‘Wouldn’t it be better,’ interrupted Professor Mishra, wiping an eyelash away from the corner of his eye, ‘wouldn’t it be better if we were to concentrate on Joyce for the moment? We will take up Lawrence at our session next month — before we adjourn for the summer vacation.’
‘The two matters are interlinked, surely,’ said Pran, looking around the table for support. Dr Narayanan was about to say something when Professor Mishra pointed out:
‘But not on this agenda, Dr Kapoor, not on this agenda.’ He smiled at Pran sweetly, and his eyes twinkled. He then placed his huge white hands, palms down, on the table and said, ‘But what were you saying when I so rudely interrupted?’
Pran looked at the large white hands emanating from the grand pulp of Professor Mishra’s round body, and thought, I may look thin and fit, but I am not, and this man, for all his slug-like pallor and bulk, has a great deal of stamina. If I am to get agreement on this measure I must remain calm and collected.
He smiled around the table, and said: ‘Joyce is a great writer. This is now universally acknowledged. He is, for instance, the subject of increasing academic study in America. I do think he should be on our syllabus too.’
‘Dr Kapoor,’ the high voice responded, ‘each point in the universe must make up its own mind on the question of acknowledgement before acknowledgement can be considered to be universal. We in India pride ourselves on our Independence — an Independence won at great expense by the best men of several generations, a fact I need not emphasize to the illustrious son of an even more illustrious father. We should hesitate before we blindly allow the American dissertation mill to order our priorities. What do you say, Dr Narayanan?’
Dr Narayanan, who was a Romantic Revivalist, seemed to look deep into his soul for a few seconds. ‘That is a good point,’ he said judiciously, shaking his head sideways for emphasis.
‘If we do not keep pace with our companions,’ continued Professor Mishra, ‘perhaps it is because we hear a different drummer. Let us step to the music that we hear, we in India. To quote an American,’ he added.
Pran looked down at the table and said quietly: ‘I say Joyce is a great writer because I believe he is a great writer, not because of what the Americans say.’ He remembered his first introduction to Joyce: a friend had lent him Ulysses a month before his Ph.D. oral examination at Allahabad University and he had, as a result, ignored his own subject to the point where he had jeopardized his academic career.
Dr Narayanan looked at him and came out suddenly in unexpected support. ‘“The Dead”,’ said Dr Narayanan. ‘A fine story. I read it twice.’
Pran looked at him gratefully.
Professor Mishra looked at Dr Narayanan’s small, bald head almost approvingly. ‘Very good, very good,’ he said, as if applauding a small child. ‘But’—and his voice assumed a cutting edge—‘there is more to Joyce than “The Dead”. There is the unreadable Ulysses. There is the worse than unreadable Finnegans Wake. This kind of writing is unhealthy for our students. It encourages them, as it were, in sloppy and ungrammatical writing. And what about the ending of Ulysses? There are young and impressionable women whom in our courses it is our responsibility to introduce to the higher things of life, Dr Kapoor — your charming sister-in-law for example. Would you put a book like Ulysses into her hands?’ Professor Mishra smiled benignly.
‘Yes,’ said Pran simply.
Dr Narayanan looked interested. Dr Gupta, who was mainly interested in Anglo-Saxon and Middle English, looked at his nails.
‘It is heartening to come across a young man — a young lecturer’—Professor Mishra looked over at the rank-conscious reader, Dr Gupta—‘who is so, shall I say, so, well, direct in his opinions and so willing to share them with his colleagues, however senior they may be. It is heartening. We may disagree of course; but India is a democracy and we can speak our minds. . ’ He stopped for a few seconds, and stared out of the window at the dusty laburnum. ‘A democracy. Yes. But even democracies are faced with hard choices. There can be only one head of department, for example. And when a post falls open, of all the deserving candidates only one can be selected. We are already hard-pressed to teach twenty-one writers in the time we allot to this paper. If Joyce goes in, what comes out?’
‘Flecker,’ said Pran without a moment’s hesitation.
Professor Mishra laughed indulgently. ‘Ah, Dr Kapoor, Dr Kapoor. .’ he intoned,
‘Pass not beneath, O Caravan, or pass not singing. Have you heard That silence where the birds are dead yet something pipeth like a bird?
James Elroy Flecker, James Elroy Flecker.’ That seemed to settle it in his mind.
Pran’s face became completely impassive. Does he believe this? he thought. Does he really believe what he is implying? Aloud he said, ‘If Fletcher — Flecker — is indispensable, I suggest we include Joyce as our twenty-second writer. I would be pleased to put it to the committee for a vote.’ Surely, thought Pran, the ignominy of being known to have turned Joyce down (as opposed to merely having deferred the decision indefinitely) would be something that the committee would not be willing to face.
‘Ah, Dr Kapoor, you are angry. Do not get angry. You want to pin us down,’ said Professor Mishra playfully. He turned his palms up on the table to display his own helplessness. ‘But we did not agree to decide the matter at this meeting, only to decide whether to decide it.’
This was too much for Pran in his present mood, though he knew it was true.
‘Please do not misunderstand me, Professor Mishra,’ he said, ‘but that line of argument may be taken by those of us not well versed in the finer forms of parliamentary byplay to be a species of quibbling.’
‘A species of quibbling. . a species of quibbling.’ Professor Mishra appeared delighted by the phrase, while both his colleagues looked appalled at Pran’s insubordination. (This is like playing bridge with two dummies, thought Pran.) Professor Mishra continued: ‘I will now order coffee, and we will collect ourselves and approach the issues calmly, as it were.’
Dr Narayanan perked up at the prospect of coffee. Professor Mishra clapped his hands, and a lean peon in a threadbare green uniform came in.
‘Is coffee ready?’ asked Professor Mishra in Hindi.
‘Yes, Sahib.’
‘Good.’ Professor Mishra indicated that it should be served.
The peon brought in a tray with a coffee pot, a small jug of hot milk, a bowl of sugar, and four cups. Professor Mishra indicated that he should serve the others first. The peon did so in the usual manner. Then Professor Mishra was offered coffee. As Professor Mishra poured coffee into his cup, the peon moved the tray deferentially backwards. Professor Mishra made to set down the coffee pot, and the peon moved the tray forward. Professor Mishra picked up the milk jug and began to add milk to his coffee, and the peon moved the tray backwards. And so on for each of three spoons of sugar. It was like a comic ballet. It would have been merely ridiculous, thought Pran, this display of the naked gradient of power and obsequiousness between the department head and the department peon, if it had only been some other department at some other university. But it was the English Department of Brahmpur University — and it was through this man that Pran had to apply to the selection committee for the readership he both wanted and needed.