Buddhadeva Bose

Buddhadeva Bose , also Buddhadeb Bosu ( Bengali বুদ্ধদেব বসু Buddhadeb Basu ; born November 30, 1908 in Comilla , † March 8, 1974 in Kolkata ), was an Indian poet, playwright, novelist, critic, journalist and university teacher. Bose is considered to be one of the most important literary figures after Indian independence and, after Rabindranath Tagore, is one of the most influential writers of the Bengali language. Due to his numerous publications and diverse ways of working, he and Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay represent the great linguistic and stylistic tradition of this region.

life and work

Bose was born on November 30, 1908 in Comilla in East Bengal , then part of British India , now Bangladesh . When the mother died of tetanus immediately after his birth , the father, Bhudev Chandra Bose, a lawyer in Dhaka , decided to live as a wandering basket and did not return to civil life until years later. He left the son to the care of his maternal grandparents.

Bose spent his youth in Comilla, Noakhali and Dhaka in the Ganges Delta . After attending school in Dhaka, he studied English language and literature at the university there from 1923 to 1931 . He completed it with a master’s degree with top grades by 2007. In addition, he was involved in literary clubs. In 1931 he moved to Kolkata , where he initially earned his living by taking private lessons. 1934–1945 he taught at Ripon College (today: Surendranath College), an undergraduate college of the University of Calcutta, and wrote as a journalist for The Statesman , India's oldest English-language magazine and, according to his own account, to this day the "leading English-language magazine in West Bengal"

As an employee of the aesthetic magazine Kallol and as editor of the magazines Pragati (Dhaka 1927–1929) and Kavita ("Dichtung", Kolkata 1935–1961, the first and leading literary magazine of Bengal), Bose stepped out of the shadow of Tagore, whom he adored, early on. He also wanted to be differentiated from that: Tagore's idealism was contrasted with a more modern literature that dealt with more urban and secular subjects and was oriented towards the West. Bose's bilingualism - English and Bengali - as well as his knowledge of European and American literature from Boris Pasternak to Baudelaire to Holderlin , Pound , Yeats , Eliot and Henry Miller opened up a cosmopolitan spectrum for him and kept him away from political and ideological determinations as they were before especially in the 30s and 40s especially by the writers of the "Progressive Writers Association", the "Anti-Fascit Writers" and the "Artist Association" occasionally. In the difference z. B. To his older colleague Premchand , he was so convinced of the autonomy of literature that he could go as far as confessing " l'art pour l'art " in it.

Bose's roughly 200 books, writings and collections cover an unusually broad spectrum: they range from the various forms of prose - letters, diaries, literary criticism, memoirs, novels, children's books and stories - to poetry and translations (e.g. of works by Baudelaire, Rilke and Kalidasas in Bengali) and works in English.

In the 1950s, Bose was visiting professor and lecturer in the United States. a. in Pennsylvania College for Women (1953–1954), Indiana University, Brooklyn College , Colorado University, Wesleyan College and the University of Hawaii . 1963-1965 Bose taught at Bloomington .

1956–1963 Bose held the chair of comparative literature he himself founded at Jadavpur University in Kolkata.

In 1969, Bose was charged with the unvarnished portrayal of marital infidelity in his novel "Raat Bhore Brishhti" for disseminating immoral writings, but was acquitted. However, the stir around the novel made the novel widely known and also gave the author a great, if undesirable, popularity.

From 1937 to 1966 Bose lived at 202 Rashbehari Avenue, Chandannagar / Kolkata, the "House of Poetry" ( Kavitabhavan ), a meeting place for writers, publishers, intellectuals and professors, which eventually became a publishing house itself.

Weakened by a vaccination reaction in 1972 , Bose died of a stroke on March 8, 1974 in Kolkata.

The author was married to Pratibha Bose (1914 / 15-2006) since 1934, with whom he had two daughters and a son. She was a writer herself.

Prices

Bose received several national prizes for his work: in 1967 the Sahitya Akademi Puraskar of the Indian Academy of Sciences for the play Tapasvi O Tarangini , in 1970 the Padma Bhushan Prize of the Indian government and in 1974 posthumously the Rabindra Award of the state of West Bengal for his poetry Svagata Biday ( 1974).

criticism

• Although completely bilingual himself, Bose was pessimistic about the possibility that Indian writers could express themselves creatively in English. He had no feeling for Indo-English literature, which has since developed impressively. With the same arguments, however, he had already spoken out in 1957 against the introduction of Hindi as the national standard language of India.
• The Bengal Bose had no sympathy for the separation of Bangladesh from Pakistan in 1971/72; especially after the correspondence with his daughter was published (1988/89) he was accused of disregarding the national concerns of the Bangladeshis under the derogatory keyword Bhadralok ("the better people") and, as a Hindu, generally addressing the concerns and literary efforts of the ( neglecting the poorer) Muslim population ("icy disregard ... they simply didn't count"). - The reputation of arrogance precedes the Bengali writers, of course, also within Hindu society in India.

Works (in selection)

Poems

• Bandir Bandanaa / Bandir Bandona, 1930
• Kankaavati, 1937
• Draupadir Sharee, 1948
• Shiter Prarthana: Basanter Uttar, 1955
• Je Andhaar Alor Adhik, 1958

Novels

• Laal Megh, 1934
• Tithidore, 1949
• Moner Moto Meye, 1951
• Raatbhare BrishhTi, 1967
• Raataal counter Alaap, 1967
• Golaap Keno Kaalo, 1968

Stories, short stories, collections

• Abhinay, Abhniay Nay, 1930
• Rekhaachitra, 1931
• Bhaaso Amaar Bhelaa, 1963

Plays

• Tapasbee O Tarangini, 1966
• Kolkatar Electra O Satyaasandha, 1968

Essays

• Kaaler Putul, 1946
• Saahityacharchaa, 1954
• Rabindranath: Kathasaitya, 1955
• Shbadesh O Sangskrti, 1957

Travel diaries, memoirs

• Hathaat Alor Jhalkaani, 1935
• Sab Peyechhir Deshe, 1941

Translations

• Kalidaaser Meghadut, 1957, from Sanskrit
• Charles Baudelaire: Taar Kavita, 1960
• Rainer Maria Rilker Kavita, 1970

Non-fiction

• Bhajan Rashik Bangali, 2005 (Bengali cooking recipes, originally as a series in Anandabazar Patrika magazine , 1971)

Article in English

• An Acre of Green Grass: A Review of Modern Bengali Literature, 1948
• Tagore. Portrait of a Poet, 1962

Foreign language editions

• Bose, Buddhadev: Selected Poems . Transl. by Ketaki Kushari Dyson. New Delhi: OUP 2002.
• Bose, Buddhadeva [Basu, Buddhadeba]: The girl of my heart . Novel, translated and provided with an afterword and glossary by Hanne-Ruth Thompson ; Ullstein, Berlin 2010 ISBN 978-3-550-08813-1
  • Original title Monor Moto Meye 1951 / English udT My Kind of Girl

- Four train travelers tell each other at night during an involuntary stay in a train waiting room their experiences with what love once meant to them.

Web links

• Amit Chaudhuri at outlookindia.org on August 19, 2002, accessed December 4, 2010
• Bose, Buddhadev at banglapedia.org, accessed December 4, 2010
• An introduction to the poetry of Buddhadev Bose
• The Daily Star; Buddhadev Bose and 1971: bhadralok communalism?

Individual evidence

1. ↑ According to other sources on March 17; [1]
2. ↑ Website of the magazine "The Statesman" ( Memento of the original from December 3, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
3. ↑ from November 22, 2010 website of the magazine "The Statesman"  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. .  
4. ↑ Khademul Islam, Literary editor, December 7, 2013, accessed December 4, 2010