By Dr Myint Zan
DAW Kyi Kyi Hla (28 March1932-15 October 2022) has passed away. Among many other positions she had held in her long life, she was the Vice-Chairperson of the Myanmar Academy of Arts and Sciences. This tribute will not repeat her achievements and contributions but would deal with personal reminiscences and some of the philosophical issues I have had the chance to discuss with ‘Aunty Dawn’ as it was known to some of her juniors including myself.
My recollection of Aunty Dawn goes back about six decades. The place was the compound of the University of Mandalay. My late parents’ Dr San Baw (29 June 1922-7 December 1984) and Professor Dr Myint Myint Khin (15 December 1923-19 June 2014) resided in the late 1950s to early 1960s in Mandalay University compound. So did the family of Daw Kyi Kyi Hla, her husband and her three kids. She was then a staff of the Philosophy Department of the University of Mandalay. She subsequently became Head of both the Mandalay and Yangon Philosophy Departments.
Retrieving ‘Russell: The Logician’ in The Working People’s Daily
On 27 February 1970, (Daw) Kyi Kyi Hla published an article ‘Russell: The Logician’ in The Working People’s Daily (WPD) (predecessor to The Global New Light of Myanmar). It was one of a few tributes to philosopher Bertrand Russell (18 May 1872-2 February 1970) written in English and published in newspapers in Burma. Russell was praised in the editorial of the 5 February 1970 issue of The Guardian (Rangoon, Burma) as the ‘world’s greatest philosopher and sceptic’.
More than four decades later, I searched for several hours at the Universities Central Library in Yangon for the hard copies of the February 1970 issues of the WPD and found the article. I made some photocopies and presented a photocopy of her February 1970 article to her in August 2010. Aunty Dawn told me she did not have a copy of her own article and was appreciative of my efforts in searching for it and presenting it to her.
Not taking a philosophy major but a law major
Several months after (Daw) Kyi Kyi Hla’s article appeared in the WPD I matriculated. Decades after my matriculation Daw Kyi Kyi Hla told me in front of my late mother Professor Dr Daw Myint Myint Khin and myself that my late mother told her (Aunty Dawn) not to encourage me to take up philosophy as a major. My mother probably was concerned that I might take up a philosophy major because even as a kid I and Aunty Dawn discussed philosophy occasionally. Instead, partly due to my late parents’ suggestion, I chose law. I recall a sentence in William Somerset Maugham’s semi-autobiographical novel Of Human Bondage. For Maugham’s protagonist (or character) Philip Carey ‘only the law remained’ as a career choice. But Philip Carey and its creator Maugham did not take law but medicine. Maugham became a multi-millionaire not through the practice of medicine but by writing.
For me ‘the law’ beckoned so to speak. A few years later when I occasionally visited Aunty Dawn’s house which was near the Rangoon Arts and Science University (RASU) and complained about my unhappiness in then my law studies (so to speak) she said (in English) ‘You should have taken English’. I was eligible to take the inaugural English major course having obtained distinctions in both Burmese and English in the Matriculation Exam. The then ‘inaugural’ English major took only 15 students (later extended to about 20 students) and only those who obtained distinctions in English could apply for the English major. Whereas the ‘inaugural’ English major there were intakes of only about 20 students in the 8th batch BA. LLB major to which I joined there were about 200 students. One of my law classmates obtained 40 per cent on the Burmese paper and 41 per cent on the English paper in the Matriculation exam but still got into law. None of my nearly 200 law classmates would have been eligible to take an English major and almost certainly about 20 of the inaugural English majors would have been eligible to take law if they have applied for it. But I was stuck (so to speak) with my law studies and am grateful to my late parents for effecting my further law studies abroad.
Being inspired by Socrates’ one-sentence statement in his trial but not necessarily following it
On another visit this time to her office around 1973 at RASU I noticed Daw Kyi Kyi Hla had written on her blackboard in English the following statement that the philosopher Socrates (Before the Current Era 469 -399) made during his trial:
I would rather die and speak in my own manner than live and speak in your manner.
I read the statement on the blackboard and stared at it but I did not comment anything. Nevertheless, Aunty Dawn said to me in English ‘I like that statement so I wrote it for me to be inspired by it: not that I would follow it or able to follow it’. Socrates, the ‘father of (Western) philosophy’, was a personage Aunty Daw Kyi Kyi Hla obviously admired. Who else among the philosophers did Professor of Philosophy Daw Kyi Kyi Hla admire?
Admirer of Spinoza but not that unqualifiedly
About twenty years or so ago in another visit to her house in Yangon, we discussed the Dutch philosopher Spinoza (24 November 1632-21 February 1677). After being comprehensively cursed and made an outcast so to speak by the Jewish leaders of Amsterdam, Spinoza lived simply, grinding lens while writing philosophical treatises. Spinoza’s life was such that Aunty Dawn stated in Burmese သိပ်သနားဖို့ကောင်းတယ် (one can only view Spinoza’s life with sympathy). Yet her admiration of Spinoza though great was not boundless.
In a book titled Looking for Spinoza Joy, Sorrow and the Feeling Brain by Antonio Damasio (2003), the author claimed that German philosopher Georg Hegel (27 August 1770-14 November 1831) claimed to the effect that:
You cannot be a philosopher without being a Spinozist. You have to be a Spinozist to become a philosopher.
I sent a paraphrase of that quote (perhaps by e-mail) to Daw Kyi Kyi Hla and solicited her opinion on this comment attributed to Hegel. She said she did not agree with that quotation from Hegel (as stated in Damasio’s book). The implication is that a philosopher no matter how great he is (‘it’ has to be a he, male philosophers dominated throughout the ages) cannot be considered a paradigm-setting personage. Still, the Catholic philosopher Peter Kreeft (born 16 March 1937) published around 2015 a four-volume series Socrates’ Children: The 100 Greatest Philosophers. Kreeft’s ‘Socrates’ children’ include Spinoza and obviously, Kreeft considered Socrates the paradigm-setting philosopher. Interestingly, more than a decade after I read Hegel’s praise of Spinoza I read, online, an English translation of an article written by Hegel himself critiquing an aspect of Spinoza’s philosophy
Appreciating Daw Kyi Kyi Hla’s Introduction to my book at a book launch in October 2012
On 19 October 2012 (exactly 10 years ago as I write), there was a book launch of four of my books, three in Burmese, and one in English titled Essays on International Law, Philosophy, Science and Literature. Aunty Kyi Kyi Hla was one of the speakers at the book launch. She spoke in English about my book and Saya Maung Khin Min (Danubyu) spoke in Burmese about the same book. Other speakers were Saya Goandoo U Thein Naing and Sayama writer Ju (Dr Tin Tin Win).
I am grateful to Sayamagyi Daw Kyi Kyi Hla as well as other speakers for their kind words during the book launch.
The Last Comments of Sayamagyi Daw Kyi Kyi Hla
On 16 September 2022 less than a month before Sayamagyi Daw Kyi Kyi Hla passed away, she expressed her sorrow and condolences, on social media, to the family of the late Sayagyi Dr Khin Maung Nyunt (1929-2022) ‘who contributed his knowledge of the arts, history, international affairs, archaeology for the benefit of the country and the people’.
And daughter Dr San San Myint also posted on social media that two days before she passed away Sayamagyi Daw Kyi Kyi Hla stated to her daughter to ‘make her funeral simple’. I regret and apologize to the family of the late Aunty Dawn that I was unable to attend her funeral.
In her article published more than 52 years ago on 27 February 1970 in the WPD as stated above (Daw) Kyi Kyi Hla wrote that Bertrand Russell’s death, ‘which in spite of his great and venerable age came as a shock to many of us (and) I would like to pay my humble tribute to Russell the logician and philosopher of mathematics’.
Sayamagyi Daw Kyi Kyi Hla also lived to ‘a great and venerable age’. With this article, I pay my humble tribute in appreciation and respect.
