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India Booked | Women, Morality and Moral Strength
101 Plays4 years ago
‘Bhairavi- The Runaway’, written by Shivani aka Gaura Pant, a pioneer of women’s fiction in India, is the story of a woman's life, her resilience, her moral and mental strength, and about the restraints and choices women have in the society.
In this episode of India Booked, the translator of ‘Bhairavi’ and Chitra Mudgal’s ‘Giligadu’, Priyanka Sarkar talks to Ayushi Mona about her experience translating the books, the scope and depth of women’s literature, about bringing alive a concept to an unaware audience and as she says, ‘translating the untranslatable’.
The discussion in this episode spans from the reactions women receive from the society for writing bold books to the inclusion of glossaries in translations to spirituality and sensuality in mythology and the aspect of humanizing the characters in it. Priyanka takes us into the world of ‘Bhairavi’ through significant excerpts from the book, both in Hindi and English, while pulling out comparisons between them and explaining the nuances of translation. Tune in now!
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Transcript
Introduction to India Booked Podcast
00:00:11
Speaker
I'm your host Ayushi Mona and you're listening to India Booked, a podcast where we lean into the idea of India through its literature and we speak to authors who bring this to life.
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello, everyone. I am Ayushi Mona. You're listening to India Booked, a podcast where we lean into the idea of India through its literature.
Meet Priyanka Sarkar: Translator and Editor
00:00:39
Speaker
Today, I have with me Priyanka Sarkar, who's a translator and an editor. He's translated Chitra Mudgal's book and Shivani's Bhairvi, which we're discussing today, both of them into English. A translation of short stories from Hindi to English have been published by OUP, South Asian Review and Women Unlimited.
00:00:59
Speaker
She is translated also from English to Hindi and Bangalore to English. She currently works as a publishing consultant.
Shivani's Legacy in Hindi Literature
00:01:08
Speaker
Priyanka, it's amazing to have you on the show. Thank you for agreeing to do this and glad to have you here. Thank you Aayushi for thinking of me and for inviting me to this on your amazing platform and yeah, it's great to talk to book lovers.
00:01:27
Speaker
Yeah, I really hope more and more people read the book. So Priyanka, you know, before we started this, I think we were talking about how it's a coincidence that we're recording this on Shivani's birth anniversary. Yes, absolutely. I mean, it's really quite a coincidence, but I mean, I hope this turns out to be a lucky coincidence.
00:01:50
Speaker
So for the uninitiated, right, a lot of people, you know, don't really, might not know about the works of Shivani. Shivani was born in the year 1920.
00:02:03
Speaker
She passed 17 years ago and she was one of the most popular Hindi magazine story writers of the 20th century and she won the Padma Shri and she was a starring figure in Hindi literature. She also garnered like a lot of following I think in the pre-television eras of 60s and 70s. Yes, yes, absolutely.
00:02:24
Speaker
I mean she was really, she was like a rock star and you know if you go back to any of the discussion, I mean any of the discussions or even if you look at Ira Pandey who's her daughter, youngest daughter's book on her which is Didi
00:02:43
Speaker
You would find that she was so massively popular and so loved and fettered that when her stories came out, the magazines actually made money.
Journey into Translation: Priyanka's Path
00:02:57
Speaker
I mean, they used to tell her to write stories so that they could get some revenue. I mean, imagine that kind of a situation. I mean, I don't see that kind of a popularity right now.
00:03:10
Speaker
where you know one author you actually ask one author to write a story and fiction anyway does not sell at all these days but I mean she will imagine she was so popular that her books made her publishers money
00:03:29
Speaker
and it's very interesting also right because this novel that we're discussing today where we was actually first serialized right it came out in a weekly called Substatic in the Sun yeah and I think that was also that was the time when they used to serialize a lot of these stories so it was I mean yeah even I have read some of not first stories but other
00:03:55
Speaker
So I think it sort of it was the norm till about the 80s, late 80s. And yeah, I mean, there were all these really popular women's magazines that used to carry these short stories or or novella or serialized novels and novellas. So, yeah, that was more the norm. So especially popular stuff.
00:04:24
Speaker
So Priyanka, you of course had translated before you picked up this work. What is it that drew you to this book? Did the book sort of call out to you? Did the publisher call out to you? What was your journey like? How did you actually start working on this piece? How did I get into translations?
00:04:49
Speaker
How did you particularly get into translating this book? Did you want to do it? Did the family want to do it? Did the publisher want to do it?
The Art and Challenge of Translation
00:05:00
Speaker
Really, who called out to who? Okay, so again, this was a huge coincidence because I had gone to meet one friend who shares the workspace at Yoda Press.
00:05:17
Speaker
and yeah and Arpita and I got talking this was probably the second or the third time I was meeting her and she so she and it was just like one of those regular random uh chats okay and she was like oh so Priyanka what are you up to what are you doing and uh what are you so and I and uh Gili Khatu, Chitra Mudkal's book I just finished working on it I know it had just come out
00:05:43
Speaker
So I told her, okay, so you know, I've done this translation for new books and it's just come out. So she, so she asked me what I was working on next. So yeah, I just said, I mean, I hadn't really thought of anything at that point of time. So she said, yeah, nothing right now. She's like, oh, you know, why don't you think of something and then we can see if there's something we can work on together. So I was like, okay, sure. And then
00:06:11
Speaker
I was, you know, it was just like sort of an afterthought. I was almost out of the door when I just turned around and said, hey, what about Shivani? I mean, and Shivani came to my mind because I had read her and her writing had had a huge effect on me. I read her when I was a child. Not a child, actually. I was a teenager. Let's, yeah, let's not be vandalized, but
00:06:37
Speaker
yeah so i just okay so why not shivani i mean i read her and i love her writing and yeah she like i mean her writing had a huge impact on me as a person i mean that's what i feel
00:06:55
Speaker
so yeah she's like yeah sure why not why don't you uh you know write us uh oh yeah then she said okay let me put put you in touch with the family and uh i know ira so i put you in touch with her and then uh we can see how it goes so yeah then we're uh so she put me in touch with ira i she were and ira later took her me that they were
00:07:19
Speaker
very keen on getting an outsider, someone from outside the family to translate because they haven't had the best experiences with some of the samples in the beginning. So she's like, yeah, I just told you. She's like, you know, just please translate 10 pages and send it to us.
00:07:46
Speaker
So yeah, I sent it to her and I translated those pages. My conversation with Arpita was last year in January and I sent the 10 pages in sometime in February.
00:08:02
Speaker
In March, I think it was in March or April when we, one fine day, I get a mail from Ira saying, we love the sample. Yeah, just you can go with the translation and just send the final wasp for approval. And that was that. And I am so glad for it. Thank you. But that one mail was really like, it really sort of brought about the change.
00:08:32
Speaker
I'm glad and the reason you know I said that I'm glad for it is because you know I for one right only read Hindi literature throughout school when it was foisted upon me as I grew older I have read you know the couple of popular translations that you will see lying around which is like a Munshi Prem, Chanda, Abhis, Shamsa, Hani and all of that right
00:08:57
Speaker
But by and large the school's curriculum or what is available today to readers who read in English or postmopolitan readers from Hindi literature is very limited, right?
00:09:13
Speaker
And also because, of course, there's a vast Hindi belt, but I don't know. A lot of publishing focus is on, say, a Munshi Premchand, or somebody like a Simitrananthupan, or somebody who can be glamorized. Somebody like a Sahir Ludhjhandi really endures in the popular imagination or a manto of people who wrote in that era, also in terms of time, due to their interesting personal lives as well.
00:09:42
Speaker
And an author like Shivani, I had no idea that the kind of voice that she has, right?
00:09:49
Speaker
is very distinctive and it really like shakes you up and you know it's not like reading something that's been very curated her voice is very raw very raw it's also i think it it's also raw because it talks about certain realities in a very natural fashion with the i mean there isn't any other her writing is beautiful it's very i mean you have a you've probably you haven't read the
00:10:18
Speaker
the original I mean the Hindi which is I would say a pity if you can read it read the Hindi you should try and please read some of it because her writing is beautiful and so yeah it's not like it's not stylized or in blue but the and it's slightly Sanskritized and everything but you know it's interesting that you're talking about all these authors and big beings
00:10:43
Speaker
So to speak because I mean, you know, I don't know much about the the exact Circumstances and the situations but there was at that point of time in Hindi literature at least There was a huge focus being placed on literary writing on you know, talking about the quote-unquote big issues and
00:11:09
Speaker
so you know you would so they were obviously for and so it was about and it was also about this kind of writing that she was writing it wasn't just I mean of course the even her contemporaries are people who wrote a little after her like Manubhandari and
00:11:29
Speaker
I mean, they were also massively popular, they were well-read, but they weren't given a sort of, you know,
Shivani's Writing Style and Impact
00:11:37
Speaker
they weren't taken very seriously. Let's put it that way. Let me circles because of what they were right of the kind of subjects they were picking up. I find that that's an issue even now in English. I'm more familiar with the English publishing world.
00:11:53
Speaker
So that's the problem even now. If you have the big topics, even in translations, people want to read more about the big subjects, but they wonder what they're going to learn from or understand of a woman who's in love and lives a certain kind of a life. I mean, they don't really understand why they should be reading this.
00:12:24
Speaker
So that issue is still there. This is very interesting to me. I find one of the most interesting trends in the modern publishing world is the disproportionate amount of literature consumed by women compared to men. Women read a lot more books than men do.
00:12:46
Speaker
and that is why women's fiction or romance or women writers you know and a lot of them are looked down upon in this day by the elite community and actually the money earners of the literary world much like Shivani was for these serialized magazines and it's very interesting
00:13:08
Speaker
really little where women find this nook and corner to express themselves or to talk about these realities, right? The mainstream sort of energy or media really is more male-driven or for the male days. And for me, this book, reading this book also, and now that you have told me I am definitely going to put the Hindi version on my Twitter list. Yeah, I mean, even if you can't read the entire thing, I will at least try and read the page.
00:13:39
Speaker
Absolutely. Thanks for this, Priyanka. Because as you speak, I, for one, can really draw a lot of parallels. For instance, in the foreword to this book itself, where Shivani Gaurapan's daughter has written about her mother, it's very interesting because she mentions that, right? She mentions this whole ideology, the whole patrilineal system in which Shivani's Brahmin family lived.
00:14:08
Speaker
And here was this woman writing these novels full of fashion, life, and you know, really bold books. And she does not have a mentor. She's like, she becomes a literary phenomena, quite pretty much from her kitchen, right? Yeah. And yeah, that's the thing. I mean, it's the same situation even now. Can you, I mean, can you sort of
00:14:35
Speaker
think of writing, really receive erotic and your family sort of just owning it up and saying hey we are very proud of her daughter that she's written this.
00:14:44
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, do you think that is a possibility? It's absolutely impossible and it would be impossible irrespective of your social class or community background. It just comes down to the fact that you're a woman. So you writing something like this is... Yeah, it's like, how do you even know these things? I mean, who totally refers so much? I mean, how do you like...
00:15:09
Speaker
Are you just making all of this up? That will be the reaction. So it's the discomfort with the idea that a woman can know these
Maintaining Authenticity in Translation
00:15:21
Speaker
things or they are familiar with things like desire or
00:15:26
Speaker
I mean, like here, you know, she talks about different kinds of desires, right? There is the desire, that there's the desire that Maya Diti feels for the Guru, then there's the kind of odd desire that, I mean, I won't call it desire, but yeah, I mean, it is a slight infatuation that even Charun feels for the Guru.
00:15:53
Speaker
And in my opinion, I feel that even in the first part of the book, Chandan also does feel a smidgen of desire for the Guru, but towards the end, I feel like Shivani just decided to play it safe and turned him into a villain of sorts.
00:16:16
Speaker
And I think because, right, I mean, of course, it's fiction, right? And then you have you have to build a narrative and you have to tell a story. But I think compared to a lot of feminist books, right, this book really holds a special place because how many books that had such
00:16:36
Speaker
feminist themes right from a female author even being written right and even like a character like a Rajesh Firi or a Chandan you know I mean while obviously it draws upon certain protagonists right but it's also making comments on the society right that that treats women differently than men and talks about say their endurance right and on the kind of moral strength and resilience also I don't want to get too much into plot and give spoilers away because
00:17:03
Speaker
You know, that's something I want to steer away from. But maybe, you know, without giving away spoilers, Priyanka, is there a particular scene in the book that you might want to read out or talk about that you particularly enjoyed translating or reading? OK, so this is one of my favorite bits also because of a lot of stuff that's happening around us. A lot of discussions. Once I start reading it, you will realize what exactly I'm talking about.
00:17:33
Speaker
Okay, so here goes. Let's rest for a bit and then leave. Earlier I used to return only in the evenings. One puff and then only sleep. I have come prepared. Don't worry. She took out a small chillum from the knot of her saree and then reaching out behind the idol, took out a small packet and poured its contents into the chillum and started laughing. I take one prasad of shiva here and one at home. The one I take here stows off. The fear of ghosts and spirits on the road and the one at home.
00:18:04
Speaker
of the witch there. Ever since the Shakti mandal here was pulled away by a lion, I have had to run back sooner. Lighting the full chilam with the sacred fire, she rode. Jai shived Guru and touched it to the shiveling and then to her forehead. Then, cupping the chilam with both her hands, she took a long drag and started cupping. The light of the lamp was waning. Charan was acting like she had had an attack of madness.
00:18:28
Speaker
She was dancing, cuffing and singing. Ja bam, ja bam, bam lahari, bam bam bam, bam lahari. Her voice echoed through the temple. What could Chandan do? On the one hand were the roads lost in the smoke of burning fires, the chance of running into ravenous and cunning lions, the walk through long and winding roads, the aggression of the Chandar, the memory of eyes that could look into your very soul.
00:18:54
Speaker
On the other, in a dark strange temple, a companion lost in the intoxication of marijuana. What if two ash-smeared arms increased her? Chandan tried to snatch the chilam away before the lamp went out. What are you doing, Charan? Don't smoke anymore. Let's go home. I'm scared. She choked as she said that. Her outstretched arms ordered nothing and kept handing, hanging in the emptiness.
00:19:20
Speaker
Two burning, intoxicated eyes, carved into the sheer idle on the temple's broken walls, seemed to be shooting arrows at her, pushing her back. Where did that ideal come from?
00:19:31
Speaker
Was this tantric temple making her see things or was the smoke from Charan's magical chilam getting in her nostrils and making her hallucinate? It isn't just marijuana, Charan bellowed with laughter. There's something else in it too. The poison of dog face. Understood? One drag and you're a queen. Plug diamonds of golden trees and eat them. That's the reason, Kupal says. A girl is better than the boy who hasn't smoked wheat. And that's it.
00:20:01
Speaker
Thanks Priyanka. I am so sorry for that awkward pause there because I was just like listening and I was like okay continue. I get it a lot. I don't understand why you chose this excerpt right because
00:20:18
Speaker
I mean in terms of the plot and everything. But tell me something, right? From a translator's point of view, right? How easy or difficult it is to be authentic to the original work? And I know all translators get this Hakahua question all the time, right? But I think that it's just fun to listen to the answer because everyone has a slightly different take depending on their own writing style.
00:20:44
Speaker
yeah and i think every translator also has a different style so there isn't like one or one size fits all kind of thing that you can just say and i would say that it also it doesn't just depend on the translator it sometimes also depends on the book so on the book that you're translating on the writer you're translating because uh you know i've i've translated brain churn i've translated chakra mudgal
00:21:12
Speaker
And, you know, nir prabha bharadwaj and all. So, you know, with Premchand and Chitramudkal, the language was much simpler. It was more of a spoken, simpler language. So, you know, you can just read it. It's easier in some ways because the sentences are shorter and, you know, you can just get to it very quickly. And I mean, you can't translate quickly, but yeah, you get the sense of it, the rhythm of it.
00:21:42
Speaker
a little sooner. Where like with Neer Prabhabharatwaj, I had translated her when I was very young, I was in my early 20s and I mean that's something I really wish I can, I mean I really hope I can go back to it at some point but because the piece I had translated was what you would call very, or it was very
00:22:04
Speaker
you know auditory though it was more oral so i mean i'm not particularly very proud of it but i mean it didn't get i mean that that's the one that got published in south asian review but i mean now after i mean 10 years later i think i would want to uh 10 i mean it's been more than 10 years but yeah i would
Cultural Nuances in Storytelling
00:22:26
Speaker
want to go back to it and there are some changes I would want to make yeah so and this is in spite of it being a translation you will always have this feeling that maybe you know I could have used this word instead of that that feeling will all even with Shivani I mean with Shivani the the challenge was different because so yeah I'll let I'll just read the first paragraph first paragraph of the story and then I'll read the translation and
00:22:56
Speaker
You know, that will be more like a show and not tell thing. So, you know...
00:23:42
Speaker
That's the Hindi original. So you know, I mean, it's not just simple, regular, spoken Hindi,
00:23:50
Speaker
kind of Hindi, right? It's a very stylized kind of writing. So how do you translate something like, So yeah, these were real challenges. Yes, I completely understand. Yeah, so this is how I translated the paragraph. It seemed as if the blue of the sky had ripped through the jungle to touch the earth.
00:24:17
Speaker
Old trees and fig trees stood silent and motionless like her mitt. She had been staring at those trees for a while through the open windows. Have their leaves too forgotten to stir in fear of the juggle? She tried to turn on her side every part of her body ached at the barest movement.
00:24:33
Speaker
a moan escaped her lips on hearing the same faint breath from the day of the accident an old fat woman jumped out from a bed in some dark corner of the room and bent over okay so if you look at the last sentence it says
00:24:58
Speaker
Okay and that has now become on hearing the same faint breath from the day of the accident and old fat woman jumped down from a bed in some dark corner of the room and bent over her.
00:25:10
Speaker
Now here if you look at it, I mean, Sultulay Badan Bali product could have very well been translated into an old fat hag or a jiggly old fat hag or something. So I didn't want to get too graphic. I was like there's no need for that jiggly old bit. So like the Sultulay Badan Bali. So let's just keep because it sort of does give the picture. So we omitted that and then
00:25:39
Speaker
The bit about making it old fact woman and not old hack was also, I mean it also comes a bit later and I mean it's again on the next page you call her a hack and this as you would know is Maya Dili who turns out to not be an old hack but like this really attractive older woman and not really an older woman in the derogatory ageist sense but
00:26:08
Speaker
like a more mature, sexy, mature woman, right? I had the feeling or was it just me? No, no, no. I was just nodding along Priyanka and you know, one of the things, right, that I was wondering, which I think, I mean, I can talk about without giving away spoilers because it doesn't really tell anyone anything. It's this whole role of Agori Sadhus, right?
00:26:32
Speaker
in the book. Also, I think the book has a very beautiful cover and when I saw it at first, right, and I had no idea what this book that I'm sitting to read was going to be all about, right? I had a very typical imagination of, you know, it'd be like one of those mythology things or something like that, or something about religion as its priest in the mainstream. It was actually quite delightful to even
00:27:01
Speaker
here of Agori Sadhus because more and more from the mainstream imagination certain parts of Hinduism or culture or those times when she wrote this kind of fiction has gone away. How do you deal with something like that? Because some things from a translator's perspective like Agori Sadhus has of course the exact kind of how do you handle it as a translator?
00:27:28
Speaker
The second piece is, how do you bring alive something like Agori Sadhu to an audience that even might not understand the concept of it, right? See, as far as audience who might not understand the concept, I would say there's always Google. So to encounter something you don't know, always Google. Google has, like my grandmother would say, Google has everything. My very dead grandmother used to say that. So you can imagine.
00:27:58
Speaker
like yeah so i mean let's not go there but yeah and as for translating what we call the untranslatables because you know things like agori sadhus or ramgas kirtanya or you know these kind of things have cultural nuances and
00:28:14
Speaker
you know sometimes I understand that I'm not a theologian or I'm not an expert on who he argues so it's best when A don't get into that discussion and of explaining things in the because you there's always the possibility of missing out something and then you start when you start translating these things
00:28:37
Speaker
you either end up with a fully annotated text which will seem like an academic tool which totally defeats the purpose of reading something like this because here it's more about the story. I mean she's not here to educate you about Agorizados if you want to learn about them just you know look it up even and most people at that when she was writing these stories of course Google wasn't there but
00:29:01
Speaker
People knew, had some idea of what Agori Sadhus were. They were more familiar with these ideas or concepts. And these were some of the things I had heard from my grandmother about. So I know that these people knew, the general populace knew
00:29:24
Speaker
No, Priyanka, totally fair. And I think a lot of writers are slightly more apologetic about this,
Spirituality and Sensuality in Indian Literature
00:29:32
Speaker
right? They have a tendency to have glossaries where they translate everything, describe everything. And I don't know that. I have done that. For Giriguru, I had done that. I had kept a shortish glossary because that was entirely possible with that one.
00:29:51
Speaker
but because you know i mean terms like uh therapy or and stuff i have done i mean i so but i you know there's also a certain confidence that you gain as you write or as you keep translating and with this one especially because it's so culturally dense it has so many cultural nuances i felt i had started doing it and then i realized the pointless pointlessness of it yeah i
00:30:18
Speaker
I think it was quite refreshing, you know, which is why I asked you that like, and I'm so glad that the first thing you said was that boss is in Google. No, because I mean, I thought about it. I discussed it with my amazing editor and publisher. And yeah, she was like, yeah, do like totally your readers can Google it. So tell them to look it up. If anyone says anything, just tell them to look it up. I'm like, yeah.
00:30:46
Speaker
Yeah, I am so glad, you know, because when I read War and Peace, I googled what a samovar was, right? So you might as well look up what a TV is. Exactly. And yeah, or even people who watch the Marvel, these Marvel movies, I mean, are you telling me everyone knows what, whatever that hammer has got maul near or whatever, you don't even know how to pronounce it, right? And then you're watching a movie, which is, you know, about this guy
00:31:12
Speaker
who's reading it and yeah i mean are we familiar with nordic mythology in its entirety like i have read neil diamond lost mythology and i can tell you that it's very and then when i started reading up on nordic mythology you realize that
00:31:29
Speaker
You know, it's kind of different, even like, and the Marvel, what the Marvel movies sort of what they talk about is also very different from what the real mythology is, but people who sort of follow those threads, right, if you're interested, if you want to look things up, and with the internet, things are even more convenient. So, you know, why should we offer everything on a plate? Leave it for your readers, let them
00:31:58
Speaker
You know, we can choose what they want to look up and check on. Yeah, because not everyone would be interested in knowing every little thing. True. Priyanka, my last question, second last question to you, actually. I just realized that I've been enjoying this conversation. We've overshot time. I couldn't get less.
00:32:21
Speaker
But I actually wanted to ask you that there's also a very specific spiritual element right to the love and attraction and you know Tantra etc that's discussed here. I actually don't want to really talk about it in the context of Bhairvi but I just want to talk about it in the context a lot of Indian myths or Indian stories or even in general right you always have a Meera who has this
00:32:49
Speaker
almost I mean she's blinded by love but there's a spiritual overlay right?
00:32:55
Speaker
There's a certain way that say in classic Greek literature or in classic or like a Homer or anything like that, find love being entangled with spirituality. But for us, this happens very often, especially in the stories of our gods or of our Sadhus and their wives and the kind of devotion and all of that.
00:33:19
Speaker
I know this is a little bit of that from our discussion. Maybe in the context where we, not so much, but maybe in the general context, what is it really about the kind of stories of passion that we have, right? That so often draws this spiritual element. Oh, wow.
00:33:39
Speaker
wow that's a that's a big question okay i think i'm actually super sorry for springing it upon you as you were talking you just came to my head and i thought let me give it a shot in the stars so yeah i mean yeah it's it's a huge it's a big question like i said but
00:33:58
Speaker
Yeah, at a certain level, I think we have, and I don't think it's as much now, but slowly, we are becoming a little more apologetic about the
00:34:14
Speaker
sensuousness and the sensuality about things especially in mythology and things that are considered religious and I find that the whole spirituality has increased and of course I mean if you look at Greek mythology I mean Zeus is like a serial rapist and yeah or actually most of them even I think even Apollo was so
00:34:43
Speaker
Yeah, or even these Nordic gods, they sort of go around sowing their wild lords. And to a certain extent, you can say that was true for Krishna too, but it's of course been, you know, there are all these layers of spirituality and with the Gopis, it's
00:35:05
Speaker
it's increasingly you know the bodily aspect of it the physical aspect of it is being downplayed and yeah and the spiritual aspect is you know you're trying to be apologetic about it but I think it sort of also takes away from the the overall picture because you know Krishna at the end of the day if you look at the trinity of these god of the three gods this one
00:35:31
Speaker
Bhama is the creator, he's the divine creator and he does sort of sleep with his daughter. I mean again I didn't say that. But again Vishnu is the worldly wise guy and Shiva is the Siddha Saha very
00:35:52
Speaker
Simple guy who's and which and you know, which is also he's very varied. He's very sexy in his own way But he is a one-man guy. Whereas Vishnu is like this worldly wise guy. Did you say one-man guy? One woman guy. Did I say a one-man guy? No, that was totally wrong. I'm sorry for that.
00:36:15
Speaker
So yeah, so but Vishnu is this you know, this worldly wise guy who sort of who's for everyone and I think it sort of you know, it's it was done as a packaging thing like here's this guy who's actually You know, he's more of the world. So he's also more of the worldly pleasures and which is why this there was this I mean and that's entirely my reading I could be
00:36:42
Speaker
Terribly terribly wrong and like I said, I am NOT a theologian and not someone who like I've read a lot of mythology
00:36:50
Speaker
but and different kinds of but yeah i think that was the point and we are sort of losing these these ways of looking at these people at these as these figures as characters or as people and you know the possibility of learning from them is going away with the more we try to idealize them because it's better to have
Book Recommendations and Closing Thoughts
00:37:19
Speaker
heroes or people to follow who have flaws because you also learn from those flaws.
00:37:25
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. And Priyanka, you know, thank you for being a sport and taking this very out of syllabus question that just popped into my head on syllabus. Yeah, I am so sorry. Yeah, but thank you so much. The last question, Priyanka, that I want to ask you is what is a book recommendation, right, which is based out of India or written by an Indian author?
00:37:51
Speaker
Hindi you choose that you would like to recommend people to read obviously after they're done reading Bhairavi which I highly recommend to everyone yeah so once you're done reading Bhairavi and if you can read Hindi I would say read every bloody novel by her because you know she will change your world I mean Shivani's writing changed my world and yeah I mean if you read any of her novels
00:38:18
Speaker
Because, I mean, she writes beautifully about everything. I mean, I'll give you an example. I must have been 16 when I read. I don't remember which novel this was. But you know, you're 16, you're kind of hormonal. Yeah. And there was this novel where this woman feels desire for her husband who's mentally unstable. And he's extremely handsome.
00:38:43
Speaker
And the way Shivani had written about this, just that one scene, and the way she described the desire, I mean, it really got me going. So yeah, what I'm trying to say here, and not doing great job of, is that her writing will find a lot of resonance in her writing.
00:39:10
Speaker
Anything by her by and once you're done reading Shivani if you haven't read Tagore, please read Tagore Tagore was her guru and So and she was educated in shanti. I think she was she was a star pupil. So I mean and Her style is in some ways the whole open-ended ending thing. It's very Tagore if you look at it, right and yeah, the possibilities and then sometimes it's
00:39:38
Speaker
you know you have these really strong women and but it's also it also shows the possibilities that are open to such women and sometimes you feel bad for them because you feel like they've been shortchanged but that's also the reality of those times and that is a similarity I find between both of them then again you know from it she's not exactly Indian but Moni Mohsen's butterfly books
00:40:07
Speaker
I think that's like the best example of satire. So, don't worry with that. Perumal Murugan's Purnachi again, he shows you how you can write about non-humans or speak in the voice. Then if you're reading Shivani, if you get interested in her, then do read Ira Pandey's Diddi, which is about Shivani. So, yeah.
00:40:34
Speaker
Yeah, I think those are the ones I can think of. Awesome. Thank you Priyanka. For those of you who will, despite listening to Priyanka and me not look it up yourself, let me list out some of Shivani's work. There's something called Chwada Fere, there is Krishna Kali, there is Atiti.
00:40:54
Speaker
There is Kalindi, there is Maya Puri, there is Rati Willap, there's of course Bhairvi. And there are a bunch of other books that are available on Goodreads. They've been rated by hundreds of people. They've been loved over decades by people in the Hindi speaking belt. And, you know, do read up and, you know, tell us your experience maybe of reading her books on India Book at the rate the podium dot in.
00:41:24
Speaker
I would also suggest that you pick a copy of Bhairvi. It's available on Amazon, Flipkart online. It's available at bookstores near you. So do grab the book and do share some love for these icons of Hindi literature who we don't often speak about or think about as much anymore.
00:41:51
Speaker
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