Second Letter to Uncle Sam

79,

One can be modern AND preserve the past. The characterless and inferiority complexed SAs cannot comprehend it. Look at European states and now the Eastern and Central Europeans, accompalishing both with a balance.

This is what happens when monkeys are leaders and they have a razor in their hands (Bandar they hath ch ustara). Most sikh architecture in E Punjab was and is being destroyed by these monkeys.

Re: amrita # 70

I am sure that there a few books about Lahore. Secondly, you are welcome to come to Lahore, because there is a lot to see in Lahore and Lahore, whether one likes it or not, does leave a deep impression on the visitor.

As to Delhi, I am certain that the sentiment is real because my mother also remembers parts of Lahore, which do not exist anymore, but I guess that is the price we all have to pay to keep abreast of modernity and modern times.

Thanks for your comments!

Ciao

HP # 64.

Every story by Krishan Chandar is a gem... if Bedi had written it it would have been something else.... !! What is all this unsubstantiated ranting ? You have some kind of an instrument of measurement of literary excellence from which you take these readings ?? Ridiculous.

I dont think you are not Ahle Zaban. I think you are. You only said you are not to make your argument (??) look unbiased. But if you really are not....then I feel really really sorry for your humble submission before those self trumpeted thaikaydaars of urdu. What low self esteem!

For god`s sake.... both sentences are correct. The use of ``ghanton`` has ABSOLUTELY no relevance to whether its ``ham`` or ``main``. Are you crazy or what ?

73 echoboom,
well done.

Anyone read ``Bajang Aamad`` by Colonel Mohammed Khan?? He used to be my father`s immediate boss at one time, and had a sad home life that is nowhere reflected in the humor in the book. But a great book that I plan to read cover to cover soon as I can get hold of a copy (it is still in print). I still vaguely remember when it came out first time. Read a bit of it then, and still remember some neat little pieces: How he saw an old woman saying prayers next to him in a mosque in Egypt (he was there as part of the British Indian Army contingent in WWII) - as if the sight of a woman saying prayers in a mosque was not a culture shock enough for him, the old woman was also puffing at a cigarette as she said her namaaz. My father had a very high regard for this gentleman, and that says a lot about a man if his immediate subordinates respect him and think of him as a friend rather than a boss.

Gill sahib:

``Tiraa Ishque meiN kaisay chhoRRe dooN, miri umr bhhUr kee talaash hai``

uuS kay Ishque kai kayee raastay haiN, aur yeh koi upnay bUss meiN toa hai naheeN kay raastay kaa taa`uN kraiN. Aray jubb aaghaaz-i safar hee upnay bUss meiN naa thhaa aur jubb pehla pehla qadam utthha, girtay pURrtay, toa koee soach kay toa naheeN uthhayaa thha naa? ubb Voh jahaaN lai jaaey.

HaaN jo qadam bhhee ,b-zaum-e khuud, upnee soach sey uthhayaa vaheeN ta`asuf ka mauquaa mila.

``sunee hikayat-e hastee, toa drmiyaaN sey sunee
naa ibtidaa kee khabar hai, naa intihaa maa`loom``

Echoboom Sahib:

My misfortune that I didn`t read much of Mustafa Zaidi although I knew that he was a first class Urdu poet. I read him here and there but not consistently. I didn`t own any of his books. His poem that you posted is enchanting.

Life is a mixture of strange things. There was a time when I was knee-deep (goday-goday) into Urdu literature. Then a time came when I found beauty in `sediment transport in river flows.` I got involved in studying and analyzing the profiles and properties of sand dunes in rivers. What a contrast? There is indeed beauty in river mechanics and those who are doing it, they`re hooked by it. I was hooked by it but now I am into other things; the things in which I was always interested but didn`t have time and had saved them for my retired life. Life is good; it has been very kind to me so far.

Thanks for your good feelings about me. I only express my views (aazaad taffakarat); I do not try to convert anyone. Wishing you well and ``Allah karay zor-e-sukhn aur ziaadah``,

Mohammad Gill

Manto`s views on ``modern`` literature & about progressives. This was published in Jan `41.

I hope everyone will benefit from it.

HindustanTimes.com » Infotainment » Cinema » Story






Manto set for rebirth on screen

WIDE ANGLE | Saibal Chatterjee

New Delhi, March 18, 2005|18:41 IST














C.P.Dwibedi brinig Manto to Big Screen

Chandraprakash Dwivedi, who made his big-screen directorial debut in 2003 with the award-winning adaptation of Amrita Pritam’s celebrated Partition epic, Pinjar, is now working on a script woven around the life and work of Urdu short story writer Saadat Hasan Manto

Manto chronicled the anguish and madness of the post-Independence communal riots better and more starkly than anybody other writer.

According to producer Anish Ranjan of Talking Pictures, the proposed film will weave together elements from Manto’s life with four of his best-known stories, including the one that brought him much posthumous fame, Toba Tek Singh.





“The film begins at the point where an ailing Manto is in an asylum and then it fans out in different directions,” he explains.

Manto was as much a chronicler as a victim of the Partition. The division of the subcontinent caused him great emotional agony and he poured his feeling on to the pages of his books.

Manto, who began his career in All India Radio in Delhi before shifting to Mumbai to make a career as a film scriptwriter, died in Lahore exactly 50 year ago a few months shy of the age of 43. He left behind a sizeable body of work that said a lot about him personally and about the times he lived in.

Says Anish: “I had initially envisaged a film based on three Manto stories to be directed by three different directors. When I contacted Dr Dwivedi, he was already working on a script inspired by Manto’s life. So we decided to get together.” The script is almost ready and work on the yet to be titled film is due to begin later this year.

In an interview before the release of Pinjar, Dwivedi had mentioned Manto as one of the writers he had read while researching for a Partition-era subject. “He has written some of the most meaningful stories about the pathos of Partition,” the physician-turned-filmmaker had said.

Pinjar was a commercial failure, so Dwivedi’s fame still rests primarily on the successful television serial Chanakya, which he scripted and directed. His interest in serious literature and history is well known and explains his attempts to mine serious writing for the purpose of understanding the politics and social realities of our times.

Manto lived a short but extremely eventful life. In an amazingly fecund writing career spanning a little over two decades, he produced 22 collections of short stories, one novel, five collections of radio plays, three books of essays, two anthologies of personal sketches and numerous film scripts, including Mirza Ghalib, which was made after Manto moved to Lahore in 1948.

Although Manto spent many years working with film studios in Mumbai, not too many screen adaptations have been made of his stories. Veteran Bengali filmmaker Mrinal Sen based his mid-1990s film Antareen on a Manto story, while more recently debutante filmmaker Fareeda Mehta crafted Kali Salwar out of multiple tales authored by the Urdu writer.

For someone like myself,a product of urban, cosmopoiltan, westernized india all this is downright fascinating.I have now changed my opinion of Mumbai and other indian cities.I am conditioned to think that NOW is the happening time in the lives of urban indians.NOT SO!!!.THEN was when it was all happening, the wine , women/men and the song.There is a certain innocence lost that we can never retrieve.Writers like Manto remind us of those times.When people were human.They lived, loved, wined , dined, procreated and died.

Re: # 66
feroz - that was a lovely post... i think that feeling of nostalgic loss is something that everyone can relate to. i have never been to lahore although i would like to and reading what you wrote makes me want to all the more. a few years back i came across a collection of essays on delhi edited by khushwant singh and i loved it... i could see the city as it used to be centuries ago and i could see the city my father knew as well as the one i knew/know. is there a similar collection or book on lahore?

Another Manto, as far as intensity & boldness is concerned, but his forte was poetry.....Mustafa Zaidi.

This I am writing here to badal the zaiquaa of Ahl-e ZuubaaN and ahle-bUdzuubaan alike (not necessarily immigrant-citizens! Haaa Haa Haa).

Gill Sahib`s attention is sought very especially here because if he has not read this before, he would truly truly appreciate it. Some of it has been ``corrected`` from memory but one word still eludes me ( I put `` ..?..``). Gill Sahib may or may not realise but I ``understand`` him more than he realises (a lot of stuff I write here for public consumption) and I may not be ``that`` what he might be thinking.

Suffice it to say that I am fully in-tune with the sentiments expressed in this very
excellent piece of art.

FIRAQUE

HUM NAY JIS TARA-H SABOU TORA HAI HUM JANTAY HAI(N)

Dil-e pur khooN kee maiy-i-naab ka qatra qatra
joi-y almas tha, darya-e shab-e nisaN tha
Aik ik boond main ``...?..`` thhee mooj-e kausar
Aik ik aks had-deese harm-e eemaN thha
aik hee rah pohanchtee thee tajjalee kay hazoor

HUM NAY uUS RAH SAY MOU(n) MORRA HAI HUM JANTAY HAIN

Mah paroo(n) kay talismaat main tara afsoo(n)
shaivaa-h o shObda-h O rasam O ravayaat main tu
khaa`b kee bazm teri, deeda-h-e bay-khawab tira
Suba-h kay noor main tu, neend bhari raat main tu
dil kee dharkan kaa taray qurb kay lamhoo(n) pay madar

HUM NAY JIS TARAH TUJHHAI CHHOARRA HAI HUM JANTAY HAI(N)
...........................................................
Mustafa Zaidi

The story is so fresh and it gives one a clear picture of bombay during the 40s.

What makes Manto so charming is his honesty and lack of fear in telling it like he sees and feels it. Few have this ability.

``At Bombay Central, I saw a Negro soldier who was so muscular that at his very sight I shrank to half my size... He flashed a big smile at me. His dark lips looked so attractive that I wanted to kiss them. End of story. ``

Khalid Hasan Saheb:

Both this and the earlier letter show the power of Manto`s writing and the limits of translation, which you have done very well. Not having read the original, I was constantly wondering things like: did the original use `kala` or `habshi` for black?
It`s a tribute to Manto that much of what he wrote is still relevant today for the U.S, although millet is no longer the staple of even poor desis and Bollywood girls can compete quite well with Hollywood girls in the matter of percentage of exposed skin.

re: rozaiba and Mantolives

I need to clarify a few points.

The house, which Manto used to live in and in which his daughter lives in presently, was re-modeled about 5 years ago. Both the exterior and the interior of the original 31 Laxshmi Mansions was re-designed. The original house and its layout was, in actual terms, much like the inside of Meraj Khaild`s house, which we all visited. In case of Nighat Manto`s house, the inside walls were demolished to increase the size of the living and the dining rooms and the kitchen was re-modeled and made more modern.

Still, all these changes do not lessen the history associated with house, but most people passing by, hardly realize that the brick footpath they are walking on was once walked upon by Manto, Meraj Khalid and Sir Zafarullah Khan. Little do they realize or know that maybe in the garden, which is situated in the middle of Laxshmi Mansions, Mani Shanker Aiyar might have played as a young boy. The history of Lahore is disappearing before our eyes so quickly, that we better preserve it in pictures because soon, the Lahore of today will only exist in our memories.

Within my own lifetime, Lahore has changed. The area, where the Crow Eaters is now located, there used to be toy stores, where my grandfather used to buy me toys and now, it is lined with jewelry stores. The Crow Eaters itself is owned by M. P. Bandhara, who happens to be the brother of Bapsi Sidwa and in the 1960, it used to be a wine store. Tollington Market was still a place to shop and it used to be filled with stores of all kinds. It was not uncommon to see girls on bicycles and scooters breezing past Charing Cross on the Mall. Opposite Charing Cross, there was a small garden filled with trees and later the trees were chopped down and in their place, a needle of marble was erected to commemorate the Islamic Conference of 1974, which was held in Lahore that year. In the same garden, there used to a granite statute of Queen Victoria which was removed and in its place, there was a glass case installed encasing a Qu`ran.

My most early memories of Lahore are of our house in Gulberg numbered 4R. Now, the house is an office of a denist and sits nearly opposite Cafe Zouk and next to Cafe Alyanto. I remember that I used to have a white Russian terrier, who was killed one day by a speeding car and the park, where I used to play, is still there; people still play there now. 4R was the house, I was living in when the war of 1965 started and during the war, in evenings, we used to take our Fiat and drive to my grandmother`s house in Laxshmi Mansions to spend the night. My mother tells me that the nights used to be warm and since ACs were not that common in those days, we used to sleep in the veranda. I am told, though I confess that I do not remember it, that my uncle used to take me to the rooftop and show me the ``dogfights`` in the skies over Lahore. There used to be tongas in Beadon Road, and now there is nothing there but a gridlocked and congested traffic screaming its impatience.

Change is invitable, but it is also bittersweet and we may forget what has changed from the old to the new, but we seldom forget the saddness, which tinges our memories of the past.

Ciao

Echoboom Sahib:

I am impressed of your interest in, and your knowledge of Urdu literature. I also read quite a bit of it but after 1970s, I moved on to some other things and didn`t have much time for Urdu literature nor any easy access to it.

I was very much imressed of Manto`s unique skills of story telling. Unfortuately he was born in a wrong country. I wanted to write a piece in his memory althoug I didn`t know him well from close quarters. I had read so much of him and about him that occasionally I had the feeling as if I knew him personally. I published a piece ``Bald Angel`` at chowk on December 8, 2003, and I felt very much relieved afterwards, in the same way like how one feels when he has cleared a heavy debt. In that essay, I had given the correct year, i.e., 1955, when he read his story at Lahore College of Engineering. Wishing you well,

Mohammad Gill