Hymns and gods of India

Press, 14 August 1976, Page 15

Hymns and gods of India

Hymns From The Rig-Veda. Translation by Jean Le Mee, photography by Ingbert Gruttner. Jonathan Cape. 218 pp. N.Z. price $6.95 (Reviewed by Jim Wilson) The collections of hymns and chants making up the Rig-Veda are the oldest strata of Indian literature, and have been preserved, orally and then later also in writing, for more than 3000 years since their composition. Not all are clear in meaning to us today, and for most considerable background is necessary if their full social and religious significance is to be teased out. But many of the hymns, even in translation, have a simple and moving power which can with ease bridge the milienia and share with us the awe and wonder of human reactions to life and to the universe. The 12 hymns selected for this book include the speculative and difficult “Hymn of Creation” (X. 129 hymns of devotion and praise to Varuna and Indra, two of the greatest gods of the Rig-Veda, a fascinating hymn to language as the medium of knowledge, a most powerful declaration by Vak, (Word or Truth), and simple and moving hymns to Dawn and the Sun. Apart from the quirk of translating rather than transliterating the names of the gods (which is a pity since they are used as proper names in the hymns), the translations are as poetic as any produced to date. Le Mee’s aim is to capture something of the metrical form as well as the meaning of the original, and he seems often to succeed. For example:

Blessed, bearing the sun, the eye of the Gods, Leading her white horse, magnificent to see, Dawn reveals herself, arrayed in beams of light, And with boundless glory she transforms tie world. For the hymns to Dawn and the Sun. the lovely monochrome plates, which form every second page ot the book, in the main complement the text well. But of course for these the choice of photograph for verse was easy — beautiful grainy shots of radiant dawns, mountain sunrises, raystreaked cloudy skies. In some other places, also, picture and word many happily. For example. the magnificent opening to the hymn of Vak: "I move with roaring, howling, radiant might." is matched by a superb photograph of a waterfall. But, alas, for most of th? book excellent photographs and moving words sit side by side separate pleasures rather than panneis in power. Another criticism of the book is that the main introduction and the short introductions to each hymn tend to rave rather than inform. The hymns themselves, so well translated, give the book enough words of strange moving power. A general reader, at whom the book is aimed, would have been served better by more information about the hymns and the gods, expressed simply and clearlv. These criticisms notwithstanding, this is a lovely book to own, lor sounds and for sights, and it is surprisingly cheap for the beaut\ ;u L quality of type, and the quality and quantity of phoiographic reproduction