Breaking the Bow: Speculative Fiction Inspired by the Ramayana

by Edited by Anil Menon

  Here are some things I have discovered about myself:

  I have no pleasure in life. I like nothing, definitely not absinthe or roses.

  I want to die. But a curious inertia keeps me from it. The things of the world seem heavy, and time slow.

  I still have nightmares about the burning woman. Sometimes I dream that Dhanu has a mantram that will bring me peace, and I am looking for her in the tunnels of a dying city, its walls collapsing around me, but she is nowhere to be found. I never dream of Hirasor except as a presence behind my consciousness like a second pair of eyes, a faint ghost, a memory. There are moments when I wonder what led a first-generation nakalchi to become a monster. The Ramayan says that even Ravan was once a good man, before he fell prey to hubris and lost his way. If legend is to be believed, there is a cave on some abandoned planet where copies of the first-generation nakalchis are hidden. Were I to come across it, would I find Hirasor’s duplicate in an ice-cold crypt, dreaming, innocent as a child?

  Lately I have begun to let myself remember that last climactic moment of my encounter with Hirasor. I shot my Ravan, I tell myself, trying to infuse into my mind a sense of victory despite the loss of the chance for true revenge—but I no longer know what any of those words mean: victory, revenge. Still, there is a solidity about that moment when I shot him, small though it is against the backdrop of all the years I’ve lived. That moment—it feels as tangible as a key held in the hand. What doors it might open I do not know, although I am certain that Sita does not wait behind any of them. Perhaps it is enough that it tells me there are doors.

  Vaidehi and Her Earth Mother

  Pratap Reddy

  I’m a writer who lives in Toronto. My short bio says it all: He moved to Canada in 2001 and writes short fiction about the agonies and the angst (on occasion, the ecstasies) of immigrants from India.

  A story I wrote recently is called Mythili’s Place in the Sun. The title is a little ironic because the story is set in Canada, a country which is cold and dark for the best part of the year.

  Mythli’s story is one of grit, determination and the desire to succeed against all odds. The tale drapes itself around Mythili, like the pristine snow which covers the slopes of Mount Meru. Mother to two lovely girls, Lavanya and Kushala, Mythili is a worthy heroine.

  Some of you might ask, isn’t it customary for such sagas to revolve around men, say like the Odyssey, the Lusiads or our own Ramayana? That’s true, but there are some excellent books out there which have a female protagonist as the focal point. They are not easy to come by—you will have to look really hard. Off-the-cuff I can think of two fine examples: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and No Orchids for Miss Blandish. Besides, Mythili’s husband, like most men, is a prig, utterly self-centred, and capricious. On a whim, he had left his cushy job in India and dragged a scared, mystified Mythili to Canada with an empty promise of a better life. I’m not inclined to make a male chauvinist like him the chief subject of my story.

  When Mythili’s husband first sprung the idea of immigration on her, she must have felt as astounded as Sita did when Rama ambushed her as she was returning from the garden, in the company of her giggly ladies-in-waiting. “Honey,” Rama may have said, of course using a Sanskrit (or is it Prakrit?) equivalent of the endearment. “I’ve to go away to the forest on a government matter. Would you like to join me?” Much like how a well-heeled Canadian might say to his wife or common-law partner, “Pumpkin pie, I’m going on a business trip to Florida. Care to come along?”

  Ever dutiful and deferential, Sita cast off her silks, shed all her jewellery, and got into rough and ready garments suitable for a life in the bush. She knew that the jungles of central India were no place for a lady, but not even in her wildest dreams had she imagined the actual dangers that lay in wait for her. She had no inkling at all that armies of two men would wage a full-scale international war to see who could possess her.

  For her part, Mythili too left her circle of relatives and friends be hind to start life all over again in a country half-way across the globe so that her husband could pursue his pipedream. As immigrants of limited means, they rented a cold and dark basement apartment where no sunlight ever penetrated. The basement was like an icebox in winter, and surprisingly turned into a sauna in summer. In the nights, Mythili could hear rats running amok in the wainscoting. Sita’s Panchavati, in comparison, seemed like Xanadu.

  It’s a fortnight since the Canadian magazine True North accepted my story for publication. Helen Yorke, a proof reader, calls me on my mobile. Blithely mispronouncing my name, even though it has only three letters, she continues: “I’ve a problem with your story.”

  “Really? What could it be?”

  “I don’t know how to put it. Your character—Mite-ly, she’s gone missing.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “When I had a glance at your story last night, she was very much there. But today when I sat down to read it again, she’s nowhere to be found. She has disappeared completely.”

  I’m horrified because, honestly, I didn’t expect this of Mythili. My other characters have pulled the vanishing act before and have stepped out of my stories never to return. Good riddance, I had told myself. Yet many readers, Vaidehi included, have complained of the abrupt way in which those stories end. They think it’s a literary affectation—how little they know!

  “What are you going to do about it?” says Helen.

  I’m tempted to say, “Call 911, I guess. Let the police look for her!” But I don’t. For one thing, it’s never a good idea to cross swords with an editor, even if she’s only a copy editor. For another, I’m sure there’s no police force in the world, not even the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which can bring back, handcuffed and all, an author’s runaway characters.

  If any of my readers were writers they’d sympathise with me. They’d know how fictional characters acquire a will of their own and thenceforth refuse to have anything to do with their creators.

  I once spotted Lalita, whose profile looks so much like Bipasha Basu’s, in a night club on Lakeshore Road. This was soon after she had upped and left from my Demon Glass. She was seated on a barstool drinking a cosmopolitan. Wearing a sarong-like skirt and a puffy cotton blouse, she looked hot (I’m not talking about the weather here). When I tried to grab her, she screamed and hit me with her sequined handbag. Heads turned, and some hulky-bulky types started to move towards me. I made my escape before things got really nasty.

  I have an appointment to see Dr Cunningham later in the evening. But Helen’s news about Mythili has upset me so much that I don’t quite feel up to it. I’m going to call his office and cancel the appointment.

  I had conceived Mythli not as any run-of-the mill character but as a paragon of virtue, comeliness, and fortitude.

  On arriving in Canada, Mythili couldn’t go to work because she had to look after her two infant daughters. Her husband managed to find a job at a gas station but they were always stumped for cash. In such circumstances, did you think Mythili just sat there in the Stygian dark ness of her basement apartment, twiddling her thumbs? Not a chance, she took to baby-sitting in a big way. The money wasn’t much, but it helped to buy those little extras of life—presumably, timbits, beavertails, poutine and other such local goodies.

  When the girls, Lavanya and Kushala, came of school-going age, Mythili took up a job. It was a temporary, part-time appointment in the mail room of an investments company. All Mythili had to do was to slip huge quantities of manila envelopes through a Pitney Bowes franking machine, yet somehow she managed to convince her boss of her diligence and passion for excellence. Such was the power of her personality.

  Soon, she was made fulltime. Then she moved into the main office as an admin clerk. Within a year, she became a team leader. Three more years, and a certificate in HR from Sheridan College, she was anointed as the office manager.

  While their household income grew steadil
y, the family hopped, as people in Canada do, from one home to another, each more expensive than the previous one. First they moved to a condominium tower in the downtown core, close to Mythili’s office. Then they bought a semi detached house within the bussing zone of a good school, for their daughters’ sake. Eventually, they bought an independent house, with a small patch of lawn and an apple tree in the front.

  Mythli, being green-fingered, developed a simple but eye-catching gar den. The emerald-green lawn was always in good trim, and a herbaceous border, in a lighter shade of green, ran along the driveway. In a long narrow bed, she planted tulips, which returned from their hibernation every spring to feast in the sun.

  Mythili was deeply committed to the Environment. She supported all green causes and voted for Elizabeth May’s Green Party. She was particular, in fact almost paranoid, about disposal of household refuse (“Reduce, Reuse or Recycle” might have been embossed on her family crest). She knew all about the many coloured-bins and what went into them. (Though it’s a decade since I came to Canada, I find such things much too confusing—I had always let Vaidehi handle recycling.)

  With Mythili, it was not just a matter of being eco-conscious— it was something more. She didn’t merely respect the Earth, she loved it with an intense filial devotion.

  It’s a clear and sunny afternoon in June. I drive down to Home Depot to buy some garden plants. The capacious lean-to which houses the garden supplies is deserted. I look for pink and maroon tulips, Vaidehi’s favourite flowers. I fail to find any. Panic sets in and I break into a cold sweat. I’ve so much work ahead of me, all the digging and the replanting, to say nothing of the rescheduled appointment with Dr Cunningham. I can’t find anyone wearing the orange apron with the words ‘Home Depot’ splashed across their torsos.

  I rush into the main building. I espy an idle associate, dawdling between the aisles in the electrical area. She looks south Asian, an Indian probably. From the way she is dressed I reckon she’s a newbie, fresh off the boat. When I approach her she brightens up.

  “It too late in the season for tulips,” she says grandly, shepherding me into the plumbing area. What did she think tulips were? Something they use in washrooms? I make a quick about-turn and, pushing my shopping cart, run for my life.

  Back in the lean-to, I load my cart double-quick with twenty-five pots each of pink and maroon geraniums (to hell with the tulips). When I reach the parking lot, I’m breathless. I look at my watch. It’s nearly four. I know I’ll never be able to make it to the meeting with Dr Cunningham. I call his office.

  “Not again!” says Darla. She’s a big bear-like woman who dwarfs not only the furniture in the ante-room, but also the visitors and Dr Cunningham for good measure.

  “I’m sorry, Darla-ing,” I say. “Something unexpected has cropped up.”

  “You’ve done this once too often. Dr Cunningham will not be pleased. You should be more serious about your health. Hmm, let me see if I can squeeze you in next week.” While I wince at the prospect of being caught in Darla’s bear hug, she continues, “How about 2 o’clock Thursday afternoon?”

  “Suits me fine,” I say, hoping to terminate the conversation.

  “Wait a minute!” Darla interjects. “What about your tablets? Don’t you need a refill?”

  “No, I have a few left,” I say truthfully. I’m not a stickler for following doctor’s orders, especially Dr Cunningham’s.

  “Don’t forget to take your medication every day. Aripiprazole isn’t something to play around with,” she says and adds my name, mispronouncing it to sound like a constellation in the night sky.

  You might say, as Shakespeare did, what’s in name? A lot, actually. The person who wrote Ramayana in Sanskrit had used the nom de plume (excuse my use of French, Canada is a bi-lingual country) of Valmiki. His given name was Ratnakara. He had started his career not as writer but as a full-blooded bandit. One day, deep in the jungles, he waylaid a traveller. Unfortunately for Ratnakara, his victim turned out to be Narada, a sage and troubadour rolled into one. To cut a long story short, the wily minstrel not only managed to save his own life, but he brought about a complete change of heart in the bandit. But Ratnakara had so steeped himself in crime and iniquity that the good Lord Rama’s name simply wouldn’t roll off his tongue. So Narada advised him to utter the word ‘Mara’ (which means a tree) over and over again. Seating himself on the floor of the forest, Ratnakara began to recite “Mara-Mara-Mara-Mara…” In due course, even without his knowing, the repetitive chant turned into “Rama-Rama-Rama…” He continued to sit there repeating Rama’s holy name, day after day, washing away all his past sins, until an anthill (‘Valmika’ in Sanskrit) grew around him. Valmiki means one who has emerged from an anthill.

  This story is about Vaidehi, not Mythili. If you don’t believe me, take a look at the title again. But I’m not surprised that you thought otherwise. The blame rests with me for letting the situation come to such a sorry pass.

  The presence of Vaidehi is meant to permeate through this tale like the haunting fragrance of the night-flowering parijatha in Indra’s celestial garden. But I’ve let my obsession for Mythili get the better of me. She has insinuated herself into this story and usurped it completely. This is so totally out of character.

  I had hoped to portray Mythli as an Indo-Canadian version of the docile and demure Savitri. Not just the namesake in mythology who was married to the ill-fated Satyavan, but the champion glycerine-gal of Tamil and Telugu films in the 60’s. In almost every one of her films, Savitri essayed the same role: a wronged, woebegone wife who suffers in silence (except for singing six sad songs) until her reformed husband returns at the bitter end.

  When I go over the early drafts of Mythli’s story, I’m appalled to learn how far gone she already was. She bears no resemblance to any of the ancient satis, like Anasuya or Arundhati, so dear to my heart. Witness the passage of arms that takes place between Mythili and her husband:

  Husband: I think we should have another child.

  Mythili: Two are more than enough. Remember the slogan— Hum do, Hamare do?

  Husband: We should have a son, Mythili.

  Mythili: Nowadays, daughters are just as good and capable as sons. Don’t tell me you think otherwise!

  Husband: Of course not. But according to our sastras…

  Mythili: Cut that out. We’re living in Canada, come on. Are you expecting a male child to light your funeral pyre in Dundas square? More likely, the funeral director of the electrical crematorium is going to be the person who will press the button.

  Husband (in a menacing voice): Mythili! Zubaan ko lagaam do. Enough’s enough. I don’t like the tone of your bloody voice…

  I can’t believe I’ve written all this! How deluded I’ve been!

  As a writer, I’m used to mixing fact with fiction, myth with reality. We writers live perpetually in the twilight zone where the brick-and-mortar of reality collides with the shimmering mirages of fantasy. Any wonder then that I’m unable to distinguish between the real and the unreal at times?

  While living in the treacherous forest of Dandaka, Sita too had to grapple with the problem of reality and illusion. Maricha, whose very name has come to mean deception, was a rakshasa, an ogre, in Ravana’s pay. He transformed himself into an exquisite golden fawn and entered, with mincing steps, the front yard of Sita’s mud-and-wattle home. Sita was so captivated by this beautiful animal that she wanted to possess it at once. But when the deer gave her the slip, Sita persuaded Rama to go in chase of it. Even though Rama pursued his quarry to a good distance he couldn’t catch up with it. Frustrated, he shot an arrow at the beast. The bolt found its mark, and the dying animal, which was none other than the diabolical Maricha, called out for Lakshmana in Rama’s voice. Hearing the cri du coeur (there I go in French again!)Sita ordered a reluctant Lakshmana to go after Rama. That was how it came about that Sita was left alone and unprotected, setting the stage for he
r abduction.

  There was a Hindi film in the 60’s whose posters carried the tagline: Who is the real Anita? Seated here in Toronto, in front of my computer, I’m compelled to apostrophise: Who’s the real Mythili? Is she an ideal wife, a veritable pativrata, docile and dutiful as her author envisioned? Or an independent woman, demanding and domineering, with a mind of her own?

  My preoccupation with Mythili is threatening to send this story into a tailspin. What’s the connection between Mythili and Vaidehi, the rightful heroine of the story? Are they two different individuals, or the same person seen from two different standpoints, like the two sides of a coin?

  I have no answer. Right now, I’m more confused than you are.

  Jagame maya, the universe itself is an illusion, goes a Telugu film song. On the screen, the matinee idol of the yesteryears, Nageswara Rao, appears to sing the melancholy number, but in reality it’s the mesmeric voice of the playback singer Ghantasala. This sums it up nicely -I don’t intend to add anything more to the already voluminous literature on the concept of maya.

  It’s one o’clock on Thursday afternoon. A glorious late-June day: the weather is deliciously warm with a languorous feel to it. I’m seated on a deck chair in the front porch, steadily working my way through a six-pack of Molson’s Canadian.

  The apple tree is weighed down with fruit which are still green. A pair of red-breasted robins is hopping about on the lawn as though looking for clues. The grass is a little overgrown, but who cares? I can hear the thrum of bees hovering on the bed of pink and maroon geraniums. I’ve to admit, the flowers don’t seem to be in great shape. What the hell, not everyone can be as efficient as Vaidehi.

  I’ve decided not to keep my appointment with Dr Cunningham. Who likes to visit a psychiatrist on such a lovely day? Not unless he was a madman of course. Believe me, I can live without Dr Cunningham’s tablets, and Darla can screw herself (‘scuse my French). Thinking of these two brings on my depression.