Long live the Common Man
He was India’s best-known cartoonist, though his creation was more
popular than he was. With his deft lines and witty humor, this prolific
genius touched many lives day after day, year after year
By Ashim Choudhury
It was July 1990. Calcutta was agog. RK Laxman was coming to town for his exhibition, “City Life”, chronicling the life and times of the city through his sketches. I was with the air force then, but nurturing dreams of making it as a writer and a cartoonist. And before me, at the exhibition, mobbed by admiring fans was the legend himself. I instantly made up my mind to interview him. He wasn’t very obliging, as I neither had a prior appointment nor was I on the staff of The Statesman or even the fledgling Telegraph. But, not one to be put off by insolence, I pursued him doggedly, forcing him or, more often, his wife to answer my questions. “City Life” was a roaring success as his sketches had transformed Calcutta’s garbage dumps, potholes, and traffic jams – all those mundane, frustrating aspects – into hilarious images.
Since he did not live in the city, I was prompted to ask how he managed to draw those vivid sketches. “He has a photographic mind,” Kamala, his wife offered. “He has a remarkable ability to remember places pictorially.” The sketches were products of an earlier visit to the city as he remembered it. It was this pictorial aspect of his cartoons that made them so appealing. Very often, they did not say a word, and yet the reader got the message with a gentle nudge on his funny bone. Laxman’s humor was rarely acerbic, tickling rather than poking the ribs. Between the common man and the establishment, he clearly sided with the underdog. “Is the cartoonist a natural enemy of the establishment?” I had asked. He fumbled for words finally saying: “Not exactly…but a cartoonist naturally goes against the grain.”
FAMILY MAN
Laxman’s cockiness, which came from knowing that he was the best, was mistaken by many for vanity and arrogance. It wasn’t so. The man who many thought was aloof (he had a soundproof room to himself at The Times of India office in Mumbai) was actually the family’s “handy man” as his wife put it. He loved unwinding, doing the odd job at home, repairing a leaking tap, replacing a broken windowpane or adjusting the TV antennae. When he was around at home, the plumber or the mechanic had no business there. At home he did no cartooning, except the odd freelance work. Remember Gattu, the Asian Paint boy? His daily cartoons were the result of a strict regime from 9 am to 5 pm in the office, where the first half of the day went in reading various newspaper stories and headlines. In the second half, he crystallized his thoughts and put them to paper with the deft strokes of his brush. Even editors did not always have the temerity to knock or enter his room when he was working.
Though in the nineties cartoons had still not been banished from the front pages, I had asked him what he thought of “cartooning as a dying art”. His face betrayed anger at the impertinence of the question. Put to the doyen of Indian cartooning, it did sound irreverent. But soon the livid expression melted into a smile that revealed his buckteeth. And he guffawed: “…not as long as I’m alive”. But to young people, like me, he did not recommend cartooning as a profession. “Don’t!” he had said. It was Kamala who explained: “He thinks it’s a thankless job.” Raising a laugh was no laughing matter; I had tried it briefly too. How Laxman managed to regale people with his deft lines and witty humor day after day, year after year, will remain an enigma. True, towards the end of his career he had begun to lose that punch. But then, the sheer volume of his work was monumental. There are no parallels to his prolific genius.
Rarely has a man’s creation been more popular than the man himself, in this case, the Common Man – the ageing bespectacled man in his checked jacket. “Why does he look so helpless…Why doesn’t your Common Man get angry?” I had asked. For a moment, the master of punning looked helpless searching for a retort, then his expression turned angry and he blurted: “…With the Chautalas and Devi Lals around, what can he do?” (Those days, the National Front government was gripped by a crisis when Chautala was re-elected the chief minister of Haryana). He was clear; he blamed politicians for the sad plight of the common man. Then, calling back through the throng of autograph seekers he said: “You can quote me on that.” There was something impish and child-like about Laxman. Deep down, he strongly empathized with the common man. It was this empathy that had millions of readers looking at his cartoons the first thing before moving on to the day’s headlines.
A COMMON LIFE
Laxman’s inspiration was David Low, the famous British cartoonist. “He was the only cartoonist I was exposed to in my early childhood,” Laxman admitted. Low later visited him in Bombay. There were many, kings, queens and heads of states who sought him out.
But this nation’s conscience-keeper once learnt the hard way the perils of being a common man. His car had broken down on Marine Drive in Mumbai on his way back from office. For over an hour, he stood on the road with his thumbs up, pleading for a ride. Not a single car stopped. It was little consolation that the next day, all the newspapers in the city carried this story on their
front pages.
It is ironical that this celebrated cartoonist was at one time denied entry into the JJ School of Art for not having the “right” talent. That denial hurt him deeply. To young aspiring artists his advice was: “Don’t go to any art school; it kills your creativity.” He also encouraged them not to copy but develop their own style.
With his passing away an epoch has ended. The man who worked with The Times of India since 1948 for over five decades, leaves behind a humungous body of work that should be treated as a national heritage. The best tribute to this genius would be to bring back cartoons to our front pages. Rasipuram Krishnaswami Laxman is dead, long live the Common Man!
Ashim Choudhury is the author of “The Sergeant’s Son”
No comments:
Post a Comment