VERSIONS OF A COLOSSUS: A REVIEW OF GORDON C. ROADARMEL'S TRANSLATION OF PREMCHAND'S "GODAAN" Author(s): Gayatri C. Spivak Source: Mahfil, Vol. 6, No.

2/3 (1970), pp. 31-37 Published by: Asian Studies Center, Michigan State University Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40874316 . Accessed: 26/08/2013 16:05
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Gayatri

C. Spivak

VERSIONS OF A COLOSSUS: A REVIEW OF GORDONC. ROADARMEL'S TRANSLATION OF PREMCHAND'S GODAAN

anecdote > songs of love and war, and The episode within the epic, the scriptural the the of Hindi narrative are as indeed tradition, origins mystical allegories From these so-called traditions. of most Indo-European narrative beginnings, of social to a variation realism in the early twenhowever, Hindi moved directly of tieth century, the nineteenth having spent its energies in the establishment In this, Hindi departs from the patterns standard or "Khariboli" prose itself. o It is as of generic development recognized by readers of European literatures from Chaucer to Arnold Bennett. should move directly if a narrative tradition the sentimental novel, the One looks in vain for the sprawl of the picaresque, the massiveness of gnostic novel of manners, the abandon of social caricature, moralism, the pale fires of decadence. Yet it seems true that, in times I have little faith in literary historiography. Such works reof such quick shifts, great yet flawed works of genius appear. sympathy from the reader than the well-made work quire a greater imaginative Goethe lamented retradition. competently written within an assured literary no and therefore had had was that Renaissance, Germany obliged to make peatedly I believe the quick cultural it was shift from the Dark Ages to modernity. rethat his Faust and Meister 3 those flawed masterpieces, because he recognized I be of a the above And case similar speak may quired sympathy imaginative in Russian fiction in the middle of the last century, made for the situation our specific example. Dostoyevsky rather than Tolstoi and his flaws, Dhanpat Rai his artistic In his historical ambitions, situation, to these men Godaan (1935) is is analogous "Premchand" (1880-1936) Srivastava the last of his many novels 0 I A collection away: of examples in one of his talks on the novel gives his situation

Pickuiiek Papers is his Dickens is a very celebrated English novelist. immortal comic creation c The name "Pickwick" fell on Dicken' s ear amidst dress - all in a stagecoach 0 Character, the conversation appearance, was created to suit that name. Silas Marner is also a celebrated English wrote that she once saw in childhood its authoress, novel. George Eliot, The picture was an itinerant weaver with bolts of cloth on his back. in the form of her novel. engraved on her heart and in time showed itself and moving work of Hawthorne's* He The Soarlet Letter is a most beautiful The lives of Indian novelists found its seed in the files of a court case. to give have not yet been written, and therefore I find it difficult I found the germ of Rangabhumi [one of his examples from Indian fiction. own novels ] . . 6 .

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- 32 The sense of workingan unworked field, of finding in himself the analogue for the great writers of the West, is always with him. The self-distrust of a pathfinder is part of the scene: If we read the reports of international writers1 conferences, we see judgments exchangedon all matters of morality, society, history, and psychology. We turn our eyes to the limits of our ownknowledge, and are ashamedof our ignorance. Wehave decided that a quick wit and a strong pen are enough for a writer. But this decision is the cause of our literary decline. We must raise the standards of our literature.^ The freedomto define is also part of the scene: "I take a novel to be a mere nature. .. ."^ Not only in his literary criticism but also in picture of human his novels the presence of ambitious undertakings is felt. But if we allow ourselves to judge Premchand1 s art according to the breadth of do an For this is the great writer born we shall him his ambitions, injustice. at a time of quick generic transition. His critical vantage is panoramic, but his creative idiom lacks the inherited richness of paced generations. As in the not understanding the nature case of Goethe, critics have over-praised Premchand, of his greatness. It is also a misunderstandingto underpraise him, as Mr. Roadarmelseems to do in his Introduction to this new translation of Godaan. Whatis the just approach to Premchand? The critics1 house must be set in order. Literature does not progress fromone mode to another. It is merely that, when we encounter a modeanterior to our own, we must, to save ourselves fromthe danger of "historical appreciation,11 create in ourselves, throughthe receptive to that anterior mode. The tension and imagination, a readership contemporaneous play between this imaginatively created frameof mind and the more relaxed one that we take to the literature of our own time is our reward. We usually do not for the great writer who is in the vanhave enoughof this imaginative sympathy We behave if he belongs fully to the modeinto of a sudden transition. as guard which he leaps and not at all to the one fromwhich he makes his leap. His own critical enthusiasms allow us to do this. Wemust separate these enthusiasms fromhis often un-self-consious place in the literary tradition. We shall find that he belongs more to the earlier mode than he himself suspects. We shall begin to flex our imaginations, to create in ourselves that "readership contemporaneous to the anterior mode.11 Things which had seemedweaknesses will appear to be strengths. Walpurgisnachtwill seem a lapidary folk-masque rather than an embarrassment that it is a critical convention to praise. The just approach to Premchand must see that he belongs as muchto the so-called of the tradition as to the "idealistic realism" (his Hindi narrative beginnings ownwords) that he fashioned for himself.^ II Let us consider those elements of Godaan which might seem defects in a novel of social realism. Godaan is built of episodes illustrative of clearly implied characterological principles. They sustain a slow plot which does not develop but simply presents The proliferation of episodes, created to illustrate its manyunpredictabilities.

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- 33 of character and dropped on the spot, sometimes seems excessive:

simple points

masquerade as a ferocious Why should Dr. Mehta, a professor of philosophy, his contempt for middle-class his eccentricity, Pathan merchant? To illustrate cowardice, and the Westernized cupidity of Miss Malti (the lady doctor). Why should a young woman appear out of the woods to tend Mehta and Malti in their To illustrate and hour of fatigue? Miss Malti' s Westernized smallmindedness to raise a ripple indirectly three hundred pages later, Mehta1 s disaffection; when Malti looks after poor folk gratis. To Why should a kabaddi game be organized among the unemployed proletariat? out and to Malti' illustrate Mirza Khurshed's eccentric s real paternalism, bring concern for Mehta Why should Lightning? a wife be manufactured for Onkarnath, To illustrate that even in scurrility the scurrilous editor of the there is room for pathos.

of the itinerant Dhyan Singh be introduced and concluWhy should the life-story ded within the space of a page, never to be referred to again? To illustrate of the hero's soul. the innate nobility Why should Mathura, Sona' s hitherto and henceforward unencountered husband, be To illustrate the senthat Silya, overcome with lust at Silya's proximity? suous yet chaste untouchable woman, is more sinned against than sinning. hitherto and henceforward unencountered Why should Minakshi, the Rai Sahib's husband with whom we are daughter, take a whip to a debauched and aristocratic the the New Indian Woman. To of little advent illustrate acquainted? equally But I believe I have said enough to establish that the The list might be longer, the would one in if of book Godaan simple exemplary episodes annoy proliferation realism. were read as a novel of social In fact, Premchand the creator seems to conceive of character very naively, of psycholois abundantly aware of the significance though Premchand the critic cited In of all those illustrative realismo above, he episodes spite gical or in with character seems to present incredible changes developments very little from to seduces Gobar) baddy (she goody (she gratepreparation. Jhuniya, changing to pseudo-baddy (she is instrumental in kindness) fully accepts Gobar' s parents' from his mother) to unemphatic goody (the finally appreciated Gobar' s alienation So will the rebellious common-law son wife) will bear me out. wronged-yet-loyal on "thick 426 this with us whose emotion," gives voice, Gobar, page totally unprenot right to be on bad terms with one's parents'." The pared-for statement, "It's crucial metamorphoses of Khanna, Mehta, and Malti are equally unsatisfactory. in Godaan 3 then, would also annoy one if the book were read Banal characterization So would its extreme parallelisms realism. in situation as a novel of social and I of its and its would sententiousness. sentimentality, course, plot, suggest, that the fault lies with that way of reading. Premchand' s work should be read as the final expression of a tradition of the exemplum, out of the heroic epic by the court tale. Then alone can we appreciate that it is also one of the first haland self-conscious of We can then enjoy each social realism. expressions ting a for in a longer matrix illustrative as itself episode separate exemplum, existing

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- 34 narrative whose prolixity is a virtuoso gift to be relished. That sort of enjoymentis no longer natural to us0 To make it imaginally natural while we read the workis our obligation to Premchand. Wemust play the book's game and recognize it as a miniature epic poem in prose. The parallelisms and painstaking windupswill then show themselves to be stylized patterning on a vast design. It is our lack of imaginative preparation if we expect that pattern to follow the groundrules of verisimilitude and psychologically explicable motivation. Surprise and revelation of character are not relevant to this form. Codified instruction within an accepted picture of the laws of character is relevant. The joy of the reader is in recognizing that picture in the chosen period of the early twentieth century. The heroic, practically philosophic, masculinist male ideal and the sensuous female ideal apotheosized into motherhood,endurance, and self-sacrifice are the themesupon which Premchand makes his variations. s Such an imaginatively sympatheticreading will also deliver up to us the book1 one genuine defect: the absence of "point of view." Within the anterior modeof which I have been writing, such a defect would not have been felt. The bard's, s manyshort storyteller* s, or moralist's voice is there secure. (Premchand' of the build earlier on that stories, purer examples mode, security,) The author has deliberately taken that voice away fromhis nmodernM novel. Yet the very nature of the book demands a clearly articulated value, an authoritative "point of view,11if not an authorial voice. It is too emphatically an effort to expose the highest and the lowest levels of North-Central Indian society before the Independence0 It is easy for the critic whoknowsthe story of the author's life to tell us where his sympathies lie.? The book, by itself, remains amoral, although the reader senses that this is against its intent. In fact, the only seal of approval bestowed by the book falls upon somethingthat Premchand as a Thirties-style Marxist did not personally approve of: peasant fatalism That is the substance of the character of the book's hero Hori Ram. He is the only passionately conceived and executed character in Godaan. He does belong to a "realistic narrative," and as such throws the stylized universe of the book interestingly out of balanceo But his place in the book is not central enough to give the disorganized picture of the upper class urban society a moral coherence0 A great book, a great writer, straddling two modes. The critic must learn to imagine the reality of botho Manyheady virtues, one grave flaw not quite remedied by an unwitting excellence 0 in Before I consider the merits of this particular translation, let me comment knew rural It that he a common of is on Premchand, said society judgment passing very muchbetter than he knewthe society of townspeople. The picture he paints of the formerare convincing, it is further alleged; those he paints of the latter, not so, There is some superficial truth in this judgment. But deep down, the objection does not hold0 Premchand does not seem to knowtoo muchabout Oxford colleges, the nature of small talk, or the professional life of an academic philosopher. But these are minor errors The adolescent verbosity, the moral irresponsibility, the sentimental yet ruthless relationship between the sexes, are documentarily true not only of the lugubrious haute bourgeoisie of the author's ownday, but less powerful now than then) in Northern apply to that class (as a class somewhat India today

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- 35 For the foreign reader there is a pleasant way of ascertaining this documentary A great verity, Godaan was published eleven years after A Passage to India. difference of course exists between the two books1 technical exigencies, the The two authors do not describe traditions, once again, to which they belong. Yet the grasp of the correct ambience is so the same segments of society. strong in both novels that to pass from one to the other seems to be in the fitness of things III The present volume is a poor translation.^ In general, Some of its particular faults I give below. it is boringly literal.

Mr, Roadarmel's lapses of syntax, grammar, and usage are frequent and unpardonable. MSince when had he ever listened to her," Mspeck of mercy," Mdidnft used to,M "either a gain or a loss endangers your life,M MI!m amazed at the way you can write such fat books whereas with six months' rent overdue you're not even aware of it,'1 Mat home Dhaniya would play with him sometimes and other times Rupa, Sona, Hori or Puniya,'1 "on the evening of the third, while being held in Silya's arms, the child breathed his last" -- are a very few examples of the pervasive disorder0 There are many clumsy Indianisms on every page The translator is, I understand, Is the use of these Indianisms a native American with some Indian schooling. the what was If the or former, unhappy purpose? I shall unwitting? witting once more content myself with citing a few examples out of an embarrassment of riches: "any number of tricks to raise stacks of money," "people of this gifted class of people," "begged for charity," "wenches," "dissolute loafer," "let out a roar of laughter," "made up poetry," "drink milk" (for "suckle") , "completed a large book on philosophy," "smeared in the dust," "strain every nerve to drumup all possible credit," "a sizeable platform was constructed of branches," "I'm a pure animal" (for "I'm nothing but an animal"), "in coat and pants," "donated the animal," "big" or "big fat" for "great," "no telling" (invariably for "who knows"), and "what more" for "how much more" in sentences such as "even governments are afraid of them 0 0 what more a mere individual like myself." At the other end of the scale, Mr. Roadarmel uses many suburban American slang and colloquial expressions which fit very ill with the tone and cast of characters of the bookc "Figured" (for "thought"), "nut" (for "stupid," "eccentric," "un"handout," "big deal," "burn me up," "play me for a sucker," reasonable"), "trouble hell I!" (from an Indian peasant's wife), "sat in on the meeting," "you'll find such womendown every alley and they leave me way behind," "tangle with," "smart" (for "clever"), "bawl out," "light into," "fatso," "dumb" (for "foolish"), of "the deadline expired," "come off it," and the multitude injudicious "though"-s at the ends of sentences will, I fear, give only an inadequate impression of the How convey the bathos, in context, general air of farce created by this argot. of the sentence "the two lovelies smiled," especially since two paragraphs later, are described as "womenwho ended up in the red-light district?" the "lovelies" (Why, in the face of this characteristic, of "amongst?") is the orthography British, to the extent

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- 36 Mr. Roadarmelloves nothing better than to makeup a periphrastic verb with "go" (less often "come") For examples "go live," "go take care," "go tend," "go sell," "come pay myrespects," "go find a puddle," "go play," "go drownhimself," "go settle," "go give," "go makeup with," "go poisoning other people's lives," "go have a bath," "go see the pandits," "go makingfun," "come help arrange," "go marry," "go quiet the baby," "go file a suit," "go report" will have to suffice Here again, the general massacre can only be felt in context. The dialogue is frequently distorted into teenage patter, there are occasional mistranslations, the proof was indifferently read, and the Glossary is often no more than vaguely correcto I shall not makemycatalogue exhaustive. For the real problem of this translation is not only that its prose is too memorable in its minutiae, but that it lacks a sense of the original as a whole0 Premchandfs prose is classical, chaste, muted, supple. Its contact with Sanskrit aesthetics can be sensede There is also a touch of Urdu elegance It is neither lyric nor descriptive 0 Yet the manipulation of levels of idiom in narrative passages ; didactic passages, and dialogue is remarkable. Mr, Roadarmelcontravenes this prose as the long book progresses, as Mr0 P0C. Gupta, for example, does not in his naive translation, A Handful of Wheatand Other Stories (NewDelhi, 1955). Premchandfs ambiguousliterary personality I have discussed earlier in this essay. On a moremundane level, for the Americanreader, there are ambiguities in the scene of rural India of the Thirties --at once so remote and so easily typecaste. In other words, Godaan, in both mannerand matter, needed a sensitive translator. This it has not found in Mr GordonC. Roadarmel. In spite of that volume's sins of omission, the reader is still better off with the 1956 translation, published in Bombay, made by Messrs Jai Ratan and P. Lai.

Notes Shitya ka Udyeya,Allahabad, 1954, p. 59-60. ^"Upanysa," this section are mine. All translations in

2Althoughthere were manyenthusiasts and some linguists of import in the epoch s, BhratenduHarichandra (1850-1885), the only immediatelypreceding Premchand1 writer whose workmighthave given Premchand a greater sense of direction, died too young o 3"Shitya k Udyeya," Sahitya k Udyeyaop. oit.3 p. 16-17, 4"Upanysa," ibid* 3 p6 54, Widern,., p, 56 0 ^See especially "Shitya aur Manobijnn," ibid. 3 103-106. ?For such an informedcritical-biographical introduction one must turn to Mr, Triloki Narayan Dikshit's Premchand(Kanpur, 1952).

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- 37 Premchand, The Gift of A Cow: A Translation Gordon C. Roadarmel, Bloomington and London: of the Hindi Novell Godaany tr. Indiana University Press, 1968.

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