Quilt me a Story

Our lives are a continuous thread of stories and these do not end even when we die ‘cos they continue in posterity in our children’s lives woven into the very fabric of human life on earth. We have been talking of stories for the past two exchanges and the story of stories seems to continue, its repertoire heavy and laden with more to say and share.

The picture above is a colorful design in embroidery, meticulously worked with patience, perseverance and ingenuity. It has an aesthetic appeal related to colour, touch and creativity, but more so it intrigues and enthrals us with the story which is woven unto the cloth. The sewing needle moves in and out of the fabric creating patterns with its long colorful thread tail treading a trail untold and anew. Each twist and knot is an amalgamation of explicit and symbolic meanderings of the needle and the tail replicating a story on the canvas of a wide fabric, to be deciphered and understood by humans far and wide through the ages. We arrive at the art of storytelling through ‘Quilting’.

Quilting is our artistic heritage, indulged for creativity, sharing  and community living. Quilting seems to have been around in the medieval times in Europe and the Eastern world, but it reached America in the 1800s. Initially quilts satisfied the practical purpose of warmth in the cold season, wrapping babies, folded and used as cushions or pitched on a clothes line to serve as children’s tent house. Quilting was mostly done by women at home or in larger extended groups to overcome isolation and satisfy their creative impulses. They would relay a simple joyful account of a family or episode, or be indicative of a family tree, recounting the entire history of generations of a clan. The pattern selected by the quilter can be indicative of a quilter’s lifestyle, artistic talents, political views, and even her emotions. Prior to a woman’s ability to vote, some women used their artistic talents and expressed their political views through a quilt.  Over times they morphed into story narratives, especially when women could not actively participate in active service during revolutions and wars. These stories on a cloth canvas became coded and suggestive of signals and messages to men, serving and stranded in tense zones.

An example in case would be the issue of slavery in the United States in the mid-1800s which led to quilt patterns called Slave Chain or Underground Railroad. The designs and colours indicated safe houses or routes to freedom. ‘Clara and the Freedom Quilt’  by Deborah Hopkinson is a picture book based on the true story of a young slave girl who is taken away from her mother to work on another plantation. Clara’s greatest wish is to be reunited with her mother and to become a free slave. Clara was skilled at sewing and became a seamstress at the plantation house. She was often privy to conversations between her master and other visitors to the estate. Being a sharp, clever girl she was able to piece together the information that the Ohio river was very close by. She stitched a map to the river and beyond to freedom, locating swamps, rivers and fields en route. The quilted story board was used by herself and her mother to escape and thereafter, they helped many other slaves to reach the underground railroad and thus freedom.

Harriet Powers and her two famous story quilts are now part of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. She was a completely illiterate woman who was greatly influenced by the sermons and gospels in church services and her quilts carry her favorite portrayals of biblical stories and folklore tales. “The Keeping Quilt’ by Patricia Polacco is a story of a quilt that

was made to preserve the memories of an immigrant Russian family’s remembrance of their country. Over the years the quilt is used as a tablecloth for the Sabbath, as a huppa for family weddings, and as a blanket to welcome newborn babies into the family. As the quilt is passed from one generation to the next, so too are family stories.”

‘The Sujjni Kantha’ embroidered bedspreads, ‘Embroidered Rumaals’ and  ‘Embroiderd Pahari Quilts’ are a few examples of the stitch craft practiced in India for 3000 years. They are preserved in museums across the Indian territory and the Victoria Albert museum in Britain. A revival wave in the country through the initiative of foreign interventions have led to the surfacing of our age-old heritage of crafted stories on cloth by women and it is providing sustenance to rural women in pockets even today.  The themes vary from the depiction of stories from the great Indian epics, ‘Raslila’, ‘Rukmini Haran’, depiction of popular dice game of ‘chaupad’  to contemporary works portraying  stories of female foeticide, education for girls, election violence. The oldest ‘rumaal’ is from the 16^th century embroidered by Bebe Nanki, sister of Guru Nanak, the founder of sikh religion, preserved in a Sikh shrine in Punjab.

‘Kalpa Vriksha’ – the boon giving tree, a treasure of the churning of the oceans – ‘Samudra Manthan’ was taken by Lord  Indra and planted in his garden. Many an embroidered quilts  depict the ‘Haran’ theft of the tree by Krishna and the ensuing fight between Indra seated on his white elephant and Krishna riding Garuda. ‘Ashatanayika’ is a representation of ‘Nayika Bheda’ the moods of the nayika through varied expressions, gestures and surrounding motifs of doves and peacocks.

A POW wiling away the war in a German prison camp delivered a defiant message insulting Hitler through the apparently innocuous skill of embroidery.

Maj Alexis Casdagil sewed a Morse code message around his sampler, reading 'God saves the king'.  

“Major Alexis Casdagli, who was taken prisoner in 1941, had turned to embroidery as a way of protecting his sanity against the tedium of POW life but he also found it provided a means of covert resistance. An innocent looking tapestry stitched by the officer in December 1941 bears the rather bland text stating the name and location of its creator and the date. But in a border surrounding the text Major Casdagli also stitched a series of dots and dashes, which in Morse code spelt out "God Save the King" and "---- Hitler". Unaware of the hidden message but impressed with the captive officer's needlework, the Germans even put it on display."It used to give him pleasure when the Germans were doing the rounds," Tony Casdagli, the Major's 79-year-old son, told the Daily Mail."It also stopped him going mad. He would say after the war that the Red Cross saved his life but his embroidery saved his sanity."

Quilting as a theme has been interspersed in writings in literature. To name a few writers would be Rohinton Mistry in ‘A Fine Balance’, Ismat Chugtai,  the feminist Urdu Indian writer and her controversial story titled ‘Lihaaf’ meaning quilt and Alice Walker in ‘Everyday Use’ and ‘The Color Purple’.

Quilting is here to stay through revivalist endeavors, maybe not patronized popularly but a haven for those seeking creativity, expression, sharing and healing qualities in their lives. Go Quilt a Story!