The Stories From My Journey: Yesterday, Today And Tomorrow

The third edition of the Cyrus Jhabvala Memorial Lecture was delivered by architect Christopher C. Benninger in September 2018. Benninger narrated the incidents that shaped his life and shared lessons and learnings for the future from his real-life stories.

- Christopher C. Benninger

India is the land of storytelling. Since time immemorial oral narratives have been the medium of India’s learning and self-awareness. Oral traditions are kept alive by temple artisans and priests, by wandering minstrels, and dramas in village fairs and tamashas. Stories can be conveyed through songs, dances, paintings, and of course dramas. Indian stories often share spiritual meanings, but like the Harikatha stories of Andhra Pradesh, they also educate people about ‘self-atma’ through stories showing us paths of liberation. The British and the Nizam banned Burra Katha stories of South India, because they used satire and new ideas to raise questions about justice and rational governance. The post- Independence age needed stories of hope and romance, as well as apprehension. The nation needed a vision and a new identity. Pandit Nehru was a great storyteller, uplifting everyone through his stories of hope, and a path into the future, while our present Prime Minister gifts the nation narratives of a better life to come!

The human settlements we have lived in, and the buildings we have lived in, have molded and tempered the way we think about space, form and urban structure. In a way, these buildings and spaces are stories too. Experiences in urban and built space generate deductive rationality about the way the world is, and gift formative logic about the way the world should be!