Rhythm, Interrupted

KAIFI Saheb is the salt of the earth. At 81 he still attends mushairas, travels and divides his time between his village Mijwan in Azamgarh, where he has started a school, and the rest of India where literary gatherings, the Indian Peoples' Theatre Association or ipta, and the Communist Party of India have claims on his time. He has time for all of them and then some more for his Muse.

His literary output spans almost six decades. The fact that some of his nazms like Makaan (The House), Dayera (The Circle), Somnath, Bahuroopni, Aadat (Habit), Awara Sajde (on the split in the Communist movement) and others became immensely popular, both among the regular mushaira audiences and among the literati, goes to show that he has been able to bridge the gap between expressing profound ideas and making them communicable to a lay audience. Though he is more at ease in the nazm, he has left his mark in the difficult terrain of the ghazal as well and his famous Ailan-e-Haq main khatra-e-Daar-o-rasan to hai/Lekin sawaal ye hai ke Daar-o-rasan ke baad (proclaiming the truth may lead you to the scaffold, but the question is what happens after?) has become an idiom in the daily discourse of those who still converse in the language of Mir and Ghalib. But this is not about the substantial contribution of Kaifi Saheb to the poetic vocabulary of Urdu but about the first major translation of his verse into English by Pavan Varma.

In the translator's note, Varma touches upon the perils of translating literature, especially poetry. The responsibility becomes all the more onerous for the brave souls crossing the linguistic barrier along with the cultural one. Any translator of literature with oriental moorings into any of the occidental languages has to overcome this socio-cultural divide. He not only has to know the right word but also has to be aware of the nuances and shades of meaning and the unstated associations words and phrases used by the writer excite in the mind of the reader. The poet and his reader are privy to those associations and the poet is therefore able to say, and more importantly communicate, volumes in a few words. If the translator is unaware of the little stories, the legends, the myths and the entire body of received knowledge the poet assumes as given, then the translation is at best a pale shadow; at worst, a travesty of the labours of the poet.

Not many have succeeded in this endeavour. Only consider one of the most celebrated translations into English—The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam by Edward Fitzgerald. The poor man got the words right but totally missed the essence. He reduced some very fine Sufi poetry to meaningless prattle.

Varma's effort, alas, falls in the same category of inglorious failures. His courage is commendable, but not the outcome. To point out only two of the many blunders: sehra (desert) is a recurring image in Urdu poetry to denote desolation, loneliness and also the extreme actions of those in love, an association with the story of Laila and Majnu. But Varma has repeatedly translated sehra as cemetery!

Again, jugnu, which every schoolkid fluent in Hindi knows is a firefly, goes back in this translation one stage in evolution and becomes a glow worm. While Kaifi saheb is talking of sparks and comparing them to fireflies, his translator creates an entirely new creature, a glowing worm that does not turn but flies.

Pavan has translated some of the better-known of Kaifi Saheb's film lyrics. Remember the song from Haqeeqat: "Kar chale ham fida jaan-o-tan saathiyo"? The line "Baandh lo apne sar se kafan saathiyon" has been rendered into English as "Tie coffins on your heads, comrades"! Kafan in Hindi, Urdu, Hindustani, Persian and many other languages is a shroud, not a casket. But the oblivious translator evokes the absurd image of brave patriots going to face the enemy bent double under the weight of sturdy six-by-two wooden boxes!

Kaifi Saheb chooses his words very carefully. Why he so carelessly allowed someone to damage his life's work is something that escapes me totally.