I was invited to talk about business in the CII meeting with the Mexican Minister of Small Scale Industries and his business delegation. As usual, i strayed into businessplus and talked about love and labyrinth in the relations between the two countries. I said,
-Octovio Paz 's first experience in India was a cultural shock. After landing in Bombay in 1951 he walked around in Bombay streets and was overwhelmed by the crowd, color, noise and smell. He wrote " The excess of reality in India ...made it appear unreal" . I call this as the encounter between the "magical realism" of latin america and the "mythical realism" of india.
-He came back and stayed in India as Ambassador from 1961 to 68. He travelled extensively in India and wrote poems on kanyakumari, madurai and Lodhi gardens. His poetic work "tale of two gardens" compares India and Mexico as two gardens. In this, he concludes " the strangeness of India reminded me of the other strangeness of Mexico"-I have been reading a book of his for the last six months, unable to complete it. U will understand if i tell the title..... " Labyrinth of solitude ". It is about mexican character and identity. I got lost in the Mexican labyrinth, confused as to which labyrinth is more complex and confusing, Indian or Mexican?
- But despite the labyrinth, confusion and excess reality, Octavio Paz found one thing in India..love. He fell in love with marie jose and married her under the neem tree in his prithviraj residence in delhi. She became his second wife.
- There is a latino saying, " wife brings success .... and sucess brings the second wife and more women " That is how Octavio Paz got his second wife... and so did Vincente Fox, the President of Mexico !!
No comments:
Post a Comment