"Why is a woman's intellectual prowess mistaken for madness?"
Volga does it again - raising important questions about our society, filling gaps in history in a seamless manner, her imagination full and fierce in this work that provides a minor enlightenment for the reader even within the precincts of a room.
About 175 pages long, with a slow start, the book introduces us to Siddhartha Gautama, son of Mahamaya Devi (who dies seven days after childbirth) and king Suddhodhana of Kapilavastu. Mahaprajapati Gotami brings up Siddhartha, the sensitive child right from his birth.
Siddhartha's extremely loving and compassionate nature, learning Kshtriya skills only for knowledge and never to wield superiority over foes, hatred for violence and bloodshed, inclination to question the real purpose of life and human relations leave his parents in utter doubt and despair.
Time binds Siddhartha in marriage with beautiful and industrious Yashodhara, daughter of a rich landlord Bimbanana from neighboring Koliya village. Both realise similar questions intrigue them, they denounce similar practices of the society and yearn to serve the humanity.
To start with, it appears Siddhartha under tutelage of Kalamuni and Sramanas, already on his path to attain true knowledge of the world shapes up attentive Yashodhara's way of thinking. The story changes course post 100 pages where with an incident, Yashodhara realises that she can't become a pathfinder herself and must pave the path for her husband instead. She vows to make it comfortable for him to break familial ties without guilt, urges him with an undying passion to lead the world out of darkness of dogma into the light of rational thought.
How Yashodhara manages to achieve this, what are the obstacles she faces from members of her family, what happens to her when Siddhartha leaves the palace and their few days old son in search of the ultimate truth form the rest of the story.
Behind every successful man is a woman - they say; this book is the story of a woman who with single minded devotion nurtured her husband's dream as her own and catalysed the transformation of Siddhartha to Gautama Buddha.
Allowing some room for further discussion, here I would like to state the importance of translation.
" To fight a war you just need to go with a weapon into the battlefield. There you fight on one side and win over the other. Preventing a war is different. It is fighting with both the sides and winning over both sides. That is very hard." - page 94, as spoken by Siddhartha Gautama to Yashodhara. (written in Telugu by Volga, translated by PSV Prasad). Some lines stay with you even days after you are done with the book.
Within the confines permitted by a language, the translator replicates original ideas, emotions and events with best and sincere intentions to retain the sheen as in the native language. And to achieve this, one wields an superior command in both the languages in question. Despite that prowess, a translator barely lays claim to the success of having made the original work reach millions of more readers.
If not for translation, I couldn't have read Tagore's Choker Bali. I would have missed the brilliant pieces of literature from Vaikom and Thakazhi of earlier times and that of KR Meera and TD Ramakrishnan from present. I wouldn't have developed a soft corner for Bengali literature if I hadn't read Mahaswetha Devi and Buddhadeva Bose. I wouldn't have got back to reading so fervently after a break of few years had someone not translated the book 'A Man called Ove' from Swedish.
Going along a predefined and chartered path with limited freedom and creativity under tight control is undoubtedly a tough job. It for this reason that people like Arunava Sinha, Lakshmi Holmstrom and Rakshanda Jalil impress me and command greater respect. Their names drive me to pick books without a second thought.
Each language has a flow, a structure, elements of beauty and poignance that make it unique but as a simple mortal with a clear inability to master multiple languages, translated works are only a boon in my opinion. While we feel something is amiss and lost in the course of translation, it is only a question of viewing a cup as half full or half empty.
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