[Moderator's note : Many people think that the liberation war of Bangladesh in 1971 has not yet produced any great literary work. The passions, conflicts, and frustrations that arose in our society in the aftermath of the war found splendid expression in the theatre which drew freely on both indigenous and international dramatic literature for sustenance and inspiration. We find that Prof. Kabir Chowdhury's survey of the literature inspired by the liberation war of 1971 is quite informative. We will present his article, "The Liberation War and Creative Writing" in three parts to the Mukto-mona members. We, also, have a plan to introduce the contemporary Bengali writing and the prominent authors to the readers of this forum to share invaluable information in global perspective. We welcome review of Bangla books/articles, films, music, plays etc. from the members.]
Prof. Chowdhury is one of the prominent intellectuals of Bangladesh and a well-known Human Rights activist.
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The Liberation War and Creative Writing
[Part -I]
Prof. Kabir Chowdhury
Wars of liberation have always exerted a deep and widespread influence on the literature of the peoples concerned. The patriotic and revolutionary zeal as well as the exaltation and suffering accompanying such wars have left their mark on the creative writing of man in our lime and before. If one views liberation wars as not limited only to the struggle against a foreign colonial power but from a wider perspective, one is likely lo recall in this context such writers, among others, as Maxim Gorky and Mayakovsky of Russia. Ivan Vazor and Nikolai Vaptsarov of Bulgaria. Garcia Lorca of Spain, Louis Aragon and Paul Eluard of France. Bertolt Brccht of Germany. Nazim Hikmet of Turkey, Pablo Neruda of Chile and Augustine Neto of Angola. However in this article we do not propose to take such a broad view of the subject. For our purposes here. by liberation war we shall mean the war waged by the people of Bangladesh in 1971 against the Pakistani neocolonial occupation forces, at the successful conclusion of which Bangladesh emerged as a sovereign and independent nation in December of that year ; and by creative writing we shall mean poems, short stories, novels and plays, the universally recognized major forms of literature.
The ruthless exploitation of the Bengali people, the people of the then East Pakistan, politically, economically and culturally, by the Pakistani rulers for over two decades and finally the genocide unleashed on them by the Pakistani military junta in March 1971 made the liberation war of Bangladesh historically inevitable. It was a people's war in every sense of the term. The entire population of occupied Bangladesh, barring a few quislings, rose against the occupation army. The writers, too, played their part. Some of them not only wielded their pens but also literally took up arms and fought in different sectors of the war. The experiences of the liberation war inspired our writers to write on this theme. As a result, we have a sizeable body of creative writing based on it, practically in all the genres of our literature.
In the creative writing of Bangladesh inspired by the liberation war, one finds, at one level, the picture of the heroic struggle of the freedom fighters, the fear and anxiety-ridden life of the common people in captive Bangladesh while the liberation war was being waged, the vile deeds of the brutal Pakistani occupation soldiers and the inhuman torture suffered by the activists of our resistance movement in the enemy's prison camps. At another level one finds, along with the note of revolutionary ardor, a desire for a new way of life, free from tyranny and exploitation, dreams of a society where secular, democratic and egalitarian values would prevail. While our creative writing has been reflecting these elements in varying degrees since the liberation war, I must say that it cannot always lay claim to much literary merit or artistic excellence. Not infrequently, it is melodramatic and sentimental; it lacks genuine feeling and betrays signs of an artificial design; and it often merits classification as journalistic or documentary rather than authentic creative writing. In spite of the above critical comments, however, a general examination of the creative writing of Bangladesh connected with its liberation war is not without a certain interest.
Let us, first, take a look at poetry: while dealing with the theme of liberation war, our poets present such diverse emotions as hope, anger, despair, heroic protest and unflinching determination. During the early years of independence, a note of joy and hope dominated. But later, as the anxiously awaited fruit of independence, that is, a positive improvement in the quality of life of the common man, receded further and further, that note was replaced by one of disillusionment, satire and criticism. Let me quote for the readers some extracts from a few poems by some of our well-established poets which will give them some idea of our poets, diverse approaches to a common theme. Here is a quotation from Shamsur Rahnian's poem called No. I shall not go.
"Now a days I hardly come across
a familiar face anywhere.
Many of my friends have left
the country.
In fact, pursued by fear,
thousands of men and women
are daily fleeing, leaving their
homestead behind.
Yet, I shall not go, no never,
to any other place,
I shall stay here with them
whose fate, every agonized moment
is to wait for certain death
before a finny squad."
In another famous poem by the same poet called, Liberty, you are one finds a different note altogether; joyous, hopeful, and romantic, replete with evocative imagery. Here is an extract from that poem:
"Liberty you are my mother's white sari
fluttering in the breeze in the yard,
Liberty, you are the red color of mehdi
on the lender palm of my sister.
Liberty, you are die naming poster
in my friend's hand.
Liberty, you are the thick black
loose hair of my wife
flowing in the wind.
Liberty, you are the colored shirt
on my son,
the play of sunlight on
my daughter's cheek.
Liberty, you tire my garden,
the song of the cuckoo,
the rustling leaves
of an ancient banyan tree,
the note book where I write my verses
just as I choose."
Yet again in another poem by Shamsur Rahman, instead of the tender, romantic, happy note one comes across a note of fierce anger and hitter hatred. I quote a few lines from the poem I Curse Them.
"I curse today those devils of hell
who compelled me to run up the stairs
with my feet deep in the blood
of my parents,
float on rivers,
and make my bed in wild forests.
I curse them :
let them forever wander
with rotting bodies
hung around their emaciated necks.
I curse them:
when at the close of each day
they beg on their knees
for a piece of dry bread.
It will always stay ten feet away
from their outstretched palms.
I curse them:
their cup for quenching thirst
will always fill to the brim
with blood,
the blood with which they flooded
the soil of Bengal.
I curse them !"
Let me quote a perceptive Indian critic's comment on this poem:
"There are not many poems in any language to compare with the concentrated fury and corrosive anger of this, unless one goes to Isaiah or Ezekiel or Jeremiah". Amalendu Bose in the introduction to Shamsur Rahman: Writers' Workshop, Calcutta, 1975.)