Henri Michaux - A Barbarian in Asia

I wonder whether the following trait is connected with religion: the Hindu has a propensity to strip himself that is as natural to him as sitting down. Everyone, at certain decisive moments, is aroused to fight or conquer. The Hindu is aroused to drop everything. Before you can say ‘Jack Robinson,’ the king leaves his throne, the rich man strips off his clothes, abandons his palace, and accountant of the Chartered Bank of India his post. And not for anyone’s benefit. (It is curious, I never find the Hindu kind; he is not occupied with others, but with his own salvation.) But it is as if his clothing or the display of his wealth chafed his skin, and the more naked and the more abandoned he is, wandering and with no one in the world, the better that will be.

Next come the austerities, and I am almost inclined to attribute his austerities to wickedness.

I will not mention fasting. He fasts as others would eat. If he succeeds in something, he fasts; if his calf is sick, he fasts; if his business is going badly, he fasts.

In addition, you have their vows. God does not speak first. God lets you come and go. But you put a chain around your arm, and you throw him one end of it, then what can God do? That is the way one hopes to tie him up.

Nowhere have I seen people making vows as in India. If you see a Hindu not doing such-and-such-a-thing, don’t worry: it is a vow; he has stopped smoking: a vow; he eats eggs, he stops eating eggs: a vow. Even the atheists still make them. To whom do they offer them? I suppose that the mere binding of oneself, of uniting oneself to the years, that extraordinary immediate and constant extension is an enjoyment for them.

The Hindu adores possessing self-control (that is to say, having himself well in hand), a word that he uses even more frequently than the word ‘to adore,’ and he smacks his lips over it.

If there is a creature that the Hindus hold sacred, it is their mother. Where is the ignoble individual who would dare to say a word about her?

I have a good mind to be that ignoble individual.

— That would be the last straw.

— Obviously.

But now, I am really sorry, for if there is a creature in India who works and is devoted, who knows from practice what it means to live for others , it is the mother.

No, decidedly I will say nothing against her.

I say only, something that is universal, that the women preserve the existing order, be it good or bad.

If it is bad, that is a pity.

And if it is good, that, probably, is a pity too.

In India, as elsewhere, the idea is growing more and more that it is the next generation that matters. In the old days one sacrificed oneself for the preceding generation, for the past; now it is for the future.

One of the most amazing sights I saw was the belly of my yogi guru .

He caught his breath in a manner that was high, slow, and as though drained. He drew it into himself through the chest, the belly, and piled it up almost between his legs. Several of his teachings I am only beginning now to understand — at the moment I was hypnotized by his belly, the belly suddenly appearing swollen as though harboring a head or a foetus and being slowly reduced.

In fact, the inhaling lasted fully eight minutes. He took great care not to injure himself, for the breath can give a dangerous wound like a knife.

This extraordinary man, whose superb chest swallowed up quarts of air, which he then distributed into his soul, who seemed rather young in spite of his eighty years, had nothing of the saint about him either. He was above human misery, inaccessible rather than indifferent, with a kindness that was almost invisible, and also perhaps a slightly pained look like those persons who are suffering from gigantism, or who possess more talent than personality.

The Hindu is often ugly, with an ugliness that is vicious and poor. The sparkle in his eye may be deceiving at first. But he is generally ugly. He does not photograph well, his plays, his films bring out, for those who have not observed him calmly enough (curious to say, he has an air about him that disguises everything) the ugliness of his features, his whole aspect with that vicious, rotten look on his face, so characteristic of him.

Certain old men are beautiful; indeed, their beauty is incomparable. In no other country does one see old men with majesty such as theirs. Rather like old musicians, old fauns, who know all about life but have not been deteriorated, nor even excessively affected by it. But they grow beautiful.

For the Hindu and the Bengali, between eight and sixty is the awkward age. He looks silly. Life is for him the awkward age — the head of Tagore at sixty is splendid, absolutely splendid. At twenty it is a head that is not alive enough, that has no impulse, and that is not yet sufficiently rested, not wise enough, so truly is wisdom the Hindu’s destiny.

They were right to persuade the Hindus that they must attain wisdom, or holiness. From a study of their physiognomy alone, I would have given them the same advice. Be saints, be sages.

Those degraded, degenerate faces, that silly look, those low simpleton’s foreheads — but I am not making it up. Open a magazine, The Illustrated Weekly or any other — that impertinence, the shamelessness (they absolve themselves of everything), the air of greed (when they are greedy) (no, trade does not suit them either!) (the Marouaris ‘would sell their mothers’ milk’ to make money, says the proverb), a look of conceit, flashy, pretentious, egotistical, makes millions of faces ugly. The worldly and powerful in India seldom have beautiful faces. I only saw one, and it was absolutely dazzling. I suppose that it is because of this vigorous plenitude of beauty when it is to be found among them, and then it is really exceptional, that they have always been called good looking.

What spoils their faces more than anything is the pretentiousness. What spoils their apartments more than anything is pretentiousness (seven or eight chandeliers in a room otherwise empty and unattractive, no, really it is not pleasant) and it spoils ninety-nine per cent of their decorations and their epic poems as well. 10

Well, if you haven’t perceived how ignoble his face is (when he is not a saint or a sage), and if that has told you nothing, go and see a Hindu film (not Bengali), but do go, and see ten of them while you are about it, so as to make no mistake. Here, the still water begins to move, and you will see everything. Faces becoming bestial and angry — you will see how one flagellates, how another smacks and strikes as if it were of no importance, how one tears off an ear, catches hold of breasts, unconcernedly spits in a face. You will see how a ‘nice’ young man behaves in this way, quite unaffectedly, right before the young girl he loves. How a prince imprisoned under a divan can be crushed carelessly little by little; how an ill-tempered father throws his son on the ground, or has him shut up in prison; not to mention the carefully thought-out and executed martyrdoms, where cowardly creatures slobbering with sadism display that puffed-up, unspeakable ignominy, where even the honest(!) resort to duplicity.

Treachery, knavery, base actions, here you have their whole drama. Big, hydrocephalous heads, the enormous heads of Mantek eaters, of the mentally backward, with the small foreheads of habitual criminals. They show in Marseilles some ‘special’ films, naturally forbidden by the police in ordinary picture houses. But nowhere have I seen sadism as continual and as natural as in Hindu films, and I have seen a good fifty thousand meters of them. Their supple way of smashing a hand was so ‘enjoyable’ that I, who have long since stopped blushing, blushed and was ashamed. I was guilty, and I shared, yes, I too shared in the ignoble pleasure.