At a time when intolerance is hardly seen as annoying, disgusting and slaying act and an ever-increasing sense of hatred blinds us to human miseries and tribulations, can a creatively assumed conversation with a natural phenomenon bring forth a pulsating array of emotional soothing moments? This is the question sensitively addressed by an Urdu novel “Chand Hum Se Baatein Karta Hai” (The Moon Converses with us) that appeared recently.
The veteran Urdu fiction writer Noorul Hasnain has tried to weave around his novel the proverbial tales of love from Laila Majnu to Heer Ranjha that still touch a chord with the readers across generations and geographical locations. His novel does not have a protagonist and the astutely rendered story spread over 400 pages, is narrated through ten popular tales and love emerges as the central character. The celebrated Urdu novel does not take pride in emotional adulation of love as for him it is the unwavering passion that stirs up awe, wonder, empathy and amazement simultaneously.
Evocative description
Noorul Hasnain
The author through a poignant retelling and recasting of the characters makes the mythical stories a tangible experience. According to the author love is a phenomenon that can neither be fully fathomed nor graphically depicted and it is certainly more than an inspiration for creativity. It provides emotional fulcrum and brings in vocabulary of intimacy, affection and acceptance all along.
Meaning of life
The novel is not a listless rehash of fictional or literary characters but it tries to comprehend the intensity and consequence of desire that ultimately provides us with ineffable mental peace. The ever growing absence of individual human flourishing in the contemporary fragmented world prompted Hasnain to look for a space for re-contextualising and extrapolating the meaning of life by highlighting the acts of promiscuity and unerring trust that happen concurrently. “No other God other than Love” seems to be abiding concern of the story. Milan Kundera once remarked, “I have said before that metaphors are dangerous. Love begins with a metaphor” (The Unbearable Lightness of Being) and through the fragmented tales of several non-descript characters such as Saleem, Mehrun Nisa, Ajay, Amba Bai, Sujata, Naved Azmi, Zareena, Imran and Akbar, the author creatively asserts that love usually ends with a metaphor and it is what that keeps emotions of absence at bay. Love invariably unlocks the gate of fear and happiness at once.
Novelty factor
The novel hardly fits into the run-of-the-mill of books that appear everyday. Why does the author go for the novelty of theme? The author provides the answer in his perceptive introduction – “The twenty first century is certainly the century of fiction and one can see a steady increase in the publication of novels. My contemporaries write on socio-economic and political issues with remarkable ease but I was looking for a new theme for my new novel. I do not want to tread on the trodden path so that I can take my reader to a place where no boundary of stifling contemporary reality exists. It reminded me tale of Adam and Eve. The Almighty, the embodiment of Love, created the world but why did God, who loves his creature more than seventy mothers, provide Adam with a companion. He has not created a mother or sister and Eve was created for him and it was the moment when love took birth. Love denies all dictates and that is the reason that Adam and Eve did not adhere to the divine commandment. They were thrown down to earth and the flame of love refuses to subside.”
Lived faith
The multi-layered narrative that draws heavily from the well known love tales is certainly not a high-pitched melancholic story and it depicts love as a lived faith and is destined to keep the legacy of love alive and many episodes endorse D H Lawrence who asserts: “The journey of love has been rather a lacerating, if well-worth it”.
Heartbreak and nostalgia is not what Noorul Hasnain aims at as he tries to understand why an all pervading sense of desolation evokes abandonment. Few pages of this immensely readable novel were presented before the audience by the author in a one-day national seminar on “Urdu Novels in the 21st Century” organised by the Sahitya Academy and Mahfil-e-Nisa at Bengaluru.
Noted Urdu poet Shaista Yusuf, the convener of the programme, conceived the idea of recitation from a novel and presentation of its critical evaluation simultaneously and it was well received by the audience.
Noorul Hasnain’s novel is destined to blaze a new trail as it is perhaps the first novel that portrays the anguished solitariness through a rhetorical conversation with the moon – the central metaphor of Love and the author aptly concludes – “The moon still carries the intensity of Love, and it wants to shine with it, but who has time to listen to it”.
