Sahitya Akademi

A Note from the Editor: The Little Genie

Author(s): S. Balu Rao
Source: Indian Literature, Vol. 31, No. 1 (123) (January-February, 1988), pp. 6-8, 156
Published by: Sahitya Akademi
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23336649
Accessed: 27-05-2016 18:03 UTC

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
http://about.jstor.org/terms

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted
digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about
JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Sahitya Akademi is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Indian Literature

This content downloaded from 168.83.89.190 on Fri, 27 May 2016 18:03:01 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 Indian
Literature
Sahitya Akademi's Literary Bi-monthly

No. 123: January-February, 1988 Vol. XXXI, No. 1

Dear Reader,
The Little Genie

T T WAS a cold winter evening. In a cave, in the flint quar

ries in the valley, the family hearth was burning. Around it
sat the old father, his woman and their three sons. Unlike on
other days, the sons had returned home separately, each from a
different direction. The old ailing father had not gone out that
day, but was working on his new flint weapon at home. He had
thought that the boys would bring back some big game, a
reindeer for instance, on which they would all feast. But all they
had brought individually was some speared fish and small fowl.
The scowls on their faces clearly showed that they had once
again quarrelled, fought and fallen out. The old man had advis
ed them time and again about the need to hang together, and
how, by that, it would be easy to face the constant threats of
attack from wild boars and the like. But were they the ones to
listen, these savage boys! On occasions, he had even scolded and
beat them, but to no avail. The only thing left to him now was
to drive them out and let each live his own life separately.
As the old man kept thinking, his eyes screwed to the burn
ing hearth, he had an idea and his face began to glow. He look
ed at his sons by turns and picked up a flaming log from the
hearth.
The sons knew that their father was a tough man given to
fits of anger at times. The eldest who was sitting close by feared

This content downloaded from 168.83.89.190 on Fri, 27 May 2016 18:03:01 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 DEAR READER

that he had picked up the burning log to hit them with and was
ready to duck. But the old man did nothing of the sort. He
quietly laid it on one side. He did similarly with other logs,
too, as the sons looked on in bewilderment. One by one, the
fire in the logs went out. The cave was drowned in darkness
and cold.
The youngest of the sons, dear to the old man, made bold to
ask: "Why did you put out the fire, papa? As it is, the cold is
unbearable."
"No, sons, I did not put them out," replied the father.
"They put out by themselves. Together, when they burned, it
was fire, it was light. But, each by itself is deadwood."
Father's stratagem had worked. The message had gone
home. It set the sons thinking. From that day, there was no
occasion for them to quarrel.

This is not a page from a book on Anthropology, nor

recorded history, but only a spur-of-the-moment speculation as
to how the first-ever story in the world could have taken its
birth anywhere in early times, after the primitive man had set
tled down as Homo Sapien, a Thinking Man. It is the story of the
birth of the short short story, of the genesis of the Little Genie.
Wherever and however might have been its birth, whatever
be the shape of its primordial form, the short short story has
grown and developed with human civilization, all over the
word, taking protean forms, as myth, parable, fable, tale, fairy
tale, folk tale, allegory, etc., to serve both religious and secular
ends and to achieve diverse purposes as to reveal, to instruct and
to entertain and amuse. Our own tradition in India of the
genre is a long and strong one with an unbroken history of
centuries. Its manifestations and ramifications are to well known
to labour reiteration. Nevertheless, to note the high peaks for
the purpose of record: Firstly, in its seed-form in the Upani
shads, where surprisingly, in some of the early occurrences, it
serves to reveal essential truths rather than to instruct—a role
which became dominant subsequently. For instance, one can

This content downloaded from 168.83.89.190 on Fri, 27 May 2016 18:03:01 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 INDIAN LITERATURE

recall Sage Uddalaka enlightening his son Svetaketu on the

primacy of food over knowledge in the Oxhandogya. But in the
same Upanishad, there are also narrations, like the one in which
swans teach a lesson to King Janasruti, with animals and birds
becoming the dramatis personae and the story receiving the at
tributes of a fable. After the Upanishads, in Mahabharata and
the Puranas, where it takes a mythological form with gods and
sages as characters. With the advent of Buddhism and Jainism,
as Jataka tales and Bhaväntara tales about past births, for reli
gious instruction. Finally, with Panchatantra, getting firmly
rooted as didactic fable for teaching practical wisdom and dis
persing all over the world in innumerable translations and adap
tations, certainly a rare tribute to the genius of the Indian mind,
a feat difficult even for a modern Nobel Award-winning novel
in this jet age and of electronic media. Then, further expanding
in Kshemendra's Brihatkatha-manjari and Somadeva's Katha
sarit-sagara and further branching out into romantic tales, pretty
and clever, of Vetala-pancavimsati, Simhasana-dvatrimsatika and
Suka-saptati. Similarly, there must be many in modern Indian
languages also.

When we turn to contemporary literature, some important

questions arise. On the main, is the tradition still continuing,
and, if so, how vibrant is the form today? Compared to the past,
what is its aesthetics now? The same? Or different?
What with the gaping paucity of coordinated information at
one point about twenty-plus languages spread over a vast coun
try, it is difficult to give a definite answer to the first question. But
certain things are clear. The tradition is very much there but ins
tances of writers taking to it wholly as a singular pursuit are rare.
Here and there, as for instance, in Hindi or Telugu, there are
some practising it in a big way. But most writers do it along with
other genres of fiction. They attempt it only sporadically when
a particular theme or subject-matter calls for expression as a
short-short. One can cite the late Bonophul from Bengali and
Continued on p. 156

This content downloaded from 168.83.89.190 on Fri, 27 May 2016 18:03:01 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
 INDIAN LITERATURE

Dear Reader

Continued from p. 8
Pudumaipittan from Tamil as cases in point.
In more recent times, the periodical press with its accent on
variety and more matter in short space has given the form a
great boost. It has come to receive interesting new names like
'Mini Stories' in Telugu and 'Hani Kathegalu' (Story in a Drop)
in Kannada.

As for its aesthetics, it is now no more a mere invention, but

perception. It has moved away from the traditional instruction to
exploration and from entertainment at the base level to creative
expression of the human situation.
As a proof of the foregoing statements, we have put toge
ther in this issue twentyfour such short-shorts from ten langu
ages by twenty of our eminent writers. The purpose of this ex
ercise is not just to provide some good readable stories, but to
explore the possibilities of the medium and how various effects
can be achieved in it. Firstly, there are stories which retain a
smack of old fables, but point at new 'morals' or truths. Then
there are sheer human-interest stories to depict human situa
tions or quirks in human nature and behaviour. In quite a few,
the dominant strain is satire or irony, buttressed with humour.
There are fine allegories, one in Dantean manner on the pre
dicament of man (and woman) in the universe and another, a
macabre piece, on the situation of woman in marriage. Some
narrate strange spine-chilling incidents, real or imaginary, call
them supernatural or extra-sensory. There is one which is a visual
of a frozen moment in time, and so on, We will not spell out
which is what, but leave it to the readers to exercise their minds
and discover for themselves and further find yet other meanings
in them. If these short-shorts can engage them in such a creative
exploration, the feature will have more than served its purpose.
S. Balu Rao

156

This content downloaded from 168.83.89.190 on Fri, 27 May 2016 18:03:01 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms