The Glory of Patan
Author- KM Munshi
Publisher- Penguin Random House, Rs499
The Glory of Patan, written by KM Munshi and translated by Rita Kothari and Abhijit Kothari, is much more than an imagined medieval romance, though it can convincingly be read as one. Its positioning and appropriation, as a foundational expression of Gujarati asmita — cultural pride and selfhood — is cause for interrogation, writes ANUBHAV PRADHAN
Translation is always a tricky affair. In India, there has been a steady increase in demand for translation of regional language literatures into English. However, even as translated works hit the market regularly, and translation in itself is an established discipline now, only rarely does one come across a translation which gives satisfaction.
Happily, Penguin Random House’s The Glory of Patan, the first offering in an upcoming trilogy, is one of those rare translations which provokes as much as it satisfies. Rita Kothari and Abhijit Kothari do complete justice to KM Munshi’s classic of Gujarati sahitya. At a time when fantasy and historical fiction is appealing to readers across the age spectrum, translations of such texts reacquaint us with the richness of our literary heritage and direct us to interrogating the parameters of our cultural selfhood. This may be because of the dearth of sound historical fiction in the subcontinent, literary as well as cinematic, but Munshi’s achievement in this landmark trilogy is not simply that of an accomplished writer. These books are passion measured to mould the identity of Gujarati culture.
Passionate may be the most appropriate describer for the plot and characterisation of The Glory of Patan. The narrative opens in medias res, in the thick of action: In 1150 AD King Karnadev of Patan, the primary city and kingdom of Gujarat, is on his deathbed, and conspiracies abound as various stakeholders converge onto the capital. Devprasad, the king’s nephew, gallops into Patan in the dead of the night with his son Tribhuvanpal, looking to ensure that the coronation of his brother Jaydev — Karnadev’s adolescent son — does not undermine the authority of the feudal lords of Patan. Simultaneously, the Jains of Chandravati send monk Anandsuri to win the trust of Queen Minaldevi and undermine the authority of Munjal Mehta, Patan’s chief minister and the Queen’s trusted aide — thus making Jainism the guiding moral and political authority in Patan. The Queen, Minaldevi, has her own agenda for power, and looks to use Anandsuri to weaken Munjal Mehta and Devprasad by pitting them against each other.
The plot moves quickly with the stage thus set for intrigue. As each protagonist looks to promote his or her stake in the power dynamics of Patan’s feudal court, skeletons tumble out of the royal closet and one witnesses the machinations which Minaldevi orchestrates to keep her hold on the throne. What unfolds dramatically is an epic saga of love, treachery, murder, and revenge: Tribhuvanpal finds his mother, Hansa, had been imprisoned by his aunt Minaldevi in connivance with Munjal Mehta; Anandsuri metamorphoses from a pacific, non-violent monk to a murderous zealot striving to expand Jainism at all costs; and Minaldevi finds herself ousted from her own city and palace as the shrewd merchant Udo whips popular support for Tribhuvanpal. Even as power corrupts some, others — like Devprasad and Prasann — hold onto lofty ideals of conduct, performing their duty unflinchingly for the betterment of Patan.
In all of this, therefore, it is Patan itself which reigns supreme as a framing metaphor. All action, all intrigue is for the sake of Patan, to make it stronger and richer. The city, as the Introduction acutely observes, is not as much a tangible entity as an intangible one, an ideational framework which instils devotion and patriotism in much the same way as Athens perhaps did for its citizens during the Persian Wars. Significantly, the fact that one does not get an idea of Patan as a city — its streets, residences, and places of worship and commerce — works to the narrative’s advantage as it creates an ideal of Gujarati asmita and weaves it inextricably with the conduct of not just Patan’s leaders but also its ordinary citizens. Duty, honour, courage, love, all of these are inked richly in stark hues of righteous and reprehensible evocative of the spontaneous impulse of action which frames the medieval romance in popular imagination.
The Glory of Patan is, of course, much more than an imagined medieval romance, though it can very convincingly be read as one. Its positioning, and appropriation, as a foundational expression of Gujarati asmita — cultural pride and selfhood — is cause for interrogation, though the Introduction does not expand on this theme. It might also not have been a miss to have added a little more in terms of the text’s reception history to the Introduction. Nonetheless, this handsomely produced, accessibly priced, and neatly executed translation is thrillingly readable in a way few other historical novels are.
The reviewer is a doctoral candidate with the Department of English, Jamia Millia Islamia