Exploring 'Small Towns on the River': Life, Death, and Eternity in Mamang Dai's Poem

hello namaskar vanakam small towns on the river which has been pending for a long time though I've already done a

recording of this for Maharashtra Class 12 state board because their syllabus also contains the same poem by mang da

but I'm doing it again for the students of ISC Class 12 um before I start let me tell you that I would be posting the

short Theme notes of this on the Instagram page of study with sudhir so whoever wants to have a look at it can

take it from there also um apart from that you would need to note down the explanation points of each stanza there

are seven stanza some big some small in this poem so please keep a notebook and pen so that you can note it down while I

explain this like other poems of Class 12 is also an extremely complicated and complex poem

I'm not I mean I remember struggling with it when I explained it for the Maharashtra state board so uh let me put

that caveat right at the beginning two more things before I start because once I start I will be in that zone so I will

not want to get distracted many of you have been asking me what where do we go for the question and answers I may may

is the operative word I may put some question and answer this year we are not doing any success test papers or

question bank for Class 12 students like we had done for class 11 we are not doing it so please keep that in mind I

really don't have that bandwidth what I'm doing it because I really found when we went two months ago as I have

explained to you before also that I really found that this particular question bank which has been put out by

oswall books is pretty comprehensive very comprehensive so there are two things out here if you are the kind of

student who needs help with short notes explanation of the poem or the scene or the story then different kinds of

questions as per the new format of the question paper put out by the icsc council then question bank is what you

should go for okay because questions question and answers reliable explanation points say for each

chapter and the scenes of meth so this you will find it very useful however if you are the kind of

student I've seen all the study with video so I understand every poem Every scene of Meb every this thing every

chapter then you could go in for just the sample papers which has been put out this is just released last week sample

papers put out by alwal this has 10 sample papers five of them are solved five of them are for you to assess

yourself with hints given this is something which you could look at so it's entirely up to you you have to

assess ke between now before the pre-board and the final board examinations in

February so depending on that and this is for all all subjects for all subjects I've got it checked by physics chemistry

maths biology Computer Applications teachers for question Banks and sample papers they've all said that in fact let

me tell you this dayve for yesterday I had gone to buy some books at the bookstore near my place about half a

kilometer so I generally was chatting with the guy who gives the book so I said and he had kept lot of osal all the

other Publications were all stacked up there so I said in he said

said nine out of 10 students come and ask for oswal and I said why is that why is that so um he said I did not tell him

about our own survey so he said they think the feedback is that they find this more reliable okay reliable is the

word no I'll tell you the word Hindi [Music]

word students so that's the feedback from another person so please you decide

whether you want the question bank or the sample test papers in both cases please Ure that if you go to the website

and use the sudir 1010 coupon code you get an additional discount and free delivery so that's

something which you have got done for the study subscribers and students so entirely up to

you already then I would say okay you have to decide because I have also bought some books last year and I

regretted it because for class 11 English literature there were such bad quality books so I would not want you

know and then I had to kind of you know I do my own research in any case but I thought let me see what are the books

and the four books that I bought were bad quality books so it was a complete waste of my money so please ensure that

you invest in the right things which is precisely the idea behind telling you this Beyond this nothing rest entirely

up to you talking about the small town and the river complicated

poem CH those small towns and the river now about the poet please read the Box many people students

ask will give you an idea about what kind of writing she has done in the past and what kind of writing to expect

that's what you really gain from reading the Box otherwise I'm giving you the short notes so that will you'll find it

easy but short notes don't say because even the short notes are complicated so this particular poem is

taken from a collection of poems called the river poems published in 2004 now what's the poem about now this

particular poem explores the theme of mortality mortality means life and death the feeling of death is there eternity

there nature and spirituality so to this particular word this particular word and this particular word

is very important especially one and two is okay this entire poem is going to be about this the poet uses the symbol of

this small town to represent death while the river represents life and Eternity the river keeps flowing okay the river

keeps flowing whereas the small town is used as a representative of death in this particular poem now the poem begins

with the poet stating that small towns always remind her of death and we will know why she's saying that because she

describes the town as weeping and mourning because someone or the other has died and she kind of you know

the phrase she uses is Shrine of happy pictures Shrine we generally use it in a positive sense Shrine any

religious a temple a church a mosque AA okay of happy pictures but they have been stained with tust

okay I will not want to use the word gandi but they have been smeared they are not as pure and pristine as they

should be right because when you go to a temple you expect to see a place which will be pure and which will provide you

with a lot of Peace that's unfortunately not the case as she uses the phrase out here so poet then goes on to describe

the river which she says is alive in contrast and ever flowing when you go and sit beside a river you always feel

that there is life out here right so she compares the river to a soul Yanik Atma which is free and eternal now jxa

position means the contrast the contrast that she's making between the small town and the

river it is the contrast between death and life impermanence means something which will end and something which will

go on forever so the poet seems to be suggesting that while small towns are associated with death and Decay Decay

means you know gradually you keep kind of falling apart the river symbolizes the eternal cycle of life you

know the river is also a symbol of nature obviously and spirituality which we will find towards the end of the poem

and it provides the poet with a sense of hope and renewal Ki from the

river now I've kind of now if you see this you will get an idea you know you have the river flowing like this you

have this is not a very big town with a few hundred houses out here so it's a small town and this is a river and you

see the mountain and the valley out here okay just to give you a visual idea now in the final stance of the poem which is

very important the poet returns she starts with the town she goes onto the river and then she returns to the small

town and she says the town is also a place when people come to die a very morbid thought I felt very

Frankly Speaking feel very depressed reading the PO she also acknowledges it as a place where

people are born okay the poet concludes by saying that life matters like this and she suggests

that even in the midst of death there is always hope for new life so she's ending it on a positive note but the majority

of the poem does not give you a very positive kind of a vibe The Poets use of imagery Vibe is a word

which you should be using in your answers you know it's it's a nice word it's a very modern word vi instead of

saying feeling Vibe is a good word is word The Poets use of imagery and

symbolism and there are whole lot of images and imageries and symbolis creates a sense of contrast between the

small town and the river and that's what she has done and it suggests that even in the face of death there is always

hope for new life now let's let's get to the text of the poem small town stanza number one there are seven stanzas in

which I have divided it there are some small some bigger small towns always remind me of death now just see and hear

and read the first word line you're talking about death right in the first sentence small towns always

remind me of death my hometown lies calmly amidst the trees y keep it is always the

same it never changes in summer or in winter with the dust flying or the wind howling down down the gorge now Gorge is

a narrow Valley a valley which is very narrow is referred to it as the gge okay so she says that small towns always

remind the poet of death though our hometown lies very quietly in between the trees uh life is always the same

there's a sense of monotony there is a sense of monotony it never ever changes okay U the dust is flying which kind of

conveys some kind of construction activity uh or some kind of Destruction activity and the wind is howling the

wind is howling now you see howling is a sense of personification it is a sense of someone crying and some sense of

negativity and sadness the wind is howling you know whenever there is a narrow passage through which the wind is

blowing it will it it's not spread out physics what happens is that the wind will end up creating some kind of a e

Eerie or a Sinister sound of a noise kind of ha will come sound right which is not a very pleasant or a very

positive kind of sound the dust again is a negative kind of a symbol and it is a symbol of death

right the howling of the wind also gives you a sense of a very gloomy kind of a mood right so you see the different

thing right from starting she has mentioned the word death and to add to that she has added uh dust she has added

the word howling and and the fact that there is a sense of monotony so the sense you get is

of nothing positive as far as the small town is concerned the second stanza just the other day someone died again death

in the Dreadful silence we went you see the negative imagery Visual and auditory imagery

which is being continuously reinforced Dreadful which means not not davna but something which is unpleasant we wept

weeping again a negative kind of imagery looking at the sad wreath of tuberosus wreath is that thing which you keep uh

when you are paying condolences to someone who has passed away right the flower wreath like this the round

color on the body so that is called wreath and tuberoses are the flows that are used on a dead body okay so that's

what so this again is adding to the imagery of death life and death life and death okay only

the rituals are permanent right so the rituals anyone dies you perform the same rituals so the rituals are permanent the

rituals don't die the persons only die so the theme of death in the second stanza someone died makes it seem like

it's an usual occurence quite regularly people seem to be dying in this small town so it is

followed by mourning Dreadful silence means You observe silence 2 minute silence 5 minute silence in memory of

the person who has passed away she the poet looks at the wreath which is obviously a very sad sight

because of the flowers that are used the white color flowers that are used and she thinks of the cycle of life and

death and she knows that both life and death are temporary but the rituals that follow are the ones which are permanent

okay so we usually say you know there is this line no uh there's nothing permanent apart from birth death and

taxes okay that birth is Paka death is Paka and the fact that you have to pay taxes is also Paka okay so the last line

basically uh only the rituals are permanence indicate a sense of disillusionment with

Life After People die people die people perform rituals and say Alva say goodbye right so what has the first two stanzas

done now because the next we will be moving on to the river so the first two stanzas which are focusing on death in

the small town it gives you a sense of not a happy feeling are you feeling happy I am not feeling happy it's a

sense of for booing you know when you talk about death it's not a very pleasant kind of a feel um it's a sense

of mortality that people do die uh the image of small town is associated with death in so many different ways it is

defined it is first described as being calmly amidst the trees a place which is not changing a place where people seem

to be dying quite often uh there's a sense of stagnation and you see stagnation let me give you an example

for example there is a puddle of water okay it is stagnant okay what will happen here mosquitoes will breed there

will be other insects which will come here so there is a sense of you know stagnation there is no life as opposed

to a river which is always flowing so there is no stagnancy in that River so there is life here but here it's a sense

of Stillness stagnation and death okay so in the second stanza again death is mentioned a more recent death which

seems to indicate as I said that death is a very common phenomena in this particular town uh and they're always

weeping they're always mourning for the person who has passed away and the wind which is howling which is howling down

the gorge in the first stanza again adds to the sense of you okay so it also the howling is also

a very powerful kind of force the wind of course is a very powerful kind of an element of nature so when it also adds

you know otherwise you will see the trees swaying but you may not hear the sound but when

it goes into a narrow area and it creates that kind of a sound it gives it a more Sinister kind of an edge right so

it shows that death is a very forceful presence okay even in the midst of Life the others are all alive but you are

being made aware and conscious of death which is being conveyed by the howling wind okay I have explained it to the

best of my ability okay the river has a soul in the summer it cuts through the land like a torrent

of grief sometimes sometimes I think it holds its breath seeking a land of fish and stars what does it convey now we are

talking about the river now the poet says that the river Atma the river has a soul

Soul does not die if you see the first two stanzas he she was continuously talking about death but now here she's

talking about something which is not supposed to die okay so in that sense she gives permanence to the

river river small towns we were continuously being told about death okay and mourning

so she talks of the river flowing through the land in the summer months in grief why because the river level goes

down the water sometimes completely dries up and it's a moment of grief because the river in the summer months

does not quite flow as well so she says that you know the river would want that there should be full of water and it

should be a land of fish and stars okay because the fish the fish is not something which is going to be

stationary the fish keeps moving all over the place right so the fish has a sense of life right so uh and stars

makes it seem as though the Stars which will shine in the river which will seem as though the river is also some kind of

an exploratory body okay it's also shining and the Stars can be seen in the waters of the river so only when the

river is full of water and it is not in grief that it will kind of enjoy itself it will kind of feel fulfilled and

that's what it would seek it would seek a land of fish and stars so the phrase the land of fish and stars describes a a

place which is both beautiful there's an element of mystery uh and she says sometimes sometimes what does this

sometimes sometimes convey it conveys that you know it's almost like holding its breath ah I want a land full of fish

and stars you know it's almost like it is searching for that moment when it will be full of fish and stars and then

it can have its freedom it can be wild okay so uh fish are seen as symbols of Freedom as abundance and stars are seen

as symbols of Hope and some kind of Eternity Stars never go away they will always be there we will all go away the

Stars will always be there so they are an eternal Force right fish are the symbol of life right so that's what is

being conveyed so you can understand I I hope you're getting the sense of the shift of the mood from the first two

stanzas to the third stanza third Stan Beach me sometimes sometimes say you are kind of showing a thing towards life and

not towards death and grief so uh the land of fish and stars also indicat

the cyclical nature of life in the sense that just like the rivers flow starts from the mountain flows through the

Plains and goes and joins the sea um so do the fish you know also flow in the river and flow somewhere you know from

the mountains the river the Lakes the ponds and go and join the U um ocean the sea so it's a reminder that you know

even though death is a part of life there is always hope for Renewal so uh the torrent of grief the word grief has

been associated with River almost as if she's personifying the river that the river also can be in a sense of grief

the river has a soul the four stands are continuous with the river it knows stretching past the

town from the first drop of rain to dry Earth and Mist on the mountain tops the river knows the

immortality of water that's why I drunk water so the poet says that the river has a soul it knows about the town

because it is flowing by beside the town she knows the river knows that the first drop of rain that you know the first

drop that falls on the dry Earth it gives life because unless there is water there will never be any life on Earth so

the Earth knows the value of that water it also knows the value of the Mist and the snow and the ice on the mountain

tops Because unless that snow melts the water will not flow onto the plains in the river so there's a sense of

immortality with water because the water I mean it goes into the ocean it evaporates condenses forms the ice

snow and then flows back so there is a sense of immortality in the entire water cycle which you obviously aware of so by

saying so the poet is immortalizing the river the river Never Dies you know it comes it gets its life from there like

for example let's take the example of a yo Tre or a Gango tree it flows from there it gets it takes takes birth there

it comes and forms the ganga and the yamuna it flows like that through a large part of utar Pradesh it flows into

Bengal and then it goes and joins the Bay of Bengal the water evaporates and goes back onto the Himalayas and the

cycle starts all over again so the river in that sense remains Immortal right so the river Soul which is why she's saying

the river has a soul so what does it mean the river soul is a symbol of the interconnectedness of life that the

river is both a product of the land on which it flows and it is also a a product of the force by which this is

happening the entire water cycle by which water is fed into the river so it this whole water cycle is kind of giving

you an idea that there is a larger cycle which is at play there is a you know we are all part of this larger hole so uh

it also Alo gives hope because it flows endlessly throughout U and U it's also a sense of mystery because there's the

depth we don't know exactly at every level what is there inside the river so you know there is a sense of mystery in

the way the river flows you don't know or you don't know the different sea animals which are there in the river Etc

so there is a sense of mystery which also which is associated with it and life is meant to be also equally

mysterious so uh if you have to now talk about three and four together in terms of which are about the river so one it's

about the immortality of the river the fact that River has a soul the fact that it is seen as a living being with a soul

which is why we are talking about the immortality it's also you know we I mean in our this thing you know whenever we

are doing any pujas especially in the Hindu religion and many other religions you always offer water right so water is

an essential element of the way we also pray right it is associated with various cultures and uh it is set to cut through

the land like a torrent of grief which suggests that it can bring both sorrow when water is not there it will bring

sorrow but when there is water when there is fish and when it reflects the Stars it will be full of joy as well so

the that's what the third and the fourth stanza convey a shrine of happy pictures

marks the days of childhood small towns grow with anxiety for the to Future now she's going back to the small towns the

dead are placed pointing West when the soul Rises so childhood what is childhood childhood is the beginning

phase of your life right that's what is I mean you would say the most happy phase because you are a happy gol lucky

child Shrine means a uh holy place where the poet is

reminded of the purity of the Soul by the happy pictures of one's childhood right because childhood memories

childhood pictures are also associated with happy moments with happiness so it is childhood is a temple I mean just to

say Shrine Temple any kind of religious place is like a temple of happiness of happy moments which have been

captured in pictures okay that's why she's calling it a shrine the shrine of small happy

pictures describes the memories of childhood the poet writes that the days of childhood are a shrine of happy

pictures which means to say that these memories she considers what she considers them as sacred something very

very dear something which is extremely precious small towns grow with anxiety for the future so the phrase suggests

that the memories of childhood are fragile and precious so just as a shrine can also be destroyed so can the

memories of childhood be destroyed or lost okay so the poet is trying to tell you that you know you should always

cherish your childhood memories it's important it's important to be a child always be you know learn a few things

enjoy the moment so always ensure that even English you have the same phrase that keep the child in you alive that's

very important you know when you dance okay there should be an element of Joy just like a child dances without

bothering whether the steps are perfect or not or when a child sings it should not matter because the moment of

joy is what is more important so that's what she's trying to convey then she immediately comes to small towns and the

contrast comes small towns grow with anxiety for the future that they grow with anxiety about the future because

they're thinking about the impending death impending end impending demise so the next lines talk about the

eternity of the small small towns grow with anxiety for the future and the future is Bleak the dead are placed

pointing West when the soul Rises so the the soul will rise from the Mortal Remains the dead body and walk into the

golden East now this was a belief in the tribes from where mamang comes so uh in arunachal Pradesh that you know it's a

traditional belief in some cultures including this ADI tribe of arunachal Pradesh ADI tribe from to which mamai

belongs that the soul after death travels in the western Direction okay uh and then Rises into the East so it

starts towards the Western Direction I'm pointing right because the Western direction to is towards there and then

travels to the Eastern Direction okay towards the Sun so the belief is based on the observation that the sun sets in

the west and rises in the East so basically trying to say that the Mortal remains Soul n it will go into

the house of the Sun and this revives this thought even though she started with extremely pessimistic thoughts in

the beginning of the poem it this kind of a thought that you know it is going to the house of the sun it kind of uh

gives Renewed Energy to the poet so uh the poet use of this belief in her poem suggests that she's drawing on her own

cultural heritage on her own cultural beliefs to explore this theme of death and more importantly mark this write

this in your notebook after after she is focusing so the poet is suggesting that the death are dead are

placed pointing West so that the souls are able to find their way to the east to the house of the Sun and uh it also

suggests that the poet believes in afterlife after death that the soul continues to exist even after the body

has been uh has come to an end when the time of the body has come to an end when the soul Rises it will walk into the

golden East The House of the sun into the house of the Sun so it it it it is this part of the poem is giving you a

sense of hope it is giving you a sense of renewal it is giving you a sense that the dead will be reborn into a new life

after life after death in the cool bamboo restored in Sun light life matters like this now the

poet believes that the life is like the sunlight that warms the cool bamboo Bamboo with marks like this okay marks

like this okay so cool bamboo is a reference to the body and the sunlight is a symbol of the Soul this is a symbol

of the Soul cool bamboo is a sense of the body reference to the body it conveys that also conveys obviously that

you know sunlight is is important for plant life so the cool bamboo is a symbol of the body why because it is

strong and a resilient plant so while we are alive we are strong right if we can withstand the

elements it is able to withstand all the different harsh elements of nature right we can kind of survive even in difficult

conditions just like many plants especially the bamboo it can survive in extremely hostile conditions the

sunlight is a symbol of the Soul because it's a source of life and warmth and it can penetrate you know even in the

darkest of places the sunlight can actually penetrate right so it can bring life even to you know very Barren kind

of landscape sunlight has that kind of power so the poet is suggesting that the bamboo which is strong and

resilient U and the sunlight which is a source of the so which is symbol of the source and both of them combined is what

gives them life its meaning and purpose and restored in sunlight this particular phrase what does it mean it suggests

that life is not there's no full stop life is not static okay there are

no full stops in life in that sense even though we die there is no full stop it is constantly changing because she's

talking about life after death so uh and the sunlight which is a symbol of the soul is what gives the life its beauty

and V ality um life matters like this is a statement which again conveys the poet's belief in the importance of life

after death um and importance of life and life after death and uh the fact that life is precious life matters you

know it matters it's not something which should just be discarded should not be treated lightly okay so U so the cool

bamboo and the sunlight when you combine both of them they're symbols of the beauty and the resilience and the

ability to withstand all kind of hardships in small towns by the river we all want to walk with the gods what does

this mean um it it is a it is U it is conveying the human desire for immortality okay that people who live in

the small towns by the river are all aware of their mortality right and they long for a way

to transcend death but the river is a symbol of Life uh and The Poets use of this particular phrase walk with the

gods what does it suggest because in small towns by the river we all want to walk with the gods what does it mean it

suggests that people who live in the small towns by the Riverside they want to join the Gods in the afterlife so it

is she's kind of reinforcing that cultural belief in the ADI tribe about afterlife right and the way people would

be crated Etc so uh so it is the importance of their faith the poet is suggesting that

people who live in the small towns by the river find comfort in the belief of the gods that that gives them strength

that gives them soles uh they believe that the gods will come to help them to overcome death and to achieve eternal

life so there is that sense of hope you know that's what will happen also you see in this particular uh last line w w

w w so there is that over emphasis alliteration of the um alphabet W uh it is to create a a sense of

Harmony it is to create a sense of Rhythm and finally when there is Harmony and Rhythm what does it convey it

conveys a sense of peace that as opposed to the beginning of the poem and this is a question that you could possibly get

as opposed to the beginning of the poem the ending of the poem you realize that the poet is seeming to be at peace with

the word the beginning of the poem was negative was pessimistic talking about death but at the end of the poem The

Poet seems to be uh much more at peace okay so the rhyme scheme is free verse with stanzas which have unequal length

Okay so this is as far as the explanation of this again say complex poem is concerned okay let's quickly go

through the poetic devices there's of course personification that I have talked about about the soul of the river

the river knows it holds it breath and there are a couple more imagery when the soul Rises it will walk into the golden

East you know so there is depiction of towns during summer and winter the way she has talked about howling Down The

Gorge which is also a sense of personification and imagery repetition life and death sometimes sometimes the

river has a soul she has repeated these lines then there's a use of metaphor that small terms always remind me of

death now this metaphor Compares small towns to death uh this suggest that small towns are places where death is

you know it's a frequent occurrence and they're associated with the end of life the river has a soul this metaphor

compares the river to a living being it suggests that the river is not just a physical body P it also has spiritual

Essence this is very important river has a soul is a sentence which you could well be asked to explain in a five mark

question okay so mark this the river knows the immortality of water Compares it to the Eternal cycle which I've

explained that the river is a symbol of hope and renewal the dead are placing pointing West again the Setting Sun and

then the the dead are on a journey to the afterlife to the house of the Sun that is moving towards light in the cool

bamboo life to cool bamboo and sunlight the suggest that life is precious and it should be cherished so she ends it on a

more positive and let's say a little more cheerful as compared to the beginning uh that life should be

appreciated then there is antithesis which has been used which just opposes two opposite ideas so with this we come

to the end of this particular poem's explanation is you can look at all the different

question and answers so that you are completely prepared as far as this particular poem is concerned thank you

very much Tata bye-bye namashkar