365betÓéÀÖ

Dr. T.H. Chowdary

It is phenomenally surprising that men have great love and fascination for the place and land of their birth. People migrate from the place and country of their birth for various reasons but for generations they would be handing down the memory of their original place. America is a country of immigrants. Ask even the progeny of the earliest settlers. They would be telling that their ancestors had come from Germany, Italy, Ireland, Scotland, and Sweden and so on. Similarly, in India we move away from the place of our birth in search of work from one state to another, from city to city but where we were born has always a fascination for us. The streets where we roamed about, the trees we climbed, the water courses in which we swam and the houses we used to visit and the elders whom we used to greet or not, are always remembered very pleasantly. If you visit the place of birth or where you were as child you feel like seeing each and every place associated with your childhood - our schools, our temple, and the pond and the garden where we played. The word patriotism sums up our attachment to the land. Whether it is rich or poor, whether it is an isolated one or well connected one, whether it is developed or underdeveloped we still love it. The rivers and the mountains are sacred to us. Its geography and its history are implanted in our memories. An American may look down upon Zimbabweans and his country but the Zimbabwean howsoever poor and under developed his country is, is proud of it. This attachment to one’s place of birth, to its sacredness, to its indelible influence is writ large in the literature, in the poetry, in the stories and epics. I have come to ponder over this while looking at the starry sky, lying on my in the garden. I then recalled my studies in Loyola College, Chennai. Shakespeare’s play, King Richard-II was prescribed for studying. It has a panegyric for England ... I will refer to this a little later.

When the Soviet Union was attacked by Nazi Germany in June 1941 Joseph Stalin the dictator ruler and the Pope of World communism gave a stirring call to his people to take to arms and defend the sacred soil of Russia. Until then the word Russia was not in his lexicon. It was USSR, it was communism. It was not for the defence of communism and socialism that he called upon his people to arms. He spoke of the great father-land of the great past of Russia and the sacred soil of Russia. In other words, he was appealing not to ideology, communism which according to Karl Marx does not recognise territorial nationalism but the international solidarity of the proletariat of the working classes. When it came to a question of life and death for the nation - state, Stalin cast aside ideology and appealed to the natural instincts in men, namely the love of their country of their mother land, to patriotism, to nationalism.

We in our country, during our struggle for independence were stirred by the poem Vandemataram by Bankim Chandra Chetterji. We likened Bharat to our mother to describe; we sang of its flora and fauna; we extolled her as Durga, the terribly powerful Goddess and we spoke of the natural endowments of our lands, of its abundant waters and comforting winds and plants. We attributed invincible might to this mother land. Tens of thousands of people went to jails shouting Vande Mataram. Several went to gallows cheerfully with Vandemataram on their lips. That is the spell of the land of our birth.

Shakespeare is one of humanity’s greatest poets. He was a poet of England. In the play King Richard-II there is a panegyric to England. This is pronounced by the Duke of Lancaster, uncle of King, Richard-II. His son Bolingbroke, Duke of Hereford was banished by King Richard-­II. The Duke of Lancastert was old and sick. He held that his son was exiled undeservedly just on suspicion. To be banished from so great a land as England was painful, a misfortune. To highlight that misfortune, England’s magnificence is described in beautiful verse just like our Vandemataram. Here it is�

This royal throne of kings, this scept’red isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands;
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,
Fear’d by their breed, and famous by their birth,
Renowned for their deeds as far from home,

(Source: Shakespeare Complete Works Quatercentenary Edition, the English Library)

Emma Lazarus, a Jewish child on immigration to the USA as a child, was inspired by the Statue of Liberty in New York harbour. The Statue holds up a torch. Emma was inspired; she put the following immortal words into the mouth of the Statue:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses
Yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless tempest-lost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.�

The USA is still the land of opportunity, sought by every aspiring, adventurous, dreaming daring young and not so young. Another US poet Samuel F Smith eulogized his country thus:

“My country, ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty
Of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died
Land of the pilgrims� pride

From every mountain side
Let freedom ring!

Long may our land be bright
With freedom’s holy light;

Another famous panegyric to one’s country is Sir Walter Scott’s poem, My Native Land. Here are some lines,

“Breathes there a man with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said.
This is my own, my native land.�

In Telugu we have the stirring call of Sri Rayaprolu Subba Rao to sing of our motherland and proclaim its greatness:

“To whatever land you go,
Wherever you set your foot
Whomsoever you encounter
And on whichever platform your are
Praise your mother land, Bharat�.

Patriots have boundless love and reverence for their mother-land; mere citizens look at the country as one where they can make fortune and attain power for themselves and their progeny. They will change their nationality, if there are better opportunities elsewhere

The most resounding and greatest tribute to mother-land is in the words of Lord, Sri Rama himself:

‘Jananee Janmabhoomischa Swargadapi gareeyasi�
“Mother and motherland are superior to heaven even�.

Poets have a way of putting in words, great ideas and emotions of men in wonderful poetry. Shakespeare, speaking of one’s reputation puts into the mouth of Thomas Mowbray, Duke of

Norfolk in the play King Richard II, the following words.

My dear dear Lord,
The purest treasure mortal times afford
Is spotless reputation; that away,
Men are but gilded loam of painted clay.....
Mine honour is my life; both grow in one;
Take honour from me and my life is done

This passage makes us recall Lord Krishna’s words in the Bhagawad Gita to Arjuna.

Akirtimcapi bhutani kathayisyanti te avyayam
Sambhavitasya cakirtir maranadatiricyate
-Gita 11.34

“All people will speak of your infamy for all time and for respected persons infamy is worse than death.�