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Interview
What do you mean by decolonising the mind? Today in India, there is decolonisation of a different kind. The middle class is obsessed with the West, especially America. The youth is ignoring their own language, their own literature. They have developed a taste for all things western. Kannada or Tamil is taught in the school but at homes, only English is spoken. Why? May be because Green Card comes only with English. I am not against English or the West but we cannot ignore our own language. What we need to do today is to deglamourise English. Let it be the language that kids pick up from the street. Give them kuccha English. I am for equality at all levels, more so in language. Why should any language be an elite preserve?
Can we reject the West? I don’t think we can reject the West, all we can do is negotiate with it. We should imbibe knowledge from the West but should not develop a taste for it. See, Max Mueller, for instance. He translated Sanskrit but never developed a swad for it. We will have to look into the way literature or language is used. I hate the word ethnic. The stronger state is universal, the weaker is ethnic. My novel Samskara is being taught in American universities but I do not consider that a great honour. I know it is being used more for anthropological reading than an aesthetic one. I told someone in the US that if you read Samskara to see how caste system works in India, I will read Saul Bellow to find about the marital problems of Americans. (laughs).
What do you think about Indian writing in English and the hype surrounding it? Many regional writers feel that these writers are catering to the West and indulging in export-oriented writing. Well I think it true to some extent but even this kind of hybridism can help. Walter Benjamin once said that if you can translate some of the rhythms of your language into English, the reader could be given an authentic picture of that country. Some Indian writers have been able to do that.
Who? Raja Rao in Kanthapura? Yes and some others too like Arundhati Roy. I think there is a significant Malayali feel in her sentences. Rushdie, for instance, is able to bring the Bombay ambience in his novels. It would help if more writers could make a concerned attempt at "provincialising English".
What do you think about the hype over English writing? There is a huge industry surrounding it today. See, there are two things. One is that English is the language of the powerful, not just at the national but also at the world level. So, if you are writing in English, it naturally gives you a place in that charmed circle of people. Secondly, it is a language that has a great ability to travel unlike other languages like Kannada or Telugu. The greatest literature might be written in Manipuri or even Punjabi but there is no mobility for them. English has that ability to move from one place to another.
You were chairman of the Sahitya Akademi and were instrumental in encouraging translation of works of regional writers into English. Several times you have talked about the lack of good translations. I feel that better the writer is, the more difficult it is to translate their work. Translations can be problematic. The translator is always in a dilemma, if he is true to the surface, he may not be able to reach the depth; he may not be able to convey the meaning which the author intends. And, if he tries to work hard to bring out the meaning, he may lose in the translation of the work. But, you have to look beyond language; I mean we could read translated texts to understand certain situations, political or social or you could say certain ideas that may not be in our own language.
Is there a readership for translated texts? Well, I think there is as long as the translator can actually work hard to transpose the subtle nuances of the language into English. In fact, people who are well versed with both languages can do it effectively.
In Samskara, there is a conflict between tradition and modernity. In another novel Bhartiputra, the hero tries to remove the hold of myths over people but in the end he fails. In my earlier novels I was
consciously supporting the idea of modernity, you know that insistence
on rational- logical model of thinking. Now there is a change in my
thinking and it certainly reflects in the way religious symbols are used
in my novels. The modernity that you were talking about, I see more as a
hunger for social justice and for religious tolerance.
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In both his fiction and
essays, U.R. Ananthamurthy, the eminent Kannada writer, tries to
demolish the hegemonic power structures that canons impose on us.
Persuasive in his arguments, the Jnanpith Award winner advocates a need
to decolonise the mind and purge ourselves of western influences. In an
interview with Gagandeep Singh, the writer speaks about the
elitist exclusivity of English language, the acculturation of youth in
western mores, the ideological barrenness of the middle class and his
own role in society.