'Thought once awakened does not again slumber!'

On the Able Sage of Chelsea!

In the true literary man there is thus ever, acknowledged or not by the world, a sacredness; he is the light of the world; the world's priest - guiding it, like a sacred pillar of fire, in its dark pilgrimage through the waste of time. - Carlyle

From Emerson, the Noble Sage of Concord, let’s now move on to Carlyle, the Able Sage of Chelsea!

Apropos our deliberations on Thomas Carlyle vis-à-vis the importance of the year 1836, a defining year in the annals of literary history that saw a literary torrent of sorts, me thought it meet - to mince and to munch - more on this Sage of Chelsea, who also tripled up as a historian, an essayist and a biographer of his times!

Carlyle’s annual lectures were later published under the title, On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History in 1841. In this series of six profound lectures, Carlyle brings out the uniqueness that underlies the personalities of heroic men replete with heroic vitalism.

To Carlyle, history is all about the making of heroic men or women, who are bestowed with the most excellent gifts and powers of vision and of action! Since his age lacked a person of a heroic mould, he only wishes that people of a true heroic vitalism and temperament should step forward, in the interests of society, to lead the people, who are like sheep without a shepherd. (We should also remember that, the 19^th century was an age when belief in the Divine was at its lowest ebb ever!)

Only a person of a heroic mould - he quite feels - could shake the masses out of their stupor and lead society to its acme of dynamism!

Some of the immortal quotes that have taken the minds and the hearts of his avid readers by storm, are reproduced below –

The greatest of faults, I should say, is to be conscious of none.

Men of letters are a perpetual Priesthood, from age to age, teaching all men that a God is still present in their life; that all "appearance," whatsoever we see in the world, is but as a vesture for the "divine idea of the world," for "that which lies at the bottom of appearance." In the true literary man there is thus ever, acknowledged or not by the world, a sacredness; he is the light of the world; the world's priest - guiding it, like a sacred pillar of fire, in its dark pilgrimage through the waste of time.

Thought once awakened does not again slumber.

Nay, in every epoch of the world, the great event, parent of all others, is it not the arrival of a Thinker in the world?

Do not Books still accomplish miracles, as Runes were fabled to do? They persuade men. Not the wretchedest circulating library novel, which foolish girls thumb and con in remote villages!

All that mankind has done, thought, gained, or been: it is lying as in magic preservation in the pages of books.

From 1834 onwards, Carlyle was working on his monumental work, The French Revolution. This period enabled him to meet up with great literary minds of all hues, including Wordsworth, Southey, and Sterling, with Sterling or John Sterling topping his list of hot favourites!

His Sartor Resartus published in 1836, is one of his most enigmatic works ever! It’s really impossible to pigeon-hole a book of this complexity, into any one particular genre as such! It deals with the life of a fictional German philosopher and academic.

to be continued…

image: amazondotcom

On the Dominant ‘sage’ of the American imagination!

On the Noble Sage of Concord

If Rousseau’s Emile envisages a wonderful pattern or a benchmark for the education of children, an education that goes the Krishnamurti way, through the Nature connect, Emerson’s phenomenal work titled, Nature, published first in 1836, nurtures in American hearts an exemplary rubric for restoring the human-nature-god connect, which, to him, and a host of transcendentalists of his ilk, was lost somewhere down the way!

In other words, Emerson’s Nature, was also an exemplary benchmark of sorts, for it eulogises in such beautifully evocative language, the aesthetic, the spiritual and the practical advantages there are, to the American landscape, or in other words the benefits of the human-nature-god connect vis-à-vis the American landscape!

Interestingly, the year 1836 is memorable on many other counts too!

It was the year Carlyle published his Sartor Resartus and his subsequent The French Revolution: A History happened the next year, in 1837.

Very soon Thoreau got impacted by Carlyle and his Carlylisms, and subsequently went on to write a lovely bubbly essay that eulogises Carlyle and his oeuvre, on the title, Thomas Carlyle and His Works, in which, praising Carlylisms, he says, “He (Carlyle) does not go to the dictionary, the word-book, but to the word-manufactory itself”. Moreover, the Charles Dickens - Carlyle connect is so well-known for all to see!

And that’s another coincidence that Charles Dickens published his Sketches by Boz in the same year! (1836) Let’s also not forget the fact that Boz (Dickens) got married to Catherine Hogarth, only because of the astounding success of his Sketches! Added fact is that, Sketches by Boz remains his first published book ever!

Coming back to Emerson, who is fondly referred to as the ‘Prophet of the American Religion’ by Harold Bloom,

Well, the Emerson impact on a generation of writers is then not quite a surprise though! Thoreau took a leaf out of Emerson’s book when he made his observations of Nature much more concretised, like there was to the Hegel – Marx duo!

Whitman, in his Leaves of Grass gave poetic wings to Emerson’s clarion call for a return to Nature! Furthermore, the Emerson – John Muir connect is yet another pivotal topic for much interesting deliberation that needs more elucidation, albeit on a later post!

“The one YOU feed," replied grandpa!

On Words | Personal Reflections - IV

After reading chunks of precious inspirational nuggets gleaned from the masterspirits like Jidduji, Swami Vivekananda, Norman Vincent Peale, Osho, Robert Schuller et al, one would positively and convincingly feel for oneself, with all confidence, that there’s as much power in your words, as much as there’s power in your blend! (your cuppa coffee, I mean!) ;-)

Balmy words, words seasoned with love, words that are so positive, have such therapeutic power to them, Ain't they?

Be it to a friend, to a lover, to a teacher, to a student, to a kith or kin, or to our pavapetta junior or our kovapetta senior, and even towards children, when we use words of hope, words of love and words of positivism, we would sure see for ourselves how 'words' have such power and such therapy to them! 

Yes! When we use words, which, according to the Tagorean immortal dictum, words that come out from the depth of truth, from the depths of the heart, we will never have even the littlest or slightest intentions on our hearts to wound others even a wee bit with our words!

For instance, when we use polite, gentle and refined words seasoned with love to anyone with whom we speak to, we help in gently bringing out the boundless humanity contained within that person!

On the contrary, when we use words seasoned with anger, they not only inflict pain on the person, but also tends to take away the boundless river of humanity contained within him/her in a moment's time or even lesser! 

We all know well the story of the grandpa who was teaching his grandson some seasoned, wisened words for life and living!

It goes on these lines - 

Well, there lived an old Cherokee grandpa, who had always wanted to teach his beloved grandson some seasoned, wisened values about life and living!

“A great fight is going on deep inside me,” said the grandpa to the boy.

“It seems such a vigorous fight and it is a fight between two wolves. 

One wolf is evil – he is anger, envy,and ego.”

Grandpa continued, “The other wolf is good – he is joy, peace and love!

The same fight is going on inside you–and inside every other person, too,” he said.

The grandson, after having patiently listened to his grandpa, finally asks him, “Which wolf will win?”

“The one YOU feed," replied grandpa!

How true!

In short, when we treat a person cruelly, that means we treat them as lesser humans!

If ever we, practitioners of literature were advocates and votaries to these humane qualities, we would always treat our fellow human beings as much as we love ourselves our wish to be treated ourselves!

In this connect, let me share from memory, a film, that’s had such a great impact on me all of my life!

Yes! Of all the films I have ever watched, one film stands tall and stands high in my heart and soul, and I hope it would remain the best movie I have ever watched in all my life!

And that’s without a doubt, Anbe Sivam!

And please don’t try bringing up the metaphor of the two wolves, when I tell you that Nalla Sivam and Anbarasu are two conflicting personalities, the former an altruist, who loves human beings, while the latter (Anbarasu) is a self-centred egotist!

While Anbarasu is smart and young, he is quite self-centred and quite moody by nature, Nalla Sivam, on the other hand, inspite of being differently abled, and with such not-so-handsome looks on him, tries to spread happiness wherever he goes, every moment of his life!

There are any many scenes throughout the movie that trigger a tear on you all along!

One such scene that speaks to the power of positive words, is when, after the devastating accident involving a dog and the bus, many are killed, and only Nalla Sivam happens to have escaped, albeit with grievous injuries! In the next frame, he’s admitted in the ICU Ward, when Nasser and co appear there, and asks the duty nurse who’s attending on him, ‘Will Nalla survive?’

The nurse-sister replies, ‘Speak only positive words to him. Speak lovingly to him. Don’t talk for long. Only ten minutes! But please give him some hope!’

What beautiful words! What lovely words that ooze with such positivism!

In yet another scene, on the train journey, Anbarasu deliberately shuts out Nalla Sivam from the train in which they are travelling, (when Nalla gets down to fetch some water) and subsequently, loses all his belongings to a fraudster ironically named Uthaman, on his train journey! He soon hears the news from the TTE that the previous train had met with a huge accident and hence their train will be stranded right there on the tracks midway!

Now, Anbarasu gets down from his compartment, and walks all the way to see for himself, for the first time, the horrors and the intense magnitude of the devastating train accident right in front of his own eyes! He’s much troubled and much agitated within himself! Amongst the din and the commotion, amongst the heckle and the noise, a doctor could be heard shouting out earnestly for anybody with AB negative blood on them for a badly injured boy. Nalla immediately calls to the doctor's attention his unwilling friend Anbarasu, who's all along had a strong aversion for the very sight of blood! 

Anbarasu is now, quite surprised to see Nalla Sivam standing hear him! Nalla Sivam, after being shut out from his compartment on the moving train, while getting down to fetch water, had by now, somehow managed to come all the way to the accident site, and and joined in the rescue operations by helping out the injured! Hence Anbarasu asks him on a tone tinged with surprise,

‘How did you finally manage to arrive here?’

'I came here in an ambulance that carries donor’s blood! I have a lot of friends amongst doctors and nurses, sir,’ he says.

‘Look at you. All over the world you have only friends and friends. But for me, I don’t know whom to trust, and whom to believe! I am nervous when I see anything and everything. I am afraid when I see anything and everything! I thought I knew everything. But sadly, I don’t know anything!’ he admits to Nalla Sivam!

Nalla Sivam gently goes up to him, and says, ‘You are AB negative, but Be positive,’ and then proceeds to comforts him!

Anbarasu is soon taken to the ambulance where he gets to see the little boy who’s severely injured, battling for his life, and panting hard, wanting for blood!

Anbarasu realises that, he alone could act the saviour for this little boy, right now! right here! He alone had the power on him, and the ability within him to act now! To deliver! To volunteer! To save a precious life battling for  his life!

Finally, in one decisive move, Anbarasu, who’s all along had this aversion and nervous dizziness for blood all along, all through his life, the moment he sees the sight of the injured little boy writhing in pain and agony, immediately, opens up with all his heart, with such impulsive vigour, and offers to donate his blood for the boy, and rightaway.

(A beautiful message there is, on blood donation too!)

After Anbarasu has done his noble part by donating his blood for the boy, now they are all getting back, back towards the hospital, with the boy on the stretcher, on their ambulance.

They stop midway to buy a rubber ball for the injured boy, since he had asked for it.

All of a sudden, it so happens that, sister nurse calls them back urgently, back to the ambulance, since the boy’s condition has now worsened!

Now, Anbarasu couldn’t bear to hear anything negative on the boy’s condition!

That was the last thing he had wanted to hear, in all his life! Since he had given his precious blood for the boy’s life! He's now, at last, become an empath! 

And hence, he shuts up his ears so tight, not wanting to hear any hurtful news about the boy's condition! 

But soon, when finally he sees for himself that the boy had passed away just over a minute ago, Anbarasu, for the very first time ever in his life, he breaks down, and cries out loud with all his heart!

In other words, for the first time ever in his life, he knows for himself, and he has developed for himself, the power of empathy!

Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, on the other hand, presents a clear picture in contrast. Heathcliff, the antihero, has to live all his life with harsh words and cruelty all along. He is, something akin to a stray dog, who, although, he is fed, clothed and sheltered, is treated as less human all through! There is no single human being to encourage him except Catherine! Hence he says to Catherine once, “I have not one word of comfort!”

But unlike Anbarasu, who redeems himself in our eyes, transformed into another cheerful, empathetic being by the positive, therapeutic words of Nalla Sivam, Heathcliff, sadly, because of being treated ‘less-human’ and as a servant, and because of his resultant cruelty and anger, destroys not only himself but also all around him in the process!

So much for the power of empathy and the power of words on a person's life!

To be continued…

'Synchrony is the superhighway that leads to connection and to kindness.'

On Words | Personal Reflections – III

While taking some little time off to delve deep into a few interesting reads that connect with the power of words – both fiction and non-fiction, I chanced upon this lovable read from Brian Goldman, a veteran emergency room physician, who has had quite a highly successful career in ‘setting broken bones, curing pneumonia, and pulling people back from the brink of medical emergency.’ The book is titled, The Power of Kindness: Why Empathy Is Essential in Everyday Life.

I found it so very pertinent a read, more so, as it comes from the pen, the mind and the heart of a practising medical doctor! 

Yes! Although we’ve had the likes of Anton Chekhov, medical doctors by profession, who’ve given us some immortal classics in world literature, still, works of non-fiction from off the pens of such doctors, based on their professional acumen that speak from their rich experience, are quite few and far between!

But before taking the plunge, I would like to make special mention of three lovely people who were quite instrumental in putting down my thoughts on this post that gels well with the power of words in connect with ‘the power of kindness, and the power of empathy vis-a-vis medical doctors and hospitals!’

One is an amazing Professor friend, Dr. Archana Sardana, Head, Dept of English, Anna Adarsh College for Women, Chennai, who’d gifted me with such an intense read, written by a neurosurgeon - a book that, i should confess, has had a profound, transformative impact on my sensibilities altogether. I remember, Dr. Archana’s car driver driving down all the way through the mazy labyrinthine cityscape, with this lovely read on him, and calling me up at least four times before he could ascertain my location and hand it over (this life-changing read,) right in my hands, that particular evening, at around 7 pm, on 31 January 2018! 

The book is titled, When Breath Becomes Air and it was written by Paul Kalanithi, a renowned neurosurgeon who gets terminal lung cancer, and passes away, almost midway through the writing of this, his highly inspiring, moving memoir, which has been in the Numero Uno spot on the New York Times Nonfiction bestseller list for eight weeks in a row! An amazing case of a neurosurgeon turning to the therapies of literature, after learning that from thence on, after having been diagnosed with the disease, each and every breath has become even more precious for him!

After having earned two degrees in English literature from Stanford, Paul Kalanithi attends medical school, where he is weighed down heavily by the question, ‘What makes human life meaningful?’ And this pertinent question makes him take to the pathway to becoming a neurosurgeon, thus helping him see his profession less as a job and more as a sacred calling!

And hence he says with confidence, I don’t think I ever spent a minute of any day wondering why I did this work, or whether it was worth it. The call to protect life  -  and not merely life but another’s identity; it is perhaps not too much to say another’s soul  -  was obvious in its sacredness, he quips!

To cut things short, towards the end of the book he predicates how healthy habits for life, that are highly subjective in their very nature, like empathy, hope, love, striving and virtue are by all means higher and nobler ideals to life, than the ideals enshrined in science, which, though highly objective, and although it may provide us with the most useful way to organize empirical, reproducible data, is yet ‘unable to grasp the most central aspects of human life: hope, fear, love, hate, beauty, envy, honor, weakness, striving, suffering, virtue.’

The tears spontaneously trickle down your cheeks even as you read page by page into this so intense and so realistic memoir of sorts! I would say, each of us as humans, should really go through the pages of this wonderful book with pen in hand and a notebook for jotting down notes!

Thanks much to Dr. Archana, I also passed on this intense Paul Kalanithi read to a few other friends of mine who’ve found it such an amazing, life-changing read!

Bill Gates also endearingly writes about the book in his personal blog, by confessing in the title, ‘This book left me in tears,’ and goes on to add, in his review, ‘I was super touched by it, as was Melinda and our daughter Jennifer. In fact, I can say this is the best nonfiction story I’ve read in a long time.’

Coming back to the power of empathy and how doctors grapple with this wonderful concept in their medical life, Brian Goldman’s phenomenal read titled, The Power of Kindness: Why Empathy Is Essential in Everyday Life, is such a balmy read for the soul! An intriguing read meet for anyone who wants to be healthy, happy and be an empath!

Mr. Madhuvalan is to the far right! Pic courtesy: Ms. Jenny

The second person I’d like to acknowledge on this post would be my cousin Mr. Madhuvalan, a software engineer based in Chennai. A couple of days back, at our little niece’s (CJ as we call her) birthday bash, on 08 June, where we had a memorable rendezvous with kith and kin, we both opened up on various topics galore, culminating in how one could possibly de-stress, and on the benefits of de-stressing! Mr. Madhuvalan is so passionate about the Aviation industry, and so he was waxing eloquent on how Air Traffic Controllers gain their mandated holiday time as ways and means to de-stress themselves, away from their humdrum, daily, habituated grind! He also added to say that medical doctors in particular, needed to de-stress much, as they also, in like manner, deal with the precious lives of their patients. One small stroke with the scalpel, under duress, would spell the difference between life and death, he quipped, talking about the importance of a de-stressing mechanism for people in the medical fraternity.

It is in this connect that Brian’s book assumes greater significance for me! Brian himself admits to the therapeutic effects of a de-stress for his medical career!

As a doctor, I have made plenty of mistakes, most of them due to a fatigue-related failure to make the right diagnosis, he admits!

Thank you Madhu brother! I'm so happy our discussions have proved so highly blogworthy!

Well, yes! Brian begins his book by asking a very pertinent question, that’s so intriguing and so highly validating!

‘Am I a kind soul?’ He asks!

He adds to say,

‘From what I’ve told you about myself, I sound pretty kind. So how come I’m asking? Because doubt has crept into me. I have felt this way for a long time. That I’m too stressed, too busy, too preoccupied with the errors I make at work and in life, too anxious and too self-absorbed to think enough about others to be kind to them. And I’m not alone. As I look around me, I see the same problem everywhere’ he quips.

Then he gives his yummy connect with the robusta, the barista and the bistro in tow!

Brian speaks -

You order a decaf latte. The barista repeats your order word for word. A minute later, he’s forgotten it and asks you to repeat it. When you finally pick up your beverage, one sip tells you he got it completely wrong.

What these and many stories have in common is lack of empathy.

It seems everyone has a painful story or two to tell. A recent study by University of Indiana psychologist Sara Konrath found empathy among today’s college students has declined by about 40 percent compared to their peers 20 or 30 years ago, with the biggest drop after 2000.

Then he opens up on the buzzword amongst developmental psychologists across the world today, on the topic of Interactional Synchrony, which I found so highly interesting!

Over to Brian -

The word synchrony means “a simultaneous action or occurrence.” For instance, it may refer to the matching of rhythmic behaviour between people. Synchrony is an important topic among developmental psychologists. In 1974, William Condon and Louis Sander published a groundbreaking study in the journal Science in which they observed the interaction between newborns and their parents. They found that as early as the first day of life, newborns move in sync with the sound of a parent speaking.

Interactional Synchrony in demonstration!
These are sample snaps from videotape recordings of two-three week infants.
The results have indicated that babies aged 3 to 27 days old
could imitate both facial expressions and manual gestures.

Later, Andrew Meltzoff from Oxford University and M. Keith Moore from the University of Washington demonstrated that babies as young as three days old imitate the facial expressions of their mothers. Thus, newborns mirror their parents’ faces, and their parents mirror theirs. It’s one of the earliest examples of what developmental psychologists refer to as interactional synchrony, an essential part of the process by which babies become attached to their parents.

Synchrony is also found in dance and music and in shared rituals such as chanting in church. If you have ever performed the wave at a baseball or football game, you have taken part in a mass example of behavioural synchrony. Similarly, if you’ve ever met someone and just clicked with them, you have experienced interpersonal synchrony. The next time you visit a coffee bar or a restaurant, watch twosomes who are seated together. It’s not hard to spot those who share synchrony; they’re the ones whose hand gestures and speech patterns mirror one another.  

Studies have shown that people in sync have stronger social bonds. They are more likely to empathize with and be kind to one another. This is true between friends and acquaintances. What may surprise you is that it is also true between therapist and patient.

'Patience, Humility, Manners, and Taste - Spring from the Children of the University'

On Words | Personal Reflections - II

Before we begin on today's blogpost, let me profusely thank and acknowledge a wonderful feedback that i chanced upon today, on our blog's feedback form, from a passionate Professor of Literature! She had quoted from Atwood's lines, 'A Word after a word after a word is power', and had also added to say, 'Thank you for reminding us of the power of words and our responsibility as litterateurs to use words that refresh, replenish and restore!'

And this, dear ladies and gentlemen, would really be our blessed lifelines and lovely helplines in our tryst with literature, in this lovely literary life that we all have been so graciously endowed with! Ain't it?

We could also cherish them as the '3-R's for life and living, alley? (Words that Refresh, Replenish & Restore)!

If only we, practitioners of literature, would do our kutty-little-might, all through our literary lives, to use words that would refresh, words that would replenish, and words that would restore, how much better humankind could possibly be?

That said, let's now continue with added momentum on our series on the ‘powers’ vested within words, and on the virtuous qualities of words in ‘making’ others, not ‘breaking’ them!

Well, literatures from across the world, offer us on a platter, a plethora of such wonderful characters who encourage and motivate others with their positive calls to action! A sample of such characters and role models for us all, to get to know about the power of words and their wonderful way and sway in encouraging others to give their best!

Right from the days of the good ol’ philosophers and literary minds of yore, the power of motivation and encouragement have long been cardinal qualities that have shaped the advancement and the progress of great minds and hearts over the ages! Their calls to action, with their encouraging words, have always proved significant gamechangers in bettering and in transforming the quality of life in individuals from all walks of life! 

So much for the power and the vigour of positive words that go a long way in the ‘making’ (not the ‘breaking’) and the growth of an individual!

Seneca, the renowned dramatist of yore, was, as we all know, firstly tutor, and then advisor to Emperor Nero, during the first five years of his competent reign. His words that were, again, significant 'calls to action', have always had a very positive effect on the emperor. In his treatise titled, On Clemency that was prompted by Nero's murder of Britannicus, Seneca, gently persuades Nero to leave the path of bloodshed, and advocates the path of clemency or mercy as the path to virtue for a just ruler. (Remember Portia’s famed lines, ‘The quality of mercy is not strained?’]

To Seneca, then, extremes of punishment or torture were indeed the exact opposites of clemency, or mercy, and hence, he feels, leaders should try, as much as possible, to avoid it. [Leaders here could possibly connote to mean, any leader, be it in academia, government, sports, etc] It’s no wonder then that Seneca considered philosophy as a balm for the wounds of life!

On today’s post, we shall look into a contemporary of Booker T Washington, W. E. B. DuBois, and his wonderful work titled, The Souls of Black Folk, which is, till date, considered a cornerstone of African American literature!

After slavery was finally abolished in January 1865, African Americans started coming out of their repressive shells, and they subsequently began flourishing in the world of education, politics, business and commerce! Du Bois’s work The Souls of Black Folk is basically a ‘charter of encouragement’ for Black folks, replete with words of advice and wisdom!

Like Booker T Washington, who had made it mandatory that, when his students graduated from Tuskegee, they were to return to their hometowns, as transformed individuals, who are able to share with their kith and kin their newly learnt knowledge and best practices in agriculture, farming, breeding livestock, and taking care of themselves, DuBois too, in like manner, fervently encourages educated blacks to teach uneducated folks amongst their own community, as a means to empowering them.

In this connect, he's also coined a lovely term titled, “Talented Tenth!” (You may want to look up on our past post on Booker T Washington, HERE. And yes! like a Plato and Aristotle, or a Derrida and Ricoeur, or a Gandhi and Tagore, there were core aspects in which Booker and DuBois had huge differences of opinion! But that I guess, albeit noteworthy, should be meet for a different post, rather!)

The term ‘Talented Tenth’, then, to DuBois refers to educated black folks who would encourage their uneducated fellow folks to come up the ladder of success, through guidance, mentoring, care, and leadership.

'Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs!'

On Words | Personal Reflections

“It’s only words,” sang Elvis live on stage to a rapturous, electrified fan audience in Las Vegas!

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose / By Any Other Name would smell as sweet,” said Juliet with reference to the family name of Romeo.

 

“The human spirit thinks with words,” said ‘Spinozist’ Johann Gottfried Herder!

He adds to say that, “Words, by connecting passions with things, the present with the past, and by making possible memory and imagination, create family, society, literature, history. [. . . ] to speak and think in words is to ‘swim in an inherited stream of images and words; we must accept these media on trust: we cannot create them”.

To Vico, who came a generation earlier, again, ‘words’ or ‘linguistic forms’ are keys to the mental, social and cultural life of societies, present and past!

Indeed words shape us! Words make us! Words also break us! Such is the power latent within words! In short, words, carefully used, become the basic building blocks of a beautiful relationship too!

Such is the power, such is the lure! Such is the charm and such the grace contained within  our ‘words!’

This series, hopes to tap a wee bit into this grandiose power that lay behind ‘words,’ in their myriad facets and avatars, from literature to linguistics!

Cardinal Newman, like Stephen Leacock, and other educationists of his ilk, had his own ideals and ideas for a University. In this regard, he stood an opportunity to give a host of lectures on the topic, ‘The Idea of a University,’ in Ireland, way back in 1852.

And in this wonderful lecture series, Newman provides a powerful articulation for a liberal arts education. To him, the primary aim of education is to develop and to nurture the mind of the learner, and NOT to churn out information in chunks to the student. (And today, Google and Wikipedia combined, as we would all well agree, can do that with ease, much better than the teacher!)

In this regard, his definition of the term ‘gentleman’ has such intense rubrics that seek to bring out the power latent within ‘words!’

The first time I came across this wonderful definition to the term ‘gentleman’ was in a lecture class by late Dr. Ranjan Samuel!

Dr. Ranjan was such a passionate and committed professor who used to inculcate in his students a sense of discipline and decorum in such suave and elegant ways that highly endeared him to us all! Never once have we seen Dr. Ranjan getting angry with his students ever! His words were always so dignified and gentle! And he had in ample measure, what Bertrand Russell in his ‘Education and Discipline’ would call ‘tact’, and he also knew full well the Jidduji dictum that, the key to discipline is NOT in the hands of the teacher, but in the hands of the student! And so his classes always had an ennobling effect on the student’s conduct!

His refrain, in each of his classes was on the power of ‘words’ on people! Quoting Newman, he used to say,

‘A gentleman is one who never inflicts pain on anybody by his words or actions!’

How beautifully he’s summed up a gentleman for us all!

For more on his elucidations concerning the virtues of a gentleman, you may want to read from our earlier blogpost on Newman HERE.

Newman, as I further learnt, goes on to compile some indispensable attributes that qualify a person to be a gentleman!

‘The true gentleman in like manner carefully avoids whatever may cause a jar or a jolt in the minds of those with whom he is cast,’ says Newman.

‘He respects piety and devotion; he even supports institutions as venerable, beautiful, or useful, to which he does not assent; He is a friend of religious toleration, and that, not only because his philosophy has taught him to look on all forms of faith with an impartial eye, but also from the gentleness and effeminacy of feeling, which is the attendant on civilization.’

‘He never speaks of himself except when compelled, never defends himself by a mere retort; he has no ears for slander or gossip, is scrupulous in imputing motives to those who interfere with him, and interprets everything for the best.’

‘He is never mean or little in his disputes, never takes unfair advantage, never mistakes personalities or sharp saying for arguments, or insinuates evil which he dare not say out. From a long-sighted prudence, he observes the maxim of the ancient sage, that we should ever conduct ourselves towards our enemy as if he were one day to be our friend.’

‘He has too much good sense to be affronted at insults, he is too well employed to remember injuries, and too indolent to bear malice. He is patient, forbearing, and resigned, on philosophical principles; he submits to pain, because it is inevitable, to bereavement, because it is irreparable, and to death, because it is his destiny.’

‘If he engages in controversy of any kind, his disciplined intellect preserves him from the blundering discourtesy of better, perhaps, but less educated minds; who, like blunt weapons, tear and hack instead of cutting clean, who mistake the point in argument, waste their strength on trifles, misconceive their adversary, and leave the question more involved than they find it.’

‘He may be right or wrong in his opinion, but he is too clear-headed to be unjust; he is as simple as he is forcible, and as brief as he is decisive.’

What lovely qualities laid out for us all in a platter!

And herein, ladies and gentlemen, lies the skyhigh powers of real, ennobling literature. To make a person cultured, civilized, lady-like and gentlemanly, well-groomed in etiquette, dignified in bearing, gracious in manners, and their like.

Ample evidences abound in literatures from across the world, that connect to these lovely virtues exemplified by Newman, chief among which are the qualities of empathy, tolerance, peace, love, goodness etc in great measure!

Maya Angelou in her autobiographical novel, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, provides such intense and detailed descriptions of growing up black in a racist society.

Although, initially, she has a growing feeling of abandonment, very soon, even as she joins a bevy of such abandoned children, hunting down unbroken bottles and selling them, (with a white girl from Missouri, a Mexican girl from Los Angeles and a black girl from Oklahoma), she spends almost a month on the streets with these abandoned folk, who, as she later says, “set a tone of tolerance for my life.” 

Hence, her own pain of abandonment has made her extremely sensitive to the pain of other abandoned children around her, and to their emotional turmoil as well! And as the novel proceeds further on, Maya, gradually grows into a lady who could keep her dignity with such finesse, in the midst of insults and injustices, by her sheer perseverance and tolerance. So much so that, she soon starts feeling more comfortable being herself. Now she has evolved as a lady! She is no more the passive, reticent and shy girl that she once used to be! She is now, not a wee bit worried about how others perceive her, or look at her, because she knows with such convincing surety, who she truly is! (phenomenal woman, as she herself says!)

Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre proves another paradigm for this virtue of tolerance! Indeed the power of Helen’s words are so therapeutic on Jane that they transform her life a full 360 degrees!

Helen and Jane

Jane, like Maya, again, struggles with a profound sense of loneliness and abandonment. It is at this point of time, in her loneliness, that her friend Helen’s philosophy of tolerance and her encouraging words act a great stimulus on the impulsive Jane!

At school, Helen is quite often taken to task by Mrs. Scatcherd for no fault of hers.

(On an aside, I should add that, Charlotte Bronte, in this intense story, has woven with such finesse and grace, amazingly valuable lessons for life and living in such great abundance for us all!)

So yes, coming back to Helen, although Helen answers with elegance some of the questions that even her classmates cannot, she is not appreciated or praised by Mrs. Scatcherd anytime. Rather, Mrs. Scatcherd picks on her for being dirty and disagreeable, and has her flogged quite often. But then, now comes out some invaluable lessons for life from Helen Burns to Jane.

Jane cannot comprehend Helen’s philosophy of tolerance at all. Jane hence says,

“If people were always kind and obedient to those who are cruel and unjust, the wicked people would have it all their own way: they would never feel afraid, and so they would never alter, but would grow worse and worse. When we are struck at without a reason, we should strike back again very hard; I am sure we should—so hard as to teach the person who struck us never to do it again. […] I must dislike those who, whatever I do to please them, persist in disliking me; I must resist those who punish me unjustly. It is as natural as that I should love those who show me affection, or submit to punishment when I feel it is deserved.”

Now Helen Burns comes out with her philosophy of tolerance, when she says,

What a singularly deep impression her injustice seems to have made on your heart... Would you not be happier if you tried to forget her severity, together with the passionate emotions it excited? Life appears to me too short to be spent in nursing animosity, or registering wrongs.

I can so clearly distinguish between the criminal and his crime; I can so sincerely forgive the first while I abhor the last… If all the world hated you, and believed you wicked, while your own conscience approved you, and absolved you from guilt, you would not be without friends.

So much for the power of words to ‘make’ people, not to ‘break’ them!

This transformative power of words, this therapeutic power within words, this healing balmy power within words, are the domain proper of any 'practitioner of literature!'