The word ‘epistle’ comes from the Greek word epistole that means ‘letter’ or ‘message’. Epistles were a principal form of written interaction in the olden times, primarily during the New Testament epoch. Since many of the New Testament works were originally written as letters to churches or personages, they are referred to as the Epistles. An epistle would typically have been inscribed on a scroll. Frequently, it was dictated and then reconsidered by the creator before being conveyed through a dependable emissary.
In the context of K Natwar Singh’s latest book, the word chiefly has been used in the backdrop of letters that he exchanged with a wide variety of people over an eventful career spanning many a decade. The fact that he chose to preserve all those letters is a tribute to his acute sense of history. This is not the first collection of correspondences that he has put together in a book form.
More than a decade ago he had published another such book called Profiles and Letters that encapsulated his correspondence with many eminent personalities. The present book covers his exchanges with Prime Minister Late Indira Gandhi, E M Forster, C Rajagopalachari, Nirad C Chaudhuri, Lord Louis Mountbatten, Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit, Mulk Raj Anand, R K Narayan, Krishna Hutheesing and the legendary Han Suyin.
What clearly comes out of those epistles is the fact that Natwar Singh had a host of personal and intellectually absorbing relationships with a whole bunch of very enlightened people. The expanse and range of issues covered in those interactions is truly breathtaking for the lack of a better word. His conversations with Mrs Indira Gandhi begin on August 28, 1968 and continue till August 8, 1984 spanning over a decade and a half. This reflects not only a consistency in communication but also the fact that the late Prime Minister, who was known not to suffer fools, held him in high esteem. Similarly, his conversations with the writer E M Forster, who lived to the ripe old age of 91 years and wrote many sterling books including the Passage to India, start in 1954 and continue all the way up to 1967.
What is endearing is the warm relationship he had with the second Governor General of India, C Rajagopalachari, who the author only met when the former was 85 years old in 1962. Similarly his interaction with India’s last viceroy Lord Louis Mountbatten and the author Mulk Raj Anand make for a very absorbing read. It brings out the human element in all these extremely illustrious public figures. The book is a lesson that letters and communications of private, personal and even public nature must be preserved.
For, what may sound like trivia now decades later may acquire the halo of history. As one browses through each of those epistles you cannot but help get the sense that though they may be warm, personal and even intimate communications, given the persona involved they carry the gravitas of events evolving at their own pace.