Indian English poem. Indianness . Night of the Scorpion, Goodbye party for Miss Pushpa T.S. and Ecology poem - Sourav Omnibus
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‘Night of the Scorpion' is one of the finest poems of Nissim Ezekiel and has been universally admired , for its admirable depiction of a common Indian situation , for its vivid and forceful imagery , for its bringing together of opposite , for it’s ironic contrasts , and for the warmth of human love and affection. It should that Ezekiel is a very Indian poet, rooted in the Indian soil ,and actually aware of the common human situation of Indian life. The poet's mother stung by a scorpion is given multiple treatment, bringing in its sweep the world of magic and superstition, science , rationality and material affection. Let us begin by reading the poem.
'Night of the Scorpion' is brilliant narrative poem without any break or division into stanzas, expect for the last three lines which stand apart . Here his mother was stung by a scorpion one rainy night. It had been rained continuously for ten hours and during this time the scorpion had been concealed behind a sack of rice , such as do provide hiding places for all sorts of vermin in a typical Indian home . The mother , of course , particularly in Indian homes , is the Ghar Laxmi , the beloved of all , and so all are anxious to bring her quick relief. The Scorpion is a symbol of evil. So he says,
“ …… flash of diabolic tail in the dark room.” (Ezekiel,' Night of The Scorpion', Parthasarathy , 32, line 5-6).
Enterprise by Nissan Ezekiel -
Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S. -
Night of the Scorpion -
https://youtu.be/re_yMT12S58
However , the peasants , their neighbours, come in large numbers , pray for her. They come like ' swarms of files' and like they ' buzz' the name of God . They search for the scorpion, with lanterns and candles , throwing giant scorpion like shadows on the walls and his mother suffers for pain on the mat in the centre :
“ More candles , more lanterns , more
neighbours,………
My mother twisted through and through,
Groaning on a mat.” ( Ezekiel, 'Night of the Scorpion', Parthasarathi, 32,line 35- 39)
But his father is a rationalist who, in contradistinction to the holy man, tries “powder, mixture, herb, and hybrid.” He even pours little paraffin upon the bitten toe , and burns it to burn out the poison , and the son watches the flame with interest . It would have been a real tragedy . Writer R. Parthasarathy says, “ ‘Night of The Scorpion’ evokes superstitious practices we haven't still outgrown…..” (R. Tilak(ed), New Indian English Poets and Poetry,1997).
The entire poem is build on irony which reaches its climax in the last three lines. His mother did not blame God. Rather she was grateful to God for the scorpion's biting her and sparing her children :
“My mother only said
Thank God the scorpion picked on me
And spared my children.” (Ezekiel, 'Night of The Scorpion’, Parthasarathy ,line 50 – 53 )
Another famous poem of Ezekiel , 'Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S.’ is also famous Indian poem. In this poem the poet has made fun of the craze for, 'foreign', of fashionable young ladies and of their mental vacuity. It is a delicious bid of social satire in which the poet has treated ironically the affectation and pretensions as well as wrong use of English—of Indian sahibs and Memsahibs. It is a common Indian mistake to use the present continuous tense in place of the simple present, and this fault of grammar has been parodied throughout the poem. It is also an Indian English used by Ezekiel.
The poem is in the form of a farewell speech. A party has been thrown in and number of friends have been invited to it to bid goodbye to Miss Pushpa who is “ departing for foreign” in two or three days to improve her prospects . So, the poem begins in the last para with his vivid speech : “Friends, our dear sister / is departing for foreign / in two three days.”(Ezekiel, Nissim, ‘Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S.’, in Twentieth Century Indian Poet’s,(ed) R. Parthasarathy)
Again the speaker next praises in free verse the many qualities of head and heart of Miss Pushpa. She is sweet, both externally and internally. She always smiles , even when there is no reason for her to smile. She come from high family. Her father was a renowned advocate , through the speaker does not remember exactly whether of Bulsar or Surat . There is a touch of drama when someone tells the speaker that he belonged to Surat and he remembers that once he had stayed at Surat with the family of one of the old friends of his uncle whose wife cooked very nicely . But it was long ago, and so he does not remember much about the visit. The speaker says that She is very popular both men and women. She is very obliging . She does never say 'no' , but is always willing to oblige her friends. Whenever she is asked to do anything, she always replies that she will do it just then :
“Whenever I asked her to do anything,
She was saying, 'just now only…..” (Ezekiel, 'Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S.’, Parthasarathy , 37 )
However the poet addressing to everyone ( e.g. 'sister' to 'Miss Pushpa' and 'friends' to guests). So here the Indianness is reflected through poet's verse.
Another famous Indian English writer is A.K. Ramanujan. A.K. Ramanujan is a poet who lives in Chicago and in all the time preoccupied with India. Ramanujan himself writes : “English and my discipline ( linguistics and anthropology) give me my ' inner forms' …”
However, the poem 'Ecology' by A.K. Ramanujan is about a son's devotion to her mother and her devotion to ecology that creates a kind of conflict between the two. His mother suffers many problem ( i.e. “blinding migraine”) for this Champak tree.:
“had brust into flower and given Mother
Her first blinding migraine
Of the season”. ( Ramanujan’s ' Ecology')
So the poet wants to cut the tree but his mother stops him from doing so because of her religious and emotional sentiment for the red Champak tree. Even the breeze his home cannot protect her from the ill effects of the pollen of the flowers. It was the old tree than his mother's age. And she thinks that is the germinated by the drooping of passing bird. So it is a good omen. That is why she dose not allow her son to cut the tree and by seeing the good things in the environment and tree.: “ but mother flushing her tamper
Like her mother's twisted silver,
grandchildren's knickers…”. ( Ramanujan’s 'Ecology')
Thus, Ecology attempts to study the inter relationship between the two perceptions 'things in themselves' and 'things for us.' John Elder quips ― “Just as natural phenomena can reground a poem‘s language for us, so too can poetry mediate and heighten our awareness of the living Earth”.('The Poetry of Experience Armbruster', 320). Poetry connects us with nature, the human with nonhuman: “If words tie us in one with nature, tying human with non-human, if speech in the beginning brings all into being, maybe the speech of poems will revive our lease of life.” (Felstiner 15). Vinay Dharwadker in the Introduction to the Collected Poems also says: “One of the recurrent concerns in Ramanujan‘s poetry as a whole is the nature of the human body and its relation to the natural world…The clock that ticks inside the natural mechanism of any living body is also the clock ticking away in the natural world outside, and it is the nature of this universal clock to tick inexorably towards the terminal irony of death(RCP xviii-xxiii).
To sum up Ezekiel and Ramanujan proves that they are an Indian poet by his imagery and also characteristics. Even all the aspects is clearly indicates that both Ezekiel and Ramanujan is a very Indian poet and we agree in one words of their features of Indianness. Chetan Karnani says, “No other poet has successfully exploited the nuances of Indian English as Ezekiel has done.” However, Ezekiel’s 'Night of the Scorpion' and 'Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S.’ and Ramanujan’s 'Ecology' are very 'Indianness' with some features.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Ezekiel, Nissim, 'The Night of The Scorpion' and 'Goodbye Party for Miss Pushpa T.S.’ in Twentieth Century Indian Poets, (ed) R. Parthasarathy; New Delhi; Oxford University press, 1975.
2. Ezekiel, Nissim, 'Seven Indian English Poets', (ed) Dr. A.N. Prasad and N.K. Singh, Kolkata; Indian Book View, 2016.
3. http://egyankosh.ac.in/handle.net/123456789/27473,unit-25 Nissim Ezekiel and Kamala Das, block Indian Poets, 2017.
4. http:// www .jstor.Org/ stable / 40873357, (ed) Indranath Kher; Journal of South Asian Literature, vol. 11, No. 3/4, Nissim Ezekiel issue ( Spring Summer, 1976), p. 3-7
5. Taranath, Rajeev. Poetry of Nissim Ezekiel, Calcutta ; P.Lal, Thomson Conn.:Inter Culture Associates, 1966.
6. Armbruster, Karla and Kathleen R. Wallace, ed. Beyond Nature Writing. Virginia: UP of
Virginia, 2001.Print.
7. Dharwadker, Vinay. Introduction. Collected Poems:A.K.Ramanujan. By Ramanujan. New Delhi: OUP, 1995. xvii-xxxviii. Print.
8. Elder, John. Imagining the Earth: Poetry and the Vision of nature. 2nd ed. Athens: U of Georgia P, 1996. Print.
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