Shakespeare Put On Powered Lens To See Hamlet

Papai Patra, 

Research Fellow, 

Centre for Translation and Literary Geography (CTLG), 

University of Calcutta

For years, Shakespeare has been a matter of huge literary debate. So many critical pieces caused a great havoc to the coast of academia since the emergence of Shakespearean study. In the true sense, Shakespearean canon is not a single piece to swallow. Those 38 dramas had created a special literary field which is still being studied by the Scholars today. Now to draw the Kind attention towards Shakespeare’s tragic character modulation, I should prefer to mainly four tragic heroes from his four world famous, epoch making tragedies, namely Macbeth, Hamlet, Othello and King Lear. Shakespeare can be addressed as an ‘Androgynous mind’ by Coleridge, but he was a true zeitgeist. By the deep impact of socio-political and socio-economic situation of the Elizabethan England, Shakespeare was paralysed with a literary craving to write. Each of his plays hints at those societal situations. He moulded each of his tragic heroes with a supersensitive touch of ‘Experience’, be it Macbeth, King Lear or Othello. But interestingly in the case of Hamlet he did not do so.

Hamlet is probably Shakespeare’s longest tragedy. In the creation of Hamlet, the character, Shakespeare probably changed the mould. The aspect of committing a murder or any crime takes a special twist here. Have you ever thought why the world famous ambivalent situation is present in Hamlet ?

“To be, or not to be, that is the question.”

During the murder, Macbeth was not in a situation like this. He successfully killed Duncan. In the case of killing somebody he was never in an ambivalent state rather he was so in the case of gaining the crown, the prophecy of three witches. Othello took the same Land here. When he was killing Desdemona on the bed, he was not in a state of mind like ‘to be or not to be’, he just killed her. Rather, he told himself that, “Where Othello should go?” Also for King Lear, Lear was not in a situation like Hamlet. He judged his three daughters, Goneril, Cordelia and Regan in a parameter and distributed his property between them. Though he did some unknown injustice. So in the case of killing somebody these three characters or tragic heroes were never in a situation like ‘To be or not to be.’ Macbeth had the experience of battles, Othello was so and King Lear was likely to hold the same experience. Only Hamlet was projected through a different lens. T.S Eliot rightly commented on Hamlet, the character and Hamlet, the creation in his 1919 essay ‘Hamlet and His Problems’ that it is not a masterwork but an ‘artistic failure.’ The play is quite confusing and causing uneasiness in a number of ways. Hamlet becomes so because of Hamlet, the character. Some believed ‘Hamlet’ to be ‘Shakespeare’ himself and some not. But it is very much true that Hamlet is an artistic failure because Hamlet couldn’t articulate his own problems. The work lacked something called ‘Objective Correlative’, a term that Eliot coined and popularized to a great extent. For example, the famous ‘Sleepwalking scene’ in Macbeth philosophies the action to relate but in Hamlet, audience didn’t find anything like that.

Again, many people may have thought Hamlet, a work of art because it is interesting. But it was T.S Eliot who addressed the play as the ‘Mona Lisa’ of literature. The play is intractable in the words of Eliot. The comparison went to the zenith’s height. As the greatness of da Vinci’s masterpiece lies in Lisa’s mystifying gaze and strange smile, Shakespeare’s Hamlet too is mystifying and unusual. From a critical perspective, Eliot is ‘impudent’ in his approach towards Hamlet because he found out the problem but didn’t provide any resolution for the same. The exact thing for Hamlet is with the exceptional Shakespearean mould. Shakespeare projected the character ‘Hamlet’ like a schoolboy, like you, like me, like us who didn’t have any previous experience of killing somebody like Macbeth, Othello or Lear. He simply found out the information regarding his father’s death and so acted upon the events accordingly to take the revenge. Here Shakespeare gave birth something called ‘the motif’ that takes the entire thrall of an innocent subject to make it experienced. Interestingly, Hamlet’s action was to take a revenge but still it is not a revenge tragedy rather it is a critique of revenge tragedy in a way. The gullibility of a school boy like Hamlet led Shakespeare to create an artistic failure subject. Probably Shakespeare planned to do so otherwise he couldn’t articulate his own literary problem that is the emergence of the famous philosophical statement like “To be, or not to be, that is the question.”

POSTMODERNISM THUS ENJOYED THE COLLAPSE OF THE BOURGEOIS AND THE REALIST LITERARY TREND IN ACADEMIA

Papai Patra, 

Research Fellow, 

Centre for Translation and Literary Geography (CTLG), 

University of Calcutta

The writing of a theatre history reveals almost as much about contemporary tastes and values as it does about the cultural world of the past. The period of literary history we call the English Renaissance has at its core in the new commercial theatre of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In the 16th century, means the time of Shakespeare, there was a very important transition in the society. The entire value or ethics of the Elizabethan society was shifted from the Old Feudal System to the New Bourgeois Sensibility. Before the Elizabethan era the Feudal lords could control the entire mechanism of society but with the rise of social and political consciousness, ‘Bourgeois sensibility’ came in. The society was attaining a state of stability. Time as an inseparable part of human life also acquired a new state. The linearity in time became prominent. Before the mid 17th century, time was no more that much linear. The politics of seeing time in the terms of linearity is definitely a product of the ‘Bourgeois’ society’s sensibility. This sensibility subscribed the ‘Dominant ideology’. By the gradual growth of Industrialization, Bourgeois sensibility broke the Old feudal system; the lords, barons they were loosing power and power was shifted to the hands of middle class people. For example, this transition is very clear in the juncture of the high politics in Shakespeare’s epoch making tragedy Othello. Again the middle class’s fascination towards wealth during the 18th century becomes so clear in William Congreve’s 1700s comedy of manners The Way of the World where Mirabell was chasing the rich Lady Wishfort just to gain her property.

By grabbing this renaissance hand of Bourgeois sensibility, ‘Bourgeois realism’ came to the limelight. Different art forms acquired this realism. It was only after 1688, The Bloodless / Glorious Revolution, that the realist sensibility started to take the thrall of the politics of tomorrow. In the earlier feudal system the lords, barons, courtiers, they were not forced to think of tomorrow. But in the bourgeois society the middle class people were forced by a kind of reality principle to think about a better tomorrow by delaying the enjoyment of today. There was a linearity of time and stability as well. But this delay for enjoying the better tomorrow was defined as life. The linearity of time was settled in the Bourgeois realism and European Consciousness only after 1688. In a sense, this linear progression of time is a part of High politics. The politics of tomorrow is also a political strategy of constraining the revolution. Bourgeois society was always busy to have a state of stability where no alternate definition of the society itself would be possible and thus it tried to hold the centre of a stable power or ‘LOGOS’. Social institution like 'Marriage' is such a logos, even 'Family' too.

The stability of this society was absolutely asserted and brought by the ‘Print Realism’. The rise of printing technology in Europe and its influence on theatre since the publication of Shakespeare’s plays in Quartos and Folios merge with the politics of the rise and development of bourgeois realism from Seventeenth Century onwards and its attempt to confer meaning on human experiences including literature. Therefore the politics of the fixing and stabilizing the meaning of the society started with the printed text. The year 1623 is very important to mention here in this context because in this year Shakespeare’s First Folio, including 36 dramas, was published. For the first time Shakespeare, the author became a stabilized writer, the writer of the printed text. In print realism the publication of a book is a juncture of the birth of the characters in the text as well. Hamlet, the character was born in the mind of Shakespeare long before 1623 but due to the publication of the book, Hamlet the character bears another birth. His meaning as a subject [according to the Althusserian Interpellation] also became fixed. Print realism fixed all the characters, subjects and provided the meaning. Thus the ideology of print realism started to fix the ‘LOGOS’, it helped to build the ‘CENTRE’. And it was much more epistemological. Renaissance onwards, thus, fixing the meaning meant asserting the centre or ‘logos’. Therefore, printing technology benefitted the Capitalist society as well. The dominant ideology took the control of other meanings. This market extended to the reading public, for in addition to attending dramatic productions, playgoers could obtain a printed copy of the plays they saw. The 1590s and early 1600s, in fact, witnessed a comparative ‘boom’ in the printing of playbooks. Printed versions of many scripts, often with what appear to be only modest alterations from the versions provided to the companies themselves, flooded numerous booksellers’ stalls in the busy yard of St Paul’s cathedral, and elsewhere. Significantly, some of the ‘best sellers’ plays that have subsequently found an almost permanent place in the canon of English literature were dramatic texts such as The Spanish Tragedy, Doctor Faustus and so on.

With the development of ‘Theatre’, realistic representation of reality in the theatre of Bourgeois realism maintained the linearity of time and space. In ‘Realist Theatre’ the duration is long, the stage is fixed and the middle class people wanted to gain that fixed, stable position. Realist theatre couldn’t jump into time and space and thus the linearity was being encouraged. Considering reality and the narrative of reality as a stable phenomenon is a chief marker of realism. Even all the realist novels believed in the essentialist notion, another outlet of the stable meaning and again this is very much bourgeois. The novels like Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne, Tom Jones by Henry Fielding, Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert, and the novels of Samuel Richardson like Pamela, all asserted the politics of tomorrow; the realistic representation of the characters, settings took the center of the plot. In the true sense the literary realism took the front seat at first with ‘novel’ and then theatre adapted the trend with the hands of Henrik Ibsen in Norway, Anton Chekov in Russia and August Strindberg in Sweden. In German literature, 19th-century realism developed under the name of "Poetic Realism" or "Bourgeois Realism.” The larger bourgeois realism, as discussed earlier, and the theatrical realism which in Italy is better known as verismo often interacted with naturalism. ‘Realism in theatre’ shared many stylistic choices with naturalism, including a focus on everyday (middle-class) drama, ordinary speech, and dull settings. Realism and naturalism diverge chiefly on the degree of choice that characters have: while naturalism believes in the overall strength of external forces over internal decisions, realism asserts the power of the individual to choose. Ibsen’s Nora in A Doll's House can absolutely be a fine example of that sort. Though realism in theatre came in 19th century but it had nothing to do with Bourgeois realism. 19th Century’s realist theatre was the theatre of the author, the performances, roles, props everything was fixed in the script. The print culture thus was being encouraged by this and more importantly this theatre was the theatre of business; the theatre company could earn money out of the performances. In the European tradition, Nineteenth Century realistic theatre is coterminous with modern Proscenium theatre with ‘real’ décor. Realist theatre had had its own limitation, the limitation of time and space. Indeed it attained the stable state from the concept of the stable ‘Self’. 19th century’s social ethics was to some extent driven by the Cartesian ‘Cogito, ergo sum’ or ‘I think, therefore I am’. Everything of this ego/self formation philosophy of René Decartes contributed to the search of a stable self. Realist theatre considered reality as a stable phenomenon by putting the self in an account as stable.

Print culture gained the ground not only by this theatre of script or theatre of business rather by the concept of ‘author’ and ‘text’ vis-a-vis its inseparable relation and Colonialism as well. As Victor Hugo perfectly addressed printing technology as ‘mother of revolution’ it did so. During the late 17th century the printed text helped the colonial masters to spread their empire across the world based on the sense of ‘Self’ and ‘Other’, ‘Superiority’ and ‘Inferiority’. Colonisers could easily prove the culture, literature of the colonised as inferior by producing a western printed text. Even to spread the colonisers’ language in the colonies printed text as a medium was very necessary. Thus the print realism was encouraged. And again with the influence of German Idealism, Nineteenth Century aesthetic theory puts emphasis on the mind or imagination [‘Secondary’ according to S.T. Coleridge] of the author. Hence Berkeley, Hume, Kant, Comte, Schleiermacher, Hegel and Schelling took the way of sense and enlightenment, so in this second stage of bourgeois economy we have the birth of ‘Idealism’. The belief system was that the environment either does not exist, or is unknowable. Mind is the primary location. This development is the result of industrial capitalism, of the terrific power over its environment manifested by the machine. This makes it seem as if the mind is everything, and the environment nothing. It makes mind seem the sole active force generating all quality. Therefore the mind of the author becomes the absolute place to hold every phenomenon together, fixed and stable. So the author’s mind itself is a ‘LOGOS’; it helped the society to fix its meaning by the compositions appear in the printed texts.

But it was only the beginning of 20th century, the literary ground of academia started to break all the realist traditions, the logos, the centre; ‘Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold’ this was the situation. With the publication of the modern epic called, The Waste Land by T.S. Eliot in 1922, the concept of ‘Pastiche’ or the literary eclecticism was being introduced and which is in a sense a postmodern element. Due to the World War I, every ethics, structure of the society broke down. There was a sudden break of universality in various field. The concept of multiplicity in the terms of narrative formation, contextuality started to gain the ground of previous fixidity. The bourgeois concept of time melts down and space remains an atemporal space. Salvador Dali’s surrealist paintings The Persistence of Memory can be an absolute example of that sort. A modernist text tries to liberate the narrative from the limbo of time and space. Every modern text takes a musical structure, the back and forth movement. The mind of the author is not the only place to generate the meaning alone, there are other places also. Thus the bourgeois, realist trend and the stable state of the society vis-a-vis grand narrative was discouraged. This was not only happened by the text alone rather by the mode called ‘Theatre’. For film, painting, poetry the time before 1922 was modernism but for the mode of theatre it was not so. Modernism in theatre came with the experimentation of realism and naturalism. The difference between reality and illusion becomes so frail or fragile. By seconds, reality becomes illusion and vice-versa. In modern theatre, unlike the realist or proscenium theatre there was nothing called ‘fourth wall.’ The world famous German playwright Bertolt Brecht was the first to break the fourth wall of the stage by introducing the Verfremdungseffekt or ‘alienation effect’. Brecht did the experiment with the ‘form’ and ‘content’. Everytime in a Brechtean theatre one goes back to his own reality. It draws the audiences' attention to judge the reality of the theatre from the reality of one’s own real world. Due to the absence of the fourth wall, the actors can instantly make the communication with the audiences. For example, The Good Person of Szechwan by Brecht. Theatre of Tom Stoppard, Samuel Beckett, Edward Albee liberated the theatre from the cramp of time and space. The broken narrative, strange settings, dialogue with pause in Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, Endgame very clearly shows that. The ‘Absurdity’ in theatre actually created a liminal space between modernism and postmodernism. Albert Camus, Jean-Paul Charles Aymard Sartre, Samuel Beckett they were such a figure to do that. European theatre in the true sense was changed by George Bernard Shaw by embracing a total theatre and oriental theatre concept.

20th Century’s theatre was not only in the script or dialogue but also was in dance, singing, music, spectacle; the gesture of body became so important as well. Theatre become a collaborative art, Collage. The meaning became contingent. The plays of Brecht, Peter Brook, Jerzy Grotowski, Antonin Artaud, Luigi Pirandello became the liminal stage to critique the realist theatre and the proscenium theatre. Pirandello’s famous play Six Characters in Search of an Author is a perfect critique of the realist theatre. Pirandello in this play attempts to critique both the realism; the larger bourgeois realism, as discussed earlier, and the theatrical realism which in Italy is better known as ‘verismo’ which often interacts with naturalism. Pirandello, along with exposing bourgeois pretension, also points to the failure of realistic theatre in (re)presenting reality. If we consider the author’s (who abandoned the six characters) mind as an element of reality and the space of theatre as a world of artefact then the six characters emulate the freedom of art form, illusion more convincing than reality. The destabilization happened with this dichotomy of reality and illusion in the 20th century’s modern theatre. Pirandello uses the technique of interchangeability of actors and characters a temporary suspension of the ‘being’/personality of actors and this is obviously Stanislavsky’s Method Acting process. The search of the six characters for an author and their transformation from character to a narrator of their own experiences declare their freedom; the freedom of text and of language. This process in Pirandello’s play became a chief marker of the transition from structuralism to post structuralism. In the terms of theatre, after 1940s it is no more a business. In this time theatre is the theatre of director. Director was supposed as the creator of the ‘text’ where 19th century’s theatre was the theatre of the author but here that charm is lost. 20th century’s theatre was influenced by the oriental theatre. Brecht, Pirandello they both at first looked at the Balinese theatre and Japanese theatre. Thus the realist theatre as a product of bourgeois realism, capitalist society later in the era of Brecht, Brook, Beckett lost its base and became the performance of body not the printed text. Therefore in this way of a big transition towards the end of the 19th century and mid of the 20th century all the ‘LOGOS’, ‘CENTRES’, stable body of knowledge collapsed. Modernism helplessly watched that collapse and post modernism truly enjoyed that collapse.

WORKS CITED :

Brook, Peter. The Shifting Point : Forty Years of Theatrical Exploration, 1946-87. United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Academic, 2018. Print.

Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. Delhi: Maya Blackwell, 2000. Print.

Kulkarni, Anand B., and Ashok G. Chaskar, eds. An Introduction to Literary Theory and Criticism. Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan Private Limited, 2016. Print.

Lodge, David, and Nigel Wood, eds. Modern Criticism and Theory. Delhi: Pearson Education, 2003. Print.

Moretti, Franco. The Bourgeois: Between History and Literature. London: Verso. 2014. Print.

CONFIGURATION OF THE 'GENDER STUDIES'

Papai Patra, 

Research Fellow, 

Centre for Translation and Literary Geography (CTLG), 

University of Calcutta

·     Concept of Gender. (Very derogatory)

·     Patriarchy, Patriarchal Society, Patriarchal Intrigues.

·     Male Dominating & Female Dominated.

·     Classification. ( Male & Female). 

》Two spheres

    1. Heterosexuality.

    2. Homosexuality.

•   Patriarchy believes in the “Heterosexuality”, not in the  "Homosexuality".

• Patriarchy doesn't deal with any alternate definition. It stabilizes the ideologies, 'meaning'.

•     Marriage. (Well-being of Human beings) as society hints 》Patriarchal intrigues.

•《 [Patriarchy always wants to hold their power in the Society through the next generation, (Successor, a boy child generally)] > and that's why always a boy Child is considered as superior in the rural, patriarchal, capitalist society. ('Capitalist' here in a different sense.)

·         Child Reproduction. {Successor} (For the Growth & Development of the Human race or lineage).

·         Children’s Growth and Development.

·         Culture. (Very important for the Growth & Development of the Child).

·         Society. (Impactful Milieu)

·         Socialization Process. (Familiarization, concern about the name, What they have to do or haven’t to do, What is suitable or should for or not-suitable or shouldn’t for his or her).

·         Children acquire knowledge from his or her childhood through various short stories, Fiction, Folk-tale and so on. And those texts are framed in a different,  stereotypical manner. For instance, the story of Prince & Princess, King & Queen etc injects the knowledge about the binary (two) into the child's mind. (thus Culture, Desire, Discrimination thinking emerge).

·         Birth of the knowledge about the ‘Gender’. Differences between ‘Male & Female’. (Society is the place  where the Socialization process tempt the children to derive a lot of senses and to inculcate them and to think more and more about his or her own life and others, vis-a-vis the value of existence. This process also enables them to differentiate anything even the 'Gender'; the social construction and mechanized concept of 'Sex'; the biological construction indeed).

·         Transmitted idea about the Society and Patriarchy; Patriarchal Society.

·      Sense of 'Justified position' for men and women.

·         Dominating incompletion and outlook. [A Structured form of the direct Patriarch...[basically for a boy].

·         An ideal Patriarchal person including various dominating sense.

                        

GENDER CONSTRUCTION

Gender refers to the characteristics of women, men, girls and boys that are socially constructed. This includes norms, behaviours and roles associated with being a woman, man, girl or boy, as well as relationships with each other. As a social construction, gender varies from society to society and can change over time.

§  Feminity : Femininity is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles generally associated with women and girls. Although femininity is socially constructed, research indicates that some behaviors considered feminine are biologically influenced. There are so.

§  Masculinity : Masculinity is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with boys and men. Although masculinity is socially constructed, research indicates that some behaviors considered masculine are biologically influenced. Even there are so.

§  Sexuality : This involves biological, erotic, physical, emotional, social, or spiritual feelings and behaviors. 

·         Women Protest. (1920).

·         Feminist Movement. [1st, 2nd and 3rd Wave]

·         Feminine Liberation. (Main chants of this Movement).

·         Feminism is a part of Gender Studies. (Acknowledged   in 1970 & 1980).

·         The Gender Studies does not only deal with Feminism but also with the Women Studies.

·         Biologically 'Sex' is fixed.

·       Ref. to  Gender Trouble by ‘Judith Butler’.

§  Identity Construction.

1.     Heterosexuality. (Normal) } In the Patriarchal Society.

2.     Homosexuality. (Abnormal) } In the Patriarchal Society.

§  Question about the ‘Homosexuality’ came out.

§  The Patriarchy has already pervaded the entire society so from where the Homosexual persons are coming in this Society. A concern indeed. How they are Homosexual till now even after affecting the whole society by the Heterosexual ideas ?

§  The Homosexual people do not believe in the Heterosexuality even in the Patriarchal society’s traditions, rules and rituals. They become bored by the 'Heteronormativity' and which is why they have taken the alternate way of  identity in the society.

§  Child’s education depends on the culture, family principle and this entire process are the Socialization Process. It affects the Children’s mind. For him the Pleasure principle, Reality Principle and Morality principle create a quagmire. 

§  ‘Homophobia’ because of ‘Discrimination’ happens.

§  ‘Men element’ – ‘Power/Dominating Structure’.

§  ‘Women element’ – ‘Dominated Structure by this power’.

·         "The concept of Gender is a Lie."

                      -- Dr. Niladri R. Chatterjee ( in a Seminar)

·         "The category of sex is the political category that founds society as Heterosexuality."

                                               ---Monique Witttig

·         “We need Equity to get the Equality”.

                                          --- Author of this Article 

•  Some Important figures : Mary Wollstonecraft, Simone de Beauvoir, Judith Butler, Gayatri Patel, Elaine Showalter, Virginia Woolf, Juliet Mitchell, Betty Friedan, Sandra Gilbert & Susan Gubar.

•  Special Figures: Hélène Cixous, Julia Kristeva, Luce Irigaray, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak and so on.

"One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman."

                                      ~ Simone de Beauvoir

                                                                 _ Thank You _

On Criticism

Papai Patra, 

Research Fellow, 

Centre for Translation and Literary Geography (CTLG), 

University of Calcutta

For a few years it has been a matter of debate  to encapsulate the roof of criticism in a space. Since erudition grew to a higher extent, the matter became  much more important. Criticism, in other words to say, is an extension of the people's understanding. In the wave of reading some treatise, a specific category of mass housed their view or opinion, as we can say, in a very orchestrated manner. Like the process of electrification, the grey-cells of the people's mind, at least who read, produces an instant energy to force the eye on the loopholes of a writing. Thus the progressive movement of the criticism came into being. It could have some variation if people acquired a lot of related books even existed before on the particular topic, this could have some deep impact on the way of people’s understanding. A Writer's life is not a blessing to the social being namely 'Human' rather it is a necessity in the true sense. Reading is a little work in the workshop of the readers’ knowledge gathering playground, but when a plenty of question arises out of the inquisitive mind of different kinds of people, then it aims at the extended part of reading, and that I call 'Criticism.' Criticism is not always a comment comes out of somebody's vocal chord. Criticism is the consequence of understanding of the intensity of the speech that is best suited as an extended part of reading or observation on something. It is the extension of the consciousness as I have hinted before. Instead of maintaining a balance between the faults and magnanimity, the act of Criticism becomes an addition to the work of finding the errors only. People becomes too puzzled to solve the problem as it is in its ultimate form, but a grand view can always help one to taste the flavor of the extension of the consciousness with an ultimate stance. An infinite space always sustains some minstrel touch to the view of people's eyes. But is it always alright? To answer this, we should have sustained some sort of faculty in our mind. The answer will be, if we try to find out the truth with least endeavourment, obviously 'NO'. There will be a different kind of stylistic opinion on this. If the individual always tries to find out the faults within him, so it would destroy the other side of that individual to praise himself or to have a sight on his own beauty, talent & excellency. Likewise, to say, if a reader always tries to find out the faults of a writer in his writing only by reading one work of that same writer, indeed it would be a matter of much more importance to say in a word that it will destroy the reader's mind faculty to find out the beauty of the writing also or the magnanimity of the same. Now in this respect I am bound to say that Criticism is not only an extended part of consciousness or extension of consciousness, rather it is also an extension of people’s disadvantageous or harmful side. In some events or situation, it becomes a heinous act. But sometimes criticism helps the readers to find out the truth, the truth that is completely suppressed. Or, sometimes criticism also conceals the intensified truth behind a writing. Thus, it is an exercise of Revelation and Concealment.

The Falcon

 

Like most birds,  

I chirp, 

Like others, 

I fly. 

This is not an old story that I try.

But the touch of azure-grey wings, dark brown backs, a buff colored underside with brown spots, and white faces with a black tear stripe on the cheeks made me an alien. 

The hooked beaks and strong talons made me a raptor. 

I become a bird of prey. 

I'm alienated. 

I counsel myself.

What remains ? 

Only a myth and wildlife !
It might be smoother.
I have no mind yet.
But nobody can deny my speed.
Nobody can challenge my aerodynamic torsos and specially pointed wings.
No birds can spend their days with me except my prey.
I'm the fastest, spiritually subsisted and morally persisted.
Seeing my aggressive gesture, the birds become grey.
The gusty wind is my friend.
It's matter of pride to comprehend.
The lustrous eyes of the universe behold my shape.
But my preys !
They gape.
Like lightning or thunder, I fall on the field from the zenith's height and create the bar.
Often I win or I fail.
After all it's a Falcon's life that becomes the story of hell.

The Mannlicher in the Manhattan

 

Listen!

It's not too late, we can go together.
The womb of time has left us without any danger.
See! it's like a particle, squeezed in the dead cell.
Now I become the electron, trying to find out the ladder between the Heaven and Hell.
The ladder we find together.
But the call of the wintry bed comes to one's ear.
Another begins to live in the Manhattan.
But who knows about the imminent danger.
A cozy shelter invites the precious to the Manhattan.
It grows dark, owl screeches, a gusty wind blows over the west edge of Manhattan.

It was a wuthering day indeed. 
No sound was detected except the music of nature.
Boom ! Boom! ..... a sudden sound appeared.
No...it was of course the sound of a Mannlicher.

Alas! the moon-shaped corporeal-frame now becomes cold.
That horrific sound didn't tell the truth.
But it was a Mannlicher in the Manhattan for sure.

The Final Sight

The Last Shade of the last hour is evaporated. 

One tremulous voice was approaching to my brimming ear. 

It wasn't the voice of the Volcano or the last shade, Not the voice of the mountain stream. 

My ear wanted to abscond. 

That boom forced it to be dislocated. 

But my mind recognised the great human cry. 

Dirty desires of the millions were unsheathed.

Only my austere eyes could catch the final sight of the last shade. 

The bucolic station was finding its revolving fate. Every attempt was the spear of the white tongue. But the primitive station was ostracized. 

The sword of revolt hit on the throat of humanity. Only the Reeds on the field were shivering.

Was it my final sight or not?

Heart of Spring

Passion of spring is Nature's ring. 

Nature poets are enjoying the joy of Spring. 

Enjoys the air it breathes. 

The Dandelion of Spring hath its end. 

Ode oft wrote about Spring,

Sense of joy may Blossom Blight bring. 

Cuckoo is the harbinger of this season. 

Soundless roaming, sweet-song creates the reason.

Cherish the Green on the solitary fields. 

It reminds, the Summer is just around the corner. 

It started to blow in the last Winter. 

Now growing to get the summer; it hath short lease. 

The blossom bowed down with its one while March is scarcely here. 

It is difficult to glorify the time on the same year.

Darkling Pleasure

The moon is shining bright. 

But my heart is not delight.

I cherished to be happy more, 

With the pleasant sight at the silvery shore. 

But the memories are blurring my sight. 

This is the cimmerian night with the gleaming light.

Another day has already passed. 

It was the last delight of my lust.

The language of light in darkness is not merely decorative. 

Where are the aesthetics of language? Where are they? 

Now I wanna explore my life's delight. 

As happiness lies within my sight. 

Thus making my soul Happy and Delight.

Never turn back the Cimmerian Night.

An Unknown Painter

Fresco has its own plaster.

Artist can create a short caricature.

Final creation is the new founder.

Some aesthetic comes from here.

Art; a piece of private correspondence.

The depth and passion of its earnest glance.

Nature's glittering beauty goes to the Atelier.

Ethical instruments are ready for the Painter.

Art of storytelling is the privacy of author.

Labour of reading is reader's favour. 

Imagination goes to the zenith's height.

Reflection of this fancy is so bright. 

Time reveals everything from it's womb.

There is a stone of invisible tomb.

The painting knows not to blame.

The painter is unknown to his fame.

Stopping by the Winter

Snow is falling round the city.

One is thinking about the absurdity.

Everything is looking White.

Animals are taking rest with the Sun's bright.

Hibernation is started between all of them.

To give a rousing shake, one needs to set 

the flame.

And lonely as it is, that loneliness

With no expression, nothing to express.

Day is too good, Night is so cold.

The creatures are looking like a garish wrapper's mould.

The Woodchuck takes a great Hibernation

No chance is there, no alternation.

Winter cannot scare me with its empty space.

To scare myself with my own desert place.

Blizzard starts soon after.

My aching heart invites a mitigator.

Ceasing is the favour of Winter.

Call of the wintry bed comes to the mortal ear.

Horrific Station

Mild is thy brain, having the hellish fire.

Where thou get the very mingling stir?

Is it infernal in its nature?

Should thou be that shabby creature?

Questions are left with a very weary yearn.

The mild creature is here to emancipate the turn.

Stirring station is not enlightened with the civilized light.

Hellish fire is there but not so bright. 

Visible fears are bright but those invisibles are more brighter.

Horrified workshops are now pervaded with the unconscious sensation.

Eternal, infernal fire is existed only in the 'Horrific Station '.

Crossing the Seashore

Standing on the vast seashore of Lethe,

I am sipping the sweet breeze of the restless sea.

My feet touch the ancient mossy hills. 

An unknown sonorous sound comes to my brimming ear. 

The mingling heart stops the oscillation before the bar.

A deep sensation lingers there.

For my bouncing heart the door to freedom is ajar.

Suddenly the cold, unrivaled splash of the oceanic beauty soaks my dappled face.

Such a touch my face never felt before. 

The paradise of summer-beauty is only the lonely seashore. 

Cadency of the oysters comes to the shore together. 

The halo of the unknown region forms the familiar world.

Familiar yet unfortunate.

The moment sharply turns its face to the east.

The Volcanic beauty appears in each corner of the sky.

The Oceanic beauty then hails the Volcanic one.

Till now the splashes spatter on my face.

Now long waiting becomes pregnant with the dawn at seashore.

Ode to the Soaking Rain

O Rain, feel your dropping tone.
Thy voice raises the sound of marble stone.
The dry Cistern quenched its thirst.
Thine azure figure reveals the Cistern so vast.

Dreaming earth is soaked with thy silvery drops,
Greenery grows in a troaks.
You fulfill the unrequited dream of the earth,
Something is dreary, something is in mirth.

O Rain, from the dozy bed thou awakened the dazzling flowers.

The turf enjoys the trembling showers.

From  Summer's igneous surge the earth and air is uplifted.

Thine azure glittering beauty,  one lonely cloud has gifted.

Thou soothe the ache of Green leaves.

The chirping birds are soaked, till the drop he gives.

Thou art more temperate like a damsel with her crystalline heart. 

Once I saw thy beauteous halo in my glaring heart, heart only.

Rain is gone ere so long.

Poetry of earth to mine ear is the sparkling song.

Status Quo of English as International Language

Papai Patra, 

Research Fellow, 

Centre for Translation and Literary Geography (CTLG), 

University of Calcutta

Briefing on why English has been considered as the status quo of International Language  so far ?

• Language is an important factor or component of the Human beings in this enormous world. 'Language' enables us to communicate with each other, it allows us to exchange our ideas and opinions. The presence of English Language has spilled over into almost every field, physically and virtually that energies the aspects of our everyday life. English has opened so many doors for the average person allowing them to access to the better jobs and migration opportunities.

There was a concept of something called 'Global', related to anything that reaches the international level. But an auto-generated experiment happened with English Language. People, not the native English speaker, always feel some comfort to communicate in their own language but with a slight or heavy touch of English. Therefore, English Language has also taken the soft corner of almost every society and class. The mixture of English with other languages has generated a new concept called, 'Glocal', the mixture of 'Global and Local'. The world today is so closely linked as a result of Globalisation. And that is a prime example and cause of English being a language of international level.

About 1.53 billion people speak English worldwide, but the number of native English speakers is significantly lower. The United States has the most native English speakers, with around 244 million people speaking English as their first language. The United Kingdom follows with approximately 59 million native English speakers. Other countries with significant native English-speaking populations include Canada (20 million), Australia (17 million), and New Zealand (4.5 million).

So, more than 300 million people around the world speak English as a first language and more than 430 million speaking it as a second language, there are English speakers in most countries around the world.

This English language has so many historical events to form it. English Language become the primary language of official status quo. English Language increases our chances of getting a good job in a multinational company. It’s also the language of international communication, the media and the internet and in today’s world most of the time every official of unofficial work circulates through the English Language. So learning English is very important for socialising and entertainment as well as work. But if we want to know it’s versatility and the consideration as the international language, I mean how it became a worldwide language so we have to go through it’s historical movements or events. Once upon a time the native English speakers i.e. Britishers ruled the world politically; at present the same country ruling this world in the terms of 'Culture.' This is the major reason behind English being an international language. In English there is a famous quote that is ‘the sun never sets in British Empire’. British rule was established from the North sphere to the South sphere, in many South Asian countries and some countries in Africa. In such a vast empire they had successfully established their language as a means of communication among the inhabitants of the countries they ruled. If we talk about the necessity of English by the aspect of the Business communication than we have to remember that most multinational companies require a certain degree of English proficiency from potential employees so in order to get a position with a top company, more people are learning English. So learning English is very important in our everyday life. We should take it as a global phenomenon.