Vanamala Vishwanatha’s translation, Bride in the Hills, of Kuvempu’s 1967 novel, Malegalalli Madumagalu set in the Malnad region of the Western Ghats has been lauded as an incredible feat of bringing a layered and complex narrative to a contemporary English readership. Considered by many to be one of the greatest novels of Kannada literature, the narrative explores friendships and relationships traversing a landscape dominated by caste separations and feudal hierarchies. In his analysis of the novel in Scroll, Arvind Narrain says, ‘The sense of being trapped in an eternal unchanging social order sanctified by religion and tradition is disrupted through lovers who challenge the structures of feudalism, caste and patriarchy.’ The many strong women characters in the novel paint a full, rich and significantly complex picture of society. Vanamala emphasises that in her translation, she ‘strived to grasp, and follow the structure of feeling and texture of experience of each of the characters and situations’.
Academic, Chandan Gowda has drawn attention to Kuvempu’s writing and philosophical ideas in his compilation Another India: Events, Memories, People. In his essay, ‘The idea of Vishvamanava’, he refers to Kuvempu’s concept as a ‘distinct contribution to the moral imagination of modern India’. He elaborates, ‘Animated by a great love for peace and a great daring to experience the world freely, without prior submission to the authority of official religions or to community attachments, the philosophical idea of Vishvamanava is Kuvempu’s passionate invitation to explore truth on one’s own terms.’
We requested Chandan – whose translations from Kannada of Purnachandra Tejaswi, U R Ananthamurthy and P Lankesh have appeared in Out of Print – to engage with Vanamala on the novel, and the translation. The conversation, considered, perceptive and insightful, provides the reader with an entry into the novel at multiple levels, and we are grateful for the depth and thoughtfulness of question and of answer.
Bride in the Hills (BITH) is viewed as a foundational novel in modern Kannada. Could you elaborate on this claim? What kinds of genre innovation did it bring into the modern Kannada novel?
The origin and growth of the early Kannada novel was marked by social realism. By the 1960s, the realist novel had exhausted its potential. Kuvempu had never considered the genre of the novel as a mere chronicle or reflection of reality.; for him, it was a ‘darshana’, a philosophical vision overarching the past, present, and future. Every material or physical detail in this novel of thick description gestures towards something beyond it. Much like epic poetry, he believed the epic novel is also determined by a cosmic consciousness, a result of the author's individual vision and the larger society's consciousness of itself. Thus, he claims that this is an epic novel with an inclusive and holistic vision. While his first novel is written entirely in the realist mode, with this novel, he combines many aspects from the Indian narrative tradition. Bride is undoubtedly rooted in the actual events that took place in Malnad between the 1860s and the 1890s. However, the humanism and breadth of vision that informs its imaginative multiverse is entirely Kuvempu's. This is an impressive feat that is hard to imitate. The novel is one of its kind.
In what ways does his philosophical vision of Vishvamanava manifest itself in the BITH?
The central trope that animates the novel throughout is that of a leap, a transformation, an enhanced state of being. The novel demonstrates time and again that this state of becoming is accessible to every human being. Hence, that famous ‘socialist mission statement’ as Rahamat Tarikere puts it: ‘No one is important; No one is unimportant; Nothing is insignificant.’ In order to elaborate the perspective that all life is one interconnected whole, Kuvempu chooses to tell the stories of a cross section of humanity in the social world of Malnad, deeply entrenched in caste hierarchy. All forms of sentient life – from dog Huliya to Swami Vivekananda – are a part of this epic journey. In Kuvempu’s all-embracing universe, even ordinary water can turn into sacred waters! Every sentient and insentient thing – the degenerate Chinkra, orphan Dharmu, Huliya the dog, Biri the cat, the evergreen forest, the Hulikal Peak – has a place and a purpose in this narrative. Kuvempu offers a ‘view from below’, a subaltern perspective which also takes in the world of the wealthy and powerful. Kuvempu’s purpose in creating such diverse characters and contexts was to go beyond its regional setting and explore human condition beyond constraints of space and time. Through such characters, the text embodies the possibility of sublimity or transcendence in every person, especially among women, and Dalits who were not in the reckoning for such a possibility. Kuvempu's inclusive world view provides a bedrock of resistance and reason, hope and audacity upon which an individual’s aspiration for emancipation and a community's dream of self-transformation into an enabling Indian modernity can flourish. Bride in the Hills maps this journey of becoming in all its beauty and complexity on a boundless canvas.
Did you discover anything new about Kuvempu – his style, method, personality – while translating this novel?
Kuvempu's Unconditional affection for women characters: For Kuvempu, women being close to Nature, can't usually go wrong. His admiration for women does not spring from some abstract, ideological stand. His women are vivacious, committed, hard-working, resilient, and positive – life-giving qualities that can sustain a society. Even the few women who occupy a slightly 'grey' band in his moral universe – Akkani, Nagamma, Antakka, or Kaveri – are portrayed in a completely non-judgemental manner, understanding their particular circumstances. I have not read a kinder delineation of a young woman who would have been normally vilified as a ‘flirt’ as the character of Kaveri in this novel. The unravelling of the naive and confused Kaveri's hopes and aspirations as she walks out of her house with her perpetrator, trusting him implicitly, is one of the most empathetic mirrors held to the vivid interiority of an adolescent girl I know.
Humour: Yes, his tremendous sense of humour which has not been discussed much. In fact, I can see where his son Tejasvi's humour, which has been widely recognised, stems from! Just read through the Bi-cycle riding episode in chapter 18, or the khap panchayat scene in chapter 2, or the leech scene in chapter 3 or, the water divining scene in chapter 31. Look at this description from chapter 18. Aita, who is newly married, has come face to face, for the first ever time, with this new, fascinating contraption: the bicycle. And this is his reaction: ‘Aita responds with a grin, all teeth, and implores him, ‘Please let me also touch it once … please!’ and Gutthi makes space for him.
Aita caresses the various parts of the bicycle, savouring the very same thrill that accompanied his private explorations of the tender contours of Pinchalu’s alluring body in the early days of their intimate union; gliding his hands over them again and again, he sighs long and deep in bliss as he would at the climax of orgasmic delight.’
The child in Kuvempu: I could see the child in Kuvempu as he portrays the experience of children with total empathy. He delves deep into the childhood days of Mukunda and Chinni, Aita, Dharmu and gang. The conversations among the children bring a smile on your lips and an occasional tear as you read the novel.
Were there any unforeseen translation challenges?
The words used to describe the topography of the Malnad terrain are local and specific to that dialect. Standard dictionaries do not always carry the meanings of these words. Even if the meaning is glossed in Kannada, as it was in the 'Kuvempu padakosha' , it was one was hard put to find an English word that could bring the same picture to mind. It was the same with kitchenware and implements. For example, the word ‘kesar halage’ was particularly challenging. As it is not easy to find a single word for it in English, it can only be explained in a long note. If we retained the Kannada word in the English text, it would stick out like a sore thumb.
As you know, proverbs and dialects do not easily cross linguistic boundaries as they are an expression of particular, local cultures. I wondered how to overcome this universal problem for translators. I adopted the strategy of literalism. For instance, rather than using the standard, idiomatic expression, ‘They decided to bet on the winning horse', I said, 'They decided to latch on to the tail of the winning bull,’ which is true to the original Kannada proverb in denotation and connotation. For me, it was a matter of joy to recreate different characters using different voices. For example, Marate Manja has a kind of drawl ‘aan’ in every line he speaks; Kanna pandita, who hails from Kerala, speaks English with a typical Malayalam accent. The children have different voices.
What did you love most during your work on the translation?
The narrative holds you so much in thrall that you are propelled forward involuntarily. This made for an easy flow of the text. However, the text demanded a range of robust registers, supple styles, and freshly-minted words to represent the plethora of characters, its depth and variety of emotions, its varying pace, its constant toing and froing, its hills and forests, animals and birds of Kuvempu's multiverse. I have had to stretch and grow as never before in terms of my linguistic, literary, and critical sensibilities. And the sheer thrill of that challenge is the highest reward for a translator.
What does this novel offer the non-Kannada reader?
The novel opens a whole new world located in the lush green Malnad region of Karnataka which has played home to many literary writers in Kannada. But like most classics, Kuvempu's masterpiece transports the readers beyond its specifics to larger realms of our common humanity, our challenges and possibilities. This epic novel which essentially explores the sacredness of life, not just human life but all life, is a rare and precious text for all climes and times.
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| The featured excerpt from Bride in the Hills appeared Out of Print 54, September 2024 |
The following of Chandan Gowda’s translations have appeared in Out of Print:
- An Indentured Spirit by K P Purnachandra Tejaswi, Out of Print 22, March 2016
- Bara – an excerpt by U R Ananthamurthy, Out of Print 24, September 2016
- The Retired Ones by P Lankesh, Out of Print 29, December 2017, with Narayan Hegde
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