From Spain to India to Spain

This is one of those full circles that will draw a bemused smile. Being in Kolkata is in many ways, an enigmatic paradox. A city so slow, an average Mumbaikar could loose his mind. Yet a cultural palate so shaukeen he would be at first bemused, then jealous. Where Sufi sangeet  and Cultural festivals are an annual occurence in Mumbai, a luxury few can afford. In Kolkata the same is the daily cup of tea. Mandatory, routine and unimpeachable. Sip a cup of infusion at the College street Coffee house and soak in the ambience that is made up of students discussing Rabindra poetry, theatre artists passionately debating their next ventures and writers working on their next books. There is so much culture in the very air that a Mumbaikar might just hyperventilate.


But this particular Mumbaikar-Marwari hybrid it seems was always a Kolkatan at heart. Haunting the school libraries to pour over the musings of poets in horn rimmed glasses and earning the usual monikers that are bestowed on the unfortunate breed of dorkus nerdus. Always mesmerised by the mercurially spiritual prose of Tagore. His riveting insights into relationships and society are, unfortunately not explored outside West Bengal. Powerfully overflowing with the preciousness of this maverick visionary, his literature and poetry both equally facilitate a sojourn into his unnatural contemplation of the mundane. His deep, unimaginable insights are etched and inter weaved in the tapestry of my mind. Which is why, I was surprised to see the same in the unlikeliest of places. A coffee table edition of world's prolific poets displayed a poem by an unheard of Latin poet. Yet his words were like a familiar voice whispering the old song of colloquial naturalism. A certain Pablo Neruda.


I set out to explore the connection and it was no surprise that Tagore indeed was a major personal influence, an entire globe away, on the mind of this Chilean maverick who it seemed had fashioned his entire life on Tagore. One of his books does directly acknowledge Tagore as the spirit behind his prose. Tagore's mammoth influence on Spanish and Latin American poets can be read here.To think his own countrymen know so little of the genius that these strangers across the globe idolised! To think he was probably translated in Spanish before all our regional languages !!! 


And then, earlier today a revelation that filled me with a sly smile at the naughty fancies of our maker. While his entire college education was limited to a single day at Presidency college, the young Tagore had a Spanish master, one who touched his inner being so powerfully it exploded through words. A Jesuit Professor of theology, he unknowingly sowed the seeds of deep, spiritual contemplation in a rebel who disdained classical structures. Their interaction can be read here .It was an influence that perhaps gave us our first universalist - humanist who triggered a Renaissance in his cultural milieu, albeit one that was rooted in the spirit. And Pablo Neruda,under the spell of our cultural behemoth created himself in his image.


From Spain to India to Spain.