`Wasafiri` celebrates with literary giants

London`s South Bank hosted a series of programmes yesterday (Saturday, October 31, 2009) to celebrate the Wasafiri (http://www.wasafiri.org/) magazine`s silver jubilee. The first of these was the keynote address by Ngugi wa Thiongo, itself preceded by a formal welcome and introduction by the magazine`s editor Susheila Nasta, in which she traced its history, progress and relevance on the current global multi-cultural scene, after which Ngugi was led in by Amiatta Forna.

Ngugi`s spoke eloquently about the place of European languages in the former colonised lands, how they have come to displace or even in many cases destroy the vernaculars of the local people, and where this is leading to in terms of loss of indigeneous cultures etc. The essence of his message really was that given the world we live in, while there is no denying or getting away from the attraction and predominance of English, French or Portuguese as the universal lingua franca, what is needed is a recognition of the value of cross-lingual interaction - not just in one but rather in every direction - for keeping the old traditions, and in particular local languages, alive, and for spreading an awareness of their existence generally. While we can see the benefit of translating Shakespeare into Swahili, for example, a reversal of the traffic flow could help foster greater understanding across cultures! He was his usual self in his presentation - modest, unhurried, soft-spoken, self-confident - and remained focused and consistent throughout. He developed his theme patiently and with many anecdotal references. He mentioned a recent workshop he had conducted in a certain part of Nigeria where none of the students thought it fit to include their own vernacular as one of the languages they knew or wrote in as a matter of course, because they did not regard it as on a par with English or another European language. On the technical front, his advice to them and other budding authors was always "write, write, write and you will get it right some day" of course made sense.

I put to him that while for us, growing up in English was in a sense an imperial imposition, what we are witnessing now is a post-colonial paradigm shift on account of migration and globalisation, and that the increasing influence (or invasion) of English has to be seen as an acquisition, as an enhancement; his answer was that this must not be at the expense of the traditional and historical and that unfortunately what is happening is almost that or near to it. I am paraphrasing of course, but this was the gist.

In the next session, we had the pleasure of seeing the distinguished mother and daughter novelists and academics, Anita and Kiran Desai, together appear on stage in a conversation mode chaired by Maggie Gee. They made a lovely, unassuming, charming and engaging pair, who spoke un-selfconsciously about their background and emergence as writers. They readily admitted that there is a large element of `the outsider` in their writings about their homeland. We had readings by both, Anita from `Zig-Zag` and Kiran from `The Inheritance of Loss`. In Q&A I made the point that while it was clear that the hinterland of their imagination was rooted in India, their perspectives however gave too stark a picture of Indian society and wondered if or why there were no redeeming features in such portrayal. In this connection, I mentioned that I had read `Inheritance` while we were actually touring the region (Kolkatta, Darjeeling, Kalimpong, Gangtok, Pelling etc) and that while I as a diasporan Indian could relate to Kiran`s `onlooker` perspective in that context (the festering anger, the degradation, the deprivation etc = `the loss`) (while in Anita`s `Fasting and Feasting`, there was the characterisation of the Indian student going to America to confront and be exposed to the extreme riches there, in contrast to his own humble living conditions back home) wasn`t there something missing? Anita`s response was that that, unfortunately, was the harsh reality of India, but that the balancing factor in their books lay in the humour and humanity of some of the characters themselves.

So it was really a most satisfying long afternoon. The celebration ended with a concert of musical entertainment in the evening that we alas could not attend.

RAMNIK SHAH
Surrey England