Saturday Evening Post
Making of the
Encyclopaedia
From the
Horse’s own Mouth
George
Menachery
Two
During the course of the Seminar I had interviewed His Eminence Joseph Cardinal Parecattil for a London periodical. He had just returned after the consistory in Rome where he had been made cardinal – the second Indian - after Cardinal Valerian Gracias of Bombay - by Pope Paul VI and was given a rousing reception by the Seminar participants. This was my second encounter with him – earlier we the directors of the Institute for Lay Leadership Training had been to the Metropolitan Palace, Ernakulam in 1967 to seek His Grace’s blessings for the Institute, which was the first such enterprise in India at least. The National Seminar emphasized this when it made a recommendation to start Institutions like the one we had started in Nadathara at the Madonna Sehiona in all dioceses. I was immensely pleased when His Eminence allotted me a First Class coupe in the specially chartered train which carried His Eminence to Ernakulam after the Seminar. About His Eminence’s lasting interest in the Encyclopaedia project later.
The enthusiasm I had experienced at Bangalore to write a book on the history and culture of Christianity in India gradually cooled off once I returned to my regular work in the college at Trichur. Also other urgent duties prevented me from giving much attention to this much beloved dream project. At various times I had started quite a few interesting enterprises such as the Ayurveda Encyclopaedia of India, The Encyclopaedia of the Arabian Sea, The Muziris Book, The Pazhama Series, writing of the book Church Architecture of Kerala commissioned by the Department of Archaeology, and afterwards by the Cultural Department also, writing books on Nidhirickal Mani Kathanar and Arnos Pathiri entrusted me by the Kerala History Association’s project “Architects of Modern Kerala,” The Pazhama Youtube Series, setting up various museums and libraries… all with great vigour and earnestness, most of which still remain somewhat uncompleted mainly on account my chronic laziness and inertia coupled with so called “perfectionism” resulting in procrastination and deviation into other projects. That must be the reason that generally only tasks that could be completed in a short time find me finishing them- like editing souvenirs, presenting papers, organizing conferences, workshops, expos, little museums and the like. In short I was often a sort of Jack of all Trades as my detractors truthfully propagated, while some said though jokingly “but a master of many!”. (This is the problem with writing autographically – often one cannot express anything that sounds even a little self-laudatory without feeling shy about it. One should, I suppose, follow Julius Caesar’s third person narrative style of the Gallic Wars.)
In 1969 when I returned from the Bangalore Seminar there was still some work connected with my Bharathiya Saahitya Samithi’s publication of thirty-five books by best known Malayalam literary figures on a single day in 1968, a feat that surprised and much praised by even D. C. Kizhakkemuri then at the helm of affairs at the National Book Stall and the SPCS. Also by this time I had been compelled by my partners, especially Prof. K. C. Shekar and Prof. A. J. Varghese to become sole proprietor of the Eiffel Books with all its debts and the remaining unsold books in the book shop. One of the reasons that prompted me to take over this risky ownership was that I badly needed an office for myself near my college. Phone calls which came for the teachers were never even informed them at the college, and the vast distances of most teaching classes from the college office made it next to impossible to use the phones – no mobile phones then. The phone connection at the Book Shop, and the availability of the services of the three staff members of the shop were powerful incentives. Also, in those days I was a chain smoker of Char Minar cigarettes and smoking was taboo in the college, so the book shop provided a safe abode to indulge this craze. The place also helped me to entertain friends and scholars. And the second World of Books Expo also had to be organized shortly. A number of programmes of the Institute for Lay Leadership Training were to be organized in co-operation with fellow directors, especially Prof. P. P. Peter, Prof. Joseph Kolengadan, and Advocate K. P. Devassy. Lecture visits to some colleges and organizations of professionals mostly outside Kerala, under the aegis of various Newman Circles had been previously fixed for me, as I was the national vice-president of the Newman Association of India from 1964 to 1972. And my very active AKPCTA work could not be neglected. What with one thing and another the attempt to write the projected book on Indian Church History remained neglected and even forgotten.
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