A new generation of Hindustani writers emerged in the twentieth century, whose work is marked by its focus on a previously unexplored theme which is the lived realities of common people.
Presidential Address of Munshi Premchand, delivered at the First All India Progressive Writers’ Conference, held at Lucknow on 10 April 1936. (Translated from Hindustani.) offers a glimpse into the political and socially charged literary philosophy of these writers and their spirit of resistance.
This conference is a memorable occasion in the history of our literature. Previously we had been content to discuss language and its problems; the existing critical literature of Urdu and Hindi has dealt with the construction and the structure of the language alone. But language is a means, not an end; a stage, not the journey’s end. Its purpose is to mold our thoughts and emotions while giving them the right direction. We have now to concern ourselves with the meaning of things, and to find the means of fulfilling the purpose for which language has been constructed. This is the main purpose of this conference.
Literature is not only realistic but true to life and is also an expression of our experiences and of the life that surrounds us. It assumes these qualities only when it deals with the realities and experiences of life. Fairy tales and romantic stories of princely lovers may have impressed us in the olden days, but they mean very little to us today.
Literature can best be defined as a criticism of life. The literature of our immediate past had nothing to do with actuality; our writers were living in a world of dreams and were writing things like Fasanai Ajaib or Chandra Kanta; tales told only for entertainment, or to satisfy our sense of wonder. Life and literature were considered to be two different things that bore no relation to each other.
Literature reflects the age. In the past days of decadence, the main function of literature was to entertain the parasitic class. In this literature, the dominant notes were either sex or mysticism, pessimism or fatalism.
But our literary taste is undergoing a rapid transformation as it grips with the realities of life. It is not satisfied now with the singing of frustrated love; or with writing to satisfy only our sense of wonder; it concerns itself with the problems of our life; and such themes as have a social value. The literature does not arouse in us a critical spirit, or satisfy our spiritual and intellectual needs.
In the past, religion had taken upon itself the task of striving after man’s spiritual and moral guidance; it used fear and cajolery, reward, and retribution as its chief instruments in this work.
Today, however, literature has undertaken a new task by trying to achieve its aim by arousing this sense of beauty in us. The more a writer develops this sense through his observation of nature, the more effective his writing becomes. All that is ugly or detestable as well as the inhuman, becomes intolerable to such a writer. He knows that the more realistic his story is, the fuller of expression and movement of his picture, the more intimate his observation of human nature, and human psychology, the greater the effect he will produce. We do not believe in an imaginary man for his acts and his thoughts do not impress us.
The question may be asked, but what is beauty? Why do a waterfall, the sunset, and other such natural scenes and phenomena affect us? Because there is a certain harmony of color or sound in them. We are created by a harmony of elements, and our spirit always seeks the same balance and harmony in everything else. It is the harmony that creates beauty.
Brotherhood and equality, from the dawn of human culture and civilization, have been the golden dream of idealists. Religious leaders have made repeated attempts to realize their dreams by creating religious, moral, and spiritual sanctions. But they have not succeeded. Buddha, Christ, Mohammed, and all the prophets, tried without success to lay the foundation of their equality on moral precepts without any success. Today the distinction between high and low, rich and poor, is manifesting itself with a brutality which has never been surpassed before.
Are we then to give up our ideals? If that were so, the human race might as well perish. The ideal that we have cherished since the dawn of civilization; for which man has made God knows how many sacrifices; which gave birth to religion — the history of human society is a history of the struggle for the fulfillment of this ideal — we too have to place that ideal before ourselves; we have to accept it as an unalterable reality and then see the vulgar pride, pretension and lack of sensibility, the strength of modesty, faith, and endeavor in the other.
And our art will notice those things only when our artistic vision takes the entire universe within its purview; when the entire humanity will form its subject matter, then it will no longer be tied to the apron strings of a particular class. The role of literature is not simply to provide us with amusement, or recreation; it does not follow, but is, on the contrary, a torch-bearer to all the progressive movements in society.
The idea that we want to put before literature today is not that of subjectivism or individualism, for literature does not see the individual as something apart from society, but considers him as a social unit because his existence is dependent on society as a whole.
If we read the reports of International Writers’ Conferences, we find that there is hardly a subject concerning life, literature, economic problems, historical controversies, or philosophy, that is not discussed there. When we compare ourselves with these people, we feel ashamed of our ignorance. We must, therefore, raise the cultural level of our writers.
Such are the objects which have led to the formation of the Indian Progressive Writers’ Association. It wants literature to bear the message of efforts and action. It is not concerned with the problems of language as such. So long as the content of our writing is on the right lines, we need not worry about the form. The literature which is patronized by the privileged classes will adopt their forms of expression, the literature will speak their language by the masses. Our object is to create such an atmosphere in this country that would help the growth of progressive literature. We want to establish branches of our Association in all the literary centers of India. They have a desire to organize the creative literary life in those centers, by reading papers, discussions, and through criticism. It is in this way that our literary renaissance will take place.
Further want to branch out the Association in every province and every linguistic zone, so that the message can be to all parts of the country. For some time, past, Indian writers have been feeling the necessity for such an organization. At various places, some steps have already been taken in this direction. Our object is to help all such progressive tendencies in our literary world. We writers suffer from one great defect, and that is the absence of action in our lives. It is a bitter reality; we cannot shut our eyes to it.
We shall consider only that literature as progressive which is thoughtful, awakens in us the spirit of freedom and beauty. It is creative and luminous with the realities of life that moves us by leads to action.
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