Comparative Literature in action: Reception of selected English romantic lyrics in Odia. Biswa Ranjan Sahoo

Abstract

The distinction between romanticism and modernism is blurred in the context of Odia literary history. The Odia romantic age has been enmeshed in modern age, still the romanticism is very much felt in Odia literature. The evolution of romanticism can be traced back to the collaborative publication of Odia Kabitabali- first part in 1876 and subsequent part in 1855-by two eminent poets, Radhanath Ray and Madhusudan Rao. Undoubtedly both of them, deserved to be called as romantics, were influenced by English romantics and the publication of Lyrical Ballads in 1798. The pioneer romantic poets in the Odia team, excluding the above two, are Gangadhar Meher and Nandkishor Bal. Their works reflect exotic scenic setting of Odisa, the countryside, hill side, the antique temples, the sea beach, and widespread lake and so on.

My research on this area will unveil the transformation of romanticism when migrated from English language, culture and milieu to Odia.  In this paper, I explicate, Nandakishore Bal’s Kokila Prati- a translation of To the Cuckoo of William Wordswoth and his Banapriya- a translation of To a skylark of Percy Bysshe Shelly, the reception of English romanticism to Odia poetry. As and when required I may use back translation method to display the distinction between English romanticism and romanticism in Odia. At last, by thematic analyses, I will explain how comparative literature is active when one literature receives other.

Paper

I would like to explore, in the beginning of my paper, the reception of English romantic lyrics in Odia. I do not want to show the role translation played in mere transforming one literature to another. Here, I will denominate the meeting of two cultures on the same concept of a literary genre i.e. romanticism. Learning English, a ‘gift’ of British colony, motivated the rapt Indians to study English literature. In fact a faction of Odia poets followed English romantic tradition. The reason behind a large number of Odia geniuses pursuing British romantic tradition needs discussion and scholarship. The Odias, I think, adopted western romantic genre to convey some repressed anguish- their lost freedom, their glorious past. Nanda Kishore Bal in his poem Banapria states that anguish:

“I reminisce from ages

of country-past-glory

my heart is grieved remembering past

the new hope rises.

Let not loose the optimism

in confused words

Cuckoo wake them up in cheering voice! Men

Bring back the antique chattels, oh cuckoo!”  (My translation)

Going by the history, we may deduce that the advent of Odia romanticism, which is a rejection of gaudiness archaisms, and frequent use of personifications in the poetry of Riti Era, like the rebuff of English romantics to neoclassicism. The poetry of Riti Era illustrates nature as a metaphor of love. Seeming passive, the nature is described in the narrower view of love for women. It happened contrarily in the hands of early modern poets of Odia literature- they transformed, transcribed nature the Riti poets used. As a freelancer romantics felt it as a gift. They had a readiness to recognize the mythical representation of nature. The passive ornament for Ritis is actively used by romantic poets. Describing the exotic nature, the Odia romantics become nostalgic to use nature to convey the exploitation of rich over poor. (Madhusudan Rao, Akas Prati, stanza12). They looked at nature in a larger cultural practice. Violation, compression, condensation, substitution and elimination of the original became their common strategy of writing poetry, when they followed English poetry. For them original carries no sanctity, it can be diluted, added or subtracted. They use English romantic works as liberally as they can do and are never obliged for it; even they never use the name of original writer. The Odia poets were ambivalent to western past; they were not fascinated to learn as well.

Odia romanticism, a pre colonial subject, reflects nationalism in Odia poetry. The vigour, the curiosity, the nationalist feeling for a free nation state, seems pertinent in 20^th century Odia romantic poetry. So there is a constant interaction going on in the romantic poems as a particular moment in history. The Odia past undermined or subverted the original. To beget a new literature the English poetry was an occasion; it was a context which became a pretext for their creation. In west, the love for nature results a constant revolt against Christianity; Christianity opposes nature because it is created and nurtured by devils. Many romantics, hence, became Pagan and Hellenistic in their approach. But for Odia poetry nature was a god which was prayed and celebrated.

            Romanticism in Odisha formed the spiritual keystone of national unity and identity. It is indeed described in terms of a kind of spiritual dominance. This stemmed from several causes, because the literature of the period was deeply immersed in contemporary historical era, and thus addressed the fundamental questions that plagued the Odia generation for colonialism. It was an epoch of crucial significance for the character of Odia literature. It ushered a revolution in literary language, literature and poetry reached its highest caliber.

            I have taken two poems; To a Skylark by Shelly and To the Cuckoo by Wordsworth; in both cases the bird is a singing voice who rambles from place to place and the poet is mesmerized in listening it. Poet is only concerned with the beauty of nature and natural elements throughout the poem; he is not bothered by external social or cultural milieu. When the above two poems reach the landscape of Odisha; the mentality of the poet tainted with changed socio cultural setting, the former becomes Banpriya and the later becomes Kokila Prati by Nandakishore Bal, addressing to a same bird koili. He gave the same name to two birds as the above birds are not seen in Odisha as two different species. He took the commonality of them as singing birds and considered them as koili or cuckoo. We are diverted, for a while, to discuss the importance of cuckoo in Odisha context. The habit of using ‘cuckoo’ by Odia poets in poetry counts back to Sarala age till modern age. The cuckoo has been implemented as a messenger- carrying the news of grief of separation; from mother to son; from wife to husband; from lover to beloved. Upendra Bhanja, an eminent Riti poet depicts the role of cuckoo in his Baidehisa Bilas. Goddess Sita, the wife of mythical Lord Ram, being imprisoned by Ravan the villain of Ramayan, laments and the message is sent to her husband by cuckoo.

“Trio came to the forest, duo still, one grille

Nobody hears to soothe the lonely soul

How would she dwell?

Cuckoo! Teel me what sounds in the world

to be lord less wedding the lord”. (My translation)

The task of cuckoo increased in modern age, which instead of taking the message of severance carried the message of social reform, political freedom and invoked cultural tradition of ancient Odisha. It would be conferred later on while discussing Odia poems translated from English. In English poetry the singing birds, may be Cuckoo or Skylark, is presented in a different tone as it is presented in Odia poems.

Addressing Skylark, Shelly says it a ‘blithe spirit’ rather than a bird, for its song comes from heaven. He goes on describing the flight of skylark, higher to higher which becomes unreachable to poets eyes and ears. If the West Wind was Shelley’s first convincing attempt to articulate an aesthetic philosophy through metaphors of nature, the skylark is his greatest natural metaphor for pure poetic expression, the “harmonious madness” of pure inspiration. The skylark’s song issues from a state of purified existence, a Wordsworthian notion of complete unity with Heaven through nature.  Its song is motivated by the joy of that uncomplicated purity of being, and is unmixed with any hint of melancholy or of the bittersweet, as human joy so often is. In his language, “Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought”. The skylark’s unimpeded song rains down upon the world, surpassing every other beauty. The song inspires metaphor and makes the speaker believe that the bird is not a mortal bird at all, but a “spirit,” a “sprite,” a “poet hidden / In the light of thought.”

                        We observe something changed when “To the Skylark” is converted to Kokilaprati in Odia; it has the same delight of thought and expression, the elation and ecstasy in the minds of the poet, whereas the poet becomes mournful remembering the past of the nation. He is not swayed by the emotion to exist in a world of fairies rather to survive in a pragmatic world. Poet is grieved seeing the cuckoo and exasperated to tell the inner anguish that he had since long. The poet, remembering his childhood and history of the nation, wants the people of the world to be enlightened through the light of knowledge forgetting the rivalry in between. Disregarding the men of the earth as sinful, he suggests the bird to teach them for searching the ultimate Nirvana or solace, instead of pursuing the mundane life. So he regards the bird as an eternal preacher to elevate modern men from the world of drudgery.

            Let me argue about the second poem To the Cuckoo. This poem has been written in admiration and glorification of the cuckoo. The cuckoo becomes a symbol of beauty, innocence and childhood for the poet. The poet hears the cuckoo singing in a garden when he was lying on the grass, immersing himself in nature. Her song reminds him of the golden days of his childhood. Calling the cuckoo a happy stranger, the poet remembers emotions in him that he has not visited since his childhood. He bears and enjoys her song; bit is unable to see her. The cuckoo is a wondering voice rather than a bird. The cuckoo's double-cry seems to travel rapidly from hill to hill. Sometimes, it seems very near and some times very far away. The poet calls on the cuckoo but this is vain as he cannot trace her out. The poem presents a beautiful contrast between the poet and the cuckoo-the poet lives in the past, the cuckoo lives in the present. It ends with Wordsworth commenting that the bird is blessed and deserves to be in a mythical earth, where it resides.

            Kokilaprati, on the other hand, a translation of To the cuckoo is symmetric in meaning and thematic expression. But one thing that can be marked as difference from England is the setting of Odisha. Bal is quite reminiscent of the grain fields where he sleeps and dreams of the bird but Wordsworth is still on the plain-the same grass land. The movement, from past to present and vice versa that we find in Wordsworth, is unwavering for Bal; it seems as if he is talking in present tense. Cuckoo in Odia literature, in fact, is treated as blessed eternal bird from heaven that needs worship.

By experimenting on the reception of romantic lyrics in Odia literature, I got to know how comparative literature secretly plays a pivotal role when one work is converted to other. The prominence and scope of comparative literature is felt when a work, a literary genre, an epoch take a shape in another socio-cultural milieu. The romantic sensibility that arose in early twentieth century Odia literature is undoubtedly an incursion of nineteenth century English literature. 20^th century Odia intellectuals found ample of freedom to express their inner anguish in the format of 19^th century English romanticism and an exodus of Odia bards fled English isle to hibernate. Reception of English romantic lyrics in Odia literature, at first sight, seems inane to comparative literature but by a little analysis we find its active presence.

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