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Presidency College – I

The nicest greeting Madras Musings received on its 25th birthday
was this card from Harry and Jillian Maclure and their Anglos in the
Wind team. The message inside read:
Madras Musings and you… Your journey has touched the
lives of thousands of people who call Madras home…
A pity we can’t reproduce the card as it is; it’s a beautiful design.

Presidency College (MM, May 1st) once enjoyed certain privileges. The posts of Principal and Director of Public Instruction were interchangeable. Many Principals had adorned the D.P.I.’s post with distinction. At the same time, many declined to take up the Director’s post which was considered as just an administrative post far removed from academics. I know of at least two ­Directors who chose to revert back to the Principal’s post. The first was S.R.U. Savur who, though a successful Director found the job uninteresting and went back to the College. Dr. B.B. Dey, an eminent Chemistry Professor, could not continue as Director even for three months and found job satisfaction as Professor of Chemistry guiding a good number of students in research.

While the faculty in all Government and Aided Colleges were designated Assistant Lecturers and Lecturers, those in Presidency were designated Assistant Professors and Professors. Not only that, there was the post of Chief Professor in each Department which was filled up by the Public Service Commission by direct recruitment. It was not a promotion post. T.P. Meenakshi­sundaranar was a distinguished Chief Professor.

When the Duke of Edinburgh visited the College and 150-odd members of the faculty were introduced to him as Professors, he exclaimed, “So many Professors.” In Oxford and Cambridge it is not easy for anyone to be designated Professor.

The students used to pride themselves as Princes of Presidency. Alas, this is all past glory and it is sad the college has lost its sheen.

S.S. Rajagopalan
30, Kamarajar Street
Chennai 600093

II

Indeed Presidency College, Chennai, the oldest in South India and the most prestigious institution of yore, is marking its 175th year in a muted fashion. In 1991 the old students’ (alumni) association celebrated the post-centenary Golden Jubilee rather well. There was a slew of activities announced then, like a commemorative building, sports, seminars, exhibitions etc. I ­became a life member then. I am not sure how many projects ­envisaged were taken up and fulfilled. I did not get even a souvenir, if one had been published. It had Justice S. Mohan as President and former DGP K.R. Shenai as V.P. I received invitations for some meetings till 2006, thereafter there’s been no communication.

Be that as it may, what is the College administration going to do about the present occasion? The College had several luminaries as its alumni and had a good reputation for research in Organic Chemistry (headed by Dr. T.R. Govindachari), Botany and Geology. Being a Government College, its labs were very well equipped and we could immediately get a replacement for a defective gadget, unlike private colleges which were stingy. All that has gone to seed now. The College has become autonomous, but how much it has progressed is anybody’s guess. It witnesses unruly, rowdy behavior of students who not only fight among themselves but also with other college students. They indulge in unnecessary activities like Bus Day, etc. What an abysmal fall from a glorious past!
Students carry lethal weapons instead of books. You enter the portals with trepidation. The photo (MM, March 1st) taken against an evening sky amply reflects the situation: the setting of Presidency Sun.

Some time ago there was an idea to make the institution one only for post graduate study. May be that will help resurrect its prominence.

R.K.Natarajan
10, Rajeswari Apt.,
Kalyanapuram Street,
Chennai 600 004

Memorable teachers

The world is celebrating four centuries of William Shakespeare. I have been remembering the masters in ­Madras, who taught Shakespeare to scores of Part I English ­learners of the University of Madras. I have not personally known of the first two I will be referring to, but have only heard of their mastery over the dramas of the most celebrated writer of the ­English language. They are the late K. Swaminathan (KS) of Presidency College, Madras, and the late A.L. Krishnan (ALK) of Agarchand Manmull Jain College, Madras. I have heard from many, who remember these men, that they kept their students enthralled in their Shakespeare classes.

For those who may not know, the following piece of information could be relevant: English Language and Literature as a subject under Part I was taught, until the 1980s, using two ­unabridged dramas (usually one comedy and one tragedy). When I was pursuing my BSc at Loyola College, I studied Antony and Cleopatra (exemplifying a tragedy) and the Twelfth Night (exemplifying a comedy), but I have nothing to speak of the uninspiring lecturer who taught me these dramas.

The other person I remember here is the late Lawrence Sundaram (LS), a dedicated and committed Jesuit of Loyola. Many who studied under the tutelage of Sundaram will remember the exciting Shakespeare classes of his.

My elder brother, Dr. A. Parameswaran, who was a student of ALK, when ALK was a lecturer in English at Loyola in the 1950s, used to tell me that ALK never used a book to read passages while teaching in the classroom. Teaching Othello, he would transform himself into various characters in the play, reciting verses from memory, using the most elegant diction and enchanting articulation. It so happened that once, while dealing with an emotion-packed scene from Othello, he forgot himself and fell from the narrow wooden platform on which he was teaching, suffering ­either a fracture or a sprain (I am not sure of exact details), which cost him a few days of medical leave.

I have known Sundaram, quite closely, when he lived in the Loyola Jesuit Residence in retirement in the 1980s and 1990s when I was teaching there. I used to meet Sundaram to clarify doubts in English-language use and he used to pleasantly chat with me whenever I went to him. Many a time, he clarified how to say some of the tongue-twisting, difficult-to-say words of Latin roots, such as ‘caveat’.

Although we, citizens of Madras may not have much to proudly refer to Shakespeare on the present occasion of global celebration, certainly we had great masters such as KS, ALK, and LS, who marshalled Shakespeare with excitement and taught Shakespeare to their wards with genuine joy.

Laurence Murphy, a Jesuit teaching in Loyola, and William Miller and Alexander Boyd of the Madras Christian College were equally versatile masters of Shakespeare. But we need to remember that Murphy, Miller, and Boyd were native-English speakers whereas KS, ALK, and LS were not and yet these men of Madras made the cut as brilliant exponents of Shakespeare.

– A. Raman
araman@csu.edu.au

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