Like the  Liberation War, the Language Movement also gave birth to a distinctive spirit That spirit has played a vital role to the shaping of people's movements leading to the independence struggle; but the 1952 Language Movement also resulted in the blossoming of a fiesta of creativity.

In the following years, especially in the sixties and the seventies, Bangladesh had experienced spectacular sprouting of varied mediums of creativity. With the hard-earned independence, the land found itself bathed in seemingly endless streams of creative activities. The nation proved itself to be firmly committed to the message of Ekushey, or 21st February — the 1952 red-letter day on which the Language Movement martyrs embraced martyrdom.

Upon arrival at the doorstep of the twenty-first century, the country's field of the arts had been expected to become fully vibrant with newer surges of creativity. Ruefully, it did not happen. In just 28 years, the new nation's authors, painters, musicians, film makers and other creative people appeared to have spent all their creative force. Except for a few, the majority of the people engaged in creativity looked exhausted and almost bankrupt. Critics blamed a stasis in the socio-cultural arena for this undesirable development.

A typical driving force behind activities in the country's greater area of the arts had for long been dialecticism. Suddenly it appeared to be missing in all the segments of our culture. An overwhelming air of bewilderment and detachment descended. The authors, painters and others began feeling resigned, and also a little alienated. Many point the finger at a condition of void for this creative depression formed around one and half decades ago. It's undeniable that a major part of the last two decades in the 20th century passed through turbulence. As seen in every culture, the periods of siege and socio-political upheavals produce memorable creative works. We have seen it in the Third World countries in their transitional times. Ranging from Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America to the South Asian sub-continent, numbers of countries have had their own periods of turmoil. As a result, they were able to get their Pablo Neruda, Chinua Achebe or Gabriel Garcia Marquez. These writers remained stuck to their creativity even in the times of peace. But we have failed to go ahead with the tempo gained from our defining moments. We could not put to use the spirit of the Ekushey which would have seen the nation's creativity reach newer heights.

Had it not for the educated people's growing apathy towards the arts in general, Bangladesh would have been able to continue with its creativity into the times to come. A few socio-cultural experts detect a creeping growth of disillusionment of the connoisseurs with the creative community for this development. At this point, one would like to decipher the causes of this disenchantment. Upon getting down to the roots, what do we find? To the chagrin of both the serious admirers and the writers and other creative persons, we discover mere banalities in the name of creativity. Despite not being able to produce any outstanding work, they developed all forms of pretension. Literary poseurs ruled the roost. So were the cases with painting, music, film making and other activities. The group theatre enjoyed a brief time of popular acceptance after the independence, but the enthusiasm petered out as years wore on. A number of social critics raise the issue of the failure to grasp the meaning of the Ekushey spirit. This inability adds to the already entrenched agonies of the enlightened class of our society.

In the context of Bangladesh, the Language Movement was a watershed event. It later emerged as a unique episode in the nation's history. Thanks to its being inextricably linked to the Bangla language, it was pregnant with the future germinations of our literature. In a broader perspective, it embraced all the allied fields of Bengali culture. The student and people's movement was born of the sparks of protest, and presented the Bengali nation with a rich corpus of literature of defiance. It could continue for some time. So it did. An event unparallelled in history, the Ekushey and its spirit kept metamorphosing and eventually turned into the nation's War of Independence. It happened purely on the political plain. From this angle, the Ekushey spirit had been viewed by many as inspiration for the pure literature of protest. But thanks to the creative gifts of our literary-cultural activists, both young and old, the spirit was elegantly able to break free of the narrow confines of protest only. Thus, the historic anthology of writings, the Ekushey Sangkalan, edited by Hasan Hafizur Rahman, could transform itself into 'Samakal'. It came out as the first journal of pure literature in the late fifties edited by Sikandar Abu Zafar. Accordingly, other forms of our literary-cultural activities that began after the Language Movement started occupying dominant places in their respective genres. To speak concisely, the Ekushey spirit, in the earlier days, had opened a floodgate to the Bengalees' new-age literature in Bangladesh. All this occurred as part of the dynamics of cultural development through different periods of time.

On the other hand, it also speaks of a shortcoming of ours that long after the direct impact of Ekushey faded, many of our creative people kept being haunted by its immediate spell felt in 1952. The smarter artists were able to decipher the clues to their destined paths in the later socio-political developments. They kept coming up with their new and rich collections of work.

As a matter of fact, the spirit of Ekushey has largely been misinterpreted by our people in the literary and cultural world. Some have discovered in it the perfect national identity, the first-ever outline of the emerging Bengalee nationhood. Yet, many authors and other creative persons remained engaged in wallowing in sentimentalities. It's painful to see that sixty-four years after the Language Movement, the nation has yet to have a complete novel on that historic event. There are only a handful of short stories on it, written back in the fifties. Except the play 'Kobor' by Munier Chowdhury, a marvellous work, no medium in our literature has had any significant place for the Ekushey spirit. Shawkat Osman's novel 'Artonaad', in spite of its focus on the Language Movement, has eluded most of the readers. However, Zahir Raihan's feature film 'Jibon Thekey Neya' (1970) deserves special mention.    It's surprising to note that the first-ever roar of protest let out by the land's people has failed to move the nation's writers. Fortunately, lyricist Abdul Gaffar Chowdhury and musician Altaf Mahmud presented the nation with an inspiring song on the language martyrs. A couple of songs by other lyricists and composers, and a few poems joined the creative bout of the time.

Considering the colossal impact of the Language Movement on the emerging process of the Bengalees' sovereign nation, it had deserved much wider spotlight. To show our intellectual bankruptcy, we have also failed to carry out an in-depth research on the critical phases of the movement. However, we can rightfully boast the rich literary output based on the 1971 Liberation War. Sentimentalities also cropped up here, and stood in the way of the creation of the desired volume of works. Then there were intrusions of partisan biases and a tendency to distort historical facts.

Despite these hindrances, the Liberation War could finally carve out its distinctive place in the cultural landscape of Bangladesh. To the nation's distress, the Ekushey has been pushed toward the periphery. Neither the documentary aspect of the event, nor its latent spirit could properly inspire us. As a sequel to it, we have been made to brace for a pervasive cultural barrenness. It's time we gave it a serious thought.

shihabskr@ymail.com     

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Source: The Financial Express