Musings on the Life & Times of Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan

Musings on the Life & Times of Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi
Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan

Epilogue

(Adhishree Manokaran, Advocate, High Court, just out of College, has excelled herself. As Mr. B S Raghavan (IAS)(Retd)- a Living Legend put it. Both myself and the artiste profusely thank all those who responded to the Musings and kept us going up to this 100th Chapter- Epilogue-coinciding with Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi’s 100th death anniversary- (1882-1921). We sincerely hope and pray that for the sake of Mundasau Mahakavi,everyone will a few copies each when the book is out – with Copyright pleased at the reverential feet of : Bharat Mata).

To me it seems that Kaala or Yama got scared of Bharathi. He did not come to meet him, afraid of being crushed under his feet . So he sent an elephant- Lord Ganapathy- to kick Bharathi and enfeeble him. So that when Yana came calling on Sept 11,1921, Bharathi was so feeble of health that Yamadhoots may have had no difficulty to perform their duties. When it came to duty, no one obliged more than Bharathi. An enfeebled Bharathi must have smilingly already become AMARAN- IMMORTAL that Yama was cheated by him as he lives on in his books. Just who was this Subbiah?

இன்னிசை மாதரிசையுளேன் நான், இன்பத்திரள்கள் அனைத்துமே நான்; புன்னிலை மாந்தர்தம் பொய்யெலாம் நான், பொறையருந் துன்பப் புணர்ப்பெலாம் நான்.

I am in every bird that soars the skies!
I am in every animal that wanders this earth!
I am in the trees that grows in the wild!
I am in the breeze, I am in the stream, I am in the sea!

மந்திரங்கோடி இயக்குவோன் நான், இயங்கு பொருளின் இயல்பெலாம் நான்; தந்திரங் கோடி சமைத்துளோன் நான். சாத்திர வேதங்கள் சாற்றினோன் நான். அண்டங்கள் யாவையும் ஆக்கினோன் நான், அவை பிழையாமே சுழற்றுவோன் நான், கண்டல் சக்திக் கணமெலாம்
நான் காரணமாகிக் கதித்துளோன் நான்.

I am in every glistening star of the universe,
I am in the expanses of the wide open,
I am in every worm of the soil,
I am in every life form of the water world!

கம்பனிசைத்த கவியெலாம் நான்,
காருகர் தீட்டும் உரவெலாம் நான்;
இம்பர் வியக்கின்ற மாட கூடம்
எழில்நகர் கோபுரம் யாவுமே நான்,

I am in every verse of Kamban,
I am in every masterful stroke of the artist,
I am in every room and stair of homes which spellbind people here,
I am also in every monumental tower of this beautiful city!

நானெனும் பொய்யை நடத்துவோன் நான், ஞானச் சுடர்வானில் செல்லுவோன் நான்; ஆனபொருள்கள் அனைத்தினும் ஒன்றாய் அறிவாய் விளங்குமுதற்சோதி நான்.

I am the magician who conducts a million illusions!
I am the innate nature of every active element !
I hold a million tricks up my sleeve!
I am the one who scripted the (rules of) vedas and shastras!

அண்டங்கள் யாவையும் ஆக்கினோன் நான்,
அவை பிழையாமே சுழற்றுவோன் நான்,
கண்டநற் சக்திக் கணமெலாம் நான்
காரணமாகிக் கதித்துளோன் நான்.

am the creator of the whole cosmos!
I am the one who ensures they rotate flawlessly!
I am in every powerful army!
I am the cause of logical (rational) speech!

நானெனும் பொய்யை நடத்துவோன் நான்,
ஞானச் சுடர்வானில் செல்லுவோன் நான்;
ஆனபொருள்கள் அனைத்தினும் ஒன்றாய்
அறிவாய் விளங்குமுதற்சோதி நான்.

I am the director of the illusion that is me!
I am the one who travels in the enlightened path of wisdom!
I am the unifying light of knowledge in everything ever created!

What triggered these Musings: Abdul Rahman a.k.a. Kaviko’s unforgettable verse on Bharathi:

Ettaiyapurathil Oru Erattai Prasavam 
Neeyum Puthiya Tamizhum

(A twin birth in Ettayapuram
You and New Tamil)

And Bharathi lives on in his works. He is Amaran:Immortal. He says so. Who else has the right and authority to say do?

சிலுவையிலே அடியுண்டு யேசு செத்தான்; தீயதொரு கணையாலே கண்ணன் மாண்டான்; பலர்புகழும் இமனுமே யாற்றில் வீழ்ந்தான்; பார்மீது நான்சாகா திருப்பேன்,காண்பீர்!

Christ died upon crucifixion
Lord Krishna died from an arrow
Lord Ram too drowned in Sarayu
But watch, I will live on forever, deathless in my verses.

Borrowing never stops. For this muser and his musings. It is tough not to borrow when Bharathi’s Chellamma borrowed even basics as rice, cereals, vegetables, milk, coffee powder and more, all the time , even for daily bread. And Bharathi too borrowed. What? I mean ideas. He borrowed by being inspired by the happenings around him. The simple and subtle and mundane and meaningful. So I borrow with conviction. Bharathi was and is a Mahakavi.

It may be apt to borrow on what Poetry is all about. Difficult to be precise as Poetry is the Poet. And Poetry is as different as the Poets were or are. There is however an underlying theme. Poetry lures. Hooks you. Holds you. Overcomes you. Overpowers you. All this at the feelings and emotional level. So I borrow from multiple sources to lay down the canvas, on Poetry as fits in with these musings. Picked and chose what belongs. Bharathi was a wordsmith. He used simple words. You and I were very familiar with. Could any one else attempt to ‘use’ them to make a poem? And a poem of the kind Bharathi made? No way. Poetry is easy. It is impossible. Easy for Bharathi. Impossible for us. But easy for us to read and enjoy. Is THAT impossible?

Poetry, the highest form of literature, influences us because it shows different shades of human beings. In fact, poetry is one of the most ancient arts and also the product of human imagination. It expresses different feelings such as friendship, love, death and other human emotions. In literature, poetry stands first even today because poetry has such power to influence this world. Poetry still dominates other forms of literature such as novel, drama, short story etc. Poetry is taught in schools and colleges across the world. The reason is that poetry can tap the emotions of students and their power of imagination.

The cathartic role of poetry is even more important than a social commentary one. So perhaps there is no singular role for poetry. Rather, poetry is meant to be our companion throughout every stage of societal awareness. This is evidenced through poetry’s multi-faceted ability to inspire us to action, highlight a previously unknown narrative, make us think critically, or simply to allow us to feel our humanity. In Conversations on the Craft of Poetry (1961, poet Robert Frost said, “Poetry is what is lost in translation.”

One upon a time, people did not have to ask the question, “Why poetry?” Poetry required no apologia, no formal training, no elitist ivory tower education. Poetry simply was. It was read, recited, written; taught, learned, remembered. Art is a manifestation of the kind of special beauty that can be so rare to find in our everyday lives. It can exist in so many forms whether that be in the visual arts of cinema, the performing arts of music or perhaps most importantly, in literature. While novels and plays can cause us to question our beliefs, revel in the imagination and be consumed by a feeling so enticing, nothing can elicit such a powerful and emotional feeling like poetry. While poetry may be revered by many for its supposedly pretentious and incomprehensible construction, it is in discovering all the details that are hidden in these works of brilliance that make it poignant in a way nothing else can possibly match.

There is something so innately beautiful in the construction of poetry. The idea that a limited number of words can be crafted together in a way that creates such meaning and emotion is truly remarkable. That is exactly why poetry is simply so much more impactful than standard prose can possibly be. It is through the restrictions which the author places on themselves that magic happens. There must be deep thought and focus on every single word and how it contributes to the grander meaning which the poet wishes to get across to the reader.

Reading poetry is so beneficial particularly due to how it challenges us as individuals to explore new perspectives and break free of our ethical, moral and intellectual barriers. Poetry allows us to be less rigid in our thinking with an authentic, personal touch. When you read poems, nothing is often straightforward. Every poem has a meaning hiding under it, but it is blocked by a myriad of literary devices such as metaphors and symbolism. It is important to be able to think more figuratively because it allows you to understand ideas and perspectives in a more abstract and possibly more meaningful way.

In a poem entitled ‘ In Memory of W B Yeats’
by W.H. Auden, there is a significant line regarding the grand effect of poetry. This line, “For poetry makes nothing happen: it survives”, suggests the concept that poetry is never truly alive nor dead. The ideas and hidden messages in every poem will always outlive the writer who first penned down those very lines. Another line later in the poem describes poetry as a “way of happening”, in that poetry is an event which occurs though not in exactly the same way each time. What one poet thought when they wrote a poem will never be exactly the same as what the reader thinks of it. Yet isn’t that the magic of poetry, why we read poetry. We read it to be enlightened, to be invigorated. To push away from our current mindset, explore something even more enticing and emotionally groundbreaking. Poetry must continue to be read so that we continue exploring new ideas and discerning the meaning of seemingly normal concepts. It allows us to become better people, more in touch with our humanity.

In a study published in April,2016 in the journal Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience, Eugen Wassiliwizky, a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Empirical Aesthetics, and a small team of scholars at other German and Norwegian universities set out to understand what happens to us when we read poetry.

The study authors asked groups of mostly female German speakers in their mid-20s — some of whom were frequent poetry readers, and some of whom described themselves as novices — to listen to poetry read out loud. The researchers selected a handful of poems to be read, including some by well-known German poets Friedrich Hölderlin, Friedrich Schiller, Theodor Fontane, and Otto Ernst; participants were also allowed to pick some poems on their own, choosing works from authors including William Shakespeare, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Friedrich Nietzsche, Edgar Allan Poe, Paul Celan, and Rilke. (Especially formally inventive poetry, that of e.e. cummings, for instance, was not a part of the study.) As the volunteers listened, the researchers recorded their heart rate, facial expressions, and — via the incredibly named “goosecam” — the movement of their skin and arm hairs; when the participants felt internal chills, they pressed a button and held it for as long as the chill lasted.

The results: Every person claimed to have felt chills at some point during the process, and about 40 percent showed visible goose bumps — a percentage that lines up with the responses most people have when listening to music and film soundtracks or watching emotional scenes in movies. Their neurological responses, however, seemed to be unique to poetry: Scans taken during the study showed that listening to the poems activated parts of participants’ brains that, as other studies have shown, are not activated when listening to music or watching films.

The authors also found evidence to support the idea of poetry’s pleasure as a slow-building experience, or what they called a “pre-chill”: While listening to poems they found particularly evocative, the listeners subconsciously anticipated the coming emotional arousal in a way that was neurologically similar to the reward anticipation one might get from, for instance, unwrapping a chocolate bar. Up to 4.5 seconds before the participants pressed the button to say they were feeling chills, the researchers’ skin conductance data showed that the participants’ emotions were already being stirred.

Interestingly, these chills and pre-chills largely occurred at closing positions within the poems — at the end of stanzas and, especially, at the end of the entire poem. This — combined with the fact that 77 percent of participants who had never heard a certain poem before still showed neurological signs of anticipating its points of emotional arousal — demonstrates that there is something fundamental to the poetic form that implies, creates, and instills pleasure.”

Have we cared to analyse our poets and their works this way? Do we care at all? Do we not spend time in thoughtless and meaningless pursuits? The ‘Social Dilemma’ that Tristan Harris talked on the Social Media Swamp is addressed to us. Do we care for us and ourselves? Selfish US? Poetry is the highest form of Art. It is esoteric and not, both, at the Bharathi construct. He took it to great heights by bringing it down to us, ordinary mortals. Yet, do we care beyond the lip service, periphery, dancing around the edges. We eulogise the poet forgetting the poetry and the message. That is who we are when we ought not to be.

We celebrate birth and death anniversaries? Invite political leaders in power to preside. They mouth platitudes ghost written for them. Do they read and digest what was written for them? And built Illams and Memorials, which the Bharathis did not care for. For Bharathi his works mattered. He breathed life into them. He was the poem. He knew he would be immortal. His dalliances with Kullachamy and philosophy of life told him that. He lived for 39 years only. But his accomplishments were worth a millennium and more.

The homage we can pay to Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi is to accept that he has passed into immortality. The immortality of his works. And meet him there. Not open the book and move on. Read his works. Read about him and his works. And be aware that he lives in his works. We may not be able to live a life of values he demonstrated and lived among us.

As a muser, I am too small to pay tribute to Bharathi. No word falling out of me may capture the essence of the life and times of Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi. What do I do? Typically, or what these Musings have always done, all along and through this work. Borrow. What else?

Albert Einstein was a genius like no other. He was a scientist. What he said of Mahatma Gandhi fits in wonderfully about Chinnaswamy
Subramania Bharathi too, as an artist.

“ Generations to come will scarce believe that such a one as this ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth”

A perfect synchrony or symphony between science and art, if there could be one.

Vande Mataram. Bharat Mata Ki Jai. Jai Hind.

( Author is practising advocate in the Madras High Court)