The nineteenth-century Bengal Renaissance and the 1857 uprising form the backdrop to Sei Samay (1982), a saga of human frailties and strength which also explores the cross-cultural currents of social, political and intellectual life in the city of Calcutta. Sei Samay (translated into English as Those Days by Aruna Chakravarti) is a period novel which revolves around the creator of Hutum Pyanchar Naksha, Kali Prasanna Singha, along with other legendary historical figures including Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar, the reformer; Michael Madhusudan Dutt, the poet; the father and son duo of Dwarkanath Tagore and Debendranath Tagore; Harish Mukherjee, the journalist; Keshab Chandra Sen, the Brahmo Samaj radical; David Hare and John Bethune, the English educationists, and others who bring alive a momentous time. The novel, appearing in serial form in Desh over a period of two and a half years and published in two volumes in 1981 and 1982, deftly weaves the actual and purely fictional into the vast canvas of its story using a rational, analytical and unbiased voice. Notably, for this novel, the stress on the characters goes into highlighting the era being written about, rather than the opposite. Yet Sunil stresses in his epilogue that “Sei Samay is a novel—not a historical document…The fiction writer, even when depicting historical truth, has to invest it with the light of the imagination.” According to academic Jagannath Chakravorty, “[Sei Samay] brings within its fold history and hearsay, fact and fancy, document and comment almost with equal ease…[It is] one of the most significant contributions to Bengali fiction in recent years”. It received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1985.

About the Author
The author of well over 200 books, Sunil Gangopadhyay (1934-2012) was a prolific writer who authored numerous novels, travelogues and collections of poetry during his lifetime, but declared poetry to be his “first love”. His better-known poetry collections are Eka ebang Kayekjon (1958), Amar Swapna (1972), Bandi Jege Achhi (1974), and Ami ki Rakam Bhabe Benche Achhi (1975). Gangopadhyay was the founder editor of Krittibas, an epoch-making poetry magazine started publishing from 1953, that became a platform for a new generation of poets experimenting with many new forms in poetic themes, rhythms, and words. Storming into the field of the novel with the trendsetting Atma Prakash (1966)—a powerful portrayal of the frustration and ennui of the youth of Calcutta—he soon rose to become one of the most popular Bengali novelists. Gangopadhyay also created the popular fictional character Kakababu and wrote a series of novels on this character, which became significant in Indian children’s literature. Gangopadhyay wrote under the pen names: Nil Lohit, Sanatan Pathak, and Nil Upadhyay.

Also read
Prothom Alo (First Light)
The sequel to the award-winning and critically acclaimed Those Days, Prothom Alo (translated into English as First Light) was first published in 2001.It is a magnificent novel set at the turn of the twentieth century in a Bengal where the old and young India are jostling for space. Prominent among its many characters are Rabindranath Tagore or Robi, the young, dreamy poet, torn between his art and the love for his beautiful, ethereal sister-in-law, Kadambari Devi, and the handsome, dynamic Naren Datta, later to become Swami Vivekananda. Grand in its scale and crackling with the energy of its prose, Prothom Alo is a rich and comprehensive portrait of Bengal, from its sleepy, slow-changing villages to the bustling city of Calcutta where the genteel and the grotesque live together. Equally, it is a chronicle of a whole nation waking up to a new, modern sensibility.

Pratidwandi (The Adversary)
Originally published in 1974, Sunil Gangopadhyay’s novel Pratidwandi has also been translated into English by Enakshi Chatterjee as The Adversary. Set in the late 1960s, Pratidwandi perfectly captures the cynicism, despair, economic corruption and social upheaval which had engulfed the urban youth of Calcutta and was instrumental in their affiliation with the communist ideology. Siddhartha, the protagonist of this politically turbulent novel, is also emblematic of the interminable ennui of his peers and their travails and resistance while trying to survive in a brutally materialistic society. His family, having lost their tea estate, fell in dire financial straits and thus began a cycle of misfortunes which only exacerbated Siddhartha’s growing sense of futility and bitterness as he battled on tirelessly in the face of every rejection and insecurity. The austere bleakness of the narrative, delving into the complete breakdown of the very fabric of the society, is relieved by a streak of romanticism, ethics and an idealistic vision of a world, which once embodied by Siddhartha, stands out as the redeeming feature of this novel. Satyajit Ray adapted the novel into a 1970 film, which was the first film of Ray’s famous ‘Calcutta Trilogy’ and also won three National Film Awards. According to Ashapurna Devi, an admirer of Sunil Gangopadhyay, ‘The sensibility of a real artist can turn the common into uncommon, the ordinary into extraordinary. Sunil has the power to light up those areas. The light is clear but not dazzling.’

Nishango Samrat (The Lonely Monarch)
First published in 2005, Nishanga Samrat (translated into English as The Lonely Monarch) revolves around the story of India’s greatest professional stage actor Sisir Bhaduri, a brilliant performer who was loved and respected by his peers, adored by spectators and acknowledged as a master by Rabindranath Tagore himself. Yet, Sisirkumar remained passionately committed to a singular dream: to steer his audience away from the raucous melodrama that had come to be called entertainment toward an evolved enjoyment of stage performance. Set in the vibrant world of Bengali theatre in 1924’s Calcutta, this searing novel brings to life Sisirkumar’s relentless efforts to free the stage of Western influences and mediocrity; his frustration and disillusionment with apathetic patrons and obdurate audiences; his ruinous weakness for alcohol; and the impossible ideals that alienated him from his closest friends and the women in his life. Sunil Gangopadhyay, with his inimitable literary craftsmanship, documents the tumultuous life of a remarkable man and a defining era in the history of Indian theatre, profoundly paying his tribute to the might and resilience of the creative spirit.

Referred to as a modern epic, Manabjamin won the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1989. The central character of the novel is Deepnath, and the story is woven with what happens to the families of his brothers and sister, his own emotional involvements and his reflective reaction to these happenings. The novel gives us a vivid picture of the unrelieved tragedy of the Indian middle-class life in the urban milieu and also of the palpable limitation of its range. It has an intensity about it which distinguishes it from the other works of this category. It is written in an impassioned style and the whole novel seems to be keyed to the same pitch to such an extent that every character in the novel tends to be equally clever and at times brilliant in his or her articulation. One may even get the impression that the central character spouts the author’s attitude to the human situation as he visualizes it.

About the Author
Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay is a famous Bengali author, known for creating the relatively new fictional sleuths Barodacharan, Fatik and Shabor Dasgupta. A deep undertone of spirituality runs through his works. They add to the depth, but never hinder the flow. Mukhopadhyay credits this to the influence of his guru Thakur Anukulchandra. Mukhopadhyay delved into the world of children’s literature in the mid-1970s, and got instant success with the novel Manojder Adbhut Bari. Mukhopadhyay has penned nearly 100 books of short stories and novels for adult readers, and 34 for teenagers.

Also read
Goynar Baksho
Originally published in 1993 by Ananda Publishers, Goynar Baksho is a novella by Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay which has also been translated into English as The Aunt Who Wouldn’t Die.It is a frenetic, funny and tug-at-your-heartstrings tale of love, family, and freedom centered around three generations of Mitra women who are surprising at every turn and defy all expectations—Somlata who got married into the dynastic but declining Mitra family, the embittered matriarch Pishima alias Roshomoyee who turns into a sharp-tongued ghost and a book-loving, scooter-riding, rebellious teenager, Boshon—and the different relationships they share with their heirloom, a box of jewels, which in turn, reflects the transition in the role of women in society as the characters reveal the gravity of their striking depth and definition. Aparna Sen adapted Goynar Baksho into an award-winning film of the same name in 2013.

Ghoonpoka (Woodworm)
An existential masterpiece published in 1967, Ghoonpoka (Woodworm) was Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay’s debut novel which came out in the annual Puja edition of the magazine Desh. It has been translated into 14 languages including English. It a rare and captivating examination of existential crisis in the canon of Bengali literature starts with its protagonist Shyam Chakraborty having just quit from his plush, secured and well-paying job in a reputed firm where he was in line for the big post, on account of an expletive used by an irate boss. For someone who was habituated to disciplined existence, terrific self-confidence and even a dash of smugness, taking exceptional care of his external appearance, and living in a cocoon where the vagaries of the outside world failed to touch him, the transition post the loss of his job turns out to be so striking that he turns into a different individual in a matter of days. His dynamism gets replaced with extreme stasis, ennui, and urban alienation as he wanders through bustling metropolis of Calcutta while steadily dissociating from his essential sense of being—palpably evoking the existential void and the oppressive meaninglessness which informed the raison d’être” of Kafka or Camus’s body of work. Nabaneeta Dev Sen, a well-known Bengali novelist and critic, in her appreciation of the book observes: ‘Shirshendu’s protagonist believes in purging, in divine grace, and in rebirth. Death for him is not a closure but a fresh start. It is a tale of the reaffirmation of lost values, a quest for innocence and eternal truth. Rooted in Eastern Philosophy, in his desire to redefine himself and to establish a connection with the undying cosmic force, Shyam is a far cry from Mersault.’

Bari Bodle Jay has, at its centre, Dhrubo and Preeti, a couple who live in a joint family in a rented house in south Calcutta, near Kalighat on Harish Mukherjee Road, but dream of having their own space in the city. They look out for an apartment on rent and in the process realise how difficult it is to even get a small space for oneself in Calcutta, within their modest budget. Density and proximity are the two defining characteristics of urban spatial dimensions. And it is this facet of the urban space that results in categories like tenants and landlords that is explored in Bari Bodle Jay, which, also portrays the trials and tribulations of the urban dweller constantly on the move between different houses. The novel, which was based on Chowdhury’s own experiences as a tenant, received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1988.

About the Author
Ramapada Chowdhury (1922 –2018) was a Bengali novelist and short story writer. Chowdhury started writing during the Second World War. He was associated with Anandabazar Patrika for many years, and edited its Sunday supplement. In all, he has written around 50 novels and over 100 short stories. He has also edited an anthology of stories originally published in Desh.  He was conferred the Sahitya Academy award for Bari Bodle Jay in 1988. Among the other awards that Chowdhury won were the Rabindra Purashkar for ‘Ekhoni, and the Ananda Purashkar. Chowdhury believed that “quitting is an art” and decided to retire from writing—an unprecedented feat in the Bengali literary space. He went back to being a reader, as he had started out, leaving his mark as one of the very few writers who cast a dispassionate but probing eye on human weaknesses and the fault lines of society.

Also read
Banpalashir Padabali
Chowdhury’s biggest breakthrough came with the novel Banpalashir Padabali (1960)—based in rural Bengal—which was serialised in the prestigious literary Magazine Desh and this found hundreds of thousands of readers every week. The novel, which dealt with the tensions between two brothers, when one of their daughters married a government employee, won the Rabindranath Tagore Memorial International Prize and earned Chowdhury a permanent place among the pantheon of popular and revered Bengali writers. It was made into a film by the Bengali cinema megastar Uttam Kumar (1973), who directed as well as starred in it.

Abhimanyu
The story of Abhimanyu (1982) was based on the life and work of scientist Subhas Mukhopadhyay, who created India’s first and the world’s second test-tube baby in 1978. Subhash Mukhopadhyay was ostracised for his research in in-vitro fertilisation by the government, and eventually committed suicide. Based on the story, director Tapan Sinha made Ek Doctor Ki Maut in 1990, which went on to win several awards. The film, inspired by this true story, deals with the complications and “many pitfalls that are created by a lethargic political administration and depicts the lack of infrastructural support to Indian scientists with heart-breaking insight.”

Je Jekhane Danriye
Je Jekhane Danriye was first published in the Sharadiya ‘Desh’ in October 1972 and later published as a book. It has been translated into English as ‘Second Encounter’ by Swapna Dutta and published by Niyogi Books. The novel narrates the story of Anupam, a middle-aged professor with a meagre income, who was taking a vacation with his family in a little-known mining town and his chance encounter with his childhood love interest which turns their lives upside down. The novel, while exploring the myriad shades of love, compels its readers to confront and introspect on some fundamental questions—How deep and dependable is unspoken and unfulfilled love? Does physical proximity necessarily bring one closer? Do values and outlooks change when one considers one’s children? What is love’s ultimate goal?” The novel was made into a critically acclaimed film in 1974 and broadcast as a radio play by All India Radio.

Rajnagar, a complex historical novel, is set in the former French Colonised Farasdanga area or Chandannagar in the years preceding and following the Sepoy Mutiny, 1857. The novel at its heart is an interwoven set of three different and exquisite love stories. It is a sophisticated account of the subterranean power politics of transition during colonial rule. The novel’s account of the cerebral aspects of that period’s contending cross-currents or religious beliefs is both vivid and perceptive. Majumdar experiments with unique methods of narration, at times juxtaposing the briefest of moments with minutely detailed expositions. It received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1986 and has been translated into Telugu and English (by Kalpana Bardhan).

About the Author
Amiya Bhushan Majumdar (1918 –2001), known as the ‘Writer’s Writer’, was an Indian novelist, short-story writer, essayist and playwright. ‘The God on Mount Sinai’, a one-act play, serialized in two instalments in the magazine Mandira in 1944 was his first published writing. Promilar Biye, and Nandarani, two short stories published in the Purbasha in 1946 and in Chaturanga in 1947 respectively, immediately caught the attention of a special strata of readers and critics for the very individual prose style. During 1953-54 Garh Shrikhanda (in Purbasha) and Nayantara (in Chaturanga), two major novels started serialization almost simultaneously. In fifty years thereafter, Amiya Bhushan published 27 novels, 115 short stories, about 50 essays and 6 one-act plays. Considered one of the most noteworthy authors of modern Bengali prose, Majumdar’s works received significant critical acclaim and recognition—including the Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel Rajnagar in 1986. Poet Joy Goswami wrote on him, ‘As a (classical) singer moves from note to note, Amiya Bhushan moved from sentence to sentence. It takes time for the reader to overcome the spell it creates and to adjust himself with the movement. It becomes a lesson to new writers’ and ‘Amiya Bhushan was an inventor of new lands and has taught how to appreciate achievements with a highly sophisticated self-restraint.’

Kalbela is part of the Animesh quartet. The principal character of the series is Animesh Mitra who, much like the author himself, grows up amid the tea estates of the Dooars in northern Bengal, but then moves to Kolkata in the 1960s in order to study at Scottish Church College. Animesh then plunges into the Naxalite rebellion that rocked West Bengal in the late 1960s and 1970s. Through the character of the protagonist, Majumdar portrays the tumultuous political history of West Bengal in the post-independence era. Kalbela was serialized in the prestigious literary magazine Desh in 1981-1982 and adapted into a film by the director Goutam Ghose in 2009. According to the academic Amaresh Datta, “the strength of the work can be seen in its configuration of relationships on various levels and a search for meaning through them… [It] is a novel of love and realization—love of life and the realization that this life is perennially explorable.”

About the Author
Samaresh Majumdar is a versatile writer though many of his novels have a touch of thrill and suspense attached to them which is noticeable in his novels like Aath Kuthuri Noy Daraja, Bandinibash, Daybadhha, Buno Haansher Palak. His first novel Dour was published in 1976. Being a prolific writer who has excelled in different genres, Samaresh Majumdar has worked upon short stories, novels, travelogues, and children’s fiction. He has written more than sixty novels and over one hundred fifty short stories. Some of his remarkable novels include Saatkahon, Tero Parbon, Ujan Ganga, Swapner Bazaar and Kolikatay Nobokumar. His quartet of Uttoradhikar, Sahitya Akademi Award-winning Kalbela, Kalpurush and Moushalkal are now considered modern classics, and many of his novels have been adapted into major Bengali movies as well. From the tea gardens of the Dooars to the core of the concrete jungle of the city life, his characters and stories have diverse shades and depth and have won a special place in the hearts of the readers.

Also read
Kalpurush
Originally published in 1985, Samaresh Majumder’s Kalpurush is the last of the famous Animesh trilogy, which is widely regarded as Samaresh Majumdar’s finest work, as well as one of the most significant works of modern Bengali literature. The sequel to the Sahitya Akademi Award-winning Kalbela, this riveting novel explores the conflict of Arko, the son of Animesh and Madhabilata, who tries to strike a balance between the idealism of his parents and the harrowing forces of consumerism which subsume his life.

Arjun Series
Arjun is a fictional young adventurer-detective hero, created by Samaresh Majumder, who hails from Jalpaiguri of West Bengal. Arjun’s mentor is retired official cop Mr. Amal Shome, who makes him understand his true calling. Although Arjun himself solves the cases but mostly works as the assistant of Shome. As the series evolves, Arjun matures, unlike adult detectives who are already evolved. Samaresh Majumdar, who uses the enchanting north Bengal terrain as a backdrop in his novels, bases the young detective Arjun in the same region. It gives his detective fiction a kind of charm that is missing in most city-centric writing. Kalimpong e Sitaharan was the first Bengali film based on Arjun. Books from the Arjun series include Khutimari Range, Khunkharapi, Arjun@beep beep dotcom, Khiljir Guhay Arjun and many more.

Another Outsider
(translated into English by Manojit Mitra and published by Bee Books)
The protagonist Shahin is one of those many boys from rural Bangladesh who make up for the thousands of illegal immigrants of the US. He travels to the US with a theatre company to perform for Bengali associations in several cities. Finally, instead of returning with his team, he stays back, literally dissolving in the multitude of those who seek their fortune in the US while all the time running from the police. Like most such boys, Shahin joins a restaurant that employs illegal migrants because they come cheap. His only aim is to save enough money so that he can send money back home to his aged parents, who dream of repairing their doddering house. Playing hide and seek with the police, Shahin soon finds himself working for a transport company but again gets too close to the police. Finally, luck favours him and Shahin gets a green card that enables him to visit home. But things are not the same anymore. He is now just another outsider.

Amritasya Putree was Kamal Das’s first novel. It has been translated into Odia and English as ‘Daughter of Immortality’. Enriched with the experiences of rural districts where her father was a judge and subsequent life in New Delhi, where her husband Debesh Das, a fellow writer and a member of the Indian Civil Service, was posted—the book follows the life of Amrita, the protagonist who has come to this world without any reference, i.e., of no origin that can be traced. The book later became the name of an endowment by the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, the royalties from the novel being used to support female Indian scholars and lecturers. Amritasya Putree received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1982.

About the Author
Kamal Das has produced six novels including Twamasi Momo (1983) and Amritam Bibhati (1984) and three intellectual travelogues—Jana Ajana (1977), Uttare Meru Dakshine Ban (1980) and Cake, Chocolate Aar Rupkatha (1981). Her extensive travels have given her a deep insight and understanding. Thus, much more than travelogues, these are a demonstration—through anecdotes and descriptions—of experiences, of deep feelings conveyed with rare wit and grace.

Shamba (1978) is an interesting modern interpretation of the Puranic tales. In fact, it was unique in its time for not being a purely socially realist work, but instead a transformation of an ancient legend to modernity. Written under his nom de plume ‘Kalkut’ (Deadly Poison), under which Basu published travelogues, this eponymous novel is less travel across land and more travel across time which takes the author right ‘from the bank of the Caspian to Kuru Panchala’ ending at Dvaravati, the home of the Yadavas. Guided by Suta, the official Puranic narrator, the author finds himself traversing the ‘true’ history of Aryan expansion where all characters from Indra to Krishna are ‘real’. The story depicts the life of Shamba, the most beautiful prince among the Yadavas, who is cursed with leprosy by his father, in a fit of acute sexual jealousy, roused by the popularity and attraction of Shamba with Krishna’s sixteen thousand women. Shamba searches for a cure helplessly, aided by a leper Neelakshi, and is finally healed by the followers of the Sun-god, to whom he dedicates his life and wealth. Thus, the book deals with themes of forgiveness, disability, egalitarianism, all through a meld of Buddhism, Hinduism, and modern Marxism, egalitarianism and feminism. In the words of critic Esha Dey, this makes the novel “existential history par excellence… [which] renders all encounters with reality a see-saw process of experience and analysis”. It received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1980.

About the Author
A prolific writer with more than 200 short stories and 100 novels, including those written under the aliases ‘Kalkut’ and ‘Bhramar’, Samaresh Basu is a major figure in Bengali fiction. His life experiences influenced his writings and his gritty fiction featured workers, revolutionaries, and radicals who fought society and their own demons and disenchantment. Two of his novels were briefly banned on charges of obscenity. He was an active member of the trade union and the Communist party for a period, and was jailed during 1949–50 when the party was declared illegal. While in jail, he wrote his first novel, Uttaranga, which was published in book form. He often wrote under the pen name ‘Kalkut’ or ‘Bhramar’.

Also read
Mahakaler Rather Ghoda (1977)
Originally published in 1977, Mahakaler Rather Ghoda (Horse to the Chariot of Time) has also been translated into English as Fever by Arunava Sinha (2016). Dark, powerful and full of ambiguities, the classic Mahakaler Rather Ghoda questions the human cost of revolution and its inevitable transience. A sensation in its time, it remains one of the greatest novels about the Naxalite movement which introduces the readers to Ruhiton Kurmi who has been in jail for seven years. Once a notorious Naxalite, he is now a withered shell; a man broken by torture, racked with fevers and sores. The fever which haunts Ruhiton emotionally and physically till the end becomes the symbol of decay, doubt and despair that encapsulates different kinds of sicknesses—in the socio-political power structure that Ruhiton and his comrades revolted against; in the gradual degeneration of the revolutionary movement; and in the betrayal of the toiling classes by the leaders of the revolution. This fever, which is the leitmotif of this novel, also becomes the title of the English translation.

Khandita (Dissevered)
Published seventy years after independence in 1985, Khandita (translated into English as Dissevered) raises the dominant questions of nationalism, identity crises, communal disharmony, and citizenship through a language of the gutters that ironically mimics the mores of civic society and asserts itself as the representative of the culture of the ‘urban popular’. The desire for unity of the nation felt by the three disoriented young protagonists, Gora, Bias, and Sati, is positioned against the territorial amputation born out of the Partition and the birth of a new nation (Bangladesh). This novella perhaps best illustrates Samaresh Bose’s genius as a writer who could vividly translate his experience of a crucial historical time in all its multiple complexities by weaving documentary reports into fiction and consummately depict the conflicting emotions experienced by ordinary folks on the eve of India’s independence as the narrative traverses the numerous facets of contemporary Bengali society.

Originally published in 1974, Mahasweta Devi’s best-known novel Hajar Churashir Ma was translated into English as Mother of 1084 by Samik Bandyopadhyay (2010). It is a heart-breaking and yet coldly analytical story of a loving mother who is suddenly informed of her grown-up son’s death. Identified only as No. 1084 by the morgue authorities, the young man was killed in one of the many false encounters that the police used in the 1970s in Bengal to eliminate revolutionary Naxals.

A year after his death, she begins to piece together the story of his involvement with the Naxal movement, getting in touch with his former comrades and learning the details. The novel offers a unique perspective on the armed political movement that shook Bengal in the 1970s, claiming victims among both the urban youth and the rural peasantry, leaving its impact not just on the political and administrative landscape, but also on the families of those who died. It won the Jnanpith Award in 1996.

Crisp and incisive in capturing the thought processes of a generation and the turmoil in the cosy construct of the middle-class family, Mother of 1084 is still a truly moving human document. In an interview, Devi said that she wrote it in four days flat, almost as a command performance in response to the requests of urban Naxalites who said she only wrote about the tribal community but never about them.

About the Author
Mahasweta Devi (1926-2016) was one of the foremost writers in Bengali.
She is not only known for her political writing style but her immense contribution towards communities of landless labourers of eastern India where she worked for decades. Her intimate connection with these communities allowed her to understand and begin documenting grassroots-level issues, giving her stories a distinct socio-political authenticity and empathy. Her impressive body of work includes novels, short stories, children’s stories, plays and activist literature. She received the Padma Shri (1986) and Padma Vibhushan (2006), the Ramon Magsaysay Award (1997) and was nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2012, and remains one of the most studied and translated Bengali authors today.

Also read
Aranayer Adhikar
Mahasweta Devi had woven a historical fiction around the legend of Birsa Munda in her 1977 novel Aranyer Adhikar (Rights of the Forest). Using her research about his life, as well as her experience working as an activist in tribal areas, she traces the life of this tribal leader, folk hero, and freedom fighter through his trials and tribulations in the late 19th century, particularly the tribal uprising he led against the British. While the story sticks largely to its historical authenticity, it is in the dramatization and contextualisation of the events that the novel shines. It received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1979.

Jhansir Rani
Mahasweta Devi’s prolific writing career was launched with the publication of her first book Jhansir Rani (1956) which has been translated into English as The Queen of Jhansi (Seagull Books, 2010). Mahasweta Devi undertook extensive research that encompassed family reminiscence, oral literature, local histories, and more traditional sources. From these she wove a very personal history of a legendary Indian heroine—building a detailed picture of Lakshmibai, the Queen of Jhansi, as a complex, spirited, full-blooded woman who grew from a free-spirited child into an independent young leader and led her troops against the British in the uprising of 1857, which is now widely described as the first Indian War of Independence. Simultaneously a history, a biography, and an imaginative work of fiction, this book is a valuable contribution to the reclamation of history by feminist writers.

Originally published in 1974, Maitreyi Devi’s Sahitya Akademi-winning novel Na Hanyate was translated into English as It Does Not Die. The autobiographical novel was written in response to Romanian philosopher Mircea Eliade’s book La Nuit Bengali (titled Bengal Nights in English), which related a fictionalized account of their romance during Eliade’s visit to India. Against a rich backdrop of life in an elite, upper-caste Hindu household, Devi powerfully recreates the confusion of a precocious girl child and depicts a moving account of a thwarted first love fraught with cultural tensions, of false starts and enduring regrets with a contemplative depth. Today, both those novels, written forty years apart, are often read together as reflecting the emotional aftermath of their doomed romance from two ends of the spectrum. Devi’s novel consolidates its profound position as a powerful analysis of what happens when the collisions between innocence and experience, enchantment and disillusion, and cultural difference and colonial arrogance collide. Thus, despite nominally relating the same events, they present themselves differently in their viewpoints and storylines. What startled the readers and justifiably took the literary world by storm was Devi’s bold, unabashed portrayal of her love in a lucid and disarmingly impassioned manner which catapulted her to great fame and established her as a litterateur to be reckoned with. According to the author and academic Ginu Kamani, “I was riveted by the boundary-less form of her narrative, dipping in and out of poetic prose and historical reminiscence… I have never read such a book written by an Indian woman from India, and especially by one of her generation.” The book received the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1976.

About the Author
Maitreyi Devi (1914–1990) was a Bengali-born Indian poet and novelist. She was the daughter of philosopher Surendranath Dasgupta and protegée of poet Rabindranath Tagore. Her first book of verse Udarata appeared when she was sixteen, with a preface by Rabindranath Tagore. She had written prolifically on Rabindranath and her works include Mungpute Rabindranath (Tagore in Mungpu) which she had herself translated into English as Tagore by Fireside, Grihe o Vishwe (Tagore at Home & the World), Rabindranath—the man behind his poetry and Swarger Kachakachi (Close to Paradise). The last is an anthology of letters exchanged between Tagore, her father and herself. Apart from being a writer, she also set up an orphanage for needy children later in her life.

Pratham Pratishruti is the first book of a trilogy, followed by Subarnalata and Bakul Katha. The trilogy covered the life-stories of three generations of women, over the changing rural and urban milieu in Bengal over the twentieth century. In the books, Ashapurna touches on the contradictory expectations from women in contemporary Bengali society. Originally published in 1964, Pratham Pratishruti (translated into English as The First Promise), tells the story of firebrand Satyabati who was given away in marriage at the age of eight to maintain the social norms, and was kept under the strict surveillance of Brahmanical regulations. Satyabati—the eternal truth seeker—refused to conform to her prescribed fate as an ‘oppressed subject’ and fiercely fought against family domination, psychological violence of the kulin polygamy system and misogynistic prejudices. She was not aware that she was creating history, yet her tenacious efforts empowered the third generation of women in her family to stride ahead with confidence. Ashapurna, through Satyabati, lifts the veil of the prevalent double standards in Bengali society as well as the ignored interior spaces overshadowed by the ‘larger than life’ political conflicts, against the backdrop of pre-independent India’s anti-colonial struggle and constructs women’s demands around women’s domestic, beyond the domestic and issues regarding domestic and a rallying cry against patriarchal injunctions to create awareness about the need for developing self-responsibility for transformative justice.

“Just tell me why you’ve opened your courts of justice?… There are heaps of sins that have collected over centuries. If you can rid us of those, only then would I say that you deserve to be law-makers. Why have you taken on the guise of ruler in another’s land? Why can’t you just huddle into your ships and leave?”
—Satyabati

About the Author
Ashapurna Debi (1909–1995), was a prominent Bengali novelist and poet. At the beginning of her writing career, Ashapurna wrote only for children. In 1936 she first wrote a story for adults, Patni O Preyoshi, published in the Puja issue of Ananda Bazar Patrika. Prem O Prayojan was her first novel for adults, published in 1944. Most of her writings marked a spirited protest, both for men and women, against the inequality and injustice stemming from the gender-based discrimination and narrowness of outlook ingrained in traditional Hindu society. A stalwart among Bengali writers, Ashapurna Debi was one of those rare authors able to render the voice of an entire culture, to capture its nuances and most abiding traditions with startling precision and formidable insight.

Also read
Subarnalata
This is how Ashapurna herself introduces Subarnalata—‘Apparently, Subarnalata is a life story, but that is not all. Subarnalata is the story of a particular time, a time that has passed, but whose shadow still hovers over our social system. Subarnalata is a symbol of the helpless cry of an imprisoned soul … sociologists write down the history of a changing society, I have merely tried to draw a curve to depict the change.” Subarnalata, published in 1967(translated into English by Gopa Majumdar) is the second volume of the famous trilogy by Ashapurna Debi and is a sequel to Pratham Pratishruti which introduces us to Subarnalata, daughter of Satyabati who was the protagonist of Pratham Pratishruti. Married off at nine, against her mother’s wish, Subarnalata’s days comprise of never-ending tongue lashing of her mother in law Muktokeshi, physical abuse of her husband Kedarnath and her desire to break free from the confines of the four walls of the house. Her support was her daughter Bokul, understanding brother-in-law Ambika and a letter from her mother written long ago encouraging her not to surrender the right to live her life on her own terms. The novel records a moment of reclaiming one’s agency and the much-awaited emancipation from the shackles of endless domestic tyranny and gendered marginalization when Subarnalata finally manages to find time to write her autobiography.

Mittirbari
Set in 1946, when the failure of the Cabinet Mission Plan was making headlines and Calcutta was being torn asunder by the frenzied outbreak of communal riots, Ashapurna Debi’s novel Mittirbari (The House of the Mitras), published in 1947, is an important aesthetic intervention to understand the family as a site of ideology formation and identity construction. The novel focuses on the interlocking engagements between the antithetical binaries—the private and the public, the old and the new—as the conservative middle-class values upheld by the joint family system clash with a new individualistic sensibility and transformed gender-relations. They emerge as the hallmarks of changes inscribed in the social and familial sphere by the political catastrophes. By foregrounding the meaning and range of freedom in the context of women’s subjectivities, the novel also becomes a thought-provoking meditation on how the possibilities of freedom in the emerging nation-state can be predicated upon reverberations of violence.