The Undiscarded Image: Love in C.Thuamluaia’s Sialton Official

- Dr.R.Thangvunga

The story  -  A government official at Sialton in eastern Mizoram proceeds to his new post in southern Mizoram with his family, breaking journey at the parachronistic Hotel Odyana in Zolawn, where an old discarded Shillong Times brings back memories of a buried romance which perhaps all happily married men would have shrugged off. What he reads there is an echo of lovers’ familiar heart-to-heart communiqué plus news about an ill-fated marriage of the girl he loved once. But the Sialton Official (thus known), like Pandora, must open the safely locked past with this key, and bring about ruin and death. His indulgence with memories of a romance with a tea-girl in Shillong leads to another indulgence to cure the first indulgence, and bury his loved ones in the other love. From his drunken torpor he is rudely awakened by cries of “Hotel Odyana is burning! Your family….”  He loses everything except remorse and, Oedipus-like, wanders Cainfully bearing his sin and punishment, while to all men he becomes the very sainthood of Penitence. His forgiveness finally comes where he had sinned, in Zolawn, to which his daughter’s voice has been driving him relentlessly, to find peace and self-forgiveness. With his salvation the whole community comes alive to worship and hear his testimony of the Miracle of Love.

Some early novels familiar to Mizo readers are romantic love stories with tragic endings. As in Hardy’s Return of the Native, a young man returning from civilized world to his native village in the hills typically becomes ‘the eye’ in society, winning favour and love, and rivalry: a perfect stereotype setting for a sentimental plot. But Sialton Official is different in that the romance and sentimental elements take a back seat, and practical life is foregrounded, at least in the setting. Shillong was a conventional name for education till recently, and an occasional tale of romance with a local beauty is not unconventional, for it does not seem as romantic to go gallivanting with one of the same tribe; and marriage was hardly ever the goal of such relationships – there being an unspoken taboo-like consensus against inter-tribal marriages. Any such inter-tribal amatory relationships came under a cloud of displeasure from both the communities. But it is the memory of a romance that we are dealing with, not the actual event, which had been sealed fast in Time’s sepulchre, incapable of meddling with the present life. Or is it? 

To compare such a happy memory with a Dracula or a raised Mummy and the unspeakable fear they evoke may seem farfetched. But the catastrophe attending on it is no less horrible than such visitation from the nether world.

The mind is its own place, and in itself

Can make a Heav’n of Hell, a Hell of Heav’n. [1]

And Dorothy may yet be living in St. Mary’s Convent with her daughter after the death by drinking of her husband, when her SOS reached her old lover. It is no evil hand reaching out from the grave in a fit of jealousy of his good fortune in love that bewitched the Sialton Official. Nor can we blame Dorothy for putting that bleeding message, knowing she has no hope of her distant fiancé riding against the wind to rescue her. The message may just be a ‘heavy weight of hours’ sighed out for relief – a shy, unadmitted ‘if’ betraying her need of comfort in her solitude  - an undiscarded image.

Pillowed upon my fair love’s ripening breast,

To feel forever its soft fall and swell,

Awake forever in a sweet unrest.[2]

What kind of love is this that can cut across a happily concluded marriage? Is there a different kind of love outside the marriage institution? In Medieval Europe the amatory aspect of love was institutionalized in ‘courtly love’, with the effect of relegating married love to the status of domestic order. The majority of Medieval poems celebrate love within a religious framework by which the lady is an ideal of beauty and chastity to whom devotion is due as prove of an ideal knightly character. Marriage is not the end of this holy quest, for an ideal possessed loses its value as an ideal. The beautiful lady is an ideal inspiring love and devotion till she becomes a possession. Love idealized thus is an intangible vision that illuminates the object. And when the Sialton Official cryptically remarks, “I reached for the star without climbing whereas she looked in vain for a bridge where there was none,” there can hardly be a better way of stating the situation of such relationship, showing that love is a two-way glass, man and woman having different concepts about love. According to this, man idealizes love, whereas woman sees it as a means. Man needs woman to light his life, but woman demands his very life. He loved, not Dorothy, but what he saw in her - a very Desdemona. And to Dorothy, he is a daydream, a mirage, the handsome knight who never stays. Both went separate ways to marry and kept their love alive, but closely, so closely they both thought they had buried it under marriage vows. The dead never rise, but the undead.

For Othello, Desdemona incarnates his concept of Beauty and Love. It is not Desdemona dead but the dead in Desdemona that raised the chaos in him. Man as husband and father plays his role smoothly when the undiscarded image of love lies dormant. The loss of husband, albeit a drunken one opened the chest that had confined love in Dorothy, and like Pandora, let loose the winged scion of Love whose arrow pierced the once wounded heart of  the Sialton Official on that ill-fated evening in Odyana Hotel, with catastrophic consequences.

Once Dorothy, ideal love incarnate in “Queen of the days I loved,” lives again, the other love incarnate in his wife (the ideal wife) must die. And husband too. But not necessarily in the flesh. Thus the pain of physical death is not felt by his wife and children but him alone; that is, the text saved them the horror, the fear, the burning heat and the suffocating breathless smoke. It is him so rudely called from another world that bore the full painful consciousness of death.  They are the sacrifices at the altar of the goddess of love. But the cost, so dearly paid by the penitent – of what worth is it made to serve?

The answer to this has to be the conclusion of our brief critical adventure. But there is yet an unvisited but familiar spot in love’s empire: the hill of Platonic love where true devotees of love find fulfillment. For Plato the object of love is perpetual possession of and union with the good.[3]  In literature woman more often as not objectifies the good “in her self-possessed, witty, modest and circumspect nature, ready to face life on her own.”  [4]“. . . love of a particular person leads to the discovery that beauty of soul is more valuable than beauty of body." [5]

Such beauty engendering love in man is observed in most of Shakespeare’s heroines who possess a kind of beauty that can turn cold the heat of lust. Marina of Pericles, Imogen of Cymbeline, Portia of The Merchant of Venice, among others, are the quintessence of beauty that does not rust in marriage.The seemingly wasted goodness of a Cordelia, an Ophelia, or a Desdemona constitutes an honest admission of the insignificance of human virtue in the context of an impersonal, apathetic and consciousless cosmic order. In such a universe, man is the only ‘measure of all things, of those that are that they are, that are not that they are not.’[6] Man must make his virtue meaningful in himself in order to save himself the pain of existence, or perish in the limbo of his own agnosticism, or hang precariously in the swing of ontological relativism. The Sialton Official chooses to live, to go on, and ‘BE,’ to make the sacrifice of his loved ones meaningful, for himself and for humanity, and leave an unforgettable legacy of Love.

[1]  John Milton, Paradise Lost, Bk. I (ll. 254-255).
[2] John Keats, Bright Star.
[3] R.Thangvunga, Shakespeare and Donne: Themes of Love, Time and Mutability, 2010,  Atlantic Publishers, New Delhi, p. 76.
[4]  ibid., p. 26.
[5]   ibid., p.77
[6]  Protagoras.

Dr. R. Thangvunga is an Associate Professor in the Mizo Department at Mizoram University. This seminar paper which examines this short fiction was presented at the National Seminar on Mizo Fiction  organized by the  Department of Mizo, Mizoram University, at Aizawl, in 2011.

Aftermath - Cherrie Lalteii Chhangte

You would, perhaps, have me write poems
Of bittersweet love on sun-kissed mornings,
Of how our sandalled feet splashed
Across pavements on rainy afternoons
When monsoon downpours burst
upon us in orgasmic urgency,
Brief moments of ecstasy that left us drenched,
The aftermath infinitely more permanent than the event.
Aftermaths-  that is what it always crumbles to,
Like the precarious towers made of dreams
That we are so adept at building.
How I dreamt that you would be my saviour
From the neurotic web of nothingness
That ensnares me in its fatal allure!
And how you dreamt that I-
I in my fear disguised as calm -
Would embody every pristine boyhood dream you had,
Before the scarlet of betrayed hopes
Left that stain across your battered soul.

Ah, but dreams are fragile, sweetheart,
As you and I well know,
For they crumble to dust
With an untimely question,
A half-articulated doubt,
A wing clipped in mid-flight.
The house of cards you built yesterday
Could not withstand your deep soul-weary sigh.
So we stand across each other
In the debris of the aftermath,
Weighed down by the failure
Of the punchline that was never delivered,
And the climax that never came.

Yes, I think I will write poems
Of bittersweet love on sun-kissed mornings.


Dr. Cherrie Lalteii Chhangte is on the teaching faculty of the English dept at Mizoram University. She writes poetry in English and also does translations from Mizo to English.


Photo credit:  Andrew Lalbiaknunga Ralte
 

Blurred - Dawngi Chawngthu

Do not underestimate me for a fool yet
Intelligence still runs through my veins
Cold facts of reason struggle with words of nonsense

But then don't overestimate my intelligence
My mind is blurred by dreams we weave
Dreams that border between myth and reality

Somewhere between here and there
Somewhere between hot and cold
Somewhere between sane and insane

Somebody pinch me
Shake me awake from this day-mare
Place on me the cold stamp of definition

Vague confusion though comforting
and vaguely pleasing
is somewhat disturbing..

An Analysis of Popular Mizo Culture through Vincy Chhangte's 'Aizawl' - Vanlalveni Pachuau

The simplest and most obvious way to define popular culture is as simply the culture that is widely favoured or well liked by many people. Culture here refers not just to a particular way of life, but also to intellectual and artistic works and practices, such as literature, music, art, films, etc. By this definition of culture, popular cultural forms are those that are commercially produced and therefore, are easily accessible and also understandable by the masses. Popular culture has often been defined as a culture of the people by the people. Since it is the culture that is mass produced to suit the tastes of a general audience, it is regarded by some as being an inferior type of culture.

There have been many critics who have drawn distinctive lines between “high” culture and popular culture. According to them, ‘high’ culture consists of ideas and practices which have been created out of intense study. It appeals to a select audience, that is, those who have the intellectual capacity to appreciate it, whereas popular culture caters to a general audience, one which is less discriminating, and so, it would be less intellectually significant. As a result, ‘high’ culture deserves a serious and intense response, whereas popular culture deserves only a fleeting study since it would have very little to offer. However, popular culture has the potential to offer more insight into the study of culture than what is initially apparent.

For this paper, Vincy Chhangte’s¹ “Aizawl” has been chosen so as to show how popular musical forms can and do give an insightful critique of society. Vincy’s “Aizawl” is a satirical rap-song in which the rapper elucidates the various qualities of the youths in Mizoram’s capital, Aizawl, to an outsider while actually highlighting the posturing and the hypocrisy of its inhabitants. The song starts off with praising Aizawl, extolling its virtues such as its perfect weather and its beautiful women. He tells the outsider that they are approaching Dawrpui, the market centre, where most of the city’s shops are located and where, therefore, the youths proliferate:

“Dawrpui i rawn thleng phei tep;
Angel hawlhthlak hlir maw i hmuh.
Mahse neih chhuantur i neihloh chuan
Bem ringawt suh”
(You’re almost at Dawrpui now;
Are those angels descended upon us you see?
But unless you have something worth boasting about
Don’t presume to court their favours)

The irony here lies in the usage of the phrase “angel hawlhthlak” . While the phrase has often been employed to describe physical beauty, the term “angel” nevertheless points towards the less angelic qualities of the women whose favours could only be courted by those with material wealth. Vincy here gives us the first glimpse into the materialistic attitudes of Aizawl youths. The first verse continues to provide the listener with Aizawl’s youth culture

Chhas bem huai nan Stag i peg alaw?
Khumsenin a khung ang che, fimkhur rawh
(A peg of Stag for courage to make a move on a girl?
Careful, the Redcaps will put you in the slammer)

Here, we are again shown one of the many hypocrisies of Mizo society. Around 85% of Mizoram’s population are Christians who subscribe to the belief that liquor consumption is a sin. Neverthless, the church and the government felt the need to introduce the MLTP (Mizoram Liquor Total Prohibition) Act, which was implemented in February 20th, 1997. This Act called for the total prohibition of liquor in Mizoram. However, critics are of the opinion that this Act has totally failed and has only proliferated bootlegging of poor quality liquor, resulting in fatalities and increased prices of smuggled liquor. The former chief secretary M. Lalmanzuala has said, "If a law fails, it is either to be lifted or amended. We have experimented with the Liquor Ban Act for more than ten years, and witnessed that it has failed to stop what it is meant to stop. It only made Mizoram the wettest dry state. One can find plenty of liquor, only the prices are extraordinarily high".

Locally produced liquor is still readily available, as are IMFL (Indian Made Foreign Liquor), albeit at exorbitantly expensive prices. The table below gives the statistics of liquor seizures in the years 2008-2009 and 2009-2010. Smuggled or bootlegged liquor is seized, those who are found in possession of it, or manufacturing it are arrested. Yet The bottomline is that, despite the raids carried out by the Excise Department and various NGOs, liquor is still readily obtainable. One needs only to be careful of the Redcaps or the police working under the Excise Department.

Fortified by alcohol, Vincy invites the listener to sample the many entertainments that Aizawl has to offer:
Party naah I kal chak a nih chuan
Zantin party chu a awm alawm
…
Mahse I lam anga lam kan awmlo (zak suh!)
Mi nuih kan chinglo
Hlet I siam ve thovang.
(If you want to party
There’s a party every night.
…
But no one here dances like that (don’t be embarrased!)
We don’t laugh at others.
Im sure you’ll still make an impression)

One of the things that has often been said about Aizawl youths is their great sense of belonging to the capital city. There are those who tend to regard those from other towns with a certain degree of condescension. Vincy patronizingly tells his friend that his way of dancing do not conform to Aizawl standards but that he should not feel embarrassed by it because Aizawl youths are kind enough to not laugh at others. Implicit in this is the disdain felt by the city-dwellers for outsiders, whom they feel are not quite as “cool” as they are.

In the second verse, Vincy gives a list of various music artists, both belonging to the Gospel and the non-gospel genres. Mizos are known for their great love of singing, and there is a huge proliferation of singers. This distinction between Gospel and non-Gospel singers is an important one within the Mizo context. The question of whether a Christian should sing Gospel songs or Love songs has been an ongoing debate for a long time. There are those who feel that Christians have a moral obligation to give back to God for bestowing upon them the talent of singing, and this should be done through the production of Gospel music. However, Vincy renders this moral debate into a travesty when he declares:

“Zai lama lar I duh chuan
C.Dina tlawn rawh”
(If you want fame as a musician
You should suck up to C.Dina)

C.Dina is the owner of Lelte Weekly, a fortnightly newspaper dedicated to musicians. By virtue of his being the only noteworthy musical journal in Mizoram, C.Dina is probably the biggest musical promoter in Mizoram. A mention in his newspaper brought much fame to musicians since the paper is widely circulated within Mizoram. Vincy implies that commercial success lay not with God but with the bestowing of C.Dina’s favours. This brings into question the musical integrity of the artists and of the Mizo community itself. He continues

Rimawi Kutpui a awm thin Vanapa Hall-ah
Zaimite kan fuankhawm
Kan style a dang, kan hmel pawh a dang
Studio hrang hrang a tam
J JER, SS, Zaiawi-
Ka sawi senglo
(We have Musical Festivals at Vanapa Hall
We musicians abound
Our styles vary, our faces vary.
There are so many studios around.
JER, SS, Zaiawi-
I can’t name them all)

Despite having such a huge proliferation of musicians with varying ‘styles and faces’, Aizawl, for all its appreciation of music, is unable to provide a sufficient platform for these artistes to showcase their talent. The biggest event for them is Rimawi Kutpui, and the occasional concert. The many music studios are a testament to the flourishing of budding artistes; however, the only ones who profit from the music industry within Aizawl are the owners of the studios- the artists get little exposure and are paid only a trifle. Yet, the studios never run out of the patronage of artistes who are willing to try their luck, whether their aims be religious or materialistic.

After listing the various entertainments afforded by Aizawl and its flourishing musical trade, Vincy declares the pride that he feels his hometown. But characteristic of the materialism prevalent in Aizawl, the pride he feels lie in that fact that Aizawl is home to International clothing brands:

Thawmhnaw duhzawng a kim,
duhloh zawng pawh a kim,
(Khawiah maw?)
Adidas, Nike, Reebok showroom-ah
(All the clothes you want
And the ones you don’t, they’re here
{Where?}
At Adidas, Nike and Reebok Showrooms)

The fashion-consciousness of Aizawl youths is hinted at in these lines with their reference to International Sports Fashion brands. When one takes into account that 22.5% of the population in Mizoram declare themselves as living below the poverty line, it comes as a surprise that the biggest concern among youths is fashion. This is particularly true in Aizawl, where brand-consciousness is especially prevalent. Branded clothes are seen as a sign of class and quality, and presumably after they have outfitted themselves in those, Vincy declares 

I changkang ta hle mai
Engzat motor nge I hmuh?
Aizawl motor tam zia hi!
Mak ti duh suh.
Saw saw a va mawi e,
Thlir vung vung suh!
Ava chhelo e,
Hawi huhu suh!
(You are now a person of class.
How many vehicles do you see?
There are so many vehicles in Aizawl!
Don’t be impressed.
That one’s a beauty.
Stop staring!
That one’s not bad.
Stop gawking!)

These lines are in the form of a dialogue between Vincy and his listener. After having introduced him to the higher standards of living in Aizawl, as exemplified by the parties and the branded clothes, Vincy declares that his friend is now a person of class, and therefore, befits the Aizawl standards. However, his friend is nevertheless impressed by the many vehicles and the sights and sounds around him, all of which causes Vincy to admonish him. The true Aizawlian is accustomed to these sights and sounds and is no longer impressed by them. To stare and gawk would give away that one is not from the city, and so, one should act nonchalant even if one is impressed. 

Finally, Vincy declares
Sappui nun kan ngailo, ramdang nun kan ngailo
Kan hmel a tha, chhe deuhte chu lo awm mah se…
(We don’t yearn for the Western way of living
We are beautiful people, though some are not quite so…)

Again, the irony implicit in these lines comes from his declaration that he does not yearn for a Western way of living because it is exactly the western fashion that Aizawl youths are trying to imitate- with their parties, lifestyles and fashion. The last line, “Kan hmel a tha” is reminiscient of one of our more popular Mizo folk song, which declares

“Mizo kan ni, kan hmel a tha
Kan tum a sang bawk si”
(We are Mizos, we are beautiful
And our ambitions are lofty)

This folk song praises the Mizo perseverance and determination, qualities which made the Mizo people beautiful. Yet when Vincy declares, “Kan hmel a tha”, he seems to mock these very ideals that the folk song talks about. Our beauty no longer lies in our noble and lofty aims, but it is rather commercially generated through Western influenced fashions. Thus, while Vincy seems to be extolling the virtues of Aizawl, he is actually exposing its hypocrisies and its vanities. Its angelic women are available only at a price, its laws are carelessly broken, its Christian values are subverted, its prized singers are mere puppets to commercial success, and its beauty is clothed in high priced branded clothes. 

Earlier in the paper, we have mentioned the distinction that has often been made between what is regarded as ‘high’ culture and popular culture. Cultural purists might regard Vincy’s “Aizawl” as belonging to a lower form of culture in that he uses everyday Mizo language to convey everyday elements. He shuns the literary and linguistic devices employed in traditional Mizo song s and poetry. He also departs from the traditional Mizo tunes to employ the use of rap music. As such, his style is different from what is traditionally considered as the artistic form of Mizo writing. However, it cannot be denied that what he has done is to depict, in the common vernacular, a picture of modern Mizo youth culture. Through the use of irony and satire, Vincy reveals much more than is initially apparent and the song is worthy of a more detailed scrutiny that this paper has been able to achieve. The song touches upon the twin holds of materialism and religiosity implicit within Mizo culture, and specifically upon Aizawl culture, and these two aspects will always come be a point of debate in any study regarding Mizo culture. 

¹A popular Mizo rap-singer who writes his own songs.


Vanlalveni Pachuau is presently working on her Ph.D. in the department of English at Mizoram University. This seminal study on contemporary Mizo pop culture was presented at a seminar in March 2012 at Govt. Aizawl College.

Cheraw - Lalnunsanga (Sanga Says)

I cannot place it in terms of the bigger picture

but it's somewhere south of where i am; here,
a place that is built on some great mercy of Providence
with houses teetering on cliffs.
We are known for our dance that have bamboos snapping at ankles,
as our young men and women, dressed in tradition's best, hop in and out.
The essence of this dance is the understanding of rhythm and balance,
where one wrong movement would lead to disaster.

one-two
three-four
one-two
three-four

This dry and dusty place boasts of small towns and big houses,
with comprehensive differences in warmth and sizes.
Out of these, the hopes of future generations,
hardly able to walk with pants worn at knees,
and shoes that can feed a family for months
(but what is food compared to the latest fashion).
Subbing identity for brands, a living, breathing advertisement.
and in their coolest, hippiest ignorance,
sing along to an apt tune
"Pretty fly for a white guy"
(O well, you know he doesn't really get it anyway)

one-two
three-four
one-two
three-four

We also have our share of democracy's champions; the politicians,
who in years of election give huge contributions to charity and churches.
(for votes mind you.....keep your salvation)
Then the righteous elders that go home to ignored wives and children,
and illegitimate grandchildren,
that sit around a table for a perfect family portrait, and pray,
to a God that does not live within them.
we also have our revivals, as the crowds go,
in throngs, to see the magic show.
The deaf hear, the dumb speak, the children see,
visions of angels and Christ; slowly,
convincing ourselves of strength in our shaky faith.
Multitudes would bow in awe at the spectacle

but,
if in a single raindrop
or a humming insect
you do not see the miracle
then you do not see God.

one-two
three-four
one-two
three-four

A word of praise for our ingenuity,
we do not have liquor here, but we find inventive ways to get high,
off household appliances and medicines.
Mean those meant to fix meant for a fix.
And Jim, poor Jim.
He's hanging on a shoestring.
The diluted blood in his veins ran cold.
His relief from pain became his pain.
And in the songs of mourning and accompanying drums,
mother would cry,"...it's my fault!"
Silent father would whisper, "..it's my fault."
In the corner of each isolated spot, they would discover
repentance,
regain the rhythm to the dance,
but Jim, poor Jim,
He is dead.

one-two
three-four
one-two
three-four


Lalnunsanga currently lives in Shillong and is pursuing his doctorate at NEHU.

Picture: Richard Hrahsel