Master Valluvan, the Long-Misunderstood Tamil Mentor - Part Five
Part Five
Some couplets apart
much remains redundant
even obvious
inapt by way of pointing to fresher vistas
and those that follow the rarity of your verse
imbibe nothing else from this age’s handy cornucopia
of instant wisdom
Your lines served an eminent purpose in your time
now we bed our minds down by encyclopaedic libraries
we live on another planet
Your chain-ganged lines served to teach the meek
the lame of mind
the dislocated of your time
Yes some still wallow in the same myth
today
not from want of will
but from the fear of rebirth
imprisoned in conditioned belief
and the essor of Dravidian identity
only defering to the feigned purity of Aryanising blood
reverts to the same mythic belief
some kind of imagined power of breed
History is in the past
It cannot help the present to liberate itself
If one has not understood the difference
If one has not disowned and let fall meaningless myths
If you dear Valuvan lived in these times
Would you not have disowned your own lines
well perhaps some or more
not all finding their way into a florilège of your choice
for you know how love in the third part changed with moeurs
changing with the times
so has the art of governance
and the unconscionable ways and practices of the artha classes
other precautions more pressing than mere friendship
would have compelled you to jettison many a couplet
Who knows even your first ten would have found their way
into a bin
ethical lines of advice
would turn sour in today’s ear
No child would heed to the letter your admonitions on behaviour
Nor no wife take her place in the humiliating role of kitchen-helper
No political king will base his reign on your strict plans of concern for etiquette
No youth seek virtue in the puritanical preachment of bygone observances
One singular contention:
No peasant revolution
No women’s liberation
No religious reformation
grace your pages
the establishment the status quo the traditional hierarchy the Almighty
All find mindful foundation
in your ardent didacticism
and extend licence to those who cry sacrilege
in the coming dismantling of the clans of castial power
(Continued in Part Six)
Copyright © T Wignesan | Year Posted 2012
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