Prof. Govinda Raj Bhattarai
By the time I came across Shree Gyan Bahadur Chhetri, many years of our lives had vanished into oblivion. However, I had heard of his reputation as a writer struggling in a far away land of eastern Assam before we met personally. Luckily once upon a time I could reach his native place of Tejpur which in fact had been a truly fairy land for me. I had three subsequent literary tours of that land with friends and alone. In course of these intervening years he too visited Nepal, attended seminars and became increasingly familiar with me.
Two qualities in him brought Gyanji closer to me. Firstly, he is the only well informed Nepali critic in that part of the world. There are others too but criticism without contemporary knowledge of the field becomes only a farce. Having seen some of his critical works shared through communications I could draw this conclusion. Secondly, he is a good translator, already honored with the coveted Translation Award of Sahitya Academy, Delhi for the year 2015. These qualities in his personality are enough to lure someone like me struggling in an allied field.
But he is not just a bilingual translator like me; he is gifted with a multilingual brain and surrounding as well. Most educated persons in that part acquire three or more languages and use each with equal dexterity for various purposes. This is what the survival principle has taught them. To his credit G B has performed a feat in trilingual dexterity—Nepali, Assamese and Hindi. I didn’t know he could communicate in English as well— so perfectly. Bt he did. It is a rare gift.
This was revealed to me when he forwarded some of his articles written in English and expressed his sincere desire that I peruse them and write a brief introductory note to this small compendium. In the meanwhile some of them began to appear in an English daily, The Sikkim Express from Gangtok. This was naturally a surprise gift for me though I have to work hard in order to spare some moments. Upon its perusal I discovered that the present work, which is called Glimpses of Nepali Literatureand Culture.
Glimpses of Nepali Literature and Culture is awonderful present for the English speaking populace. It is written in beautiful language. Unlike a novice, an established writer is a matured artist as well. He can use the hard earned skill in any language he knows. I know he has translated Hindi poems into Nepali, created Nepali essays profusely, written critical works, and published (and translated from the Assamese) before this.
I had a good opportunity to go through these treatises contained in the present volume of manuscript (though the term has gone obsolete). Every piece cannot be defined as an essay, these together contribute to the making of a conglomeration of critical articles, features, seminar papers, treatises, book reviews, and biographical sketches. Each, however, gives the flavor of an essay. More important is the writing itself not classification into genres.
This collection can be divided into two parts. The first section presents background and origin of the Nepali language which naturally brings the writer to the root land of it. By root land of this, we mean Nepal however both these lands in some parts share in its development from the beginning and bifurcate when India and Nepal are regarded two different countries. (They always were and will be but the transaction of language, art and culture pulls literary past too.)
Having presented some forerunners (like Bhanubhakta Acharya and Laxmi Prasad Devkota) who contributed from the root-land towards the inception of Nepali language, he moves to India and introduces the great forerunners who sacrificed their lives in forefront of its freedom movement as well as followed by that in the making of Nepali literature there.
After that he follows the tracks of language and literature in the east. There are some glimpses of political upheavals, freedom struggles, in which the Indian Nepalis sacrificed their lives so they naturally claimed their right to the soil. Today many creative works have made this obvious. One in example is Gita Upadhyaya’s Janmabhoomee Mero Swadesh, a novel which means My Birth Place is My Motherland (that is India, for the freedom of which her grandfathers had fought).
The book presents first of all A Brief History of Nepali Language which naturally goes back to the ancient days of Prithvinarayan Shah, the victorious king of Nepal around 300 years ago. The origin of Nepali language goes back to the 12th century Jumla Khasan area of Western Nepal but the writer’s purpose is not to present any archaeological details, his purpose is rather to present a traceable root of old Nepali out of which modern Nepali developed.
By presenting a glimpse of how different genres began to take shape in those darker days ( in the Indian context), he moves towards the contemporary Indian Nepali literature. I think this work of GB will be supported by the rigorous study of Darjeeling’s Gupta Pradhan through his historic Dhumil Pristharhau (The Faded Pages).
GB has penned down his occasional thoughts on the literary activities of the North East. One article of importance is History and Culture of Assamese Nepali. Then in order to show a linkage of Assamese variety with that of Nepal, he has presented the life and works of Mahakavi Laxmi Prasad Devkota. This article also reminds me of the efforts Naba Sapkota of Assam (Devkota Nagar, Maligaun) made a great contribution by organizing a conference on Laxmi Prasad Devkota, the Mahakavi and later by producing a souvenir titled Proceedings of International Seminar on the Mahakavi at Guwahati, 2015). Devkota has left a lasting impression on the litterateursof Assam. G B has also joined this great drive for introducing the Mahakavi. Dr Churanmani Bandhu has held the noble idea that Devkota is the noblest cultural wealth of Nepal we can present before the world.
Then GB moves to the unwavering stalwarts of great height rooted to the Indian soil of glory, namely, Shiva Kumar Rai, Lil Bahadur Kshetry, Gita Upadhyaya and Bishnu Lal Upadhyaya. They are the Makers of Indian Nepali Literature, especially of Assam. Also there is PrabhuramKarki an unwavering social worker of Assam.
GB has presented two book reviews—one Balram Upadhyaya’s collection of articles and the next a recent collection of shorter fictions by Sarita Sharma of Tejpur. While presenting them the writer has exercised a great care and caution to give full justice to the art of creating and critiquing both. There are articles sort of appended to this literary collection. They are the introduction to the cultural heritages of the North East, different food items and a feature article on corruption which is very timely.
This is the first work in English that gives a glimpse to the life and literature of Assam. By producing this in English G B has firstly proved his capacity and secondly, shown a presented a most reliable picture of Assamese Nepali literature dating back more than hundred years.
[Prof Govinda Raj Bhattarai, PhD (b. 1953) is a poet, novelist and critic of high repute. Professor of English at Tribhuvan University, he retired from his job a few years ago, and has since then devoted himself fully to literary works. He made his debut in writing quite early. His seminar works of repute include novels Muglan, Socrates Footsteps and Socrate’s Diary, theoretical non-fictions like Kavyik Andolanko Parichaya (Introduction to Poetic Revolutions) Aakhyanako Uttaradhunik Paryawalokan (Postmodern Study of Fiction), Paschimi Balesika Bachhita (Drops of Western Eaves), Uttaradhunik Aina (Postmodern Mirror), Uttaradhunik Bimarsha (Postmodern Discourses) and Samayabodh ra Uttaradhunikta (Time Consciousness and Postmodernism). He is also among Nepal’s pioneering translators and essayists. ]