Tarashankar Bandopadhyay

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Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay

Born 23 July 1898
Labhpur, Birbhum district, Bengal, British India
Died
Occupation Novelist
Notable award(s) Rabindra Puraskar
Sahitya Akademi
Jnanpith Award
Padma Bhushan

Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay (Bengali তারাশংকর বন্দ্যোপাধ্যায়; 23 July 1898 -14 September 1971) was one of the leading Bengali novelists. He wrote 65 novels, 53 story-books, 12 plays, 4 essay-books, 4 autobiographies and 2 travel stories. A notable man of wisdom, he was awarded Rabindra Puraskar, Sahitya Akademi award, Jnanpith Award, and Padma Bhushan.

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[edit] Personal life and education

Bandopadhyay was born at Labhpur, Birbhum district, West Bengal. He was born to Haridas Bandyopadhyay and Prabhabati Debi. He passed the Matriculation examination in 1916 and took admission in the intermediate class at St. Xavier's College, Calcutta.

While studying in intermediate at St. Xavier's College, he joined the non-cooperation movement and was interned in 1921. He was again jailed for a year in 1930. After the release from the prison in 1931, he decided to devote himself to literature.[1]

Bandopadhyay married Uma Shashi Debi and they had two sons and two daughters.

[edit] Literary career

[edit] Literary achievements

The realism in Literature is well substituted when the writers indulge in introducing romance in it. Tarasankar Bandyopadhyay is grouped with those writers of the third decades of the twentieth centuries who broke the poetic tradition in novels but took to writing prose with the world around them adding romance to human relationship breaking the indifference of the so called conservative people of the society who dare to call a spade a spade. Tarasankar’s novels, so to say, do not look back to the realism in rejection, but accepted it in a new way allowing the reader to breath the truth of human relationship restricted so far by the conservative and hypocrisy of the then society.

He learned to see the world from various angles. He seldom rose above the matter soil and his Birbhum exists only in time and place. He had never been a worshipper of eternity. Tarasankar’s chief contribution to Bengal literature is that he dared writing unbiased. He wrote what he believed. He wrote what he observed.

His novels are rich in material and potentials. He preferred sensation to thought. He was ceaselessly productive and his novels are long, seemed unending and characters belonged to the various classes of people from zaminder down to pauper. Tarasankar experimented in his novels with the relationships, even so called illegal, of either sexes. He proved that sexual relation between man and women sometimes dominate to such an extent that it can take an upperhand over the prevailing laws and instructions of society. His novel ‘Radha’ can be set for an example in this context.

His historical novel ‘Ganna Begum’ is an attempt worth mentioning for it’s traditional values. Tarasankar ventured into all walks of Bengali life and it’s experience with the happenings of socio-political milieu. Tarasankar will be remembered for his potential to work with the vast panorama of life where life is observed with care and the judgment is offered to the reader. and long ones, then any other author. He is a region novelist, his country being the same Birbhum.

[edit] Works

Tarasankar mainly flourished during the war years, having produced in that period a large number of novels. His celebrated novels are Dhatridebta, Kalindi, Panchagrm, Ganadebata, Kabi, Arogyaniketan, Jalsaghar, Raskali, Hansulibaker Upakatha and so on.

[edit] Awards

In 1957, he led the Indian delegation of writers at the Asian Writers' Conference in Tashkent. For his novel Arogya Niketan, he received the Rabindra Puraskar in 1955 and the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1956. In 1966, he received the Jnanpith Award for his novel Ganadebata. He was honoured with the Padma Shri in 1962 and the Padma Bhushan in 1969. He also received the Sharat Smriti Puraskar and the Jagattarini Gold Medal from the Calcutta University. In 1970, he was elected the president of the Bangiya Sahitya Parishad. He was a member of the West Bengal Vidhan Parishad from 1952-60 and the Rajya Sabha from 1960-66.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Novels

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[edit] References

  1. ^ Sengupta, Subodh Chandra and Bose, Anjali (editors), (1976/1998), Samsad Bangali Charitabhidhan (Biographical dictionary) Vol I, (Bengali), Kolkata: Sahitya Samsad, ISBN 8185626650, p 195
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