Inner travels, actual journeys
Nasrin Pervin takes a plunge into human endeavour
Songs Of Our Swampland, Manzu Islam, Shahitya Prakash, Dhaka, Peepal Tree Press, Great Britain
Only a literary genius would venture into developing a character of a social misfit for physical or psychological reasons. Dostoyevsky created The Idiot and Victor Hugo immortalized The Hunchback Of Notre Dame. There are others, but for Syed Manzurul Islam to embark on a narrative through the eyes of a man who is of unknown birth with ghoulish deformity (a hole for a mouth) needs to be applauded because it demands an awful lot of insight into and empathy with human character. Songs of Our Swampland could feature as a literary masterpiece or the adventure of a human soul in accompanying another soul through the inner journeys of humanity. The events and characters of the book unfold as the liberation war of Bangladesh progresses from early days to victory. Significantly, the title of the novel befits both the geographic position and the mindset of the people of Bangladesh. It is said that every Bengali is either a singer or a poet by birth because of the country's topographic status, which is a delta. Paradoxically, the narrative unfolds incidents from the bloody liberation war of the country. Moreover, the total backdrop of the plot circles round a journey of the characters from one swamp to another with the distinctive songs of each swampland. The result aimed at --- the success of the writer's endeavour is a matter of interpretation though --- is a concerted song of a delta known as Bangladesh. The principal theme remains, however, Kamal's odd deformity and its interaction with society's prejudice, sympathy and tolerance. His half sister, in his adopted family, is married off on 24 March 1971, and Kamal accompanies her to her in-laws' house and walks back after she bids him a tearful goodbye. Deep within his heart her love for him ferments, while in the environment there is talk of war and atrocities. Kamal comes back to his village and rescues the blind scholar and ex-civil servant Zomir Ali, who has chosen to be a librarian in the village. Zomir Ali is a Svengali-like character who wants Kamal to be moulded into his thought process. There is a hint of prejudice here, Zomir Ali taking Kamal as unable to think for himself. Kamal in his spare time reminisces about the incident back to the place a year before when he had caressed Moni, his half sister, on a lonely afternoon. The novel now moves to its middle stage. Some tedious interaction with Zomir Ali goes on. Kamal's father, as the war intensifies, decides it is no longer safe to stay in the village. He sends Kamal to find Moni. Meanwhile Moni's in-laws' house has been burnt down and they are nowhere to be seen. Kamal crosses the border with the help of a guide only to find that Moni has joined the Liberation War. After a few days he returns to his village but moves out again, this time with his family to a nearby village. The Pakistan army raids the village and from the top of a tree Kamal sees a group of people being murdered. The villagers band together and move on. At one point a young stranger , Kulsum, joins the journey. There is uneasiness about her allegiance. If she was a Bihari (Urdu speaking) she should be killed. Kamal tricks others into believing she is dumb. To secure her life Kulsum proposes that Kamal marry her. Others are reluctant to be witnesses to the union and Big Suban volunteers. The Pakistan army raids at that point and Kamal's father tries to save him. In the process he himself gets killed. Kamal and Kulsum, taken prisoner by the Pakistanis, manage to escape. In the meantime Moni Banu has become a commander in the Mukti Bahini. She sends for Kulsum to be taken and killed. Kulsum is forcibly taken away by BosaKhuni. A desolate Kamal is befriended by a legless man. A few months later Bosa Khuni comes back with Kulsum. He fails to kill her and now either he or Kamal is allowed to live and on this Kulsum's fate hangs. In a heroic act Bosa Khuni forces Kamal to kill him. So Kulsum lives. On the day Bangladesh wins victory a pregnant Kulsum, the mouth-less Kamal, the legless unnamed man and Kamal's friend Big Suban board a boat and sail away, symbolically into the future. The last scene, despite its imposed symbolism, has all the elements of typical cinematic melodrama: an assembly of sympathy-rousing for visibly disadvantaged people, more than one symbol of a new beginning --- a child in the womb and the dawn of victory --- and all of them journeying to a future. The novel is not a study in human character. It is not actually a story told against the background of liberation war. There is hardly a story line. It is rather a narrative of an inner journey. But read on, for there are the good things. For example, Kamal's adopted father lays down his life to save Kamal, even though in life he was ashamed to acknowledge Kamal as his son. Kamal's position in the house balanced between a servant and a son. His adoptive sister loved him, in a sexual way, and the feeling was mutual. She sent for Kulsum, Kamal's love object, to be killed. And there is the harakiri-like butchery of Bosa Khuni. It is uncharacteristic of Kamal, of Bosa Khuni and Bosa Khuni's reasoning of it all. Read on, for it is a journey into the mindset of a budding novelist who brings his experiences of the War of Liberation and village characters with their emotions and dilemmas and weaves them into the grammar of a novel. A nagging question, however, persists: Why assemble so many human beings with the bondage of deformity in one novel? It is a curse of fate, nature's profanity, if you like, which tests human character. But what is the point in gathering them and to point out what? Human depravity and an elaboration of environment have been depicted well by Dickens but Manzu Islam's endeavour has its limitations. His characters may have far-fetched metaphoric parallels with mute people ---think of Kamal having no mouth and joining the Liberation War --- and their sufferings culminating in the Liberation War. But it is not as distinct as is expected in the novel. The narrative of the novel is divided into three parts, but there is no apparent thesis, synthesis or antithesis in the development of the story. The good thing, though, is that in an ambience where not many Bengali-speaking writers go for fiction in English, Manzu Islam happens to be a refreshing exception.
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