I’ve always loved comic books—actually, any illustrated book. It seems insane that you wouldn’t. Why wouldn’t you want words and pictures to work together, in harmony? But many people don’t. They think the pictures are a shortcut, that the words cheapen the images.
This post is clearly not for them. I believe in shortcuts, as starting points to learning. When I was 10, I found a book of “collected stories of Shakespeare.” I didn’t know who Shakespeare was, but the book—illustrated, of course—introduced me to his wondrous, unlimited imagination. That kind of fascination does not die easily. For me, it taking and eventually teaching classes in Shakespeare, and rushing to every Shakespearean adaptation, no matter how bizarre (Ethan Hawke’s Hamlet springs to mind as does Pacino’s Looking for Richard). If it hadn’t been for that initial taste, in bite size 10-year old pieces, I might be one of those unfortunates who glaze over every time the Bard is mentioned.
So, back to comic books. I’m an avowed X-Men fan, and was weaned on Wonder Woman, but my first comic book love was and still is Amar Chitra Katha. Wait—is that eye-rolling I see? I hope not.
Amar Chitra Katha was my “short cut” into Indian culture. I was lucky; my parents always had Indian friends who they saw often, who had children I who I went to school with, and tried to surround us with the culture that they had grown up with. As soon as I learned to read, my father did two things: bought me a nice “Ex-Libris” leather bookmark, and the entire Amar Chitra Katha comic book series, bound with red paper covers.
Bear in mind that I grew up with parents who strictly limited my weekly library book allowance to 5 (and no magazines), and you will understand, as I did then, the significance of this purchase. By some quirk, I started with the second 10 books first—Chanyaka through Vikramaditya. But I quickly read every one.
For those of you who do not know, Amar Chitra Katha is a venerable old Indian comic book series that tells the tales of Indian myths, history and religious stories. There has been much recent criticism of the comics; here is a typical link.
This article throws a lot of heat at AKC’s way, some deserved. Racist? Of course—lots about the caste system in ancient Hindu culture. Sexist? Ditto. Badly written? Well, it was pretty pompous—I made the mistake of “taking a vow of silence” on the playground one day that ended somewhat badly for me. And I know that many people minded having to look up words like “dharma” or “asura” but I was fine with it. (of course, if you’ve read my Nerd/Geek entry, you’d know why).
I did not learn many bad lessons from Amar Chitra Katha. I was perplexed by how many people had blue skin. But mostly, I learned that my culture was beautiful, that it was old and important, that its values were very complex. I went easily from stories of Guru Gobind Singh to Buddha to Valmiki to Noor Jahan, unaware that I was supposed choose one over the other. That was the one thing that Amar Chitra lacked—animosity. I read stories, but I didn’t really grasp how many old angers divided the cultures I read about. And I still have a weak timeline of Indian history.
The AKC comics are not perfect, but what children’s literature is? It’s all exaggeration and fantasy, run through with threads of violence and death. It’s always about the beautiful conquering the ugly—but also about the clever conquering the stupid, and the lazy. My collection of AKC sparked a sense of identity in myself. I loved my MTV and played with Barbies, but this, this ancient, magical India, was part of me too.
As a non-practicing Hindu, I would hate, absolutely hate, an Amar Chitra Katha that didn’t allow all religions to tell their stories in comic book form, that allowed me to understand why Sikhs wear turbans and why Hindu sages once starved themselves, what the practice of syamvara is. The stories will never be fully accurate—they are just like my book of “Shakespeare stories” but the planted a seed of interest in Indian history that hasn’t gone away. With Amar Chitra Katha, I could incorporate my eight-year old interpretations of Buddhist teachings (that Siddharta was so good!)with Vedic ones (go Rama! go Krishna!), to investigate what traditions (polygamy, child marriage, widow burning) are no longer central to the culture. I want my children to have the same opportunity that I did to act out both the stories of Akbar the Clever and the Mahabharata. I’ve heard rumors that these comic books are or have been edited by the Hindu nationalist party—I sincerely hope not. I’ve never believed in silencing minority voices.
That said, I wouldn’t mind updated, glossy versions of the old AKC comics, a few more stories about clever apsaras or sage’s daughters who outwitted demons disguised as foxes. A few more warrior maidens like Noor Jahan rather than martyrs like Padmini, and I’d be ready to stock my library for future generations of lawyerwriters.
But all the excitement I feel is nothing compared to what I’d feel if someone did a really good adaptation of a Mahabharata—top of the line special effects, great storytelling, top writing. I haven’t seen it yet. Because I love the story, I have suffered through years of plastic-looking battle scenes, melodramatic line-reading and blandly smiling Krishnas. If movies like The Matrix and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon can revolutionize action sequences, the least we can do is get the folks behind Xena the Warrior Princess to get us a convincing Ghatokacha, or at least Ravana with heads that don’t look like a row of masks. And can we get battle scenes that consist more that than men in cardboard armor fighting clanging swords in front a smoke machine to the sounds of pots and pans clanging? Please? Someone, look up Saving Private Ryan or even Gladiator for a good war sequence. What’s wrong with keeping the comic-book sensibility, the great visuals that AKC popped into my head, alive! If they can do it with Spiderman, they can do it with Abhimanyu.
After all, what more can I expect from the X-Men? I don’t have high hopes for the movie, which is coming out this Friday, and which I will probably see anyway. I believe this fixation will last about as long as the opening credits. First of all, as I have said before, no Gambit. What, was Josh Lucas too waterlogged from Poseidon? Second, lesser director. It’s a tough thing to go from Bryan Singer (The Usual Suspects) to Brett Ratner (Rush Hour). The latter is a competent action director; the former is a storyteller. Third: I just KNOW they’re going to blow the whole Dark Phoenix storyline.
If I get bored during the movie, I’ll work on casting my fantasy Mahabharata in my head. Unfortunately, I really don’t know too many Bollywood actors, which makes keeping the fantasy cast brown and proud very hard. Will we have to plug in key roles using….white actors? Maybe even…the token African-American? The scandal! The riots! The ritual suicides waiting to happen!
Just remember: anything is better than Salman Khan.
