10 - Literary and visual portrayals of Gandhi

Summary

Since shortly after he entered Indian public life on return from South Africa in 1915, Gandhi has permeated Indian literature and the arts; he is to be found everywhere, from office walls to public spaces to collective memory either personal or transmitted. He has been represented to enduring effect by a variety of foreign writers and artists as well, from points of view that serve to illuminate him differently and often with a striking supplementarity. Several surveys in print and now increasingly on variously websites indicate the sheer richness of materials of which the account that follows is a necessarily small and partial selection.

POETRY

The regard in which Gandhi was held not only by the common man in India but also by many of its eminent literary figures found spontaneous expression as the news spread that he had been assassinated on 30 January 1948. Over the next 108 days (a number sacred in Hindu belief), Harivansh Rai Bachchan (1907–2003), probably the most popular Hindi poet of the twentieth century, wrote 204 poems paying tribute to Gandhi, the first one of which began “Today our Bapu has passed on/Today our flag is lowered in shame” and concluded “Today he has died and become immutable/Today he has died and become immortal”.