Shreekumar Varma
Author, Blogger, Critic,
Columnist, playwright, poet
On Song @ The 13th Edition
of the TG Narayanan Endowment Lecture
Today | 5th December 2024
| CMS Auditorium
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| Mr. Shreekumar Varma releasing Cornucopia |
An eminent MCC-ian of the 70s,
Shreekumar Varma, [who had his schooling in MCC School, Chetpet, and
later went on to do his BA, MA and MPhil in English at Madras Christian
College, and also taught in the Dept of English for one year] – was the speaker
for the 13th Edition of the TG Narayanan Endowment Lecture today.
He spoke on the topic, ‘Writing
to Live: Stories within Stories’.
Here goes –
Dr. Manohar Samuel, my classmate
in BA and MA, Dr. Franklin, the gracious young man then, who remains gracious even today, Dr. Ganesh, Mr. Keshav, an active
Alumni member, the grandguru – Prof. Cherian Kurian, my MA English classmate - Mr. Kantharaj Jude Sekar,
IFS, Director General of Forests, New Delhi, (Retd), my BA Classmate – Anand
Ponniah, who was responsible for ‘driving’ me here today and to all my good friends... and I have a special word of appreciation for the excellent rendition of the State Anthem of Tamil Nadu - thamizh thaai vazhthu by the Dept Choir.
I first stepped into this beautiful campus
50 years ago, and I did my PUC, BA, MA, and then went to Bombay – I was a journalist – I came
back did my MPhil for one year, and afterwards I was called back to teach
English Literature in the Dept of English.
Two weeks ago, there was a
book release – that had a lot of old faces from MCC around me – and there was
this girl – who is now a famous film director, who was an assistant to
Maniratnam, and who later went on to do her own films, and now she’s done a
serial too. She came up to me and said, Sir, you were the one responsible for
my interest in creative writing. It’s an amazing thrill that you feel – any teacher
feels – when a student comes back and tells you that!
And this is what we do! You take
stories from someone else and pass it on to others. This is what we do in
class, and this is what a writer does as well.
Beyond the rhetoric and
intellectual and critical discourse, there is the very core of our literary pursuit
that we often tend to forget: The story.
Not the story in the book, but the
stories of the world and the stories of you and me – without which the story in
the book would be orphaned.
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| Mr. Shreekumar Varma on Song... |
There are two ways of
writing –
Doing the done thing all over
again. You follow the masters – whether it’s literature, or architecture, or
mathematics or public administration. In the case of literature, if you are a
writer, you study the great writers, the thinkers, the classical masters the
modern writers, and then you write a beautiful poem, novel, play or essay that
will fit the same mould, flow in the same waters, and be true to what you were
taught.
Then there is the second
way
– the yet to be done thing that you create.
You read the masters, you research a
field, you look around and see the people, the neighbourhood, and finally, you
look within yourself to find the story that needs to be written by you.
In the second case, you know your art.
But when you begin your creation you do according to your experience, your
mind, your heart, or rules. It may have been done before, but the world sees a
difference in it – a creativity, a freshness, a new quality that can be named
after you!
I’ll give you an example. I will show
you two pictures – both are self portraits by Picasso the Artist. The first one
was painted by him – his self-portrait when he was 15 years old, in the year
1896. He must have studied the masters, and wanted to paint a lot when he was
young.
Then he grew and he grew and he
grew. Out came cubism. The masterstroke of Pablo Picasso. And then when he was
90 years old, he painted his last self-portrait.
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| The first and the last... |
Now just imagine if he had painted
this self-portrait the first time. Would he have got this recognition. They’d
have called it nonsense.
He studied the masters, had
his creativity, went into the route which no one else had taken, led these
people through that path and showed them what he’s capable of. And cubism is a
recognised, big part of the art scene today.
That’s because you have to learn
to be simple. You have to learn everything else to be able to know yourself. Your
art grows within you, watered by the stories around you, and the stories that
came before you.
Many of you must have been
familiar with Arunagirinathar - a Tamil saint and poet who lived in the 15th
century and is known for his devotional hymns to Lord Murugan.
There are a couple of stories
about his life – one miraculous and the other, more matter of fact.
In the film version, Lord Murugan
appears before him, and Arunagirinathar (played by TMS) asks him, what should I
do to attain you, my Lord?
Lord Murugan simply replies,
Chumma iru. (do Nothing). It means, be still.
That doesn’t actually mean do
nothing. It means, you have to look at the world, study everything, you have to
go through that process. You cant simply paint your last portrait and say, this
is me!
You have to go through all
that. Only then your path will be recognised.
So that I think, being still,
is the primary way to what’s lying inside you. There’s so much within you.
Each of us – sitting here –
looking and admiring other people’s works, movies, reading books, new discoveries,
you have so much to offer, if only you look within yourself and see the stories
around you.
In an art school for example,
the students are taken on little excursions and told to paint what they see! -
the trees, the skies, the birds, the flowers, the animals, etc.
They are also taught the techniques
of art and the process through which a thought or an idea can be turned into a piece
of art.
In the study of literature,
that little excursion of discoveries would be about stories.
Along with our own personal
stories, our most important stories include those of our families, our friends,
our neighbours and our colleagues.
Two, three, four decades from
now – those college friends, with whom you are sitting today! Just look at them
and see, how much of friendship there is now, and how much of friendship was
there in the past! will they be sitting with you today like the way my friends
are sitting here. Those are the stories.
A person sitting next to you has a
story that you don’t know anything about. Those are the stories you grow up
with. And that energises you – while you are learning all these technical
things – the intellectual discourses and critical studies, etc.
The more stories we have, the
more we can understand other people and the world. The more we understand and
welcome, the less we will condemn and reject. And this an important lesson for
a writer.
More than any creative
writing techniques or templates, this is the important thing – to understand
and try to get into the mind of another. In my life, the process began with my
years in this college. The train rides, the people I met, my fellow students,
my teachers – everyone had a story. I only had to listen. And because I listened,
my own story was enriched.
And then I became a journalist
in Bombay. Imagine the number of stories I was exposed to.
So many interviews added more and
more stories. And in Bombay I also worked in a magazine run by the film
industry. So I can go anywhere – any film party, any shooting, go and interview
any producer, director, and so during that time I was in close contact with the
story tellers, the actors, the musicians.
And I was getting my dose
of life
in various forms. Most important thing is – life is a changeable thing. It doesn’t
stay the same forever. We are constantly evolving and our stories are growing.
We
are a work-in-progress, until the day we die. We are not finished products. That’s
one of the most important things for a writer to learn. That’s why you find
this self-portrait of Picasso when he was 15 and that one when he was 90. When you can trace the first book
of an author and find the progress when you read the last book of his.
Everybody has a story. For example,
Charles Dickens earned money to get his father out of prison. At twelve, he
worked in a shoe-polish factory, and you know what he wrote. Whatever you
experience goes into your creativity.
Ken Kesey, who wrote his
novel titled, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in 1962, was janitor in
a mental hospital. The novel is also set in an Oregon psychiatric hospital, and the
narrative serves as a study of institutional processes and the human mind,
including a critique of psychiatry, and a tribute to individualistic
principles.
What he experienced went into his
creativity.
Perumal Murugan, closer
home,
born into a family of farmers in Tiruchengodu – his father was a farmer and so
he couldn’t earn enough to support his family. So he ran a soda shop in a
cinema theatre in Namakkal district. And Murugan became a Professor in Tamil
Literature. See the deadly combination of theory and the lived life which is
obvious in his writings.
To be continued…
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| Our Lovely Band of Professors - Past & Present |
The lecture was well-attended
by all our students, and faculty and students from other city colleges as well.
The Q & A Session was highly engaging
with thought-provoking questions donning the post-lecture session.
Student authors including Shreya,
Lekhaa, Ganga Santhosh and Gracelin were honoured by Mr. Shreekumar Varma. He also
took a photograph with them.
Cornucopia, the exclusive Literary
Magazine of the Dept of English, designed by Prof. Christina Dhanasekaran
a.k.a. DeeCee was released by Mr. Varma on the occasion.
A host of our past
professors
and former Heads of Department graced the occasion – including Dr. Mekala Rajan, Dr.
Ganesh, Dr. Azhagarasan, Head, Dept of English, University of Madras, and other
luminaries.
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| Our Vibrant Student Authors with Author Shreekumar Varma |
Dr. Franklin Daniel, Head, Department of
English, was at his wittiest best, while welcoming the gathering - that had us
all in splits – setting forth the tone and the tenor for what’s to follow.
Dr. Rufus while introducing
Mr. Shreekumar Varma, was highly appreciative of his friends who’ve been with
him right from his school days in the 1960s up until today – seated proudly in the
first row to listen to their classmate’s lecture. He then quoted from Mr. Varma’s
blog (thinkopotamus.blogspot.com) – On his tryst with writing.
Here goes – (from Mr.
Shreekumar Varma’s Blogpost)
Sensitivity and a sense of self
does strange things to you sometimes. You are aware that you - this being on
two legs, seeing the world through two small pin- holes in your face - are
living an entire life, making things happen and impinging on other people’s
lives. One day, you’ll close those eyes forever, and life as you know it will
end.
My wife says that I get so
involved in my writing that I reflect every emotion I write about. She’s wary
about my subjects and gets jittery when I write dark events.
Invariably, some of it seeps into
real life. My third play, Platform, lay waiting for some months before a
director picked it up.
The play was appreciated and drew some
brilliant performances. During the cast party at the director’s house one rainy
afternoon, the male lead (who’s now gone on to do feature films) took me aside.
He said, “I’ve been
wanting
to tell you this for some time. It’s amazing, there’s such a marked resemblance
between my life and that of the character you wrote for me. No one knows that
part of me, but you’ve been so accurate!”
I patiently explained to him that I
hadn’t written the character for him. I hadn’t even known who was going to
direct the play, much less who was going to act in it!
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| After the Lecture - Meeting with our I MA Students |
I have now got used to the fact
that my writing may precipitate or reflect events without any help from me.
I’ve come across people who’ve lived the lives and moments that I’ve described
while sitting in the privacy of my room. I think creativity is a link between
ourselves and the universe. What awakens in us might have gone to sleep in some
part of the universe, or vice-versa, quoted Dr. Rufus, from Mr. Shreekumar Varma’s
blogpost.
Overall, the programme was highly
rewarding in every way to all of us who had gathered together to listen to our
own fellow MCC-ian!
Viva la MCC!
Photos Courtesy: Therese Maria | Painting Courtesy: rarehistoricalphotosdotcom
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