Loss of common creative space

Amartya Sen’s new book ‘The Idea of Justice’ may have been publicly acclaimed for its presentation of an alternative approach to mainstream theories of justice. But while going through the book, I was particularly struck by Sen’s frequent recourse to poets and fiction writers whenever he has to describe something in the most telling and convincing way. Whether it is the Indian poet Javed Akhtar or the English poet Seamus Heaney or the novelist Aldous Huxley, Sen makes it a point to quote a poet or a creative writer to capture the spirit of a time or a situation.

For a professor of economics, and a Nobel laureate in the same subject, who is critiquing the philosophical notions of justice propounded so far, it was perhaps a bit unusual to rely on the poetic creatures that rely more on intuition than on reason. This, however, led me to reflect on the role of the Nepali literary writers during the most tumultuous times of this country as a nation. Are they able to produce a voice that captures the spirit of time in such words that even an economist or a philosopher or a historian would be compelled to borrow in the future.

Nobody has talked about this publicly but it is dangerously serious that the so-called “culture” of coalition among the political parties has literally divided every public intellectual, expert and writer into party camps. Whenever the government wants to form a technical committee on something or appoint members for any useless commission, each party gives their name on a quota basis.

This practice started openly after April 2006 and has continued since. The latest is the example of appointment at Nepal Academy. While it is not a crime to be affiliated to one political party or another for experts or others, it is true that they cannot command the respect that they would have otherwise by being publicly known to be a person of a certain political group. Due to this, an expert’s expertise is undermined, a poet’s poetry is not appreciated and a public intellectual’s opinion not heard.

The literary or creative writers in Nepal in the last few years have lost their common space of art and creativity by their open alignment with one political group or the other. Initially, dating from the pre-1990 Panchayat era, we had lawyers and professors who were clearly divided as democrats (Nepali Congress) and progressive (communists). With the 1990 dawn of democracy, we saw the outpouring of trade unions and associations affiliated to political groups, which was not unnatural though.

Are Nepali literary writers able to produce a voice that captures the spirit of time in such words that even an economist or a philosopher or a historian would be compelled to borrow in the future?

King Gyanendra’s direct rule of 14 months was the best period for an assimilation of political identities because the former provided with an ideal common enemy and the rest were pro-people. It was during this period that we saw poets like Shrawan Mukarung with his masterpiece poem Bise Nagarchi Ko Bayan that gave a powerful poetic voice to the feelings of the masses against the tyranny of monarchy. But that was it.

There has been some lamentation and hue and cry about the division of the civil society figures across party lines or agendas carried by one party or another, and due to which the whole of civil society voice has been weakened. However, the division of creative writers across political party lines has not been even mourned in the public spaces. Some of the literary writers do write in the public media spaces but what they are busy writing is through the vocabulary of certain parties. How pathetic to note that literary writers, instead of giving an idiom to describe the spirit of the time in a succinct poetic and powerful way, follow the vocabulary of the popular politics and compete to be ‘inclusive’, ‘pro-change’ under the shade and color of parties.

At the moment, which is most critical for constitution-drafting, various groups have been active demanding their rights to be enshrined in the new national law. It is only the voice from the literary community that is not heard anywhere amid the crowds of voices demanding rights. Whether or not art, literature, poets and writers should have any special status in the new constitution is a subject that deserves certain discussion. But maybe because most of the nationally-renowned literary figures have been tied to – or perceived to be tied to – either one political group or another, their voices have simply lost their natural strengths.

The culture of coalition at the political front is neither always bad nor avoidable. However, its impacts in a society like ours are dangerous and far-reaching. It has not spared any neutral public space of expertise, professionalism and even creativity. Our economists, sociologists, historians, geographers and linguists, for instance, have not been able to remain pure from the “taint” of the political affiliation. It is really strange and sad that it is hard to find “experts” who do not belong to, or who are not perceived to have belonged to, one of the groups mentioned above.

Any society has, or rather should have, a group of people from various fields such as art, literature, culture and other genres of knowledge and expert people who are respected by all for their special contributions in the society. Our society is losing such commonly respected groups of people gradually. The appointment at the Nepal Academy is just an example. There is no common space left where individuals are given responsibility for what they deserve, and not on the basis of where they belong to. In the long run, society will surely have to pay a heavy price for this loss of common space of creativity and expertise.

bishnu.sapkota@gmail.com