Description
This volume, selected and compiled by Nandini Manjrekar, exhibits what made Johannes Manjrekar one of India’s beloved haibun practitioners. The pieces collected here reveal Johannes’ mastery over the craft and his acute sense of observation, drawing from his love for photography.
Brevity releases language as darkness releases a star. Ernest Hemingway once said to an interviewer: “I always try to write on the principle of the iceberg. There are seven-eighths of it underwater for every part that shows.” When I first chanced upon the haibun and haiku of Johannes Manjrekar, in 2005, I was struck by how much was said in a few words, and by the simplicity and the directness of the language. On a different note, the idea of laya (a term used in Indian languages to mean tempo/speed) is not unique to music — it exists in raindrops, in the falling of the leaves, in the heartbeat, in the birth of a child, and in our breathing — laya means the flow of life and we can experience this in each of Johannes’s haibun. We are fortunate to have this beautiful book, Jacarandas are a Deep Shade of Blue, and my sincere thanks go to Nandini for making it a reality.
— Kala Ramesh, founder and director, Triveni Haikai India and founder and managing editor, haikuKATHA
This book gives home to fifty-three of Johannes’ haibun on childhood. Most of the works are autobiographical (I presume) but those that turn their gaze outward are equally poignant. His keen eye for detail, deep empathy with everything around him, and ability to not take things too seriously are palpable in every haibun of this collection. Johannes even manages to include social and political commentary in these simple tales of childhood —a feat only someone as gifted as him could have achieved. I consider each haibun in this book to be a pin-hole, showing us a glimpse of the largest canvas possible — Life.
— Paresh Tiwari, author of Now of Poem, Now a Forest
This volume should have come out in his lifetime. Now, after he is gone, it is my small tribute to a best friend and humsafar, in gratitude for a life well-shared. The range of Johannes’ writing is wide, and here I have only put together his haibun on childhood. Much of it is autobiographical; Johannes himself had a somewhat unusual childhood, and perhaps this is why he was always able to see in children’s lives the ways of the world.
— Nandini Manjrekar
Johannes Manjrekar (1957-2020) spent the first few years of his life in Germany, and the large part of his growing up years in Mysore, Karnataka. His early interest in wildlife and natural history led him to pursue molecular biology for his PhD at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai. After his postdoctoral research, he joined the Microbiology Department and Biotechnology Centre at the Maharaja Sayajirao University, Baroda, from where he retired in 2019. Johannes pursued other interests apart from his scientific ones — insect collecting, bird-watching, photography, translation (he was fluent in 7-8 languages, primarily English and German), satirical pieces on contemporary life and politics, and most all, haiku, for which he came to be known by the community of poets.