Originally posted by: sashashyam
Dear Vicki,
A beautiful piece of writing. I particularly liked the impressionistic concept of your take on today's episode, which is, as you say, open to any number of interpretations and assessments. After all, Claude Monet, the quintessential Impressionist, did say once Close your eyes, and you will see that the snow is pink!
I agree completely with your summings up of Salima and Ruqaiya, especially the former,where your lyrical prose is as evocative of the essence of her persona as her ittar.
Thank you, Shyamala. 😃... yes, you can see one thing from a thousand coloured glasses and it would mean a thousand different things. Someone else may see Ruqqu and Saleema differently from what i see - it depends on individual thought , perception and evaluation.
Not with that of Jodha, where I think you - and you are of course far from alone in this respect - tend to romanticise her to excess, perhaps as the designated heroine. I do not see her as embodying all shades of humanity and womanhood, unless you include in this description being brattish, and overtly and publicly rude to the man who is both her husband and an emperor, and thus has to be accorded at least public respect.
I think my interpretation depends on my definition of humanity. And from where i see it, humanity includes both the good and the bad in us, irrespective of what the dictionary says. If Jodha is angelic as white to Raheem, she is as calm as blue to Hameeda and as intense and hot as red with Jalaal. I didn't even think that am romanticizing Jodha- am seeing her as an all round individual in all her shades. If she refuses to answer Jalaal in the Meena Bazaar, she defends his honour as well when he is not looking. That is what she is for me - ALL SHADES.
Not to forget a tendency to hold forth, at the drop of a hat, about the superiority of her native culture in the most condescending and even sarcastic manner possible, like a Hyde Park soap box orator. I found her lecture on colours pompous throughout, delivered as if she was talking to an uncultured inferior being, and in parts completely meaningless.
She was also trying so hard to needle him that she lost sight of all good sense and even her royal breeding. Her apologists never tire of saying about Jodha that she never fails to maintain proper decorum towards her husband in public, no matter how she rails at him in private. Today, she threw even that to the winds. The way is which she declared, in answer to his polite question of what was the significance of having a stall of colours, that she did not consider it necessary to tell him that, was not only extremely rude, but betrayed a total lack of breeding dismaying in a princess born. One wonders what the Shahenshah' s attendants, not to speak of her own,would have thought about such behaviour in public. Nothing flattering to Jodha, I am sure.
If Jodha had no intense and rather unhealthy history with Jalaal, i would second you on all that you have said above. But that is not the case at all. Till the time, Jalaal did not talk about sending Jodha back home to Amer, Jodha, still wounded by the Ekaantwaas and 'zinda jalaa denge' rant of Jalaal , was curt to him privately but she kept his honour and her duty as his wife - defending Jalaal in front of Raheem, telling Jalaal in public that she doesn't like seeing him beg and scolding commoners for trashing Jalaal...but the offer of Jalaal that threatened to send her back to Amer has driven her up the wall. She has no idea what she is feeling but whatever it is, it is making her behave worse than ever. No justification. But we all know the root cause.
I was delighted that her deliberate impertinence in soiling what she thought to be his white dupatta boomeranged on her,and she fell flat on her face. I almost cheered Jalal for having tripped her up so smoothly and effectively.
The symbolism of her colouring what would have been a widow's white with pink, thus making it a sign of happiness (for a wedded woman it would have to be red, not pink), as you put it so eloquently, would have been perfect, except that she did not do it for that purpose. She did it to spoil something that she thought belonged to him. That she was left with something gifted to her that is now unusable seemed to be poetic justice!
Its again how you look at it. For you, its poetic justice that Jalaal's gift is unusable to her by her own fury foolishness. For me, its the hand of fate that puts colour into a dead white that symbolizes that she will bring colour into his life and that colour will be of sentiment. Its like Jodha wanted to destroy something but ended up giving it a wholly another meaning. I know that the bridal colour is red but when i talk colour on clean white , i mean any colour which a married woman can wear.
It seemed to me that Jalal treated her today the way an adult treats an ill-behaved and obnoxious child, with exaggerated patience and unshaken calm . Not as if he was trying to patch up an as yet non-existent relationship, but rather as if he wanted a civil parting free of any hostility or vindictiveness. He thinks she has chosen to leave, which does not surprise him given the assurances of hatred and contempt that she bestows on him so liberally. I do not think that at this point he is thinking of her staying back, and when he refers to the aakhri khwahish of a departing guest, it is precisely that and no more.
To sum up, while we all know what is to happen eventually, probably after another 200 episodes, right now, to say that Jodha is Promising that this marriage is for keeps and she will always be his shield, seems to me to be so far out into the future as to be clean out of the range of sight for the present. In the meanwhile, I am tiring of all this unending prodding and poking of the tea leaves or chicken entrails to see where their putative love affair is headed, while all we get onscreen these days is an endless series of tiresome squabbles and exercises in one-upmanship, interspersed with bouts of rona dhona and acid-tipped exchanges.
I agree that Jalaal is truly keeping the patience of an adult for an obnoxious child , but at the same time, even he knows that he has done no angelic acts to her right from the time of marrying her and promising hell to her. Jodha is a loose cannon right now, but even this girl has been through hell, especially with the MC drama and the threat of death and shame on her and her family. On top of that, all that Jalaal is evoking inside her is only making her behaviour more irrational.
I have only mentioned the symbolism and i have no idea when it will happen - hopefully in less than 200 episodes😆... as for Jalaal, i will still believe that he wants Jodha to stay back , irrespective of whether he is aware of it or not - because he didn't order her to leave , he gave her a choice. Its another thing that Jodha is too blinded by her own frustration that she was given a choice. 😆
If I had paid for a ticket for this show, I would ask for my money back and go buy a DVD of Jodhaa Akbar. Aishwarya's Jodhaa would be balm for nerves frayed by the shenanigans of this avatar.
I do apologise if I sound acidic myself, but today's Meena Bazaar encounter set my teeth on edge. I set great store by proper behaviour and good breeding, and I do not like it when these are found to be so patently wanting in the accredited heroine.
Never apologize for what you feel and believe. Its your opinion and I respect that. You said what you felt and its perfectly okay. There is nothing acidic about it. 😃
Shyamala
Book Talk
Anupamaa
29