The famed temple of Devi Chaudhurani, the famous ‘bandit queen’ immortalized by Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay lies in a small non-descript outskirt of Jalpaiguri. It is believed that this is where Devi and her mentor, Bhavani Pathak, who led a gang of dacoits, offered prayers to
Beyond the bounds of life and death There you stand, O my friend! On World Poetry Day, I cannot think of anyone better than Rabindranath Tagore, to give us solace amidst the mayhem and fear of the new strain of a virus that is killing one human
Two of his novels were briefly banned on charges of obscenity, and the case against his famous novel Prajapati, was settled in the Supreme Court of India. Despite controversies surrounding him, Samaresh Basu was probably one of the most prolific writers of Bengali literature, who
If Jorasanko had witnessed the rise of geniuses like Rabindranath, Gaganendranath, Abanindranath and many more, it was also a home that produced rebels. Subho Tagore was a multi-faceted talent who kept his creative sparks alive all his life was one such rebel who left the
‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ An essay that had a big impact on postcolonial intellectualism and one that catapulted Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak to a new academic high. Considered as one of the most influential postcolonial intellectuals, Spivak had raised a pertinent question that was somewhat path-breaking
In the 19th-century, Kolkata was gradually emerging as a city from three non-descript villages. The British colonial rulers were keen to transform this newly-found city along the lines of London and establish it as their Capital of the East. The river Ganga became the lifeline
When a freedom struggle is fought on the lines of one’s mother tongue, then it reaches a different proportion, a movement that scripts history. Such was the Bhasha Andolan of Bangladesh, when a nation fought to establish the freedom of speech in one’s mother tongue.
“Those who know the English colonies abroad know that we carry with us our pride, pills, prejudices, Harvey-sauces, cayenne peppers and other Lares, making a little Britain wherever we settle down…” That’s what William Makepeace Thackeray says in The Vanity Fair. English novelist William Makepeace
The 1930s was an epoch-making decade in Bengal. This was a time of great socio-political upheaval following rapid urbanization of Kolkata. Revolutionary activities were on the rise as did repression by the British. In 1940, a slim book of poems in Bengali named Padatik, was
If Bengali literature has pampered our children to Thakurmar Jhuli and Goopi Gayen Bagha Bayen, Russian literature has enriched children of a generation in Kolkata to attractive Siberian fairytale characters from Olga to Misha. Even today, Russians produce a large number of children’s books to