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"Down by the river" - Hatto Fischer
The question of development sounds differently 'down by the river'!
Down by the river – where we used to play.
Shifting sandbanks reflected the curvatures of the river.
Always we made our thoughts while throwing into the water sticks to see them head downstream.
The river could be seen already from far away. Through the trees. The river could be smelled.
As children we would approach the river with caution.
Only later on, we plunged into the cold water. The stream took us quickly down stream. We had to swim hard to make it ashore.
And then there is the story by Mark Twain of Huckleberry Finn who took a raft and went down the Mississippi with the run away slave Jim. That meant adventure. The two went down the river, but not to sell Jim, but to be together. They became in due course one and the same, a destiny and a life longing for freedom.
A river moves, but stays quiet in pockets of shores where the current slows down and the fishes rest for a while.
It is amazing what can be experienced down by the river where the women come to wash the clothes or animals to drink around sunset. It is a time when the day birds hush up while the night owl has not as of yet awaken. It is when the beaver makes one more crossing and the shadows from the trees along the shore begin to merge with the water growing darker with every minute of the sunset.
So I don't mean necessarily the song by NEIL YOUNG
Down by the River
Be on my side,
I'll be on your side,
baby
There is no reason
for you to hide
It's so hard for me
staying here all alone
When you could be
taking me for a ride.
Yeah, she could drag me
over the rainbow,
send me away
Down by the river
I shot my baby
Down by the river,
Dead, oh, shot her dead.
You take my hand,
I'll take your hand
Together we may get away
This much madness
is too much sorrow
It's impossible
to make it today.
Yeah, she could drag me
over the rainbow,
send me away
Down by the river
I shot my baby
Down by the river,
Dead, oh, shot her dead.
Be on my side,
I'll be on your side,
baby
There is no reason
for you to hide
It's so hard for me
staying here all alone
When you could be
taking me for a ride.
Yeah, she could drag me
over the rainbow,
send me away
Down by the river
I shot my baby
Down by the river,
Dead, oh, shot her dead.
So let us get started with a different approach, and by that I mean thoughts which come to one when down by the river.
Perception of nature
Philosophiy of the Western world has held people trapped in a fear of nature. It is presented as the dangerous unknown. Thus for many ages all kinds of projections by man were made in the direction of dark forests or explosive vulcans. Even more frightening is when the earth trembles or rivers swell on so much that it becomes a force which tears everything in its way out of its roots or foundations.
There is in nature a force or energy to which man can only attribute the word 'violence' while Democrit and Epicur thought already in Ancient times about the 'atom'.
Hegel would say violence enemates out of things. It follows that nature must be controlled and by extension therefore can be exploited in order "to harness this energy". Hegel attempted to do so by contemplating how it would be possible to capture the energy stemming from lightening.
With the industrial revolution all these thoughts were carried forward by all the scientific discoveries. They showed how an ever greater exploitation of nature's energies was possible. This included building dams to irrigate fields but also to make electricity. In turn, it forced mankind to seek ever new resources. After the 'coal and steel' era, there came electricity and then finally the atomic energy. Today renewable energy means seeking the power of winds and the energy of the sun to gain other sources for energy supply systems.
At the same time, exploitation of nature expanded. Explorations to the Artic did not make halt in front of the last remaining unknown territories to mankind. Once Ernst Schnabbel, the writer and radio man in post war Germany made it in a Clipper plane around the world in eighteen days, an American officer upon hearing how long it took him, predicted that this would be the end of any Robinsoe Crusoe. He meant there were no longer niches any man could withdraw to in order to lead a life which would stay untouched by civilisation.
Interestingly enough, if one takes the poem by the Bengali poet Anjan Sen about nature, quite other aspects become audible and visible. There are visible signs, something becoming audible, with leaves singing, the water talking to the sea and the sea speaking to the sky now growing ever larger till it touches the mountain. Things come to life. Here and there things are happening. They do not make as of yet a pattern, but they are all signs of life.
Of Nature He walks to the beat of the madal Runs the whole field to the river's morning Leaves sing silently Flowers suddenly blossom near the new sun The water said to the sea come with me The sea spoke of the sky The sky began to grow larger Touched a mountain and became infinite The koel bird found its song A flock of parrots flew off in bunches On the other side of the river Many unknown voices float down from the sky How do the sun and the light expand The shadow of fathers, forefathers, ancestors Touch the ground Where were they where am I where will I go Many more departures remain The morning sunlight spreads its wings Original title "prakritir".First published in(Bengali) "Sundar" ,2000. "madal" =folk drum . Ccollected in "Bhando Bevando"2002 Translated by Subha Chakravorty –Dasgupta
Beautiful is when the poem translates these sounds into human voices even though most of them are unknown. Still they are a part of common and therefore human knowledge. To see that sun and light are important until the shadows of the ancestors begin to touch the ground - a most powerful image of chemical like reactions linked to the sense of touch, but not in any ontological sense. Rather past, present and future form the continuum of time like the river which flows on. There is a slight despair because the need to go on is more self evident than the knowledge where to go next. In recognizing this Anjan Sen speaks about life awaiting still many more departures all while 'morning sunlight spreads its wings'. It is a beautiful moment even though the ancestors have only arrived as far as their unknown voices and shadows are concerned while one is departing already before their arrival. This is a subtle sign of time hastening on, changes occuring, and the risk ever greater not to hear for long those unknown voices on the other side of the river.
Departure from the global village or development questions in Bengali, India
An example of posing this question of development from such an independent perspective can be given on hand of a very simple poem written by the Bengali poet Anjan Sen.
Anjan Sen / Village
Sorrow's family has left It's rundown ancestral home Heading down the path of poverty The universe will be a village, my dear.
("Translated by Jesse Knutson)
Anjan Sen adds to his poem about "village" following explanation: "In our country due to globalisation a lot of FERTILE AGRICULTURAL lands are being taken over by the state and industrialists for SEZ (Special Economic Zone) purpose. Farmers are not getting enough compensation, so they are heading for poverty. They have to leave their houses for which they have strong sentiments. In the last line 'my dear' is satirical about the kind of global village these people will leave behind?"
Certainly ever since Marshall McLuhan spoke about the world becoming in an age of communication a 'global village', this juxtaposition between local and global factors affecting the outcome of development, poverty being one of them, has dominated in many discussions. Artists like Boudewijn Payens seek even to understand further this interconnectivity, but he does so in an unexpected way. For he reveals hidden messages once something becomes as evident as sailors stranded in the port of Amsterdam after the financing of the ship suddenly broke down. The officers left the ship, but the sailors, all of them of foreign origin, remained on board as they had no papers, no money and therefore nowhere to go. They ended up selling off parts of the ship to survive. Alone that action repeats itself when migrants who have fled Tunisia, Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan and other places torn apart by war and counter terrorism efforts and end up in the streets of Athens where they start combing through the rubbish bins.
Hatto Fischer
8.5.2011
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