FRONTISPIECE - Re-creation: From words to words : Ranjita Biswas

There are numerous technical matters to be handled by a translator, particularly one from the region, finds Ranjita Biswas

Ever since Sofia Coppola’s film Lost in Translation (2003) set in Japan earned critical acclaim, the title has often been used while referring to a branch in literary work, though the view has been in circulation in sections of the academia for quite some time.  In short, the belief that a creative work in translation loses something in the process from the original, that the act of translation, or transliteration if you may, gives the reader a bastardised version of the writer’s work. There is, of course, the other view, and honestly more accepted today, that without the act of translation, readers worldwide would have been deprived of appreciation of some of the greatest works of the world. Coming nearer home, with so many listed regional languages recognised under the Constitution, only translation into English, or another language from the source, say Assamese-Hindi or vice-versa, could introduce the booklover to the literature of the ‘other’.

As Vanamala Viswanatha has said: “Translation is above all a dialogic process, one that pre-supposes cultural exchange and transfer. Whether necessitated by trade, propelled by propaganda or activated by an interest in intra/inter-cultural dialogue, translation activity remains a phenomenon that cut across culture, sociology, linguistics, anthropology and literature” (Routes: Representations of the West in Short Fiction from South India in Translation). She goes on to say: “As an ‘interfield’, to borrow a term from cultural ties, translation allows all of these seemingly separate disciplines to interface and gain new dimensions.”

Talking about literature from the Northeast, it is undeniable that most of the works in translation have been from the Brahmaputra Valley, though, of late, talented writers from other states have taken up writing, translaing and, most importantly, weaving the oral traditions which figure majorly in tribal societies into the stories.

In Mamang Dai’s The Legends of Pensam the stories of the Adi tribe of Arunachal Pradesh that encompass myths and oral histories do not seem to be translated but echo in the present as if they have been flowing seamlessly from time immemorial to this day. The word pensam means ‘in-between’ — a middle ground — “but it may also be interpreted as the hidden spaces of the heart where a secret garden grows.”

Most of the works in translation have been
from the Brahmaputra Valley, though
of late writers from other states have
taken up writing, translating and
weaving oral traditions into the stories

One realises that traditions reflecting a community’s values and beliefs, whether in direct translation or transcreated into the narrative, give readers a glimpse of a tiny corner of a world and also preserve, in print, nuggets of oral history. Temsula Ao of Nagaland also blends the oral and the written sensitively in her stories. In her poem The Old Story Teller, Ao seems to say the same:

I have lived my life believing

storytelling was my proud legacy

The ones I inherited

From grandfather became

My primary treasure

And the ones I garnered

From other chronicles

Added to the lore.

Lately, Assamese short stories have been increasingly finding a forum in their translated versions. Like the oral stories getting translated into English, in Assamese, too, the challenge remains how to bring out the essence of the local culture but at the same time not hinder the text. Today some publishers do not italicise the Indian words in English, letting the words flow along and even avoid footnotes. Whether it is a hindrance to a foreign reader or to those unfamiliar with the nuances even within the country is debatable.

But  translators can try to bring out the flavour of the source material by adding qualifiers subtly:  “Like her, a couple of others also sit by the roadside, hawking vegetables such as baah ganj — tender shoots of bamboo, dhekia fronds and kosu tubers” (Guilt, Harekrishna Deka, translated by Mitra Phukan).

However, there are moments when a choice has to be made while translating local idioms. In the story “Crows, Crows and Crows” (Kawri, Kawri, Kawri by Bhupendra Narayan Bhattacharya which the writer translated) there is a place where the character called Crow, on seeing his boss just when he was preparing to take French leave from the office uses the local idiom: jote baghar bhoy, tate rati hoy, which roughly translates to ‘night falls at a place where you know tigers abound’. Instead of making it too long-winded, disturbing the flow of the story, it was translated thus: “I suppose it always happens like this. What you fear most will always take place.”

But sometimes it reads better if some sentences are kept intact from original because a translation may even spoil the mood of the story. For example, Harendra Kumar Bhuyan’s Assamese story Rainmaker translated by Apratim Barua, begins with the line “Allah megh de, paani de.”

Another problem a translator may encounter especially is when it involves doing it from Indian regional languages into English or other foreign languages sans the social formalities we practice. For example, address forms. In an Indian language such an expression can establish a relationship: a peha is not the same as khura in Assamese. So blanketing it as ‘uncle’ does not bring out the same essence and it may not even be contextual. This is also true of address forms like a tumi and aapuni as ‘you’ does not very well bring in the subtle difference. 

 

Arunava Sinha, whose translation of Bengali novel Chowringhee by Shankar has been a huge hit at home and abroad, tackles this problem neatly by adding non-intrusive explanations as in his new translation A Tale of the Times from Buddhadeva Bose’s Tithidore:

‘You..’ . Using the formal aapni the professor noticed the books in Swati’s hands. Pausing abruptly – and avoiding both the formal aapni and the less formal tumi — he mumbled ‘From college?’

Finding evocative words for local abusive words is not easy either because some of them are so rooted in the land and culture that it simply is not possible to create the same impact while in translation. 

But then these are options one has to juggle with constantly and come out with the best possible representation. This constant looking for solutions by a translator is inevitable after all and the rewards are rich.

FRONTISPIECE - Growing feminine gaze: women writers of Northeast : Mitra Phukan

While the many women writers in English from the region are bound by some common background, Mitra Phukan finds that their works reflect the uniqueness of their respective cultures

There is the view that there is no such category as “women’s writing”. True, goes this argument, writers can be male or female, but writing can only be good or bad. A work stands on its own merit, not on the gender of its writer.

But the fact remains: gender colours perspective. Just as the full flavour of a work can only be had with some knowledge of the social context in which a writer is placed, so too, is knowledge of a writer’s gender required to get an idea of where s/he is coming from. The life experiences of a man at the top of the caste  pyramid, for instance, and a woman at the bottom are so different that they can be inhabiting different continents, different centuries,  even if they live in the same village at the same point of time. Gender shapes the mind, just as milieu does. And awareness of the environment of the writer and his/her gender certainly makes for a more enriching experience for the serious reader.

There is also the point of view that the term “Northeast” as applied to the seven states is too sweeping a term, which homogenises an essentially very diverse region. Of course nobody disputes the heterogeneity of this region where people living even in adjacent valleys do not understand each others’ tongue.

Despite this, the undoubted truth is writers from this region, who mainly use English as their chief mode of literary expression, are bound together by certain economic and social factors that gives their work a shared commonality.

There are certain linkages that make the term “writers in English from the Northeast” a valid one. These writers have gone to English medium schools, and have often pursued their higher education outside the region. Those who go to these schools “think” in a certain way, are trained to write in a certain way, have read similar books in their formative years in schools and colleges. They often belong to the better-off strata of their societies. This economic reality makes their “point of view” a middle class one. They “know” life outside the region, as well as within.

Several of these women are first-generation writers in English from their respective states. This creates a bond that reaches across political boundaries of the region. Of course the underpinnings of literature itself in all the states are very different from one another. Arunachal Pradesh has had a rich history of oral literature. For the most part, written literature there over the last century was in Axomiya or Hindi. Mamang Dai’s The Legends of Pensam (2006) therefore, in spite of vast differences in theme, tone, style and tenor, has a common thread with The Collector’s Wife (2005) from Assam and These Hills Called Home (2006) by Temsula Ao from Nagaland. All three works by women were written originally in English and published outside the region. And yet the books have an extremely strong rootedness in their own states.

Though these women writers are well-travelled and have sometimes lived away from this area, they write overwhelmingly of their own region. Mona Zote grew up outside Mizoram. And now, back in her home state, she writes poetry about her people and her land with a sensibility inescapably coloured by this fact. While writers such as Mamoni Raisom Goswami wrote of places outside the region, those working in English seem loath to do so. This may be from a feeling that there is so much to be mined from this region in English, yet. In Stupid Cupid, Mamang Dai, writing ostensibly about a paying guest accommodation in Delhi, keeps oscillating between Arunachal and the capital of the country. Villages and small towns rather than big cities are often a feature of the writings of these women, with all the baggage that this brings to the psychological makeup of their characters.

The “feminine gaze” is apparent in all the recent works by prominent women writers in English here. Of the three books mentioned above, there is an underlying sense of helpless compassion that seems to be a feminine sentiment. Not that compassion is a prerogative of women writers only. But a particular kind of compassion, which is more static in a way than the manner in which the world is seen by male writers. That is, historically speaking, while men have gone out and shaped the world through external means like wars and inventions, women have shaped it at a domestic and, therefore, internal level. Women have awaited the outcome of wars, for the bodies to come home and were also burdened with the knowledge of expecting this sorrow to visit them. There is therefore a kind of uniqueness of vision that several of these women authors have. This is exemplified to an extent in Mamang Dai’s poem ‘The Sorrow of Women’:

They are talking about

hunger,

They are saying there is an unquenchable fire

burning in our

hearts

My love, what shall I do?

I am thinking how I may lose you

To war, and big issues

More important than me. …

…

And they are talking about escape,

About liberty, men and guns,

Ah! The urgency for survival.

But what will they do

Not knowing the sorrow of women.

Kinships and friendships are important components of these works. Easterine Kire Iralu’s A Naga Village Remembered, for example, as well as Bijoya Sawian’s Shadow Men are full of references to kin, to the ancient tribal ties that bind strongly even in today’s world.

Conflict forms the basis of these fictional worlds. This is perhaps inevitable in this region today. But the texture of the conflict is different with each author. Bijoya Sawian talks of the endemic violence in Meghalaya, though she links it to the practice of a corrupt kind of matriliny among the Khasis. Temsula Ao’s people are ordinary folks trying to live through the decades-long turmoil in Nagaland. Rukmini, the protagonist in The Collector’s Wife is caught between the state and students as she witnesses the Student’s Agitation in Assam. Rashmi Narzary brings to the reader the wrenching results of the constant conflict in the Bodo areas of Assam. Poet Uddipana Goswami (‘We Called the River Red’) maps her body as a conflict zone, relating the outer world to her innermost feelings through the delicate, easily-violated barriers of the body.

Such writing is uniquely flavoured by the local traditions of literature, both oral and written. Assam, with its long practice of the written word, is giving birth to writers who write in English, who are influenced by this history. If Srimanta Sankardev’s luminous bhakti outpourings, the works of people such as Birendra Kumar Bhattacharjee and Homen Borgohain influence the cadences of the English that they write in and even the subject matter of their work, then the writings of Mamang Dai are inevitably influenced by the accents of the legends of her land. The Englishes that are evident in their works, therefore, are as heterogeneous as the characters that people them, and are as different as the thoughts that go into their making.

Women writers who work in English in this region are finding their voice, and their feet in the publishing world. It is heartening to find that “second generation” writers in English from this region are making their presence felt in the literary world. Often theirs is a diasporic view of the land they have left behind, and an immigrant’s view of the land in which they have settled. This gives their work an added edge. One such example is Jahnavi Barua’s Rebirth, where the location alternates between Bangalore and Guwahati.

FRONTISPIECE - Mizo literature: Opening the door : Laltluangliana Khiangte to development

Laltluangliana Khiangte takes a close look at the history and development of Mizo language and literature

The original inhabitants of Mizoram are known by the generic name Mizo. They form several major and minor tribes in the state. Mizo is a word of the Lusei language. The Luseis seemed to have used the term ‘Mizo’ while referring to themselves and kindred tribes, who have adopted the Lusei language discarding their own dialects. ‘Mizo’ has gained a wider meaning through the ages.

Mizos are an important hill tribe of the Indian subcontinent. A pioneer missionary, James Herbert Lorrain, in the introduction to his Dictionary of the Lushai Language, wrote, “…their speech belongs to the Assam-Burma branch of the Tibeto-Burman family of languages.” There is a quirky story about how the traditional tribal group of Mizos lost their original script. The script was written on an animal skin which was one day eaten up by a stray dog, leaving the Mizos without a script that they could call their own. However, after setting foot in what was called the Lushai Hills, missionaries started the process of ‘Christianisation’ of the area. In 1894, the Christian missionaries compiled what is referred to as the Mizo alphabet, using the Hunterian system of Roman script, in line with the script used in the writings of Lt Col. TH Lewin in the 1870s.

Although there are some minor dialects like Hmar, Lakher, Pawi and Ralte in Mizoram, Duhlian or Mizo Tawng is the official language – lingua franca – of the state. Many of the Mizo tribes have forgotten their original dialects as almost all of them speak Mizo, a language that binds them together. ‘Mizo Tawng’ was called ‘Lushai’ during the British regime, a corrupted term of ‘Lusei’. It is sometimes referred to as ‘Duhlian’ or ‘Zotawng’ as well. According to Pastor Vanchhunga, who made a contribution to the October 1916 issue of the popular Christian monthly magazine, Kristian Tlangau, “...there were as many as 46 tribes that could be identified as Lusei...and 40 dialects of the tribe have died...”

When a reader goes through
any of these tales, she sees a
vivid picture of what the rural
Bishnupriya Manipuri life
looked like and to some
extent, still does

In fact, the state is characterised by a unique example of a true tribal harmonious pattern. It is also a very ordered society with clearly defined social roles and responsibilities for all. Mizo society values and maintains its customs and lifestyles while at the same time accepting modernisation and global influences even on its language.

Mizo is mainly spoken in India, Myanmar and Bangladesh. The total Mizo population in 1961 was three times bigger than that in 1901. From the figures thus projected, no less than 96% of the population wanted to be called ‘Mizos’. As per the Imperial Gazetteer of India (1908), since 1908, 87% of the population had spoken the Lushai dialect. It is observed that in the course of half a century only, the Luseis who wanted to be called Mizos had dominated the entire population, with only 4% remaining non-Mizo. The Ralte figure was not available in 1961, which showed the total submission of the clan to Mizos for nationhood. The process of ‘Mizoisation’ may be a welcome sign for the integration of the different Mizo tribes.

Present status of the Mizo language

Though the Mizoram Official Language Act 1974 was passed by the Mizoram Legislative Assembly, it was not implemented immediately. The so-called Mizo Language Board, formed by the Government of Mizoram, met once or twice without much significance.

After twelve years, the government of Mizoram, following public pressure, notified Mizo as the official language of the state on 15 August 1987. According to the Census of India 1991, 5,37,527 people speak the Mizo language. It is the 30th most used language in India which means that 0.064% of Indians use Mizo. The Census of 2001 puts the population of Mizoram at 8,91,058, showing a growth rate of 2.92%. Moreover, about 3,29,480 people in neighbouring states and other parts of India speak Mizo but not as their mother tongue. The estimated figure of Mizo speakers in India, Myanmar and Bangladesh exceeds 26 lakhs. The Mizo language, considering the number of people who use it, should be included in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution.

The leading literary organisation in the state, Mizo Academy of Letters, which was formed in 1964, has been taking major steps for the development of the language, literature and culture. It brings out Thu leh Hla, a monthly magazine which carries stories, articles, essays, poems, reports and critical writings in the language. Since 1989, the Academy has been giving the Book of the Year Award to the best book published in a year. About 200 books are published in Mizo every year. In 1993-94 alone, more than 200 new books were published, mostly by the churches, on the occasion of Gospel Centenary Celebration. Books related to music, science and computers have also been published recently.

Mizo in educational institutions

The vernacular Lushai (Mizo subject) began to be taught in 1930 at the matriculation level under Calcutta University. Gauhati University introduced Lushai at the intermediate stage in 1961 and then in its degree course in 1962. Mizo was introduced as an elective subject at NEHU, Shillong in 1983. The hill university made Mizo part of its honours course in 1993. The Mizoram Campus of NEHU introduced master’s degree in Mizo during the 1997-98 session. Since the birth of Mizoram University on July 2, 2001, its Mizo department has been functioning as a full-fledged post-graduate institution.

Justice cannot be done to a description of the spurt of Mizo literary works in recent years without a full-fledged study. Suffice it to say that the literary award given to Rev Liangkhaia, a prolific writer, by Mizo Academy of Letters in 1979 and Padma Shri to James Dokhuma by the President of India in 1985 show that the doors are now open for a massive development of Mizo literature.

Thirteen litterateurs have been honoured with Padma awards for their contribution to Mizo language and literature. Nine writers have also been awarded the Academy Award in literature by Mizo Academy of Letters. The greatest impediment to the growth of Mizo literature is lack of funds for printing of books on a large scale. Publication of a literary work, unless it happens to be a text book or is supported by the government or church organisations, is a losing proposition for a writer in Mizoram.

Under the Mizoram Publication Board Bill 1993, which has been made effective during the last ten years or so, more than 200 new books have been published with 75% assistance from the government. Mizo has now become an important subject from primary to master’s degree level. The Mizo Language Committee which came into existence in the last part of 2006 has been functioning effectively for the promotion of language and literature under the wings of Mizoram Board of School Education. Today the Mizos have a good number of poems, plays, essays, novels,articles, critical reviews and other prose works which can be translated into different languages of the world and circulated outside the state of Mizoram.

As the Mizo language is the lingua franca and official language of the state of Mizoram, due recognition should be given to it by the leading literary organisations as well as the government of India. It is high time that the government included Mizo in the Eighth Schedule of the Indian Constitution.