Folks,
Let me first dispose of the minor points, of which there are several.
No more Shri: First, Shivdutt. I knew that our luck would not hold for too long, as soon as Anusuya and my adorable little Malay came on the screen, I knew that our bete noire could no be far behind. He came, he rolled his eyes and bared his teeth less than a foot away from Anusuya's face, and tried to intimidate her. He failed signally.
Just as I was saying Atta girl!! , 👏 for her, I was doubly pleased to note that at long last, she has come round to calling him just Shivdutt. No more Shri. I cheered silently!😃
Cleitus: End nigh: His death, at Alexander's hands, is now, it seems finally close at hand.
Historically, Cleitus was killed much earlier, after a drunken spat he had with Alexander in Persia. He not only condemned the Persianisation of their customs that Alexander was introducing as part of his grand scheme of merging the two cultures, but went much farther, attacking not just Alexander but his mother Olympias as well, calling her a witch. Alexander, who was also drunk, grabbed the spear of a bystander and ran Cleitus through.
Once he realised what he had done, he was distraught, for Cleitus, though not a close comrade like Hephaestion, had been with him from the very beginning of his campaign and had, moreover, saved his life at the battle of Granicus. His repentance was so violent that all around became alarmed and tried hard to console him, and the army later passed a resolution condemning Cleitus for treason.
Here, this incident has not only been delayed, but the build up to it looks very odd, with Cleitus waiting for several moments before he joins in the cheering after Alexander recovers from his prolonged immersion in the Jhelum, and generally displaying none of the anxiety that wracks the faces of both Hephaestion and the Macedonian troops.
I do not know how the killing of Cleitus is going to play out in the end, but it bids fair to look contrived and unconvincing.
Bamni and Puru: Abundant affection: The scene of the father and son meeting once more was deeply emotional, with both displaying the abundant love they now have for each other. But Bamni also mananged to project the bone weariness of a man who has been close to death, and has survived only to need a lengthy process of recuperation. Puru, on the other hand, after having been almost drowned in the river, looked as fresh as a daisy!
Puru-Laachi: Sweetly romantic: Yes, yes, I know that it was in the previous episode, but I wanted to include this para as I really loved their scene. Puru was not making any speeches, and Laachi was, praise be to God, not coquetting - she never does,bless her ! - , and they were just perfect together.
The more I see of Laachi, the more I like her. She is a strong, capable girl, unfazed by any crisis that might surface, and her commitment to Puru and his cause is deep, genuine, and for keeps. Plus she is also delightfully pretty!😊
The contrast with Alexander's fate in the romance stakes could not be more dismal!!😉
Pat on my back!: I was also very pleased that I had, for once, predicted correctly that it was Laachi who had set off the blast, for all that it all looked very artificial (98 times out of 100, the mashaal she tosses from quite far away would have fallen into the water and got extinguished, but here the flames roar instantly into life and the explosive goes off!😕)
Ambhiraj and Alexander: I liked Ambhiraj's lucid and thorough explanation of the reason why Bharatiyas welcome any vistor with a pranam with folded hands. But it was odd to hear Sony Alexander (this is to accommodate complaints that the historical Alexander is being deliberately confused by some with the Swastik version, to the greater glory of the latter. I shall use Sony as the suffix as it is easier to type out)asking why this was always done this way. Where could he have noted this so often as to use the word always? The only Bharatiya he has met formally was Chanakya, who greeted him with a pranam. Perhaps he means the locals he might have met, but that sounds unlikely.
Yes, and the quickness with which Ambhiraj rearrranged his startled face and accepted the credit for having had the bridge blown up and Porus (supposedly) killed. He was flummoxed only for a moment, unlike most of our serial characters who goggle endlessly in shock.😆
But I was surprised that Alexander, who is normally lynx-eyed, did not notice the sign made by Porus to Laachi, which was immediately followed by the blast. This should have told Alexander that the blast was a ploy by Porus, but it did not.😲
A Jalal in the making?: Be that as it may, the way in which Sony Alexander copied his dharampatni's gesture and folded his hands, though he did not go so far as to say pranam as well, seems to have stirred up fears that he is on his way to do a Jalal, and that the haiwaan bhediya darinda rakshas, and now siyaar Alexander would soon be "reformed" and made an insaan by his wife, a la Jodha Begum.😉😉
I think these fears are unfounded. The real Alexander was himself interested in foreign cultures--- he had after all received the best education available in the west from the great philosopher Aristotle, the pupil of Plato, who was the pupil of Socrates. By all accounts, he made special efforts to meet rishis and learned Brahmins in and around Takshashila, and discussed philosophical and metaphysical subjects with them.
Though Sony Alexander came to us only at 18, one can take it, from his reference to Ustad Arastu (Aristotle) that the education he received was the same as for the real one. Also, what he said to Chanakya about not being interested in Bharatiya customs was not serious. He was trying to take this highly unusual aalim down a peg, as Chanakya was getting under his skin, as I had noted in my last post.
As for his obsession with Roxanne, that might deepen this interest. It definitely didn't create it.
Chanakya and Alexander: Siyaar ki pratibha
Now, Chanakya's term, last night, for Sony Alexander was siyaar, or jackal.
This animal, though noted for its cunning and resourcefulness, is mostly not itself a hunter-killer, and subsists for the most part by scavenging the kills of the bigger predators, especially the big cats like lions or tigers. It ranks well below the big cats in the pecking order in the animal world. Many here were thus shocked, and outraged, when Chanakya thus demoted Alexander, a lion on the battlefield and off it, from even the earlier bhediya, or wolf, to a siyaar or jackal!😲
A less appropriate term for a world conqueror, a man who had met the greatest army the world had then seen, the Persian one, with a much smaller force, and defeated it fair and square in open battle, not once but twice, could not have been imagined (OK, Gaugamela, considered one of the most brilliant, tactically, of Alexander's victories, has been swallowed up by the CVs, so for Sony Alexander, just once!) .
It seemed as if Chanakya had, for once, lost it, and was allowing his detestation of the invader Alexander to cloud his sense of judgement in his regard, something that hardly accorded with his reputation for omniscience.
I, however, did not share this sense of shock and outrage. Let us look at the evidence, going beyond that one word, and checking what Chanakya then says about the Alexander (from now on, the Sony one).
We then find that despite having used this definitely derogatory term for him, Chanakya rates the Sony Alexander very highly.
Tumne apni aankhon se Alexander ki niti dekhi, Puru (now here Chanakya is wrong, for our Puru sees only what he wants to see!😉). Apne shatru se 5 pag aage ki soch rakhta hai wo....someone whose mind is always five steps ahead of his adversary... Maine swayam pehli bhent mein uski pratibha ko pehchan liya!
Here it is, the real McCoy. What Chanakya really thinks of Alexander after that meeting.For pratibha is a very strong word, which means genius, brilliance, talent, ability. Its root, aabha, means glow, or glory, and it conveys a sense of radiant effulgence, like the rays of the sun.
Then he mentions Alexander having declared himself as eeshwar, or God, and notes that Eeshwar ko rokh paana aasaan nahin. Here Chanakya, unaware of the Greek concept of divinity and semi-divinity, thinks that Alexander is calling himself God (with the capital G), and not a god,which is what Alexander says (far too often of late!). But the meaning he seeks to convey is clear, that Alexander has the incomparable self-confidence that comes with the assumption of divine status, and is thus going to be tough to halt in his tracks.
Note that Chanakya is here not talking of Puru defeating Alexander, only of stopping him (from penetrating deeper into Bharat).
In short, Chanakya recognizes, and respects, the towering force of nature that Alexander is.
Which is why he says, finally, Lekin Alexander wo dhara hai jise bhatkaya to jaa sakta hai, roka nahin ja sakta. And goes on to add that Alexander would soon rebuild the bridge across the Jhelum and also learn that Puru was alive.
So when Chanakya equates Alexander with a siyaar, it seems to be not really as a derogatory term, but as one meant to stress his shrewdness and his tactical and strategic vision. The lion, on the other hand, is not much known for intelligence, only for brute power, which is why Chanakya tells Puru Sinh ko haraana aasaan hai, Puru, siyaar ko nahin.
A reality check for Puru: More important, Chanakya provides a masterly reality check regarding Alexander for Puru's benefit, which probably brought Puru's smugness down several pegs. His rather blunt comment that he had already praised Puru for blowing up that bridge was obviously an exasperated reaction to Puru's unwarranted sang froid.
Like the cool way in which he was talking about assembling a sanghatith sena if he gets the time, which he says he has bought for himself by blowing up the bridge across the Jhelum (which I never knew existed😕) . He forgets that it needs both money and the ability to locate the men and train them, unless he can get the Paurav Rashtra troops to abandon Shivdutt and Kanishka,who is now the anointed Maharaja there.
It is clear to the Acharya that Puru is too cocky and is grossly underestimating Alexander, and he wants to set him right.
For when it comes to the issue of Akhanda Bharat, Chanakya and Puru are, as I had noted in my last post, soulmates.
It is not for nothing that Chanakya was rated as having the sharpest mind in all of Bharat in that age.
This said, I could not quite fathom something that Chanakya said at this point. No, not that the Jhelum was the sole obstacle in Alexander's path. It was rather what he said about what would happen once Alexander crossed the Jhelum. That then Paurav Rashtra, then Magadha, then poora Bharat uske adheen hoga..
But why? Why does Chanakya rate the military strength of Magadha under Dhananand so low? The answer is that he does not. He, however, wants to ginger Puru up with a more limited objective than victory on the battlefield against Alexander. This is to prevent Alexander from crossing the Jhelum in the first place.
And Puru does precisely what the wily old gentleman hopes he will, take a solemn pran, or vow, that he will not allow Alexander to cross the Jhelum.
The quixotic Pran: This is really a very odd thing for the CVs to spring on us. I can't make it out at all, their game plan, I mean.
Sony Alexander makes grandiloquent statements periodically, but he has, thus far, never taken any oaths, either in the name of Zeus, or plain vanilla ones! 😉
In the unwritten, but cast iron code governing our TV serials, a vachan, a shapath, or the even stronger pran taken by a major character, in this case the leading man, HAS to be fulfilled in toto.
Does this mean that Alexander and Porus are going to slug it out on the Takshashila side of the Jhelum? 😆
Since one thing that is crystal clear historically is that Alexander crossed the Jhelum through a brilliant feint, and confronted Porus on the east bank, this new take, if it materialises, would be one for the history books, the ones documenting the rise and fall of Indian historical TV serials, that is!😉😉
While we wait with bated breath to see what exactly happens, I would recommend that you visit the hilarious thread, Maa ka doodh, opened by LuckySnow. You will not regret it, the only negative consequence likely to be that your ribs are sure to ache for laughing!
A special request: I was asked by Inlieu to try and decipher the expression in Alexander's eyes when he comes to after his prolonged immersion in the Jhelum. Now I can only state what I felt on watching it, which might not be the same as what the actor intended and the director wanted. Anyhow, here goes, and I am including it here in case others besides Inlieu are interested in this matter.
Alexander recovers his senses, coughing, and as his eyes open, they focus first on Roxanne, then shift to the desperate Hephaestion who has been pressing his chest to get the water out, back to Roxanne, and then finally to his anxious soldiers.
As he lifts himself slightly, his eyes remain on Roxanne. Even when Hephaestion exclaims anxiously, his voice quivering with the strain, Khuda ka shukr hai... Koyi takleef to nahin? Alexander's gaze does not shift at first.
When he does look at Hephaestion, he does not allow him to help him up.'This is completely understandable. Alexander can never be seen needing any kind of help from anyone, even his dearest friend and alter ego.
He pulls himself erect with some difficulty, but his eyes are still looking into Roxanne's. It is as if he were searching for something. Some hint, no matter how small, that she had been worried about what might have happened to him, that she cared for him. His face is still, but the green brown eyes are alive, questing, hoping.
In vain, for there is no answering spark in Roxanne's steady, almost blank gaze, nor does she move an inch towards him in a gesture of caring. I was not surprised, but for Alexander it was clearly like a parched man in a desert ending up with a mirage.
His gaze becomes opaque, inward looking, as if a curtain had come down over the eyes, shutting his soul away from the gaze of the curious. He moves past her, stooping to pick up his sword, to address his soldiers, to enthuse them, to get them to shake off the anxiety and fear that had taken possession of them, and to infuse them with his own courage and resilience.
His chest heaves visibly as his lungs struggle to achieve normalcy, but by sheer force of will, he ensures that nothing of that struggle shows in his voice or his body language.
For once, I was not exasperated by his umpteenth affirmation that he was not only Zeus ki aulad but was himself a devta, and as such, he could never die. Under these circumstances, it was absolutely necessary.
I loved the aapka in the line: Isliye aapka Alexander bhi kabhi nahin marega! It was a subtle reaffirmation of the bond between him and his soldiers, a bond like none other, forged on the battlefield and off it over more than a decade of relentless campaigning and endless marches , where he had shared every danger and every difficulty with them.
As his relieved soldiers, sword in hand, roared his name, Alexander's eyes scanned the multitude. As the cheers grew ever louder, they were lit up by triumph, and he smiled.
Alexander was back.
The President's tweet: To end on an unusual note, LuckySnow (who is really most resourceful) had located a tweet by the President of India about,of all things, Alexander and Porus. It goes as follows.
Of course Alexander the Great was not Greek but Macedonian, but till date,there is no breaking news about official protests to the Rashtrapati Bhavan from Macedonia (a former republic of Yugoslavia). Albania etc. who also claim Alexander as their own. 😆 The Greeks,who despised the Macedonians as "barbarians" in Alexander's time, are now ready,eager and willing to proclaim him a true blue Greek, as the reply tweet indicates,😉
Since the President would never have had the time, or the inclination, to watch our show, his mind doesn't resemble the scrambled eggs to which the cerebral apparatus of most of us has been reduced. So he sees things clearly and simply.
This said, I can't at all visualize any such dramatic transformation in the relationship between Sony Porus and Sony Alexander. That would have needed a far more sophisticated and nuanced treatment of the pair of them than what we have been treated to. Indian TV seems to mostly look down on its viewers and to infantilise them by feeding them pap.😡
OK,folks, that is, finally, it. If you have read it and liked it, please do not forget to press the Like button.
Shyamala Aunty/Di
