In the Beginning, there was no Sky nor Earth, no Water or land, just the endless dusty wastes of the Is.
And there were the Others, who lived in the World of the Is Not, and among them were Giants and Dwarves, and those who were known as Wizards of all kinds.
Now amongst the Giants was one called Dahno, who was the greatest of all the Giants the Is Not had ever known, and ugly with heat and brightness so much that he was hard to look upon. He, however, loved the Daughter of the King of the Dwarves, who was called Swan, and was the loveliest maiden the Is Not had ever known. And for all that she was a Dwarf and he a Giant, Swan loved him back with all her heart, because though he was huge and ugly he was good within, and as kind as he was big.
And when he judged the time was right, the Giant Dahno went before the King of the Dwarves and asked the hand of the maiden Swan in marriage, for he was assured that she loved him as much as he did her, and they could find no happiness but in each other.
But the King of the Dwarves grew furious, and rose up in wrath at the temerity of a Giant to ask to marry his daughter; more so, a Giant as ugly and huge as Dahno was. And in his righteous rage he banished the Giant from his presence, and forbade him ever to set eyes on the fair Swan again.
And Dahno went from the royal presence, but he could not keep from thinking of his beloved Swan, nor she from weeping for him. And the King of the Dwarves grew disturbed indeed.
“As long as my daughter continues to inhabit the Is Not,” he decided, “we shall never be able to put our minds at rest.” If he could he would have exiled Dahno from the Is Not, but as a Dwarf he had no power to banish a Giant. So, he and his Wizard conspired and had the maiden Swan exiled to the endless dusty waste of the Is, until she should see reason and agree never to have anything to do with the Giant again.
And the maiden Swan wept bitterly, for all she had lost, and for the love of the Giant Dahno, lost forever to her in the Is Not – for not for a moment did she ever consider giving her word to her father never to think of him again. And her tears washed over the Is, and flooded over it until a mighty ocean covered all, and swallowed the maiden Swan in its depths.
When he saw this, the King of the Dwarves was in despair, and in the depths of his grief and misery, he summoned his mages and demanded of them that they save his daughter. And long they murmured amongst themselves, but at the end of it they admitted they could not.
“The only one who can save her, Sire,” they said, “is the Giant Dahno, for only he is big enough to plumb the depths of the Ocean that covers the Is.”
And the Giant Dahno came to the Dwarf King’s summons. “If you should save the maiden Swan,” the Dwarf King said, “Giant, you and she would then be joined together forever.”
“Even without this offer,” said the Giant, “I must save her, because it is meaningless for me to live when the fair Swan is no more.” And straightforward he gave a mighty leap, the kind that had never been seen among all the Giants, and came down into the Ocean that covered the Is.
And he was so tall that the Ocean came up only to his thighs; and as he strode through the Ocean, his feet stirred up the dust, which mixed with the water and formed mud, which he pushed away with his hands as he searched. And the mud plied up until it formed islands and mountains, and the water gathered to form seas. And still the Giant searched, and searched, and in the end he found the fair Swan, who was drowned near unto death.
And the Giant brought her out of the Ocean and held her in his mighty arms, and pressed her to his bosom; and the heat of his being roused her, so that she stirred and opened her eyes; and when she saw him, she clutched him to her, and wept tears of contentment, which fell on the land and sea as rain.
Then said the Giant Dahno, “Sweetheart, I shall now convey you to the Is Not, where your father awaits, for he is mightily worried about you, and has agreed to our marriage.”
But the fair maiden shook her head. “My father will never have meant to keep such a bargain,” she said. “He intends to imprison me, and with the aid of envious Giants he wishes to have you impaled, for he hates all your folk, and now that he is in your debt, he will hate you most of all.”
“What shall we do then?” asked the Giant. “Shall we hide in the Is, where there is now land and water where there was only dead dust before?”
“My father would track us down,” the maiden Swan said. “He would track us down, for in the Is there is no place for us to hide. But,” she said, “where we will go, my father can never follow, even though he can see us; and we will be together as long as the Is continues to be. And our children will be as numberless as the drops of water of the sea.”
So the Giant and his fair bride left the Is for their new abode; and below them the land and the sea brought forth plants and fishes, and animals, among whom were people who looked up and saw and wondered; and high above them Dahno swung by, his brightness lighting the day. And they called him the Sun.
At night his bride the maiden Swan passed overhead, with her cool beauty lighting the land and the oceans, and they knew her as the Moon.
And across the heavens, numberless as the drops of water of the sea, were their children, spread out like dust, from the Is to the End of All; the numberless, endless tide of the stars.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
One day early in the summer vacations, Mirabelle’s parents took her to the Borderland, where the worlds of Here and There mixed and merged. She’d been promised this trip as a reward if she did well in her examinations, and she’d done so well that they hadn’t been able to wriggle out of it, though they’d tried. Oh, how they had tried. “Why do you want to go there?” Mummy had asked. “It’s going to be hot and crowded, and there’s nothing you can’t see on the TV right here. Why don’t we just go to the hills like we do every year?” “I might not be able to get time off from the office,” Papa had added. “I can’t let your mother and you go alone all that way. It wouldn’t be safe, with all the pickpockets and criminals. It’s better that your mom and you go to the hills.” But Mirabelle had no wish to go to the hills. “You promised,” she’d said, and to her horror had felt her eyes brimming over with tears and her lips starting to tremble. It was something only little girls did, and she was almost twelve and not so little any longer. “Don’t begin blubbering,” Papa had snapped. “We can’t always have everything we want. Tine you realised that.” But in the end they’d given in. So now they were walking through the gate that separated the world of Here from the Borderland. No cars or any other machines were allowed through that gate, of course, not even cameras or cell-phones. “It’s just a tourist trap,” Mirabelle’s Papa grumbled, as they waited impatiently behind a fat foreign lady who was arguing with the guards, in an almost incomprehensible accent, that she had to be allowed to take at least one camera through. “And it’s an overpriced tourist trap at that. Just look at these entry prices – it’s a disgrace.” “And we have to walk everywhere too,” Mama sighed, wiping her face. “In this heat. It’s not right.” Mirabelle didn’t want to listen to either the fat lady’s yammering or her parents’ grumbling, so she took the opportunity to look up at the gate and the wall instead. She’d seen them both on TV, of course, but they looked different in reality, higher and more imposing, the top of the grey wall lined with instruments, boxes with shiny round lenses and spiky antennae growing out of them. “What are those?” she asked, pointing up at the boxes. “Papa? What are those things on the wall?” Papa looked up at the boxes impatiently. “I don’t know,” he snapped. “Security cameras, maybe, keeping an eye on everyone. How does it matter?” Mummy squeezed Mirabelle’s hand sympathetically. They both knew when Papa was in one of his moods. “We’ll buy a guide book,” she said, pointing at the stall outside the gate. “It’s sure to have a lot of information.” Papa began grumbling about the cost of the guide book, so Mirabelle looked at the gate instead. It was in the shape of an arch, very high, and decorated with all kinds of carvings, of unknown creatures with the faces of frogs and the bodies of feathered snakes, and the like; and strange scenes, such as mountains hanging upside down and water flowing uphill. The carvings were done very intricately, so that the animals seemed alive, and the water in motion. The foreign lady, having lost her argument, had deposited her cameras at the counter and stalked through the gate, and Papa was at the counter taking a long time paying for the tickets and trying to bargain for a discount. Mirabelle watched the people in the line behind her, many of whom were foreigners from all parts of the world. “My teacher says,” she told Mummy, “that we should all be proud that the Borderland’s situated in this country, and not in America or Europe or somewhere like that.” “Um,” Mummy replied. “Why should it be something to be proud of? It’s not as though we had something to do with its being here. Did your teacher say anything about that?” Mirabelle thought for a moment. “All these people have to come here to see the Borderland, haven’t they?” she argued. “And if it were elsewhere, they’d have gone there instead,” Mummy replied. “It’s not as though we had anything to do with it. So why should we be proud?” Before Mirabelle could find a reply to that, Papa came over with the tickets. “It’s even more expensive than I thought,” he grumbled. “Even the half-day tour is twice as much as I expected.” “Half-day tour?” Mirabelle repeated, stricken. “Of course, the half-day tour,” Papa snapped. “Do you think we can afford one of the longer jaunts? As it is, even this one costs more than I thought it could possibly could.” “I heard the half-day tour’s very good,” Mummy said quickly. “They show all the most interesting things.” She flipped through the guide book. “Yes, they show the Portal to There, the Goblin Grounds, the Lake of Rainbow Fire, and...” “What about the Wind Dragons?” Mirabelle asked. “Do they show the Wind Dragons?” “The Wind Dragons?” Mummy flipped through the table of contents. “Well, they’re listed as an optional. We can see them or the Rain of Stars.” “I want to see the Wind Dragons,” Mirabelle declared firmly. “That’s what I want to see the most in the Borderland.” “Are you sure?” Mummy asked doubtfully. “We’d have to climb right up the cliffs, in the heat. And they aren’t really anything much to see at all. Now, the Rain of Stars looks so pretty.” “I want to see the Wind Dragons,” Mirabelle repeated, her voice rising in pitch. “I’m not interested in the Rain of Stars.” “But –“ Mummy began to argue. “But they can’t even really be seen.” “I don’t care,” Mirabelle said. “I want to see them, and I want to listen to their songs. There’s nothing else here I’d rather see.” “They sing?” Mummy asked. “Really?” “Yes,” Mirabelle replied angrily. “I’ve read all about it. They fly around the cliffs, and they sing so beautifully.” “Oh, let the child have her way,” Papa said irritably. “She’ll just start whining otherwise. Let’s get this thing over with so we can go home.” They walked through the gate after passing through security. Of course, they’d known not to bring cameras, but they were still searched. The uniformed lady even made Mummy take off her sandals and checked the heels. “We’ve found people trying to smuggle spy cameras in their shoes,” she apologised, handing the footwear back. “You can’t believe what people will try.” “What happens if someone does take a camera through?” Mirabelle asked curiously. “Why don’t they allow it?” The guard lady smiled. “The scientists say all kinds of bad things can happen, imbalances of energy and so on,” she replied. “They don’t allow anything mechanical at all.” “That woman doesn’t know a thing she’s talking about,” Mummy said once they were out of security and walking through the gate. “They don’t allow cameras only because the government wants to make money out of selling the pictures.” “But my teacher says,” Mirabelle began, and then didn’t say anything more, because they’d gone through the gate and were in the Borderland. Even though she’d heard what it was like, Mirabelle was taken by surprise at the difference from the world of Here. The air was still as hot and dry, but there was a strange smell to it, faintly acrid, and it tasted of cinnamon. The sky was a deeper blue, and things seemed to look sharper and clearer, because there was no dust in the air. And all around was the strange landscape of the Borderland, the hillocks which looked like human faces, the tiny castles which grew out of the rock, the weirdly twisted trees and giant reddish mushrooms. Mirabelle looked around at it all, gawking, and wished she could run off to explore. “It feels like the place is full of magic,” Mummy said wonderingly. “You know, it’s the sort of atmosphere in which you’d expect ogres and wizards and fairies.” “The half-day tour line’s over there,” Papa said, pointing to a small group of people standing beside a small stone bridge. “Come on.” So Mummy and Mirabelle followed him over the little bridge, and for the next few hours a uniformed guide escorted them around. He had a high-pitched voice like a squeak, and his English was so terrible that Mirabelle had to fight down an urge to giggle whenever he said anything. But even though it was only a half-day tour, the things they saw were so strange and wonderful that they filled her mind with wonder. At the Goblin Grounds, they looked through a falling sheet of water at the goblins – brown and leathery, with small heads and long needle teeth, which stared back at them with beady little black eyes. They stood on a platform of rock high over the Lake of Rainbow Fire and stared through the round tunnel of the Portal to There, looking out at that strange and enigmatic world, with its clear blue light and sand as white as silver. The time passed so quickly that Mirabelle was amazed when the guide announced that the tour was almost over. “Optionals only now left,” he said. “Wind Dragon group? Any Wind Dragon?” “Yes,” Mirabelle said loudly, before either of her parents could speak. “We’re going to the Wind Dragons.” The guide grinned with stained teeth and pointed. “To the right.” Mirabelle’s Mummy sighed with exasperation. ********************* To get to where the Wind Dragons flew, they had to climb up to the top of the Cliffs of Storms, which thrust up into the clear blue sky like serrated teeth. There was a winding path going up, covered with thick green grass like a carpet, and it wasn’t really difficult at all to climb. Still, Mummy sighed when she saw it, and Papa refused to go up at all. “I’ll just wait here,” he said, sitting on a flat rock. “You go on up and enjoy yourselves.” A different guide led them up the path, a short young woman with a broad face and a sprinkling of moles on her cheeks. There were about fifteen people in their group, and the way to the top was empty. Only one group was allowed on the Cliffs of Storms at any one time. “Are they really so stormy?” someone asked the guide. “Is that why they call them the Cliffs of Storms?” “It can get windy up there,” the girl replied. “But it’s just a name, really.” “Are the dragons dangerous?” someone else asked. “Not at all, sir. They’re made of wind and light, and can’t hurt you.” She glanced at them over her shoulder. “Please be silent when we’re up there,” she added. “The Wind Dragons don’t like noise, and besides only if there’s no other sound can one hear them singing.” “They actually sing?” Mummy asked. “That’s really true?” “Yes,” the guide said. “But nobody knows why.” Nobody said anything further all the way to the top of the path, where there was a broad platform of stone with flat-topped boulders like benches to sit on. Before them was the cliff edge, beyond which there was only the endless blue distance of the World of There, from whence the dragons flew. “Where are the dragons?” Mummy asked the guide, after they had been waiting several minutes. “It doesn’t look like we’ll see any.” “Please be patient,” the girl replied. “They’ll come. This is one of their favourite places.” But for a long time nothing happened. “I’m sorry,” the guide said at last, rising to her feet. “It must be one of the days when they don’t appear. We’ll have to go down soon. Our time is almost up and the next tour party will be –“ It was Mirabelle who first saw the dragon at that moment, even before the guide put a finger to her lips and pointed. It was more a glitter in the air, a sparkle like rainbow dust, twisting and twining just past the cliff edge, as though a long tail was lashing back and forth. She caught a glimpse of writhing antennae, and spiky horns, and what might have been beating wings. And for a moment she was sure she saw two great lambent eyes, and they were looking straight at her. The Wind Dragon saw her, Mirabelle knew. It was looking at her as a single, special human being. It was watching her. “Listen!” someone whispered softly. As though from infinite distances came the dragon’s song, notes warbling up and down the scale, building up into rhythm after complex rhythm. Another dragon joined in from somewhere unseen, a deeper note, the two voices merging and building, until it was impossible to tell which was which. Entranced, they listened, the music resonating through the rock and their bodies, making the very air vibrate in sympathy. And the air glittered and turned on itself with the movement of great wings, as all around them, the dragons flew. And then, suddenly, the air ceased to move and glitter. Like a door shutting, silence fell. It was over. Nobody said anything all the way down. Three was nothing to say. “Well?” Papa demanded when Mummy and Mirabelle had rejoined him. “Had a good time chasing around after invisible flying lizards?” Neither Mummy nor Mirabelle replied. ********************** That night Mirabelle had a dream. In the dream she was standing on the platform on the Cliffs of Storms, alone. The sky was clear and blue, but there was no sun, and she could feel no heat. All around her were the dragons, close enough to touch, and she could feel the beating of their wings. They circled her, they sang to her, and as she listened to them she began to understand. “Come with us,” they said. “Come with us to the world of There, where no human has ever been. Come with us to the land of wonder.” “Why me?” she asked. “Why did you choose me?” “Because you are the one we’ve waited for,” the dragons sang. “You’re the one who is in perfect tune with us, the one who can understand us, the one who dreams and wonders. Come with us.” “How?” Mirabelle asked. “How do I come with you?” “Nothing simpler,” the dragons sang. “Step off the ground, and let yourself fly. Fly with us. But if you fly with us, you can’t come back again.” “Yes,” Mirabelle said, and she tried to step off the ground, but she could not. Her feet held her tight. “Come with us,” the dragons sang, their wings carrying them away. “Fly with us.” “Wait,” Mirabelle called out desperately. “Wait for me.” But they didn’t wait. And then she woke up. She never told anyone the dream, but she never forgot it. ************************ Years passed, and turned into decades; and Mirabelle grew up and went to college, and became a successful career woman. But nobody ever got close to her, really close; and those who called themselves her friends came to feel that she was not really happy, or could ever be. One day, when the chill of winter was in the air, Mirabelle looked at herself in the mirror of a hotel room, and saw that her hair was streaked with grey. She looked at herself and thought of her world, of business deals and money flows, and thought how sterile and futile it was. And then once again she remembered the wind dragons, and the song they had sung to her. So it was that she caught a plane and flew across the world, back to the country of her birth. The Borderlands were still there, but the tourist trade had long since dried up, victim to civil unrest and economic collapse, to war and global warming, and the security guards and guides were long gone. So it was that there was nobody to object when Mirabelle walked up the grassy path to the top of the Cliffs of Storms, alone, and sat waiting for the Wind Dragons. They came, twisting and writhing, their wings beating rainbow glitter, and they sang to her. “Come with us,” they said. “Let go of the ground, and fly with us. We’ve been waiting so long for you. But if you fly with us, you can’t come back again.” “I’m coming,” Mirabelle said. “Wait for me.” And it was absurdly easy then, to let go of the ground and fly with the wind dragons, through the vast blue distances, to the world of There, where wonders never ceased. It was a small price to pay, not to be able to come back again. Nobody ever saw Mirabelle again. But if one goes up to the Cliffs of Storms, there’s a new voice on the wind, a new note in the dragons’ song. It is the voice of Mirabelle, singing. Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
My way is not the way of violence, I thought I have seen enough killing, I thought I have seen the land burn I want only to be left in peace I want to tend my fields, bring up my children Find a way to pass the years Honourably.
Why should I kindle the fire, I thought My village is my world, I thought The quarrels of kings are the quarrels of kings And nothing to do with me. My family and I, we could live out the storm I thought, and come through Peaceably.
A man came, he flew down from the sky In a helicopter from the big city. He read from papers and told us That we were now all free. While men with guns stood beside him and frowned He told us we now had freedom, and we had Democracy.
A man from the city came and he took my land Which my ancestors had tilled for centuries He told the court that it was his by right And he had bought the documents to prove it. So the judge gave him my land, The judge smiled and gave him my land Legally.
The foreign soldiers came, they came to my house In the dead of night, and broke down the door They made my daughters cry, they shouted at my wife They took what they wanted My family's honour, my honour They took it all, and said it was by the rules They said it was done Properly.
My son found a bride and planned to wed And I called the village to the marriage feast – There were other guests high overhead And they bombed my son and his wife They snuffed out their wedded life Before it began, and afterwards they apologised Far away in the city they apologised Nicely.
The police chief said he wanted my girl He wanted to make her his wife He wanted to get a sex slave for life Now my daughter walks in fear For she knows he hovers near Her dreams are filled with his voice, raised Threateningly.
The Taliban came, they gave me a gun They said they were of the people. They said I could stand up Or I could lie in the dirt They said it was my choice to make They warned me not to make a mistake Then they went away, into the night Quietly.
Today at last I took up the gun I knew it had no answers But the choice before me was stark Die in the light or die in the dark. I do not fight for Taliban Or for Freedom or Democracy. All I can do is choose my way To live or to die Honourably.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
Statutory disclaimer: This article is meant as a statement of opinion. It does not purport to be the final word on the subject or in fact anything more than my personal opinion based on the research materials available to me. On this topic there is no such thing as “right” or “wrong” – there can only be opinions based on research.
Introduction:
For military historians and anyone else interested in military history, there’s one recurrent point of controversy which never quite seems to die down; one which, by its very nature, seems to defy a final answer: which was the most influential battle in history?
There are so many candidates for this position that these discussions tend to devolve into lists, going by names as The Ten Greatest Battles In History or The Six Most Significant Battles In History. Generally speaking, though, the same names tend to figure over and over, with only the order varying; and usually the order varies according to the nationality of the creator of the list.
That’s not very difficult to understand, really; each person’s perception of the flow of history tends to have his own nation at the centre. Thus if you ask an American which the most significant battle of history was, his immediate candidates would be Yorktown and Gettysburg, perhaps with the Battle of the Bulge or (maybe) Pearl Harbour added in. A Russian would instantly name Stalingrad. If the person is British, you’d more likely than not find the Battle of Hastings up there sharing company with maybe El Alamein and probably the Battle of Britain.
However, being from a nation whose battles – while often extremely bloody – have never, in even the most inflamed imagination, made the slightest dent in world history, I didn’t have any national loyalties to adhere to. Also, I’m not a historian, but I do have some knowledge of military history. So I decided to search for one battle that I could identify as having influenced history more than any other – in my opinion, of course. And I believe that there is such a battle. Not a very well known one, but one which I believe had consequences out of all proportion to its immediate effects.
This article is the result.
Before I go further, let me list and explain the reasoning behind the parameters I used in arriving at my final decision:
First, I meant battle, not war; a single clash of arms, whether as part of a larger conflict or in isolation. Therefore I have not considered entire wars – the two World Wars for instance are outside the scope of this discussion, though the individual battles in them are very much so.
Second, I have considered the most influential battle in modern history, instead of in all history; and by modern history I’ve placed a not-quite-arbitrary cut-off date of 1850. This is why:
1. There’s a fairly well-known phenomenon called the inertia of history; meaning that in the course of hundreds and thousands of years, the peaks and valleys of human happenstance tend to get smoothed away as if they hadn’t ever existed. For instance, suppose the ancient Egyptians had lost their battles against the Hyksos occupiers from West Asia, who introduced the wheel to the heirs of the builders of the pyramids. If the Hyksos had endured, the later part of Ancient Egyptian history would probably have been rather different, but it’s difficult to see how Egypt’s role in world history would have been, from this distance in time, much different than it is now. The Hyksos would eventually have been either assimilated into Egyptian civilisation or been overtaken by the Islamic conquest in the course of time, and after that Egypt would have been pretty much as it is today.
As a comparison, one might consider the European rediscovery of the Americas. Suppose someone took a time machine, went back to 1490 and assassinated Christopher Columbus before he started off on his voyage. Would the Americas have remained “undiscovered” by Europeans? Hardly – Leif Ericsson had already reached them several hundred years ago, and someone else would soon have started off on the same voyage that Columbus took. He might have reached some other part of the American continent, but reach it he would have.
Therefore, considering very long-ago battles doesn’t make much sense to me; their effects, however significant at the time, will have damped down over the centuries, or other forces of history would have produced the same effects. I’ve considered only battles recent enough that their effects haven’t yet been similarly damped out.
2. I’ve decided on 1850 for a reason; it’s about the first date from which we can assume the modern world to have come into existence, with networks of telegraph cables connecting continents and major events in one nation potentially affecting another, possibly on the other side of the planet, within a relatively short period. Also, in terms of battles, it marks the period of the first modern technology, with steam-powered ships, the first submarines and machine guns, and the beginnings of modern armies.
Accordingly, I won’t be considering otherwise attractive candidates like the Hastings, Waterloo, Lepanto, Trafalgar or my personal favourite, the Battle of Hattin.
Third, this article is about the most influential battle in history in terms of long-duration effects. It is not about the biggest or bloodiest battle, or the most one-sided one. Therefore, I’m not even considering Verdun, the Somme, Moscow or Berlin. The first two were utterly insignificant in terms of their effect on the Great War; the third is superficially attractive, but even had Moscow fallen the Soviets would have beaten the Nazis in a war of attrition; and as for Berlin, by the time Marshal Zhukov’s armour stormed the Reich Chancellery, the German war was already over bar the final surrender.
Similarly, of the other battles I’ve already mentioned, most can be dismissed. The Battle of Britain, for one, loses its sheen once one acknowledges that Hitler never had any intention or capability of invading the British home island; El Alamein is much touted as a “turning point” of the war, but was one battle of a sideshow. North Africa had no effect on the course of World War Two, which was primarily fought in Eastern Europe. The Battle of the Bulge was fought after the Germans had already lost – at most it hastened the end. And as for Pearl Harbour, by the time it occurred, the US had been pretty much at war for several months anyway, with its ships escorting British convoys and its war industry supplying the British Empire’s needs. Franklin Roosevelt was itching to join in the war formally; Pearl Harbour gave him the excuse. If it wasn’t for Pearl he would have found something else.
In the end, after considering several other alternatives, I was left with only two real candidates: Gettysburg and one other. Why I chose the other is something that ought to become obvious by the conclusion of this article.
So here goes: my candidate for the most influential battle of modern history is...
TANNENBERG
The background:
At the time the First World War started in 1914, Germany was faced with war on two fronts: on the west, against France, with Britain sending forces to bolster the French; and in the east, against the great mass of Tsarist Russia.
Back in 1914, the map of Europe was rather different to what it is now. There was no Poland; its territory was divided between Germany and Russia. A large segment of Germany – East Prussia – stuck out like an arm flung out to the east, with the Baltic Sea to the north and the bulge of Russian Poland to the south. It would be elementary strategy, obvious to the meanest military intelligence, that an attack from the south of that arm – aiming at the “armpit” – would cut off Prussia from the rest of Germany and inflict a significant strategic defeat on the Kaiser.
This was basically the plan of the Allies – that the British and French would conduct a holding operation in the west while the vast weight of the Russian army (the “Russian steamroller”) would be brought into action from the east. The Russians had ten full armies available, more troops than the Germans could muster on both fronts combined, but the problem was that their logistics were extremely primitive. Motor transport was lacking, the road network in the border area had been deliberately left undeveloped in order to deter a German invasion, and the Russian railway lines did not share the same gauge as the German, meaning that unless the former could capture German locomotives and trains, they would be unable to use the railway once they crossed the border.
Allied with these problems was the incredible inefficiency, corruption and incompetence of the Tsarist system. This isn’t the place to discuss that in detail, but the Russia of that time was utterly feudal and this extended to the military. General Sukhomlinov, the chief of the army and then Minister of War, owed his position to his penchant (vide Alan Clark, Suicide of the Empires) for telling entertaining stories to the royal family at parties. The remainder were little better – court favourites and the children of the nobility, promoted for their ability to look good in uniform. There were energetic officers, of course, hardworking and sincere, but the system actively discouraged hard work and sincerity.
Under them were the mass of troops that made up the Tsarist army. They were almost all peasant conscripts, mostly illiterate, and at that time, at the beginning of the war, conditioned to believing in the Tsar as almost a divine figure. Their courage was by no means lacking, but their weaponry and training were primitive, and their leadership almost uniformly execrable. They were basically peasant cannon fodder, and nothing more.
 | | Russian platoon, 1914 |
Communications were as bad as everything else. The radio operators were unfamiliar with their equipment, incompetent with their codes, and reduced to broadcasting secret orders in the clear. The generals in the field often could not communicate directly with army headquarters (Stavka). Officers frequently had difficulty communicating with troops from remote corners of the Empire who did not speak Russian. The average soldier, being usually illiterate, couldn’t read written orders or directions. It was a mess.
On the opposing side was the Kaiser’s army. The German army of 1914 had its own problems, including difficulties with communication equipment and its own incompetent generals, but in comparison with the Tsar’s forces it was far more ready for combat. And unlike the Russians, who were fighting an offensive war with an army built up and suited for defence, the Germans had laid down plans on what to do in case of a war on two fronts. The Schlieffen Plan (named after its inventor) called for the French to be defeated quickly in an offensive to the west of Paris, followed by troops to be shifted east before the Russians could fully mobilise. Therefore the Germans had an army prepared for offence, a railway network capable of moving troops rapidly from front to front, and a plan to work with. The Russians had none of these things.
It’s difficult, at this distance of time, to appreciate the utter casualness with which the ruling classes of Europe launched the Great War. The Tsar, especially, seems to have looked at the war as a path to personal glory – a way of compensating for two decades of incompetence and ineffectuality on the throne. And so, instead of using his army in the role for which it was suited, he flung it into an offensive against Germany and, to the south, against Germany’s ally the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
The offensive:
The Russian plan was relatively simple, and, as I’d said, fairly predictable. The First Army (under General von Rennenkampf – like many of the Russian officer corps, he was an ethnic German) was to thrust into Prussia from the East, to tie down German forces. Meanwhile, the Second Army under Samsonov was to attack to the north from the bulge of Russian Poland, aiming to cut off the “arm” of Prussia by striking at the “armpit”. Opposed to that was a single German army, the Eighth, which was numerically much weaker than either of the Russian armies. The Germans were at that time concentrating on knocking out the French, and had not anticipated that the Russians would be able to mobilise and attack as swiftly as they in fact did.
The German Army commander in the East, General von Prittwitz, was (according to Clark, Suicide of the Empires) someone whose abiding obsession was food, and who was known to all and sundry as der Dicke (“Fatso”). As the Russian First Army advanced, scoring a victory over the Germans at Gumbinnen, he panicked and ordered a retreat, effectively abandoning all of East Prussia. In response, General von Moltke, the chief of the German General Staff, sacked him and replaced him with Field Marshal von Hindenburg and General Ludendorff. They ordered the German forces retreating from the First Army, at von Prittwitz’ orders, to detrain and redeploy to face Samsonov’s Second Army.
Meanwhile, the Russian advance was hindered by two factors. The first was the appalling logistics, which made it difficult for Samsonov’s Second Army to advance. The second was the fact that Rennenkampf and Samsonov had hated each other since the Russo-Japanese War of 1905; and this was well known to the Germans, who based their strategy partly on their assessment that the former was in no great hurry to help out the latter. Indeed, instead of advancing rapidly after the victory at Gumbinnen, Rennenkampf’s First Army halted in order to prepare for a German counterattack. Due to the terrible communications, Samsonov did not know of this, and expected to link up with Rennenkampf advancing from the east. At the same time, because the Russians radio network sent out the orders of the day uncoded – as already mentioned – the Germans knew the Russian deployments and planned movements in advance. This is why they felt it justified to turn their forces towards Samsonov, exposing their backs to Rennenkampf; they knew quite well he would not take advantage of the opportunity, even though, as they said, “Rennenkampf need only have closed with us, and we should have been beaten.”
This article is not intended to refight the battle shot by shot, so it will not describe the various deployments, advances and retreats in all details, but an overview of the action would be a good idea before moving on to discuss its implications for modern history. Anyone who wants a more detailed description can check here, or here.
The Battle:
On 22nd August 1914, Samsonov’s forces encountered the German XX Corps and in a series of clashes drove it back over the next several days. Meanwhile, the rest of the German Eighth Army continued to deploy in positions on the flanks of the Second Army, having confirmed from signal intercepts that Rennenkampf’s First Army would not make any attempt to join up with the Second Army or come to its aid. The Second Army’s own movements were similarly known to the Germans, again due to orders being sent out on the radio in the clear; there’s evidence that even Hindenburg and Ludendorff found it difficult to accept the full extent of the staggering stupidity of the Russian commanders.
Starting from the 27th August, the Germans advanced against both flanks of the Second Army, and by the 29th had surrounded it east of the village of Tannenberg. Pounded ceaselessly by artillery, by the time the battle ended on the 30th the Second Army was almost completely annihilated, fewer than ten thousand of its soldiers managing to retreat back to Russian Poland. The Eighth Army captured some 92000 prisoners and so much equipment that sixty trainloads were required to transfer it back to Germany.
 | | Russian PoWs after Tannenberg |
Of the two Russian commanders, Samsonov vanished, and is thought to have shot himself to avoid having to report the disaster to the Tsar.
Rennenkampf, who had made a belated and ineffectual attempt to come to the aid of Samsonov after the Second Army had already been surrounded, was himself now dangerously overextended. The German Eighth Army was now free to deploy against him, and soon defeated the First Army at the Masurian Lakes and drove its remnants back over the border.
The German victory was complete. Russian troops would not invade German territory again until 1945.
The Effects:
As I’ve said before, the Allied plan was for the French and British to hold off the Germans in the west while the “Russian steamroller” rolled over Germany from the east. Tannenberg, and the subsequent Battle of the Masurian Lakes which was made possible by the victory at Tannenberg, put a premature and permanent end to the Russian threat against Germany for the duration of the war.
The Russian Army recovered to some extent by 1915, but it was never again the force it had been before Tannenberg. It did score some successes against Germany’s ally, the incompetently led Austro-Hungarian Empire, and later against the Turks; but it could never stand up again to the Germans. As the war went on, the Tsar was forced, step by step, to abandon Russian Poland and retreat across what is now Belarus, the Baltic States, and the Ukraine, until the Germans threatened the Imperial capital, St Petersburg, itself.
Meanwhile, the defeats at the front caused mass discontent at home as well. Back in 1914, in common with most of Europe, the Russian upper and middle classes had greeted the war with enthusiasm and joy. In fact, except for Lenin, who was in exile, and some other “defeatists” – who argued that the war was illegal and stupid – even Bolsheviks like Stalin patriotically supported the war at that stage. But as defeat followed defeat, prices soared and food became scarce, the people turned against the Tsar, his German wife, and the royal family with virtually universal hatred. By early 1917, there were mass strikes in the cities, coupled with a complete collapse of the military effort and this ultimately led to the Russian Revolution of February 1917. And that in turn paved the way for the Bolshevik Revolution of November.
However, Tannenberg had an unexpected side effect. As I’ve said, the German plan was to knock out the French and British before the Russians could get themselves organised, and they had launched a major offensive in the West in accordance with the Schlieffen Plan. This didn’t go quite according to plan, partly because of German Army Chief von Moltke’s tinkering with the original template, and instead of a massacre of the French Army, what happened was a series of battles collectively known as the First Battle of the Marne. While this battle was still in progress, however, von Moltke removed three infantry corps and a cavalry division from the Western front and sent them east to reinforce the Eighth Army in East Prussia. They arrived far too late to have any effect on the battle, but they did weaken the Western Front so much that the First Battle of the Marne ended in a German defeat.
The significance of the defeat on the Marne was immediately appreciated by von Moltke himself, who told the Kaiser, “Your Majesty, we have lost the war.” He knew that Germany did not have the resources to fight a long war and had just lost the chance to secure a speedy victory, which was the only way it could have won at all. However, since the Kaiser did not see that fact, the war did not end at once; the retreating Germans dug into the fields of Flanders, and the next three years passed in trench warfare, poison gas attacks, and mass assaults across the shell-shattered wastes of no-man’s land. For anyone who wants a more detailed description of that, I’d recommend that you go ahead and read Erich Maria Remarque’s All Quiet On The Western Front. Open mobile warfare, as at Tannenberg and the Marne, would not be seen again on the Western Front until the last months of 1918.
The effects of the slaughter in the trenches can hardly be overestimated. Back in 1914, Europe had still been a very 19th Century society, with strict social stratification between the gentry and the working class. But the war ended that. By the time it ended, the upper classes, which had traditionally supplied the officer corps, had been virtually destroyed. Egalitarianism was there to stay, both in the battlefield and off it. The Twentieth Century was born in the trenches of the Western Front.
By 1917, then, the nations of Western Europe had almost bled themselves white after years of fruitless trench warfare. The Great Hope in Britain and France, now that the Russians were clearly finished, was the US. And though the Americans were at the time a financial and industrial power, they not particularly militarily significant; the doughboys of the US Army had to train on wooden guns, and the nascent Army Air Force was equipped with aeroplanes bought from France.
Still, President Wilson was as desperate to enter the war as the British and French were desperate to entice him into it, and finally by 1917 he had managed to “manufacture consent” enough to be able to declare war on Germany. US forces would not be in France in strength until 1918, just about in time to participate in the offensives that attended the final German collapse. In other words, the US took part in the victory without having much of a role in the fighting that led up to it. And while the British and the French suffered appalling casualties amongst their young males, the American losses were relatively minor. If anything, it was the taste of victory in the First World War which led to American militarism and the Empire.
And on the East, the Russian Civil War and the Bolshevik victory caused its own mass social churning. The defeated and prostrate Russia of 1917 was gone, but a new Russia was rising on its ruins. Whether it was a good or bad force in the history of the world can be something endlessly debatable, but one thing can’t be denied – it was the first time Russia would emerge as a technologically and socially modern country.
Meanwhile, the embitterment that resulted from four years of war could not be shaken off easily. The Treaty of Versailles, imposed on a defeated Germany by Britain and France, compelled that nation to take on itself the entire blame of the war and pay “reparations” – which in turn caused mass hardship in a Germany awash with demobilised soldiers and right-wing militia. It was the ideal situation for political extremism, and one such ex-soldier soon made a name for himself, ultimately making his mark in history. His name was Adolf Hitler.
Everyone pretty much knows what happened after that.
Why Tannenberg matters:
It is in the nature of discussions of this sort that the only way to understand the significance of a particular event is to ask what would have happened if it had gone another way – to consider an alternate-history scenario.
So let’s see what might have happened if the Russians had won in East Prussia, as they very easily might have, despite all their shortcomings.
If Samsonov and Rennenkampf had captured East Prussia, they would have dealt a shattering political blow to the German Empire. Prussia was the seat of German militarism, the home of the Junker class which supplied the German officer corps, and the leading component of the princely states which comprised the Germany of the day. At the same time, the defeat on the Marne would have meant simultaneous German defeats on both fronts – something not even the Kaiser could have ignored. It’s more than likely that the war could have ended in September 1914 via some kind of political settlement. The First World War, as historians know, was one of the least necessary wars ever fought, borne of competing egos and webs of military alliances more than existential threats. It would not have been very hard to abort it in 1914.
If the war had ended in 1914, what might have happened? In no particular order of importance, I can think of these:
First of all, the Old Europe – the one of class stratification and feudalism – would have endured, perhaps to this day. What is certain is that the bitterness that came with the trench warfare of 1915-16, the poison gas and pointless bloodletting, would not have happened. There would have been no unequal Versailles Treaty, no Weimar Republic, no fascist militia and no Führer Adolf Hitler. There would, in turn, have been no Second World War in the form we know today, and therefore no weakening of the old imperialist powers to the point where they would have to begin letting the colonies go. Without the First World War, there would not have been the decolonisation of the late forties to the late sixties.
Secondly, the decaying Ottoman Empire was not involved in the war in 1914. Most of West Asia between Suez and Iran was then still Ottoman territory, including what are today Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and the so-called state of “Israel”. It’s unlikely that the Ottoman Empire would have lasted very much longer, but its fall would not have meant the takeover of its Arab colonies by the British and French. There would have been no British mandate in Palestine, no Balfour Declaration, and almost certainly no Zionazi pseudostate.
Then, of course, Tsarism would have survived in Russia. Nikolai II would have remained on his throne, his position strengthened by his victory in the war. He would have felt emboldened to snuff out the political reforms he had been compelled to permit after the Russian Revolution of 1905, and would have returned to full autocracy. Lenin would have remained a powerless agitator in Swiss exile; there would have been no Communist Soviet Union. And in turn, the effect on the rest of the world, including nations like China, would have been profound.
The effect on the US would have been scarcely any less. If the war had ended speedily in 1914, there would have been no American intervention in Europe, and the US would most likely have confined its own imperial longings to the Western Hemisphere. It would still have been an economic and industrial powerhouse, but it would not have been a militaristic empire.
And this is why I consider Tannenberg far more significant than Gettysburg. The latter battle may have preserved the unity of the US; I don’t really know enough about American history to judge that. But, as I’ve said, if the war had ended in 1914, it would not have mattered in the slightest whether the United States would have been one nation or two, because its effect on world history would have been infinitesimal.
Technologically, too, the Great War left an indelible mark on civilisation. War seems to bring out the innovator in humanity, and it was after 1915 that aviation took off, so to say, in a big way, and aircraft became something more than curiosities. The first tanks that clattered across the battlefields, the submarines that set off to ambush battleships, the innovations in electronic communication – all that advanced tremendously during the years of the war. They would probably still have occurred in a time of peace, but much more slowly. No Great War means no Second World War, and that means no Cold War, and therefore no Global War of Empire; there might of course have been other wars, other conflicts, but their shapes would not have been the same, and their effects would not have been the same.
I’m not saying the world would have been a better place if the Russians had won at Tannenberg. Nobody who knows anything about the Tsarist system could ever imagine that.
But the world would have been very, very different.
 | Fear | Apr 23, '12 12:38 PM
for everyone |
She glanced over her shoulder at the big man, feeling his eyes burn into her.
He was a very big man, and she felt the small hairs on the back of her neck rise as she noticed his brutal features, the prognathous jut of his simian jaw, the heavy brows above his cruel eyes. What would she do if he called out, ordering her to stop? His uniform gave him the authority to do anything he wanted to her. Her eyes flicked nervously way, and back. There was nowhere to go, no place to run. Running would be the worst thing she could do, anyway. As long as she tried not to attract his attention, perhaps he would let her go.
He was still watching, his small eyes boring into her. She knew she was pretty, prettier than was probably good for her, she’d long grown used to being watched by men. But this wasn’t the harmless ogling that she’d endured since her teenage years. This man’s stare was nothing like that. She didn’t feel like a woman under that stare; she felt like a lab specimen pinned to a dissection board.
Her mouth was dry, her heart hammering, and her stomach clenched with tension. She felt her knees trembling, and was afraid that she would sway on her legs, her body betraying her with the mark of weakness. From the corner of her eye, she saw him turn towards her, raise a hand. This was it, she thought, and resigned herself. Whatever he did to her now, it would be better than this terrifying waiting.
“Ma’am,” he said. “Are you all right?”
“Yes,” she whispered, automatically. “I’m OK.”
“Then will you move on, please. You’re holding up the line.”
Outside the terminal building, she sank back into the taxi and sighed. In a few minutes, she would be in the hotel. That was the last time, she thought. Never again, she promised. But that was what she’d told herself last time, and the time before that.
Inside her churning stomach, one of the sachets of heroin burst open.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
Here is your god In the pressing together of hydrogen atoms driven To fusion, in the energy set free As matter dies inside a trillion suns.
Here is your god In the storm of energy streaming Out into the dark between the worlds At the speed of light.
Here is your god All over everywhere, everywhen In ten million million galaxies, till the border of eternity Where spacetime ends.
Here is your god In the glow of a red dwarf sun And in the prism of a dewdrop on a leaf Trembling, before it falls.
Here is your god Everything that was, is, will be Till the last star burns out And entropy wins.
Here is your god Who requires no worship Who requires no faith Who requires no Holy Wars.
Here is your god God of broken rock whirling through the cosmic dark God of man and woman and all else Made of a reborn star.
Here is your god Who was before the first consciousness Stirred in the primal mud And who will outlive it.
Here is your god Who has no angels singing praises at its throne Who keeps no track of the fall of a sparrow Who just was, and is.
Here is your god Who offers no heaven, threatens no hell Who only allows you to live And create your own destiny.
Here is your god In the comet in the sky In the laughter of a child In everything that you see.
Here is your god
Who does not demand your belief
Who does not know you exist
Or care.
Here is your god Whose temples are the galaxy and the pebble Dark matter and giant white sun And you.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
Suppose you’re a woman walking down a lonely street in the dead of night. All of a sudden, a man jumps out of the bushes, shoves a knife in your face, and demands that you submit to him. And then throws you down, gets on top of you and begins thrusting away.
Would you, at that moment, wish you had teeth inside your vagina so that you could amputate his penis and leave him thrashing in agony on the ground? Wouldn’t it be the perfect punishment?
Apparently, the same thought occurred to a South African doctor (also described as a medical technician; I don't know which is correct but let's give her the benefit of the doubt and call her a doctor) named Sonnet (or Sonette; I've come across both spellings) Ehlers, who happened, she says, to have heard a rape victim sobbing that she wished she “had teeth down there.” Sometime later, Dr Ehlers says she saw a man in agony due to his foreskin being caught in his pants zipper, and, putting two and two together, came up with something she calls Rape-aXe.
On the face of it, it’s every potential rapist’s nightmare come true: a device resembling a female condom, placed inside the vagina by means of an applicator, with serrated teeth meant to catch on a rapist’s penis. (The description of the device on Dr Ehlers’ website mentions specifically that it only engages the skin of the shaft of the penis – this is significant for reasons I’ll go into later in this article.) The Rape-aXe can then, again according to Ehlers’ claims, only be removed in a hospital emergency room, presumably with a policeman standing by with handcuffs.
I said, as you’ll note, that on the face of it this is every potential rapist’s nightmare come true. As soon as one looks into it with any attention, though, it seems more of a nightmare for the potential rape victim than the perpetrator. Let’s see how.
First of all is the obvious point that this Rape-aXe ceases to work if the woman isn’t wearing it at the time of attack. No rapist is going to, you know, allow her to insert and position it before beginning his crime. Therefore, in order to be protected by it (for whatever that protection is worth; not much, as I’ll talk about) the woman would have to wear it at all times except when she’s having consensual sex. Is this even possible?
There are two potential responses to this point: first, that the Rape-aXe is meant to be used only when venturing into potentially “dangerous” situations; and, secondly, that the uncertainty of whether the victim is using it will serve as a deterrent. Both these responses are fallacious.
Let’s take the “dangerous” situation first, which Dr Ehlers addresses on her site (she recommends using it when “...you may be in a compromising situation, such as going on a blind date, or having to use public transport late at night”). As far as I’m aware, most rapes worldwide happen in circumstances where the woman can be got at when she’s alone, and where the perpetrator will have the time and privacy to carry out his crime without fear of interruption. Also, a large proportion of rapes are committed by friends or relatives, rather than strangers (even Dr Ehlers’ own site says 69% of rapes are committed by people who aren’t strangers); in other words one is at least as much at risk in one’s own home or in a friend’s home than in the archetypal dark street at the dead of night I talked about earlier. Or, and this is not uncommon in India, a woman can be kidnapped, put in the rapists’ vehicle, and raped as they drive around town – frequently for the duration of the night.
All this means that when a woman might think she’s in a “safe” situation, she’s nothing of the sort; and, when she’s in a “dangerous” situation, she might actually be safer than at other times since she’s far more likely to be on her guard and less vulnerable.
Then, there’s the idea of “uncertainty causing deterrence”. As far as general crime trends go, uncertainty hasn’t stopped any kind of crime – it’s merely made criminals try and neutralise the uncertainty factor. Let’s say the attacker with the knife I mentioned holds it in the woman’s face and says, "If you're wearing one of those things, take it out right now or I'll cut you up so bad your own lover won't want to ever look at you again." What will the woman’s reaction be? To take it out, right? Really, what other alternative does she have? Well, according to Dr Ehlers, she
“...would then have a free hand at which point you either grab his testis or twist them (sic) or poke your fingers into his eyes and get away from the scene. Rape-aXe will buy you time.”
It somehow strikes me that Dr Ehlers (who says she hasn’t been raped) hasn’t put herself in a situation where she has to choose between being cut up and complying with orders. Also, her entire invention is based on the idea that the victim is faced with a single rapist. A significant proportion of rapes, including rapes in southern Africa, are committed by gangs, and it strikes me that her advice is a good way of getting oneself turned into a smear on the ground.
Or, let’s take one of those facts about rape that just about everyone, including Dr Ehlers herself, agrees with: that it isn’t about sex, it’s about power. The least important part of the rape is the fact of the rapist’s penis entering the victim’s vagina. It’s the actual and total domination that the rapist exerts over his victim that matters, not the penetration itself. Therefore, it doesn’t really necessarily signify that rape will involve penile penetration of the vagina. It can be anything including forced anal or oral intercourse, or merely partial penetration of the vagina – not nearly enough to let the Rape-aXe engage its target – or penetration of any of the above with other objects. I wonder how effective Dr Ehlers’ invention will be against a baton or a beer bottle. Not very, I don’t think.
Nor does the Rape-aXe offer any protection at all against a far more important danger faced by a woman in the so-called “dangerous” situation – against assault. This may include anything from being verbally abused and/or hit, to being slashed with a knife or (and again this is quite common in India, much used by jilted suitors) being splashed with sulphuric acid. As a matter of fact, I’d even say that in a situation where women are known or suspected to be wearing Rape-aXe or similar devices, the possibility of potentially substantially more damaging assault increases. The mindset goes something like this: “So you think you’ve won, bitch? Well, let’s see how you like this.” If Dr Ehlers’ claim in her website is to be taken at face value, and rape is a “hit and run offence”, well, assault is an even easier hit and run offence.
But let’s imagine that all of Dr Ehlers’ claims are correct, and see where that gets us. Let’s assume that the Rape-aXe works exactly as she claims it to, that it engages the penis shaft’s skin, and that it can’t be removed without the assistance of facilities available in a hospital emergency room only. What then?
We’ll consider a situation where a rapist has achieved his purpose and penetrated a woman vaginally, against her will, while she’s wearing a Rape-aXe, and deeply enough for the teeth on the instrument to engage him. I don’t know if this device can cope with condoms, but let’s say it can; let’s for the sake of argument claim that it will engage his penile skin whether he’s using a condom or not. Assuming, then, that his wearing of a condom or not doesn’t matter, even if he’s caught by the Rape-aXe, he’s actually already committed the rape, am I right? It’s not a rape-prevention device, it’s just a device to try and make the consequences more severe.
And what happens if he’s not wearing a condom? I’ll just point out that this instrument is a South African invention, and that southern Africa has one of the highest incidences of HIV in the world. So, the lady might have caught her rapist, but she might have caught something else besides. Of course, that’s true of any rape, but this instrument of vengeance can’t stop her from running the risk of getting HIV, which a can of pepper spray or some simple precautions like going about in groups well might. (I should mention that according to Dr Ehlers’ site, the Rape-aXe is supposed to prevent the transmission of sexually transmitted diseases from the rapist to the victim, but she gives no data proving this contention. Nor does she mention what happens if the rapist is wearing a condom.)
Then, let’s take it from the rapist’s perspective. According to the site, he’s supposed to be hooked through the penile skin and therefore “tagged”. Well, let me tell you something as someone who’s actually – back as a kid, when I wasn’t yet circumcised – got his foreskin stuck in a zipper; it’s painful, but unlike a crushing injury (like a kick to the penis or testicles) is very, very far from incapacitating. All that the pain is likely to do is infuriate the rapist and likely end up with the woman getting the beating of her life, if not killed. It’s kind of interesting that Dr Ehlers seems to be aware of this problem – she mentions it in the FAQ (it’s, in fact, Question No 1) but her answer is anything but direct. All she does is repeat that the rapist is “tagged”; how is that supposed to stop the victim from getting her head beaten in? According to Dr Ehlers, the rapist won’t do anything further because he’ll be in “double trouble”. I doubt if an enraged rapist will stop to think of further consequences at that moment. It’s as though Dr Ehlers has never even seen anyone in a frenzy of anger. And if there’s more than one rapist, the chances of major violence increase to a complete certainty.
It’s interesting that in one of the pages on her site, Dr Ehlers talks at some length about rape as a weapon of war – and yet that rape is always one with multiple perpetrators. It’s not as though her invention would be helpful in that situation.
Dr Ehlers claims for her invention that it will prevent the rapist from urinating until it’s removed. I don’t really see how that works since according to her it’s basically a barbed latex sheath. It seems to me that the end of a latex sheath can be cut off without too much trouble, just like the end of a condom, which is also a latex sheath, can. But then I haven’t actually seen one of these contraptions for myself so I can’t really swear to that.
What I can say, though, is that even if we are to take Dr Ehlers’ assertion that the Rape-aXe can only be removed by a surgeon at face value, there’s no reason to accept her assertion that the rapist will end up being “tagged” and arrested. Where there’s a demand, it will be satisfied, and crooked surgeons aren’t exactly unknown. Any number of clinics will be on hand to quietly remove the Rape-aXe from anyone it’s attached to, if and when the time comes.
Then, we have the fact that something like this can actually be misused. In a world where we have people like Lorena Bobbitt, I can see instances where some women trap their boyfriends or colleagues into having sex with them, and then accuse them of rape. It’s not exactly a minor consideration, given that those are precisely the men who are liable to go to official hospitals to have the device removed.
In any case, the purpose of this invention isn’t to prevent rape; it’s basically Dr Ehlers’ route to fame if not fortune. A look at her website, and this becomes clear. Not only does she offer no statistics as to how many rapists have been brought to justice as a result of her invention, this is what she states as her “mission statement”:
“In this day and age there are communities where practices such as virginity testing, female genital mutilation, child marriages, arranged impregnations and then forced marriage are practiced. My mission is to highlight the plight of these women and give them the choice!”
Does this seem kind of highfalutin tripe to the average reader? How does “tagging” a rapist, even if that could work, affect in any way child marriages, “arranged impregnations” (whatever that might be) and forced marriage? But for Dr Ehlers,
“Rape-aXe is the beginning of my crusade towards curbing the scourge of violence against women and girls!”
At this point, I’d really want to see some statistics. How many rapists has Rape-aXe brought to book? A thousand? A hundred? One?
Actually, the answer seems to be zero, since
the device has never been marketed to the public and it remains unclear whether the product will ever be available for purchase.
In other words, we have a "crusade for women's empowerment", we have a website, we have a lot of publicity - and we do not have a marketed and testable product which is supposed to achieve any of the claims made for it.
Pardon me for not ranking Dr Ehlers' credibility too high.
With all the obvious criticism that can be directed at her invention, it’s curious that Dr Ehlers addresses only two, and these two are so infantile as to be practically straw-man arguments.
The first, in her own words? “I have been accused of all sorts, my all-time favourite though is that I am the inventor of a most medieval device… my response, quite frankly is that a medieval deed deserves a medieval consequence.”
Does this even mean anything? Rape is a crime that has been around as long as there have been humans (and is far from unknown among other animals either). Burglary and murder are crimes that have been around as long as there have been humans, too, and are to this day punished in certain nations by amputation or death. How is hooking a man’s penis skin a medieval punishment? Castration might have been more like it.
The other? “My second favourite criticism comes from Victoria Kaija, from the Center (sic) for Disease Control and Prevention, Uganda. She refers to my invention as a form of ‘enslavement’. Apparently wearing the device, according to Victoria, is a constant reminder, to women, of their vulnerability.”
This is like saying taking elementary precautions like wearing a seat belt while driving a car shouldn’t be done because it makes you feel vulnerable; obviously a ridiculous argument, and easy to strike down. It seems to me extremely unlikely that more cogent arguments have not been made, but if so, Dr Ehlers absolutely refuses to mention them.
Rape is a serious problem, and merits serious attempts at prevention. Gimmicky devices like this are not the solution, and are actually liable to exacerbate the problem.
But in the final analysis, ladies, tell me this: would you be psychologically comfortable walking around with a latex sheath inside your vagina, which you know to be lined with metal hooks? How does that idea make you feel?
Not all that good, I’ll bet.
The sky outside is reddening with the glow of the sunrise. Soon, the sun will push above the horizon, as red as the blood which will soon follow.
For today will be the day the war ends, the day when we make the final victorious assault.
From inside my tent, I can hear the noise of the army preparing for action. To the untutored ear it will be as chaos, a medley of purposeless sound, as of a crowd, but the military ear can easily pick out the shout of orders from the crack of whips urging on the lowing oxen as they strain in the harnesses dragging up the big guns, the creak of the cannons’ carriage wheels from the tramp of marching boots. It’s a grand sound, marking the transformation of the army from a collection of men and animals and weapons into a single fighting force.
Many times, in the past, I’ve heard that sound, sitting in my tent, and thrilled at the knowledge that this great instrument of war was mine to command. And to this day, every army under my command has won every battle it has ever fought. The instrument of war has never failed me.
I have no doubt that it will not fail me now, but for the first time ever, the thought brings no joy.
I should be going out now, out of the tent to where my staff officers await me, to plan out the battle; I have to go, but I don’t want to, not today. I want to postpone the going as long as possible, because the coming battle fills me with dread. The fact that I know quite well that we shall win is the most dreadful thing of all.
If only I could have, I think, I’d have left this battle to one of my generals, but on this occasion I have to be in command. It’s perhaps the most important battle of my life, certainly the most important I’ve fought since I ascended the throne, and the fact that I’m going to win it makes no difference to that at all. I cannot leave it to a general – not even the most trustworthy of them is quite trustworthy enough for this.
From where I’m sitting, if I look over my left shoulder, I can see the battlements of the fort through the tent’s entrance, the red sandstone like clotted blood in the dawn. I know this fort very well. I lived in it for years, and each passage, each staircase, is familiar and precious to me. Yet, today, my own artillery is going to blow those walls down.
Right now, the captains of artillery will be emplacing the batteries of cannon so as to be able to concentrate their fire on vulnerable spots of the fort wall; spots I’ve marked out myself, because there’s nobody in this army who knows this fort quite as well as I do. My artillery, bought from the French down on the coast, is the best anyone in this country has, and my gunners, trained by the same French, can hit a coin-sized target with the fire of an entire battery at these distances.
The enemy, who crouch now behind those battlements, and stare out fearfully through slit windows at our army’s trenches and earthworks, know these things too. They know that their defeat is certain, and that before the day is out our flag will fly above their fortress and those of them who survive will be in chains and dreading the morrow. That is the lot of the weaker side in battle, and always has been, and I wouldn’t normally feel the tiniest grain of pity for them. If the situation had been reversed, they would have given as little quarter as we’d give them.
But this time it’s different, because the enemy army in the fort is of our own people, not an invading horde; and their commander, the rebel against my Imperial Crown, is my son.
*******************************
The partly folded-back flap at the tent’s entrance is raised slightly, and my colonel of cavalry peeps in. “Sire,” he says, “the officers are waiting.” He looks faintly surprised to see me not yet dressed for battle in my chain mail vest and helmet. “We’re waiting for you, Sire,” he repeats.
“Yes,” I grunt, without rising. “I’m coming.” The colonel of cavalry has a thin, ratlike face with wispy grey whiskers. I don’t like him at all, but I can count on his loyalty – and in a civil war, loyalty is a rare and precious resource. “I’m coming,” I repeat, and finally he withdraws, still staring. The tent flap falls back into place.
It’s a strange thing, loyalty. If you’d asked me which of my senior officers would stick with me if one of my sons had risen in rebellion, this cavalry colonel wouldn’t have been among those I’d have thought of. But the general I’d have named, who’s been at my side through many campaigns, is now in that fort, by the side of his chosen new master, my son.
My son, the Prince Jamil, the rebel and traitor.
I still remember the shock I’d felt when the news of his rebellion had first reached me. It’s not that I’d been oblivious to the possibility that one of my sons might rebel, but he would have been the last one I’d have expected. I’ve not yet named an heir, but I’d planned on him succeeding me. All he’d have had to do was wait.
Now, of course, there’s no question of anything like that.
Before I’d left the capital on campaign, his mother had come to me. The Begum Sahiba Faizunnisa isn’t my principal wife, but she is and has always been one of my favourites. I’d been talking to one of my ministers, and she’d waited quietly until I’d finished and the man had gone.
“What are you going to do?” she’d asked. Her eyes had been red and swollen from crying, but, typically, she’d lined them with kohl and made herself beautiful before coming to me. “He’s not really a bad boy,” she’d pleaded. “He’s been put up to it by others.”
This is actually almost certainly true. I even know who those people are, plotting to be the powers behind the new occupant of the throne. My assassins have already gone to take care of those of them who are within reach. But that makes no difference as far as he’s concerned.
“Whether that’s true or not,” I’d explained, “it’s not just against me, personally, that he’s raised his hand in rebellion, but against the Empire. If the Empire has to endure, I can’t allow any kind of rebellion or secession, and I can’t forgive rebels and traitors. You do see that?”
“But Jamil is your son,” she’d pleaded. “You watched him being born. You’ve played with him on the floor and you held his hands when he first learnt to walk. He’s not like your Ethiopian or Hindu generals or one of those oily Turkish ministers. Can’t you just forgive him this once?”
“And then what?” I’d asked her. “Suppose I do forgive him. Will he be willing to let the past go? Will his backers allow that? Or will they keep on with their intrigues?”
“I could get a message to him.” Of course she has her own network of spies and couriers; everyone does. It’s a necessity of survival in the political maze of the Court. “I could tell him to ditch them and come back to you. He might listen to me.”
“That wouldn’t work,” I’d explained. “Do you think this can be allowed to pass? However much I want to, I can’t spare him. See here, Faizun,” I’d added, sitting by her and taking her hands in mine. “What kind of message would I be sending out if I forgave him? That anyone can get away with raising his hand against the Imperial Throne if he’s got the right family? Just how long do you think it would take before my other sons rebelled too? They’re already straining at the leash. In six months the Empire would dissolve in civil war, brother fighting brother to succeed me.” I didn’t add that we were already in civil war, and that the provincial governors were watching with keen interest. Unless I scotched the rebellion speedily and brutally, the more distant provinces would begin declaring independence, and after that we’d never stop the slide. She’s more than intelligent enough to work that out for herself.
“Well then,” she’d said, and it was clearly her last throw of the dice. “Abdicate in his favour. Hand him over the entire Empire while it’s still intact.”
“It’s too late for that, Faizun,” I’d replied. “The moment Jamil took the advice of those who put him up to this, he showed himself unfit to wear the crown. Somebody who doesn’t know his own mind can never be the Emperor. At times like this, a weak monarch will bring disaster down on everyone. Besides,” I’d added, cruelly but unable to help myself, “nobody who launches a rebellion quite so incompetently can be allowed to succeed. Anyone fit to win the crown should fight for it properly or not at all.”
“At least then,” she’d begged, “spare his life. Can you at least do that?”
I’d said nothing, unwilling to make a promise I knew I couldn’t keep. Faizunnisa caught it at once.
“You love him,” she’d wailed. “You must save him for the sake of that love!”
“It’s because I love him,” I’d finally told her, shaking my head, “that I can’t spare his life, and won’t. If I take him prisoner, at the very least I’d have to blind him and lock him away for the rest of his life. The other princes will settle for nothing else. Can’t you see that? And when I die, the first thing whoever succeeds me will do is have him poisoned. He’ll spend years in a tiny room, unable to see, waiting for death to come without notice in his food or water. Do you want that for him, Faizun?”
“Go, then,” she’d said, turning her face away, and, rising, left on silent feet without saying goodbye. I’ve not seen her again since then.
Sighing at the memory, I get up from my stool and beginning pulling on my armour. From my days as a soldier, I’ve always preferred to do this for myself, clumsy as the chain mail is and though it would be convenient to have an attendant. Also, I always use the armour of an ordinary officer; the only function a king’s ornate helmet and breastplate have, it seems to me, is to attract the attention of any enemy soldier with a good musket and a keen aim.
Outside the tent, the noise is beginning to die down, as the army settles itself and readies for the battle. The artillery will be emplaced now, behind the earthworks my men have thrown up overnight, their cannonballs stacked in pyramids behind them. The infantry will be waiting, crouching in their trenches, waiting for the thunder of the guns. And once a hole is blasted in the sandstone walls, they’ll charge the breach, hunched over, hidden in the swirling clouds of dust and gunsmoke. The cavalry, under the whiskery officer who had looked in on me, will sweep out to the flanks, to prevent the enemy breaking out in an attempt to escape.
The slaughter shall be savage. I know this, having seen it many times before. The terraces of this fort will be washed in blood by the time the fighting ends; and the blood will be all our own, the blood of brothers fighting each other to the death.
I wish it could have been different. I wish I might have tried siege warfare, to starve the other side into submission, but there’s no time for that. Nor is there any time to try and establish contact with the men inside the fort, to sniff out someone to bribe and open the gates. This war must be concluded at the earliest, before anyone among the generals or the governors begins getting ideas.
Outside, my officers will be waiting, for the final briefings before I give the word for the artillery barrage to begin and signal the start of battle. I will go out to them in a minute, but I take one last moment to whisper a message to my son, Prince Jamil, in the fort across the lines.
“My son,” I tell him, as though my whisper could reach his ear. “Do you remember, once, how we had gone out hunting the lion, you and I? Do you remember how the lion had turned at bay, full of valour to the last, ready to die but not to yield? You had called that lion a hero, and asked me to spare its life.” I visualised the scene as I remembered it, the tawny monster backing away into the scrub, yellow fangs bared, defiant even in escape. “I have just one request to you. Do not permit yourself to be brought to me in chains, broken in spirit and cringing. Do not let yourself be taken alive. Fight, with knife and sword, with musket and bare hands, but fight until you are killed. Die as you would have wanted to have lived, like the lion, like a hero. Make me proud of you, my son. Make me proud.”
Ducking my head to avoid my peaked helmet catching on the tent cloth, I go out into the red glow of the rising sun.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
Whenever I hear about celebrities who burn out because they "can't handle their fame" I have a strong desire to ask them to exchange places with me, because, damn it, I want that fame. I want it very much.
But then I remember that I don't actually enjoy the society of people at all, especially people in large numbers. I also like to have my time to myself rather than hand it out slice by slice to multitudes of faceless "fans". Also, I kind of enjoy my privacy.
And after that I go back to reading or writing; something I don't think the average celebrity has the time or inclination to do.
Frankly, I no longer blame celeb-twits for their staggeringly mindless comments, like Angelina Jolie on KONY2012 where she said she doesn't know anybody who doesn't hate Kony. These people have essentially painted themselves into a corner where they have to play the "celebrity activist" and yet lack the time, intelligence or patience to do any research on anything. So they have people to feed them predigested pap and spew it out for the cameras.
And there are those who are no longer anything more than a packaged product, subject to market research and evaluation. Can you imagine changing yourself to suit what your fan base thinks you should be like, to dress and act as they want you to, even to weigh as much as they think you should? I can't.
No, I'm glad I am not a celebrity. I mean, I like a bit of fame. But I want it on my terms.
Otherwise, forget it. I'd rather be me.
One morning, when Gregoralingam Samsamurthy woke from uneasy dreams of buxom maamis with big breasts and oiled black hair, he discovered that he had been changed in the night to a gigantic insect.
Yes, it was all there, he saw, lying on his back and looking down the length of his body through his compound eyes – the three pairs of jointed spiny legs, moving spasmodically; the relatively long antennae whipping back and forth, the mouth parts which he worked against each other in a futile attempt to lick his teeth.
“I’m an insect,” he thought. “Now how did that happen?”
Trying vainly to wriggle into a more comfortable position, he thought about how it might have occurred. “Perhaps,” he said to himself, “it was that woman in the dream with the very big – I mean the one who told me to quit bugging her when she caught me looking at her very big...! Well, if she didn’t want me to look at her she shouldn’t have walked around without anything on but panties, even if it was a dream.”
This train of thought gave way to another. “Assuming that this is not also a dream,” he thought, “I suppose I am actually an insect. This is a bit inconvenient. The kids in school won’t take too kindly to being taught by an insect. Especially in biology class,” he added, “they’re going to say they want to dissect me!”
The idea proved so distressing that he tried to find solace in the poster he’d bought from the bearded old Muslim man who had a stall in the lane behind Kumaramangalam Hardware Stores and sold porn books and photos under the counter. He’d bought the poster just yesterday in the evening and had intended to hide it away before sleeping, but had forgotten, and it stood propped up against the cupboard, the woman smiling coyly at him over her bared and, if truth be told, rather pendulous bosom. He couldn’t bend his head enough to see down to her exuberant thicket of pubic hair, but for some reason she no longer looked appealing at all. He wondered what he’d ever seen in her.
“Ayyo!” he thought. “Maybe I’ll only ever be sexually interested in insects again. I don’t even know how one would go about seducing a cockroach or a beetle, even supposing one could find one my size.” The thought was so appalling that he forgot to worry about the kids for some time. But the growing demands of his body brought his mind back to the situation.
“I had better get up now,” he thought. “It’s probably something like six in the morning and if I don’t get up soon I’ll be late for the morning tuitions.”
This proved to be easier said than done. His carapace, with its chitinous plates, was convex, inflexible, and proved difficult to manoeuvre on the soft mattress. He hated the mattress, but his mother had insisted on him putting the softest one in the house on his bed. “You work hard,” she’d informed him, as if he didn’t know that, “and you need to sleep comfortably.” So he’d had to take the accursed thing, which was so soft that it had always hurt his spine. Now, of course, he didn’t have a spine, but instead of giving him leverage to get up, it just led to his wriggling around like, well, a bug on its back.
As he lay wriggling, there was a knock at the door. “Perianna”. It was, of course, his sister Umaparvathi. “Perianna, your kaapi is ready. You should get up now. You’ll get late.” Samsamurthy waited, hoping she would go away, but Umaparvathi was a persistent girl, always had been. “Perianna,” she called, knocking at the door, “are you sick? Your kaapi is getting cold.”
Samsamurthy began to get exasperated with her voice. He’d never, he thought, noticed just how whiny it was, and he wished there was some way of making her shut up. But she just went on and on and on.
“Amma Appa,” she called, “Perianna is not answering. I think he may be sick.” This, quite predictably, brought Amma scurrying. “Kanna,” she called urgently. “Kanna, open the door. Are you ill?”
Samsamurthy attempted to deny this vigorously. Indeed, he was not ill. He was merely an insect. But all he managed was a kind of hissing noise through his spiracles.
“I can hear him coughing,” Umaparvathi said.
“Maybe he’s got the whooping cough,” Amma replied. “I can hear the whooping noise. I’m sure he’s got whooping cough. Get a doctor, quick.”
“What’s going on?” it was Appa’s voice, heard faintly. “Where’s my breakfast? What are you two doing outside the boy’s room? Why isn’t he up yet, anyway? He’s getting lazy; he needs a good beating, but you never let me hit him when it would have done some good.”
Samsamurthy listened to this peroration with mounting irritation, and tried without success to push himself upright in the bed. All this did was bring the poster into full view, dimples of cellulite, unkempt pubic puff, unshaven legs and all the rest of it. It provoked a moment of such pure nausea that he tried to close his eyes so as not to see it. But, not having eyelids, he couldn’t. Hissing with disgust, he sank back on the bed.
“Now I’ve had it,” he thought. “At least I hope I’ll be interested in female insects.”
There was a much louder banging on the door. “Get up!” Appa commanded. “You young ones have it too easy, disobeying your elders and betters. I’ve a good mind to break my walking stick across your back.”
“He’s sick,” Amma protested, in the whispery little voice which was all she dared use in counter to her husband. “He has whooping cough.”
“Whooping cough?” Appa yelled. “When I was his age I had malaria, and measles, and still I wasn’t ever one minute late getting up. Open, you! I tell you, if my dad had caught me locking my door, he’d have whipped the skin off me. I’ve been far too indulgent with him.”
“Appa,” Umaparvathi broke in. “The students are coming for morning tuition. I can see them from the window.”
There was a pause. “You get up,” Appa shouted. “You’re supposed to be a teacher, and you know that the tuition brings in more money than your salary, and you owe it to us to earn, and...”
With a convulsive movement, Samsamurthy rolled off the bed and fell on to the floor with a thud. Fortunately he fell the right way up and didn’t hurt himself too much. He was about to scuttle to the door and open it when he thought of the poster. His parents couldn’t be allowed to know that he had bought a nude poster. It wasn’t what good boys did – good bachelor boys weren’t even supposed to know or care what a naked woman was like. Even though the thought of a naked woman was enough now to make him puke, he went to it and yanked it down from where he’d propped it up on the wall. Not finding anywhere else to put it, he finally slid it under the bed.
Then he went over to the door, but he found himself labouring for breath, since his spiracles couldn’t oxygenate his tissues fast enough. Whistling like a boiling kettle, he heaved himself up to the door and somehow slipped the latch open.
Perhaps he should have known what would happen next. In his defence, though, he wasn’t exactly thinking straight.
Fortunately, though there was a stampede, nobody was hurt.
********************************
“I’ll go to Tirupathi Temple tomorrow,” Amma sobbed, “and shave my head. I’ll beg the Lord Balaji to cure him.”
It was later in the day. Samsamurthy was locked inside his room, his parents and sister whispering urgently outside. They’d phoned him sick at work, and sent away his tuition kids. Fortunately, none of them had caught a glimpse of the big insect or it would have been the talk of the town.
“I talked to the astrologer,” her husband said. “He says it’s because of the positions of Rahu and Ketu, and we shouldn’t do anything until the malign influence passes.” From inside his room, Samsamurthy could hear Appa’s urgent whisper. “Most of all,” he said, “we can’t let it out that this happened. Who would marry Umaparvathi then?”
“I don’t want to get married,” Umaparvathi said sullenly. “I want to become an engineer.”
Her parents ignored her. “This is what happens when we don’t keep tight control over children,” Appa said. “They go wild and then the gods get angry, and this kind of thing happens. I told you again and again, he needs to be beaten, but you would never let me put a hand on him. Now see where that gets you.”
Samsamurthy tried to protest, but only ended up hissing angrily.
“Listen to him!” Amma said. “The poor boy must be suffering. Now if only Lord Balaji takes pity on him then everything will be all right.”
“In any case,” Appa responded, “he has to recover quickly, so as to keep earning. We can’t risk his losing his job.”
“At a time like this,” Amma sobbed, “all you can think of is money?”
“Well, what do you suggest I think about? If he doesn’t recover, who’s going to earn? Do you expect me to go to work at my age?”
“I can work,” Umaparvathi declared. “I can easily get a salesgirl’s job in Muthuswamy and Sons. They pay well, and I can work in the evening, after school. All I’d have to do is give up music class. I hate music class anyway.”
Neither parent looked at her. “Your music class is important,” Amma said. “You’ll be able to get a better husband if you can sing. And I won’t let you go work somewhere like Muthuswamy where you can talk to boys.”
“The astrologer told me he’ll do some special calculations tonight,” Appa said to Amma. “He’ll be able to say when the influence of Rahu and Ketu will ease.”
“Give your brother some dosa to eat,” Amma told the girl. “He’ll be hungry and dosa is his favourite.”
The thought of dosa made Samsamurthy’s stomach turn over just as the naked woman in the poster had earlier, but he was hungry. Suddenly he realised he was famished. So when his sister pushed open the door and timidly slid a plate of dosa into the room, he made an attempt to eat. But he could not taste the food at all, and found it excessively crumbly – his mouth parts couldn’t handle it. So he flung it down again, and, disconsolately wandering about the room, suddenly he smelt something that felt to him like heaven. Throwing himself upon the bookcase, he pulled out the school textbooks, and, one by one, began to eat the paste binding the pages together.
Later, he had a sudden idea. He had heard Appa going out, stomping angrily across the floor, and knew he was going to the astrologer to find out what the reading had disclosed. Amma was sitting in front of her household shrine, praying loudly, and Umaparvathi had gone to evening music class. He decided to see if he could crawl up the wall and through the ventilator under the ceiling.
It turned out to be extremely easy. His spiny legs proved able to adhere easily to the plaster, and his broad but flat body squeezed without difficulty through the narrow space. He didn’t even have as much trouble breathing as he’d had down on the floor.
He squatted on the terrace of the building, looking out at the city, and especially at the big shopping complex opposite. Without too much difficulty, he thought, he’d be able to crawl across the intervening space and through ventilators like the one he’d just come through, all the better to find things he could eat, like the wonderful glue earlier in the day. He could even perhaps rob a safe or two and bring back the money, and leave it lying around, so his parents wouldn’t feel the pinch. He’d do it tomorrow, he thought. For tonight, it was enough that he knew he could do it.
After a while, he climbed back through the window, rooted around and ate a little more, and then went to sleep.
That night he had a dream. He was scuttling around in a huge room full of other insects, all of whom were very attractive and female. One particular lady cockroach drew his attention immediately, with her long sexy antennae and the come-hither look in her smouldering compound eyes. He ran after her, trying to caress her with his own antennae, but she kept on flicking him away. At last, with an angry hiss, she scuttled away faster than he could follow, squeezed through a hole in the floor, and disappeared. And when Samsamurthy looked around, he found that all the others had disappeared as well. He was alone.
He woke so bitterly disappointed that it was some time before he realised that his spine was aching. This was followed by the discovery that he had a spine, and a moment after that he realised that he had the usual four limbs again, and a nose and mouth and the rest of it. In the wan light of dawn, he saw that he was sprawled on top of his terrible soft mattress, human once more.
“Ayyaiyyo,” he said. “I wonder if I’m attracted to women again? There’s only one way to find out.”
Leaping up eagerly, he bent under the bed and pulled out the poster, his heart already thumping with excitement. And then, looking at it, he let out a hollow groan.
Sometime during the evening, he’d eaten most of it.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
One of the most interesting bits of news in the last few days seems to have been largely ignored by media obsessing over what some “celebrity” wore in a function or what a politician’s latest profundity on this or that might be.
Simply put, it was this: that there is, almost to a certainty, life on Mars. And this life was discovered as long ago as 1976; only nobody recognised the fact till now.
Think about that; 1976, when I was just starting school, the Vietnam War had been over only a year, a mulitlateral world order still existed, there was no such thing as a cell-phone or the internet, and the Viking rovers were digging into Martian soil. The scientists didn’t recognise it then, but the data didn’t vanish, and re-examination showed that there’s, apparently, a 99% chance that the Red Planet actually has life. In most statistical systems, a 99% chance is considered about as close to a sure thing as you can get.
In other words, there are almost certainly Martians, though they aren’t climbing into cylinders and blasting through space to land in your backyard and disgorge tripod fighting machines. Not yet, anyway.
These Martians are, if they exist, bacteria, or organisms analogous to bacteria. You know bacteria? Those tiny things somewhere between the worlds of the viruses and the earliest, smallest algae, which aren’t even eukaryotic in their cell structure? I mean those bacteria, or organisms equivalent to them.
This might not seem like a big deal. And, actually, it isn’t a big deal.
It is a humongous, a gigantic, a titanic deal.
From our viewpoint as self-appointed lords of the earth, bacteria aren’t significant. In reality, they are so significant that life as we know it would be impossible without them. Everything – but literally everything – that can be considered “life as we know it” ultimately depends on bacteria. (And a note here, referencing HG Wells’ The War Of The Worlds, in which the Martian invaders died off because Mars didn’t have bacteria and so they had no defences against them; that is simply not possible. Without bacteria, Wells’ Martians could never have existed, since all organic matter would have been locked up in corpses which could not decompose and release their nutrients to the environment. The first generation of complex life would have been the last. So there.) And there are, correspondingly, more bacteria than there are anything else. In terms of numbers, almost all life is bacteria. Such gigantic creatures as blue whales, humans or cockroaches are infinitesimal compared to them.
It’s not just that bacteria are somewhere else, either. A few days ago I’d written an article in which I pointed out, inter alia, that we humans have, on average, a hundred trillion bacteria in our bodies. When we’re looking in the mirror, we are viewing a composite organism, most of which is bacterial. We are part bacteria ourselves.
So, yes, bacteria on Mars are something of a gargantuan deal; but it’s more than just the fact that bacteria are important to life.
Mars, as you may know, isn’t exactly the canal-irrigated, hospitable world that nineteenth-century science fiction would have led us to expect. It is, in fact, a cold, extremely arid planet where there hasn’t been running water for billions of years, a planet with an atmosphere that isn’t exactly breathable by our standards – what little there is of it. Think of the moon with a thin wrapping of carbon dioxide, and you wouldn’t be all that far off.
And yet, Mars has, it seems, bacterial life. And I don’t mean possible fossils in an ancient meteor, though those are important enough; I mean actual, feeding, reproducing, bacterial life.
What does this mean? It means something extremely important, so important that we humans should stop murdering each other and think about the implications. And those implications are these:
Firstly, if Mars has life, active bacterial life, then we are not alone in this solar system, let alone the Universe. It doesn’t matter that this life is “just” bacterial life; its very existence immediately knocks humanity off its self-styled pedestal as the pinnacle of creation. All right, so it’s “only” bacteria; but, as I said, bacteria (or equivalents) are essential to the existence of any more organised life. If you don’t have bacteria, you have nothing. Ergo, if bacteria exist elsewhere, the fundamentals of life exist elsewhere. And that means...
...that, secondly, if bacteria can exist in an environment as inimical as Mars, then they can exist just about anywhere; in fact, we don’t have to depend on “goldilocks planets” to find life. If life can exist on Mars, then we can expect to find it almost anywhere, from the seas of Europa to the atmosphere of Jupiter, from the planets orbiting nearby stars to the gas clouds between the galaxies. It might well be that lifelessness is the exception.
Now think about that for a moment; not in scientific terms, but in philosophical.
Not so very long ago, the earth was a flat disc, around which the sun, moon, and entire cosmos revolved. It was the centre of all creation, the only favoured place of the gods, and, of course, the ruling species was the pinnacle of creation – so much so that the majority of religions ascribed to the gods the same physical characteristics as humanity. But time passed, and the earth – in spite of the efforts of the Catholic Church, which burned Giordano Bruno at the stake for stating that the sun was a star and other worlds could have life – shrank to a sphere orbiting the Sun, which briefly took its place as the centre of creation, before becoming an ordinary little star on a spiral arm of an ordinary galaxy in the seas of time and space; hardly a fleck in the heavens. And, simultaneously, that most favoured species of the gods became just another ape, the result of random mutations and evolutionary pressures; a creature which has existed for the blink of an eye, and might vanish tomorrow when circumstances change – as they will.
So now, when we suddenly have to consider the fact that we are definitely not the only place in the cosmos which has life, and we have to consider the possibility that the cosmos is teeming with life, what does that do to us, the former Centre of All Creation? We shrink to the position of, perhaps, a gnat, or worse. We are as nothing.
Can we – do you think human society, especially human society as regulated by absolutist Abrahamic religions, is ready to deal with that realisation? When you consider that the nation which arrogates to itself the right to rule this planet as its private domain, the nation which claims to be the fount of enlightenment and liberty, still can’t make its own citizens accept the fact that they are simply evolved apes, then what chance do you think this further realisation stands?
And this is why, I think, we aren’t going to hear much about the Martian bacteria; in fact, I’ll even say efforts to confirm their existence will be killed off by deliberate underfunding and suchlike underhanded tactics. Unless there’s a potential military or other profit-making applicability, the powers that be are scared of science. They absolutely do not wish to know. And if these bacteria are confirmed, you can bet the news will be carefully buried in other chatter.
Of course, that won’t stop the Martian bacteria from existing, just as the Creationists can’t erase evolution just by denying it. Even King Knut couldn’t turn back the tide.
But it’s a tragedy on a Cosmic scale that we allegedly rational creatures don’t take this opportunity to measure our own place in the wonder that is the Universe, and realise what a precious bubble of life we inhabit – this beautiful blue planet, where bacteria are just the foundations on which everything from elephants to earthworms, from earwigs to echidnas, have evolved. We should come together now, to preserve what we have. Unfortunately we just keep on destroying it.
Looking at it from the level of sustainability, then, the Martian bacteria may be the favoured ones.
Further Reading:
Kabul, 16th April 2012. Rueters. On the second day of massed attacks on diplomatic enclaves, military strongpoints and other targets across the embattled Afghan capital, NATO spokesmen said confidentially that these attacks prove the weakness and desperation of the Taliban.
"We've done the Taliban so much damage across the countryside", Brigadier General T A L Storie said, "that they have no other option but to assault the cities." As he spoke, plaster from explosions rained down from the ceiling.
"All the counter-Taliban fighting," he said, "is being conducted by our brave Afghan allies. It's absolutely not true that NATO is helping in any shape or form. If you don't believe me, go look out of this window, but don't blame me when your head gets shot off. What, nobody wants to do that? There you are, then.
“Under the glorious leadership of our Commander in Chief, President Obama,” Brigadier General Storie continued, ducking under the table as a rocket-propelled grenade exploded on the window sill, “the Taliban has been practically annihilated. Our troops will not only be able to conclude all their combat operations by 2014, but will then be able to remain forever in peaceful occu...I mean, in peaceful partnership with the Afghans to ensure the Taliban never return.”
To the questions of the assembled reporters, shouted over the sound of the barrage, the Brigadier continued, “Also, the Taliban are cowards. Cowardy-custard cowards. They don’t fight fair. That’s why they’re outside there shooting at us from close quarters. Otherwise they’d come out in the open so our brave boys could blow them away with drones and stealth bombers flying at stratospheric levels. Now that’s what I call a fair fight.”
As reports came in of further Taliban raids across the country, the Brigadier emerged momentarily from under his desk. “It’s absolutely not true that the Afghan security forces are riddled with Taliban,” he said. “All Afghans in the National Army and Police are absolutely loyal. Those cases where so-called Afghan soldiers and police have murdered their NATO overlords...I mean trainers...were, in every case, Iranian agents. We have proof of this, supplied to us by Israel.”
In response, the White House announced another 1234 sanctions on Iran, this time targeting olive oil vendors and cobblers, and announced that it would “understand” if Israel felt compelled to drop a billion tons of bombs on Gaza.
Meanwhile, the Taliban spokeman, Mullah Barakuddin, claimed that his organisation had launched a Spring Offensive designed to carry the war to the occupation forces. In response, President Obama proclaimed “Bring Them On!” and announced that he would launch another 5678 daily drone flights over Pakistan. These drone flights, he said, by expending large amounts of munitions, would also further speed up economic recovery in the United States.
“Anyone opposing the Commander in Chief’s decision,” a White House spokesperson declared on condition of anonymity, “is a traitor and a peacen...I mean, terrorist, and the Commander in Chief reserves the right to terminate such persons without trial, and their families as well. Remember Abdulrahman al-Awlaki.”
The Most Honourable Order of Obama Worshippers immediately nominated the President for further Nobel Prizes in Peace, Economics, Medicine and Chemistry. “If it were not for the unpatriotic refusal of the Physics Committee,” its spokesperson, Brownne Oser, said, “to consider the Commander in Chief for an award in that subject, we’d have nominated him for that as well.” A spokesperson for the Nobel Committee declined comment.
Just in: Taliban forces have overrun the office in which Brigadier General Storie was giving his briefing. Last heard, the gallant officer was shouting for the stampeding reporters to return, and insisting that the attacking insurgents did not actually exist.
"They're all dead," he shouted. "I tell you, they have all been killed!"
It is not known what happened afterwards, but presumably the dead Taliban ate his brains.
 | Pictured: Afghan soldiers shooting at nonexistent Taliban attackers
|
To The Defence Minister of India New Delhi.
Dear Defence Minister,
This is a confession.
I think I’ve been slightly harsh on the Indian defence industry. No, that’s too mild. I have been extremely harsh on the Indian defence industry.
I’ve slandered the lobbyists demanding a military-industrial complex, and I’ve been guilty of underestimating the immense boost that a defence industry would bring to the nation.
Let me, therefore, attempt a corrective. Better late than never, as they say.
Of course, it’s difficult to ignore the fact that the Indian defence industry isn’t actually geared up to producing top-of-the-line equipment yet; but, at the same time, one agrees that it needs to create something powerful and prestigious, pronto; something that will force the world to sit up and take notice, and revive the Indian peoples’ pride in their armed forces. At the same time, the government of the day – which means your government, Mr Defence Minister – should be able to take just pride in its accomplishment, so as to garner electoral gains. I mean, that’s only fair, isn’t it?
Now, what can a nation that hasn’t managed to manufacture a working fighter plane, intermediate jet trainer, aircraft carrier or tank after more than three decades of effort do that will make the world sit up and take notice? Let’s see...yes! I’ve got it!
India should build a battleship.
You know battleships: those immense mountains of floating steel, mounting turrets studded with gigantic artillery pieces, which can send huge capsules of metal and explosive soaring over tens of kilometres of ocean? You’ve heard of, say, the Bismarck or the Yamato, the Prince of Wales or the Missouri? You have? Yes, those are the kind of battleships I mean.
 | | Yamato |
Now let’s look at all the benefits building a battleship will bring.
First, of course, and most eye-catching of all, is the sexiness of battleships. I mean, just think of the name: battleship. As in, a ship meant for battle, and battle only. Who could ever accuse a battleship of pacifism? And who could ever call a government which launched a battleship of being weak-kneed on defence? If anyone dared say any such thing, the government would only have to point to the floating citadel with its turrets bristling with guns, and say, STFU. Possibly you are unfamiliar with that acronym, so let me translate, sir. It means Shut The Fuck Up. As in, shut your trap, traitor.
Talking about those guns I mentioned, just look at them. They’re so utterly phallic that they are an instant balm to the average Indian male mind, which is, let’s say, insecure about its masculinity and kind of obsessed over size. One good look at them and the collective masculinity of the nation will receive, um, a boost. All you have to do is arrange plenty of photos of those guns in the media. I’m sure they’d be happy to oblige.
 | | I mean, just look at them |
Then, and we should remember this well, there is the uniqueness of battleships. Other countries have tanks. Other countries have fighter planes and aircraft carriers. Even Pakistan has submarines. But nobody – nobody, sir – has battleships anymore. With your battleship roaming the seaways, you can proclaim that India is the only possessor of this technology in the world. Why, not even the Americans have it. If that doesn’t bring forth gasps of admiration from the public, your pet media aren’t doing their jobs.
Can you imagine the photo ops a battleship offers? Someone – it may be you, sir – standing on the bridge of the craft, beside an admiral or two, gazing sternly out at the ocean as those titanic guns blast out a broadside? Which political enemy dare mess with you then? And which admiral dare claim the navy’s being neglected? Why, you could even shell a coastal forest or two, and claim that you were bombarding Maoists, like those who abducted those Italian tourists recently. Who would do anything but praise you for your toughness and ruthlessness?
 | | Death to everyone |
Nobody.
And there are all the subsidiary benefits. Constructing a battleship will provide so many jobs, directly and indirectly – the dockyard workers and fitters to build it, the steel mills to supply the steel, the two or three thousand sailors the behemoth will require to maintain and operate it; can you imagine those grateful votes flooding your way? And there are the other benefits, too; with all the forty or fifty thousand tons of high-grade steel each battleship will require, you can justify strip-mining the forests for iron ore and for coal to smelt it; you can justify unleashing the army on the forest villagers, and lock up the environmentalists and human rights activists; and you can do it all in the name of national security.
Doesn’t that make you go weak in the knees with anticipation, Mr Defence Minister?
So, here’s anticipating the launch of the first ship, and please make sure it doesn’t sink on the spot.
That might be a little bit embarrassing.
Yours helpfully
Bill the Butcher.
From: The Dark Lord of the Universe To: His loyal Minion, Aged Nicholas.
Dear Old Nick,
I realise that this letter will not find you in an altogether happy mood, and I don’t mean it as an official reprimand; in fact I’d like this entire sorry episode to remain between us and go no further. I don’t want to demoralise you in any way or reduce your enthusiasm for future projects.
However, that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t discuss precisely what went wrong in Operation Lazarus, and why we’re going to have to start all over again from scratch. You realise that only if we discuss it step by step do we have a chance to identify the problem, and understand how to avoid them the next time around.
Let’s just go over the planning from the beginning, step by step, then, shall we?
I’ll admit right off that I have no memory at the moment of whether Operation Lazarus was your idea or mine; I don’t see that it matters. The fact is that we were agreed that something had to be done about that disgusting bipedal race of hairless apes before it laid further waste to the fair blue planet over which it had secured dominance. I remember both of us discussing options like provoking a nuclear war or something similar, but we both agreed that it ran the risk of destroying completely the utterly innocent non-hairless simian part of the planet’s biosphere. And so we had to drop that idea, though it would have been easy to carry out.
So we talked about other options, like introducing some kind of disease which would destroy the apes. However, and unfortunately, at least a few per cent of these creatures would have been certain to be immune to any disease we might try, and before you know it they’d be screwing their minds out in an effort to repopulate the planet; and going by their record, it’s tolerably certain they’d succeed. Besides, the germs might mutate enough to wipe out other, and innocent, primate life. So we junked that idea.
The same went for the other bright ideas we had, including meteor strikes, tsunamis, and random induced psychological aberrations. All were either not complete enough, or potentially destructive to innocent life, or both. I’ll admit to you now that I’d begun to despair of finding a way, and had almost gone back to the nuclear war option.
It was then that you, or I, had what I’ll still call, despite what happened, a brilliant idea: Operation Lazarus. After all, and it was apparent right off, the risen dead are a self-replicating weapon, and have the terrific advantage of not being amenable to destruction. In other words, they can be revived but not rekilled, and therefore they can destroy the simian societies from the inside out. And I’m sure you were the one who pointed out that since all simian societies have corpses, there would be none immune to the effects. Even those who escaped, not being immortal, would eventually die, and become one of Them.
How we chuckled and congratulated each other, as we visualised the contagion devastating the hives of the naked apes, wiping them out in ever greater numbers the more countermeasures they took! Do you remember us discussing the fact that the more of the revived dead the apes attempted to kill, the more collateral damage they’d inflict on themselves, and the more dead they’d create? Unlike the crippled “zombies” the apes described in their popular entertainment, which could be dispatched by simply damaging their craniums, our subjects, once risen, would be utterly indestructible. Nothing could stop them, and they’d spread across countries and continents until the last living simian was gone from the earth.
Yes, it was a brilliant plan, Nick. I fully and absolutely admit that. It was a plan that deserved to succeed.
Of course, it proved more difficult in the execution than in the conception. I’m sure you remember how disappointed we both were when we discovered that it would be utterly impossible to begin the mass revival in multiple places that we’d planned. The energy involved in reviving even one corpse, we found, would require the annihilation of a couple of minor suns; and though we found a couple which would serve and whose destruction wouldn’t harm any life forms, more than that we could not manage, given the absolute imperative of maintaining the Prime Directive.
So, Nick, we had to settle for reviving just one dead ape, and relying on it to infect enough others to set off the Operation. Even so, as our calculations showed, if our Specimen Zero (as we called it) managed to infect just three or four of its fellow apes, and they infected a similar number each, the effects would spread so exponentially that in a month at the utmost, barring a closed simian society or two, it would have covered the planet. And those societies would succumb eventually, because nothing is ever completely sealed off.
Yes, even there, we were completely correct. I don’t see any problem with the planning even till that point.
Of course, the next logical problem was to pick a Specimen Zero. Perhaps, I suggested, we should choose a juvenile or a child, since the simians would have a natural affinity for these immature individuals and might allow one to get in close more easily. But you pointed out that these juveniles would be weak and slow compared to adult simians and therefore relatively easy to avoid. Similarly, we rejected the aged; they were too slow and doddery for our purposes.
For a while we discussed the merits of using an ordinary ape, like a housewife or a teacher. Being innocuous, it would be relatively easy for them to get closer to their targets. At first, the idea looked like a good one, and you remember that we almost decided on it. But then we ran a few tests, and found that they had a signal flaw: the kind of ape which would remain a housewife or a teacher would also have low aggression levels and therefore anyone it affected would contract the same low-virulence form of the infection. In other words, the housewife or teacher wouldn’t be ideal for the job.
It was at that point that we had the idea of reviving a warrior.
Even now, Nick, I’ll admit that it was a good idea. No, I’ll go further: it was a great idea, comparable to the notion of Operation Lazarus itself. Why, a warrior would be already trained and inclined to violence; it would have no inhibitions against dealing out devastation. And if we only picked the right kind of warrior, the sort which was so indoctrinated to aggression that it had no regard for its own existence, we might have the ultimate weapon we needed. Unleash such a Specimen Zero on the world, and nothing, but nothing, could come in the way of success.
Oh yes, Nick, I thought it was in the bag then. I was so confident that it was in the bag that it was without a second thought that I signed the order delegating to you the authority to carry out the Operation itself.
And, Nick, that was my mistake; I shouldn’t have left it to you. I did it because you begged and pleaded for the responsibility, and because I have so many other things on my plate, but still, I admit my error: I should not have left it to you.
Oh yes, I don’t doubt that you did all that you were supposed to. You did blow up those two little stars quite efficiently, and you channelled the energy to your chosen Specimen Zero extremely well. You handled the revival exactly as you should have. I’ve got no quarrel with you at all on that point; I couldn’t have done better myself.
No, it’s with your choice of Specimen Zero that I disagree. It’s the single reason that Operation Lazarus failed, despite all our planning and effort. Even there, I agree with your contention that you picked a Specimen Zero who was a warrior indoctrinated to aggression and uncaring of self-preservation. And you certainly did revive him, and very successfully. Nobody’s denying you credit for any of that.
But, Nick, tell me this:
Having concentrated all your undoubted talent and resources, all your vast intellect, on the task, couldn’t you have found a better subject for revival than a kamikaze pilot in a wrecked plane lying at the bottom of the sea?
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
“You know,” D says, leaning against the wall, “you’d be perfect for a Roman slave market.”
The young man he calls X looks up from his book and smiles uncertainly. “What do you mean?”
“Just look at you.” D waves a hand. “Those cannonball shoulders of yours, those bulging biceps, that washboard stomach. I can imagine you, naked and oiled on the auctioneer’s block. Those Romans would’ve salivated over you. I can see the bidding reaching record levels.”
X shrugs. “Not exactly something I’d find flattering, I think.”
D laughs. “That’s just the start. Then the buyer would have you trained as, let’s see, a gladiator. Train you to become a perfect killing machine, give you a sword and shield, and put you in armour with one of those helmets with holes to see through. And then you’d be in the arena, Romans cheering, blood on the sand. Ave Caesar, morituri te salutant, you know, though I think they never actually said that. When I think of how that would be, the crowds baying for the kill and you winning the victor’s laurels, well, it seems the perfect setting.“
“The perfect setting for what, precisely?’
“Huh, I don’t know. Scaling the heights of glory, maybe? All those maidens swooning at your feet. The world would be your oyster, as long as you kept winning.”
X shuts hid book and puts it down on the table. “What set this off, exactly?”
D sighs and pushes himself away from the wall. “I don’t know. Just, maybe, thinking this is too good to last. You’re young, you’re handsome, you’re bright and personable. You have a future. Whereas I’m a washed-up old man past his prime and getting wrinkled and flabby.”
“Oh come on,” X says. “You’re not old, or past your prime. And I love you.”
D nods and sits on the edge of the bed. “I know. At least I tell myself I know. But I look at myself in the mirror, and I know what I’ve lost.” He laughs suddenly. “At least you’re still with me, despite everything. That’s something.”
“Did you really think I wouldn’t be?” X sits down next to D and puts his arm around his shoulder. “What’s bothering you, really? Is it something I did?”
“No, no. Why should it be? But I do feel I’m keeping you from finding someone else, someone more your age and interests. I mean, I can’t really be very interesting to you, if you really get down to it. I don’t know anything about what young people like these days. You and I don’t watch the same movies or share a taste in music. We don’t even,” he adds, pointing at the book, which has a bloodstained dagger on the cover, “read the same books.”
“There’s more to love than just that, isn’t there?” X says. “Why don’t you ask what I see in you?”
D chuckles suddenly. “Maybe I’m afraid you’re going to say a father figure.”
“Father figure? No. You know what my dad said when he found out I was gay?”
D turns to look at X, who keeps his eyes fixed on the floor. “No. What did he say? I didn’t want to ask, really. It’s usually a pretty personal thing, isn’t it?”
“Well, yes. I didn’t actually want to tell him. But I was in my first serious relationship then – and the guy made it a condition to stick with me, that I come out officially.” X swallows, his prominent larynx bobbing. “I wasn’t really sure then, you know? I thought I was still experimenting, and I wanted to be sure. But it was either come out, or break with him. So I came out.”
“Um. And what did dad say?” D has seen pictures of X’s father in the newspapers, giving speeches and inaugurating projects. “Forget it. I can guess what he said.”
“Yeah, it was like what you’d think. For a week I didn’t go home. Slept in friends’ houses and so on. One night I slept on a bench in the park.” X looks intensely unhappy. “My mother gave in after that, but I had to keep out of my dad’s way, fade into the background. By the time I moved out for good, it was a relief for all of us.”
“And what about the guy? The one you were in a relationship with? Didn’t he ask you to move in with him or something?”
“Oh yeah. Him. The moment he found out I’d actually burned my bridges, as it were, he began backpedalling as fast as he could. I think the whole thing was only a power trip for him, to show what he could make me do.” X sighs. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t really be saying all this, right? I mean he’s not here to defend himself.”
“Does it matter? If you talk about it you get it out of your system.” D gets up and fetches two tall glasses of chilled orange juice from the kitchen; he does not permit alcohol in the house, hasn’t drunk any for many years. “And you haven’t been back home since, of course.”
X wipes the outside of the glass with his handkerchief, blotting away the condensation. “Of course. And after that I went through a phase when I pretty much slept with anyone who came along. I think they have some kind of psychological term for that kind of behaviour, but I don’t know it.”
“Yes, I can see that you were fighting your own identity battle.” D sips at his juice. “Did you win it?”
“Who knows? I don’t think I’m bi, if that’s what you’re getting at. But does it matter? I’m not looking elsewhere, nor do I have any desire to. And I don’t look to you as a father figure. It was the happiest day of my life when I met you, simply because you were so different from all of them.”
“Really? Thanks. I mean that seriously.”
“There’s something I’d like to ask too.” X pauses. “Was it difficult for you in the beginning?”
D shrugs. “It depends on what you call difficult. I didn’t have problems with my parents but I think they knew already. Besides, they were the self-conscious liberal type; they’d hide their actual feelings even from themselves to fit into their liberal ethic. You know the type of person I’m talking about?
“The real problem began with the AIDS thing. Suddenly you didn’t know who had it, or if you’d got it and didn’t know. I knew people who had it, and I’d slept with a couple of them, too. For a while I was too scared to go for a test. And of course there were all those people saying gay people deserved it because of their unnatural lifestyles. I suppose they didn’t want to know it happened to heteros too.”
“So that was your own battle? You faced it alone.”
“Yes.” D laughs shortly. “I used to lie awake at night in the dark, looking up at the ceiling, trying to face the possibility that I had it. It was like facing my fear in the arena, with my life in the balance; quite like a gladiator, actually. If you lost, you died. I only went in for the test when people I knew began actually dying from it. Not just falling sick, you understand; literally dying. Finally, oddly enough, it was a female friend who forced me to go in for it. She went with me to the clinic and took the test herself, as well. Just so, you know, nobody would think I was gay.”
“Um, well.” The glasses are empty, and X takes them away to the kitchen. When he returns after rinsing them, D is leafing through the book with the dagger on the cover. “That’s really rather trash, you know,” he says.
D looks up, grinning. “Yes, that’s what I was thinking. And maybe I should read a little trash once in a while. So what are you doing this evening? Going out?”
“No. I think I’d rather stay with you.” X shakes his head. “Too much trash outside.”
“Don’t I know it,” D says, putting down the book, “When you look back at it, we did win our gladiatorial fights so far, didn’t we? You and I, both. We’ve won each fight so far.”
“And each fight could be the last, so we’ve got to keep winning? Is that what you mean?”
“Something like that, kiddo. We can’t afford defeats, not a single one. Ever. You’re learning fast.”
“I love you,” X says. “You know that, don’t you?”
“I know,” D says, and believes it. “I know.”
Challenge No 108, Real Writers Group
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
You are a metropolis.
On your eyelashes, creatures crawl, tiny eyeless mites with stubby legs and translucent bodies; creatures which are born, live and die in the follicles of those hairs on your eyelids.
 | | Yes. I am talking about this. |
They eat a little of the oil your sebaceous glands produce, and they have such efficient digestive systems that they don’t defecate at all (in case you’re wondering whether mite faeces is oozing down your lashes as you read this, no, it isn’t).
Your mouth is a teeming wilderness, populated by millions of flora and fauna, including a substantial portion of the hundred trillion bacteria which inhabit your body. Bacterial colonies stick to the top of your tongue in mats and sheets, and swim through the mucoprotein layer covering your teeth and membranes. Protozoa of the Entamoeba group crawl around your gingival crevices and you swap them around with your significant other with every deep kiss.
 | | Feel like snogging now? |
A few of these creatures are harmful, stowaways with an agenda as it were; a much larger majority are, under normal circumstances, passengers in your mouth, eating dead cells, food particles and generally doing you no harm and possibly – by occupying space that would otherwise be taken up by the harmful ones – doing you some incidental good.
Then, let’s take a look inside your intestines. Even if you aren’t among those who harbour cute little parasitic worms (or, for tapeworm hosts, cute big parasitic worms), your intestines are full of tiny creatures hopping, skipping and jumping around, from bacteria to yeasts. It’s more than a rain forest in there in terms of the richness of life, more than a coral reef. And you cannot survive without those microorganisms. You are dependent on them to keep you alive. For one thing, some of them break down cellulose in the plant matter you eat, thus liberating the interior of the cells to your digestive juices. For another, they, even those whose only purpose of existence is to nibble fastidiously at fragments of your forming faeces, aggressively block out the others – the millions upon millions of less than pleasant microorganisms you swallow each day.
 | | I have a gut feeling about this. |
Want to know what would happen if those microorganisms all vanished from your gut? Have you ever had a course of antibiotics and suffered the side-effect of diarrhoea? Yes? Well, that’s because the antibiotics have waged indiscriminate chemical warfare on the forests and jungles inside you, like a kind of Agent Orange in your inner Vietnam. And until the survivors grow back to fill the empty spaces, undigested food flows through you like...well, like undigested food flowing through you. Now imagine that going on all the time, and worse; imagine all these microbes vanishing. Will the space they vacate, all that lovely real estate, remain empty? Of course not; it will be flooded by invaders, murderous marauders from the outer light, whose only purpose is to consume and destroy.
Consume and destroy you, that is.
But such a marvel is evolution that it fills every nook and cranny, quite literally, with life, and seeks out, always, to fill it with viable life. That is why the passengers on your body block the enemy without; they want to keep living, and it's in their interests that you keep living. They've evolved to help keep you alive, just as you've evolved to tolerate their presence in your body.
You are a metropolis, larger by far than any the mere human race has ever built, and your countless citizens are keeping you a living city, simply by going about their daily business. You are a city that never sleeps, that never can. So look in a mirror, and call yourself we.
And tonight, as you lie down to put your conscious brain to rest, remember those mites crawling demurely along your eyelashes, eating, meeting, breeding, and otherwise leading their own doubtless meaning-filled lives. Remember the teeming millions of your passengers, who aren’t even aware that you exist as a living entity, and yet for whom you are a universe. Think of them a little.
Pleasant dreams.
| Tell Me | Apr 10, '12 12:19 AM
for everyone |
You are the Chosen, you have Dominion Over bird and beast and the fowl of the air You have Dominion over your brother.
You are the Chosen. You have divine sanction You have Manifest Destiny; and you have fulfilled it. Oh, how you have fulfilled it.
You can’t create, but you can destroy, you can kill The leaf trembling with dew, you can poison The mountain stream glittering in the sunshine
You can destroy the ancient cities sleeping in the evening sun. You can burn forests down to ash, you can break the mountains down You can devastate them all. You have Dominion.
With your guns and your bombs, your drones flying overhead Your machines that rip the heart out of the earth Your factories that belch poison in the name of profit
You can kill, you can destroy, you can rule what’s left And talk about Freedom and Democracy For you are Chosen, you have Dominion.
Which is to say, you rule over the crust Of a ball of rock, and the shell of air around it. Nothing more.
You do not rule over the moon, the planets, the sun, The myriad of galaxies, the expanding Universe. You have no control over Time and Space
And in the scheme of things, you are nothing. You are less than nothing, An eyeblink, and you’re gone, you’re Less than a meteor flashing in the night.
Tell me:
What of your frontiers, your Eternal Borders Which you say will last forever and a day What will happen to them as continents move When the oceans rise and mountains fall?
Tell me:
In five billion years hence When the sun is a red giant, swollen red ball of helium fire Earth burned to a cinder, the oceans dry, the air all gone Where will you be? Can you turn the tide of entropy?
Tell me:
When the wheel of Time turns, and with it all of eternity Where will be your Dominion then, your Freedom and Democracy Where will be your Holy Profit, your One True God, What will you do with your Eternal Wars?
Tell me
What will be left of you
After Dominion.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
Many years ago, while in college in Lucknow, I watched a street play. It was put on by students from a college in Bihar, and was performed in Bhojpuri, a language which I can’t speak but can understand owing to its similarity to Hindi. It was about Indian politics, where oily, slimy politicians came around begging for votes during the election, and afterwards expended a lot of hot air in political debate while doing nothing. And when the people rose up in anger, the so-called political opponents instantly joined hands against them.
I remember this play more and more often these days, almost twenty years after I saw it performed, because it depicts so wonderfully all that is wrong with India’s political system and its so-called “democracy”. I don’t actually call it a democracy, hence the quotes; for want of a better word, I’ll refer to it, in the course of this article, as an “electionocracy”.
Let me explain what I mean.
A democracy, by definition, is rule by the people, through their elected representatives, and for the people. So, we have two distinct conditions necessary for democracy to exist: the choosing of representatives by the people through open, free and fair elections, and followed by these elected representatives ruling in accordance with the wishes (and, one assumes, in the best interests) of the people who voted for them.
If either of these two factors is missing, therefore, democracy, by definition, ceases to exist.
So let’s see how it stacks up in this country:
First, we have the actual process of standing for election. By definition, an electorate should be free to choose whomsoever it wishes, and therefore anyone who chooses should be able to stand for election on an equal level. But does that actually work that way?
Of course not.
One of the positive things about the Indian electoral system is that it isn’t, as yet at least, a two-party toss of the coin where one is compelled to choose what one believes to be the lesser of two evils. However, it is mostly a (rather loose) two-alliance system, and though there are some other parties around, they are marginal at best. One can, actually, stand for election as an independent, but one’s chances of winning an election as one are slim.
Actually, the system works hard at discouraging “independent” candidates, on the plea that they aren’t serious. As of now there’s no law banning independents from standing for election, but the regulations for submitting their candidature have been made so rigorous that it’s rather difficult to stand as one unless you have the covert backing of one or other of the parties.
Why would a political party covertly back a candidate standing against it, anyway?
To understand that, you have to comprehend the simple fact that Indian society is ultra-heterogeneous. There isn’t space in this article to discuss the role of caste and religion in India; let’s just say that the political system treats voters as monolithic voter blocs, called “vote banks”, almost entirely on the basis of caste, religion or (where applicable) tribe. The idea is that, overall, people will vote according to their castes, tribes or religion and not on the basis of the party or candidate. As they say, Indians “don’t cast their vote, they vote their caste”. So if your candidate is of one caste, and your opponent is of another, if you quietly introduce an independent candidate belonging to the same caste as your opponent into the race, that might take away some of his votes. These candidates are known as “dummies” and some of them appear on the lists of every election for decades on end, without ever coming close to winning.
So, the space for true independent candidature is thin at best, and shrinking steadily. I don’t think I’m wrong in stating that even in a multi-party system, if one has to submit to the ideology (and more of that in a moment) of one of the established parties in order to be a candidate, the electorate isn’t being allowed an open choice. That’s one thing.
Then, there’s the fact of money-power. More and more often, in Indian politics, candidates are big businessmen who are specifically chosen as candidates by parties on the basis of the amount of money they can spend on their election. The Election Commission of India, an independent and largely efficient and fair body, imposes restrictions on the amount a candidate can officially spend, but funds sourced from the parent party can be traced. Private funds, of course, cannot.
And this, logically, leads to a situation where a rich candidate is already far ahead in the race compared to one of more modest means; hardly a situation unique to India, but hardly democratic in any sense either. Rule by the rich is called plutocracy, not democracy.
But then even in the established parties, not just anyone can stand for election. The parties nominate people not on the basis of merit, but on far more questionable grounds. One of the biggest problems is that, except for the far left and some (but not all) of the parties of the far right, all Indian political parties are family-owned private firms. They have no real ideology but the interests of the party’s ruling dynasty, and the internal structure of the party is entirely feudal. In these parties, being given the nomination for an election therefore depends on (i) having brown-nosed the ruling dynasty enough to be in its good graces, (ii) being of the right caste or religion and (iii) having adequate disposable funds to be able to “invest” them in the electoral process.
There have been demands – many demands – in the recent past to provide the voters with a “none of the above” option in the vote, but this is something the parties are united in opposing. I’ll stick my neck out and say that they are afraid of this option because that would show the world how little actual legitimacy their candidates have.
In fact, there was an unofficial way to reject candidates when we used to use paper ballots. One could stamp an invalid vote by marking the paper in multiple places or in the wrong place. But now, with an electronic voting machine, one can’t even do that. One’s options, if one wishes to register protest, are either not to vote at all or – and this is what I do – vote for someone one knows is sure to lose.
Therefore, one cannot choose candidates on the basis of free choice, and therefore the election system in India is not democratic.
The first of the two pillars of democracy, therefore, is already defunct.
Now let’s look at the second of the two points I mentioned above. Do these elected representatives work for the people?
As I already mentioned, the basic fact of Indian politics is feudal fealty to political dynasties; ideology not being a factor (except in the really, really far left and the equally really, really far right) the parties don’t feel any particular reason to do either of two things:
They don’t feel any need to fulfil the pledges they made when standing for election, because those were just a way of getting to power. I realise that hardly any party worldwide fulfils its promises once elected, but these don’t even try. Once in power, alleged “ideological enemies” from across the spectrum will quickly join in coalitions whose incompetence is equalled only by their rapacity and corruption; the current coalition (mis)governing the nation is a classic case.
Then, since ideology is not a factor, there’s really little or no difference between parties. Thus, in order to win elections, they’re willing to do anything – not “almost” anything, but literally anything – to get the votes. One of these things the parties do is to develop their own private armies of criminals, strong-arm enforcers and goons whose function is precisely the same as that of the SA in the early stages of Hitler’s Germany.
Recently, there was an election in India’s most populous state, Uttar Pradesh, whose capital is Lucknow – the same place where I watched the street play I’ve mentioned. In this election, there were four major competing forces. One was the chief minister of the state, Mayawati, a megalomaniac whose primary activity in the last five years when she held power was to put up statues of herself and get weighed against monetary “gifts” from her “admirers”. Another was the “socialist” party of the former chief minister, Mulayam Singh Yadav, now represented by his son Avishek. The third was the Congress, whose chief campaigner was the nation’s Crown Prince-designate, Rahul Gandhi. And the fourth was the Hindunazi party, the BJP. All these four were contending against each other, and Avishek Yadav’s Samajwadi (“Socialist”) Party won a complete majority, more because people were sick of Mayawati than anything.
Now, what happened was that the Congress, which had been wiped out in the election (it won only 28 seats) immediately set out to co-opt Avishek Yadav; and Yadav himself said he’d rein in his goons. But the goons were already running amok, and still are. After five years of being out of power, the Samajwadi Party is in a hurry to get into the profit making game.
Similarly, three years ago, the so-called "Communist" government of the state of West Bengal (comprising a coalition led by the Communist Party of India [Marxist], one of the two major Indian self-styled "communist" parties) took agricultural land at gunpoint from farmers to hand over to a notorious right-wing capitalist baron, well known to be extremely close to Hindunazi parties, in order to set up a car plant. It was certainly not due to the so-called "communists" in power that the deal ultimately fell through; it was due to a violent revolution on the ground. The "communists" were voted out of power last year, but the new "centrist" government of the state (led by another female megalomaniac, Mamata Bannerjee) has already proved itself even worse.
A choice that makes no difference is the same as no choice at all.
Therefore, the second of the two pillars of democracy also fails, and unless the mere holding of elections counts as democracy, India isn’t a democracy but an “electionocracy”.
But let’s look further at the actual effect this “electionocracy” has had on India; has it been of any real use?
I remember this incident some time ago when an official said, talking about the high incidence of illiteracy even now amongst Indian children, “But we can’t force parents to send their kids to school; after all we are a democracy.”
It’s exactly this kind of mind-numbing stupidity that is so characteristic of India’s electionocracy; where “democracy” is turned into an excuse not to do things, where it’s, in fact, turned into a millstone around the nation’s collective neck. Then there is the pandering to “vote banks” (the caste/religion based voter blocs I mentioned a while ago in this article). That pandering, of course, leads to rampant tokenism like making some caste leader’s birthday a holiday, or building a temple somewhere; utterly empty gestures void of meaning, gestures which detract attention from real problems which need actual solutions.
Supportive evidence comes from the fact that Indian courts are becoming more proactive, issuing orders that clearly intrude into the executive field and is therefore out of their purview; but these orders have widespread public support, simply because people feel the politicians aren’t doing what they’re supposed to do, so the judges have to.
I’ll once again stick out my neck and say that, going by the actual experience of Indian politics, this nation is incapable of a true democratic system. I’ll even go so far as to make a generalisation: true democracy can only work in nations with relatively small, homogeneous populations with roughly equal income levels. That is to say, only among peers can there be democracy.
Now, India is anything but a nation of peers; the inequalities are staggering and growing literally by the day. Anyone who’s been reading me regularly will be aware that the so-called “economic miracle” is a lot of hot air; it’s just “empty growth” without real income level rise, and India’s Human Development Index remains amongst the worst in the world. It is also a nation so ethnically diverse that it’s not so much a country as a confederation of nationalities which exists as a political unit only as a result of two centuries of British colonial rule. Even formerly homogeneous societies, like tribes where most property was held in common, are now socially layered with deep inequities and intense resentment.
Also, for democracy to work, one needs a level of knowledge among voters; they need to be informed, in order to make a choice. That’s why it’s called an informed choice. But that, equally, means the voters have to be educated. I don’t mean handed out degrees, but made politically aware. However, that is not happening in India. Education, here, falls into two distinct sub-categories: the poor people in the villages have a completely dysfunctional system with schools that exist on paper and “literacy” where the child can barely write its own name; and the college graduate whose education is so compartmentalised that he or she knows a lot about one subject and absolutely nothing about anything else. Such people aren’t informed; they are as ignorant of facts outside their immediate training as the illiterate villager, and maybe more so. These are the stalwarts of the Great Indian Muddle Class who revel in their own ignorance and actually reject knowledge; they literally do not want to know.
Add to that electronic and print media which have sold their souls completely to money power and openly back particular political parties, which means that the “information” they disseminate is indistinguishable from propaganda, and there’s little hope to be found there, either.
In such a situation, democracy on any level is simply not possible.
I know that at this point the question a discerning reader will ask is, “What then? What system do you think will suit this country? Do you advocate a military dictatorship?”
Frankly, while I have nothing per se against a military dictatorship – it can’t be worse than an electionocracy – going by the type of generals we have in our army, about whom I’ve written earlier[1][2], and going by the type of generals who have ruled Indian-offshoots Pakistan and Bangladesh, they won’t be any better than the politicians. Not worse, for sure, but not better.
In any case, unfortunately, I have no solution to offer. What I do have is a prognostication I made a couple of years ago, in an essay titled Thoughts On An Indian Revolution:[3]
...(A)s every single Indian knows, all that Indian “democracy” really means is holding elections, said elections being meant only for one purpose: to decide who is going to loot the nation until the next election comes along...elections in India are now an exercise in cynicism, no more.
Food riots... are only a matter of time. Crime levels will certainly escalate. Water and power supply will continue to be worse than poor. People will increasingly look for someone to blame.
At first, the blame will go to the migrant, whether from the villages or from other cities…We’ve already seen this in many parts of the country.
When this happens, the villages might well retaliate by blockading the cities, and cutting off food supplies, railways and roads.
The next stage... will come with the creation of virtual city states, each zealously protecting itself against theft of its food, water and electricity by others. Once this happens, de facto balkanization is only a matter of time, with each of these ministates forming its own economic policies and its own understandings with the hinterland. And once that stage is reached, the fiction of India will fully be exposed.
I can’t predict what will happen after that, whether the Maoists will roll over the country (chances slim) or, as is much more likely, the nation will dissolve in anarchy and random violence. But at the end of it, this old order will go. India, as it now is, is doomed, and there’s nothing this feudal system can do to stop it.
Today, more than ever, what I wrote then stands true.
Sources:
And on the one thousand and fourth night, Shahrazad said:
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THE STORY OF THE GREEN BIRD
In the days when the Khalifa Harūn al Rashīd ruled in Baghdad, there was a rumour that swept from the souks to the slums and even reached the palaces of the mighty. At first few believed, and then a few more, until virtually everyone who heard it had no doubt of its veracity; and in course of time it reached the august ear of the Commander of the Faithful himself.
This was the rumour; that, somewhere in the city, there was a slave so beautiful and accomplished, so intelligent and exemplary in all respects, that her master dare not show her in public, lest he draw upon himself the envious attention of the nobles and other powerful people. It was even rumoured that the owner was afraid that his slave might be so coveted by the Khalifa himself, and the only way of keeping her safe was to hide her away from sight.
When the Khalifa heard the rumour, he flew into a rage and summoned his famous wāzir, Jafar al Barmaki. “Dog of a wāzir,” he thundered, “what is this I hear, that my own subjects are so unsure of me that they fear for their possessions and their slaves? Is this how I am regarded by my people?”
“Commander of the Faithful,” Jafar answered, “I can only answer that I have no information on anyone who is so fearful of you. My spies tell me only that the people, in all their joys and sorrows, look up to you as a child to its father.”
The flattering words, however, did not mollify the irate Khalifa. “If that is so,” he said, “your spies are neither efficient nor truthful. Find out where this man lives, who has a slave so beautiful that he must needs hide her from my sight, lest I be tempted into taking her from him.”
“I hear and obey, Commander of the Faithful,” Jafar replied formally. “If this person exists, we will find him; but, I must ask you to tell me your wishes about what we must do when we have him. Should we have him brought before you, and the slave too?”
“No,” said the Khalifa, after a little thought. “Find him, but let him not know he has been found. And when we have found him, you and I will pay him a visit in secret. But remember,” he added, “find him, or you shall answer with your head.”
So Jafar went away to consult with his spies, and they brought to him all the rumours they had heard about this wonderful slave; but there was nothing in them which would help the wāzir find his quarry. The spy was rumoured to be in the east of the city, and on the west, living in splendour or in the poorest of houses. Some of the spies had heard that she moved from one part of the city to another regularly to keep her away from the eyes of the authorities. Others had been told she was confined only within a few rooms and a tiny courtyard where none but her master could ever see her. Nobody had seen her, or met anyone who had actually seen her, so nobody could say what she looked like. The only point in common was that everyone agreed that she could sing with a voice as sweet as any perī, and could play the lyre well enough to make Allah’s angels weep.
So, Jafar al Barmaki ordered his spies to listen for the sound of singing accompanied by the lyre, so sweet that they had never heard such music before. Each night the spies wandered the streets and souks, listening, and though they heard much sweet music and much superb singing, they never came across anything that might have been the talents of that mysterious girl.
At last, after some weeks had passed, and his spies had not found a clue, the wāzir Jafar al Barmaki decided to join in the hunt himself. Donning the clothes of an elderly dervish, he took to the streets, wandering down alleys and knocking on doors asking for alms. Some alms he did get, and some abuse besides, for not all the subjects of the Khalifa were as faithful to the commandment of the Prophet (on whom be peace) to give in charity to the needy as they should have been. But little by little, as the days passed, he grew familiar to the people and they scarcely noticed his presence.
Then, one dark evening as he was passing through a lane in one of the poorer quarters of town, full of old houses that had seen better days, he suddenly paused. He had heard a snatch of music, and though it was faint and far away, he was convinced that even in the pavilions of the Commander of the Faithful’s palace there was not a musician who could play the lyre with such delicacy.
And as he stood listening, the music of the distant lyre came again, accompanied by a voice, and such a voice as the world had never before heard, a voice that could melt the stone from around a Jinn’s heart, singing of loneliness and longing for a home that lay far, far away. The music and song were very faint and only came intermittently, borne on the wind; so that it took a very long time before the wāzir finally managed to discern the house from which the music came. It was already late, and the street was dark, and no detail of the house was visible; so Jafar, who was not lacking in resourcefulness, marked its doorstep with a small piece of coal, and went home. Very early the next morning, he returned and, having identified the house from the marking, carefully rubbed it out so as not to alert the occupants that something was amiss. Then he went to the Khalifa.
That day the Khalifa was in a good mood, and he was even happier when he heard from the wāzir that the house in which the slave lived had been identified. “Tonight,” he said, “we will go there in disguise, and we shall see what we shall see.”
So that night, after the evening prayers, the Khalifa and the wāzir dressed themselves in the disguise of Persian merchants of the less prosperous sort, and set off through the city until they reached the house. As they came, they could hear the faint sound of music and singing, and even though it was far off and unclear, the Commander of the Faithful stood as one struck to the heart as he listened.
“Surely,” he said at last, when the music faded, “it can only have been the slave herself who could have produced such wonderful strains and accompanied it so beautifully. Come, Jafar, let us now go to the house and beg for admission, for I am determined to know more of this woman, and learn if her other accomplishments match her singing and ability to play the lyre.”
So saying, he walked up to the door and knocked on it awhile, first gently and then with mounting impatience; and at long last it creaked slowly open and an elderly man peered out.
“I am sorry to trouble you, my grandfather,” Jafar said, mimicking the atrocious accent Persians use when speaking our beautiful Arabic. “We are foreign merchants, lost in your city. We carry gold on our persons, and, being afraid of robbers and thieves, we beg shelter for the night.”
Blinking slowly, the elderly man stepped aside and motioned them to enter. “You are in the City of Peace, Baghdad,” he said. “Here, under the benign rule of the Commander of the Faithful, there are no robbers or thieves. But never let it be said that I turned away fellow Mussālmans in need, even if they be strangers and Persians.”
“We thank you, my grandfather,” Jafar replied, and he and the Khalifa followed the elderly man to a room which was furnished with a plain carpet on the floor and large bolsters set against the walls. From the centre of the ceiling hung a large cage made of silver, and in it was a green bird, much like a parrot, which watched them with glittering eyes. Apart from calligrapher’s brushes and inks in one corner, there was nothing else.
“Sit down,” said the elderly man, and brought them water to wash their hands, and after that tall cool glasses of sherbet and a bowl of fruit. There was no sign of any woman in the house that they could see, nor could they hear the faintest musical note.
“Do you live alone here, grandfather?” the Khalifa asked, finally, unable to restrain himself. “It would seem a hard life for someone of your venerable years.”
“Ah, my friends,” the elderly man sighed. “I am not as old as you think. It is my sorrows which have aged me. Once, I was a man of consequence, who had thriving business. Now, you find me in sadly reduced circumstances, eking out a living by calligraphy. But circumstances were such as to leave me no other recourse.”
“Will you not tell us of it, grandfather?” the wāzir asked. “For a sorrow shared is a sorrow halved, so they say.”
*****************************
So saying, Shahrazad fell silent; and, when Dunyazad asked what had happened next, she said:
“It grows late, little sister, and it would be better, if this gracious sovereign saw fit to spare my life, to continue this tale tomorrow, for there is much to tell.”
So the King Shahryar thought that it would be better to wait till the morrow to hear more of the marvellous story; and, in the morning, he went about his daily work in his royal court, honouring some, debasing others, hearing petitions and righting injustice, until the close of day.
And on the one thousand and fifth night, Shahrazad said:
********************************
“Ah, my friends,” the elderly man said, “since you are foreigners and will be gone on the morrow, I shall tell you my tale. But understand that it is such a story that, if it were written with a needle on the corner of an eye, it would still provide a lesson to the circumspect.”
THE ELDERLY MAN’S TALE
Know then, my friends, that I was once a prosperous merchant in Basra, and had ships of my own, in which I would sail to far lands, where I would trade for the goods available there. I had spent many decades at the profession, and had done well for myself, for I had mansions and gardens in that fair port city, and slaves, and gold enough to last me till the end of my days. I had no family, though; and it came to me in time that I should marry and leave an heir to carry on my line and my business after I was gone.
But I had already passed, by then, the flush of youth, and had attained the steepening slopes of middle age. I knew it would not be so easy to find a bride among the maidens of my city, and that any who chose to marry me might be attracted more to my fortune than my person.
So I resolved that on my next journey to distant lands, I should find a woman who might love me for who I am, for in those distant countries people are not judged merely by their age, appearance and wealth, but for knowledge and wisdom. And so, at the head of my fleet of forty ships, I started out on a voyage that I intended to last fully two summers and winters, visiting all the lands between Basra and the end of the world; and in charge of my business I left a trusted clerk called Abdullah, whom I had employed for more than twenty years.
At first my voyage went well, and we visited Persia and India, and other lands beyond, and did so much trade that my ships were submerged nearly to the waterline under the weight of their cargo; but I found no woman whom I wished to marry. Yes, I met many charming and beautiful women, women whom kings would be proud to wed; but, even if they were willing to be my wife, and many were, none appealed to me enough to call the kādi and witnesses and write out a marriage contract. There was always something missing, some spark, and each time I resolved to keep searching.
Now those two years of my voyage had almost passed, and we had made our last port of call, and still I had found no wife for myself. For a while I despaired of ever finding such a woman, and resolved to return home and spend my days enjoying my wealth, for I need not ever come out on a voyage again after the profits I had made on this one. But then, as I was about to leave the last port, one of the local officials said to me:
“I am told you are in search of a wife, and you have been disappointed in that search. If you are interested, I can tell you of an island not too far from here, where the women are as beautiful as they are talented, and as wise as they are skilled in all the arts; and there, perhaps, you will find what you are looking for. But I warn you that if you should go there, you will risk everything, your health, happiness and fortune. For you must keep the woman you choose happy always, or she will plunge you into sorrow as profound as her own.”
Now, I have never, in all my years, shirked a challenge; and so, sending thirty-nine of my ships back to Basra by the direct route, I set sail in the fortieth to the island he told me about. For a week we sailed through seas that none of the sailors aboard had ever navigated before, and we were very cautious of rocks and unknown currents, but it went well for us, and on the eighth day we came to the island.
To this day, it makes my heart weep to think of that island, of the wonderful marble pavilions and pleasure gardens, like unto the gardens of Jannat, and the women, beautiful as hurīs, who dwelt there; and I wish I could some day set eyes on it once more. But we could not dwell there very long, for the season of storms was fast approaching, and the voyage back home would be impossible unless we hurried. So I spent every moment there searching amongst those women for one who would be ready to be my wife; but it was soon already the last night we were to be on that island, and still I had not found a bride.
It was on that last evening on that island, when I had finally decided that I would not find a wife there after all and as a consequence was sunk in melancholy, that I was approached by a venerable old man, with a long white beard and the robes of an official of high rank. “You are, I hear,” he began, “in search of a woman to wed; and it has come to my notice that you are to leave tomorrow, and yet you have found nobody.”
I was compelled to admit that such was the case.
“I offer to you then,” this old man responded, “my daughter in marriage, a girl of such wondrous talents that there are none on this island her equal; a girl, moreover, whose life would be wasted if she were to spend it in the confines of such a small country as ours. Take her to your city, for in the lands ruled over by the august Khalifa, Harūn al Rashīd, she will be happy and content.” And he took me to his house, and there showed me his daughter, who was playing on the lyre and singing; and she was all that he had promised, and more. It would not be too much to say that I fell in love at that instant, to the extent that I completely forgot the warning the port official had given me; and I resolved to make her mine by all means.
When I had communicated this to the old man, he grinned happily, and clapped me on the back. “Then,” he said, “let us not delay any further, but gather the kādi and witnesses, and solemnise the marriage at once, for you will be leaving on the morning tide.”
“But what of the lady herself?” I asked, though my mind was so inflamed by the sight of her that I could scarcely care what she thought of the matter. “Will she want to marry me?”
“She will, when she knows how much you love her and how you will take her to the glorious city of Basra,” the old man said. He went into his house and brought out the maiden, who looked down and seemed overcome by shyness. But when the kādi and witnesses came, she made no demur to the marriage; and as soon as it was solemnised, we had to leave the house of her father and go down to the harbour, for as the old man had said, my ship had to leave on the morning tide. All she brought with her, apart from the clothes she wore, was a lyre, the same one on which I had heard her playing, and a large silver cage that her father gave her without comment. The ship, in any case, was far too heavily loaded to have room for much more cargo. I showed her to my cabin, performed the morning prayers, and we set sail as the dawn broke in the east.
All that day, I was busy with work on board ship, seeing to it that all was ready for the long voyage home; and it was only in the evening that I finally returned to my cabin, where my bride awaited me; and, as it was the first time that she and I would be alone together, I had hoped to find out more about herself, her likes and dislikes, and answer her questions about my own.
But when I got to the cabin, I found her lying face down on the bed, weeping bitterly, as one weeps who mourns a lover gone forever. At first she would not answer my queries except by paroxysms of fresh sobs. But, after much persuasion, she looked up at me through the tears coursing down her face, and told me a most singular story. This is what she said:
THE GIRL’S TALE
O merchant, do not think that I weep because I despise you, or I have been hurt by you in any way; the fault is not yours. But my tale is such as would break even the cruellest of hearts, and I beg you to understand my sorrow.
Know, first, that the loathsome old man, who gave me in marriage to you, is not my father, but a terrible and avaricious sorcerer, whose only love is for himself and the dark arts he pursues. Know too that his only purpose in giving me to you was to destroy me by ruining my happiness beyond recall.
I was born to a fisherman and his wife, who lived in a hut down by the sea. They were poor but honest folk, who lived frugally and brought me up as well as they could, for they believed that I could rise far above their lowly station in life. And I loved them with all my heart, and wished to do anything I could to make them happy. My father taught me what he could of the ways of the wind and the waves, and my mother taught me letters, for she could read and write; and she taught me, also, to sing, for she had a voice like no other on all that island. And so I grew towards womanhood, and the years passed.
One day, my father, out in his boat, brought up something in his net which was no fish, but this lyre of mine that you see here. Perhaps it had fallen off a passing ship, or perhaps his net had stolen it from the people beneath the sea. At any rate, he brought it home and gave it to me, and I soon mastered the use of it, playing on it from the break of day till nightfall.
**************************
So saying, Shahrazad fell silent, and when her sister queried as to what happened next, she stroked the girl’s hair with a gentle hand. “There is much more to the story,” she replied. “But let it wait for tomorrow night.”
But on the one thousand and sixth night she said:
******************************
One day, when I was out on the cliffs above the harbour and playing my lyre, my heart full of the beauty of the sea and the sky, a step sounded behind me, and I turned to find a young man standing there, someone I had never seen before; a young man, moreover, of such beauty that my heart was at once smitten with love for him, so much so that I almost fainted away with the force of my emotion.
“I have been listening to your music and singing,” he said, “and I am smitten by your talents; I wish to marry you and make you my wife. Come away with me.”
And though my heart leaped with joy at those words, I remembered my mother and father, and shook my head with regret. “I cannot,” I said, “without seeking the blessings of my parents, for they mean all to me. Come with me to their home, down by the sea, and when they see you, I am sure they will give their blessings, for they wish nothing but my happiness.”
But then the young man grew wroth and changed in an instant to a wrinkled old man; it was, in fact, the lecherous and evil sorcerer whom you met, the one who claimed to be my father. He caught me up instantly in bonds I could not break, and bore me, lyre and all, to my palace, where he tried by all means of dark arts to break my spirit. But to him I would not yield; and the limits of his magic were such that he could not compel me to wed him by force. Unless I agreed of my own volition to be his wife, he could do nothing to me except keep me imprisoned in his palace.
Meanwhile my poor parents had been frantically hunting for me up and down the country, and by some means they came to know that I was in the magician’s palace. One day they came there and demanded to see me. I could hear them talking, and I cried out to attract their attention, but the sorcerer had surrounded me with spells of silence, and I could not make myself heard. The sorcerer went out to meet my parents, and claimed that I was not there, and never had been. His protestations failed to satisfy them, though, and they threatened to go to the king and the police chief and bring them to search the palace for me. And as it turned out, they did indeed go to the king, and after many days of pleas and persuasion they managed to get him to agree to send a search party.
On the day that search party came to his palace, the sorcerer came to my room, carrying a large silver cage. Glaring at me with terrible anger, he took a stick and struck me lightly on the shoulder; and, instantly, I was changed to a large green bird, which he secured in the cage. Moments later the search party came in, with my parents in the lead. I could see the despair and sorrow in their eyes, and flapped my wings to attract their attention, but they scarcely glanced at me.
After they had gone, the magician came to me in triumph. “I think I will keep you a bird from now on,” he said. “You are a danger to me otherwise. But I must also look for a way to get rid of you, for you have humiliated me by rejecting me, and that I cannot forgive.”
So saying, he thought for a while and smiled. “There is a ship in harbour,” he said, “from a distant land, whose owner looks for a bride. If he takes you as wife and carries you far away, you will be of no further danger to me; and your own unhappiness will bring doom and destruction on you both.” Chuckling happily, he turned me into a woman, murmured some spells over me, and left. The next I know of him was when I was brought out before you and the kādi, to be your bride.
You ask why I did not tell you of all this when you were to marry me; I can only point to that wall of silence that the sorcerer had bound me in, and which he only broke enough for me to agree to marry you. And know this – soon, I will turn again into a bird, and you are to put me into that cage there, so that I do not fly away. Each day I will return to human form for a few hours, for that the sorcerer granted me, not from kindness but all the more to remind me of all I have lost; and after that I will be a bird again.
My heart is breaking with sorrow, for my native land, left so far behind and falling further behind with every moment that passes; and for my parents, who must be stricken with such grief as mortal heart should not have to bear. And I am stricken too, with sorrow, for you; because, my husband, you cannot make me happy, and must accordingly bear sorrow everlasting and forever.
THE ELDERLY MAN’S STORY
So saying, the girl fell silent, and with a flutter of feathers turned into a green bird, which began flapping round the cabin; so I caught hold of her and thrust her into the silver cage.
We were already, by that time, many leagues distant from the island, and a brisk wind was bearing us further away. And though my soul was deeply troubled from the tale I had heard, there was no way for us to turn back; the season of storms was hard upon us, and the clouds were gathering. And, besides, I knew that my fortune awaited me at Basra, ably husbanded by my clerk Abdullah; surely, I thought, I could find and pay for a remedy for my love’s affliction, and bring her happiness and joy.
Each night, as darkness fell, my wife would return to her human form for a little while, and sing to me and played on the lyre; and though her songs were sad enough to melt hearts of stone, I listened to her as one enchanted.
So we sailed homeward, and the winds blew harder and harder, hurrying us along; and the captain and crew, experienced sailors all, began to throw worried glances at the sky.
“We have tarried too long,” the captain said to me. “There is no hope for us to avoid the storms. Allah only grant that we may weather them, and find a safe homecoming.”
But the wind blew harder and harder, and the storm was upon us with such vengeance that we thought that we must surely sink; and then the captain and the crew grew exceedingly furious with me, and said it was my fault. “For if you had not extended the voyage so long,” they said, “we would have been home long since, and it is because of your greed that now we stand in danger of drowning.” Then they put down the boat and dropped me into it, along with my bird and the lyre. “Make your way wherever the will of Allah takes you,” they said. “We bid you farewell, and hope the wind and water bring to you the punishment that you deserve.”
For days the storm drove our little boat before it, and more than once I thought we should be upset and swallowed by the ocean; but eventually the wind dropped, and we sighted land in the distance. The rising tide brought us close to shore, and we could see a city in the distance. I realised, with joy filling my soul, that it was my own city of Basra. The storm had brought us home after all.
At that moment, I thought all my troubles were over, and that a life of happiness lay before me, with only the little matter of curing my dear one of her affliction; but I did not know that my troubles were only just beginning.
*********************************
At this point, Shahrazad saw the approach of dawn and discreetly fell silent.
But on the one thousand and seventh night, she said:
********************************
When I went up to my mansion, carrying the bird in the cage in one hand and the lyre in the other, I found myself denied admission. The guards at the gates had been changed, and they said they had never seen or heard of me before. And when I went to my offices at the wharf, it was the same story – the clerks were new, and claimed that they did not know who I was.
As I discovered later, soon after I had left on my voyage, my trusted clerk Abdullah had died at the end of a brief illness, and his place had been taken by a nephew; a most disgraceful cheat and charlatan, of whom I had heard and whom Abdullah had long since disowned. Unfortunately, on his deathbed, it appeared that he had reconciled with this man, who had shed hypocritical tears of repentance and pledged to carry on in my clerk’s shoes.
But of course he was looking only for what he could derive from my business; on one pretext or other he dismissed the other clerks, and filled the staff with people who did not know me and who were beholden to him alone. When the thirty-nine ships I had sent back after the last port of call before leaving for my wife’s island came to harbour, he took their cargoes too, and sold them in his own behalf, so that the immense fortune I had made on my last voyage was his alone.
Perhaps, if I had returned with my fortieth ship, he might still have been stopped; but the captain and crew, who returned to Basra several days before me, reported, to protect themselves and conceal their crime, that I had been drowned at sea. This suited the rogue admirably, and he immediately took over my business and home, paying a few bribes to smooth his way.
Utterly without recourse, I then found no way but to make my way up to Baghdad, intending to throw myself on the mercy of the Khalifa Harūn al Rashīd, for he is known through all the world as being just and generous. But I have no way of finding audience with him, for I know no one here; nor do I have any proof of what I said, nothing at all. I have nothing in the world, in fact, but my bird, her cage, and her lyre.
Each night my bride comes to her human form for an hour or two, and sings and plays on the instrument like one divine; but that, too, has brought its own dangers on my head. I have heard the tales going around that there is a splendid slave who dazzles with her beauty and her voice, and I am much afraid that this will draw down the jealous greed of people who have the power to take her from me by force. I could forbid her to sing and play during the time she is human, of course, but I cannot bring myself to do so, for, small as it is, it is her only joy.
So saying, the elderly man heaved a deep sigh and fell silent; and the Khalifa and the wāzir sighed, too, in sympathy, and looked up at the green bird in the cage. The night passed, and dawn appeared in the East; they performed the morning prayers along with their troubled host, and, after giving him thanks and leaving him – despite his protestations – a few coins of gold as recompense for their night’s lodging, they left.
“Jafar,” the Khalifa said, as soon as they had returned to the palace and changed to their usual clothes, “you are to go this evening to our host of the night, and command him to appear before me, bringing his bird and his lyre. In the meantime, have a guard discreetly placed on his house, so that he is not bothered by any greedy malefactor, and also to prevent him from trying to escape, if he has had second thoughts about his night’s indiscretion to a couple of unknown foreigners.”
“I hear and obey,” the wāzir responded, and sent his men to guard the house. That evening, he dressed in his formal robe of office and, at the head of a troop of soldiers, he went to the elderly man and brought him, trembling with terror, to the august presence of the Commander of the Faithful.
“I am told,” the Khalifa said, “that this bird of yours has miraculous abilities. I hear that she can even turn human and sing and play on that lyre. What have you to say to this?”
Ashen-faced with fear, the elderly man threw himself at the Khalifa’s feet. “Pardon me, Commander of the Faithful,” he said. “It is not of my doing.” And he began the tale that he had recounted the previous night, but nothing would be gained by repeating it here.
“If what you say is to be believed,” the Khalifa said, when he had finished, “all we have to do is wait for your bird to turn back to her human form, and we will know of the truth of the matter.”
As the hour of the evening prayer passed, there was a fluttering of wings, the bird emerged from her cage, and transformed into a woman so pretty that the palace of the Khalifa seemed to be lighted up by her; and, taking up her lyre, she sang a song of such beauty and sorrow as even an angel might weep.
“Lady,” the Khalifa said when she had stopped singing, “tell me, how can we return you to what you were?”
“None but the sorcerer can do that,” the woman responded. “He alone knows the secret of my transformation. But he lives on the island where I was born, so far away that there is nothing to be gained by talking of him.” And, a moment later, she had turned back to a bird, and the elderly man had put her in the cage again.
Then the Khalifa called his scribes and had them write two documents affixed with the royal seal, and gave them to the elderly man, with instructions to give the first of them to the governor of Basra; and that same night he sent him down the river by ship, with an escort of troops beside, to ensure his protection. And when the governor broke the seals and read the letter, he ordered the usurper arrested and thrown into prison; and so the merchant recovered his business and his ships, and all his fortune again.
Then the merchant took ship, and sailed along with his bird and her lyre to the island of her birth. After a long voyage they arrived, and then he took the second document and went to the king. This king, who knew of the Commander of the Faithful and acknowledged him as the Ruler of the World, read the enclosed letter; and then he sent his men to seize the sorcerer and have him brought before the court. Threatened with torture and death, the lecherous old man broke down and agreed to reverse the spell in return for his life; and the bird turned back to a woman, and was no more a bird again.
And so it was that the merchant and his wife went down to a hut on the sea shore, where an old couple spent their days and nights in ceaseless lamentation for a daughter who they had decided was no more; and they could scarce believe their eyes when they saw their daughter back again. And after they heard of all that had befallen her, all they could do was cry tears of mingled joy and sorrow.
And then the merchant and the woman received the blessings of their wedding from the girl’s parents, and then all four of them took ship, sailing over the ocean until they came to the fair city of Basra, the woman singing and playing the lyre all the way, only now the songs were of happiness and great joy.
Such is the story of the Green Bird, and of the wisdom and magnanimity of the Khalifa, of whom so many tales are told.
*****************************
“Sister,” Dunyazad said when Shahrazad had finished, “I would like to hear another tale, for this has filled me with such wonder that I fairly crave for more.”
“Little one,” Shahrazad replied, “I have many more tales to tell, if only the gracious king would give me permission; yet, it grows late, so let the next story await tomorrow night.”
And the King Shahryar smiled and drew her to his bosom; and as the night turned towards morning, silence fell in the royal chamber. Shahrazad slept.
KHATAM SHUD
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
“I haff here,” said Doktor Professor von Schtinkerfussen, pulling open the shed’s door, “der machine I told you about. Like this, the vorlt has nefer seen.”
Rupert and Eugenia stared at the strange object that took up the centre of the shed’s dirt floor. It was a sphere with thick round windows studding the walls, and an armoured hatch set in the curved side. Though rather higher than a large man, it still seemed small for the awe-inspiring mission for which it was destined.
“Is that...it?” Eugenia whispered.
“That is so, mein friends,” the good Doktor Professor said, the light overhead gleaming on his bald pate. “Vorking days and nights for these last two years, I haff, with mein own two hands, this made. I wanted to keep it a secret, understand you, from reporters und other troublesome people.”
“I must congratulate you, Doktor Professor.” Walking across the floor to the wonderful machine, Rupert bent slightly to peer through the nearest of the round windows. It was set in the metal somewhat below the equator of the sphere, so that it pointed downwards. “It does look cosy inside.”
“Ja, I haff it padded inside, so it will from too much cold und heat insulated be.” With simple pride, the little scientist patted the side of the machine. The dull silvery metal shivered slightly at his touch. “Also,” he added, “if it happens something hard to strike, the padding the occupants from injury will save, nicht wahr?”
“You think of everything, Professor,” Eugenia exclaimed, clasping her hands under her chin. Her ethereal and beautiful features were pink with excitement. “You’re wonderful!”
“Really, Ginny,” Rupert said, “the Professor isn’t looking for you to gush all over him.” Twisting the end of his moustache between his fingers, he began walking slowly round the machine, peering up at it. “Are you sure it will work?”
“It has in der tests,” the Professor responded, cleaning his thick spectacles on his coat. “Der models also vorked. Aber one must der final step self take, is das not so?”
“I suppose,” Rupert said, not sounding altogether convinced. “And you want to go now?”
“Aber I will not leave alone.” The Doktor Professor’s eyes twinkled. “You will with me come, mein young friends, will you not?”
“Us?” Rupert exclaimed. “But, Professor, I mean to say, it’s not that I’m scared, but don’t you think that the honour of the first trip should be yours alone? You’re the inventor of this wonderful contraption, and so it will be invidious of us to detract from your glory by sharing in the first manned trip. It’s only right that you should have all the honour.”
“Oh, Rupert,” Eugenia snapped, “don’t be such a ninny.” Smiling, she turned to the Professor. “Of course we’d love to come,” she said. “Do we start right away?”
“Of course,” Doktor Professor von Schtinkerfussen said, and, lifting a panel in the side of the spherical hull, pressed down on a lever. With a hiss and a soft thud, the armoured hatch swung open. “After you, mein friends. Perhaps you first, dear young lady?” With a hand below her elbow, he helped Eugenia inside. Rupert, who had gone a slight greenish colour, followed without a word. The Professor clambered in last, and pressed a button. With another hiss and thud, the hatch swung shut.
Inside, the machine was surprisingly roomy, so that even with the three of them it did not feel particularly crowded. The padded walls were studded with boxes and dials, with strange levers and knobs set here and there, and amber lights set in the roof overhead glowed down warmly on them.
“Please sit you yourself down, und yourself comfortable make.” The Professor swung down three seats from recesses in the wall, beaming. “As you see, mein friends, I arrangements for der three of us already haff made. Food und drink for us there is, also.”
“This is so exciting,” Eugenia said. “What an adventure!”
Rupert, still silent, wiped his face with a handkerchief. His greenish colour had deepened, and Eugenia fought down the urge to poke him with her parasol. She retied the string of her bonnet, loosening it slightly, and wished she could have removed her tall buttoned-down boots. The inside of the machine was really rather warm.
“Also!” The Doktor Professor turned a lever. “Here goes.” An eerie moan sounded from below the floor, climbing slowly in pitch. Motors began to grind and clatter, and the entire machine started to vibrate.
“When do we start?” Rupert asked after the vibration and clatter had gone on for a while. He seemed to have recovered a little of his colour. “It seems to be taking a rather long time. Maybe it isn’t working properly?”
“But we already haff started, mein young friend.” Doktor Professor von Schtinkerfussen peered at him, and pointed to a dial on which a hand was crawling slowly across the arc of numbers. “Already we are far beneath der ground.”
Startled, for she had felt no descent, Eugenia turned to the window at her shoulder. Through the thick round pane of glass, the world outside was completely dark. The shed and its lights had vanished.
“Soon,” said the Professor, “we shall at der depth of der deepest mines be.” He rubbed his hands together. “Und dann we will of all the people of the vorlt be the ones, who deepest under der ground haff been.”
“But there’s nothing to see outside,” Eugenia objected. “I can’t see a thing.”
“There will be, when we haff gone deep enough,” the Professor said. He fiddled with a knob here, and pressed a lever there, and the moan grew to a whine, and the whine to an eldritch scream. “There,” he said, “now we faster descending are.”
“You mean,” Eugenia said, “we’re drilling through the ground?” It brought to her mind an image of the machine spinning round and round, and that made her feel suddenly queasy. “Is that what we’re doing?”
“No, no, mein dear young Fraülein.” The Professor shook his head indulgently. “Atomic rays I discovered have, und made generators for, under der machine which fitted are. They melt der way through rocks und soil, like a hot knife through butter.”
“The wonders of modern science,” Eugenia murmured. “I shouldn’t really be surprised, since it is almost the end of the nineteenth century, but still, I am.”
“Tell us again, Professor, about your theories.” Rupert had recovered his normal complexion and only a slight sheen of sweat now lay across his handsome features. His immense shoulders flexed as he adjusted his coat. “What were you saying about the cities at the core?”
“Ja,” Doktor Professor von Schtinkerfussen said. “I was saying, das all people wrong are, who say the earth is only a solid ball of rock und iron, floating on top of a molten core. It is not true, und I, Ludwig von Schtinkerfussen, shall prove it once und for all.” He took off and polished his spectacles. “Der Earth,” he said, “more than only one intelligent species has. Man is not alone. We haff equals, und they live far below us, in cities at der core.”
“But how is that possible?” Rupert asked. “The pressure of the rock above –“
“They adapted to it are, of course.” The Doktor Professor opened a box and took out a paper. “See here, mein young friends. This is a picture I haff taken by der new X Rays, of der world far down at der core.”
Rupert and Eugenia leaned together over the paper. It was as though they were looking down from a mountaintop at a distant plain, Eugenia thought, or from a balloon; and those concentric rings and radial lines were the streets of some town far, far below.
She must have said something of this aloud, because the Professor nodded approvingly. “But precisely, my dear young lady. Those are der avenues of some gigantic city, so great that we cannot even begin to it imagine. You may understand how big if I say das that city bigger than Switzerland, perhaps, is.”
Rupert snorted. “You’re imagining things, Professor. It’s just some kind of mineral formation, perhaps.”
“Minerals? In those lines so straight? I never haff about such mineral deposits in all my life heard.”
“Well, then,” Rupert argued, “maybe it’s like one of those buried cities the archaeologists keep digging up. Maybe it’s Atlantis or one of the other cities of the ancients, which got buried with the passage of time.”
“Maybe,” the Professor said equably. “Perhaps you are right, mein young friend, though I cannot see how it so deep could be. We shall for ourselves find out, shall we not?” He smiled at Eugenia. “Und what do you think, Fraülein?”
“What must they be like?” Eugenia wondered. “Do you think they’ll be like us? Just think,” she added, “another race of humans, with their own languages and customs. Perhaps, Rupert, there will be a girl like me, and someone like you, among them, and perhaps someone like the Professor here too.”
“Really, Ginny,” Rupert said, “you’re being ridiculous. These so-called creatures don’t even exist. It’s all a story.”
“They vill not like us be, dear lady,” the Professor said, ignoring Rupert. “Under the pressure und temperature they tolerate must, they must very different be.” He put the photograph away and took out bottles of lemonade. “You are thirsty, mein friends?”
Realising that she was actually rather thirsty, Eugenia sipped at the lemonade. The inside of the machine was perceptibly warmer, and, ignoring Rupert’s disapproving glare, she undid her bonnet and took it off. “If they aren’t like us,” she asked, “what are they like?”
“Gott knows,” Doktor Professor von Schtinkerfussen said. “But living as they do, they must be able to withstand high pressure und great heat. Living without lights, blind they must be, but some way of building they must have, like hands, or claws.”
“That’s ridiculous!” Rupert exploded. “The whole thing is impossible.” He paused suspiciously. “How is it that we haven’t ourselves been crushed flat by the pressure by now?” he demanded. “We must be a fair long way down.”
“Further than you imagine,” the Professor said, and indicated the gauge. “Soon, ve into der mantle of der earth shall be. But der atomic rays we generate, they melt der rock around us, so we sink through them like water. Das ist why we have not by the pressure flattened been.”
“And how do we get up again?” Rupert demanded.
“Nothing simpler,” the Professor chuckled. “You need not fear have. We just have to reverse the direction of the atomic beams, und up we again vill go.”
Rupert was still not satisfied. “Just suppose,” he said, “that your fantastic theory is correct, and that these creatures and their cities below us actually exist. What do they eat and drink?”
“Perhaps they on der energies of der earth’s core subsist,” the Professor said. “Perhaps they farms below haff, of which we can nothing now know. But we shall.”
It had grown torrid in the machine, and finally Eugenia, unable to tolerate the heat any longer, took off her boots and stockings and hitched her skirts to her knees. Rupert, of course, frowned angrily, but it looked more as though he wished he could remove his tie and waistcoat, and was envious because he dared not. The Doktor Professor, who had no such inhibitions, was already in his shirt sleeves.
“We are in der mantle now,” the Professor said, checking his gauges, and pressed more levers and buttons. The eldritch scream of the machine rose to a demonic wail. “Now faster still we go.”
Eugenia leaned back and stared out of the window, fighting down a shudder at the thought of the immensity of rock above and on all sides. She had a mental image of them, like an infinitesimal dot travelling through the great stony ball of the planet. How tiny they must be, in relation to the gigantic globe of the world!
“And yet,” she thought, “tiny as we are, we humans have conquered the planet. And, if writers like Monsieur Verne and Mr Wells are correct, someday we shall reach the moon, and perhaps even the stars.”
Then she looked across at her companions; at Rupert, alternatively fretfully pulling at his collar and twisting the ends of his moustache. He was big, strong and handsome, the very image of a hero, and she wondered if it were disloyal of her to suddenly think of him as a relic of a bygone age, when brute strength mattered and not simple common sense. Certainly, he looked ridiculous now, sweating in his waistcoat and high collar, and that simply because he could not bring himself to remove them. She shook her head and wiggled her bare toes appreciatively. If he chose to suffer, she thought, that was his problem. Maybe he would learn a lesson from it, though she doubted that.
Then she looked at the Professor, small, middle-aged and pudgy, his bald head shining in the amber light as he bent over a cluster of instruments adjusting one and then another. “Perhaps,” she thought, “it is the people like him who will inherit the future; ugly little men with big brains, who spend their time thinking and inventing, while the Ruperts of the world go on hunting trips in the colonies and spend their evenings in their clubs, drinking and telling tall stories. But must it be one or the other? If you really look at it, aren’t they both men – human beings, perhaps not so very dissimilar as all that? And are they really that different from some black Zulu or yellow Chinaman, or other of the savage races?”
That led her to wondering about the creatures which inhabited the city the Professor said lay under them. Perhaps, of course, there was no such city; perhaps Rupert was right and it was only some sort of mineral formation. But she found herself believing that there was such a city; the Professor was certain enough of it. Perhaps there would be a whole network of cities, spread across the globe, under oceans and continents; there would be entire civilisations under the crust of the planet, huddled around the core.
“And in that case,” she murmured aloud, “we are a race which has dominion over only the surface of the world – and there is another which owns the planet beneath us.”
“What’s that?” Rupert stared at her. “What are you babbling about, Ginny?”
“Nothing,” Eugenia told him. “Forget it.” She began to feel tired and sleepy. The machine was now very hot and stuffy, and she could not in any decency take off any more clothing. The trip seemed to have gone on a very long time. Leaning back against the padding, she closed her eyes.
Something brought her out of her doze. For a moment she couldn’t identify what it was, and then she realised that the demented shriek of the machine had changed pitch and slowed to a throaty moan once more. “What’s happened?” she asked through dry lips. “Is something wrong?”
“Nein, nein,” the Doktor Professor said. He seemed quite as full of energy as ever, darting around the chamber like a cheery, tubby little sparrow. “We are now almost to the level of der city arrived. We must now slow down.”
“All right, Professor,” Rupert said. “Suppose these fantastic creatures of yours exist and have constructed this city you speak of. Since there’s no light down there, how do we even see them?”
“All taken care of has been, Junge.” The Professor indicated a switch. “We haff, set into der hull, powerful searchlights. When it required is, I shall turn them on.”
Barely listening to them, Eugenia rubbed her eyes and looked again through the window. Something seemed different, somehow, she could not say what it was. Then she saw that the pitch darkness outside the window was not quite as deep and homogeneous as it had been.
“Professor,” she said, “there’s something down there, below us. I can see something.”
Frowning, the Professor peered down through another window, and then, with an abrupt movement, turned off the light. The machine was plunged into darkness, but it wasn’t as complete as it might have been. And, looking down through her window, Eugenia realised why.
It spread as far as the eye could see, a great tangled net, glowing faintly blue, lines and arcs and whorls. It grew perceptibly as they watched, the lines broadening as they rose, turning from barely visible hair-thin traces to broad avenues, running between huge dark masses like buildings. The Professor’s fingers moved again on the controls, and the machine slowed still further, the moan dropping to a scarcely audible murmur.
“Mein Gott,” the Professor said. “So I was right, und more than right. Here we haff not just a city – we haff a living city, with lights und buildings, avenues und intersections. Wunderschön! Am morgen, in die Uni...” He trailed off into muttered German as the machine slowed almost to a crawl.
“Professor,” Rupert said, “all right, I admit you were correct. But what do we do now?”
“We get closer,” said the little scientist, “und dann I shall take photographs, with der photographic apparatus I haff in the bottom of der hull. It is wonderful, is it not?”
“Yes,” Eugenia whispered. She felt torn between wonder and a vague dread. She wished, obscurely, that they were already rising away from the strange city beneath. “Be careful, Professor.”
By now they were so close to one of the glowing avenues that they could see clearly that the black masses on either side were buildings, great windowless blocks of stone, carved into such grotesque shapes that the eye could not fully follow their curves and lines, their margins bent and flowed together under the heat and pressure of the thousands of millions of tons of rock above. And along the avenue there was movement, too; a slow humped movement, as though the very surface of the way heaved and rippled and twitched. Eugenia looked at that movement and her mouth grew even drier; she tried to swallow and could not.
“We shall der searchlight turn on now,” the Doktor Professor announced. “Und then we shall photographs take.” Unerringly, in the darkness of the chamber, his fingers found the correct switch, and turned the light on.
A few moments later the machine was rising up through the rock, the murmur given way to an insane screeching, the entire sphere trembling from the force of its ascent. Eugenia held on frantically to the edge of her seat, convinced that if she let go, she would be bodily thrown across the chamber. And yet she would not for a moment want that insane speed reduced; she wanted it to travel faster still.
“Did you see them?” Rupert was shouting. “Did you see those things?”
Eugenia did not reply. Her eyes were shut tight, her heart hammering. Try as she might, she could not remove the image in her mind’s eye, of what she had seen in the moments that the searchlight had illuminated the avenue, before it had burned out. She could see them, as if they lay now, before her; the great crusted crablike bodies, flattened from the pressure and repulsive, set around with claws; the tiny, questing eyes, set as in the turrets of a battleship, turning upwards. She remembered the weapon they had raised towards the sphere, and the spitting red arc that had cut towards them and destroyed the searchlight.
“They knew we were coming,” she said factually, when at last the sphere had risen far enough that the Professor had slowed its ascent to some extent. “They were waiting for us.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Rupert snapped. “How could those...beasts...have known?”
“How should I know? What makes you think they’re beasts, Rupert? Could beasts build a city like that? Could beasts have struck at us with a weapon like that?”
“What weapons?” Rupert twirled his moustache furiously. “It was just a malfunction of this machine.”
“Oh, yes, you know everything.” Eugenia turned to the other man. “What do you think, Professor?”
“I think,” the Professor said, “that we better electric shielding must have.” He clicked at the switch several times, but the light in the chamber failed to turn on. “Und I think that we must more careful be, next time we down there go.”
“What?” Rupert yelled. “Are you thinking about going down there again? Well, leave me out of it, and Ginny too.”
“Don’t you think Ginny should be allowed to make up her own mind?” Eugenia asked. “Really, Rupert, I don’t know what you think of me sometimes. It’s as if you think I’m your property or something.”
“I have a moral responsibility towards you,” Rupert began. “If you’re going to behave like a shameless hussy, it’s bad enough, but I will not allow you to endanger yourself. What will everyone say?”
Eugenia sighed. She turned away from Rupert, who was still ranting, and looked down again through her window. The great network of lines had almost vanished in the darkness below, and she was about to give way to relief when she stiffened suddenly.
“Rupert,” she said very quietly. “Shut up and look down there.”
A bright blue dot was swimming up at them from the city. It was obviously larger and faster than their own sphere, and as obviously following in their tracks.
“Another machine, it is,” the Professor said. He sounded shaken for the first time. “These creatures, they are coming after us.”
“They’re climbing faster than we are,” Eugenia said matter-of-factly. “They’ll catch us long before we reach the surface.” She laughed suddenly. “Rupert,” she said, “you didn’t think these creatures existed. Now, you’re going to be introduced to one. Are you planning to tell it that it doesn’t exist? Will you refuse to shake its hand?”
Rupert did not answer.
“Whatever are we going to do, Rupert?” Eugenia whispered.
There was still no answer.
They watched the brilliant point of light climb up through the rock towards them.
Copyright B Purkayastha 2012
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