurs give up their full-time paying jobs to become delivery boys. Do we have news for these boys? Drones are dying to get up and replace you.
If one were to think that only the blue-collar job is at risk, think again. Conveyancing jobs currently carried out by paralegals can be taken over by an AI programme to churn out beautiful Sales and Purchase Agreements[5].
These programmes have also learnt to say the appropriate words during grief and crises. Increasingly, call-in helplines are ‘manned’ by AIs. The field of psychiatry may be at risk of not needing doctors. Even as we speak, we may already be conversing with chatbots about our bank transactions without realising it. This raises ethical questions about the role of AI in sensitive areas of human life and the potential loss of human connection in these interactions.
I remember a time in mid-1990 when the Malaysian civil society expressed concern over Malaysia’s uncontrolled influx of foreigners and our overdependence on the foreign labour force[6]. Someone suggested automation and mechanisation as a possible way to avert this. Still, apparently, the financiers were not too keen to increase business expenses, which would possibly reduce foreign investment. The general acceptance was that third-world nations were not ready to fully automate. They had not been able to provide universal employment to their citizens. This historical perspective highlights the complex relationship between automation, economic development, and social equity.
Moving forward, we sometimes find ourselves in zombie states, clicking reel after reel on social media as if we have so much time. Examples of children turning violent against the hands that feed them when their demand to go online is denied are not uncommon. Have we not heard of spouses immersed in full-blown affairs living under the same roof with the other half with ease, with a bit of help from the need for data privacy? A husband does not know what the wife does behind his back because access to devices is guarded by passwords.
Rock bands once thought using synthesisers on their songs was sacrilegious. The legendary British rock band, Queen, proudly boasted that they never used synthesisers to maintain a traditional, raw, organic feel to their sounds. Now, we must be happy with the digital manipulation of music and voice. Even though AI can compose music at a philharmonic level, music connoisseurs are far from contented. They say it lacks emotion, probably because great music comes from lived experience[7].
What started as automation, where machines aided humans to ease work, has now evolved to something which can learn and mimic human actions. It has come to be called intelligence, albeit artificially developed by the human mind. Like a student surpassing his teacher, the real fear now is that AI is evolving consciousness. If AI is the future, the person who controls the future will be King. Does that not mean that tech entrepreneurs will be the world’s future leaders? The world will indeed be borderless, only determined by digital connectivity.
We already long for the good old days when talking to customer service did not start with, “press 1 for English and this conversation will be recorded for self-improvement.” What they mean is that it will be used against you. Dealing with a computer chatbot already feels Kafkaesque. It feels like talking to a wall without recourse to “talking to the manager!”
Farouk Gulsara is a daytime healer and a writer by night. After developing his left side of his brain almost half his lifetime, this johnny-come-lately decided to stimulate the non-dominant part of his remaining half. An author of two non-fiction books, Inside the twisted mind of Rifle Range Boy and Real Lessons from Reel Life, he writes regularly in his blog, Rifle Range Boy.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
Whirling Dervishes, painting by Jean Baptiste Vanmour (1671-1737). From Public Domain
In 1976, I bought a small country cottage very pleasantly located near the town of Sheffield at Dronfield in South Yorkshire from an elderly woman who informed me she that had travelled quite extensively throughout Asia in the nineteen twenties and thirties before settling down here. She never married. The learned woman left no forwarding address.
Settling in took much time and energy because of my abundant belongings. At last, one rainy afternoon having nothing to do, I climbed the shaky stairway that led to the garret. The door had been left ajar. Inside the low-ceiling, ill-lite space, there was nothing but a large chest placed in the middle. The lid lay aslant. Its hinges were broken.
Curious about its contents, I began rummaging through the numerous newspaper and magazine clippings, booklets, letters and other documents. A particular envelop caught my eye because the red wax seal had been broken. Wax-sealed letters are very out-dated these days. When I opened the envelop I understood why it was sealed. A seven-page letter had been written in fine, elegant script, by Lady Sheil, dated 1869. Lady Sheil was quite a prominent woman in her time[1] . This indeed was a remarkable find. It baffled me why the former proprietor would leave in a chest of documents a letter of such archival interest. Since there was little light in the garret, I took the letter downstairs to read it. Unfortunately there was no addressee, so I assumed it was sent to the former proprietor. I must confess that a feeling of guilt touched me when I began my reading. Luckily I overcame this sensation because the contents of the letter proved extraordinary …
Lady Sheil details a very peculiar adventure of an Englishman who named himself Ali the Dervish -or as she spelt it, Deervish — who had undertaken a voyage to ‘Balochestan, Persia’[2]. As I read through her letter, I came to realise that the Englishman had abandoned his British ways entirely, adopting those of the semi-nomad Balochi. To such an extent was his assimilation that he even married a Balochi woman, something utterly unthinkable at that time — in the year 1856. Why Lady Sheil would write a long letter about this chap to an unknown reader or readers heightened my curiosity.
I began investigations at the Sheffield library and found Lady Sheil’s Glimpses of Persian[3] though I found nothing at all about Ali the Dervish. Lady Sheil mentioned something about his diary but nothing substantial came of this. Be that as it may, the letter fascinated me by its mysterious allusions and ellipses, especially concerning this unusual identity change. Not a simple task for a European in the nineteenth century, or even in our century for that matter. This Ali even outdid Sir Richard Burton’s bursts of outlandish impersonation …
Examining the letter carefully, I felt a strange, slight tremor goading me to do justice to this eccentric Ali. Something unsaid in the sentences urged me to read between them, to scrutinize the margins and the paragraph indents as if Lady Sheil had deliberately left out parts of her narrative for her reader to fill in those blank, yellowing spaces.
I picked up my pen, imagining myself to be both Lady Sheil and Ali the dervish, and began filling in the those blanks, writing in the gaps, the lacuna, the untold events and details so to speak. Indeed, I had convinced myself that the letter had been destined for me. And this resolution was enough for me to divulge the mystery of Ali …
Ali, whose English-born name was left unknown, had had the best of aristocratic educations in the fine arts, especially languages. He was fluent in Hindustani, Persian, Pashtun and Turkish, besides having mastered four or five European languages, including Hungarian. This was quite a linguistic feat, second only to Richard Burton whom, by the way, Ali had the occasion to meet in Lahore. A meeting which lasted two or three weeks according to a friend of Burton’s memoirs. Little, however, is reported about their relationship.
Prior to Ali’s arrival in India and that fortuitous encounter with Burton, he apparently had led a rather lukewarm existence in England, and this in spite of his family wealth, or perhaps because of it. His accumulation of capital was analogous to his successive accumulations of prolonged bouts of depression. They left him utterly exhausted. How and when he left England is not written in the letter, although he probably reached India by ship, then on horseback or foot into Northwestern India, accompanied often by erring minstrels and story-tellers. From whom Ali learned the art of dancing, chanting and story-telling. It was not a question of imitating these rituals and customs. Ali had integrated them as if they had been part of some distant, latent self that required jolts of recollection to surge up from the depths of the unconscious. In fact, Burton was quite taken aback by Ali’s very ‘unEnglish’ appearance. His manner of speaking English, too, possessed a curious twist of Persian and Hindustani syntax — a ring of their tonal stress.
To Ali’s pleasant surprise, he no longer suffered from bouts of violent depressions. The former Englishman on leaving Burton, perhaps in 1849, rid himself of paper money, donating it to missionaries, then rode off into the verdant valleys of North-western India towards Afghanistan carrying only the clothes on his back, two gourds of fresh water, several loaves of acorn-bread and a pouch of Arabic gum. Ali carried no weapon.
Ali’s sound knowledge of Hindustani, Pashtun and Persian offered him unparallel glimpses of these undomesticated lands. Lands of shifting desert sands whose rising heat conjured in the distance illusions of ravishing oases and sparkling cascades off tree-laden crags. Ali had been warned about these deceitful mirages (by Burton?) whose marvellous vision had been the death of many a brave adventurer.
He kept to the clayey track, accepting food and board from the hospitable villagers or sleeping under the silver stars on his woven kilim-saddle cloth. He rode days or nights penetrating landscapes of indescribable beauty, of terrifying singularity, of unbearable heat in the day and equally freezing nights. At one point in his wanderings, Ali, slumbering on his horse due to the rising heat and lack of food, looked up to discover a gigantic Buddha hewn into a tuft-like cliff. A small stream ran in front of the lithic niche along which flourished many date trees. There the Buddha stood, calm, reposed, sedentary, encased in his stone casket, home to a myriad birds who had made their nests on his rounded shoulders and shaven head. Ali jumped off his horse, filled his gourds with clean water, scouted about for fresh dates. With one last look at the towering Enlightened One he set off towards Persia, filled with equivocal sensations. He felt that his nomad days would soon be numbered …
A month or two passed. Now villagers tilling their fields or collecting wood no longer greeted or spoke Pashtun to him, but in Dehwari or Persian. He welcomed this language shift. Ali felt more at ease in Persian, albeit it be the Dehwari dialect, which he had learnt from one or two erring Zarathustrian talebearers in India. By then his uncombed beard touched his chest and his hair his shoulders. In one village he traded his khaki-coloured shorts for a shalwar[4] and his boots for goat-skin sandals. In another his Safari sun hat for a turban and his heavy flax shirt for a long, cotton tunic. Whenever he met tillers or merchants they would greet him with the customary ‘hoş amati’[5]. By their pronunciation and vocabulary Ali knew he was travelling southwards into Balochestan. Temperatures rose and rose — 37° C … 42° C. His horse trotted slower and slower. Her rider drooped soporifically over her mane. Ali no longer calculated his wanderings in farsakhs[6] but by the risings and settings of the sun …
Notwithstanding these discomfitures, the persevering Ali carried on. To his delight the track widened, hospitable shepherds driving before them their herds of sheep or goats offered the solitary traveller the warmth of their camp-fires, goat’s milk, cheese and acorn-bread. Caravans of transhumance nomads pressing towards the high plateaus nodded to him. The stony-faced herdsmen chanted in their own language which translated means —
A breath of mountain breeze, A breath of wind from the Sea, In the middle, We trudge The pilgrims of the fountain…
Then they called after their huge, savage dogs. Ali seized upon that admirable chant and intoned it to himself or aloud …
One sparkling, azure day, Ali, road-weary, alighted from his horse in a large settlement of tents, called Sa’idi. There both Persian and Dehwari were spoken, judging from the scores of people who came to greet him. It was a charming settlement, surrounded by fields of red poppies, iris, bluer than the blue of the sky, crown imperials whose orange tints glowed like lit candles, and tulips. Horses, sheep and goats dotted the terraced rows of poppies on the hills and skirts of the low-laying piebald mountains, motionless. Ali, both dazzled and comforted by the undulating kaleidoscope colours decided to halt for the night in this welcoming settlement to rest his fatigued physical and mental state and his horse.
When he asked for the elder of the settlement, he was directed to a very large white tent. In fact, since his arrival the snowy-bearded elder had been eyeing the stranger askance. He threw open the flap of his tent and greeted him in Persian as custom would have it, inviting his visitor inside for tea. Sipping their respective glasses of sugared tea, the snowy-bearded elder’s deep-set black eyes peered into those hazel-brown of Ali’s. Though he was pleased to meet this curious traveller, he was confused about his identity. Finally he put the question point blank to his sipping visitor: “Are you Persian?”
Ali nodded neither yes nor no. His ambiguous nod set off the string of events that followed. events that transformed the already transforming Ali into a rather ambiguous Other …
The snowy-bearded elder had read that ambiguous nod as a sign of belonging. Ali’s sun-mat complexion, his extraordinary command of both Persian and Dehwari, his knowledge of social and religious habits and practices, mostly acquired during his years on the road, opened the elder’s heart and those of the Balochi people of Sa’idi, people who now had stepped into the tent, forming a large circle round Ali and the snowy-bearded elder. Out of this wide circle came the elder’s three sons and daughter to lead him to his own red tent at the outskirts of the settlement. His horse was led to pasture with the others.
On the thick carpets of his medium-sized tent, Ali sat and meditated upon that ambiguous nod. Had he really become the one of them? Deep within his heart, the former Englishman rejoiced … rejoiced at his ‘crossing over’. He had become what he really was …
Several years passed. Ali no longer felt guilty about leaving his past behind. His immersion seemed complete. He sang and danced round the ritual fire at night. He told stories night after night after a hard day’s work in the poppy fields, apple and peach orchards and the vineyards, the tribesmen chanted their chants of ancestral lore, joined him in his whirling dance, one palm to the Heavens and the other to the Earth, eyes staring into a void of quiescence …
It was in Sa’idi that he began to be called Ali the Dervish, whirling as he did before and behind the leaping flames. Ali taught his dance to the snowy-bearded elder’s three sons. In turn, the elder offered his daughter to him in marriage — a privilege since this signified entrance into the chieftain’s family.
Once the three-day marriage ceremonies were over, his lovely bride — for she was truly lovely — sat next to him in the nuptial red tent. His wife, whose name has never been recorded, demanded nothing of him. She accepted all his nightly hesitations … ‘failings’ … Her fruity laugh and obsidian back eyes spoke a language that communicated higher values … loftier treasures than uncertainty, physical gratification or hereditary obligations.
Ali slowly discovered that his young bride possessed the quality of a seer, perhaps even belonged to a long lineage of Central Asian mystics. Intense were her meditations and visions of the Other World, of events passed and those to come … His past … Their future … Ali, both bewildered and beguiled by this power of prophesy, would timidly question his bride about her unusual gifts. She would answer enigmatically: “One must remove the Husk before bringing in the Bride,” an adage he never fully understood, nor would she ever elucidate.
On other moonlit nights, alone within the sanctuary of their intimacy, Ali’s wife would envision scenes of his long aristocratic lineage, each member afflicted by physical or mental atrophies, plagued by wasting ennui. The Dervish listened in awe as she revealed events quite unknown to him. Yet, he remained speechless, peering into the almond-shaped eyes of this woman depicting scenes that could very well cost him his life. She said nothing. He yearned to avow everything to her but some fey voice prevented him each time. She read his mind and laughed her fruity laugh, delving ever deeper into his life … theirs !
Ali accompanied her with his eyes then turned them to the dying embers of the stove fire, the glowing logs sizzled lightly in the silence. Was he deluding himself? He knew that his wife had discovered his native idenity. But were all those past scenes his true identity? He indeed stemmed from that hoary lineage, the last scion. Was he the last to play a role on this world stage of masquerade and mummery? No ! He was Ali the Dervish … Here amongst these hearty tribesmen he played no role. He had overcome the hardships of childhood as a fatherless boy. That unknown gentleman had left for Africa never to return! Never a letter nor a message brought by acquaintances. Before dying of grief, his poor mother repeated to him everynight: “Look to the stars.” And the sullen boy looked, and believed that they would lead him to another life … another identity !
Once Ali began to cry softly listening to the sizzling embers and the light, rhythmical breathing of his strange wife.
Many years had passed and yet, they had no children. His hair and beard had greyed. Yet, no reprimand, no rebuke, no judgement ever came from the community, especially from her aging father. Was the power of her revelations known to him ? Would he be the last branch of that gnarled and rotten aristocratic tree ?
Ali rode often into the fields and mountains to gather wood to build tent-frames or glean fruit from the many apple and peach trees. During these solitary moments his past crept up on him, making him feel guilty. There seemed only one solution : speak openly, candidly to his wife about his British birth, his genuine desire to become the Other. She would surely understand since she had already read his former life by sounding his heart. That night he would go straight to his wife.
But, just then out of the blue sky his wife came galloping towards him, whipping up her stead. She jumped off, an odd expression wrinkling her forehead. Ali ran up to her, took her shoulders gently, admiring the sapphire blue that framed them so perfectly like a painting. There she stood, basking in the soft glow of the mellowing, evening sun. Before he could utter his rehearsed confession she put a hand to his lips.
“Father has just passed away,” she whispered softly, without emotion. “He has been freed from the trammels of worldly existence.” She smiled. “Now you too are free to divest yourself of a personage that has been conferred to you by the stars and the strength of your will.”
“But who am I really, my dear?” her husband wondered. She caressed his bearded, burning cheeks. She answered: “If you want the horse to neigh, you must slacken the reins.” Turning round, she rode back to the settlement to wash the body of her deceased father and prepare the three-day funeral rites with her brothers. Ali puzzled by that enigmatic counsel trudged to his horse.
He rode back far behind her, meditating his ‘freedom’. What other choice had he?
This sentence was the last in Lady Sheil’s long, detailed letter. On further investigation into this strange fellow at the London library, I discovered that Ali the Dervish had divorced and remarried his bride to one of her brother’s mates, then left Sa’idi. He was last seen in Tabriz, Persia. No document reports his whereabouts after his reaching that northwestern town in the lands of the Azeri people.
I have often wondered whether Lady Sheil ever knew who Ali the Dervish really was. I have my doubts. Only his Balochi wife knew, and of course, that mysterious person could have never been questioned. It’s also odd that Ali himself — whatever self that be– had never woven his thoughts and experiences into a book, never enlightened a Western public on integration and assimilation into a foreign culture.
As time went by I even considered that this letter might have been a hoax to hoodwink a naive fellow like myself into clothing Ali in legendary fashion. On second thought, though, who’s to arbitrate between fact and fiction ? Not I, in any case. For isn’t it a refreshing act of freedom to slip from one to the other without a pinch of guilt ?
[6] A Persian measurement equivalent to 5.35 kilometres
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Paul Mirabile is a retired professor of philology now living in France. He has published mostly academic works centred on philology, history, pedagogy and religion. He has also published stories of his travels throughout Asia, where he spent thirty years.
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PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
A review of Anuradha Kumar’s Wanderers, Adventurers, Missionaries: Early Americans in India (Speaking Tiger Books) and an interview with the author
Migrants and wanderers — what could be the differences between them? Perhaps, we can try to comprehend the nuances. Seemingly, wanderers flit from place to place — sometimes, assimilating bits of each of these cultures into their blood — often returning to their own point of origin. Migrants move countries and set up home in the country they opt to call home as did the family the famous Indian actor, Tom Alter (1950-2017).
Anuradha Kumar’s Wanderers, Adventurers, Missionaries: Early Americans in India captures the lives and adventures of thirty such individuals or families — including the Alter family — that opted to explore the country from which the author herself wandered into Singapore and US. Born in India, Kumar now lives in New Jersey and writes. Awarded twice by the Commonwealth Foundation for her writing, she has eight novels to her credit. Why would she do a whole range of essays on wanderers and migrants from US to India? Is this book her attempt to build bridges between diverse cultures and seemingly diverse histories?
As Kumar contends in her succinct introduction, America and India in the 1700s were similar adventures for colonisers. In the Empire Podcast, William Dalrymple and Anita Anand do point out that the British East India company was impacted in the stance it had to colonisers in the Sub-continent after their experience of the American Revolution. And America and India were both British colonies. They also were favourites of colonisers from other European cultures. Just as India was the melting pot of diverse communities from many parts of the world — even mentioned by Marco Polo (1254-1324) in The Kingdom of India — America in the post-Christopher Columbus era (1451-1546) provided a similar experience for those who looked for a future different from what they had inherited. The first one Kumar listed is Nathaniel Higginson (1652-1708), a second-generation migrant from United Kingdom, who wandered in around the same time as British administrator Job Charnock (1630-1693) who dreamt Calcutta after landing near Sutanuti[1].
Kumar has bunched a number of biographies together in each chapter, highlighting the commonality of dates and ventures. The earliest ones, including Higginson, fall under ‘Fortune Seekers From New England’. The most interesting of these is Fedrick Tudor (1783-1864), the ice trader. Kumar writes: “In Calcutta, Dwarkanath Tagore, merchant and patron of the arts (Rabindranath Tagore’s grandfather), expressed an interest to involve himself in ice shipping, but Tudor’s monopoly stayed for some decades more. Tagore was part of the committee in Calcutta along with Kurbulai Mohammad, scion of a well-established landed family in Bengal, to regulate ice supply.”
Also associated with the Tagore family, was later immigrant Gertrude Emerson Sen (1890-1982, married to Boshi Sen). She tells us, “Tagore wrote Foreword to Gertrude Emerson’s Voiceless India, set in a remote Indian village and published in 1930. Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore called Emerson’s efforts, ‘authentic’.” She has moved on to quote Tagore: “The author did not choose the comfortable method of picking up information from behind lavish bureaucratic hospitality, under a revolving electric fan, and in an atmosphere of ready-made social opinions…She boldly took in on herself unaided to enter a region of our life, all but unexplored by Western tourists, which had one great advantage, in spite of its difficulties, that it offered no other path to the writer, but that of sharing the life of the people.’” Kumar writes of an Afro-American scholar, called Merze Tate who came about 1950-51 and was also fascinated by Santiniketan as were some others.
Another name that stuck out was Sam Higginbottom, who she described as “the Farmer Missionary” for he was exactly that and started an agricultural university in Allahabad. Around the same time as Tagore started Sriniketan (1922), Higginbottom was working on agricultural reforms in a different part of India. In fact, Uma Dasgupta mentions in A History of Sriniketan: Rabindranath Tagore’s Pioneering work in Rural Reconstruction that Lord Elimhurst, who helped set up the project, informed Tagore that “another Englishman” was doing work along similar lines. Though as Kumar has pointed out, Higginbottom was a British immigrant to US — an early American — and returned to Florida in 1944.
There is always the grey area where it’s difficult to tie down immigrants or wanderers to geographies. One such interesting case Kumar dwells on would be that of Nilla Cram Cook, who embraced Hinduism, becoming in-the process, ‘Nilla Nagini Devi’, as soon as she reached Kashmir with her young son, Sirius. She shuttled between Greece, America and India and embraced the arts, lived in Gandhi’s Wardha ashram and corresponding with him, went on protests and lived like a local. Her life mapped in India almost a hundred years ago, reads like that of a free spirit. At a point she was deported living in an abject state and without slippers. Kumar tells us: “Her work according to Sandra Mackey combined ‘remarkable cross-cultural experimentation’ and ‘dazzling entrepreneurship.’”
The author has written of artists, writers, salesmen, traders (there’s a founder/buyer of Tiffany’s), actors, Theosophists, linguists fascinated with Sanskrit, cyclists — one loved the Grand Trunk Road, yet another couple hated it — even a photographer and an indentured Afro-American labourer. Some are missionaries. Under ‘The Medical Missionaries: The Women’s Condition’, she has written of the founders of Vellore Hospital and the first Asian hospital for women and children. Some of them lived through the Revolt of 1857; some through India’s Independence Movement and with varied responses to the historical events they met with.
Kumar has dedicated the book to, “…all the wanderers in my family who left in search of new homes and forgot to write their stories…” Is this an attempt to record the lives of people as yet unrecorded or less recorded? For missing from her essays are famous names like Louis Fischer, Webb Miller — who were better known journalists associated with Gandhi and spent time with him. But there are names like Satyanand Stokes and Earl and Achsah Brewster, who also met Gandhi. Let’s ask the author to tell us more about her book.
Anuradha Kumar
What made you think of doing this book? How much time did you devote to it?
These initially began as essays for Scroll; short pieces about 1500-1600 words long. And the beginnings were very organic. I wrote about Edwin Lord Weeks sometime in 2015. But the later pieces, most of them, were part of a series.
I guess I am intrigued by people who cross borders, make new lives for themselves in different lands, and my editors—at Scroll and Speaking Tiger Books—were really very encouraging.
After I’d finished a series of pieces on early South Asians in America, I wanted to look at those who had made the journey in reverse, i.e., early Americans in India, and so the series came about, formally, from December 2021 onward. I began with Thomas Stevens, the adventuring cyclist and moved onto Gertrude Emerson Sen, and then the others. So, for about two years I read and looked up accounts, old newspapers, writings, everything I possibly could; I guess that must mean a considerable amount of research work. Which is always the best thing about a project like this, if I might put it that way.
What kind of research work? Did you read all the books these wanderers had written?
Yes, in effect I did. The books are really old, by which I mean, for example, Bartolomew Burges’ account of his travels in ‘Indostan’ written in the 1780s have been digitized and relatively easy to access. I found several books on Internet Archive, or via the interlibrary loan system that connects libraries in the US (public and university). I looked up old newspapers, old magazine articles – loc.gov, archive.org, newspapers.com, newspaperarchive.com, hathitrust.org and various other sites that preserve such old writings.
You do have a fiction on Mark Twain in India. But in this book, you do not have very well-known names like that of Twain. Why?
Not Twain, but I guess some of the others were well-known, many in their own lifetime. Satyanand Stokes’ name is an easily recognisable still especially in India, and equally familiar is Ida Scudder of the Vellore Medical College, and maybe a few others like Gertrude Sen, and Clara Swain too. I made a deliberate choice of selecting those who had spent a reasonable amount of time in India, at least a year (as in the case of Francis Marion Crawford, the writer, or a few months like the actor, Daniel Bandmann), and not those who were just visiting like Mark Twain or passing through. This made the whole endeavour very interesting. When one has spent some years in a foreign land, like our early Americans in India, one arguably comes to have a different, totally unique perspective. These early Americans who stayed on for a bit were more ‘accommodating’ and more perceptive about a few things, rather than supercilious and cursory.
And it helped that they left behind some written record. John Parker Boyd, the soldier who served the Nizam as well as Holkar in Indore in the early 1800s, left behind a couple of letters of complaint (when he didn’t get his promised reward from the East India Company) and even this sufficed to try and build a complete life.
How do these people thematically link up with each other? Do their lives run into each other at any point?
Yes, I placed them in categories thanks to an invaluable suggestion by Dr Ramachandra Guha, the historian. I’d emailed him and this advice helped give some shape to the book, else there would have been just chapters following each other. And their lives did overlap; several of them, especially from the 1860s onward, did work in the same field, though apart from the medical missionaries, I don’t think they ever met each other – distances were far harder to traverse then, I guess.
What is the purpose of your book? Would it have been a response to some book or event?
I was, and am, interested in people who leave the comforts of home to seek a new life elsewhere, even if only for some years. Travelling, some decades ago, was fraught with risk and uncertainty. I admire all those who did it, whether it was for the love of adventure, or a sense of mission. I wanted to get into their shoes and see how they felt and saw the world then.
Is this because you are a migrant yourself? How do you explain the dedication in your book?
I thought of my father, and his cousins, all of whom grew up in what was once undivided Bengal. Then it became East Pakistan one day and then Bangladesh. Suddenly, borders became lines they could never cross, and they found new borders everywhere, new divisions, and new homes to settle down in. They were forced to learn anew, to always look ahead, and understand the world differently.
When I read these accounts by early travellers, I sort of understood the sense of dislocation, desperation, and sheer determination my father, his cousins felt; maybe all those who leave their homes behind, unsure and uncertain, feel the same way.
You have done a number of non-fiction for children. And also, historical fiction as Aditi Kay. This is a non-fiction for adults or all age groups? Do you feel there is a difference between writing for kids and adults?
I’d think this is a book for someone who has a sense of history, of historical movements, and change, and time periods. A reader with this understanding will, I hope, appreciate this book.
About the latter half of your question, yes of course there is a difference. But a good reader enters the world the writer is creating, freely and fearlessly, and I am not sure if age decides that.
You have written both fiction and non-fiction. Which genre is more to your taste? Elaborate.
I love anything to do with history. Anything that involves research, digging into things, finding out about lives unfairly and unnecessarily forgotten. The past still speaks to us in many ways, and I like finding out these lost voices.
What is your next project? Do you have an upcoming book? Do give us a bit of a brief curtain raiser.
The second in the Maya Barton-Henry Baker series. In this one, Maya has more of a lead role than Henry. It’s set in Bombay in the winter of 1897, and the plague is making things scary and dangerous. In this time bicycles begin mysteriously vanishing… and this is only half the mystery!
It all started with a Facebook post which quoted Churchill and read, “If you are twenty and not a Communist[1], you don’t have a heart. But if you are forty and still a leftist, you do not have a brain.” That snowballed into a literary discourse on the word great and what constitutes greatness. The funny thing is that Churchill never said anything to that effect. The closest one gets to that quotation is Otto von Bismarck, the first Chancellor of Germany who may have uttered, “He who is not a socialist at 19, has no heart. He who is still a socialist at 30, has no brain.” By the way, Bismarck’s brand of politics earned him the title ‘Iron Chancellor’. How do we classify something or someone as great or otherwise?
As written by the victors, history also designates Churchill as a great leader and statesman. A towering figure, he stood steadfast with the people, with his oratory skills, during ‘The Darkest Hour’[2], as London was bombarded by German fighter planes. Surprisingly, he was also voted out of office after World War II. He was mentioned to have said, “History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it.”[3] I do not think that the family members of the 1943 Bengal famine victims will consider him anything but great – a racist, a bigot and a white supremacist, maybe.
Even then, many in the United Kingdom thought Churchill was not a statesman but a foul-mouthed drunkard. At a function, a female guest of aristocratic standing, obviously not his fan, berated him and his politics. She is said to have said, “Sir, if you were my husband, I’d poison your tea.” Without a single pause, the witty Churchill quipped, “Madame, if you were my wife, I’d drink it!” [4]
When Churchill was informed about the Bengal Famine, he was infamously quoted as saying, “Serves them right for breeding like rabbits and, by the way, why isn’t Gandhi dead yet?” [5]
My point is that one man’s great leader may be another’s mortal enemy. This is especially true in a world where power and wealth are used as a yardstick of prosperity. We often forget that these commodities are finite; the losses of one side exactly offset the gains of the other.
Alexander may be ‘Great’ for putting a small region called Macedonia on the world map. With all the carnage and misery he spread over the lands he and his army traversed, it took only the might of a tiny mosquito to bring him down. At least, that is one of the likely ways he died. Other contenders include alcoholic liver disease, depression and strychnine poisoning.
Alexander The Great On His Sickbed, By Christoffer Wilhelm Eckersberg (c. 1783 – 1853). From Public Domain
Like Alexander, many monarchs with the suffix ‘The Great’, such as Peter, Catherine, and Frederick II, left behind an enormous body count and a trail of devastation.
The Great ‘state-of-the-art’ Titanic was marketed as ‘unsinkable’, and itself was a lifeboat with tight watertight compartments, giving ample time for ferry passengers to be rescued by rescue vessels. Hence, the need for an adequate number of lifeboats was deemed unnecessary. We all know about the irony of its disastrous maiden journey, which is still spoken about a century later as one of Man’s greatest miscalculations.[6]
Indians of the 20th century honoured Karamchand Mohandas Gandhi as a selfless soul who chose a life of poverty to stir the masses’ consciousness towards self-rule. The people thought it appropriate to address him as Mahatma (the Great Soul) or the Father of the Nation. Today, an increasing number of Indians are having second thoughts. Perhaps they may have been taken for a ride and got the short end of the stick from the British. It is amusing that Gandhi’s son, Harilal, despite the reverence of the people of the subcontinent towards his father, also did not hold his father in high regard. Disillusioned with the senior’s move to block his law scholarship to England, Harilal became a rebel, spiralling into alcoholism, eventually becoming a public nuisance and falling into oblivion.[7]
The Great War, also known as World War I, was touted as a necessary battle to end all wars. We know it never ended anything, but its post-war deals remain a nidus for World War II and the turmoils that persist even today.
The Great Gatsby exposes the fallacy of the American Dream and the notion of a successful life under capitalism. F. Scott Fitzgerald shows that success-based materialism and trying to relive a nostalgic past will not lead to fulfilment. Instead, it will lead to a decadent path and disappointment. [8]
Published in 1925Film from 2012
In a world so entrenched in wealth acquisition, we have heard of many families afflicted with the misfortune of striking it rich in the lottery and seeing their family spiral into an abyss.
The Great Train Robbery in 1963, the UK’s biggest heist, where the robbers scooted off with the present-day value of £62 million, ended with none of the culprits laying their hands on the loot, but mostly just behind bars. [9]
Just look at Trump and his track to the White House using the ticket which promises to ‘Make America Great Again (MAGA)’. The illusion of the blissful past only morphed into civil unrest, which required the deployment of National Guards and Marines to use flash-bang grenades and tear gas to squash down their own citizens. If that was not enough, now there is talk of MIGA — Make Iran Great Again, perhaps returning Iran to its glory days of the Persian Empire! [10]
When we describe something as great, we usually refer to it in a positive light, as something extraordinary pushing human abilities beyond normal boundaries. It is a subjective assessment. One man’s greatness is another’s failure. It can serve as a cautionary tale for those who have fallen.
It’s just food for thought. After having a bad day at the office when nothing went right, we returned to find that we had forgotten the house key at work and had to go all the way back to the office to retrieve it. What do we say? “Great!”
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[1] ). Even though this quote is often referred to as coming from Churchill, it may have been originated from Otto von Bismarck, the first Chancellor of unified Germany between 1871 and 1890. He could have said, “he who is not a socialist at 19, has no heart. He who is still a socialist at 30, has no brain.”
[4] People probably put words into Churchill’s mouth. It may be a misquotation. The conversation may have taken place between Lady Astor and Churchill’s aide.
Farouk Gulsara is a daytime healer and a writer by night. After developing his left side of his brain almost half his lifetime, this johnny-come-lately decided to stimulate the non-dominant part of his remaining half. An author of two non-fiction books, Inside the twisted mind of Rifle Range Boy and Real Lessons from Reel Life, he writes regularly in his blog, Rifle Range Boy.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are solely that of the author and not of Borderless Journal.
PLEASE NOTE: ARTICLES CAN ONLY BE REPRODUCED IN OTHER SITES WITH DUE ACKNOWLEDGEMENT TO BORDERLESS JOURNAL
Odia literature is characterised by a profound tradition of classic narratives, with notable examples such as Fakir Mohan Senapati’s timeless Chha Mana Atha Guntha[1]. This literary corpus is further enhanced by an array of mythological and folk narratives that hold significant importance in the cultural legacy of Odisha.
These narratives persist through time because they reflect universal human experiences, encompassing themes such as land, power, family, and morality, all while being intricately linked to the historical context and cultural identity of the region. They serve not only as stories but also as reflections of society, having been shaped and refined over the years.
Readers are consistently attracted to these literary works for reasons similar to those that draw us to the writings of Shakespeare or the epic narrative of the Mahabharata: their themes are enduring, and the insights they provide remain pertinent. Similarly, publishers and curators, even at the national level, often revisit these classic tales, a trend that is entirely justifiable.
However, it is the transition to contemporary matters that strikes a significant chord. Odia literature has been progressing, albeit perhaps not as prominently or visibly as certain other Indian literary landscapes. Modern voices are addressing current issues—urban isolation, the influence of technology, caste relations, and environmental deterioration. The change is evident, yet it remains less pronounced than it has the potential to be.
What accounts for this? There may be multiple reasons.
The literary tradition of Odisha is profoundly embedded in its heritage. Classic literature is not only revered and taught but frequently eclipses modern works. Both publishers and readers exhibit a conservative inclination, preferring established texts. This trend is not unique to Odia literature; for example, Tolstoy remains a central figure in Russian literary discourse. As a result, this inclination obstructs the acknowledgment of new authors.
Modern Odia literature faces considerable challenges in its distribution. In contrast to Bengali or Tamil literature, which benefits from larger urban readerships and established translation networks, Odia books often struggle to reach broader audiences.
While digital platforms are making significant strides in this domain, the overall development is still sluggish. Without a strong market, numerous authors may opt to concentrate on more conventional themes that are viewed as more commercially viable.
The demographic composition of Odisha is primarily rural, where numerous readers find a stronger connection with stories that delve into village life or ethical dilemmas, as opposed to genres like cyberpunk or themes focused on existential angst. Although there are urban Odia authors, their readership is frequently limited in range. As a result, contemporary themes may seem alien to those who maintain a deep bond with traditional cultural settings.
The literary language of Odia typically possesses a formal tone, significantly influenced by its classical roots. This can lead to a conflict with modern terminology and global themes, posing challenges for writers who wish to innovate without jeopardising their connection to the audience. In contrast, languages such as Hindi and Malayalam readily incorporate colloquial expressions, which thrive in contemporary literature.
Nonetheless, modern Odia literature is dynamic and progressing. Short story writers are exploring a variety of topics including religion, science fiction, feminism, leftist ideologies, and climate change. Prominent authors such as Sarojini Sahu, Satya Mishra, Rabi Swain, Sadananda Tripathy, Jyoti Nanda, Bhima Prusty, Janaki Ballabh Mohapatra, Ajaya Swain, Biraja Mohapatra, Sujata Mohapatra and young writers like Debabrata Das are actively investigating these contemporary themes. Publications like Kadambini, Rebati, and Katha are offering platforms for these creative narratives.
Despite this, the main obstacle remains the need to improve visibility. Social media and over-the-top (OTT) platforms have the potential to revolutionise this landscape—just picture an Odia adaptation of Black Mirror[2]!
There is an immediate need for greater investment in Odia storytelling to effectively bridge the gap between traditional and modern narratives.
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[1] Six acres and a Third, a novel by Fakir Mohan Senapati(1843-1918) published in 1902
[2]Black Mirror is a British dystopian science fiction television anthology series that started in 2011 and is still on the run.
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Bhaskar Parichha is a journalist and author of Cyclones in Odisha: Landfall, Wreckage and Resilience, Unbiased, No Strings Attached: Writings on Odisha and Biju Patnaik – A Political Biography. He lives in Bhubaneswar and writes bilingually. Besides writing for newspapers, he also reviews books on various media platforms.
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Poetry, prose — all art forms — gather our emotions into concentrates that distil perhaps the finest in human emotions. They touch hearts across borders and gather us all with the commonality of feelings. We no longer care for borders drawn by divisive human constructs but find ourselves connecting despite distances. Strangers or enemies can feel the same emotions. Enemies are mostly created to guard walls made by those who want to keep us in boxes, making it easier to manage the masses. It is from these mass of civilians that soldiers are drawn, and from the same crowds, we can find the victims who die in bomb blasts. And yet, we — the masses — fight. For whom, for what and why? A hundred or more years ago, we had poets writing against wars and violence…they still do. Have we learnt nothing from the past, nothing from history — except to repeat ourselves in cycles? By now, war should have become redundant and deadly weapons out of date artefacts instead of threats that are still used to annihilate cities, humans, homes and ravage the Earth. Our major concerns should have evolved to working on social equity, peace, human welfare and climate change.
One of the people who had expressed deep concern for social equity and peace through his films and writings was Satyajit Ray. This issue has an essay that reflects how he used art to concretise his ideas by Dolly Narang, a gallery owner who brought Ray’s handiworks to limelight. The essay includes the maestro’s note in which he admits he considered himself a filmmaker and a writer but never an artist. But Ray had even invented typefaces! Artist Paritosh Sen’s introduction to Ray’s art has been included to add to the impact of Narang’s essay. Another person who consolidates photography and films to do pathbreaking work and tell stories on compelling issues like climate change and helping the differently-abled is Vijay S Jodha. Ratnottama Sengupta has interviewed this upcoming artiste.
Reflecting the themes of welfare and conflict, Prithvijeet Sinha’s essay takes us to a monument in Lucknow that had been built for love but fell victim to war. Some conflicts are personal like the ones of Odbayar Dorj who finds acceptance not in her hometown in Mongolia but in the city, she calls home now. Jun A. Alindogan from Manila explores social media in action whereas Eshana Sarah Singh takes us to her home in Jakarta to celebrate the Chinese New Year! Farouk Gulsara looks into the likely impact of genetic engineering in a world already ripped by violence and Devraj Singh Kalsi muses on his source of inspiration, his writing desk. Meredith Stephens tells the touching story of a mother’s concern for her child in Australia and Suzanne Kamata exhibits the same concern as she travels to Happy Village in Japan to meet her differently-abled daughter and her friends.
As these real-life narratives weave commonalities of human emotions, so do fictive stories. Some reflect the need for change. Fiona Sinclair writes a layered story set in London on how lived experiences define differences in human perspectives while Parnika Shirwaikar explores the need to learn to accept changes set in her part of the universe. Spandan Upadhyay explores the spirit of the city of Kolkata as a migrant with a focus on social equity. Both Paul Mirabile and Naramsetti Umamaheswararao write stories around childhood, one set in Europe and the other in Asia.
Do pause by our contents page for this issue and enjoy the reads. We are ever grateful to our ever-growing evergreen readership some of whom have started sharing their fabulous narratives with us. Thanks to all our readers and contributors. Huge thanks to our wonderful team without whose efforts we could not have curated such valuable content and thanks specially to Sohana Manzoor for her art. Thank you all for making a whiff of an idea a reality!
I remember feeling tense when I opened my very first email account with the help of the friendly staff at a British registered charity office where I was a member of the learning resource centre in Manila. I thought that it would open a floodgate of privacy issues, including surveillance and compromise. The world’s technological landscape was changing, and I had to adapt. I have always held onto the belief that while technology has immense benefits, it also has a lot of unbridled consequences, including insecurities, pride, selfishness, egoism, shame, and individual and religious superiority. A number of digital platforms have continuously increased and evolved in various iterations, from its email function to TikTok, Facebook, Messenger, Viber, vlogs, WhatsApp, YouTube channels, Pinterest, Blogspot, WordPress, LinkedIn, ZoomInfo, and Threads. The list seems endless.
I have a personal and professional Facebook account, as well as Messenger and Viber, because I find these platforms to be the most helpful to me. I have limited comprehension when it comes to understanding why young people feel the need to be on every digital platform. In my opinion, less is more. Being overexposed can be toxic in terms of seeking external validation and interaction. Not every thought needs to be published on social media. Why do you have to drag your friends and family and even strangers into your rollercoaster of emotions and shifting ideas about life’s journey all the time? While it is true that social media is a tool for self-expression, it is also equally true that it is a medium for self-destruction, as transparency can be both good and evil.
Take, for instance, the case of a woman in her mid-20s who is active on various social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, Pinterest, Blogspot, WordPress, TikTok and X (Twitter). She lost her parents at a young age and had to work as a household helper in the city. Eventually, she received a government scholarship and was able to continue her college studies. She shared on one of her social media accounts that it has become a sort of diary for her, in addition to her voice notes and physical journal. What is the reason for this repetition? Perhaps it is an issue of validation. When an individual delves into an onslaught of social media accounts, it implies proving one’s identity and self-esteem to the world. This can become a form of spiritual superiority, indicating that the person is self-absorbed. We are not the world.
The same holds true for partners who must keep up with their significant others’ social media accounts. The rat race is not just physical, but also digital. For instance, decisions about getting married early are often swayed by image quotes or social media discussions that push boyfriends to give in to these pressures, even if it’s not the right time for those who have only been working for less than two years and have not established a stable and relevant career. Saving for one’s wedding becomes the priority when it should be the other way around – saving for one’s personal and professional growth and development first. Why is there a need for comparison? As a result, emotional manipulation and threats are common. Career concerns are also plagued by the pressure to amass wealth by a certain age. The repetition of social media posts may be a way for individuals to acknowledge their own shortcomings.
In the context of a close friend, I have often wondered why, in most of his photos with me and our other friends, he rarely smiles. Yet, in his photos with his girlfriend, he has a big smile all the time. Is this a result of social media pressure, causing him to appear serious with friends while showcasing happiness in his relationship? On the contrary, I believe that his consistent seriousness may be a reflection of both his and his partner’s insecurities and jealousy.
For years, I have developed a close bond with a friend who was orphaned at a young age. Our main forms of communication are face-to-face and online. However, a year ago, he unexpectedly unfriended me on Facebook. I suspect that this decision may be related to the social media pressure he faces regarding his relationship. Despite this, we still communicate and share stories on Viber and meet face to face, although not as frequently as before. I understand that his job at a global fast food chain keeps him busy, but the pressure from social media can be overwhelming as it becomes a cycle of repetition.
In a way, social media serves as an escape, so repetition is necessary to cope with both material and non-material stressors. To some extent, this coping mechanism may be healthy, but most of the time, it becomes detrimental to a person’s well-being. Being overly repetitive on social media always comes at a cost.
Manuel A. Alindogan, Jr. or Jun A. Alindogan is the Academic Director of the Expanded Alternative Learning Program of Empowered East, a Rizal-province based NGO in the Philippines and is also the founder of Speechsmart Online that specialises in English test preparation courses. He is a freelance writer and a member of the Freelance Writers’ Guild of the Philippines (FWGP).
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Title:Wanderers, Adventurers, Missionaries: Early Americans in India
Author:Anuradha Kumar
Publisher: Speaking Tiger Books
INTRODUCTION
The Wanderers, Lost and Seeking
The people you will meet here—the ‘first Americans in India’—were indeed all wanderers. They came, not attached to the intentions of a country, or even protected by it, unlike their peers, the Englishmen who made up the East India Company, and who came to trade backed by a royal charter granted by Elizabeth I in the year 1600.
The wanderers, the first of whom came at a time when the United States of America had not come into being—and their actions, thus, were different from what was ordained as state policy. The ‘wanderers’ were not ‘state actors’ in that sense, but they, men, and some women, came to India, on their own, driven by their own spirit of search. They were brought here by a sense of adventure, or by a wild dream—that of finding something that would make their fortune—gold or inspiration quite like gold—or by the need to do something good and enobling.
But they were in some ways quite lost after they came to India.
Stepping Into a Mosaic
To these wanderers who travelled to Asia between 1700-1950s, India came as a mosaic of many impressions, a spread of colour and many experiences. It offered a field of new sensations compelling them to revise received knowledge. They were intrigued, they saw its contradictions, its strangeness, and how things were very different from the homes they had left behind. In the process, life for these wanderers was made afresh.
They came as traders, adventurers, military men, fortune hunters, seekers of knowledge, storytellers, mystics, those seeking a new career, or who came simply to serve.
To them, India—that looked quite different from what it does now—was a land of adventure. A land to make a fortune in, or to find fame.
It was a mysterious, magical place, one that fuelled the imagination, a land that contained the ancient truths of the universe. Yet it was a place caught in the ‘medieval age’, a place they had been sent to, a matter ‘divinely ordained’—as the missionaries and mystics believed—to save souls.
A place one could write about, for it was as strange as fiction; it was a land that offered inspiration and where one could find new, yet old, wisdom. A place to serve and cure and heal. A land where a new world was possible, or an arena to set the world aright.
The wanderers were awed and overwhelmed, and then, scandalized and shocked in equal measure. Some of what they wrote mirrored each other’s experiences. For example, their surprise at the number of servants that were needed. The astonishing beauty of the temples. The majesty of the Taj Mahal. The artistry produced by craftsmen and artisans, an art passed down generations. The riot of unexpected colour—in the bazaars, in the turbans men wore, and in the forests with ‘exotic’ fauna and flora yet to be named and classified by the new science of taxonomy. Balmy days spent on houseboats—‘doongas’—in Kashmir. The spiciness of the food, the liberal doses of pepper in curries. And then, the sad state of its women, especially the child brides, and the young widows, who had to be ‘saved’. The timeless stubbornness of the caste system. The very unchanging nature of things.
Change in America
To look at this period—1700-1950—and talk of Americans is somewhat anomalous. For one thing, for the early part of this time, America was a British colony. By the mid-1770s things would change. The United States of America emerged as a new political entity only in 1776.
On the other hand, from the early 18th century onward, the once dominant Mughal Empire was in decline. Aurangzeb, the last powerful ruler of that dynasty, had worn himself and the empire out with his battles in the Deccan and the upsurge of discontent elsewhere that he failed to contain. Even before the Battle of Plassey in 1757 tilted the balance—beginning in the east—in the East India Company’s favour, India was a patchwork of regional rulers, each brimming over with ambition and jostling for power. To adventurers and fortune-seekers—like the ‘wanderers’—who had no master, who came lacking the conqueror’s zeal, but who had their own sense of adventure, such a state of affairs was ideal to make a fortune, to remake a life.
It is thus of little surprise that the first of the wanderers came as part of the East India Company, to associate themselves with it, as ordinary private traders. America at that time, showed the same precarity that characterized India. It was a continent divided up between competing European powers, and to the west of the continent, the different native American groups too had their territories.1
In the next decades, as America extended westward into new frontiers, set its own foundations as a young democracy, some of the wanderers, citizens of a new nation, also faced their own frontiers, as they sailed eastward onto an unknown land.
Most of these early travellers were those who lived on the northeastern seaboard of the American continent, that is, in the port towns of New England that had historic links with England since the early 17th century. These travellers who came all the way from the faraway West to the East were immigrants themselves, children of people who had moved a generation or two ago, a westward journey from Europe to the ‘New World’. The wanderers to India—the South Asian subcontinent—were thus children of wanderers themselves.
(Extracted from Wanderers, Adventurers, Missionaries: Early Americans in India by Anuradha Kumar. Published by Speaking Tiger Books, 2025)
THE BOOK
In 1833, Frederic Tudor, an American businessman, made history when he shipped 180 pounds of ice harvested from Walden Pond in Boston, to Calcutta—this luxury item being much in demand amongst the elites of British India. Tudor was deservedly christened the ‘Ice King’, and soon built a flourishing trade exporting American ice to India.
Others were drawn to the country by less materialistic goals. Like the ‘medical missionaries’ who were deeply concerned with the ‘women’s condition’ in India. Ida Scudder’s efforts in the 1900s resulted in the setting up of the Christian Medical College in Vellore, which continues to save lives till this day; in 1873, ‘Doctor Miss Sahiba’ Clara Swain set up the first hospital for women and children in Asia, in Bareilly, on land donated by the Nawab of Rampur.
There were also those who came to stay. Twenty-two-year-old Samuel Evans Stokes came to Kotgarh in the Himalayan foothills in 1904, embraced Hinduism and became Satyanand Stokes. He revolutionized apple cultivation in the area, now in Himachal Pradesh, by introducing the ‘Red Delicious’ apples of Missouri; today, his descendants still live and work in the region. Likewise, the Alter family. Martha and David Emmet Alter arrived in Mussoorie in 1917, to spend the summer studying at the Landour Language School; in 1941, Emmet became principal of Woodstock School, just around the hillside. Twenty-five years later, his son Robert occupied the same position. Robert’s son Stephen continues to live in Mussoorie, pursuing a successful writing career; his cousin Tom Alter was a much-loved actor in Indian films until he passed away in 2017.
These are just some of the ‘first Americans in India’ who came here, beginning in the 1700s, with different motives and dreams—as adventurers, traders, reformers, writers and artists. All of them, without exception, were fascinated, astonished, moved and, in the end, profoundly changed by their ‘Indian experience’.
Anuradha Kumar’s skilful and well-researched account of these early visitors makes this an important and engrossing book that informs, surprises and amuses in equal measure.
THE AUTHOR
Anuradha Kumar lived in Mumbai for over a decade, where she worked for the Economic and Political Weekly. She now lives in New Jersey in the US, and writes often for Scroll, The India Forum, The Missouri Review, Catamaran Literary Reader, The Common and Maine Literary Review. Two of her essays received ‘notable’ mention in Best American Essays editions of 2023 and 2024.
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How can a 470-page long book turn into a page-turner when it is neither a historical novel nor a whodunit thriller that compels the reader to go on reading as quickly as he/she can? That too when it is a motley collection of twenty-six essays written on different occasions and on different topics for the last twenty-five years. The answer is of course Amitav Ghosh who can literally mesmerise his readers with his multi-faceted interests and subjects ranging from literature and language, climate change and the environment, human lives, travels, and discoveries. Divided into six broad sections, Ghosh clearly mentions in the Introduction that the pieces in this collection are about a wide variety of subjects, yet there is one thread that runs through most of them: of bearing witness to a rupture in time, of chronicling the passing of an era that began 300 years ago, in the eighteenth century. It was a time when the West tightened its grip over most of the world, culminating ultimately in the emergence of the US as the planet’s sole superpower and the profound shocks that began in 2001.
A subject very close to his heart and that is reflected in all the books that he has been writing over the last decade or more, the six essays of the first section are on “Climate Change and Environment.” Ghosh writes about different aspects of migration (both in the sub-continent and in Europe), about the storm in the Bay of Bengal, cyclones, the tsunami affecting the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, and about Ternate, the spice island in Indonesia. According to him, by knowing about anthropogenic greenhouse emissions and their role in intensifying climate disasters, it is no longer possible to cling to the fiction of there being a strict division between the natural and the political. Climate change and migration are, in fact, two cognate aspects of the same thing, in that both are effects of the ever-increasing growth and acceleration of processes of production, consumption and circulation.
According to Ghosh, each of the six essays in the second section entitled “Witnesses” grew out of the research he undertook for his four historical novels, The Glass Palace, and the Ibis Trilogy. All the essays in it “are attempts to account, in one way or another, for the recurrent absences and silences that are so marked a feature of India’s colonial history”. While looking for accounts written by Indian military personnel during the First World War, Ghosh came across two truly amazing books, both written in Bengali, on which three pieces in this section are based. The first of these books is Mokshada Devi’s Kalyan-Pradeep (‘Kalyan’s Lamp’; 1928), an extended commentary on the letters of her grandson, Captain Kalyan Mukherji, who was a doctor in the Indian Medical Service. The second, Abhi Le Baghdad (‘On to Baghdad’), is by Sisir Sarbadhikari, who was a member of the Bengal Ambulance Corps, and is based on his wartime journal. Both Mukherji and Sarbadhikari served in the Mesopotamian campaign of 1915-16; they were both taken captive when the British forces surrendered to the Turkish Army in 1916 after enduring a five-month siege in the town of Kut-al-Amara – the greatest battlefield defeat suffered by the British empire in more than a century. He also writes about how these two prisoners of war witnessed the Armenian genocide.
Regarding the exodus from Burma, Ghosh narrates the plight of one Bengali doctor, Dr. Shanti Brata Ghosh from whose diary (written in English) we are given incidents of events that are a striking contrast to British accounts of the Long March. What the doctor remembered most clearly were his conflicts with his white colleagues and his diary represents a personal assertion of the freedom that his nation’s hard-won independence had bestowed upon him.
Section Four entitled “Narratives” consists of three essays. Speaking about the etymology of the word ‘banyan’, and a short personal anecdote about 11 September 2001, we come to the essay from which the title of this collection – Wild Fictions – is taken. It shows us how the policies and administrative actions have divided landscapes between the ‘natural’ and the ‘social.’ Discussing several environmental issues related to the manner in which over many decades there has been a kind of ethnic cleansing of India’s forests and how the costs of protecting nature have been thrust upon some of the poorest people in the country, while the rewards have been reaped by certain segments of the urban middle class, Ghosh warns us why the exclusivist approach to conservation must be rethought. Before environmental catastrophe happens, we have to find some middle way, one in which the people of the forest are regarded not as enemies but as partners. The idea of an ‘untouched’ forest is none other than a wild fiction.
As mentioned in the beginning, Ghosh’s intellectual curiosity ranges from exploring themes of history, culture, colonialism, climate change and the interconnectedness of human and natural worlds and the readers will get a sample of these different topics in this rich collection. Over the years, we had read some of the essays in journals like Outlook, The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Hindu, The Economic and Political Weekly, The Massachusetts Review, Conde NastTraveller and so on, and some of the articles have been the product of his detailed research before he commenced writing a novel. The five essays in the penultimate section titled “Conversations” begins with a long correspondence that Ghosh had with Dipesh Chakraborty via email after Provincilaizing Europe was published in 2000. The two never met personally as Chakraborty was in Australia at that time, but the exchanges between these two scholars on such wide-ranging issues is surely a reader’s delight. The pieces on Shashi Tharoor’s An Era of Darkness and Priya Satia’s Time’s Monster which were written as reviews also form parts of ongoing dialogue. As Ghosh states, Sattia’s work “has given me new ways of understanding the role that ideas like ‘progress’ have played in the gestation of this time of monsters”. In ‘Storytelling and the Spectrum of the Past’, we are told about the historians versus the novelists view of seeing and documenting themes.
The final and sixth section comprises of three pieces that were originally conceived as blogposts or presentations, accompanied by a succession of images – “the texts that accompany my presentations are scripts for performances rather than essays as such”. In the first one, Ghosh gives us new insights from his diary notes (the Geniza documents) about how he chose to study social anthropology and how In an Antique Land was made—about the Muslim predominance in the Arab village where he stayed and how he evaded the attempt at conversion. In a lecture he delivered at Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, Ghosh asks us to think back for a moment to the intellectual and historical context that led to the foundation of such institutions as the IITs, the IIMs and the outstanding medical institutions of contemporary India. He tells us how we cannot depend on machines alone to provide the solution to our social problems and talks about mercenaries, prisons, the hegemony of the Anglo-American power and how the empires kept close control over rights to knowledge. One of the great regrets of Ghosh’s life was that he never met A.K.Ramanujan and in the concluding essay of this section, he tells us how he considered Ramanujan to be “one of the foremost writers and intellectuals of the twentieth century and how one of the most important aspects of his work is the context from which it emerged.
In the introduction to this collection Ghosh wrote that we were now in a time between the ending of one epoch and the birth of another – ‘a time of monsters’, in the words of Antonio Gramsci. In the Afterword he mentions how the strange thing about this interstitial era is that it could also be described as a ‘time of benedictions’ in that it has suddenly become possible to contemplate, and even embrace, potentialities that were denied or rejected during the age of high modernity. He reiterates that it is the elevation of humans above all other species, indeed above the Earth itself, that is largely responsible for our current planetary crisis. “The discrediting of modernity’s anthropocentricism is itself a part of the ongoing collapse that we are now witnessing.” The only domains of human culture where doubt is held in suspension are poetry and fiction. Though it is not possible to discuss all other aspects that Ghosh deals with in this anthology as the purview of the review is rather limited, I would like to conclude it by quoting the last couple of sentences written by Ghosh himself when he categorically states: “High modernity taught us that the Earth was inert and existed to be exploited by human beings for their own purposes. In this time of angels, we are slowly beginning to understand that in order to hear the Earth, we must first learn to love it.”
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Somdatta Mandal is a critic and translator and a former Professor of English at Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India.
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Borderless 