Recently I was listening to Beethoven’s “Moonlight Sonata”. It was so beautiful and I was awestruck that he could compose something like that when he was completely deaf. It is said that he composed a lot of his music inspired by his “Immortal Love”, a lady named Antonie Brentano, whom he never married, but wrote impassioned letters to.
(Un) surprisingly there is very little information about this mysterious woman who even Beethoven didn’t know much about. Now the train of thought that Im pursuing here is, if he had married her or did have a longish affair with her and dumped her she might not be his “Immortal Love” anymore. As cynical as one might think this is, for love to be immortal or eternal it has to be unrequited, unconsummated or one that ended with tragic consequences is my personal opinion.
Take the case of any of our legendary love stories, Shakespeare’s classic love story Romeo and Juliet, Anthony and Cleopatra, popular Arabian tale of Layla and Majnun, our very own Devdas and Paro (adapted into many a Bollywood movie including Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s magnum opus which they had the cheek to send to the Oscars!!), Heer Ranjha, still a favourite in Punjab and Pakistan (infact Punjab has other tragedies like Mirza Sahiba, Sohni Mahiwal, etc), Kovalan Kannagi or even Kovalan Madhavi of Tamil epic Silappadikaram and many more.
These are no happily ever after stories; these are stories full of longing and angst, where lovers rebel faced with treachery and deceit. These stories have lovers struck by the blow of fate in the prime of their love, life and what not. I wonder if only these guys had got together or married or had many kids, would their love be as celebrated and as legendary. Even Shah Jehan and Mumtaz Mahal’s love became stuff of greatness only after he built the hauntingly beautiful, near perfect Taj and made it her tomb (Let us for one minute forget those forwards we got where the Taj was originally supposed to be a Shiva temple and blah blah).
One of my retirement plans is to write the greatest love story where the lovers get married at an “appropriate” age, have two kids, send their kids to good schools and colleges, plan, invest and insure for their old age, have no diabetes, blood pressure or prostrate problems and live happy till a ripe old age of 90 and 95. Now that is some love story and 40 years down the line when I retire it will be some story to tell!!
12 comments:
damn....an interesting line of thought, but love is the only thing where failures are celebrated more than successes. But what has me totally stumped is the concept of 'undying love' when most of these 'famous' love stories ended in death itself. A good article anyway.
Hi Nu,
Interesting thought, more so, coming from you :). I think that the failures of love are more celebrated than success owing to the uncertainty that arises, what would have happened had they met?
Giving the whole perspective a twist, Both lovers, say laila and majnu, are mostly caught up in fighting the problems (zaalim zamana) in life and i trust, they get a rare chance to know each other that well. It would be really interesting to know how they react to each other's grotesque personality nuances once they win the social battle and marry each other. Remember to include this part in your post retirement novel.
I'll buy it for sure !
Ro
http://sixgunlover.blog.com/
I totally agree with the bit that a trajedy of some sort makes love stories stronger.. I think its all got to do with the audience... people in general can relate to those that they can sympathise with.. its kind of a wicked survival instinct i guess...When they are sympathetic towards someone, the lesser a threat they are to them.. so the sadder the story, the more it is glorified..
Personally I think every love is immortalized in the moment when it is no longer about the self.. and that happens at some point in every story..We humans are a surprising mixture of extraordinariness (if thats a word) and pettiness.
hmn,... 2 kids?? i thot u always wanted 3 :D
i am sure u meant auto biography rather than a story :P
nice observation..but then on ur conclusion...i am doubtful if that long a story would be a love story :D
it would be a drama!!
hehe, the ending is typically you...as for the rest, it's true history dictates love must be unrequited to be immortal. But that's idealised, don't you think? I think Beethoven might've been less enchanted with this woman if he'd got to know she had sinus or something, but if she were truly all that, maybe he'd've written a more wonderful composition...
I used to know a totally blind Physiotherapist who almost cured my grandma from paralysis. He used to play guitar by his ear and he was good. One day when I reached him to the bus stop we heard a sound from far. "Its the bus" I said. "No its a truck", he said and he was right. Beethoven was deaf, and he certainly must have had extra powers in other senses.
40 years down the line
when u have a story to tell
m sure it'll really sell
cuz u write very well...
sorry for spoilin this page with a pathetic rhymn...
Ayush
I ve thought about this on many occasions. But what I feel, atleast at this point in time of my life is this - The pain of love lost is so intense that it overshadows the spirit of love that has succeeded (if success of love is defined by marriage, kids etc..) Thats why great love stories are centred around a tragedy or love that has not ended in marriage. As I mentioned before, this is what I feel now (Subject to change in future) :)
@sricharan: thxx. we are going to make a lot of money with this :)))
@rdx: totally agree with the "grotesque personality nuances" part.
@lk: you have proved tat with age comes wisdom!!!;))Ur probably right, got reminded of ur athai's "pavam" statements. Makes sense??
@lathuu: you have truly seen within through my soul. It will definitely be my story. after the success of that book, i will write many self-help books and for cheap publicity, i will go to the super market without underwear like britney spears!!
@aishu: Sorry, ur statements are binding in a court of law. If you do change your opinion i will have to send you a legal notice!! I do see the point of lost love overshadowing the spirit of love!!
Oh ayush!! I thought u missed the bus wrt my article. Then i realised it was a truck!! The b.p sounds like a total dude though!! And thx fr the rhyme, damn sweet it is!!
@ nandini: tats exactly wat i mean too!! Any kind of realistic love story ends with disenchantment!! No one is truly all that...maybe casanova, which is why he is casanova, if u get the gist of my thrust!!
I definitely luv ur post retiral ambition ! But my opinion is that the human mind only awes what it can never acheive and in this case its eternal and unrequited love! And the moment you try to satiate that with a story that ends with people living with grand children and stuff.....i am not sure tats the stuff that makes it to legends ! But nonetheless, with your writing bravado that should be childs play ! :)
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