Vanamala Viswanatha.
Credit: M Sreedhara Murthy
A new translation of Kuvempu’s epic novel Malegalalli Madumagalu is about to hit the stands.
Vanamala Viswanatha, who last translated the 12th century Kannada poet Raghavanka for the Murty Classics Library of India (Harvard University Press), has now translated the 1967 novel for Penguin.
Kuvempu wrote two novels, with a gap of 30 years between them, ranked by many among the greatest novels ever written. The other novel, Kanuru Heggadati, was turned into a film by Girish Karnad. Bride in the Hills is the second attempt at cracking the 816-page classic in English. In 2020, the Rashtrakavi Kuvempu Pratishthana had published a translation by K M Srinivasa Gowda and G K Srikanta Murthy, titled The Bride in the Rainy Mountains. The orignial novel has also been adapted and presented as a nine-hour, overnight play.
In an interview with Metrolife, Vanamala talks about how the new translation came about.
What was it like, as a translator, to transition from Raghavanka (13th c) to Kuvempu (20th c)?
When I first read ‘Malegalalli Madumagalu’ decades ago, I was stunned by the sweep and depth of the novel. Kuvempu’s novel looked like material fit for a Nobel prize. It was no less than a Marquez work.
Back then, I did not even dream of translating it. But later, I could not resist my growing fascination for this women-centric text that has a way of extending the limits of one’s given identities and revealing new possibilities.
How long did it take you?
About two and a half years.
What are the challenges of translating Kuvempu’s prose, especially an epic novel that critics say places him in the league of Tolstoy?
Translating Kuvempu’s masterpiece meant dwelling in the homes and hearts of diverse characters in order to discover anew our common humanity. Negotiating the narrative involved moving among the many worlds it simultaneously straddles — nature and culture, tradition and modernity, men and women, the oppressor and the oppressed, this life and the lives before and after… in short, the utterly mundane in its rich multiplicity and the supremely sublime in its cosmic unity. It demanded close attention to Kuvempu’s aesthetics, his literary craft in putting together the novel. It entailed tough choices about making English malleable to articulate the life-world of the Malnad region. A joyous challenge, a challenge as true for the translator as it is for the reader!
What in the novel is relevant to the India of the 2020s? And how do you think the many dimensions of love, as described in the novel, resonate with young readers in the social media era?
I think three important issues raised by the novel speak to us today with a tremendous sense of urgency. One, the relevance of Kuvempu’s bio-centric vision for a world traumatised by climate change. Kuvempu who called himself a ‘poet of the forest’, uncovers the limits of an anthropocentric approach. The novel offers a veritable, biodiversity register of the Malnad region. The forest which reveals itself in its plenitude and in its terrors is the cosmic centre of the narrative.
The most remarkable aspect of Kuvempu’s humanist thought is that he portrays with care and love people and things repressed by dominant structures. Every sentient being and insentient thing — the degenerate Chinkra, orphan Dharmu, Huliya the dog, Biri the cat, the evergreen forest, the Hulikal Peak — has a place and a purpose in this narrative. He offers a ‘view from below’, a subaltern perspective that also takes in the world of the wealthy and powerful. Two, Kuvempu’s inclusivity that lights up the elaborate architecture of the work is most striking. Three, the novel describes the moving saga of not just one young woman, but of many who yearn to escape from their social confines and seek love and freedom. The struggles of young couples are played out against the fraught relationship between the land-owning Gowdas and the landless masses who work on their land. The irrepressible impulse for freedom and dignity in these youth is sparked and sustained from within by their love for each other, the most powerful agent of change. This is indeed inspiring, especially for the youth of today.
What are you working on next?
I am translating Lakshmisha
Tolpadi’s book of insightful essays on the Mahabharata, which add a whole new dimension to the study of the epic.
Launch of ‘Bride in the Hills’,
4.30 pm, Saturday, October 19, National College, Basavanagudi.