Nikay Besa Konyak
Research Scholar
“Ring-a-ring o’ roses,
A pocket full of poises,
A-tishoo! A-tishoo!
We all fall down.”
A nursery rhyme and a play ground singing for children and what appears to be cute and fun filled that if we dig a little deeper, it will reveal shockingly the sinister backstories. The 1665 Great plague of London: the “rosie” being the noisome rash that developed on the skin of bubonic plague sufferers, mithe with a “pocket full of poises”. The bubonic plague killed 15 % of Britain’s population, hence “atishio, atishio, we all fall down’.
Before the virus of the novel Covid-19 walked the earth, most people thought that epidemic and pandemic crises have plummeted effectively in the last few decades due to the unprecedented achievements of twentieth-century medicine, which has provided us with vaccinations, antibiotics, improved hygiene and a much better medical literature. It is quite natural to believe it so because the world has witnessed of how the outbreaks of SARS (2002-2003) and Ebola (2014), were quickly contained. Fewer than 1,000 died of SARS and not more than 11,000 of Ebola, mostly in Africa. Even HIV AIDS (1980s), which killed 30 million people worldwide, has ceased to be fatal in most cases. All thanks to the work of scientists. While being optimistic at this trying time, we also believe that science will find a way to defeat the Covid-19 sooner than we think; nevertheless we are still fighting the novel virus without vaccines or cure like waiting to win a game by potentially engaging in lockdowns, social distancing and self quarantining. At this troubled times, many people try to escape the time of monotonous waitings by engaging in numerous activities, and as a lover of literature, here is to you bringing forth a self engaging activity to gain an insight as how to deal with Corona Virus through literature. Few literary works among many works bestowed by eminent writers are being listed below, and reading those works will impact us with insights of how the world since its inception has been facing different phases of crises in the midst of normal existence. These few literary works about plagues are highly readable, gripping, fascinating, humourous and topical. You will find yourself engaging in the stories as you compare how people have responded during the pandemic crises earlier. It is intriguingly acceptable that language and literature might not occupy a place to find vaccine or cure for a disease that attacks the world, but it can be a source to gain profound and deep inspection of events during pandemics at all times, and it also help us gain consolations in times of need. It is a way of sharing humanist concern.
At times like this, when our thoughts are running wild, escaping into other experiences, or trying to understand what’s happening around the world, literature can be a kind of lifesaver that will help us to rejuvenate our emotions, mentalities and hope to survive at these trouble times. One can also be highly productive by engaging in reading books especially if you are home alone and has nothing much to do other things.
“Tagore’s poem, “Purtan Bhritya” tells the story of a house helper who nursed his master to health but succumbs to small box. A much- loved poem of times that holds a mirror to our troubled times. This poem was composed in 1985 during the undivided India, when ruled by the colonial government, the health care system being skewed in favour of the rich, the upper-castes, and the British. The poor faced ire of epidemics like small pox and cholera. In this poem, Puratan Bhrittya (“An Old Servant”), the small pox turns out to be a leveller between the classes, revealing the structural gross injustice internalised by the society that Tagore lived in.”
“The plague, a novel by Albert Camus, published in 1947 that tells the story from the point of view of an unknown narrator of a plague sweeping the French Algerian city of Oran.’ This novel narrates the story about the people on the coast of Algiers that had never imagined the idea of facing the plague; yet found themselves battling it. What the writer attempts to draw from his writing is the portrait of what it is to be human in trying times. There is much discussion by the characters of how the plague cannot be simple accepted but must faced and fought. ‘On this earth there are pestilences and there are victims, ‘says one character, ‘and as far as possible one must refuse to be on the side of the pestilence.”
“The Decameron is a collection of novellas by the 14th Century Italian author Giovanni Boccaccio that structured as frame story containing 100 tales told by a group of seven young women and three young men sheltering in as secluded villa just outside the Florence to escape the Black Death, which was afflicting the city. This literary masterpiece holds the recipe on how to defy troubled times, and he painted a picture of a society on the brink of absolute disappearance- would everyone in Florence die? And what has all this to do with times of crisis? All his tales are about new life, about survival, human activities and how people can be prosperous and creative even in the worst of times.”
“Beauty Salon (1994) by Mario Bellatin is a novel written in response to HIV/ AIDS outbreak in the 1980s. The novel is set in a large unnamed city struck by a plague which is killing young men. The state’s institutions have abandoned them, and this is when the protagonist, a transvestite hair stylist, opens up his salon to provide shelter to these dying and rejected men. “It wasn’t death that got me,” he says, “the only thing I wanted was to make sure these people, abandoned by state hospitals, didn’t die like dogs in the middle of the street.”
“Blindness (1997) is a novel by Portuguesse Author Jose Saramago. It is a novel written about a situation when a mass epidemic of blindness striked an unnamed city, where law and order breaks down and the government opts for increasingly authoritarian but hair-brained measures to keep the city in control. The novel protagonists, the novel’s only character who does not lose her sight, is the beacon of reason and hope as she and her husbands, a doctor, try to survive in the city where institutions have stopped functioning, families have been broken up, and there are riots in the streets.”
“The novel that has spawned a hundred “Love in the Time of Cholera” by Gabriel García Márquez’s literary classic has been called one of the greatest love stories ever told and the greatest literature of all times. Published in Spanish in 1985 and translated into English three years later, Love in the Time of Cholera begins a century earlier, in an unnamed city similar to Cartagena, on the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza are young and falling passionately in love when Fermina chooses to marry someone else; it takes nearly 51 years for their love to be fulfilled. Against a backdrop of recurring civil war and recurring cholera epidemics, Márquez explores death, decay and the idea of lovesickness as disease. Márquez, who won the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature, offers a lyrical escape to the sensual, sensory landscape of turn-of-the-century South America.”
There are many fictional and true story based novels published only recently, so as to mention a few like : Orax and Crake by Margaret At wood (2003), The children's hospital by Christ Adrain (2006), The transmigration of bodies by Yuri Herrera (2013), The Years of Rice and Salt by Robinson (2002), and the list goes on.
No matter what’s going on in the world, or what is happening with you, literary works can provide insight, comfort or a welcome escape. As the COVID-19 outbreak continues and many of us are experiencing fears, uncertainties and sorrows; and while some seeking entertainment while staying home, reading offers some respites. Now may be the time to finally dig into that epic novel you’ve had on your shelf forever; now may be the time to make reading and writing to be your hobby; revisit an old favorite or try something out of your reading comfort zone. These days, thankfully, books are easy to access without leaving home. Libraries across the map allow cardholders to borrow e-books and audiobooks without visiting a branch. Several companies are also offering free e-books and audiobooks right now. A few of book apps also offers free trails. Grab it and immerse youserlf into the book which might help you to overcome this pandemic by being sensible towards this crisis. We are all together fighting in a different way, and I hope your way of fighting helps yourself and the society around you. Happy reading!
