Tribute to Bulleh Shah, event amalgamates poetry, performance

Chandigarh, November 4

The Murty Classical Library of India and Harvard University Press in association with the Novel Bunch held a unique event — an amalgamation of poetry and performance interspersed with translations celebrating 18th century poet Bulleh Shah. Held at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Public Administration-26 on Saturday, singer Harpreet gave a special performance based on the book “Sufi Lyrics”, translated by Christopher Shackle.

Robust singing with insightful commentary by literary enthusiast and social worker Ravee Pandher, and army veteran Col Ashish Bedi, in Punjabi and English respectively, added to the experience. Harpreet held the audience with his enthusiastic singing and made the crowd part of this performance. Harpreet, who holds the knack of performing poetry, has done it for not just Bulleh Shah, but also Kabir, Suryakant Tripathi Nirala and Faiz.

The Saturday evening was, however, dedicated to the book “Bullhe Shah — Sufi Lyrics”. A bilingual edition and English translation-only edition of his poems is edited and translated by Christopher Shackle. The new translation in English is presented alongside the Panjabi text, in the Gurmukhi script, re-edited on the basis of the best modern Pakistani and Indian editions.

The Murty Classical Library, founded by Rohan Narayana Murthy, aims at reintroducing some of the greatest literary works of India, written over the past two millennia, to a new generation of readers. The Saturday event in the city, a right step in this direction.