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| My copy of the novel |
The Germans thought that Hitler was going to be their
Saviour. His very memory nauseates them now. Joseph Stalin met with a similar
fate. Mussolini did too. What will be the fates of Putin, Xi Jinping, Kin Jong
Un, and (should I say?) Narendra Modi?
All of these ‘great’ leaders are
people who misused power. They are cowards at heart, psychology would say. Ask
Eric Fromm, for details.
O V Vijayan’s novel, The Saga
of Dharmapuri, published in Malayalam originally, is about the
cowardice of mighty leaders. You can claim to have a 56-inch chest. The moment
you make that claim, you’re revealing the coward that lies deep in your heart.
Such cowards wreak havoc of all sorts. They kill a lot of people. Never by
themselves. They kill a lot of people using others. Using others in the name of
religion or something similar. Killing is important. It proves that they are
not cowards.
Violent power is inevitably related
to cowardice. That is one of the core themes of Vijayan’s novel which was
published originally in 1977, just after Indira Gandhi’s Emergency in India. Vijayan
stated explicitly on diverse occasions that the novel was not about the
Emergency. Indira Gandhi might have stirred Vijayan’s scatological imagination.
But the novel is not about Indira Gandhi and her kind of dictatorship. It is
about dictatorship in general.
Including democratically elected dictatorship.
Hitler was popular. And Stalin too.
Mussolini too.
Indira Gandhi was nothing in front of
them. Vijayan knew it.
Vijayan died in 2005. He didn’t live to
see the Modi Era in India. If he had, he could claim that The Saga of
Dharmapuri was prophetic.
The Saga of Dharmapuri is about a ruler in the
kingdom of Dharma. The ruler is a dictator. As immoral as a human being can be.
His stool is the protagonist of the novel. The judiciary, the police, the
ministers, and the media bring his excreta to the citizens for whom it is
supposed to be something like Mann ki Baat. Delicious. Exquisite. Exotic.
Aromatic. Blissful. Amrut.
Shit reigns supreme in The Saga
of Dharmapuri, in short.
But the Dictator of Dharmapuri will
parade his might on the royal highway every month by displaying some antique weapons
his predecessors built. And he will heap abuses on those predecessors at the
same time. Nevertheless, he knows how to use these weapons to foster nationalism
among his subjects. Whenever something goes wrong in the country, he will
create a problem with a neighbouring country whose God is different.
God is a do-or-die entity for all
cowards who want to rise high in the political hierarchy. They know that God
can perform a lot of miracles with the masses.
Siddhartha, the king who relinquishes
his kingdom in search of the truths beyond cowardly myths, makes a few appearances
in Vijayan’s novel. His touch heals the wounds of the victims of nationalism in
Dharmapuri. But he is helpless when nationalism goes raping women, selling
children, and plucking out the vital organs from the men.
Dharmapuri is on the way to becoming
Viswaguru. Shit has a strange charm! 
O V Vijayan
PS. This post is a part of Blogchatter Half Marathon
Previous Posts in this
series:
2. Pip Learns the Essential Lessons
3. Delusions and Ironies of Love
After reading your post I again read your title, it made me smile. Suppose the ruler of each tailor is graded differently, then I will have to probably find the right tailor to get my dress stitched properly otherwise some might be loose, some tight; some mini dresses and some giant gowns. Your mention of democratic dictatorship is well-framed and presented. Actually, we live in a new world with a modern look of dictatorship where we only choose our leaders who later refuse to leave their chairs and keep continuing in their post for years and years. I think you have used the word ruler as a homonyms which adds more meaning to your post from various angles.
ReplyDeleteVijayan used the word Prajapati in the Malayalam original and President in his own English translation of the novel. I used Ruler precisely for reasons that you've mentioned here.
DeleteHari OM
ReplyDeleteIt seems that Vijayan-ji may have presented an equal to another great treatise on power and its corruptions... 1984. Both have proven, as you say, prophetic. Or at the very least, prescient. YAM xx
Prescient may be the better term, Yam, and thanks for that. Vijayan's novel is what literary convention calls Grotesque Realism. It revolts us sometimes with its excess of excreta! Unlike Orwell.
DeleteThe dictators keep showing up. Any story about a dictator will follow roughly the same playbook. It's not prophetic. It's just recognizing patterns.
ReplyDeleteYes, intelligent and perceptive people see that pattern pretty easily.
DeleteInteresting and somewhat humorous too.
ReplyDeleteThe humour is bleak in the novel.
DeleteAh! The popularity contest. It would be a delight to read this novel. Is it return in a satiical manner or essays?~Sukaina
ReplyDeleteIt is a novel, a very troubled and troubling one with faeces appearing larger than human beings every now and then.
DeleteLooks like an interesting read... have added the book in my list...
ReplyDeleteA troubling read, I'd say.
DeleteAdd Trump in there too!
ReplyDeleteTrue, he should have been there.
Delete