Jeroo Dinshaw and English Literature: A Tribute

 

This is a tribute to my high school English teacher Jeroo Dinshaw (1941 - 2019) who taught in St. Helena's High School in Pune (pronounced Poo-nay), India. Not only did she instill in me a love for the language, she also introduced me to many classic books which I would never have heard of, growing up in 1990s, pre-internet India. After I graduated from school with the highest marks in English (94%), I stayed in touch with Mrs Dinshaw who insisted I call her Jeroo. A couple of years later, I left Pune for America, before beginning a new life as a married woman in Ireland. From then on, Jeroo and I stayed in touch, writing frequently to each other. She retired from her St. Helena's job around the same time I left India, and from 2005 onwards, I'd always visit her on my trips home - first at her old house on Bund Road, then at her apartment in Dongursee Park. Between 2005 and until her death in 2019, Jeroo became my closest confidante, offering support through difficult situations from across the miles, and ensuring I always had a friend to talk to during my subsequent visits to India. 

St. Helena's High School in Pune, India

 

My memories of Jeroo aren't only rooted in childhood nostalgia stemming from my time as her student during my school days. As an adult Indian woman, living in a new country (Ireland), I relied on her to provide me with much needed humour and levity during times of crisis. She had suffered her own health setbacks and she knew just the right things to say when I was facing mine. Jeroo wasn't one to dwell exclusively on our mutual struggles; we knew how to talk through various problems, while keeping our sense of fun intact. Ultimately, Jeroo's love of English literature was contagious too: because of her, I tracked down many books from the Victorian Literature canon, especially the novels of Thomas Hardy, whose Far From The Madding Crowd was her favourite. 

 

Reading was my favourite hobby even as a young girl, but I never took it seriously until I entered Jeroo's English class, a few weeks before my thirteenth birthday in 1995. I credit my love of the subject to her, and I knew she had faced a few battles as a Parsi (Zoroastrian) teacher of English in a Protestant Christian girls' school. The other English teacher who taught high school students in St. Helena's told me shortly before her death that she didn't think it was right that Mrs Dinshaw was given the job of teaching the subject since Shakespeare should only be taught by a Christian! Genuinely shocked at this comment, I realised the glass ceiling Jeroo must have had to shatter merely to earn a living teaching English in India.When we spoke about these challenges, Jeroo remained philosophical, acknowledging that such biases around Christianity and English teaching were inbuilt into the education system. I took umbrage at the other teacher's remarks, and a few days later, when I visited her again, Jeroo delighted in my outraged reaction. She chided me for getting affected at her colleague's ignorance (and decidedly un-Christian attitude!) before engaging me in conversation about how difficult it was to teach Shakespeare to Indian students who came from different classes, castes and linguistic backgrounds. We recalled a highlight from both our lives: my production of the courtoom scene in The Merchant of Venice, where I took it upon myself to play Portia and direct the whole thing under Mrs Dinshaw's expert guidance. I ensured my whole class participated in the play - nobody was left out, and everyone had a crucial role to play. I remember being especially sad that neither my mum nor my dad made it to watch this landmark production, but Jeroo ensured the whole senior school (including the students of the other English teacher) were in attendance. Not only that, she stepped in instead of mum and dad, to provide me with much needed emotional support throughout the whole process. As a result of her faith in all of us, our class did exceedingly well in English, with Muslim, Hindu, Parsi, Christian, Sikh girls all giving Shakespeare their best shot. 

 

 

 

 

 But that was then. Over the nearly two decades that we kept in touch as adults, Jeroo also did what every good friend does: tell it like it is. She wasn't one to sugar coat her opinions when I'd seek her advice, and many times over the years, I chose not to take it, to my detriment. She also didn't patronise me as many ex-teachers tend to do - they remember you as a child, and talk to you as if you're still their little student! Not Jeroo. She treated me as her equal, not her junior. She insisted that I musn't put her up on a pedestial, and she always initiated the conversation if she hadn't heard from me in a while. Jeroo was one of those rare people who didn't play games, flake out, or let you down. A true friend, she was quick to write back when I needed her to, and as the years passed, and technology improved, she stayed more in touch than ever. Despite being older than me, and definitely wiser, she was unpretentious enough to ask me for my opinion. As far as friendship went, she set the bar very high indeed.

 Her passing in 2019 affected me deeply. I was in the middle of a very difficult health crisis myself, and I wasn't able to say a proper goodbye. She left me a copy of her memoir, which I'm currently typesetting and editing. Over the past six years since her death, I've had a chance to write up our many conversations, letters, texts and in-person chats. Ultimately, she taught me the value of writing things down: thoughts, opinions, random philosophical musings, funny stories, childhood experiences, all of it. Jeroo also believed that humour was sublime, and often told me she valued my friendship because I could always see the funny side, no matter how serious the situation. Because of her, I persevered reading the archaic language of classic English literature: from Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure and George Eliot's Middlemarch to the complete works of Jane Austen, plus Shakespeare plays like Julius Caesar, Anthony and Cleopatra, and Macbeth. 

  

Jeroo Dinshaw would not want a flowery tribute, nor a hagiography. She would prefer to be remembered as somoeone who positively impacted my life, and as someone who used English as a force of good. It's not just that she was a gifted teacher, more that she lived and breathed the works she taught. Her narration of Tennyson's Ulysses moved the thirteen-year-old me to tears; later, when I learned of the health battles she'd fought, this poem took on even greater resonance for me. To this day, I cannot read o recite the ending without crying. 

 

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

 
Similarly, Jeroo's gifts as a teacher lay in her ability to cut through the waffle of the great works, and explain the character's complex psychological motivations in simple, accessible English. She forced us to acknowledge our own biases - as fifteen year old girls, we were genuinely amazed at the level of academic maturity Mrs Dinshaw expected of us. She was especially gifted at communicating what she loved about a particular line of dialogue, or poem, or text. That enthusiasm was contagious, even amongst students who didn't come from English speaking homes, for whom the curriculum was especially difficult. Jeroo took great pains to bring old books and words to life - we might have been living in a chaotic, polluted, noisy city, but in her English classroom, we were able to escape to Austen's Pemberley, or Shakespeare's Venice. If I could pick a single quality from Jeroo's teaching that is entrenched in my mind, however, it is her ability to call me on my b.s. She did this very early on, when I was in the ninth grade, and spent far too much time playing piano for the school choirs, instead of attending classes. I walked in like a celebrity into Jeroo's English lecture, and she sarcastically announced my entry: 'look girls, the V.I.P. Miss Felfeli has decided to grace us with her presence!'. Needless to say, I didn't miss an English class again after that, and the memory of Jeroo putting manners on me stayed with me for many years. 

So yes, I choose to remember Jeroo Dinshaw as a lifelong friend who pushed me hard to become a better, more authentic version of my self. I was lucky enough to know her through good times and bad, and I was especially glad that she was able to meet my husband Stephen, in 2017, shortly before her death. We are all changed by those who touch our lives - like many others, my life was greatly improved by my English teacher. To sum up how I feel about Jeroo's impact on my life, here are the final lines from my favourite book Middlemarch by George Eliot: 

...the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs. 

 It's no exaggeration to say that most of my academic achievements, and my personal victories are in part because of Jeroo Dinshaw, who went above and beyond the call of duty, to be a teacher, confidante and friend.