The Progressive Writer's Ideology

There's plenty of discussion in various texts about what progressive writers should write and how they should influence their readers' thinking, but what we don't find is this: what role should the writer play in the progressive camp's readership circle?

Any writer is an individual, but not every individual is a writer. So while a writer has their own worldview, they must also gather that worldview from the currents of society. Since society is divided by class, no writer can position themselves above class interests. Therefore, their subject matter and ideology will inevitably revolve within the boundaries of their class interests—there's no doubt about this. Hence, no writer can express themselves without revealing their class character. This is why a writer's work creates a distinct readership circle.

It's natural for readers who immerse themselves in a writer's worldview to develop ideological unity and fellowship. The invisible ideological bond through which a writer infiltrates readers' consciousness and draws them in creates a sweet relationship between writer and reader. Even if the writer remains physically distant from readers, that distance cannot create a mental divide. And this is where the writer's life becomes truly meaningful. Therefore, it's primarily the writer's responsibility to watch how quickly the gap between progressive writer and reader narrows.

Many writers are failing to build a readership circle, while simultaneously trying to keep themselves far removed from their readers. We've seen in various contexts that good writers develop a certain kind of ego. Many writers display a tremendous effort to freeze themselves in the ice of pure self-absorption. As a result, we find writers who, even after gaining good readers, feel reluctant to come close to them. If anyone thinks such a writer is helping to create a vast chasm in the relationship by wounding the reader's goodwill, they can hardly be blamed.

The character traits that oppose progressive, cultured mentality appear undesirably in many writers. Every good writer is progressive. Just because someone writes about worldly contexts doesn't mean they'll necessarily join the ranks of those opposed to established interests.

There are many good writers who position themselves at a distance from readers—like film stars—to create enchantment. They seem like heavenly angels. They love to transform readers into devotees. Just as devotees feel blessed by glimpsing their guru, these writers want readers to stand with folded hands like enchanted devotees. It seems as if the writer, detached from earthly concerns, wants to maintain an otherworldly connection with readers from their distant ivory tower.

No matter how much artistic beauty may bloom in literature and culture through such writers' magnificent progressive rhetoric, a patch of dark cloud inevitably appears in that writer's heart's sky, causing readers to perpetually fail in finding the address of light from them.

Then there are many famous writers who, immersed in bureaucratic thinking, love to consider readers as subordinates. Clear signs of their neglect toward readers become apparent. Distant readers devour such writers' works hungrily, only to become distressed with a kind of mental anguish. Their scattered emotional outpourings get wounded in the writer's cruel fist, cry out in pain, and are cast into the refuge of waste paper. What a pitiful scene unfolds when such progressive writers mark each blooming flower in readers' hearts' deep gardens with signs of being trampled and crushed, forever surrendering themselves to a scentless existence!

Positional authority can at most make someone a book-seller, never a creative writer. When bureaucrats' and big businessmen's wives write (publish) books, they mostly end up irritating readers. You can force someone to keep a dog, but not readers.


No matter how much progressive literary light may be published by such writers' hands, that light fails to provide healing balm to readers' pain-scorched hearts. Many writers dressed in bureaucratic attire can be seen in the progressive camp. The attitude working in their minds is that they're graciously blessing readers with their presence. From afar, beyond reach, they want to shower blessings on readers.

Just as a certain class of people maintains a nose-turning attitude toward day laborers and other "small people," yet never tire of giving speeches about revolutionary work to change their fate, similarly a class of writers in the progressive camp never tire of gifting readers inflammatory writings; but when readers want to come close to them, they step aside with a dignified dust-off like proper gentlemen. The fewer such bureaucratically-minded writers enter the progressive camp, the better it will be for readers and the progressive movement.

For those writers who have embraced the pen as their livelihood while being progressive, many find Manik Bandyopadhyay's life terrifying. They know what cruel and harsh poverty Manik Bandyopadhyay fought against to establish himself in his writing career. Such difficult and pitiful circumstances could still descend upon any progressive writer's life today—that is, any progressive writer might have to remain bound in bonds of intimate kinship with poverty while making firm resolve to sacrifice for the working class's interests.

It's very difficult nowadays to find writers who have chosen writing as their life and committed themselves to seeking it as their sole livelihood. Almost everyone has chosen some profession and then descended into the writer's role. As a result, we find dual character in writers. Of these two, the personality attached to their profession is primary. As a writer, they are secondary. Readers' melted affection and love bang their heads uselessly against this secondary status and return frustrated.




If someone who inspires readers to be roused in struggle against anti-culture to build tomorrow's socialist system by immersing in progressive currents keeps readers at a distance and behaves in a hostile manner, then truly speaking, they are merely hypocritical. Therefore, scholars need to say something about what role writers should play in the progressive camp's readership circle, whether they will only suffer from self-contradiction in the progressive camp. Of course, it's good to remember this simultaneously: rulers have always preferred the headless bodies of vocal scholars.