Sunday, November 25, 2007

Sabse Khatarnak Hota Hai Hamare Sapnon Ka Marna


There is nothing more dangerous than the death of our dreams.
These lines by the Punjabi Poet Paash are what Safdar Hashmi lived by. How do Safdar's dreams survive today in the changed context?

Safdar Hashmi was born to Haneef Hashmi and Qamar Azad on 12 April 1954 in Delhi. He spent his childhood in Aligarh and finished his schooling in Delhi. He did his M.A. in English literature from Delhi University. After short stints of teaching in the universities of Garhwal, Kashmir and Delhi he worked in the Press Institute of India and then joined as the Press Information Officer of the Govt. of West Bengal in Delhi. In 1984 he gave up his job to work full time as a political cultural activist.

Safdar, a founder member of Janam, was a brilliant theoretician and practitioner of political theatre, especially street theatre. A versatile personality, he was a playwright, a lyricist’ a theatre director, a designer and an organizer He also wrote for children.

His film scripts were much acclaimed. He wrote on various aspects of culture and related issues in journals and newspapers. Safdar was a member of the C.P.I. (M). His creativity and ideology were inseparable. In recognition of his contribution to the street theatre movement and to the growth of a democratic culture, the Calcutta University in 1989 conferred on Safdar the degree of D.Litt. posthumously

On January 2, 1989, the convenor of Janam, Safdar Hashmi, died in a New Delhi hospital following a murderous attack on Janam activists the previous day by anti-social elements patronized by the ruling vested interests. Janam was performing Halla Bol in Jhandapur, Sahibabad, in support of the workers’ demands led by the Centre of Indian Trade Unions (CITU). People from all walks of life – workers, political activists, artists and intellectuals – came together spontaneously in a massive, unprecedented protest against this brutal murder. Today, Safdar’s name has become synonymous with street theatre and the progressive cultural movement in India.

My memory of Safdar is of a book lost somewhere on the paths of my childhood. It was a children's book with lots of poems and sketches in it...I remember falling in love with the writer, who was only a name and the book to me.

To be Continued...

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

The Mirror, Sylvia Plath



THE MIRROR

I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.
What ever I see I swallow immediately
Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike .
I am not cruel, only truthful---
The eye of a little god, four cornered.
Most of the time I meditate on the opposite wall.
It is pink, with speckles. I have looked at it so long
I think it is a part of my heart. But it flickers.
Faces and darkness separate us over and over.

Now I am a lake. A woman bends over me,
Searching my reaches for what she really is.
Then she turns to those liars, the candles or the moon.
I see her back, and reflect it faithfully.
She rewards me with tears and an agitation of hands.
I am important to her. She comes and goes.
Each morning it is her face that replaces the darkness.
In me she has drowned a young girl, and in me an old woman
Rises toward her day after day, like a terrible fish.
Sylvia Plath

Small joys keep me going...




"No matter how much madder it may make you, get out of bed forcing a smile. You may not smile because you are cheerful; but if you will force yourself to smile, you'll end up laughing. You will be cheerful because you smile. Repeated experiments prove that when man assumes the facial expressions of a given mental mood — any given mood — then that mental mood itself will follow."
Kenneth Goode

This is what I try to do each morning...I get up, smile...I smile at the new leaves on my money plant, I smile at the cat at the water well, I smile at myself trying to multitask; cooking & reading...I just smile, so that I go through the day smiling at what life has to offer me...
I try to believe that the world is a good place to be, I try to look at everything with gold tinted glasses, I see abundance, of beauty, of nature, of friends, of joy...
I enjoy beauty hunting...i.e, enjoying the scenary when on a detour...the detour can be deliberate too...
Do I sound like a hopelessly happy person when there are wars, poverty, garbage and problems all around the world? Well, about all the problems of the world, I can only learn more, personally try not to contribute to them, try to spread word, tell kids the truth, act in time and take a clear political stance on every issue I am aware of...
I don't have to be an unhappy person because of them, but I'm a sad & angry one because of them...This sadness and anger is what drives me forward to try, to make the world a better place to live for atleast one person...I think like Anne Frank when she said, "How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." I'm not waiting...
I'm in love with life...
"Love the earth and sun and animals,
Despise riches, give to everyone that asks,
Stand up for the stupid and crazy,
Devote your income and labor to others...
And your very flesh shall be a great poem."
Walt Whitman