The many faces of Nazrul

Kazi Nazrul Islam: Man and Poet Mustafa Zaman Abbasi Independent University Bangladesh IUB

It is perhaps because his father, the legendary folk-music artiste Abbasuddin Ahmed, was closely associated with Poet Nazrul Islam that made the task of writing about the poet's life so easy for Mustafa Zaman Abbasi. Or maybe the task wasn't easy at all. However, Kazi Nazrul Islam: Man and Poet is an easy flowing book and the reader enjoys the fruits of Abbasi's labour. It is most fortunately free of all the pedantry so often associated with research work and has a very conversational style. It is as if the affable Abbasi is encircled by a group of listeners as he tells the story of the great poet.
Early on in this book, Mustafa Zaman Abbasi points to the pertinence of Nazrul in today's world, to his universality that transcends time and boundaries. He writes:
Nazrul's style and philosophy is a unique combination of two cultural patterns. Usually we think these forces will run parallel and would never meet. Inspired by his identity as a Bengali merged with Islamic and Indian moorings he was drenched deeply into the ocean of prophetic love and Hindu diversity. We find in literature a union of the two cultures. He is a Bengali poet of inspired genius wherein one can find a way of spiritual rejuvenation into this material world of meaningless pursuit.
Having thus established Nazrul as a man and a poet way above the petty pursuits of the world, Abbasi depicts him both as the down-to-earth champion of the downtrodden, as well as an avante garde modernist of the "new epoch of Bengal". Thus, despite his poetic sensitivities that transcended the mundane, Nazrul was very much a part of the political predicament of the nation around him. That is why the writer sees a similarity between Nazrul and Pablo Neruda, the Chilean poet-politician. He also sees an affinity between Nazrul and Rabindranath Tagore, both possessing great minds with a deep devotion for beauty and transcendental love.
After the prologue which gives us Nazrul in a nutshell, Abbasi takes us to the beginnings, where Nazrul was born:
The sun rises in this remote village of Churulia in Asansol, a sub-division of district Burdwan in West Bengal, India. Arid, but the village is really beautiful, lush green during monsoon... a poet is born.
It is like a novel, wherein Abbasi tells the story of the protagonist Nazrul. But this is very real. It is interesting to see how Nazrul winds his way through schooling, singing and writing; poverty and sufferings could do nothing to stem his enthusiasm or his talent.
Nazrul appeared on the literary scene at a time when Tagore dominated all around. Who would be read or heard while the great man's genius remained all-pervading? Abbasi answers this question:
... a genius of another kind indeed startled the sky of literature showing that another sun had risen from nowhere.
Nazrul was indeed a sun, shining brilliantly on the world around him. His works illuminated the beauty of the world, just as it shed light on the injustices of society.
As mentioned earlier, this book on Nazrul is written in a very conversational style without the constraints of a conscious biographer. After all, Abbasi must have also heard so much about the poet from his own illustrious father, the singer Abbasuddin. Thus the writer has added interesting tidbits here and there, little gems of information not to be found even in the most detailed biographies of the poet. For example:
One day one of Nazrul's spiritual mentors and friends, Abbasuddin was sitting by his side, both suffering from melancholia. The poet had lost his son Bulbul, and the singer, his second son, Nilu.
Nazrul said: "Unless I am alone, I won't be visited by the unknown. So, I decided to be alone each Thursday. I failed. Then I decided to go speechless on every Thursday. I failed. Where can I have a place to be friendless for some time?"
Abbasuddin said: "Kazida, I have a special way when I am in a meditative prayer, gradually reaching a stage where I cannot hear anything anymore, nothingness enters into me. I realise that I am with Him, a practice which can benefit you."
What profound spirituality! Today all around us we see people spending thousands of taka on new age meditation gurus, but Abbasuddin encapsulated it all in these few words of empathy to a kindred soul.
In the chapter 'Poet Wanderer in Battle Field', Mustafa Zaman Abbasi gives a picture of Nazrul's times and the poet's political convictions. He speaks of Nazrul as a "politically motivated poet" and says that Comrade Muzaffar Ahmed's memoirs indicate that Nazrul would have led the nation to great heights if the country was not suffering from wars, famine and communal riots. His fiery songs were an inspiration to the masses and he was often seen at public political meetings, addressing the people with words of rebellion and motivating them with his inspiring songs.
In this book, Abbasi alludes to several great writers of the world, like Omar Khayyam, Pablo Neruda, Shelley, Whitman and more, placing Nazrul on the same level as these universal greats. He sees an influence of Whitman on Nazrul. Nazrul's Agropathik is based on Whitman's Pioneers.
Whitman says:
Come my tan-faced children,
Follow well in order, get your weapons ready.
Have you your pistols? Have your
sharp-edged axes?
Pioneers O Pioneers!
And Nazrul writes:
O pioneers! O soldiers!
O my sun-burnt mud-stained brothers
listen to me
This is the day for your new vengeance
in the stale world...
Where is your hammer? Where is your shovel?
O pioneers! O soldiers!
Though Abbasi finds a similarity between Nazrul and the other great poets, he also sees him as unique. He says that Bengali poetry was saturated with the tune of the flautist, with Krishna featuring prominently in the pages of literature. But Nazrul burst upon the idyllic literary scene like "a volcano, a virtual Vesuvius." Following the war, Nazrul's book of poems Agnibina emanated with his fearless and uncontrollable spirit, like the relentless waves of the ocean.
Abbasi uses Nazrul's famous poem of rebellion, Bidrohi, as an example of the new dimensions the poet brought to the table of Bengali poesy. He refers to a modern critic's observations in this regard, saying that Bidrohi presented action orientation on the body of Bengali poetry; it introduced new imagery and new words; it combined mythology of the Indian puranas, of the Arab-Persian genre and also that of the Greeks; it discarded old age concepts of kings; it used folklore and folk images; used colloquial Bengali with ease; and, overall, widened the scope of the Bengali language.
It is interesting when the writer describes Nazrul's visits and interactions in Dhaka, Kolkata, Darjeeling and more. Those familiar with these places can go back in time and conjure up pictures as if travelling by the side of the poet.
Then there is a description of Nazrul's concept of beauty. His beauty is not the thin veneer of artifice, it is not all sugar and spice. His beauty has power. He sees beauty in so many different forms. He says, "In jail my beauty made me wear hard wreaths of chains around my hands and feet; soon after getting out of jail the whole of Bangladesh welcomed my innermost beauty with flower fetters, sandalwood of love..." He later writes, "Then my beauty came as my grief-beauty. My son came as my affection beauty." His grief of losing his son led him to the beauty of solace found in the Holy Quran and spiritual mediation.
A glance at some of the chapter titles in this book will reveal the diversity of Nazrul which Abbasi has brought forth. There is Master Musician and Master Poet; Harbinger of Nationalism; Breeze of Tagore, Rumi, Lalon with Nazrul; Modernity, Post Modernity and Nazrul; Nazrul as a Man; and much more.
In the epilogue of the book, Abbasi stresses the need to project Nazrul further to the people, to the world. Just as translations of Gibran, Rumi and Tagore have taken them to the four corners of the earth, the writer calls upon Nazrul lovers to take this great poet too beyond the borders, far and wide.
Kazi Nazrul Islam: Man and Poet will certainly be further enhanced with a collection of photographs of the poet. Perhaps we can hope for this in the second edition.

Ayesha Kabir is a journalist, critic and translator