Indian Holocaust My Father`s Life and Time - Four Hundred Four
Palash Biswas
http://indianholocaustmyfatherslifeandtime.blogspot.com/
"I should be able to see everyone and everything but no one should be able to see me. I should be able to kill whoever I please," Meghnad.
Based on Michael Madhusudan Datta's epic version of the Ramayana story in which Ravana, not Rama is the hero.
Ravana's sister Surpanakha was treated cruelly by the human King Rama and his family, who were living in exile in Lanka. To get her revenge on Rama, she persuaded her brother to abduct Rama's wife, Sita, for her stunning beauty. A great war between the demons and the humans ensued. Both the humans and demons prayed to the same God, Shiva. Shiva decided to side with the humans and suddenly Meghnad's almighty power was no longer enough.
 | Heart of a Rebel Poet - Letters of Michael Madhusudan Dutt Ed. Ghulam Murshid Jacket Illustration: Manoj K. Jain and Atul Bose (Portrait of Michael) Pp. 327; Oxford University Press Year of Pub: 2004 ISBN: 0 19 566669-0 "Michael Madhusudan Dutt's [1824-73] exclusive role in carrying forward Bengali literature--especially poetry and drama--into the modern era, remains uncontested....Dutt's letters offer an excellent point of entry into the heart and mind of this great poet. Nowhere else did he express himself as freely as he did in his letters which provide invaluable insights into his life, character, and, above all, his art. Although originally written in English, no standard edition of his letters is in existence. The present volume, edited by Ghulam Murshid, provides extensive annotations to individual letters, brief biographical sketches of their recipients, as well as glimpses of the poet's life." -- from the cover jacket. |
This book can be purchased directly from the Parabaas Bookstore
http://www.parabaas.com/bookstore/bookpage/murshid_heart.htmlGhulam Murshid has published more than a dozen books on subjects ranging from Bengali language and literature to the socio-cultural history of Bengali. His book Reluctant Debutante: Response of Bengali Women to Modernization (1983) was a pioneering work in women's studies in India. He is the author of Lured by Hope: A Biography of Michael Madhusudan Dutt, translated by Gopa Majumdar (OUP, 2003)
CONTENTS
| Foreword | vii | |
| Acknowledgements | xi | |
| Note on Transliteration and Spelling of Indian Names | xv | |
| Recipients of the Letters | xvii | |
| Biographical Sketches | xxix | |
| 1. | Young Love and the Crisis of Identity Letters Written between 1841 and 1847 | 1 |
| 2. | Marriage, Infidelity, and Poetry Letters Written from Madras (1849-55) | 48 |
| 3. | An Outburst of Creativity Letters Written from Calcutta (1856-62) | 81 |
| 4. | Hardship and High Hopes Letters Written from Europe (1862-66) | 185 |
| 5. | Dreams and Reality Letters Written from Calcutta (1867-73) | 276 |
| Bibliography | 311 | |
| Index | 320 |
The Heart Of A Rebel Poet is based on Letters written by Michael Madhusudan Dutt ! Ghulam Murshid is an eminent Bangladeshi author, scholar and journalist, ... The Heart of the Rebel Poet (Oxford University Press) is his prime work to focus on Renaissance in Bengal!Michael Madhusudan Dutta was a pioneer of Bengali literature, and father of Bengali sonnet and blank verse. He was a master playwright.
Not many days past, I have written about the Maniratnam Film RAVAN with which the Eminent Film Maker justified the Ethnic Cleansing of Negroid Dravid Aboriginal Indigenous Human scape and Genocide Culture Resultant in Aryan Invasion, demonising RAVAN once again! In reference to Chidambaram`s Corporate War against the Aboriginal Tribal Landscape, this is a CULTURAL Event revoking Lord Rama leading the Global Zionist Brahaminical Hindutva! But our friends countrywide have Neglected the Development and the Matter became Irrelevant as the Film turned to be another FLOP! The Meghnad Badh Kavya, written in amitrakshar chanda (blank verse), was a radical reinterpretation of Ramayana, portraying Ravana and his son Meghnad as the defender of aboriginal Landscape as well as Humanscape against Aryan Invasion led by Lord Rama!Mind you, the strategy of Exploitation of the Nature and Ntural resources has always been equated with the Annihilition of the Nature associated Demography as it happened in Americas and Osania, Europe and Asia, everywhere every time during Colonial Rule. War against Terror started with Oil War which shifted in the Peace Zone of Indian Ocean as the Ruling Brahamincal Hegemony allied with the Global Zionist Corporate Order! Like Ravan, in modern days, the Faces of Resistance are being branded as Extremism, Insurgency and Terrorism to make way for MONOPOLISTIC Aggression!
MEGHNAD Vadh is the first Epic work against the Aryan Invasion which Projects an Aboriginal Protagonist Meghnad, the son of Ravan challenging the Ethnic Cleansing Aryan. Not SITA, here Michael Madhusudan Dutt has Presented an Aboriginal Heroine , PRAMILA, the wife of Meghnad!Meghnad Badh Kavya – Perhaps the greatest of all his literary works, this masterpiece was once again written in blank verse. This 1861 epic was inspired by Milton's Paradise Lost and depicted the heroism of Ravana's son Meghnad. The tragic epic Meghnadh Badh Kabya (মেঘনাদবধ কাব্য) is the most famous work of Michael Madhusudan Dutta (মাইকেল মধুসূদন দত্ত) (1824-1873) - one of the greatest Bengali poets, a pioneer in Bangla drama and sonnets.
In artistic Sanskritized Bengali, Meghnadh Badh Kabyo remains unparalleled. Rabindranath Thakur himself paid homage to the work, speaking succinctly and truly "The Epic Meghnad-Badh is really a rare treasure inBengali literature. Through his writings, the richness of Bengali literature has been proclaimed to the wide world." Bankim Chandra Chatterjee proclaimed the poem as "on the whole the most valuable work in modernBengali literature." Sri Aurobindo wrote about Megnad Badh Kabyo and Michael Madhusudan Dutt, "All the stormiest passions of man's soul he expressed in gigantic language."
Even in Aesthetics and Phonetics, it was a clear departure from the Brahaminical Poetry. His self Destruction was resultant in Revolt and enormous creativity which I witnessed in CHHOTOKAKA`s Life who was a Simple RMP, but who had the Surgical capability and proved himself as the Only Life Line in refugee colonies in Nainital during sixties and seventies. He Never did hesitate for Surgery if it was Necessary as Medical Care was a remote thing in those days. I witnessed his immense creativity in daily life as he was too busy. He was a TOTAL SAHEB and used to dress himself in White only.He never believed in Rituals and helped me to get rid of all kinds of Rituals and Superstitions. For him, I despite born in a remote village without connectivity or electricity, got the taste of world literature in my School days which inspired me in Nainital to connect myself to the rest of the World. He taught me to know the Non Aryan Subaltern Heritage. But like Michael , his life also proved to be a total Disaster and we could not help him. He expressed himself in Medical care in spite of Poetry but failed to get any recognition and immersed himself in self destruction!
I had to read the work in my childhood while the Antithesis attracted me more as the Superstitious Traditional roots in DEVOTION to Rama and the impact of the Ramayan Rituals were Supreme!
I may not write Poetry nowadays. But my childhood and Youth was full of Poetry. I had to recite Rabindra, Satyendra, Nazrul and Madhusudan daily. It was linguistically very hard specifically in reference to Meghnad Vadh Kavya which had quite a Different DICTION, Rhythm and Format!
I have lost the Passion, the sense of Beauty, the impulses which are quite essential and I inherited these from my aboriginal folk roots very well. Isolated from the Landscape and resettled in the Metro Cosmopolitan Life, I had no way but to bid adieu to the MUSE, the Goddess of Poetry.
Like Michael, my CHHOTO KAKA was also a Genuine Rebel who challenged everything as an Atheist. Though he Never did write Poetry, but he had been a regular reader of Western Literature. He had been Creative and inspired me to try for Originality. He was IMPULSIVE and Passionate. I may not know whether his lifestyle was also inspired by the Rebel Poet as it proved to be True Replica which I Never dared to try!
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
SLAYING OF MEGHNAD – A BALLAD
A letter I sent to Mr DMR Sekhar of sulekha.com
Dear DMRS saab,
When you suggested a few days ago to write about 'Meghnad Badh Kavya', by coincidence, I took out an anthology of writings of Michael Madhusudan Dutt with the intention of reading this ballad once more.I wanted to write a blog on anti-hero of our mythology and who can be better than Ravan to be the person to write about!
Michael has broken many grounds in this ballad. He has introduced a new style …'amitrakshar chhanda' ( the lines of his ballad do not rhyme : blank verse). More importantly, he has portrayed the characters of Ram, Lakshman , Ravan and Meghnad in a very unconventional way. The story has been told in several layers and he followed western grammar of epics , specially Virgil.Though reading 'Slaying by Meghnad' by Cinton Seely in the internet , through the window I suggested , is not easy to manage, it is the 2nd best way for you to savour the ballad….since you cannot read the original. The following two links will give you a good idea about the ballad and there are couple of points I would like to add .
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-Ln6wH3cieqcxWMDJColVNL6Evg--?cq=1&p=16
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-Ln6wH3cieqcxWMDJColVNL6Evg--?cq=1&p=32
While Michael has shown Ravan and Meghnad are victims of Destiny (the poet has repeatedly used the word 'Bidhi' which means 'the god above'), his narration brings out a picture of conspiracy by the gods and deception by Ram's camp being at the root of defeat and fall of Meghnad, not the valour of Lakshman. He has portrayed Meghnad as invincible in face-to-face battle with both Indra, king of gods (that is why he used to be called 'Indrajit',he who vanquishes Indra) and Ram. Please read this quote : '….duibaar aami haranu Raghave, aar ekbaar pitah deha aajnaa more;dekhiba ebaar beer baanche ki oushadhe! – twice I defeated Raghav ; father, you give me permission once more, let's see which medicine brings him back to life this time ) !
Night of the long knives : Indra convinces Parbati to influence Shiva in accepting that Ravan and Indrajit do not deserve any more support of Shiva. Kamadev aids the process. With Shiva's acceptance of the proposal in principle , Mahamaya hands over the weapons Kartikeya used to kill Tarakasur and Indra arranges to deliver the same to Lakshman before the day-break.
Deception : Bibheesan shows the path to the place where Meghnad has lighted the fire for his Yagna at dawn before he will proceed for the battle and obstructs Meghnad's exit for acquiring weapons to fight Lakshman . Please view the panel Bengal's artist portrayed decades prior to Michael's penning this ballad.
http://books.google.com/books?id=7YOptVKnP14C&pg=PA177&lpg=PA177&dq=Meghnad++badh+kabya%2BRadice&source=bl&ots=W0goWNCc4R&sig=iKKDvdpKltftRygcN6Rnbxcrd1c&hl=en&ei=IkLBSbNpw8OQBcvZ-CU&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=5&ct=result#PPA179,M1
As wikipedia puts it:
In his trip to Versailles, France during the 1860s, Madhusudan had to suffer the ignominy of penury and destitution. His friends back home, who had inspired him to cross the ocean in search of recognition, started ignoring him altogether. Perhaps his choice of a lavish lifestyle, coupled with a big ego that was openly hostile to native tradition, was partly to blame for his financial ruin. Except for a very few well-wishers, he had to remain satisfied with many fair-weather friends. It may be argued, not without some obvious irony that during those days, his life oscillated, as it were, between the Scylla of stark poverty and the Charybdis of innumerable loans. He was head over heels in debt. As he was not in a position to clear off his debts, he was very often threatened by imprisonment. Dutt was able to return home only due to the munificent generosity of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. For this, Dutt was to regard Vidyasagar as Dayar Sagar (meaning the ocean of kindness) for as long as he lived. Madhusudan had cut off all connections with his parents, relatives and at times even with his closest friends, who more often than not were wont to regard him as an iconoclast and an outcast. It was during the course of his sojourn in Europe that Madhusudan then realized his true identity. Perhaps for the first time in his life, he became aware of the colour of his skin and his native language. What he wrote to his friend Gour Bysack from France neatly sums up his eternal dilemma:
| " | If there be any one among us anxious to leave a name behind him, and not pass away into oblivion like a brute, let him devote himself to his mother-tongue. That is his legitimate sphere his proper element. | " |
Contrary to this general belief, Madhusudan NEVEr did apreciate Vidyasagar as a scholar as he used to term the Sanskrit Pundits as RASCALS. He wrote so in a letter to Raj Shekhar Basu quoted in the Murshid Book!
The Slaying of Meghanada Book Description
"The poem is rising into splendid popularity. Some say it is better than Milton-but that is all bosh-nothing can be better than Milton; many say it licks Kalidasa; I have no objection to that. I don't think it impossible to equal Virgil, Kalidasa, and Tasso." Michael Madhusudan Datta wrote
this in a letter to a friend about his verse narrative, The Slaying of Meghanada (1861). The epic, a Bengali version of the Ramayana story in which Ravana, not Rama, is the hero, has become a classic of Indian literature. Datta lived in Bengal at the height of what is frequently called the Bengal
Renaissance, a time so labeled for its reinvigoration and reconfiguration of the Hindu past and for the florescence of the literary arts. It was also a period when the Bengali city of Kolkata was a center of world trade-the second city of the British empire-and thus a site of cultural exchange
between India and the West. Datta was the perfect embodiment of this time and place. The Slaying of Meghanada is deeply influenced by western epic tradition, and is sprinkled with nods to Homer, Milton, and Dante. Datta's deft intermingling of western and eastern literary traditions brought about a
sea change in South Asian literature, and is generally considered to mark the dividing line between pre-modern and modern Bengali literature. Datta's masterpiece is now accessible to readers of English in Clinton Seely's elegant translation, which captures both the sense and the spirit of the
original. The poem is supplemented by an extensive introduction, notes, and a glossary.
0195167996
9780195167993
The Slaying of Meghanada A Ramayana from Colonial Bengal Datta, Michael Madhusudan Seely, Clinton B. (Translator), Associate Professor in the Department of South Asian Languages and Civilizations, The University of Chicago Print publication date: 2004 Published to Oxford Scholarship Online: October 2005 Print ISBN-13: 978-0-19-516799-3 doi:10.1093/0195167996.001.0001 | |
Abstract: "The poem is rising into splendid popularity. Some say it is better than Milton — but that is all bosh — nothing can be better than Milton; many say it licks Kalidasa; I have no objection to that. I don't think it impossible to equal Virgil, Kalidasa, and Tasso." Michael Madhusudan Datta wrote this in a letter to a friend about his verse narrative, The Slaying of Meghanada (1861). The epic, a Bengali version of the Ramayana story in which Ravana, not Rama, is the hero, has become a classic of Indian literature. Datta lived in Bengal at the height of what is frequently called the Bengal Renaissance, a time so labeled for its reinvigoration and reconfiguration of the Hindu past and for the florescence of the literary arts. It was also a period when the Bengali city of Kolkata was a center of world trade-the second city of the British empire — and thus a site of cultural exchange between India and the West. Datta was the perfect embodiment of this time and place. The Slaying of Meghanada is deeply influenced by western epic tradition, and is sprinkled with nods to Homer, Milton, and Dante. Datta's deft intermingling of western and eastern literary traditions brought about a sea change in South Asian literature, and is generally considered to mark the dividing line between pre-modern and modern Bengali literature. Datta's masterpiece is now accessible to readers of English in this translation, which captures both the sense and the spirit of the original. The poem is supplemented by an extensive introduction, notes, and a glossary. Keywords: Bengal, Ramayana, Ravana, Hindi, Kolkata, western epic tradition Table of Contents  show abstractsPreface  Introduction canto 1. Investiture  canto 2. Weapons Acquisition canto 3. Reuniting canto 4. Ashoka Grove canto 5. Preparations canto 6. The Slaying canto 7. Felling with the Shakti Weapon canto 8. City of the Spirits canto 9. Funeral Rites | |
Ghulam Murshid
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Ghulam Murshid is an eminent Bangladeshi author, scholar and journalist, based in London, England. Previously, Dr Murshid was a professor of Bengali literature at the University of Rajshahi and a radio journalist with the British Broadcasting Corporation in London. He also held teaching and research positions with Bangladesh Agricultural University and University of Melbourne. He is currently a research associate with the department of the language and culture of South Asia at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London,[1] and an occasional commentator for Voice of America. He is a renowned scholar on the literature, history, culture and society of Bengal. He is the author of a number of well-known, pathbreaking studies , including Lured by Hope (Oxford University Press), The Heart of the Rebel Poet (Oxford University Press), and The Reluctant Debutante.[2][3], Kalantare Bangla gadya : aupanibeika amale gadyera rupantara, Kalapanir Hatchani: Bilete Bangalir Itihas, and Muktijuddha O Tarpor: Ekti Nirdolio Itihash. In recognition of his creative achievements, he received a number of literary awards, including the Bangla Academy Award for literature, from both India and Bangladesh.
[edit] References
- ^ "Dr Ghulam Murshid". SOAS. http://www.soas.ac.uk/staff/staff36414.php. Retrieved 2010-03-10.
- ^ "Ghulam Murshid.". Open Library. http://openlibrary.org/a/OL520257A/Ghulam_Murshid. Retrieved 2010-03-10.
- ^ Amin, Sonia. The world of Muslim women in colonial Bengal, 1876-1939. Page 25.
 | This Bangladeshi biographical article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |
Madhusudan's life was a stupendous boon and also an enormous sorrow. Loss of self-control was mainly responsible for his life's financial and emotional sorrows and yet it was a God-gifted boon for his over-flowing poetic originality.
The all-inviting epitaph on his grave came from the poet himself:
Stop a while, traveler!
Should Mother Bengal claim thee for her son.
As a child takes repose on his mother's elysian lap,
Even so here in the Long Home,
On the bosom of the earth,
Enjoys the sweet eternal sleep
Poet Madhusudan of the Duttas.
I visted Kolkata in 1973 for the First Time with my father Pulin Babu who ensured my Visit to the Grave of the Rebel Poet in Keoratolla, Kolkata and I read those lines!
- Sharmistha – Written in western style, Sharmistha was the first original Bengali play. This play written in 1858 was based on the story of Yayati, Devyani and her mate Sharmistha.
- Padmavati – This play composed in blank verses was a successful attempt by Michael Madhusudan Dutta. This drama based on Greek mythology was composed in1860.
- Tilottama - Sambhava – This was the first Bengali poem composed entirely in blank verse. This 1860 composition was based on a Puranic story of a war between the demons Upasunda and Sunda with the Gods.
The other compositions of Michael Madhusudan Dutta include Krishna-Kumari, Virangana, and Brajangana-Kavya. Except for Brajangana Kavya which was written in verse form, the other two compositions were in blank verse. All these works were written between 1861 and 62.
Meanwhile,The stage was set for another meet between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and US President Barack Obama here later Sunday, during which they were expected to discuss a host of issues from Afghanistan and Pakistan to the current global financial crisis.
But Indian officials accompanying the prime minister ruled out the possibility of his bringing up the issue of extraditing former Union Carbide chief Warren Anderson from the US during his meeting with Obama.
The two leaders will meet soon after the conclusion of the G20 Summit where they both shared similar views on the issue of how the world should overcome one of the worst global financial crisis in decades, officials said.
Both felt that fiscal stimuli introduced by many countries after the crisis, to ensure that large doses of public spending keep demand alive, must not be withdrawn suddenly.
If such a step toward consolidation was taken in haste, it could fuel deflation, rather than just stoke inflationary pressures, which was far more dangerous for the economy, the two leaders felt.
Other issues that could crop up include China's stated intention to supply two more nuclear reactors to Pakistan, the ongoing development efforts in Afghanistan and the progress made by Pakistan in bringing the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks to book.
Epic Failures Sunil Gangopadhyay's new Ramayana raises difficult questions about Ram, says VISHNUPRIYA SENGUPTA
It has been a while since Gangopadhyay, the current Sahitya Akademi president, has moved away from his beloved Neera, the idealised woman who has been the subject of his most famous poems. But her trace still persists in the modest Kolkata living room where two striking pen-and-ink works of a musician and a young girl by Jogen Chowdhury reflect the agony and ecstasy of love. The object of his affection has however turned from the enigmatic Neera to the oppressed of mythology. Conversations with Ranajit Guha, an authority on subaltern studies (an approach of social sciences focussed on the masses rather than the elite), rekindled his interest in the epics. Particularly in the subalterns of the Ramayana, prompting in him a desire to expose Ram's clay feet. Gangopadhyay says, "There is little mention of the people who served Ram and Sita in the forest for 14 years. There are long descriptions of the meat that Ram consumed, but Valmiki does not describe those who cooked for the royal couple or carried their belongings. So in my work, I would like to portray the lives of the hoi polloi in Ram's era. Ram will come alive through their eyes." The epics have been reinterpreted by writers before. Michael Madhusudan Dutt, the 19th century poet, set the chariot rolling when he wrote Meghnad Badh Kavya with Ravana as the hero. In the 1970s, novelist Buddhadeb Bose projected Krishna as the villain in Mahabharater Katha. And there is Telugu novelist Yarlagadda Laxmi Prasad's Draupadi — shortlisted for this year's Kendriya Sahitya Akademi award — which is currently mired in controversy, revolving as it does around Draupadi's sexual escapades. Gango padhyay, however, is quick to defend Draupadi. "As a literary text, it contains nothing objectionable. The objections raised have been on moral grounds."
Morality of a sexual nature isn't the key issue in Gangopadhyay's retelling, which begins at the moment when a victorious Ram returns to Ayodhya, Sita and Lakshman in tow. "There is an episode in which Sambuk, a Sudra, performs a yagna, a task meant to be performed exclusively by Brahmins. A livid Ram beheads him. "No transgression was permissible in Ram Rajya. If a Kshatriya like Viswamitra can meditate to convert into a Brahmin, why not a Sudra? Ram glorified the caste system." Gangopadhyay claims there are no gaps in the research which he has been conducting for a year into Rajshekhar Basu's Bengali translation of the Ramayana as well as the Sanskrit text. Ram and Sita are often perceived as an ideal jodi. Far from it, says Gangopadhyay. "Polygamy was the norm then. Ram's father Dasarath had 350 wives, none of whom were able to conceive naturally. Sita too failed to conceive when she was living with Ram. She did, much later, after her return from Lanka. Perhaps Ram realised he couldn't possibly be the father of her children and exiled her: not so much on public demand, but for personal reasons," chuckles Gangopadhyay, emphasising each word. "If he loved her, why would he subject her to agnipariksha twice just to appease some minions?" These are just a few teasers from the writer whose Those Days turned the Bengal Renaissance into a compulsive, epic reading experience. In a few months, the saffron brigade will certainly have something to dig into. Hey Ram! | ||
From Tehelka Magazine, Vol 7, Issue 09, Dated March 06, 2010 |
IF RAM AND Sita lived happily in the forest for 14 years, why did Sita conceive twins only after her abduction by Ravana? If Ram was hopelessly devoted to Sita, why did he insult her on the flimsiest of pretexts? If Ram Rajya was an ideal age, why did Ram glorify the caste system? These are some of the issues 76- year-old Sunil Gangopadhyay is probing in his controversial untitled Bengali novel, slated to be launched by Anand Publishers this September.
A Tremendous Comet : Michael Madhusudan Dutt
Ketaki Kushari Dyson
Ghulam Murshid, Lured by Hope: A Biography of Michael Madhusudan Dutt, translated from Bengali by Gopa Majumdar, Oxford University Press, New Delhi, 2003. ISBN 0-19-565362-9. Pp 238 + xvi
'You may take my word for it, friend Raj, I shall come out like a tremendous comet and no mistake,' wrote Michael Madhusudan Dutt (1824-73) to his friend Rajnarayan Basu in July 1861. The appearance of Michael Madhusudan Dutt (i.e. Datta) in Bengali literature was indeed not unlike that of a striking comet; perhaps the only 'mistake' in this self-assessment, as Michael's biographer Ghulam Murshid has pointed out, was in his use of the future tense. When he penned these words, Michael was already at the peak of his literary career, well-established as the most important poet and playwright of the new Bengal of his times. Intellectually, he was a rebel and a product of the Bengal Renaissance, and challenged much of the value system encoded in traditional literature; a gifted linguist, he taught himself several Oriental and Occidental languages, and was well-read not only in English literature, but also in other European literatures, including the Greek and Latin classics. A naturally talented writer, he was thus in an excellent position to mediate many new foreign influences to Bengali letters. He became a major innovator and experimenter in formal matters, introducing blank verse and the sonnet form into Bengali poetry; he was an important pioneer in dramatic writing; he wrote a grand heroic-tragic epic in nine cantos which is quite unique in the corpus of Bengali literature; inspired by Ovid, he wrote poems about the sorrows and hurts of love spoken by women in an epistolary or dramatic monologue mode. A hundred and thirty years after his death, his eminent stature in the field of Bengali writing is not questioned. The fact that he began by writing in English, then, persuaded of the futility of that endeavour, turned his attention to the mastering of his neglected mother tongue, and ended up by becoming the most important modern precursor to Rabindranath Tagore in poetry and drama, has had a special appeal to Bengali pride. This turn-round has endeared him to his readers and enhanced his status.
Making good use of his location in London, Murshid has explored many published and unpublished sources of information which have a relevance to the vita of Michael, in particular the archival records and institutional publications from colonial times which are available in Britain and France. With the help of such sources he has been able to unearth new facts, correct many previously held misconceptions, and cast new light on areas of Michael's life which had been veiled to the public eye before. In particular, his assiduity in chasing records of births, baptisms, marriages, and deaths is exemplary. His work has been invaluable in establishing the real identity of the two women who shared Michael's life, Rebecca Thompson and Henrietta White. In my generation we grew up with the notion that Henrietta was his second wife and that she was French. She was neither. She was also from the English-speaking circle of Madras. Her father was a friend and colleague of Michael's, and she and Michael became close after she had lost her own mother and her father had remarried. She and Michael do not seem to have been formally married, presumably because Rebecca had never granted him divorce. There is no record either of their marriage or of Michael obtaining a divorce from Rebecca. Henrietta and her children were fluent in French because of their French sojourn, but as Murshid points out, had she been of French ethnic origin, her name would have been Henriette, not Henrietta. Prior to Murshid's definitive researches, even this very simple clue hadn't been followed up by anybody. Murshid has been able to show that Rebecca Thompson was an orphan who was three-quarters white (with a British father and a mother who was classified as an 'Indo-Briton'). Henrietta's father George Giles White was clearly British, but her mother Eliza might have been either British or Eurasian.
Murshid's documentation has been specially valuable for the reconstruction of those dramas of Michael's life which were enacted away from Calcutta, those relating to his years in Madras and his life in Europe, but his special forte as a literary biographer is that he is interested not just in presenting discrete facts, but in making connections between them, in presenting facts in their contexts, and weaving all the details into a narrative that flows. His biography is packed with social, cultural, and intellectual history, and is outstanding in making connections: between the man and the work, between Michael's life-experiences and the themes developed and elaborated in his poetry and drama. Michael thus emerges as a figure in three dimensions whose works of art are elucidated by his life-story. In particular, Murshid shows in detail how Michael projected onto his art his suffering and sense of guilt at the failure of his marriage to Rebecca and his abandonment of his first family. Michael did not speak openly about this aspect of his life to his friends, but his emotional turmoil is recorded in his poetry and drama: if we know how to decode it, we can read it clearly, and Murshid helps us to do it. This is a real triumph for a literary biographer.
It is therefore good to see that Oxford University Press, New Delhi, has issued an English version of this book. Gopa Majumdar, a professional translator with many published works of translation, writes a fluent, idiomatic style, and the book should be a good read for those who cannot access the original work. Let us hope that this book will introduce the colourful figure of Michael Madhusudan Dutt to those who have never heard of him, and fill in some of the much-needed details for those who have heard his name but know little else about him. A commendable feature of the English edition is the Select Bibliography that has been compiled by Murshid and appended to the end of the book. Regrettably, though, there is not a single portrait of Michael Madhusudan anywhere in the entire book, not even on the front or back cover. I must say I cannot applaud this decision of the publishers. For a biography not to show the face of the person whose life is being unravelled, when one or two authentic likenesses are available, is odd indeed. The Bengali book has an abundance of pictorial material (though not always very well reproduced), and I think readers do value the visual quality. Pictures, even faded and blurred pictures, help to make a book reader-friendly and arouse interest in the subject. A few illustrations, a few human faces to relate to, a few facsimiles of documents: such things make all the difference to the feel of a book, and I would say that in a biography they are indispensable. This book could have easily had a few faces, a few documents, a sample of the poet's handwriting, the title-page of one of his books, perhaps a photograph of his grave, but it has no such visual material, just the English text, which seems to say to us: 'Don't look for anything else. Here there is only one modality, the textual.'
Sadly also, the literary resonances in the title and chapter-headings of the original book have been silenced. The title of the book, accurately translated from the original Bengali title, comes from a line of Michael's poetry, but nowhere in the book is that explained. Indeed, the original title, Ashar Chhalane Bhuli, along with its full bibliographical details, does not seem to get a mention anywhere, which is odd. The six original chapters were each named after fragments of Michael's lines, but all that has been abandoned. There are not even page headers telling us in which chapter we are. The additional chapter, where Murshid had lovingly gathered together information about Michael's descendants, has been jettisoned. This was a strange decision, I think; in my opinion, this additional chapter would have enhanced the overall attraction of this book to general readers. Besides, Michael's own descendants are all English-speakers. Some are settled in Australia, but a few (I hear) are still living in India, and a few could even be in Britain. Some of these descendants might well have taken an interest in this book, and could have perhaps brought a few more facts to light, if this chapter had been made available in English.
The transliteration of Bengali words and names in the Roman script is a nightmare for anybody working with Bengali material in English. In her 'Translator's Note' Ms Majumdar says: 'The main difficulty lay in the absence of certain letters in the Bengali alphabet, 'v' in particular.' That, I would have thought, was the least of our problems! We can soon adopt a compromise over the v/b problem. Essentially, the 'v' has disappeared from Bengali. There is only 'b'. The real hurdles in representing Bengali are much more formidable. First, a decision has to be reached on whether we represent the pronunciation or the orthography. Secondly, unless extra symbols and markings are used, the usual apparatus of the Roman script, as used in English, is very inadequate for reproducing many of our sounds. The difficulty really is that the Roman script, as it is used in English, lacks enough letters for representing Bengali. The difficulty of distinguishing between the dental consonants and the cerebral consonants, of distinguishing between the short 'a' and the long 'a', or between the short 'a' that is pronounced as 'aw' as in 'awkward' and the short 'a' that is pronounced as 'o': these are some of the genuine problems with which we have to struggle. Everybody has to adopt some compromise or other. On the one hand, the way we say things has to be respected; on the other, if spellings are wrenched away too much from the way they have been represented for a very long time, people have difficulty in recognizing them, and communication, the very purpose of all language, is affected. I was amused to see in this book the spelling 'Janhabi Debi' (the name of Michael's mother); the representation of the conjunct is close to the way we would pronounce it, but I wonder if other Indians will realize that we do still write it as 'hn', not 'nh'! But I was more amused to see 'Dushyant', for we never pronounce it that way! That's the Hindi pronunciation; in Bengali we do not drop the end-vowel! How has that crept in? And Manomohan Ghosh, usually written Manomohan Ghosh in this book, has become Manmohan at least once (p. 161)! But these are the hazards of the business of writing and being published, like typos. Talking of those, I have noticed a handful, of which 'a hundred year's time' for 'a hundred years' time' sticks out on the first page of the Foreword, and likewise 'I did what I could do [to?] streamline and edit' sticks out in the Translator's Note (p. xv). 'Alexandra' puzzled me slightly on p. 158, until I was reassured in a few lines that 'Alexandria' was meant. However, 'Laudon Street' twice on pp. 195-96 is a more serious error; it needs to be Loudon Street.
In the second part of this article I wish to concentrate on the translation aspect of this book. Those who are not interested in the details of translation issues need not plough through this second section, but to those who are, it could be like a translation workshop. Before I leave this section, I should mention that Murshid has edited the letters of Michael Madhusudan Dutt, which are all in English, and that book is forthcoming from OUP Delhi. We look forward to it.
Next Segment: Some Translation Issues...
Published January 22, 2004
Ketaki Kushari Dyson [ketakI kushaarI Daaisan*] was born in Calcutta in 1940 and educated at Calcutta and Oxford. She has been based in England since ... (more)
http://www.parabaas.com/translation/database/reviews/brLured1.htmlMichael Madhusudan Dutta
Profile of an Epic Poet
Compiled by Aparna Chatterjee
Madhusudan began writing while at Hindu College. He drew everyone's attention at a college function when he recited a self-composed poem. He won several scholarships in college exams as well as a gold medal for an essay on women's education. While a student at Hindu College, Madhusudan's poems in Bengali and English were published in Jnananvesan, Bengal Spectator, Literary Gleamer, Calcutta Library Gazette, Literary Blossom and Comet. Lord Byron was Madhusudan's inspiration.
Michael's exceptionally colourful personality and his unconventional, dramatic and in many ways tragic life have added to the magnetism and glamour of his name. Generous in friendship, romantic and passionate by temperament, he was also fond of the good life; he was financially irresponsible, and an incorrigible spendthrift. He experimented not only in the field of writing, but also in his personal life.
On 9 February 1843, Madhusudan ran away from home and converted to Christianity, to escape a marriage his father had arranged and also to satiate his fascination with everything English and Western. He took the name 'Michael' upon his conversion and wrote a hymn to be recited on the day of his Baptism. However, on becoming a Christian, Madhusudan had to leave Hindu College as Christians were not allowed to study there during that time. In 1844, he got admitted to Bishop's College and remained there until 1847. There, he also studied Greek and Latin.
Madhusudan's conversion to Christianity estranged him from his family, and his father stopped sending him money. In 1848, Michael left for Madras where he started teaching, first at Madras Male Orphan Asylum School (1848-1852) and then at Madras University High School (1852-1856). Besides teaching, Madhusudan was also involved with a number of newspapers and journals. He edited the Eurasian (later known as the Eastern Guardian), the Madras Circulator and General Chronicle and the Hindu Chronicle. He also worked as Assistant Editor of the Madras Spectator (1848-1856).
While in Madras, Madhusudan married Rebecca Mactavys Thompson and had a family by her. Meanwhile, his mother died and then his father. After his father's death, Madhusudan abandoned Rebecca and his first family due to a failed marriage and returned to Kolkata in February 1856 to live with a Frenchwoman named Henrietta White and had a second family by her. She and Michael did not seem to have been formally married, presumably because Rebecca had never granted him divorce. There is no record either of their marriage or of Michael obtaining a divorce from Rebecca.
In Kolkata, Michael first worked as a clerk at the police court and then as interpreter. He also started contributing to different journals. His friends urged him to write in Bengali.
Madhusudan realized the paucity of good writing in Bengali as well as his own ability to fill this vacuum. While translating Ramnarayan Tarkaratna's play Ratnavali (1858) into English, he felt the absence of good plays in Bengali. He became associated with the Belgachhiya Theatre in Kolkata patronized by the Rajas of Paikpara. In 1858 he wrote the western-style play Sharmistha based on the Mahabharata story of Devayani and Yayati. This was the first original play in Bengali, making Madhusudan the first Bengali playwright.
By dint of his genius, he removed the stagnation in Bengali literature both in style and content. He was the first to use blank verse in 1860 in the play Padmavati based on a Greek myth. This use of blank verse freed Bengalipoetry from the limitations of rhymed verse. This success prompted Madhusudan to write his first Bengali poem, Tilottama-Sambhava in blank verse in that very same year. It is based on the Puranic story of the war waged on the Gods by the demon brothers Sunda and Upasunda. This poem was written entirely in blank verse, and so were the two later poems Meghnad-Badh Kavya (Ballad of Meghnad's Demise in Ramayana) in 1861 and Virangana. The later poems silenced the critics and detractors, and permanently established the vogue of blank verse literature.
Madhusudan's epic poem: Meghnad-Badh Kavya is considered his all-time masterpiece till today. Written in blank verse, this epic was based on the Ramayana but inspired by Milton's Paradise Lost. Madhusudan transformed the villainous Ravana into a Hero. This grand heroic-tragic epic was written in nine cantos which is quite unique in the history of Bengali Poetry. Meghnad-Badh Kavya was Bengali literature's first original epic and gave Madhusudan the status of an Epic Poet.
The years 1861-62 were Madhusudan's most fruitful period. These were the years of publication of Meghnad-Badh, Krishna-Kumari, Vrajangana, and Virangana-Kavya (1862). Virangana was modeled on Ovid's heroic epistles, and contains some of Madhusudan's finest blank verses. Technically it is his best work. Almost all his poems, except Brajangana-Kavya (1861) were written in the blank verse pattern.
Madhusudan worked briefly as Editor of the Hindu Patriot before leaving for England on 9 June 1862 to study Law. In 1863 he went to Versailles in France, staying there for about two years. It was in France that Madhusudan overcame the longing for England that had inspired his early works and realized the importance of his motherland and mother tongue - Bengali.
Much of his time abroad, especially in Versailles, was spent in abject poverty, as the money from his late father's estate on which he was relying did not come regularly. His Indian friends who had inspired him to cross the ocean had by now managed to forget the beggar Madhusudan altogether. He fell hopelessly into debts and appealed for help to the great personality, the scholar, social reformer, and activist Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar (this kind soul was known to all as Dayar Sagar – the ocean of kindness, for his immense generosity).
Vidyasagar labored to ensure that sums owed to Michael from his property at home were remitted to him and sent him a large sum of money to France. However, as Madhusudan was still not in a position to clear off all his debts, he was very often threatened by his creditors with the eventuality of prison-arrests. He was deeply over head and ears in debt.
Madhusudan returned to England from Versailles in 1865. In 1866 he became a Barrister. He returned to Kolkata on 5 January 1867 and started practicing Law. But his practice did not pick up and in June 1870, he was obliged to give up his legal career to work as a translator at the High Court on a monthly salary of Rs 1000.
However, his habit of reckless spending ran up debts again. Despite all ups and downs, Madhusudan kept on writing. In 1871 he wrote Hectarbadh after Homer's Iliad. His last composition was Mayakanan (1873).
Madhusudan's last days were painful, because of debts, illness and lack of treatment. He had no place of his own and had to take shelter in the library of the Zamindars of UttarPara, Hooghly, W.B.
His extravagant life-style, fickleness in money matters, and reckless drinking to drown problems conspired to wreck his health and happiness, and likewise the health and happiness of his second partner Henrietta, who had also succumbed to alcoholism during her days of poverty in Versailles.
On 29 June 1873, three days after the death of Henrietta, the greatest poet of the Bengal renaissance died in Calcutta General Hospital in a miserable condition at the age of only 49 years. Thus, he and his partner both died prematurely, within 3 days of each other's demise, leaving behind orphaned children.
Even now after more than 100 years to his death, Michael Madhusudan Dutta is revered as the pioneer of the new 19th century awakening of Bengal. With his unusual talent, he brought about revolutionary changes in Bengali language and literature. Drawing profusely on Sanskrit themes for his poems and borrowing from western literature, he set a completely new trend in Bengali literature.
He was a man of real, though somewhat erratic, genius, and a courageous innovator of forms and types which altered the whole course of Bengali literature and added new dimensions to it. To his adventurous spirit, Bengali Literature owes its first blank verse and the sonnet , its first modern comedy and tragedy, and its first epic.
The life-style and poetic virtues of Michael Madhusudan Dutta were not only unconventional but awe inspiring. He would be always highly regarded and remain immortal in the history of Bengali literature as the founder of Amitrakshar Chhanda or blank verse (rhyme less verse) and as its best ever exponent.
Madhusudan used to collect themes for his poetry from the Sanskrit Puranas, ancient Hindu epics and also English and French literature. He also wrote poems about the sorrows and hurts of love spoken by women. He is considered as the Father of Bengali Sonnet. He was also a wonderful linguist. Besides Bengali, Sanskrit and Tamil, he studied Greek, Latin, Italian and French and could read and write the last two languages with perfect grace and ease.
Madhusudan's life was a stupendous boon and also an enormous sorrow. Loss of self-control was mainly responsible for his life's financial and emotional sorrows and yet it was a God-gifted boon for his over-flowing poetic originality.
The all-inviting epitaph on his grave came from the poet himself:
Stop a while, traveler!
Should Mother Bengal claim thee for her son.
As a child takes repose on his mother's elysian lap,
Even so here in the Long Home,
On the bosom of the earth,
Enjoys the sweet eternal sleep
Poet Madhusudan of the Duttas.
September 10, 2006
M.Madhusuda Dutt
"The god himself took up thy pen and wrote. "
- Sri Aurobindo
Madhusudan was born with rock-like determination. He proved himself to be a student of exceptional gifts, and his teachers and professors with no difficulty recognised in him a fast-blossoming intellectual figure. When his boyhood was just commencing to bud into adolescence, countless coloured images rocketed in the sky of his imagination for a swift flare-up into fame.
From his adolescence he was consumed with the desire to be an out-and-out Englishman. There was no shadow of a doubt in him that the moment his feet touched the foreign shores he would become a world figure. According to him, Bengal, nay, the whole of India was sadly wanting in the capacity of appreciating a genius, whereas the free thinking of foreigners could evaluate real merit. Let us leave him to speak:
"Where man in all his truest glory lives,
And nature's face is exquisitely sweet;
For those fair climes I heave impatient sigh,
There let me live and there let me die."
At last the fated day dawned. On February 9, 1843, Madhusudan embraced Christianity in spite of his parents' and relatives' thundering and wailing in chorus. On that red-letter day Madhusudan in Michael's heart sang:
"Long sunk in superstition's night,
By Sin and Satan driven,
I saw not, cared not for the light
That leads the blind to Heaven.
But now, at length thy grace, O Lord!
Bids all around me shine;
I drink thy sweet, thy precious word,
I kneel before thy shrine!"
Again let us not miss Michael's song in Madhu in after years on the eve of his departure to England.
Forget me not, O Mother,
Should I fail to return
To thy hallowed bosom.
Make not the lotus of thy memory
Void of its nectar Madhu.
(Translated from the original Bengali.)
Neither Shakespeare nor Milton but Byron was Madhusudan's hero. It is really worth noticing how the lives of Lord Byron and Michael Madhusudan were fashioned completely in a similar mould. The characters of the two can be summed up in one word: audacity. These two mighty poets at once remind us of Danton the French revolutionist: "L'audace, encore l'audace, toujours l'audace!"
With Childe Harold's Pilgrimage Byron won the world. To cite the poet himself: "I awoke one morning and found myself famous."
With Meghnad-Badh the Indian poet distinguished himself. However, it took a few years for this epic to win recognition all over the country.
Bankim, the creator of Bengali literature, pays a glowing tribute to the poet of Meghnad-Badh thus: "...to Homer and Milton, as well as to Valmiki, he is largely indebted, and his poem is on the whole the most valuable work in modern Bengali literature."
"The Epic Meghnad-Badh," says Tagore, "is really a rare treasure in Bengali literature. Through his writings, the richness of Bengali literature has been proclaimed to the wide world." Vidyasagar's lofty praise runs: "MeghnadBadh is a supreme poem."
Nolini Kanta Gupta, who ranks high among the great literary figures of Bengal, writes: "The day Bankim produced his artistic beauty, Kapalkundala, and Madhusudan penned
In a battle face to face,
"When Birbahu, the hero sovereign,
kissed the dust and departed to the land
of Death
the day Rabindranath could declare
"Not mother, not daughter, not bride art thou,
O Beauty incarnate,
O Urvasi, denizen of Paradise!"
was a momentous day for Bengali literature to proclaim the message of the universal muse and not exclusively its own parochial note. The genius of Bengal secured a place in the wide world overpassing the length and breadth of Bengal. And Bengali poetry reached the highest status."
Let me deal a little more with Byron and Madhusudan. "Self-worshipper": such was the comment made by Keats on Byron. Macaulay goes one step ahead: "He [Byron] was himself the beginning, the middle and the end, of all his own poetry, the hero of every tale, the chief object in every landscape." But who can dare to accuse the Indian poet of the same crime? Not even a single criticism of the kind can be levelled against him. Be that as it may, I should like to draw the attention of my readers to a strangely significant matter. In Byron's Manfred what the Abbot St. Maurice spoke of Manfred can equally be applied to the life of Madhusudan:
This should have been a noble creature: he
Hath all the energy which should have made
A goodly frame of glorious elements,
Had they been wisely mingled, as it is,
It is an awful chaos light and darkness
And mind and dust and passion and
pure thoughts
Mixed and contending without end or order,
All dormant or destructive.
A wonderful linguist was Madhusudan. His reading is almost unbelievable. Besides Bengali, Sanskrit and Tamil, he studied Greek, Latin, Italian and French and could read and write the last two with perfect grace and ease.
His heart gave a throb of joy after he had made his first attempt at the Bengali sonnet. He presented the poem to his dear friend Rajnarayan (Rishi Rajnarayan Bose), along with a letter which runs:
"What say you to this, my good friend? In my humble opinion, if cultivated by men of genius, our sonnet in time would rival the Italian."
We are at once reminded of Italy's high appreciation of Madhusudan. It happened that when Madhusudan was staying in Versailles France, the third centenary of Dante was being celebrated all over the West. Madhusudan wrote a poem in memory of the immortal poet and translated it into French and Italian and finally sent it to Italy. Victor Immanuel, then ruling monarch of Italy, was enamoured of the poem and wrote to the poet: "It will be a ring which will connect the orient with the occident."
Madhusudan's life was at once a stupendous boon and an enormous sorrow. Loss of self-control was in the main responsible for this sorrow and his over-flowing poetic originality for this boon.
As Tamburlaine was Marlowe's first attempt at blank verse in Elizabethan England, even so Sharmistha was Madhusudan's first attempt at blank verse in Bengali literature.
The Bengal Tiger, Sir Ashutosh Mukherji, while paying a glowing tribute to Madhusudan's blank verse, said, "As long as the Bengali race and Bengali literature would exist, the sweet lyre of Madhusudan would never cease playing." He further added: "Ordinarily, reading of poetry causes a soporific effect, but the intoxicating vigour of Madhusudan's poems makes even a sick man sit up on his bed."
In France poor Madhusudan suffered tremendous blows from within and without. His Indian friends who had inspired him to cross the ocean had by now managed to forget the beggar Madhusudan altogether. Except for a very few well-wishers, the poet had to remain satisfied with many a fair-weather friend. But the Goddess of poetry had not deserted him from the day he began to worship her. The poet's boat was plying, as it were, between the Scylla of stark poverty and the Charybdis of innumerable loans. He was simply over head and ears in debt. As he was not in a position to clear off his debts, he was very often threatened by the four walls of a prison.
The tenebrous night was over. The sun at last dawned, thanks to the munificent generosity of Vidyasagar, equally known as Dayar Sagar (the ocean of kindness). The matchless Pundit of the country sent the poet a large sum of money. The son of Mother Bengal returned to her "Elysian lap." To our joy, Madhusudan realised his mistake. He wrote to his friend Gour from France: "If there be any one among us anxious to leave a name behind him, and not pass away into oblivion like a brute, let him devote himself to his mother-tongue. That is his legitimate sphere his proper element."
Just three days prior to his death, Madhusudan, with the help of Shakespeare, expressed his deepest conviction of life to his dear friend Gour:
...out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more; it is a tale Told by an idiot,
full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing. (Macbeth)
Gour too could easily have taken the help of Longfellow:
Tell me not in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream.
Life is real! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal.
Madhusudan died. We are as much ashamed as pained to confess that the gloomy veil of ungratefulness which had lain across the eyes of the Bengalis was not rent asunder until fifteen years from the day of his passing, when we, his countrymen, erected a tomb on his grave. No doubt, some of his countrymen did understand that such an act was essentially a duty on their part to perpetuate the memory of the mighty poet whose very life was to their gain, but there the matter ended. It is no good lamenting the past. The golden future is at our disposal. Now, we are proud to see that the all-inviting epitaph which shines there came from the poet himself:
Stop a while, traveller!
Should Mother Bengal claim thee for her son.
As a child takes repose on his mother's elysian lap,
Even so here in the Long Home,
On the bosom of the earth,
Enjoys the sweet eternal sleep
Poet Madhusudan of the Duttas.
As at the outset of this humble attempt of mine Madhusudan came under the lofty praise of Sri Aurobindo's immortal pen, even so at the close Madhusudan comes under the equally high praise of the Master Seer of the Age:
"All the stormiest passions of man's soul he [Madhusudan] expressed in gigantic language."
By Sri Chinmoy
http://www.poetseers.org/the_great_poets/in/dutt/Michael Madhusudan Dutt
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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| Michael Madhusudan Dutta | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Michael Madhusudan Dutt | |
| Born | 25 January 1824(1824-01-25) Sagardari, Jessore |
| Died | 29 June 1873 (aged 49)[1] Kolkata, British India |
| Occupation | Writer, lecturer |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Ethnicity | Christianity |
| Genres | Poet, playwright |
| Subjects | Literature |
| Literary movement | Bengal Renaissance |
Michael Madhusudan Dutt (Bengali: মাইকেল মধুসূদন দত্ত Maikel Modhushudôn Dôtto 25 January 1824 – 29 June 1873) was a popular 19th century Indian Bengali poet and dramatist. He was born in Sagardari, on the bank of Kopothakho River, a village in Keshobpur Upozila, Jessore District, East Bengal (now in Bangladesh). He was a pioneer of Bengali drama. His famous work Meghnadh Badh Kabya (Bengali: মেঘনাদবধ কাব্য), is a tragic epic. It consists of nine cantos and is quite exceptional in Bengali literature both in terms of style and content. He also wrote poems about the sorrows and afflictions of love as spoken by women.
From an early age, Madhusudan desired to be an Englishman in form and manner. Born to a Hindu landed gentry family, he converted to Christianity to the ire of his family and adopted the first name, Michael. However, he was to regret his desire for England and the Occident in later life when he talked ardently of his homeland as is seen in his poems and sonnets from this period.
Madhusudan is widely considered to be one of the greatest poets in Bengali literature and the father of Bangla sonnet. He pioneered what came to be called amitrakshar chhanda (blank verse). Dutt died in Kolkata, India on 29 June 1873.
Contents[hide] |
[edit] Early life
His childhood education started from his neibour village name Shekpura, There an old mosque, where he went to learn Persian, He was an exceptionally gifted student. Ever since his childhood, young Madhusudan was recognized by his teachers and professors as being a precocious child with a gift of literary expression. He was very imaginative from his boyhood. Early exposure to English education and European literature at home and in Kolkata made him desire to emulate the proverbially stiff upper-lip Englishman in taste, manners and intellect. One of the early impressions were that of his teacher, Capt. D.L.Richardson at Hindu College. In this respect, he was an early Macaulayite without even knowing it. He dreamt of achieving great fame the moment he landed abroad. His adolescence, coupled with the spirit of intellectual enquiry convinced him that he was born on the wrong side of the planet, and that conservative Hindu society in early nineteenth century Bengal (and by extension Indian society) had not yet developed the spirit of rationalistic enquiry and appreciation of greater intellectual sophistry to appreciate his myriad talents. He espoused the view that free thinking and post Enlightenment West would be more receptive to his intellectual acumen and creative genius. In this, perhaps he forgot the colour of his skin, as he was to realize later on in life, much to his consternation and disgust. He composed his early works--poetry and drama--almost entirely in English. Plays like Sermista, Ratnavali and translations like Neel Durpan and poems like Captive Ladie which was written on the mother of his close friend Sri Bhudev Mukhopadhyay, indicate a high level of intellectual sophistication.
[edit] In His Own Words
| " | Where man in all his truest glory lives, And nature's face is exquisitely sweet; | " |
Madhusudan embraced Christianity at the church of Fort William in spite of the objections of his parents and relatives on February 9, 1843. Later, he escaped to Madras to escape persecution. He describes the day as:
| " | Long sunk in superstition's night, By Sin and Satan driven, | " |
On the eve of his departure to England:
| " | Forget me not, O Mother, Should I fail to return | " |
(Translated from the original Bengali by the poet.)
[edit] Later life
[edit] Influences
Dutt was particularly inspired by both the life and work of the English Romantic poet Lord Byron. The life of Dutt closely parallels the life of Lord Byron in many respects. Like Byron, Dutt was a spirited bohemian and like Byron, Dutt was a Romantic, albeit being born on the other side of the world, and as a recipient subject of the British imperialist enterprise. However, the lives of the two can be summed up in one word: audacity. These two mighty poets at once remind us of the saying of Georges Danton, the French revolutionist: "L'audace, encore l'audace, toujours l'audace!"
If Lord Byron won over the British literary establishment with Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, a comparative analogy may be made for Dutt's heroic epic Meghnadh Badh Kabya, although the journey was far from smooth. However, with its publication, the Indian poet distinguished himself as a serious composer of an entirely new genre of heroic poetry, that was Homeric and Dantesque in technique and style, and yet so fundamentally Indian in theme. To cite the poet himself: "I awoke one morning and found myself famous." Nevertheless, it took a few years for this epic to win recognition all over the country.
[edit] Linguistic Abilities
Madhusudan was a gifted linguist and polyglot. Besides Indian languages like Bengali, Sanskrit and Tamil, he was well versed in classical languages like Greek and Latin. He also had a fluent understanding of modern European languages like Italian and French and could read and write the last two with perfect grace and ease.[citation needed]
[edit] Work with the Sonnet
He dedicated his first sonnet to his friend Rajnarayan Basu, along with a letter which in which he wrote:
"What say you to this, my good friend? In my humble opinion, if cultivated by men of genius, our sonnet in time would rival the Italian."
When Madhusudan later stayed in Versailles, France, the sixth centenary of the Italian poet Dante Alighieri was being celebrated all over Europe. He composed a poem in memory of the immortal poet and translated it into French and Italian and sent it to the court of the king of Italy. Victor Emmanuel II, the then monarch, was enamored of the poem and wrote back to the poet:
"It will be a ring which will connect the Orient with the Occident."
[edit] Work in Blank Verse
Sharmistha (spelt as Sermista in English) was Madhusudan's first attempt at blank verse in Bengali literature. Sir Ashutosh Mukherjee, while paying a glowing tribute to Madhusudan's blank verse, observed:
"As long as the Bengali race and Bengali literature would exist, the sweet lyre of Madhusudan would never cease playing."
He further added:
"Ordinarily, reading of poetry causes a soporific effect, but the intoxicating vigour of Madhusudan's poems makes even a sick man sit up on his bed."
In his The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian, Nirad C. Chaudhuri has remarked that during his childhood days in Kishoreganj, a common standard for testing the level of erudition in the Bengali language during family gatherings (like for example, testing the vocabulary stock of a would-be bridegroom as a way of teasing him) was the ability to pronounce and recite the poetry of Dutt, without the trace of an accent.
[edit] In France
In his trip to Versailles, France during the 1860s, Madhusudan had to suffer the ignominy of penury and destitution. His friends back home, who had inspired him to cross the ocean in search of recognition, started ignoring him altogether. Perhaps his choice of a lavish lifestyle, coupled with a big ego that was openly hostile to native tradition, was partly to blame for his financial ruin. Except for a very few well-wishers, he had to remain satisfied with many fair-weather friends. It may be argued, not without some obvious irony that during those days, his life oscillated, as it were, between the Scylla of stark poverty and the Charybdis of innumerable loans. He was head over heels in debt. As he was not in a position to clear off his debts, he was very often threatened by imprisonment. Dutt was able to return home only due to the munificent generosity of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. For this, Dutt was to regard Vidyasagar as Dayar Sagar (meaning the ocean of kindness) for as long as he lived. Madhusudan had cut off all connections with his parents, relatives and at times even with his closest friends, who more often than not were wont to regard him as an iconoclast and an outcast. It was during the course of his sojourn in Europe that Madhusudan then realized his true identity. Perhaps for the first time in his life, he became aware of the colour of his skin and his native language. What he wrote to his friend Gour Bysack from France neatly sums up his eternal dilemma:
| " | If there be any one among us anxious to leave a name behind him, and not pass away into oblivion like a brute, let him devote himself to his mother-tongue. That is his legitimate sphere his proper element. | " |
[edit] Marriage and Relationships
One of the reasons for his decision to leave the religion of his family was his refusal to enter into an arranged marriage that his father had decided for him. He had no respect for that tradition and wanted to break free from the confines of caste-based endogamous marriage. His knowledge of the European tradition convinced him of the superiority of marriages made by mutual consent (or love marriages).
Madhusudan married twice. When he was in Madras, he married Rebecca Mactavys. Through Rebecca, he had four children. Madhusudan wrote to Gour in December 1855:
| " | Yes, dearest Gour, I have a fine English Wife and four children. | " |
Michael returned from Madras to Calcutta in February 1856, after his father's death. Michael married a French woman named Henrietta Sophia White. His second marriage was to last till the end of his life. From his second marriage, he had one son Napoleon and one daughter Sharmistha.
The tennis player Leander Paes is the son of his great granddaughter.
[edit] Death
Madhusudan died in Calcutta General Hospital on 27 June 1873 three days after death of Henrietta. Just three days prior to his death, Madhusudan recited a passage from Shakespeare's Macbeth to his dear friend Gour, to express his deepest conviction of life:
| " | ...out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, | " |
(Macbeth)
Gour responded with a passage from Longfellow:
| " | Tell me not in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream. | " |
After Dutt's death, he was not paid a proper tribute for fifteen years. The belated tribute took the form of a shabby makeshift tomb. Madhusudan's life was a mixture of joy and sorrow. Although it could be argued that the loss of self-control was largely responsible for his pitiable fate, his over-flowing poetic originality for joy was to become forever immortalized in his oeuvre.
His epitaph, a verse of his own, reads:
| " | Stop a while, traveller! Should Mother Bengal claim thee for her son. | " |
[edit] Legacy
In the words of Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, the father of modern Bengali prose, the poet of Meghnad Badh Kabya thus:
| " | ...to Homer and Milton, as well as to Valmiki, he is largely indebted, and his poem is on the whole the most valuable work in modern Bengali literature. | " |
In word of Tagore:
| " | The Epic Meghnad-Badh is really a rare treasure in Bengali literature. Through his writings, the richness of Bengali literature has been proclaimed to the wide world. | " |
Vidyasagar's lofty praise runs:
| " | Meghnad Badh is a supreme poem. | " |
Rabindranath Tagore would later declare:
| " | It was a momentous day for Bengali literature to proclaim the message of the universal muse and not exclusively its own parochial note. The genius of Bengal secured a place in the wide world overpassing the length and breadth of Bengal. And Bengali poetry reached the highest status. | " |
In Byron's dramatic poem Manfred what the Abbot of St. Maurice spoke of Manfred can equally be applied to the life of Madhusudan:
| " | This should have been a noble creature: he Hath all the energy which should have made | " |
In the words of Sri Aurobindo:
| " | All the stormiest passions of man's soul he [Madhusudan] expressed in gigantic language. | " |
[edit] Major works
- Tilottama, 1860
- Meghnad Vadh Kabya (Ballad of Meghnadh's demise), 1861
- Ratnavali
- Rizia, the sultana of Inde.
- The Captive Lady.
- Visions of the Past.
[edit] Further reading
- Ghulam Murshid, Lured by Hope, Oxford Univ Press, (2003) ISBN 0195653629
- Clinton Seely (2004). Lured by Hope: A Biography of Michael Madhusudan Dutt. Translated by Majumdar Gopa. New Delhi and New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. xvi, 238 pp. $29.95 (cloth).. The Journal of Asian Studies, 63, pp 830-831 doi:10.1017/S002191180400213X
[edit] References
[edit] External links
 | Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Michael Madhusudan Dutt |
Iswarchandra Vidyasagar
Vidyasagar was born on 26th September, 1820 in a village named Birshingha in Midnapore district to father Thakurdas Bandyopadhyay and mother Bhagavati Devi. He spent his childhood in extreme poverty. At the age of eight he came to Calcutta with his father where Thakurdas took book keeping job. The saying is that Vidyasagar learned English numbers by following the mile stones labels on his way to Calcutta.
In 1829, he got admitted to Sanskrit College. His concentration and quest for knowledge was so intense that he was used to study on street light as his family couldn't afford gas lamp at home. In 1839, he passed Hindu Law Examination and was honored with the title 'Vidyasagar'. Started his first job as the Chief Pundit in Fort William College, Calcutta in 1841 at the age of 20. Vidyasagar started learning English and Hindi here. In 1846, he joined Sanskrit College as Assistant Secretary. He wanted to improve the teaching system in the college and faced difference in opinion from then secretary Rasomoy Dutta. Vidyasagar left the job and joined Fort William College. In 1850, he became a Professor at Sanskrit College with one condition that he should be allowed to do the redesign of the education system. In 1851, he became the Principal of this college. None other than the Brahmins were allowed to study in Sanskrit College. He changed that rule and opened it for everybody.
Vidysagar realized that there was no place for education of women in the society. With his tireless effort to uplift the status of women in the society, he was able to establish some Girl's schools in different places of Bengal. But there was no good Bengali text book for basic Bengali education. He wrote Bengali books with basic language construct and fundamentals, like, "Barnaparichay", "Bodhoday", "Kathamala" etc. and then easy grammar books like "Upakramonika" and "Byakaron Kaumudi". He also introduced some basic books for Mathematical logic. Rabindranath Tagore called him as the father of modern Bengali language. Vidyasagar translated some masterpieces of Sanskrit and English literature into Bengali: "betaal panchabingshati"(Sanskrit Kathasarit sagar, "shakuntala", "bhranti bilaas" , "sitaar banabaas" and edited books like "raghubangsha", "kumarsambhab" etc.
Vidyasagar proposed the widow remarriage act in 1856. Widows could not marry again in those days. There was strong protest from the upper class and orthodox people of the society. He encouraged his son to get married to a widow. Sometimes, he spent money from himself to get widows married. He wanted to stop the Hindu men from getting married to many women. Not withstanding the miserable condition of Hindu widows, he introduced 'Hindu Family Annuity Fund'.
Vidyasagar opened as many as 1200 schools for women in those early days of women education. Vidyasagar was one of the founder member of University of Calcutta which was established in 1857. With help from some friends, in 1859 he established Calcutta Training School. This school was later named as Metropolition Institution and later was converted to a college named after him as Vidyasagar College.
Bold and articulate life style, honesty, strong determination, self respect, tenacity to fight against all odds - these charateristics made him a legendary personality in the era of Bengal renaissance. His strength of character became proverbial. He was also known for his charity and philanthropy and was called as "Daya-r sagar" - ocean of kindness. Renowned poet Michael Madhusudan Dutta wrote about him - "The genius and wisdom of an ancient sage, the energy of an Englishman and the heart of a Bengali mother". In 29th July, 1891, this great personality died.
http://www.calcuttaweb.com/people/vidyasagar.shtml
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar | |
| Born | 26 September 1820(1820-09-26) Midnapore, West Bengal, India |
| Died | 29 July 1890 (aged 69) Kolkata, West Bengal, India |
| Occupation | Writer, lecturer |
| Nationality | Indian |
| Ethnicity | Bengali |
| Genres | Philosopher, academic, educator, translator, printer, publisher, entrepreneur, reformer, philanthropist |
| Literary movement | Bengal Renaissance |
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (Bengali: ঈশ্বর চন্দ্র বিদ্যাসাগর Ishshor Chôndro Biddashagor 26 September 1820 – 29 July 1890), born Ishwar Chandra Bandopadhyaya (Bengali: ঈশ্বর চন্দ্র বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়, Ishshor Chôndro Bôndopaddhae), was an Indian Bengali polymath and a key figure of the bengal renaissance.[1][2]
Vidyasagar was a philosopher, academic, educator, writer, translator, printer, publisher, entrepreneur, reformer, and philanthropist. His efforts to simplify and modernize Bangla prose were significant. He also rationalized and simplified the Bengali alphabet and type, which had remained unchanged since Charles Wilkins and Panchanan Karmakar had cut the first wooden Bangla type fonts in 1780.[3]
He received the title "Vidyasagar" ("Ocean of learning" or "Ocean of knowledge") from the Calcutta Sanskrit College (where he graduated), due to his excellent performance in Sanskrit studies and philosophy. In Sanskrit, Vidya means knowledge or learning and Sagar means ocean or sea. This title was mainly given for his vast knowledge in all subjects which was compared to the vastness of the ocean.[4]
Contents[hide] |
[edit] Early Life
Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar was born at Birsingha, Midnapur, in 26th of September, 1820 A.D. [4] to a poor religious family. His parents were Thakurdas Bandyopadhyay and Bhagavati Devi. The childhood days of Vidyasagar were spent in abject poverty. After the completion of elementary education at the village school, his father took him to Calcutta.
Ishwar Chandra was a brilliant student. It is believed that Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar learned English numbers by following the mile-stones labels on his way to Calcutta at the age of eight years. His quest for knowledge was so intense that he used to study on street light as it was not possible for him to afford a gas lamp at home. He cleared all the examinations with excellence and in quick succession. He was rewarded with a number of scholarships for his academic performance. To support himself and the family Ishwar Chandra also took a part-time job of teaching at Jorashanko.
In the year 1839, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar successfully cleared his Law examination. In 1841, at the age of twenty one years, Ishwar Chandra joined the Fort William College as a head of the Sanskrit department.
After five years, in 1846, Vidyasagar left Fort William College and join the Sanskrit College as 'Assistant Secretary'. In the first year of service, Ishwar Chandra recommended a number of changes to the existing education system. This report resulted into a serious altercation between Ishwar Chandra and College Secretary Rasomoy Dutta. In 1849, he again joined Sanskrit College, as a professor of literature. In 1851, Iswar Chandra became the principal of Sanskrit College. In 1855, he was made special inspector of schools with additional charges. But following the matter of Rasomoy Dutta, Vidyasagar resigned from Sanskrit College and rejoined Fort William College but as a head clerk.
[edit] Teaching career
In 1841, Vidyasagar took the job of a Sanskrit pandit (professor) at Fort William College in Kolkata (Calcutta). In 1846, he joined the Sanskrit College as Assistant Secretary. A year later, he and a friend of his, Madan Mohan Tarkalankar, set up the Sanskrit Press and Depository, a print shop and a bookstore.
While Vidyasagar was working at the Sanskrit College, some serious differences arose between him and Rasamoy Dutta who was then the Secretary of the College, and so he resigned in 1849. One of the issues was that while Rasamoy Dutta wanted the College to remain a Brahmin preserve, Vidyasagar wanted it to be opened to students from all castes.
Later, Vidyasagar rejoined the College, and introduced many far-reaching changes to the College's syllabus.
In the face of opposition from the Hindu establishment, Vidyasagar vigorously promoted the idea that regardless of their caste, both men and women should receive the best education.
[edit] A Compassionate Reformist
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar would start crying in distress whenever he saw poor and weak people lying on the footpath and street. Though he was very outspoken and blunt in his mannerisms, yet Vidyasagar had a heart of Gold. He was also known for his charity and philanthropy as "Daya-r sagar" - ocean of kindness, for his immense generosity. He always reflected and responded to distress calls of the poor, sufferings of the sick and injustice to humanity. While being a student at Sanskrit College, he would spend part of his scholarship proceeds and cook paayesh (rice pudding) to feed the poor and buy medicines for the sick.
Later on, when he started earning, he paid fixed sums of monthly allowances to each member of his joint family, to family servants, to needy neighbors, to villagers who needed help and to his village surgery and school. This he continued without break even when he was unemployed and had to borrow substantially from time to time.
Vidyasagar did not believe that money was enough to ease the sufferings of humanity. He opened the doors of the Sanskrit College to lower caste students (previously it was exclusive to the Brahmins), nursed sick cholera patients, went to crematoriums to bury unclaimed dead bodies, dined with the untouchables and walked miles as a messenger-man to take urgent messages to people who would benefit from them.
When the eminent Indian Poet of the 19th century, Michael Madhusudan Dutta, fell hopelessly into debts due to his reckless lifestyle during his stay in Versailles, France, he appealed for help to Vidyasagar, who laboured to ensure that sums owed to Michael from his property at home were remitted to him and sent him a large sum of money to France.
[edit] Reform Concerning Widow Remarriages
Vidyasagar championed the uplift of the status of women in India, particularly in his native Bengal. Unlike some other reformers who sought to set up alternative societies or systems, he sought, however, to transform orthodox Hindu society from within.[5]
With valuable moral support from people like Akshay Kumar Dutta, Vidyasagar introduced the practice of widow remarriages to mainstream Hindu society. In earlier times, remarriages of widows would occur sporadically only among progressive members of the Brahmo Samāj. The prevailing deplorable custom of Kulin Brahmin polygamy allowed elderly men — sometimes on their deathbeds — to marry teenage or even prepubescent girls, supposedly to spare their parents the shame of having an unmarried girl attain puberty in their house. After such marriages, these girls would usually be left behind in their parental homes, where they might be cruelly subjected to orthodox rituals, especially if they were subsequently widowed. These included a semi starvation diet, rigid and dangerous daily rituals of purity and cleanliness, hard domestic labour, and close restriction on their freedom to leave the house or be seen by strangers. Unable to tolerate the ill treatment, many of these girls would run away and turn to prostitution to support themselves. Ironically, the economic prosperity and lavish lifestyles of the city made it possible for many of them to have quite successful careers once they had stepped out of the sanction of society and into the demi-monde. In 1853 it was estimated that Calcutta had a population of 12,718 prostitutes and public women.[6]
Vidyasagar took the initiative in proposing and pushing through the Widow Remarriage Act XV of 1856 in India.
[edit] Alphabet reform and Vidyasagar's other contributions
Vidyasagar reconstructed the Bengali alphabet and reformed Bengali typography into an alphabet (actually abugida) of twelve vowels and forty consonants.
Vidyasagar contributed significantly to Bengali and Sanskrit literature.
Rectitude and courage were the hallmarks of Vidyasagar's character, and he was certainly ahead of his time.
In the final years of life, he chose to spend his days among the Santhals, an old tribe in India.
Shortly after Vidyasagar's death, Rabindranāth Tāgore reverently wrote about him: "One wonders how God, in the process of producing forty million Bengalis, produced a man!"
Vidyasagar Setu (commonly known as the Second Hooghly Bridge), is a bridge over the Hooghly River in West Bengal, India. It links the city of Howrah to its twin city of Kolkata. The bridge is named after Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar.
A fair named Vidyasagar Mela (Bengali: বিদ্যাসাগর মেলা Biddashagor Mêla), which is dedicated to spreading education and increasing social awareness, has been held annually in West Bengal since 1994. Since 2001, it has been held simultaneously in Kolkata and Birsingha.
There is a reputed college named after him and it is located in college street, Kolkata and a university in Paschim Midnapore.
[edit] References
- ^ "Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar". www.whereincity.com. http://www.whereincity.com/india/great-indians/literary-persons/ishwar-chandra.php. Retrieved 2008-12-20.
- ^ "Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar: A Profile of the Philanthropic Protagonist". www.americanchronicle.com. http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/26148. Retrieved 2008-12-20.
- ^ "BANGLAPEDIA: Vidyasagar, Pundit Iswar Chandra". banglapedia.search.com.bd. http://banglapedia.search.com.bd/HT/V_0042.htm. Retrieved 2008-12-20.
- ^ a b Lal, Mohan (2006). "Ishvarchandra Vidyasagar". The Encyclopaedia Of Indian Literature. Sahitya Akademi. pp. 4567–4569. http://books.google.co.in/books?id=KnPoYxrRfc0C&pg=PA4567.
- ^ "ISHWAR CHANDRA VIDYASAGAR". www.hinduweb.org. http://www.hinduweb.org/home/children_and_youth/omnnagarajan/filename6.html. Retrieved 2008-12-20.
- ^ Nikhil Sarkar [Sripantho], Bat tala, (Calcutta: Ananda, 1977) p. 66. (This text is in Bengali and is, unfortunately, yet to be translated.)
[edit] Further reading
- Benoy Ghosh, Vidyasagar O Bangali Samaj, Orient Longman, Kolkata
- Indramitra, Karunasagar Vidyasagar, Ananda Publishers, Kolkata ISBN 81-7215-040-7
- Asok Sen, Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar and his Elusive Milestones, Riddhi, Kolkata.
- Gopal Haldar, Vidyasagar: A Reassessment, People's Publishing House, New Delhi
[edit] External links
| |||||
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| NAME | Vidyasagar, Ishwar Chandra |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Bandopadhyaya, Ishwar Chandra |
| SHORT DESCRIPTION | Vidyasagar was a philosopher, academic, educator, writer, translator, printer, publisher, entrepreneur, social reformer, and philanthropist associated with the Bengal Renaissance. He simplified and modernized Bangla prose. |
| DATE OF BIRTH | September 26, 1820(1820-09-26) |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 29, 1890 |
| PLACE OF DEATH | |
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Rabindranath Tagore
(1861-1941)
Tagore's literary life extened over sixty years, and he reminds one of Victor Hugo in the copiousness and variety of his work: over one thousand poems; nearly two dozen plays and playlets; eight novels; eightor more volumes of short stories; more than two thousands songs, of which he wrote both the words and the music; and a mass of prose on literary, social, religious, political, and other topics. |  |
Add to these his english translations; his paintings; his travels and lecture-tours in Asia, America, and Europe; and his activities as educationist, as social and religious reformer, and as politician- and there you have, judged by quantity alone, the life-work of a Titan. Thia is not to say that his genius was no more than the capacity for taking infinite pains; but to note the element of steel and concrete that went to his making, and thus to dispose of the legend, that has grown in some quarters in recent years, of Tagore the pale-lily poet of ladies' table.
Not that the legend is entirely baseless. Tagore's almost continuous iteration, in his English translations, of the softer side of his poetry and his wistful-mystical message, is partly responsible for it. After having won world-fame with the mystical-devotional poetry of the English Gitanjali, he dug overmuch along that particular seam, producing a monotonously one-sided impression of his work. It is true that The Gardener and the subsequent volumes of translations gave some of his best lyrics, but they also gave many poems which were very thin and had nothing beyond a delicate fancy or a pretty sensibility to show for their author.
The Tagores were a cultured and wealthy family, and Rabindranath's father, Devendranath, was one of the leaders of the Brahma Samaj,. The poet's early life was spent in an atmosphere of religion and arts, principally literature, music and painting. In religion his inspiration was derived from the Vedas and the Upanishads, but with him as with many Hindus the Upanisadic monism was diversified by the Vaisnava dualism. In music Tagore's training was classical Indian, though as a composer he rebelled against the tyranny of classical orthodoxy, and introduced many variations of form and phrase, notably from Bengali folk-music of the Baul and Bhatiyali type. he had some training in European music during his first visit to England, and some of his early songs were composed to the tunes of the Border Ballads and Moore's Irish Melodies. In later life he made some experiments on harmonaization in the European manner. As a writer the course of his life was early set. He was brought up on three languages- Sanskrit, Bengali and English- and the most formitive influences were those of the Sanskrit classics, the Vaisnava poets of Bengal, and the English romantics and post-romantics, most notably Shelley.
In 1901 he founded his school, the Santiniketan, at Bolpur as a protest against the existing bad system of education. The school was a great success and gave birth to Viswabharati. On revisiting England in 1911 he brought with him the English Gitanjali, and it's publication in 1912 and the award of the Nobel Prize for literature the following year made him world-famous. This was the first award of that prize to an Asiatic. The rest of Tagore's life was spent at Santiniketan, except for several travels and lecture-tours in which he carried his message of human unity to all the important countries of Asia, America and Europe.
As a novelist Tagore gave good pictures of upper middle-class life in Bengal in Naukadubi, Chokher-Bali, and later, in Gora and Ghare Baire. The last two , perhaps the best novels written by an Indian, are interesting studies of the impact of Western ideas on Indian life. His plays represent a large variety of types: social comedies in prose, such as Chirakumar Sabha, Goray Galad and Vaikunther Katha; symbolical plays in prose, such as Raja, Phalguni and Rakta Karabi; and short romantic playlets such as Malini, Chandalika, and Natir Puja. The Post Office is generally regarded as a symbolical play, but is more aptly described as a fable. All these plays have songs, but Tagore wrote several plays, such as Valmiki-Pratibha and Mayar Khela, in which music predominates as in the European opera. Mention should also be made of the dramatic dialogues in verse, such as Karna o Kunti and Viday-abhishap.
In My Reminiscences (Jivan-smriti) Tagore has recorded the inner history of his early poetry. It is the history of his emergence from the unreal and self centered world of adolescence into the adult and super-personal world of man and nature. The emergence found expression in many early works: in the poem "Awakening of the Fountain" where the poet's soul was likened to a fountain imprisoned in a dark cave until one day the morning sun pierced the cave with its rays and set the fountain free. His gift of lyricism and song was fully in evidence in Kari o Kamal and Manishi and attained ripeness in Chitra. The Ode to Urbasi which appeared in Chitra is the highest watermark of his aestheticism. Mysticism first appeared on a considerable scale in Sonar tari, and Tagore's philosophical and devotional-mystical poetry attained maturity in Naivedya, Kheya and Gitanjali. His stories in verse in Katha o kahini, Palataka, Punascha and other volumes and his epigrams in Kanika and in Lekhan. In addition he wrote many patriotic poems and songs and many poems having a social and political contents. His best reflective poems are to be found in Balaka and some of his later books. He is happiest in the bondage of rhyme, but has also written some beautiful blank verse and free verse.
There never was a poet more of the earth, more earthy, than Tagore. The beauty and splendour of the earth he has proudly and lovingly sung in many a poem. But he also loves the earth, perhaps all the more, for her poverty and imperfection. 'Infinite wealth is not yours, my patient and dusky mother dust.... I have seen your tender face and i love your mournful dust, Mother earth.' In some poems he suggests that his love of the earth is older than his life.| Top |
Kazi Nazrul Islam
(1899 - 1976)
Kazi Nazrul Islam is another great poet of Bengal. When still a school student in his teens Nazrul joined the newly recruited Bengali regiment (1916) and was sent to Mesopotamia some months before the armistice. The regiment was not given a chance to face battle but all the same Nazrul got his fill of the fighting gusto which later-found expression in poetic effusion and warmth. His first two significant poems , Pralayollas (Exhilaration at the Final Dissolution) and Vidroho (Rebellion) appeared early in 1922 and his first book of poems Agnivina (The lute of fire) was out before the year was over. |  |
The book was received with an enthusiasm never experienced in India before or since. After that he joined the Kollol group and wrote mostly deft and pungent verse and songs galore. He produced more than twenty books of poetry and songs and some fiction and plays. some of his later poems were good but the fire of agnivina was already quenched.
Nazrul was an emotional soul but his emotion was unstable and volatile. Those who came in personal contact with him were moved by his irresistible enthusiasm and sincerity. But his literary output falls far short of his merit , except the early poems in Agnivina. After Agnivina his best known books of poems and songs are Dolonchampa(1923) , Biser Bansi (The Poisonous Flute ,1924), Bhangar Gan (Songs of the Break-up, 1924), Puber Haoya (The East Wind, 1925) and Bulbul(1928).
| Top |
Sufia Kamal
(1911 - 1999)
| Sufia Kamal was a Bangladeshi freedom fighter, a poet, and a longtime activist for the enlightenment of women. She was born in 1911 in Barisal, as the only daughter of an eminent lawyer. Formal education was denied her as a woman, but she educated herself by reading in her uncle's library. She was married at the age of 11, and after her husband's death she remarried. She published her first poem at the age of 14. Her activism and involvement in socio-economic issues started in 1952, and then more vigorously in 1961 when Rabindra Sangeet was banned. |  |
In the 1960s, she fought against the regime of General Ayub Khan and formed Mahila Sangram Parishad in 1969 to demand Ayub Khan's resignation and in support of the six- and eleven-point demands. During the war of liberation (from Pakistan, 1971) she started working for the war-affected women and people in general. She remained the chairperson of the Bangladesh Mahila Parishad throughout her life. She was a deeply religious woman who opposed religious extremism, a stance that led to her being named in the hitlist of Harkatul Jihad, an Islamic extremist group. She turned 89 in June 1999, was hospitalized for age-related illnesses, and died in November 1999.
| Top |
Taslima Nasrin
(1962 - )
is a Bangladeshi writer, born in 1962. She has published poetry, essays, a syndicated newspaper column, and novels. She has received awards in India and Bangladesh for her work. She sprang into international consciousness when her novel, Shame, which depicts Muslim persecution of Bangladesh's Hindu minority, brought forth a death threat from Islamic militants. She had to flee Bangladesh lived in Sweden for some time, and now lives in France. |  |
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Shamsur Rahman was indisputably one of the greatest poets of Bangladesh, with more than sixty books of poetry to his credit. The renowned critic, Syed Manzoorul Islam, spoke of Rahman as having "produced a solid body of work which has permanently changed the geography and the climate of Bengali poetry. He gave it a new dimension and meaning, he created an ethos which belonged indisputably to him. |  |
He gave us a language, which we did not have. It is true he built on the ground of the 30's poets, but he developed the ground, explored into areas they thought too dark for exploration, added new features to it, landscaped it and in the process left his footprints all over." The critic, Z. R. Siddiqui, described Shamsur Rahman as one who was "deeply rooted in his own tradition." In his opinion, Shamsur Rahman soaked "the language of our times, transcending the limits of geography. In his range of sympathy, his catholicity, his urgent and immediate relevance for us, Shamsur Rahman is second to none."
Shamsur Rahman did his Honours in English literature from Dhaka University. He had a long career as a journalist and was the Editor of a national daily, Dainik Bangla.
He won numerous awards including Bangla Academy Award (1969), Ekushey Padak (1977), Swadhinata Award (1991), Ananda Puroshker from India (1994) and TLM South Asian Literature Award for the Masters (2006). He died in Dhaka on 17 August 2006 at the age of 77.
The Library of Congress has in its collection fifty titles by him, six translations of his poetry and three edited works by him.
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Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay
(1935 - )
Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay was born on November 2, 1935 in Bikrampur, Dhaka, in present day Bangladesh. He is recognized as one of the finest writers of modern Bengali literature. His approach to writing is intelligent, sensitive and lively, yet always somewhat detached. |  |
He began his writing career during West Bengal's turbulent 1960s with the debut of his novel Ghunapoka startling its readers with the charm of its characters and its introspectiveness.His characterizations of Jao Pakhi, Parapar, Durabina, and Parthiba stand out as true representatives of a time and place.
As a master story teller, Mukhopadhyay focuses more on the gradual revelation of his characters than on the narration of events. His novels and short stories reveal an undercurrent of love and faith in humanity over human violence and aggression. During his career he has experimented with detective fiction, and stories infused with a sense of surrealism. In addition to his fiction for adults, he has published fiction and science fiction for children.
He received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1989 for his novel Manabajamina. In 1975, his contribution to children's literature was recognized by the West Bengal Government with the Vidyasagar Puraskar. He is a three time winner of the Ananda Puraskar and a recipient of the Bhualka Puraskar in 1988.
The Library of Congress owns sixty-three titles by Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay including works in translation.
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| Humayun Ahmed is a leading Bangladeshi writer, and the most prolific among his contemporaries. His phenomenal success is attributed to his ability to tell stories of contemporary Bengali men and women in simple and unostentatious language, portraying them with spellbinding intimacy. |  |
Although his characters belong to a broad spectrum of society, Humayun is at his best while depicting the Bengali middle class. His first novel, Sankhanila Karagara, published in 1972, caused a great stir among readers and the literary circles in Bangladesh. Since then, he has published more than a hundred novels. Many of his novels have been adapted successfully for television serials and plays. Ahmed did his Masters in Chemistry at Dhaka University and obtained his Ph.D. in Polymer Chemistry from North Dakota State University. He is a former Associate Professor of Dhaka University and an honorary fellow in writing at the University of Iowa. Lately Humayun Ahmed has turned his attention to film making. His film, Agunera Parasamani, won the National Film Award in eight categories. Another film Srabana Meghera Dina also enjoyed critical and popular success.
Among other prestigious awards, Humayun is the winner of Bangla Academy Award (1981), and the Ekushey Padak (1994), National Film Award (Best story 1993, Best film 1994, Best dialogue 1994).
The Library of Congress has seventy-three of his works in its collection.
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Mahasweta Devi was born in Dhaka, to literary parents. Her father Manish Ghatak was a poet and a novelist, and her mother Dharitri Devi was also a writer and a social worker. Her first schooling was in Dhaka, but after the partition of India she moved to West Bengal in India. She joined Vishvabharati University in Santiniketan and completed a B.A. (Hons) in English, and then finished an M.A. in English at Calcutta University. |  |
Mahasweta Devi started writing at a young age, and contributed short stories to various literary magazines. Her first novel, Nati, was published in 1957 Among her masterpieces are Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa, Rudali, Bioscoper Baksho, and Chatti Munda O Tar Tir. She writes about the lives of ordinary men and women, particularly Adivasi (tribal) people like the Santhals, Lodhas, Shabars and Mundas, and other topics of social and political relevance. Hazaar Chaursai ki Maa has recently been filmed.
Unsual for most writers, she is also an activist and has spent many years crusading for the rights of the tribals. Among her many awards is the Jnanpith Award (India's highest literary award) in 1996, and the Magsaysay Award in 1997, the Asian equivalent of the Nobel prize.
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| Selina Hossain is one of the most important women writers of Bangladesh. She has published twenty-one novels, seven collections of short stories, four collections of prose writings and four collections of stories for children. Her works are a moving account of the contemporary social and political crises and conflicts as well as the recurrent cycles of the life of the struggling masses. |  |
Quite a few of her novels have been translated into Indian regional languages and into French, Russian and English. Commenting on the war of liberation in Bangladeshi novels, Kabir Chowdhury wrote that Selina Hosain's, Hangara, Nadi, Greneda (Shark, River and Grenade), "set in a remote riverine rural area of southern Bangladesh, dealing with illiterate common men and women, achieves a commendable integration of theme and style and brilliantly highlights the essence of all that is heroic, noble and glorious in our liberation war." Critic Syed Akram Hossain recalls Selina's Pokamakorera gharabasati and comments, "Her portrayal of life of a particular community living on the south-east coast of Bangladesh is informed by a deep awareness of life which transcends regionalism."
Hossain is the winner of Bangla Academy award, 1980 and Alaol Purashkar, 1981 among many others. In 1994-95 she won a Ford Foundation Fellowship for her novel, Gayatri Sandhya. Selina Hossain is currently serving in the position of Director of the Bangla Academy in Dhaka.
The Library of Congress has in its collection thirty-four titles by her.
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Nirmalendu Goon is one of the most eminent poets of contemporary Bangladesh. His first book of poems was published in 1970. Since then he has published forty-five collections of poetry and twenty collections of prose. Goon belongs to the generation of writers that emerged in the 1960s, a period marked by the sudden growth of a neo-rich class alongside stark poverty. |  |
The contradictions and conflicts of the period influenced Goon and fellow writers. His themes address an urge to overcome restrictions and break down the barriers dividing human beings. Love of freedom and faith in the human spirit underlie many of his poems.
Among many other awards, Goon has won the prestigious Bangla Academy prize (1982) and Ekushey Padak (2001). He represented Bangladesh in the XI Afro-Asian Writers' Union Conference in Ho Chi Minh City in 1982, Bangladesh Festival in London in 1999, and the SAARC Writers Conference in Delhi in 2000.
The Library of Congress has thirty-seven titles by him in its collection.
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The highly respected writer of modern Bengali literature, Atin Bandyopadhyay was born on March 1, 1934 in Rainadi, Hizadi, Dhaka District, in present day Bangladesh. His vivid description of events and subtle analysis of situations and characters give many of his novels and short stories a documentary quality. As with much of his writing, his magnum opus Nilakantha pakhira khonje draws from Bandyopadhyaya's own experiences. |  |
It is considered to be the most poignant story portraying the lives and times of the Hindus and the Muslims during the rioting and violence that followed the partition of Bengal in 1947. The hopes, aspirations, disillusionment, and pangs of separation from one's own homeland have been narrated with deep sensibility. His vivid description of the Bengal rural life is as picturesque as a photo album.
In addition to his journalism and fiction for adults, he has written fiction for children. He is the recipient of many awards including Bibhuti Bhushan Award, 1990; Tarasankar Award, 1991; and Matilal Award, 1983. The Library of Congress has fifty-nine titles by him.
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Well-known Bengali poet, academician and critic, Sankha Ghosh was born on February 5, 1932 in Chandpur, in present day Bangladesh. His mastery over language and his absolute control over the form of poetry mark his poems with an exemplary quality of proportion, grace and depth. His poems convey message, but are refreshingly free of polemics. Ghosh is lyrical, reflective, and introverted in some of his poems. Other poems reflect a sense of anguish towards the superficiality of our society and existence. |  |
His commitment as a poet is well-pronounced in many of his unforgettable creations such as Murkho baro, samajika naya, chapa srshti karuna, etc. Poems such as Dinaguli rataguli and Nihita patalachaya are examples of perfect application of control and proportion. His Babarera prathana won him the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1977. Sankha Ghosh is the recipient of many awards including Narasimh Das Puraskar, 1977; Kumaran Asan Prize, 1982; Rabindra Puraskar, 1989; Kamalkumari Award, 1993, Saraswati Samman, 1998, Sahitya Akademi Award, 1977. His poems have been translated into a number of Indian and foreign languages. The Library of Congress has thirty-eight titles in its collection by him including translations.
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Bande Ali Mia
(1906 - 1982)
Poet Bande Ali Mia was a very productive poet and writer who was awarded President's Award and Bangla Academy Award. A very productive poet and writer. Till his death he wrote 84 books, most of them have countryside background. |  |
He was a school teacher by profession in Calcutta (untill 1947) and also edited Bikash and Bhorer Alo-two well known periodicals at that time. The Poet was a script-writer at Rajshahi Radio Station. He was also a successful publisher.
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Madhusudan Datta
(1824 - 1873)
Michael Madhusudan Datta , the greatest poet between Bharatchandra ray and Rabindranath Tagore, is undoubtedly the most interesting figure in the history of Bengali literature. He was a man of real, though somewhat erratic, genius, and a courageous innovators of forms and types which altered the whole course of Bengali literature and added new dimensions to it. To his adventurous spirit we owe blank verse and the sonnet , our first modern comedy and tragedy, and our first epic. |  |
He is the pioneer of the new (westernized) poetry and the new drama. The heroic note he introduced into Bengali poetry gave it a power and weight, a richness and elevation, it never had before. In his Meghnad-vadh and Virangana the rustic bengali muse sometimes spoke the language of Valmiki and Vyasa, as well as of Homer, Tasso, and Milton. In introducing blank verse he gave to Bengali poetry a music that was as rich as it was novel; with almost miraculous skill he elicited from the dulcet-toned Bengali vina the deep notes of the Miltonic organ.
Tilottoma, his first Bengali poem, appeared in 1859. It is based on the Puranic story of the war waged on the gods by the demon brothers Sunda and Upasunda.This poem was written entirely in blank verse, and so were the two later poems Meghnad-vadh and Virangana. the later poems silenced the critics and detractors, and permanently established the vogue of blank verse literature. The years 1861-62 were Madhusudan's most fruitful period. they were the year of publication of Meghnad-vadh, Krishnakumari, Vrajangana, and Virangana. Virangana was modelled on Ovid's heroic epistles, and contains some of Madhusudan's finest blank verse. Technically it is his best work.
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Sheikh Mohammad Sultan
(1923-1994)
SM Sultan was a renowned painter. His real name was Sheikh Mohammad Sultan but he is more widely known as SM Sultan. He was born on 10 August 1923 at Masimdia, a village in Narail district. His father worked as a mason, and Sultan joined him after five years of schooling at the Victoria Collegiate School in Narail. Sultan also began to draw the buildings his father used to work on and thus developed a liking for art. Sultan knew that an art education was only possible in Calcutta, but family hardship stood in the way. It was then that the zamindar of the area, Dhirendranath Roy offered his help. With monetary support from the zamindar, Sultan went to Calcutta in 1938.
On first looking at SM Sultan's paintings, one gets the impression of vastness and strength. His canvas is large, like a spacious stage where life's dramas are played out. The cast of the drama consists of agricultural labourers, fishermen, simple householders, and toiling men and women. The men pose an enigma, since their large muscular and sinewy bodies contrast oddly with the emaciated physique of real life farmers and fishermen wasted by hard labour and hunger. Yet, in painting after painting, mostly in oil, but some in striking watercolours, Sultan painted the same human figures, symbolically suggesting the possibility of a dream rather than reality. Sultan believed in an arcadia where happiness and contentment would reign, yet was acutely aware of the exploitation, violence and deprivation that were the daily fare of the life of the villagers.
Sultan's watercolours are bright and lively, but treat the same theme - nature and rural life. They contrast sharply with the often drab and flat oils painted in deep colours. Sultan tended to work heavily all over his canvas without living any empty space. His drawings, however, are masterful in their economy and compactness. The lines are powerful and full blown. In his later works though, the composition is less tight and focused, perhaps a sign that Sultan was growing a little impatient with the reality of his time.
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Monica Ali was born in Dhaka and came with her parents to England when she was 3. Her mother is English and her father Bangladeshi. She grew up in Bolton but has spent most of her life in London. She attended Bolton Girls' School and Wadham College, Oxford. |  |
She is married to a management consultant. She worked in publishing and design before having their two children. She started to write during the brief periods when her son and daughter were both asleep. She was named one of Granta's "Best Young British Novelists" in 2003. Her first novel, Brick Lane was published by Doubleday in the summer of 2003.
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Among modern Bengali poets, Shakti Chattopadhyay is an unique personality. He started writing poems in the decade of fifties. When he started writing, the conflict between followers of Rabindranath and modern poets were raging. In the midst of this, Shakti found a place in the heart of modern readers through sheer talent and a very different form of expressions. He started writing from his childhood. His first poems were published in 'Kabita' magazine. |  |
In his earlier years as a poet, he became deeply involved with the 'Hungry' movement. This movement gave birth to poems dealing with sexual fantasy and animal instinct. The exponents of this movement also wrote explicitly on sexual exploits of people in general. IN fact, sex remained a major theme for all 'Hungry' poets.
In 1983, he received the Sahitya Akademi Award for his collection of entitled 'Jete Pari Kintu Keno Jabo' (can go but why should I go). This book dealt with various aspects of life and death and middle-class ties. On one side his grotesque experience, his call from the moon and next life, at the same time a call to meet his obligations of family life, he says.
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Annadashankar Roy
(1905 - 2002)
A dozen of Bengali literature, he was the only surviving literary persona who became a household name in the post-Tagore era. Rabindranath Tagore was proficient in writing prose, poetry, drama, songs, everything. Annadashankar was also adept in many genre of Bengali literature – prose, poetry, travelogue and essay. In the post-Tagore era, it was he who pioneered the modernist writing in Bengali literature.
Born on 15th May, 1905 at Dhenkanal in Orissa, Roy initially started writing in Oriya. But soon he understood that his Bengali roots attracted him more than anything else and he started writing in Bengali. Though he reached the stage of post-graduation, in his academics, he never had any particular fascination for formal education. Annadashankar Roy dropped out of MA course, which he was pursuing in English Literature from Patna University. Later, he sat for the Indian Civil Services Examination in 1927, and stood first. He joined the Indian Civil Service. He took premature retirement in 1951 with a view to devote full-time towards his literary pursuits.Roy aspired to become a journalist in the US. The budding young author was so obsessed with the US, he just wanted to stay there. He was very much fascinated by the turn of events in the US. But all his ambition came to a naught when he failed to laud himself a job several attempts. He decided to stay back a pursue a career here.
In 1930, an American lady, Alice Virginia Orndorf, came from Texas to India and met Annadashankar, who was then posted as Assistant Magistrate of Behrampur. They fell in love and got married in the same year in Ranchi. Alice, after her marriage, was renamed Leela Roy as her husband's pseudonym at that time was "Leelamoy". Leela Roy breathed her last in 1992.
Annadashankar Roy started his literary career by translating Leo Tolstoy's Twenty-three Tales. Later, he wrote several novels such as Ratna O Srimati, Satyasatya, Visalyaksarani Trishnar Jal, Prabandha Samagra (Collection of Essay) etc. One of his rhymes 'Teler shishi banglo bole khukur opor raag karo, tomra je sob dhedhe khoka bharat bhenge bhaag karo, Taar bela?' (What right do you have to be angry with a little girl for breaking a bottle containing oil, when you grown-ups can give up a part of your country without any protest) written about two months before Partition, has almost become a proverb.He got the Sahitya Amademi Award for his travelogue Japane (In Japan) in 1962. He was also honoured with Annada Puraskar (1983, 1994), Vidyasagar Puraskar (1980) and Shiromoni Puashkar (1995). However, no amount of onwards Bengali litertue.
Old age and death is synonymous and the latter overtook the former in Annadashankar Roy on 28th October, 2002. He was suffering for a long time. At the time of his death, he was 97 years old.
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Arun Mitra
(1909 - 2000)
Arun Mitra was born on September 2, 1909 at Jessore, now in Bangladesh. His poem was first published in a children's magazine 'Benu'. He was only 16 year old then. It was from a very tender age that he became inspired in Marxism. He read at Bangabashi College and Surendranath College.
He started learning French language and it inspired him greatly. He started translating French poems into Bengali. Later he almost became an institution in translating French poems into Bengali. For Bengalis, he became the window of the French Literature.
From 1931 to 1942, he worked as a journalist in Anandabazar Patrika. After Anandabazar he joined 'Arani'. He became an activist of anti-fascist movement. His anti-fascist poems are still a great inspiration for all activists of anti-fascist movement.
He was actively involved in the propagation of French language in Bengal. He went to France in 1948. On retiring to India, he joined Allahabad University as a professor of French University. From 1972 onwards, Mitra became a Calcuttan permanently.
He got the Rabindra Puraskar in 1979 for 'Shudhu Rater Shabdo Noy'. He got the Academy award for his book 'Khujte Khujte Eto Door' (a long distance for a search). He got the D Litt. from Rabindra Bharati University in 1990. The French government conferred the Legion de 'onour, the highest award of the French government on him in 1992.His creativity remained alive till last day. He never became tired of writing poems. He was truly a genius.
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Balaichand Mukhopadhyay
(1899-1979)
Banaphool appeared in the Bengali literary scene during the interim of the two world wars. He was a doctor by profession. Naturally, he was vastly experience with various places and joy an sorrow of many people
As a poet Banaphool succeeded most composing satirical poems. These satirical writings, sometimes covered, sometimes explicit, are still very relevant. 'Kingbadanti' is a good example of his satirical poems. 'Angarparni', 'Chaturdashi', 'Aharanijo', 'Banaphooler Byangakabita' are instances of his poetical works.
Banaphool excelled in novels, too. His first novel was 'Trinakhanda' (1935). His social, familiar, historical, political, psychological novels are 60 in number, including both big and small works. His remarkable novel 'Nate Bazare' (1961) drew the attention of the readers. Notable among his many novels are 'Bhuran Shome', 'Ujjala', 'Pakshimithun', 'Alor Pipasa', 'Sandtu puja' and 'Lee'. Lee is the backdrop of marital life. 'Lee' is a morning love-story about the longing of an aged novelist for his dead wife. Here the hero is the writer himself. Banaphool the novelist is empiricist and formalist. His 'fanciful' and 'original' imagination is acquired through a unique curiosity about human life and experience born out of deep empathy.
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Moti Nandi
(1931 - )
Moti Nandi is a well-known name in modern Bengali literature. He has a nice personality and a good sense of writing in Bengali literature, especially he was a writer of sports literature
In early life Moti Nandi played cricket and other games. The maximum time of his life he was engaged in the sports reporting and writing sports books. His remarkable novels of sports are noted as 'Cricketer Aienkanun' (1968), 'Striker' (1972), 'Cricketer Don' (1975), 'Koni' (1975), 'Khelar Yuddhya' (1980), 'Kapil Nachchhe' (197), 'Biswajora Biswacup' (1990), 'Minu Chinur Trofi' (1996), 'Cricketer Rajadhiraj Don Bradman' (1999) etc. Apart from these sports books, he wrote also many different novels and short stories of different tastes. His remarkable novels are 'Karuna Basata' (1977), 'Nil Thali' (1981), 'Ferari' (1990), 'Malabika' (1994), 'Puber Janala' (1995), 'Bhuter Basay Kalabati' (1998) etc. His famous short story collections are 'Behular Bhala' (1975), 'Chair (1983), 'Shrestha Galpa' (1992) etc. Since then he wrote forty-five novels and approximately eight short story collections.
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Sri Narayan Sanyal was a well-known and powerful writer of modern Bengali literature. He was born in Calcutta on 26th April 1924. His father was late Chittasukh Sanyal and mother Late Basantalata Devi. |  |
His remarkable books are - Gramya Vastu, Parikalpita Paribar (literature for new-literates); Timi Timingil, Na Manushi Viswakosh (animal world for juvenile and adults); Ajanta Aparupa, Rodin (art and architecture); Gramer Bari, Vastu Vijnan (technology); Netaji Rahasya Sandhane, Chin-Bharat Long March (research-oriented); Bakultala P.L. Camp, Balmeek (novels based on refugees); Viswasghatak, Abak Prithibi (novels based on science); Mahakaler Mandir, Ladlibegam (historical novel); Sutanuka Ekti Devadasir Nam, Sutanuka Kono Dvadasir Nam Nay (novels on Devadasi system); Nilimay Neel, Satyakaam, Ashleelater Daye (novels on social problems).
He won many awards, including the 'Rabindra Puraskar', the 'Narsinghadas Award' etc. His 'Gramya Vastu' and 'Parikalpita Paribar' was adjudged the best book in Bengali for the new-literate in 1958 and 1959 by the Govt. of India. All India Radio declared the dramatised version of his 'Timi Timingil' as the best radio broadcast drama of 1982.
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Nirad . C Chaudhuri
(1897 - 1999)
| Who was Nirad . C . Chaudhuri? Was he a social reformer? Or merely a curator? If it is difficult to pinpoint the genius of Nirad. C. Chaudhuri. Born on 23rd November, 1897, at Kishoregunj, this man remained ever-young throughout his life. His subsequent novels, Atmaghati Bangali (Suicidal Bengali), Bengali Jibone Ramani (women in Bengali's life), thy Hand, Great anarch, The continent of circe, Three horse and the Apocalypse etc lived up to the trend set by his first novel. |  |
Almost all his books reflects the social inadequacies and the fragile structure of individuals and the fragile structure of individuals of our society. The darker side of some great men also came to light through his book.
Whenever he was confronted, he never surrendered, rather he took pride in exposing the various icons of our society. In fact, he was against hero-worship.
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Salina Husain
Salina Hussain, an eminent novelist of Bangladesh shared her views at Nandan on the Annual Programme of "Ekushe Sansad." She was clear and bold in her views. |  |
Salina was in touch with humanistic problem from her childhood, as her father kept himself engaged in welfare activities. "Pathos and laughter, flood and draught, everything was close to my heart. Human relationship grew gradually in my mind and maturity made me a writer, stated the graceful writer.
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Sunil Gangopadhyay, the famous novelist and poet in Bengali literature born on 7th September, 1934 in Faridpur presently in Bangladesh. Though he was born in Bangladesh but his education are from Calcutta. He loves travelling and in his writings we get the reflection of the portrayal of socio-economic condition of the countries he travelled. He was founder – editor of Krittibus Patrika. |  |
He started as a poet and gradually drifted in writing novels at equal ease. His first book of poems is 'Eka Ebang Kaekjon'; first novel: Atmaprakash published in Sharodia Desh. He is equally popular as child novelist, his first contribution Bhayankar Sundar. He wrote two drama – Raja – Rani O Rajsabhay Madhabi and Praner Lahari. His few such famous contributions are Amriter Putrakanyer, Aranyer Din Ratri Arjun, Nillohiter Sandhane, Kakababu Samagra etc.
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Nasreen Jahan
(1964 - )
Nasreen Jahan has established herself as a major novelist in contemporary Bangla fiction. She first revealed her literary inventiveness through some memorable short stories in the middle of the eighties. Her entrance in the realm of novel was announced in 1993 with the publication of Urukku (The Restless) and fortunately her first novel brought her an important literary award. Subsequently she had published a good number of novels in the last decade. |  |
Her later books are Chandrer Prothom Kola (The First Phase of the Moon, 1994), Jakhan Charpasher Batigulo Nive Ashchhe (When All Lamps Dim 1995) Chandralekhar Jaadubistar (Magical Exposition of Chandralekha, 1995) Sonali Mukhosh (The Golden Mask 1996) Baidehi (The Incorporeal, 1997) Li (Titled after the last syllable of the name of heroine Sonali, 1997) Krus Kathe Konya (The Daughter on the Cross, 1998) Ure Jai Nishipakshi (The Nocturnal Bird Flies Away, 1999) etc.
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Before Syed Waliullah's Lalshalu (1948), the history of novels of Bangladesh was not very significant. No doubt, there were attempts by a good nuember of writers, but only a few could create impression on the readers' mind. Mohammad Najibar Rahman's (1860-1923) Anowara (1914), Kazi Abdul Wadud's (1894-1970) Nodibakshe (1919), Kazi Imdadul Huq's (1882-1926) Abdullah (published in periodicals in 1920 and in book form in 1933), Abul Fazal's (1903-1983) Prodip O Patongyo (1940), Humayun Kabir's (1906-1969) Rivers and Women (1945, Bangla version Nodi O Nari 1952) and Abul Fazal's Shahashika (1946) are the important instances. |  |
Then after the partition of 1947 came out Lalshalu, the first novel of Waliullah, which demonstrated the Bangali-society in a more analytic and artistic way. But when after sixteen years his second novel Chander Amabashya (Black Moon) was published in 1964 (although it was written in 1962-63) it heralded a newer voice in our novel. His third and last novel Kando Nodi Kando (Cry O River Cry 1968) exposed that voice in a more delicate and pleasing way.
Syed Waliullah was born in Chittagong. Completing his intermediate education from Dhaka Intermediate College, he got his BA from Kolkata University. At the age of twenty-three only, when he was a student of MA and served as a sub-editor in The Statesman, his volume of short stories Nayanchara was published. Excluding his second volume of short stories Dui Teer O Onyanyo Golpo, (published in 1965) he wrote more thirty-two stories, which he did not publish in any book-form. Along with fiction he had considerable mastery in plays also. His plays are Bahipeer (1960), Suranga (1964) and Tarangabhanga (1965). Waliullah was awarded with the Bangla Academy and Adamji Awards in 1961 and 1965 respectively. Urdu, French and English Translations of Lalshalu were published in 1960, 1961 and 1967 titling Lal Shalu, L'Arbre Saans Racines and Tree without Roots translated by Kalimullah, Anne-Marie Thibaud and Qaisar Sayeed respectively.
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Shahidul Zahir is one of the least acquainted writers of the country, though the true critics do not fail to identify the gems in him. In his two novels only he has established his ability regarding his imagination and experimentation. Writing all his fiction in the trend of magic realism Shahidul Zahir has emerged as the pioneer of this Latin American genre is the literature of Bangladesh. |  |
In the year 1988 his first novel Jibon O Rajnaitic Bastobota ( Life and Political Reality) came into light which announced his appearance as a mighty fiction writer out of the general trend. After long seven years his second novel She Rate Purnima Chhilo (That Was a Moonlit Night) was published. Shahidul Zahir's novels could not draw much reading public; more over he roused a huge storm for the unconventional components in his novels and graded himself as a disputed writer in the country. But the novelty of narratology in both his novels is undeniable. The theme of the spirit of liberation war in his first novel and its treatment are quite worthy to be talked about.
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Akhtaruzzaman Elias
(1943 - 1997)
Akhtaruzzaman Elias wrote only two novels - Chilekothar Sepai (The Soldier in an Attic, 1986) and Khoabnama (A Narrative on Dreams, 1996) but he has created a permanent place in the history of Bangla novels. In the context of the novels of Bangladesh, he is possibly the second person highest acclaimed after Syed Waliullah (1922-1971) both of whom wrote the least (Waliullah wrote only there novels) and with their small numbers could win the majority readership of Bangla language with their creativity and their novelty.
Akhteruzzaman Elias started his literary career with the volume of short stories Anya Ghore Anya Swar in 1976, though before it his Chilekothar Sepai began to be published serially in a national daily. By then he came in limelight as a serious and committed fiction writer. In 1982 his another volume of short stories Khoanri was published. His literary creation got an official acclamation when in the year 1983 he was honoured with the Bangla Academy Literary Award. After two years his third volume of short stories Dudh Bhate Utpat came into light in 1985. The year 1987 accorded Elias with the Alawol Literary Award. In 1989 his fourth volume of short stories Dhojokher Om was brought out. During the last months of 1995 he felt very sick which resulted the detection of cancer in the right leg. On March 20, 1996, he had to undergo an operation on his leg which was later on cut off from his body. The authority of Ananda Award of Kolkata felt honoured to award Elias for his great novel Khoabnama in April of the same year. On January 04, 1997 Elias died. Jaal Swapno, Swapner Jaal, a collection of stories and Sanskritir Bhanga Setu, a collection of essays were published posthumously in the same year of his death.
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Jahanara Imam born in a conservative Muslim family of Murshidabad (India) in 1929, received a liberal education. She held a Master's degree in Bengali language and literature and a Bachelor's degree in Education from Dhaka University. She has spent a significant part of her life as an educationalist. She visited the United States in 1964-65 as a Fulbright scholar and again in 1977 under the International Visitors Programme at the invitation of the government of the United States. |  |
Mrs. Imam was a prolific writer. Among her outstanding works are "Another Life", an autobiographical account depicting the life of a Muslim conservative family in a rural society of West Bengal in the first half of the century, and 'The Days of '71' which gives a graphic account of life in East Pakistan under the Pakistani military occupation. Mrs. Imam passed away in 1994.
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Her first creative impulses found expressions in rhymes, Brishti poriya jay/mushol dharay…….. She was only 8 then. By 15 she was writing full-fledged novels and at 18 she wrote Bot tolar Upannayash that created quite a stir when it was published in 1958. Her adolescence was spent reading Tagore, Sharat Chandra, Gorky, Shaw, Galsworthy and Marx Engels. |  |
A novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, short story writer Razia Khan has not written enormously, but whatever she has written will be treasured along with the immortal works of Bangla literature.
Though her first love was writing and literature she didn't limit herself just there. She took great interest in acting and performed on both the radio and the stage. She also earned fame for recitation and as a presenter on the radio. An exceptionally brilliant student of English literature, Razia Khan stood first class first in both Honours and Masters, went to University of Birmingham, UK, on a scholarship from the British Council for higher studies. On her return she joined the editorial board of the then Pakistan Observer (renamed the Bangladesh Observer after the independence), but soon left it to join the English Department of Dhaka University which set her career path. Among all these she has, however, continued with her first and ever-lasting love writing.
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Sharbari Zohra Ahmed was born in Dhaka, Bangladesh in 1971 but had to flee with her family when she was three weeks old due to the outbreak of revolutionary war. She earned Bachelor of Arts degree in English and Journalism from Marymount College (NY) in 1994 and earned Master of Arts degree in Creative Writing from New York University in 1997. |  |
Sharbari Ahmad made waves in New York City's theatre scene in 2002. Originally written in 2001, Raisins not Virgins is a social comedy of a 29-year-old Muslim-American woman in New York City. Sahar is a spunky, irreverent young Bangladeshi New Yorker who is rattled by the seeming contradictions in the way Muslims practice their faith and plagued her terrible luck in relationships. At first she is quite disillusioned by the religion preached by fellow Bangladeshis in her city but eventually she finds her faith through a series of debates with various characters and herself.
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Abdul Quadir
(1906-1984)
Abdul Quadir, poet, essayist, journalist, was born on 1 June 1906 in the village of Araisidha, comilla, son of Haji Afsaruddin, a prominent businessman. Abdul Quadir lost his mother early in childhood and was brought up by his father.
Abdul Quadir passed the Matriculation from Brahmanbaria Annada Model High School in 1923. In 1925 he passed the ISc from Dhaka Intermediate College. He enrolled at the Dhaka University but could not complete his BA. Instead, in 1929, he joined the editing section of the monthly saogat in Kolkata. He was one of the principal initiators of the buddhir mukti andolan (Movement for freedom of thought), led by the muslim sahitya samaj. He was the writer as well as editor of shikha (1927), the mouthpiece of the organisation.
For some time, Abdul Quadir served as headmaster at the primary school of the calcutta corporation. Simultaneously, he published and edited the monthly Jayati from 1930 to 1933. He also served in various posts at the Saptahik Nabashakti (1934), Jugantar (1938), Dainik Nabajug (1941), Banglar Katha (the weekly mouthpiece of the Indian Government Department of Publicity), Saptahik Mohammadi (1946) and Saptahik Paigam (1947-52). On his return to Dhaka in 1952 he edited the monthly mahe-nao up to 1964. From 1964 to 1970, he was publication officer of the Central Bengali Development Board.
Abdul Quadir wrote many poems and essays. Among his books of poems, essays, literary criticism are Dilruba (1933), Uttar Basanta (1967), Kavi Nazrul (1970), Kazi Abdul Wadud (1976), Yugakavi Nazrul (1986), etc. He also wrote two books on Bangla prosody: Chhanda Samiksan (1979) and Bangla Chhander Itibrtta (1985),
Abdul Quadir also edited a number of books, including Kavya Malancha (1954), Yakub Ali Chowdhury Rachanabali (1963), Nazrul Rachanabali (5 vols, 1966-84), Shiraji Rachanabali (1967), Kazi Imdadul Huq Rachanabali (1968), Abul Hussain Rachanabali (1968), Lutfar Rahman Rachanabali (1st vol, 1972) Rokeya Rachanabali (1973), and Bangla Sonnet (1974).
In recognition of his literary achievements, Abdul Quadir was awarded the Bangla Academy Literary Prize (1963), Adamjee Literary Award (1967), Ekushey Padak (1976), Nazrul Academy Gold Medal (1977), Comilla Foundation Medal (1977), Mohammad Nasiruddin Gold Medal (1977) and Muktadhara Prize. He expired in Dhaka on 19 December 1984.
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Dr. Ahmed Sharif
(1921 - 1999)
A most controversial and misunderstood personality in the socio-cultural arena of our time was Dr. Ahmed Sharif, who was a renowned scholar, researcher of Bengali literature and a forerunner of free thought movements in Bangladesh. A man with a deep sense of dignity who was a true non-conformist and an atheist, a former Chairman and Professor of the Bengali Department, University of Dhaka, who died on February 24, 1999. The colorful life of Dr. Ahmed Sharif can be divided into two broad lines, one is his literary and intellectual side and another one is his socio-cultural and philosophical side.
Dr. Ahmed Sharif who came from Patiya, Chittagong, did his Masters and Ph.D. degrees in Bengali literature from the University of Dhaka, in the year of 1944 and 1967 respectively. From 1945 to 1949, he taught at Laksham Nawab Faizunnessa College and later on at Feni College. From July 1949 to 17 December 1950.
In his lifetime, he was the lone authority on ancient and medieval Bengali literature, the discussions of which he enriched with many original contributions. He was the author of more than 100-research publication in the form of books on history, philosophy, socio-cultural and contemporary political issues. He edited with long introductions 46 manuscripts of ancient and medieval Bengali literature and a number of others were in joint collaboration. It is rated by the sub-continental scholars that two volumes of his Bangalee and Bangla Shahitya (Men and Literature of Bengal) published between 1978 to 1983 are masterpieces.
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Mohitlal Majumder
(1888-1952)
Mohitlal Majumder, poet, essayist and literary critic, was born on 26 October 1888 in the village of Kanchrapara in Nadia district. Mohitlal started as a poet, but later became better known as a literary critic. He graduated in arts in 1908 from Ripon College (now Vidyasagar College), Kolkata. He began his career as a teacher at Calcutta High School and continued in this profession until 1928. He also worked briefly as a kanungo (1914-1917) in the Settlement Department. He joined dhaka university as a lecturer in the Bangla and Sanskrit Department in 1928 and retired from there in 1944.
Mohitlal Majumder made his literary debut through the journal manasi. Later, he contributed regularly to journals such as the bharati and Shanibarer Chithi. His early poems, written in pleasing rhythms, reflect the aspirations and sorrows of a dreaming youth. Acquainted with Arabic and Persian, he used Arabic and Persian words in his poems. His poems are inspired by both aestheticism and spiritualism.
Mohitlal early poems reveal the influence of rabindranath tagore, but later, as a member of the Shanibarer Chithi group, he distanced himself from the older poet. He did not regard Tagore's poetic works (post-fifty) with much respect and made an effort to replace him with michael madhusudan dutt and bankimchandra chattopadhyay.
As a literary critic, Mohitlal attempted to set standards and reveal the problems of art and literature. His psychological and poet-like approach greatly elevated the status of criticism. In writing critiques he used a number of pseudonyms such as krittivas ojha, Sabyasachi and Sri Satyasundar Das.
Mohitlal was a prolific writer. Among his books are Svapan Pasari (1921), Smargaral (1936), Adhunik Bangla Sahitya (1936), Bangla Kavitar Chhanda (1945), Kavi Shri Madhusudan (1947), Sahitya Bichar (1947), Bangla O Banali (1951), and Kavi Rabindra O Rabindrakavya (1st Vol. 1952, 2nd Vol. 1953). He also edited bangadarshan for some time.
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Jogesh Chandra Bagol
(1903-1972)
Bagol, Jogesh Chandra researcher and writer, was born on 27 May 1903 in his maternal uncle's house at Kumirmara village in pirojpur district. His paternal home was in Chalisha village. After completing his primary education, he studied at Kadamtala George English High School, passing the Entrance Examination in 1922. He passed the IA Examination in 1924 from Bagerhat College (at present Prafulla Chandra College) and BA in 1926 from City College. He took admission in Calcutta University, but could not continue his studies due to financial constraints.
While still a student, Jogesh Chandra met aswini kumar datta and Kamakhya Charan Nag and was influenced by their nationalistic ideas. In 1928 he started working as a proofreader for the prabasi and Modern Review. He was then appointed sub-editor. During this time he became intimate with Brajendra Nath Das, Ramananda Chattopadhyay, Sajanikanta Das and nirad c chaudhuri. From 1935 to 1941 he was involved with the Desh.
Jogesh Chandra was a fairly prolific writer, writing 21 books in Bangla and 4 in English. He wrote about 19th century Bengal after considerable research among old documents, records, and proceedings of different institutes and journals. Among his historical writings are Bharater Muktisandhani (1940), Unavingsha Shatabdir Bangla (1941), and Banglar Navyasangskrti (1958). He also wrote a book on iswar chandra vidyasagar, Vidyasagar Parichay (1959), and Kolkata, Kalikatay Sangskrtikendra (1959). He also wrote considerably on national and social issues, for example in Hindumelar Itivrtta (1945), The History of the Indian Association (1953), and Jagrti O Jatiyata (1959). He was also interested in women's education, writing in both Bangla and English on the subject in Banglar Strishiksa (1950) and Women's Education in Eastern India (1956). He also wrote for children, for example, Sahasir Jayayatra (1938) and Jatir Baraniya Yara (1943). He also wrote an autobiography, Baraniya (1959).
Till 1961, when he became handicapped by blindness, he was involved with writing and research. However, his blindness did not end his active life. Hindumelar Itivrtta and Sahitya Sadhak Charitamala were written after he had lost his vision. He also edited a book on the hundred years of Indian Art College at this time. In 1958 he gave a speech commemorating Vidyasagar and in 1968 he did the same on sharat chandra chattopadhyay.
For his uncommon contributions in the fields of literature and research he was given the Rampran Gupta Award of the bangiya sahitya parishat (1956), Sarojini Basu Gold Medal (1962) of Calcutta University and Shishir Kumar Award (1966) of Amritabazar magazine. He died on 7 January 1972 in Kolkata.
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Raavan – A Masterpiece as flawed as life.
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The anecdote about an artist goes like this. He's painting a portrait so beautiful that other artists who watch him paint it start comparing it with Monalisa. As every connoisseur around busies himself in judging the perfection of the painting, the artist goes ahead and erases an ear from the painting. His brief explanation, he wanted to keep the painting imperfect, because beauty is imperfect. Perhaps, there is a lesson for all of us in the anecdote who obsess with dissecting films.
I would not have written this review if it was not for the overwhelming cynicism flying in from all corners of the self proclaimed Mani Ratnam fans trashing their "Mani Sir" and giving him pearls of advice. After seeing the movie, reading such cynic and judgmental posts and comments made me want to say a few things.
*There may be spoilers ahead. If you haven't seen the movie, be careful.*
The problem with judging work of great artists is that, often times, we are not the right people to actually judging their craft. What we end up doing is, actually judging ourselves and our own limitations. First thing, Did Raavan work for me as a movie? Yes, bigtime. It is a movie more than the sum of its parts for me. It's not uniformly great. It alternates between being a great movie and a movie with its flaws. It has a pulsating flow of great moments, sheer brilliance, inconsistency, a slight let down here and there. But in the end, when I was about to leave the theater, sure I could have been more content, sure I expected more from Ratnam, but I was content nevertheless and happy with the film. Mani Ratnam has made a political comment clearly and a very significant albeit predictable one at that. He has also offered his interpretation of Ramayana and paralleled it with the state of our polity and I agree to it whole heartedly and love it too.
Let me first talk about the negatives. Is Raavan without its flaws? No. On the other hand, for a film coming from such an accomplished film maker, surprisingly it has many flaws. There are two principal flaws in the film. One, some of the scenes are not well acted and in some scenes the dialogue delivery is not upto the mark. Especially scenes involving Vikram. Two, some of the songs are unwelcome in the narrative and break the flow instead of aiding it. There is one embarrassing moment also, the scene where Aishwarya Rai jumps. The special affect in that scene is too naive. But that's about it. Like the Moon has its dark spot, so does this movie.
Raavan on the positive side is a tremendous achievement in commercial Hindi cinema. It's a very bold, artistic and experimental film made on a huge budget. Mani Ratnam tries to venture out of his zone and inject a crazy, manic energy into the movie. The super cinematography along with art direction and Rehman's music offers such a visual and sensory treat, the film is world class in its sensory delight. I don't think since Santosh Sivan's Asoka and Ratnam's Dil Se, we've seen an Indian film with such stunning cinematography. To add to the stunning cinematography, we have Aishwarya Rai who looks stunningly beautiful and a work of art in the film. Acting wise she's adequate to the task. She has been very well used in the movie, without verbose dialogues where she generally struggles. Abhishek Bachchan has pulled off a difficult role. He has managed to tug at the audience's heart in his author backed role and though he could have done a handful of scenes better, he's the heart of the film. Vikram had to constantly switch between his Tamil role and his hindi role and the two being opposite, his performance in the hindi role is abysmal. He looks most out of place. Govinda for once has been used the right way and is eminently lovable.
What do I say about the movie's sensory offering? Aishawarya Rai's fall from the breaking branch into the water is poetry. The train coming out of the tunnel scene, the film is visually unmatched from a Bollywood offering. No amount of praise is enough for the cinematographers.
He's given a stellar climax. It's one of the best I've seen in some time. He didn't change Ramayana, within the framework, he gave his interpretation. Back in the 1800's Michael Madhusudan Dutta wrote "Meghnad Badh Kabya" not "Ramayana" because he considered Meghnad's murder the biggest act of cowardice and felony and Ravan the ideal administrator and the better human being, not Ram. In his own way, Mani Ratnam also puts his point across.
I read a lot of comments in many posts saying Mani Ratnam generalizes and over simplifies complex problems such as terrorism or Maoism etc. He should stick to human relations stories etc. The thing is, when he deals with such topics, he doesn't go after making a documentary and instead addresses not the detail but the root of the problem, which is always one of intensely personal loss and hurt and sense of deception and oppression. That's exactly what he has repeatedly shown whether in Dil Se or in Raavan. If people think he's being naive then let me tell you, I've stayed in North east for over 13 years and a lot of terrorism originates due to the inhuman treatment which the tribals and back ward locals get. So, I'd not use words such as trivialized or over simplified ever. To separate the wheat from the chaff and to not beat about the bush but to address the root and personal cause would be a more realistic description of Mani Ratnam's approach.
Another thing is this whining about lack of story and wafer thin plot. The lack of verbose dialogues do not mean lack of story. Dialogues are not the only means to take a story forward. I fear what people would say if they see "once". I took one of my friends to see DevD and he complained there was no story. I'm sure the story which was told under five minute in Lenny's introduction piece, some film makers like Madhur Bhandarkar would have made an entire film on it. All I'm trying to say is, there are different ways to tell a story. Mani Ratnam is a visual story teller.
I also saw a lot of reviews say lack of emotion and effect. The hit and run style narrative is designed to be frenetic. It's by design and not due to failure.
When I thought of some flaws in Raavan, I thought how difficult it must be to shoot two movies at the same time, in such painstakingly difficult production locales as where Raavan was shot. It may sound as an excuse but Bollywood directors don't ever have to do that and they can focus on the single movie.
I also thought of why this film got such unabashed praise in Western press but a lot of stick in Indian media. Raavan's flaws lie in the localised details. As in, inept dialogue delivery at some places. Think of the western audiences reading the subtitles, it's impossible for them to understand that a dialogue in Hindi was not well delivered. While the flaw is local, the story and its effect is global. So, they have a filter where they can tap the beauty and brilliance of Raavan but not its flaws. So, the overwhelming positive response from the west is expected.
Now, to the main reason of writing this review, the reason for the overwhelming disappointment of Mani Ratnam fans? Steve Jobs recently said what Henry Ford had famously quoted -"If you ask the consumer what they want, they would say a faster horse". Any artist continues to create as long as he creates new, ventures new paths, embarks on new journey. We should appreciate Mani Ratnam and AR Rahman both actually for being bold enough to have conviction of character to charter new flights. The new dishes they make may not taste the same as their best dishes which they mastered, but we must rejoyce the fact that they are making new dishes and showing us new things.
More than ever we need responsible Film Criticism in this country. SRK worked in Swades and Dil Se and once they flopped he went back to doing bad commercial films. What we dont need is great film makers making great attempts but losing huge money due to insensitive and shallow criticism, which really shape popular opinion. Yes, Raavan may not be Mani Ratnam's most complete or most perfect work, but its a way better film than 99 percent of what this country produces.
As I saw the last half an hour of the movie, I realised, that to me, Raavan would also be a master piece, like Dil Se or Asoka is. But unlike these two movies, it's a little more flawed, but so is life, as real as the flaws.
Tags: aishwarya rai, mani ratnam, Raavan, Santosh Sivanhttp://passionforcinema.com/raavan-a-masterpiece-as-flawed-as-life/
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