Next: About my Race: A Song by Poykayil Appachan : Essay Questions
REF: Multiple Modernities, edited by Board of Editors, Kannur University, Cohin: Hornbill Publishing House, 2019. Print.
1. Critically comment on the different attitudes towards Art that the conversation between Kelu and the Poet reveals.
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2. The “mirror scene” in the play brings together reality, representations, visions, and constructed images. Explain.
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3. Attempt a critical analysis of the play Kelu.
The play Kelu dramatises the life of Vidwan P Kelu Nair, a nationalist leader who also became popular as a dramatist in Malabar under the British Raj in the early twentieth century. The play Kelu deals with many nuances of the art of writing. The centre of the play is the dilemma faced by a writer who faces a writer’s block. The play brings together the present and past generations of writers in one frame. Through the interaction with the past generation of writers, Balakrishnan overcomes the limitations that clutch the process of his writing. The beginning of the play is a meeting where the assignment of writing the play is given to Balakrishnan.
K Madhavan, the chairman of the Vidwan P Kelu Nair Memorial Trust suggests that they should celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of independence appropriately. He was speaking in the meeting of the Executive Committee of the Trust. When one of the members suggested that they could enact one of the plays written by Vidwan P Kelu Nair, K Madhavan responded that more significant than his plays is the playwright himself. It is Kelu master that the new generation must know about. K Madhavan acknowledges that the present generation does not know the depth or breadth of the life of Vidwan P Kelu Nair. Balakrishnan Nambiar is chosen to write a play on Kelu Nair. Balakrishnan Nair had written a biography on Kelu previously. It is this experience that prompted the members of the committee to select Balakrishnan Nair to write a play on Kelu.
As the process of writing unravelled, Balakrishnan confronts his incapabilities to complete the play. He hallucinates seeing the figure of Kelu and converses with him on the difficulties of the writing process. He acknowledges that he knows very little about Kelu. In light of this, Balakrishnan finds himself incapable of completing the play. Kelu suggests that Balakrishnan can use the contradiction between the person and the act as the mould for his play. When Balakrishnan inquired why Kelu killed himself, Kelu didn’t give any answer and left the stage. Soon, Balakrishnan visualises the presence of the great poet P Kunhiraman Nair and speaks with him. Kunhiraman Nair consoles Balakrishnan by telling him that a play is not meant to shrink life into a grasp. It is important to acknowledge the difficulty in such an attempt.
Then the scene shifts and Kelu and Kunhiraman Nair appear. At first, Kelu is unable to recognize Kunhiraman Nair. Once he recognizes him, a feeling of astonishment washes over him. We observe them converse about their place in the play being written by Balakrishnan. They discuss a question of great import: who is an artist? Kelu remarks that life is a deluge. Every individual should possess a mirror of one’s own to have perspective.
Then both take hand mirrors. Each of them calls out the epithets given to them by society while looking into the mirror. Gradually, their vision shifts to specific instances of their life, giving them the perspective that the epithets given to them by the society do not completely represent who they truly are. Kunhiraman Nair, the great poet, concludes that as artists, they do not require mirrors. In other words, the poet acknowledges the importance of shedding all the labels imposed on them by society. From this conversation, the play moves onto a scene from the life of Kelu and Meenakshi.
Meenakshi fears that if the relatives in Neeleswaram and Chanderi come to know about the play, they will turn against Kelu. Kelu’s ideas were revolutionary. They are about the removal of untouchability from society. She also worries that if her father finds out that one of the characters, a stubborn patriarch, in the play is modelled on him, he shall be furious. She reminds him of Lakshmikutty’s wedding, where, according to Meekakshi, Kelu staged a khaddar drama. Revolutionary ideas that contradict the traditional dogmas prevalent in the society appear daunting to Meenakshi.
Kelu Nair becomes emotionally disturbed at Meenakshi’s reminder of how the tentacles of the society would be quick to interfere in the life of the playwright if he goes on to endorse revolutionary ideas. Kelu’s attempt to inculcate opposition against the caste system and untouchability in the society is viewed as a threat by the members of dominant communities. Realising this, at the end of the play on his own, Kelu looks up at the statue of Pakkanar. Kelu feels that the statue’s eyes are gazing at his defeated self. He threatens the statue of Pakkanar that he shall smear its eyes with kohl. In his emotional surge, Kelu smears the eyes of the statue with kohl. However, he is quick to apologise for his action as well. In his delirium, Kelu sees Pakkanar as a representative of the traditionalists who denounce the plays of Kelu.
1. What are K Madhavan’s reasons for suggesting that a play on Vidwan P Kelu Nair be written and enacted?
According to K Madhavan, Vidwan P Kelu Nair Memorial Trust should celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of independence appropriately. He was speaking in the meeting of the Executive Committee of the Trust. When one of the members suggested that they could enact one of the plays written by Vidwan P Kelu Nair, K Madhavan responded that more significant than his plays is the playwright himself. It is Kelu master that the new generation must know about. K Madhavan acknowledges that the present generation does not know the depth or breadth of the life of Vidwan P Kelu Nair. One of the members pointed out that the biography of Vidwan P Kelu Nair is published, so they can use it to learn about his life. However, Madhavan is of the view that a biography cannot capture fully the many sides of a person’s life. That is when he suggests that a play on Vidwan P Kelu Nair should be written and enacted.
2. What suggestion does Kelu offer Balakrishnan Nambiar for composing the play?
Balakrishnan Nambiar is given the responsibility to write a play on Vidwan P Kelu Nair. Balakrishnan Nambiar is stuck with a writer’s block while attempting to write the play. He sits down on his table to write. However, he is unable to bring to life the character of Kelu in words. When he is engrossed at his desk, Kelu comes to him as a figment of his imagination. Kelu tells him that he too had gone through the same conflicts as a writer. He also tells Balakrishnan that it would be best if he could let contradictions between the person and the act become the mould of the play. This is the suggestion given by Kelu.
3. What reasons does Balakrishnan Nambiar give P Kunhiraman Nair regarding his inability to write a play on Vidwan P Kelu Nair?
P Kunhiraman Nair asks Balakrishnan why he was having such difficulty in completing the play about Kelu when Balakrishnan himself wrote Kelu Nair’s autobiography. Balakrishnan responds that it is the knowledge about the life of Kelu that blocks his path in the process of writing. He states that the play demands a Kelu Nair beyond the Kelu Nair he learned about. Balakrishnan acknowledges that the real life of Kelu must certainly exist beyond the life he recorded in the biography. Limiting the life of a real human being within the pages of a play seems difficult to Balakrishnan.
4. What are Meenakshi’s fears about the repercussions about Kelu’s play?
Meenakshi fears that if the relatives in Neeleswaram and Chanderi come to know about the play, they will turn against Kelu. Kelu’s ideas were revolutionary. They are about the removal of untouchability from society. She also worries that if her father finds out that one of the characters, a stubborn patriarch, in the play is modelled on him, he shall be furious. She reminds him of Lakshmikutty’s wedding, where, according to Meekakshi, Kelu staged a khaddar drama. Revolutionary ideas that contradict the traditional dogmas prevalent in the society appear daunting to Meenakshi.
5. What is Kelu’s attitude towards Pakkanar?
Kelu Nair becomes emotionally disturbed at Meenakshi’s reminder of how the tentacles of the society would be quick to interfere in the life of the playwright if he goes on to endorse revolutionary ideas. Kelu’s attempt to inculcate opposition against the caste system and untouchability in the society is viewed as a threat by the members of dominant communities. Realising this, at the end of the play on his own, Kelu looks up at the statue of Pakkanar. Kelu feels that the statue’s eyes are gazing at his defeated self. He threatens the statue of Pakkanar that he shall smear its eyes with kohl. In his emotional surge, Kelu smears the eyes of the statue with kohl. However, he is quick to apologise for his action as well. In his delirium, Kelu sees Pakkanar as a representative of the traditionalists who denounce the plays of Kelu.
6. Comment on the theme of “writing” in the play.
The theme of writing appears as a major element in the play. The members of the committee selected Balakrishnan Nair to write a play on Kelu. As the process of writing unravelled, Balakrishnan confronts his incapabilities to complete the play. He hallucinates seeing the figure of Kelu and converses with him on the difficulties of the writing process. Balakrishnan acknowledges that he knows very little about Kelu. Balakrishnan is unable to complete the play. Soon, he visualises the presence of the great poet P Kunhiraman Nair and speaks with him. Kunhiraman Nair consoles Balakrishnan by telling him that a play is not meant to shrink life into a grasp. It is important to acknowledge the difficulty in such an attempt. Kelu and Kunhiraman Nair are then having a conversation about their place in the play being written by Balakrishnan. This is an instance of metatheatre or metadrama that brings into notice the very nature of the play. Through the dialogues or the interference of a character, the play draws attention towards the play. They hold a mirror at each other. The poet acknowledges that what they see in the mirror are not their real selves. As artists, they do not need mirrors. From this conversation, the play moves onto a scene from the life of Kelu and Meenakshi. Kelu is also writing a play and is unable to complete it, similar to Balakrishanan at the beginning of the play. Writing as a process challenges writers of different generations such as Kelu, Kunhiraman Nair, and Balakrishnan.
Eri is a novel written by Pradeepan Pampirikkunnu and published posthumously in 2017. Eri, the character represents the historically downtrodden people in the Parayan community in Kerala. Pradeepan Pampirikkunnu uses the medium of the novel to establish the prehistory of the Parayan Caste. The narrator of the story is a research scholar, who uses memories, memoirs, oral histories, ritualistic performances, gossips, books, and other oral/literary sources. The novel attempts to historicize the making of a Paraya community in its transit to modernity and retells the renaissance of Kerala from a Paraya male perspective.
Recovery of the history of Eri is important to the narrator because he was impressed as a subaltern linguist by the legend of Eri. However, from the accounts given to him by his father, he is convinced that an unbiased account of the community to which Eri belonged is unavailable. For example, the narrator’s father pictures Eri to be clean in his appearance. The father tells his son that Eri wears a white dress, indicating purity and cleanliness, which is a symbol of upper caste sensibility. According to his father, a rudraksha chain was around his neck. The house in which he lived was a hut, clean and mud-plastered. It was situated on the slope of the Kannambath temple. All such data are coloured by elements of mainstream standardization.
Eri has an inter-caste identity. He is born to a Parayan father and a Malayan mother. Eri lived during the time of the narrator’s father’s father. The text starts with a story narrated by his father about Chaliyan Raman’s confrontation with Eri. From this story, we learn that Eri is a mysterious figure. It is also evident that Eri does not care about the barrier of caste to help others. This view is contradictory to what happens with Antharjanam who seeks Eri’s help to run away from the clutches of her community.
Eri was an educated man. He was educated in the Sanskrit language. In Kurumbranad, a parallel system of education existed several years ago. In those days, some schools taught writing in the sand. There were Ezhuthassanmaar who travelled from one place to another and taught writing. They stayed in a place and taught Amaram (Amarakosham), Kavyam (Manipravalakavyangal), Enjuvadi, etc. to the children there. For the people of the Malaya caste, Mahabharatham was more important. The tales of Mahabharatham may be seen incorporated in their various traditional Prakkal, Theerkkal rituals like Ennamanthram, Tholuzhiya, etc. such a parallel tradition of education existed in Kurumbranad.
Another instance where the character of Eri is established is in the third section of the text. Contrary to what is expected from the myth of pulappedi, Eri appears to be a helpless human being. Eri stands outside of Antharjanam's house after being invited by her to help her escape the clutches of her existence. She is only twenty and her husband, who was sixty, had just passed away. She implores Eri to help her in God’s name. He rejects her by telling her that he lives his life with a sense of justice and God has no role in it. It can be seen that Eri does not accept the notion of an upper-caste god. He states that it is impossible to live together without love.
Eri explains that the anguish suffered by the Parayan community is the reality of his abode. He asks her forgiveness before leaving her there. This response from Eri is in stark contrast with the propaganda spread by the upper caste about the people of the downtrodden communities.
The exploration of the narrator, therefore, does not take established methods of research. He does not use the traditional research methodology to unearth the realities of caste in Kerala. The author attempts to establish the prehistory that defies the standardized notions of objective value. The subjective reality of self-implicating research is evident in the work.
1. Why is the recovery of the history of Eri important to the narrator?
Eri, the character represents the historically downtrodden people in the Parayan community in Kerala. However, the history of Eri is unwritten. Pradeepan Pampirikkunnu uses the medium of the novel to establish the prehistory of the Parayan Caste. The recovery of the history of Eri is important to the narrator because he was impressed as a subaltern linguist by the legend of Eri. The narrator had heard stories of Eri from his father. Eri lived during the time of his father’s father. The narrator’s father had also seen Eri. According to the narrator’s father, Eri appeared clean and was always dressed in white. A rudraksha chain was around his neck. The house in which he lived was a hut, clean and mud-plastered. It was situated on the slope of the Kannambath temple. The narrator is confronted by some conflicting questions such as why his father would describe Eri wearing a white dress. The narrator concludes that Eri was a wise man and decided to investigate the history of North Kerala as a researcher of the evolution of language.
2. Does the text try to address the problems of Namboothiri women? How?
In the third section of the text, the character of Antharjanam appears. Invited by Antarjanam, Eri stands outside her house. Eri is confused as to why he is being invited to meet her outside the house. That was unusual. Antharjanam comes out of the house and speaks to Eri. She requests Eri to use magic to lure her out of her husband’s house. Her husband, who was sixty, passed away. She is only twenty years old and wants to experience more from life. However, as per the tradition of the Brahmin community, she would be forced to live inside the house without any contact with the world outside for the rest of her life. Such a context foregrounds the plight of the Brahmin women during the early twentieth century and earlier times in Kerala. The text imaginatively captures the scene and helps to spur a discussion on the discrimination of women in upper caste communities.
3. How does Eri question the practice of Pulapedi?
Pradeepan Pampirikkunnu uses the medium of the novel to establish the prehistory of the Parayan Caste. Pula/Parapedi is a ritual in which men of Pulaya, Paraya, and Mannan castes, the so-called ‘slave castes’, would roam around to defile upper-caste women who strayed alone outside their houses. In the third section of the text, we witness a scene that deconstructs the image of the Parayan propagated through rituals such as Pulapedi. Invited by Antarjanam, Eri stands outside of Antharjanam's house. Antharjanam comes out to meet Eri. Eri moves back from her in the fear of defiling her caste with his nearness. She tells him her story. She requests Eri to use magic to lure her out of her husband’s house. Her husband, who was sixty, passed away. She is only twenty-years old and wants to experience more from life. However, as per the tradition of the Brahmin community, she would be forced to live inside the house without any contact with the world outside for the rest of her life. Antharjanam implores Eri to help her in God’s name. However, Eri states that he lives his life with a sense of justice and God has no role in it. It can be seen that Eri does not accept the notion of an upper-caste god. He states that it is impossible to live together without love. The anguish suffered by the Parayan community is the reality of his home. He asks her forgiveness before leaving her there. This response from Eri is in stark contrast with the propaganda spread by the upper caste about the people of the downtrodden communities. Thus, the novel Eri questions the practice of Pulapedi.
4. What does the story mentioned in the beginning of the text tell about the character of Eri?
Eri, the character represents the historically downtrodden people in the Parayan community in Kerala. The story mentioned at the beginning of the text is about Chaliyan Raman confronting Eri. Chaliyan Raman was returning home after giving clothes in Kannur. It was night and he walked in the light of a choottu in his hand. When he reached Ancham Peedika, he saw someone sitting in the verandah of a tea stall, chewing betel. The person he encountered was robust in his build, short in stature, and resembled Buddha in his posture. Chaliyan Raman requested for a choottu as the one in his hand had already burned out. The stranger inquired where Chaliyan Raman wanted to go. When Raman told him that he wanted to go to Panniyur the stranger replied that there is no choottu. Instead, the stranger offered him the ability to find him a way to reach home. The stranger inquired if Raman had any issues coming nearer to the stranger. There was no way to know the caste of the person as it’s dark and Raman could not see the face of the stranger. The stranger applied a potion to Raman’s eyes and he was able to see in the dark. He walked a short distance and turned to look at the stranger. To his surprise, Chaliyan Raman could not see anyone there. When he reached home and saw the light of his house, his ability to see in the dark was lost. The next day, Raman learned that the stranger he met at Ancham Peedika was Parayan Eri. From this story, we learn that Eri is a mysterious figure. It is also evident that Eri does not care about the barrier of caste to help others.
5. Describe the parallel tradition of education that existed in Kurumbranad.
In Kurumbranad, a parallel system of education existed several years ago. In those days, some schools taught writing in the sand. There were Ezhuthassanmaar who travelled from one place to another and taught writing. They stayed in a place and taught Amaram (Amarakosham), Kavyam (Manipravalakavyangal), Enjuvadi, etc. to the children there. For the people of the Malaya caste, Mahabharatham was more important. The tales of Mahabharatham may be seen incorporated in their various traditional Prakkal, Theerkkal rituals like Ennamanthram, Tholuzhiya, etc. such a parallel tradition of education existed in Kurumbranad.