Guru’s life, poetry, philosophy revisited in ‘The Golden Tree’
When the proposal (to write book) came to me from the tourism and culture department, time was short but I started work on the text. SURJIT PATAR, Punjabi poet
CHANDIGARH: Midst the numerous books coming out to mark the 550th birth anniversary of Guru Nanak, a bilingual pictorial book titled “Sone ka Birkh” (The Golden Tree), released at the inaugural function at Sultanpur Lodhi, a historic city where the Guru spent 14 years as a young man. It was from here that he began his first spiritual “Udasi” (journey) seeking truth with his companion Mardana, who played the musical instrument rabab, in the most turbulent of times in medieval Punjab.
“When the proposal came to me from the Punjab tourism and culture department, the time was short but here was something after my heart and I started work on the text of the glossy pictorial book. The title came from Nanak bani itself ‘Sone ka Birkh’ for it reflected the
Guru’s quest for spirituality through communion with nature, says prominent poet Surjit Patar.
Patar as a child grew up listening to the chanting of Gurbani at home and listening to the kirtan in the gurdwara of his village Pattar Kalan, situated on the
Kapurthla-kartarpur road. The poet in Patar responded best to Nanak bani and that was to be the subject of his research later. The thesis for his PHD was ‘Transformation of Folklore in Nanak Bani’. The references to the Guru appear in his early couplets ‘Rait te Babur da si rooohan
Sidharth, the artist, to Guru Nanak whose words and images became his spiritual and artistic symbols. “It was in my village Bassian near Raikot that I caught the first glimpse of the words of ‘My Baba’, as he calls the Guru, when I went with my mother to gather the yellow flowers carpeting the earth against dunes in the distance turned blue in the glowing sunset!” It is from this experience that the golden tree on the cover of this book took shape.
The bilingual book, translated into English, is embellished by paintings of different artists of Punjab.
Besides, the paintings of Sidharth there are works of Sirjat, Harjot Kaur, Harpreet Naaz, Savi and some very young artists. The well thought-out narrative by Patar is divided into sections encompassing his journeys, communion with nature, his philosophy, his life and a re-telling of the Janam Sakhis.