A Loss Of Identity
Mowni
- Translated by Albert Franklin - From "Tamil Short Stories", Selected and Edited by Ka.Naa. Subramanyam, Authors Guild of India Cooperative Society, First Edition (1978). - Contributed by Sundara Pandian
He awoke suddenly, wide awake in the night, cleanly awake, as
if something had startled him. Trailing across the edges of his
consciousness like tatters of dream were junctures and
disjunctures, meetings and partings of his entire life. Outside
in the breathless dark, the sibilant cry of some nightbird
faded, answered by, or answering, the sharp scolding of the owls.
The steps of a man, perhaps two, passing along the street in that
unseasonable hour before dawn seemed to fade without disturbing
the surface of the silence. Beggars huddled in sleep on the walk
below. Far into the night, till sleep had come, they had
gossiped, now and then shouting uproariously, coughing, coughing
their way toward beggar death. Now they would sleep until
daylight.
Why hadn't his life with her ended with the same sweetness
it had had at the beginning? What had made events follow a course
which confirmed the passing suspicion that had fallen between
them? The world indeed blamed her, but was she really to be
blamed for moving about in the world, showing her sweet beauty,
delighting all who might see her wherever she went? He wasn't
sure.
The blackness of the night in his room was overpowering. He
opened the window, pushed aside the shutter, and looked out. The
immense expanse of the universe seemed to extend before him.
Townlights merged with stars, as if the stars had come down from
the sky to parade in long lines in the streets.
He wanted to retrace in his mind just what had happened at
the evening before, to get a clear idea of how it all had gone.
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To do this, he would have to gather the long shadows cast by
things to come and piece them together with memories of things
long past and forgotten.
* * * * * * *
It had all started evening before last when he had run into
him at the corner of the side street. That had been unexpected.
"Hello there! What a surprise to find you here! I never
dreamed..." There must have been some meaning behind these
excessive reactions. You could tell by his face, his manner, that
he was living on the top of the world. Could it be that *she* was
living with him now? He had asked for his address, noted it down,
promising to call on him the following afternoon at half past
four. Then he had hurried away. The dull yellow of the lowering
sun had glowed for a moment in the street and quickly faded.
His upstairs room was larger than he needed for himself
alone. From up there, through windows looking in all directions,
he could see off into the sky as well as look down to see what
was going on in the village. But he had to stumble and grope up a
long steep staircase to get to his room. The anticipated
difficulty of getting back up usually quenched his impulse to get
out on the street and wander around the village. Holding the
shutter, he gazed out into the distance. He could see the first
gray of the dawn.
The evening before, from four o' clock on, in his excitement
over the expected visit, he had begun to worry that the hour
would come and the visitor not arrive. The effect of this had
been to cause him to cease to focus on the exact time the visitor
had promised to come, as if to console himself with the thought
that it was not yet really late. And, then it often happens that,
when one was waiting for someone, the identity of the person one
is waiting for slips from one's mind.
Couples with their children had been pouring in a flood down
the street toward the seashore. What a fuss they made, and how
they decked themselves out to wash away the humdrum of their
lives with a few minutes in the sea breeze! The sky too, as if
preparing for a celebration in the heavens, held a special
clarity, poised for sunset and the sharp plunge into darkness.
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The street lights,not yet lit, ranged along the street in regular
files to a distant vanishing point.
The time had come. The silence in the room had become a
torture. It had been impossible to stay there quietly and wait.
He had made his way down into the street. He had moved along
staring intently at each passer-by so that his visitor would not
pass without his seeing him. He had sidled up to a man wearing a
wrist-match and asked, "Sir! the correct time, please?" The man
had given him a side-long glance, looked at his watch, and
mumbled something to the effect that he was always forgetting
to wind his watch and it had stopped. Then the man had said,
"It must be about four-thirty. In any case, it's not after five",
and had gone away.
He had considered going back to his room. Perhaps his vistor
would already be there waiting for him, perhaps even sitting in
his armchair, ready to chide him for having made him wait so long
when he had arrived exactly on time. Walking along, pondering
over how he would answer that the idea of returning his room had
slipped from his mind. The thought came to him that, on coming
out, he had only closed his door, not locked it. He had gone on
walking down the road.
He had come to a house within a garden wall. Walking past, he
had found himself watching a beautiful young woman on the veranda
languidly turning tha pages of a book. Her reading and the play
of her imagination were reflected in her features. It had
occurred to him to walk straight up to her that he had come
exactly six o' clock as agreed, and that if she was bored, he was
not to blame. But a doubt flashed in his mind whether he could
become "him" to her, and he had walked on. It seemed absurd that
life should ensnare one in such hazards through unexpected
occurrences. Cars whizzed past, along the street and across the
crossings, sometimes even grazing him. The street lights had not
yet been lit.
Then the milk woman had come up to him in the street and he
had stopped short. She had smiled at him and spoken "Why Sir!
what on earth are you doing out so early in the evening! You even
forgot I was coming to your room!" At first he had considered
taking her back to the room with him. But what if his visitor is
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there waiting for him? What if he should see them together? He
had dropped that idea and considered whether to tell her to go
there herself and leave some milk. Then he had said, "I don't
need anything today. You don't have to go to the room", and had
walked off, basking in the sun of her smile, "Poor thing, how she
loves me!"
* * * * * * * *
Aimless wandering, earnestly pursued, finds its own goal
somewhere beyond the limits of intention. The railway station was
there before him, glittering with a thousand lights. He stood
awhile looking at it. Then somehow he was caught in its pull and
became an atom in its bustling crowd.
Railway stations usually give an impression of isolation and
helplessness. Both in their empty moments and their crowded
ones, they are essentially sheds for people coming or going on
the railway. But a great railway terminus is the point of origin
and the point of return for travellers. From here, trains move
out in all directions and return here again. People set out from
this place to everywhere; people come to this place from every-
where to take up new lives, new relationships. In such a place as
this many people become detached from their essential natures,
their souls, and here also those natures become lodged in other
beings. A beginning-ending place, a place of crowds, noise, and
straining, itself unshaken, a lofty, enigmatic shrine. At that
moment there was a great surge in the crowd, an enormous
confusion in which some arriving passengers became thoroughly
mingled with a crowd waiting to leave. Noise seemed to come from
everywhere. One seemed to be part of the noise. Forms seen and
unseen, sound heard and unheard, all these rolled together into
one great confusion, one great undifferentiated mass of noise,
which rose and rose and broke as a wave breaks on the beach. Then
each shap, each sound, each word or name seemed to have lost its
harmony, slipped from its place, so that the senses could not
grasp the message the mind seemed to be trying to convey.
One of the trains about to depart seemed to be waiting,
delaying unintentionally, purposely flaunting the temptation to
travel. Its intended occupants swarmed and whirled about it,
peering into it here and there, looking for a place. Some were
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already packed sardine-like inside the train, some were clinging
to the steps and windows, others had even climbed onto the roof.
Those who could not find a hold were giving vent to their
frustration by shinnying up the posts, onto the platform
shelter, even onto the roof of the station, like a frolic of
blind monkeys. The engine stood belching smoke in a monstrous
plume, snarling and gasping its exasperation at not being allowed
to move now that it was ready. The cars strung out behind it were
a massive braid of human beings.
Departure was announced and the police moved into impose
order. They dragged those they could reach off the train, beat
them, and drove them away. Some of these circled back to get a
new hold everywhere else. Jolting first back, then forward, the
train lurched to a start, shaking off several passengers. Those
who failed to get a new hold, ran alongside until they dropped
from exhaustion. In all this confusion, somehow or other, he had
got on the train. He was crouched in a luggage rack. He pulled
his knees up, rested his head on them and went to sleep. Whenever
the train stopped or slowed down anywhere at all, passengers who
had gotten on the train apparently for no particular reason,
suddenly found some new reason to get off, and disappeared into
the darkness. Now that he had more room in the luggage rack, he
strectehd out his legs and fell into a deep sleep. He opened his
eyes and raised his body up. Shreds of dream fluttered in his
consciousness; he had the feeling that he himself was a dream-
image.
A mischievous smile on a sleepy face was looking up at him
from below as if waiting to speak to him. Smiling-face said,
"That conductor came through while we were sleeping. He thought
we looked like people who would not be travelling without
tickets, so he didn't disturb us. He won't come back.. "
He patted his shirt pocket. No ticket there! He couldn't
remember either buying or not buying one, or even starting out on
this voyage. He suspected that if he had bought one, smiling-
face had picked his pocket in his sleep. The conductor might
come. He'd better get away from there. He dug his fingers into
his scalp as if he drag himself off by his hair.
The train was crawling past a small flag-stop platform
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apparently uncertain whether it had been flagged or not. The
carriage he was on came almost to a stop in an open field. He
prepared himself, calculated its speed, and swung down neatly and
expertly before it stopped. He had no luggage to hinder him.
As the train stopped and moved on, he looked sharply about and
sensed, rather than saw that there was no one else there but him.
But in that black void, the darkness itself seemed to glow and
to illuminate objects and forms. Then this strange brightness
would merge again with the dark. He heard a sound like the
searing outcry of a soul parted from its body but still torn by
its involvement, its bondage to earth and the flesh.
This dark, this death, this clarity, all gave the impression
of being what they were not, as if slipping from their true
natures. The severed head of a rooster, unable to find its own
body, seemed to attach itself to whatever was near and unnatural-
ly herald the dawn. A datepalm, a coconut tree, a goat, a cow, a
man: in that eerie half-light might not any of them serve as
cock's body, a crow cock's crow? Even if one were aware of the
cause of this slipping from role to role, how could one avoid it?
Perhaps in perceiving the world itself as just such a slip, just
such a mistake, one could.
* * * * * * * *
A little before full daylight the milk woman knocked and
shouted at his door, but he didn't get up. He lay as if immersed
in the world of his dream, as if bemused with the thought that it
might be an extension of someone else's dream. The milk woman
called so loud he certainly should have heard, but he did not. It
would be a mistake to wait for him any longer, the milk woman
thought, and went on her way.* * * * * * * *
Literary Profile: Mowni M. Sundaramoorthy S. Mani (1907- 1985), who wrote under the pen name 'Mowni', is one of the rare writers of 20th century Tamil fiction with his unique contributions of short stories. He was born at Semmangudi village in Thanjavur district, home of few other noted artists, including the famous carnatic vocalist, Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer. He had his high school education in Kumbakonam and lived there for fourteen years, since his marriage. He then moved to Chidhambaram permenantly to look after his family properties. Mowni had a Bachelor's degree in Mathematics, but he did not take up any job. He was very fond of classical music, had very strong exposure to western literature, and showed deep interest in Indi- an philosophy. His creative power was enriched by his analytical ability obtained through science education, his artistic mind due his love for music, foresight as a result of his deep knowledge in philosophy and literary awareness from his exposure to western fiction. He started writing (in mid 30s) around the same period as Pudumaipithan and Ku.Pa.Rajagopalan. His earlier stories appeared in `maNikkodi', widely recognised as avant-grade of Modern Tamil fiction. The `maNikkodi trio', Pudumaipithan, Ku.Pa.Ra. and Mowni are considered to be the leaders of the movement that shaped the art of short story in Tamil. They represented three entirely different trends of short story writing and left a legacy of rich writings. However, unlike the other two, who inspired scores of writers to continue their trends, Mowni stands alone, without any predecessor or successor, that is considered both as his success and failure. This is one of the few reasons that brought him extreme criticisms: some recognize him as a great writer and some others do not. 1 It is often said that his becoming a writer was accidental. He himself insisted that he never had any intention of writing, though he was very much interested in literature and involved in literary discussions with his friends. It was B.S.Ramaiah who suggested at their first meeting in 1933, during an informal chat in a group of friends that Mowni could make a good writer if he had tried. This suggestion steeped in his mind for more than a year and wrote five short stories and a long story at a stretch in late 1935 out of curiosity. He was not keen about publishing, but gave them to a friend to comment. To his astonishment, his friend praised them of very high standard and were new to Tamil. He handed them over to B.S.Ramaiah who was the editor of `maNikkodi' at that time. The first one `En?' appeared in February '36 issue with the pseudonyme Mowni, who was originally S.Mani. Mowni's stories are based on the uncertainity of human life, human relations and their manifestations like love, disappoint- ment, failure, death etc. The theme for most of his stories is the love between man and woman (to be precise, boy and girl). Though most of his stories appear to be built on the manifest- ations of romantic experiences, they pervade through many dimen- sions of human life. They are not stereotype love stories nor do they move towards the marriage of the people involved, family etc., which is commonly the case with the romantic stories. (Only one of his stories, `kudumbaththEr' is based on family life). The relationships are beyond physical attraction and sexual appeal, and there is hardly any physical description of the characters in his stories. They hide behind the abstract images characterized by the feelings and thoughts of their inner minds that are beyond the common experiences manifested by the materialistic life. He successfully portrays the characters through their feelings and thoughts and introduces them in the dark or twilight by which he could avoid the narrations of their physical features. Most of his stories are set in dawn or dusk. His characters wander in a world that is in between real and dream worlds, without strong attachment to the materialistic world. The stories often change between realistic and metaphysical worlds. His characters lack strong social identities and hence the stories as such lack the social character. The characters do not represent any particular section of the society and the stories 2 do not portray the life of any particular class and discuss any social issues. Essentially his creative world is romanticised one and does not have the social and political dimensions. His stories are synthesis of semi-realism and romanticism. This brought him strong criticism from left wing critics that he lacked social concern. The `form' of his stories is one of the main reasons for their success. His stories are sculptured meticulously with great artistic touch. His story-telling techniques and the narrative power definitely added a new dimension to the prose writing in Tamil. Mowni's stories are very difficult to comprehend at the first reading because of their unique nature both in form and content. Several reapeated readings are needed to fully appreciate his stories and with each reading they are capable of unveiling a new dimension and providing a new experience. He wrote five short stories in late 1935 and added nine more between 1936 and 39. He did not write anything for a decade. He wrote two short stories at the request of his contemporary writer M.V. Venkatram in 1948 that appeared in `thEnee' magazine. He stopped writing again till 1954. Afterwards, he occasionally wrote short stories and the last one `thavaRu' appeared in 'kasa- dathapaRa' in 1971 (the translation of this story, `Loss of identity', is included in this issue). During a span of 35 years of his literary career he wrote only two dozen short stories, which is surprisingly small. Mowni's first short story collection `azhiyaac chudar' was published in 1959, the second one `Mowniyin kadhaigaL' in 1967 and the last one in 1973. A complete edition Mowni's works, comprising 24 short stories, his only interview (`dheepam',1967), a memoir about B.S. Ramaiah, the editor of `maNikkodi' ( `enakku peyar vaiththavar', 'B.S. Ramaiah 60 aaNdu niRaivu malar', 1965), a memoir on his village ('Semmangudi: than oor thEdal', 'aanandha vikatan', 1968) and a couple of essays by Ka.Naa.Subramanyam on Mowni, was published by Peacock Publications, recently (1991). Described as "Thirumoolar of Tamil Short Story" by his contem- porary writer Pudumaipithan, Mowni occupies a distinct place in the annals of Tamil literature.- Translated by Albert Franklin - From "Tamil Short Stories", Selected and Edited by Ka.Naa. Subramanyam, Authors Guild of India Cooperative Society, First Edition (1978). - Contributed by Sundara Pandian