Last
Saturday, 20 April, I was invited to speak at a book launch. Thousand
Thoughts written by Larysa (Laura) Savinska is an unusual book. It has
Larysa’s original poems in English, in Russian and as if bilingualism is not
enough, three poems in Ukrainian.
Linguistic
theory says you can write poems only in your mother tongue. Because poetry is
about feelings and emotions. Our strongest sentiments are attached to our
mother tongue, our first language, the language we learn naturally, without having
to cram grammar books. Larysa proves that theory wrong. She writes her poems with
equal passion in English and Russian.
*****
Jean-Marc
Dewaele from the University of London has spent a substantial part of his
academic career investigating how swearwords and taboo words, the F language, affect
multilinguals. (Incredible the kind of things academics pick for research). His paper begins with the drunk and angry Captain Haddock. Tintin and Captain
Haddock are surrounded by armed Arab bandits in the desert. (The Crab with
the Golden Claws, HergĂ©, 1940). When captain Haddock’s whiskey bottle is
shot to pieces by the bandits, he releases a mouthful of oaths in French, his
mother tongue. The swearing, of course, is only as strong as the kids’ books
can swallow. Anyone fond of Tintin is familiar with the ‘mille milliards de
mille sabords’ (billions of blue blistering barnacles). The Captain’s swearing
is so powerful, the bandits run away.
The
conclusion of Dewaele’s paper is more interesting. His research finds that
swear words in our mother tongue offend us more than those in languages learnt
later in life. This emotional force in mother-tongue applies to both the giver
and the receiver of the swear words.
Those
of you who can use swear words or have been sworn at in various languages can
verify how true his research is.
*****
In the
discussion on multi-lingual writing, Nabokov’s story is quite telling.
Vladimir
Nabokov, the Lolita fame, wrote an autobiographical memoir called Speak,
Memory in 1951. (In the USA, it was called Conclusive Evidence). The
book essentially covered the period of his childhood and adolescence. As a
child, Nabokov grew up in Saint Petersburg, in Tsar’s Russia. After the
communist revolution, his family fled Russia and emigrated to England. Nabokov
enrolled at the University of Cambridge. After graduating, he moved to Berlin.
In the Second World War, once Hitler’s troops began advancing, the family fled
again, this time to Manhattan, USA. That is where he wrote Speak, Memory, a
memoir in English.
The
following year, a Russian publisher approached Nabokov and requested him to
write a book for the Russian readers. Nabokov offered Speak, Memory; now
to be published in Russian language. Nabokov, being Nabokov, a prolific writer,
didn’t want to translate. He began writing the same book in Russian.
A
strange thing happened. Memories, associations, smells began to flood his mind.
He recalled several stories he had completely forgotten when writing in
English. The Russian memoir Drugie Berega (Other Shores) was published
in Russia in 1954. Initially meant to be a simple translation, it was a very
different book than the memoir in English.
Nabokov’s
first two decades of life were spent in Russia. Apparently his memories,
emotions, feelings from that period were closely associated with the Russian
language. Though he was fluent in both languages, it was a mistake to try and
capture the Russian period in English.
After
the publication in Russian, Nabokov became restless and began translating the
Russian version, which he considered to be authentic, back in English. In 1966,
the memoir was published in English once again. Now called: Speak Memory: An
Autobiography Revisited. In its preface, Nabokov acknowledged his
difficulties in trying to fit the Russian memories in English. “This
re-Englishing of a Russian re-version of what had been an English re-telling of
Russian memories in the first place, proved to be a diabolical task….” (Pp.12-13)
*****
In
1980, our flat in Bombay got its first phone- an immobile landline. It had a
six digit number – 465416. The six digit number showed how few people had
phones despite Bombay’s large populace. We were among the last to get a phone.
I began to memorise the numbers of my friends, relatives, and colleagues. By
1986, I was holding more than 200 Bombay phone numbers in my head. I didn’t
work as a telephone operator or a spy; I simply loved numbers and was proud of
my memory.
In 1986
I moved to Moscow, and began to memorise the Moscow phone numbers. Moscow had
seven digits. By 1990, I could easily recite more than 100 Moscow phone
numbers. The following year, Soviet Union collapsed. In 1992, Ruble collapsed.
Calling India from Moscow became dirt cheap. I thought I should surprise a few Indian
friends by calling them from Moscow. In my Moscow flat, I still had a dialing
phone. I tried to recall the Bombay numbers, but struggled. I was confident
about my Bombay residence number, but most other numbers were blurred.
However,
as soon as I came back on vacation to Bombay, and put my index finger on the
phone dial, all those numbers came back. Now I had difficulty trying to recall
the Moscow numbers.
This
was one of the most bizarre experiences of my life. Both sets of numbers were stored
in my head. But I could recall with ease only the local numbers.
*****
I
notice something similar with the languages I learnt.
I left
Russia 20 years ago. I rarely speak Russian now. But whenever I land in Moscow,
words and expressions start flowing from my lips.
Since
leaving Poland at the end of 2002, I have been there only twice. And still in
November 2017, as soon as I breathed the Warsaw air, I could converse in Polish
with the old fluency. On the third day, I was cracking jokes in Polish.
I may
not have had as many lives as a cat does, but I have distinctly experienced
Indian, Russian and Polish incarnations.
*****
If you
speak only one language and live in only one country, you have only a single
life.
If you
spend a considerable number of years abroad, learn the local language and
customs, mingle with the local community, (marry a local), start talking in
that language in your dreams, work along with the natives, immerse yourself in
that land, more importantly love the place and the people, that is reincarnation.
I don’t know how credible the philosophical or religious concept of
reincarnation is, but I certainly know that people who become part of another
country and culture are reborn in the same life.
This is
what happened to the author of Thousand Thoughts. For the past thirteen
years, Larysa has made India her home, married an Indian, at her home in Goa
she speaks in English with her family. She has even renamed her Indian avatar –
Laura. She works as a coach and motivator- all her clients are Indian. In those
thirteen years, she has experienced emotional ups and downs that have found an
expression in her poems. Her Russian poems were written in Russia, her English
poems are written in India.
In her
poem Golden Cage, a lovely metaphor, Larysa writes about the people who shy
away from experiencing another life: (Only an excerpt here)
There was a bird in a
golden cage
A tiny singing bird
I loved her songs, I
sang along
Enjoyed her voice a lot
One day I thought I’ll
free the bird
Allow her to fly
It must be sad to stay
inside
And never hit the sky
I’ve opened the little
golden gate
But the silly bird
stayed in
It’s all she ever knew
She was quite happy here
I’m like that bird, the
whole sky is mine
And what do I choose
instead?
I’ve locked myself
inside the cage
Of what I thought is my
nest
I look outside, perhaps
I feel
That there is more out
there
But I’m not ready for
the sky
It’s so familiar here….
*****
Linguistic
theorists who claim poems can be written only in one’s mother tongue didn’t
take into account that reincarnation in another land can produce poetry in
another language.
Ravi
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