Of power of realism
| Date :01-Sep-2020 |
Sudha Murthy
By Vijay Phanshikar :
“Imagination has its own limitations. Actual life offers a greater array of ideas to write --
fiction or non-fiction ...”
-- Dr Sudha Murthy, in a speech
(Not an exact quotation)
THROUGH this statement, Dr Sudha Murthy, author of several fiction and non-fiction books that caught people’s fancy, is espousing one of the schools of thought in literature. There could be many who would disagree. But there also are bigger numbers of people agreeing with her -- that actual life offers a more diverse array of ideas to write about. Of course, there is that old saying -- Jo na dekhe Ravi, wo dekhe Kavi. (The poet can see -- imagine -- things that the Sun cannot ‘see’).
This simple assertion talks of the power of imagination. It is that power of imagination that led to creation of fantastic literature the world over since time immemorial. Despite this, literature has often drawn its succor from actual life -- prose, poetry, essays, sheer fiction. In all these genres, the element of fact of life is often seen and sensed by the readers. Authors, too, often make a point to say again and again that fact of actual life lends their writings a sense of legitimacy and acceptance. Having interacted with countless authors of different languages, I have often stopped at the assertion that much of the powerful expressions they could put forth stemmed from experiences of actual life.
All authors also insist that even the dialogues -- which can be absolutely imaginary -- in their novels including historical ones often stay as close to real-life characters involved as possible. In movies or plays, too, spectators first look for the real-life touch, no matter how much indirectly. Even in Bond movies where a lot of scenes depict wild imagination, the people still look for real-life evidence.
Going by these standards, Dr Sudha Murthy is verbalising what the world -- of authors and poets -- and of readers sees and senses. Her books have often created new benchmarks of popularity for herself as well as her subjects. Even when she writes non-fiction books, drawing richly from actual-life examples of people and their experiences and issues and challenges, Dr Sudha Murthy’s writing has an element of fictional finesse. And when she writes fiction, her writing has the realism of actual life. The manner in which she writes makes it obvious that literature is never created in suspension of lifeless imagination; it is created out of life’s reality and realism...