I’m a cyclone, a whirlwind, I pommel all that lie in my path, I am a dance-driven swing, I dance to my own beat, I’m a free spirit, high on life...
-- Kazi Nazrul Islam, Rebel or Bidrohi, translated by Prof Fakrul Alam.
Young Nazrul
Nazrul’s writing has the power of whirlwind or a tornado — it can break with its force and make with love. His songs are a law unto themselves and called Nazrul geeti. And all this remains popular and still relevant more than a century after he was born.
Kazi Nazrul Islam (1899-1976) was born in Burdwan, a part of the Bengal Presidency that stretched from Bengal to Singapore during colonial times. Nazrul lived through the colonial rule, the independence of the subcontinent, the Partition and the creation of Bangladesh. He was multifaceted — he had tried his hand at soldiering and then settled for being a poet, writer, journalist, and musician. He is now regarded as the national poet of Bangladesh, the Bidrohi Kobi or the rebel poet.
Nazrul teaching Nazrul Geeti
Here, we have tried to gather flavours of his writing and life. We start with the translation of his lyrics (a Nazrul geeti) on butterflies, translated by Fakrul Alam performed by the legendary Feroza Begum, move on to his response to Tagore’s poetry — they had a vibrant relationship as Somdatta Mandal has reflected in her discussion on Radha Chakravarty’s recent translation of his Selected Essays. It’s followed by more translations of three of his poems by Niaz Zaman, who has also written about Nazrul’s support for women. A searing essay on religious divides and socio economic gaps, translated by Sohana Manzoor, also brings to focus the plight of a beggar woman torn by poverty. A short story , showcasing him as a fiction writer, is borne of his experiences as a soldier. Last but not the least, we have a fiery speech by Nazrul from Chakravarty’s translation.
On Nazrul’s 125th birth anniversary, we welcome you to muse on him and his world…
Poetry
Projapoti (Butterfly) by Nazrul has been translated by Fakrul Alam from Bengali. Click here to read.
Somdatta Mandal writes about Radha Chakravarty’s translation of Selected Essays: Kazi Nazrul Islam and in the process explores his life and times. Click here to read.
Perhaps when Dylan Thomas wrote these lines, he did not know how relevant they would sound in context of the world as it is with so many young dying in wars, more than seven decades after he passed on. No poet does. Neither did he. As the world observes Dylan Thomas Day today — the day his play, Under the Milkwood, was read on stage in New York a few months before he died in 1953 — we have a part humorous poem as tribute to the poet and his play by Stuart McFarlane and a tribute from our own Welsh poet, Rhys Hughes, describing a fey incident around Thomas in prose leading up to a poem.
May seems to be a month when we celebrate birthdays of many writers, Tagore, Nazrul and Ruskin Bond. Tagore’s birthday was in the early part of May in 1861 and we celebrated with a special edition on him. Bond, who turns a grand ninety this year, continues to dazzle his readers with fantastic writings from the hills, narratives which reflect the joie de vivre of existence, of compassion and of love for humanity and most importantly his own world view. His books have the rare quality of being infused with an incredible sense of humour and his unique ability to make fun of himself and laugh with all of us.
Nazrul, on the other hand, dreamt, hoped and wrote for an ideal world in the last century. The commonality among all these writers, seemingly so diverse in their outlooks and styles, is the affection they express for humanity. Celebrating the writings of Nazrul, we have one of his fiery speeches translated from Bengali by Radha Chakravarty and a review of her Selected Essays: Kazi Nazrul Islam by Somdatta Mandal. An essay from Niaz Zaman dwells on the feminist side of Nazrul while bringing in Begum Roquiah. Zaman has also shared translations of his poetry. Professor Fakrul Alam, who had earlier translated Nazrul’s iconic ‘Bidrohi or Rebel‘, has given us a beautiful rendition of his song ‘Projapoti or Butterfly’ in English. Also in translation, is a poem by Tagore on the process of writing poetry. Balochi poetry by Manzur Bismil on human nature has been rendered into English by Fazal Baloch and yet another poem from Korean to English by Ilwha Choi.
Ratnottama Sengupta this month converses with a dancer who tries to build bridges with the tinkling of her bells, Sohini Roychowdhury. Gita Viswanthan travels to Khiva in Uzbekistan, historically located on the Silk Route, with words and camera. An essay on Akbar Barakzai by Hazran Rahim Dad and another looking into literature around maladies by Satyarth Pandita add zest to our non-fiction section. Though these seem to be a heterogeneous collection of themes, they are all tied together with the underlying idea of creating links to build towards a better future.
In focus this time is a writer whose prose is almost akin to poetry, Rajat Chaudhuri. A proponent of solarpunk, his novel, Spellcasters, takes us to fictitious cities modelled on Delhi and Kolkata. In his interview, Chaudhuri tells us: “The path to utopia is not necessarily through dystopia. We can start hoping and acting today before things get really bad. Which is the locus of the whole solarpunk movement with which I am closely associated as an editor and creator…”
On that note, I would like to end with a couple of lines from Nazrul, who reiterates how the old gives way to new in Proloyullash (The Frenzy of Destruction, translated by Alam): “Why fear destruction? / It’s the gateway to creation!” Will destruction be the turning point for creation of a new world? And should the destruction be of human constructs that hurt humanity (like wars and weapons) or of humanity and the planet Earth? As the solarpunk movement emphasises, we need to act to move towards a better world. And how would one act? Perhaps, by getting in touch with the best in themselves and using it to act for the betterment of humankind? These are all points to ponder… if you have any ideas that need a forum on such themes, do share with us.
We have more content which has not been woven into this piece for the sheer variety of themes they encompass. Do pause by our content’s page and browse on all our pieces.
With warm thanks to our wonderful team at Borderless — especially Sohana Manzoor for her fabulous art — I would like to express gratitude to all our contributors, without who we could not create this journal. We would also like to thank our readers for making it worth our while to write — for all of our words look to be read, savoured and mulled, and maybe, some will evolve into treasured wines.
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