Lessons of Great War still relevant
Even after a century, the Great War remains pertinent in understanding the way of life and literature in today's world, scholars told an international conference at Dhaka University yesterday, pointing out the profound impacts it made subsequently.
“We need to talk more about the Great War for a more peaceful and humane world so that such devastation doesn't recur,” said Prof AAMS Arefin Siddique, the vice-chancellor of DU.
“The Great War was a turning point that impacted almost everything of our life and also sowed the seeds of the Second World War,” poet and essayist Prof Kaiser Haq said in his keynote paper.
The English department organised the two-day conference, "The Great War and English Studies", to mark the centenary of the four-year war that broke out in 1914, and its impacts on the fine arts, film, and literature, particularly English studies.
The world which emerged after that "apocalypse of a war" was radically different, said Kaiser Haq. Art and literature registered the aftershock, and modernism came into being, he added.
The English professor said poet Kazi Nazrul Islam's participation in the World War I deeply influenced many of his literary works.
He said the introduction of intelligence services and passports was a result of the war regulations to strengthen the grip on individuals.
Robert W Gibson, the British high commissioner in Dhaka, said the Great War was instrumental in giving women emancipation and voting rights in the UK.
The war shaped the world every way throughout the rest of the 20th century, said Prof Fakrul Alam of the English department, and its impacts were articulated in unforgettable poems, paintings, narratives, films and plays.
Speakers at one of the six sessions yesterday pointed out that Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore was critical of the Great War and European nationalism, and called for peace in the Gitanjali.
Prof Tahmina Ahmed, English department's chairperson, said 50 participants including 15 from India, Nepal, the UK and America would present 40 papers in two days.
Six sessions will be held today.
Prof Kazal Krishna Banerjee of Dhaka University, PhD researcher Binayak Bhattacharya of EFL University of Hyderabad, India, and Prothom Alo adviser Lt Col (retd) Mohammad Lutful Haq, among others, presented papers, while Prof Serajul Islam Choudhury and Prof Niaz Zaman were among the moderators.
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