innovation and tradition in nineteenth century bengali literature

Innovation and Tradition in Nineteenth Century Bengali LiteratureAuthor(s): Rachel R. van MeterSource: Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 88, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1968), pp. 352-358Published by: American Oriental SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/597213 .

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352 Brief Communication

appear any agreement between the two. Bharata speaks of ahgahdra as 32 in number, which are combinations of nrttakaranas which are in turn described as "hastapadasamayogo nrtyasya icara- nam bhavet" (4-30 and 31). So it is not mere hastapracdra, but it involves hasta as well as pada. Similarly for the astadagavidhamj nirilksanam we do not find any identical enumeration in the Ndtya~s'stra. Bharata speaks of rasadrsti, sthayi- bhav-drati, and saicvdridrsti in the eighth chapter. These are as many in number as the rasas, the sthayibhhvas, and twenty of the saficaribhavas. So the niri1csanas of the TUbh. do not seem to have anything to do with the drstis of Bharata. The author of the Ubh. was probably earlier than the Natyasastra now available, and followed some other school of which no recorded evidence has come down to us. Consequently we cannot help differences in some items between the two. The identical cases, if they really are identical, must be a matter of coincidence, and not because of one having in view the other. On the other hand, had the author of the ITbh. been posterior to the Bharatanatyasastra we can reasonably expect in this context some reference agreeing with the available Natyasastra, as we have by Kaliddsa. The TUbh. was perhaps earlier by some centuries than the date suggested by F. W. Thomas and

S. K. De (cf. his article referred to above, page 90; the date suggested by them was the time of Harsa of Kanauj, or even that of the later Guptas, i.e. in the sixth and seventh centuries). This is of course a negative aspect of the matter. The problem, however, of fixing the date of this work will remain a difficult one until some positive evidence is available. The brief (and cryptic) refer- ences to Sffikhya and Vaiseeika do not by them- selves help us in solving the problem completely.

Further, with reference to one Anafigadattd it is said in verse 10, as

tyaktvd vaLi kaascdanam bahuphalam vesyadpganddust- yajam, gatve kdntanives'anam bahurasamr praptdsi kamotsavam/

"Having abandoned the injunctions of the codes of harlots, which are rich in fruit and are therefore difficult to give up for the courtezans (and thus contrary to the injunctions) you have gone to the house of your lover, and enjoyed the festivities of love rich in pleasures etc.,".

It is clear from this verse that the author of Ubh. means that the going of a courtesan to the house of her lover (instead of his coming to hers) is against the injunctions of the science of harlots. But VYtsydyana's K. S. says "-vyapadesena pgtha- mardo njyakaiy tasye udavasitam anayet. tOin ta tasya" and "sapithmardayas ca svayasn gama- nam" (6-1-25, 26 and 30; ed. VeAkate~wara Steam Press, Bombay, 1934), which thus mentions also her going to the house of the lover as per- missible. In all probability, the Ubhaydbhisarikc was earlier than the Kdmasiitra, and, therefore, had in mind some other text.

T. VENKATACHARYA UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO

page 27, samyyutSarmyutaripopajivina ete ityekakino'pi prayujyante," and on page 71, " na catu??a~titdvyahatir iti, etc." are probably intended to explain the significance of the number 64. Of course the text in these two places, as in many, seems to be corrupt and is not very clear. Yet, I doubt very much whether these two of the Ubh. and N.A. can be really identical. The translators are silent about the discrepancy.

Innovation and Tradition in Nineteenth Century Bengali Literature

Living literatures of the world have among their more prominent characteristics frequent innovations and borrowings from other literatures, or, perhaps, from other art forms. Very often it is possible to identify direct influence on the work of a single author by a writer or writers in a totally different literature. By way of simple illustration, we recall the influence of the American, Edgar Allen Poe, on the Frenchman, Guy de

Maupassant, resulting in the conscious employ- ment by Maupassant of Poe's techniques in his short stories. This example is typical of the greater body of such borrowings in that it occurs between literatures whose traditions and cultural contexts show considerable similarity. By contrast, the subject of this study directs the focus of our attention to a dramatic and more distinctive confrontation of long standing and more dissimilar



Brief Communications 353

traditions, a meeting which eventually made possible the direct influence of the Frenchman, Mau- passant, on the Bengali, Rabindranath Tagore.1 This, indeed, is the basis for the intellectual vigor and excitement which permeate the developments in Bengali literature in the nineteenth century.

Innovation, one of the two key words of this discussion, implies the existence of the other, namely, tradition. Without a tradition, an innovation, by its very nature, is not possible. There was in Bengali a literary tradition of some seven centuries prior to the beginning of the nineteenth century. Its forms, all of which were metrical, included songs and lyric poems, long story narra- tives and short verses. Its themes were varied. A great portion of this literature was devoted to several religious themes, both devotional and mythological. Some of the literature expressed the universal theme of love. Still other poems praised the might of medieval kings, and at least one lengthy work gives an account of an important historical event in Bengal.2 The tales of the great Sanskrit epics were retold in Bengali verse, an innovation of the medieval period directly linking Bengali literature with the ancient Sanskrit tradition. Heroism, love, religious devotion became the predominant themes of the Bengali literary tradition. The literature achieved great sophistication both with respect to its prosody and in the development of well defined symbols and motifs.

Innovations in such a literature may arise in part from sources internal to the culture, but often the source of innovation is contact with external influences. In the case of Bengali literature, the greater number of innovations in the nineteenth century were the direct result of the assumption of political authority by the British trading interests in India. The effects of this historical event were two-fold: (1) British scholars in India "discovered" India's classical literature and re- vived a general interest among Indians in their ancient past, and (2) western literature and learning were transmitted to young Indians through the educational institutions arising from

the efforts of the British in that field. From these two streams of influence issued forth a new literary movement in Bengali which employed new forms and sometimes new themes, but which remained consciously and profoundly Bengali.

The first innovation in the modern literature appeared at the very beginning of the nineteenth century. It was the prose style of writing, first introduced in a major way by Ram Ram Basu in his Rajd Pratapddityacaritra, published in 1801. This remarkable volume of some one hundred fifty-six pages came into being as a result of one of the ironies of Indian history. The British who had established the College of Fort William for the purpose of teaching their own young clerks the local languages and customs, found no suitable textbooks available for the language courses due to the fact that the whole of the existing vernacular literature was in metrical form. It was neces- sary for them to institute a prose literature in the Indian vernacular languages in order to teach those languages to Englishmen. RdP'a Pratatp- ddityacaritra was the first of a series of textbooks produced for the College under the direction and inspiration of William Carey and other British members of the faculty. Two points relevant to this discussion are to be made with regard to Rajd Pratapadityacaritra: (1) although it shows exten- sive problems with syntax, the language of the text is a simple style of Bengali having little of the Persian influence frequently ascribed to it; (2) the theme and literary style were uniquely Indian. The theme is heroism, and the story is told in the chronological narrative style charac- teristic of the Bengali literary tradition. Its directness and simplicity of style are illustrated by the following brief excerpt from the text: Sibananda had two nephews, the elder, Bhabananda's son, Sri Hari, and the younger, Gunananda's son, Janaki Ballabha. These two brothers 8 were of almost equal age. Sibananda enrolled these two for studying in Daud's pathsahi. In this way those two boys studied with the son of the Nawab, played and went around together. Gradually between these two and the son of the Nawab, a great friendship grew; the three were very affectionate and were rarely separated.

One day Daud said to these two brothers, " If I become emperor, then I shall make you ministers. This is my sure promise. I will make you deputies in the work which shall be mine; it shall not be otherwise." They were passing their time happily in this fashion, in

I Chakravarty, Amiya, Introduction, The House- warming and Other Selected Writings (New York: The New American Libary, 1965), p. x.

2 Dimock, Edward C., and Gupta, Pratul Chandra, eds., The Maharashtra Purana (Honolulu: East-West Center Press, 1965). This is a historical text from the eigh- teenth century. 3 That is, cousin brothers.



354 Brief Communications

getting an education, in youthful sports and in study, etc. A long time passed in these [pursuits].

In the meantime, when Solomon died, his elder son, Wajid, became engaged in the work of the subi. At that time Solomon's son-in-law Haso killed Wajid and was himself subadir for one week. Meanwhile one of Solomon's chiefs named Amir Ludi was living in the south. He came and killed Haso with a blow of the sword and placed Solomon's youngest son, Daud, on the 8ubadar's throne.

When Daud became nawab, he honored the two brothers with titles and robes of honor and made them recipients of offices. He made the eldest, Sri Hari, chief manager and chief officer, giving him the title Maharaja Bikram- aditya; he made the younger, Janaki Ballabha, steward of the househould, giving him the title Raja Basantaray. When he had become subaddr, Daud's fame spread every- where through his judgment of his subject's rights and wrongs with great justice, and through destroying their enemies [thus] pleasing them with his devotion to their protection.'

Simplicity of language closely akin to colloquial Bengali dominated the texts written during the first decade of the College. Shortly before his death, Mrtyunjay Vidyalankar wrote in 1813 a text which was published posthumously under the title Prabodh Candrika. It contained passages written in an extreme form of the newly develop- ing sadhu bhdsd (the chaste language), and provided the first clear cut example in this period of an innovation occuring as a result of influences internal to the culture. The composition of literary texts under the auspices of the British rulers posed a serious threat to the Brahman pandits who were guardians of the revered San- skrit tradition. As a result of the attack they launched against the use of Bengali as a literary medium (according to them a highly vulgar and improper practice), the writers of Bengali began to borrow heavily from Sanskrit both with respect to vocabulary and to syntax. Moreover, Sanskrit pronominal forms and non-finite verb forms also frequently found their way into this prose style. The highly artificial sddhu bh&a was developed in order to claim for Bengali composition artistic merit and intellectual respectability.

It is clear in the literature published under the name of Rammohan Ray that a decision had been made with regard to style of language in literature,

and that the sddhu bhiad was the style to be employed. The simple language of the early Fort William texts was rarely to be seen again for several decades. Also in the Rammohan literature, we have the first major effort at didactic and polemic writings in Bengali prose. Aside from his use of the prose style, Rammohan's work gives evidence only partially of external influence. His literary style seems to be modelled predominantly on Sanskrit texts, and his themes, while inspired in part by his dialogue with the Europeans, were still drawn from the Hindu Vedanta.

Rammohan was connected, however, with a new literary movement whose form and method were developed entirely along the lines of the western model. Journalism was introduced in Bengal in a major way by the Serampore missionaries toward the end of the second decade of the century. Rammohan and his colleagues were among the first Indians to follow them in this field. From the outset, the journals became important media for serious literature as well as for reportive writing. In the latter form, style and content were entirely new to Bengali and may be considered as pure borrowings.

It was not until the writings of Vidyasagar that a truly polished style of language had been achieved in the new literature. A man of unusual talent and personality, Isvarcandra Vidyasagar wrote with great elegance and beauty. His language was the sddhu bh&st, and although it was characterized by utmost dignity, it did not present insurmountable difficulty. With his Sitar Banabds and ?akquntal&, the Bengali prose style had attained artistic merit. It is highly relevant to this study to note that while Vidyasagar brought the newly adopted prose style to a high degree of excellence, his themes in fiction, almost without exception, were Indian. He retold the beloved tales of ancient and classical literature. His social and didactic writings were no less dependent upon the traditional religious literature of his own country. The following portion from Wakuntald gives us some idea of his style and treatment of the traditional literature:

The time of departure had arrived. Gautami and two disciples, named Sarngarava and Sardvata, prepared for the journey with Sakuntala. Anasuya and Priyamvada arranged her ornaments with as much care for fashion as they could give. The sage, agitated in his grief, began to speak silently to himself. " My heart is bursting because Sakuntala will go today; my throat is

4 Basu, Ram Ram, Rjid Pratdpddityacaritra (Seram- pore: Mission Press, 1802), pp. 10 to 12. All the trans- lations in this essay are my own. In this portion from Ram Ram Basu's work, I have also provided punctuation since almost none exists in the original text.




so choked that I am devoid of speech; my mind is dulled with heaviness. How astonishing! I am a forest dweller and this weakness which derives from affection has touched even me. I cannot imagine what unbearable pain the people of the world suffer in these circumstances. I have learned that love is a powerful thing." Finally, controlling the force of his grief, he spoke to Sakuntala. "Child! The time has come,-be on your way. Why let more time slip uselessly away? " After speaking thus, he addressed the trees of the hermit forest. " 0 neighboring trees! She who never drank water without first watering you, she who though fond of adornment never plucked your leaves; whose joy knew no bounds when you brought forth your blossoms, -that Sakuntala is going today to her husband's home. Grant her your blessing."

Then everyone arose. Sakuntala made abeisance to her elders and going to Priyamvada began to speak, her eyes filled with tears. " Friend! It is true that my heart is intensively eager to see that husband of mine, but my feet will not move to carry me away from the hermit forest." Priyamvada said, " Friend! It is not only you who are distressed because of separation from the hermit forest. Look at what is happening to the forest. Every living thing is bereft of joy and restless with grief. The deer have averted their faces from their food and are standing still. What grass was in their mouths is falling from their lips. The peacocks and their hens have ceased their dancing and are quiet with heads raised. The cookoos have turned away from the nectar of the mango buds and are silent. The bees have stopped eating honey. The sound of their humming is gone." 6

During the first half of the century when great experimentation in the new prose style with its various forms,-the story narrative, the essay and monograph, journalism,-was being carried out with great industry, little or nothing was being done to introduce new forms of poetry. The first effort came in this direction very nearly half-way through the century. Michael Madhusudan Datta who aspired to fame in the field of English literature attained, instead, a high reputation among his countrymen as the first major poet in modern Bengali. The experience he gained in working with new metrical forms through his pursuit of English and European verse made it possible for him to enrich the literature of his own language at a later time with innovations from the West. Bengali literature is indebted to Michael for intro- ducing blank verse, the sonnet, and a number of new meters used in western literature. Although Michael was obsessed more than any other promi-

nent Bengali of the century with adoration of western culture and western literature, when he turned to composition in his own language, he used his newly learned forms to articulate themes distinctly Indian and to celebrate tales long since woven into the very fibre of Indian culture. The best known of his longer Bengali works, Meghnad Badh, is based on the story of Rama's conquest of Ceylon and the resulting death of one of Ravana's sons. Shorter poems also were devoted to men revered in Bengali society, as, for example, the sonnet to Kasiram Das; and their images and figures, as with the longer works, were the old, familiar images and figures of traditional Indian literature. In the following prose translation of the poem, it will be noted that Kasiram's translation of the Mahabhdrata into Bengali from San- skrit was likened by Michael to the release of the sacred Ganges from the matted locks of diva. As the Janhabi was [entwined] in the matted locks of Candracur, so the divine sage Dvaipayana poured forth the essence of the Bharata, and held it in the lake of Sanskrit. Restless Bengal wept with thirst. As the vrati Bhagiratha (most blessed tapasa in this world, treasure of the human race!) worshipping the Ganges with austerities, accomplished the release of the Sagara clan, [and] bringing the Mother, purified the three worlds; so you digging the channel of language have brought the streams of the Bharata-essence to assuage the thirst of Gaur with that pure water. The land of Gaur will never be able to pay this debt. The words of the Mahabharata are like nectar,-O Kashi! in the company of chief poets, you are worthy."

The problems which confronted Michael were undoubtedly the least formidable of those facing the other leaders of the new literature. His art was intimately associated with a seven-century tradition. His poems were, in fact, graftings on an already well developed structure.

The most serious problems in the literature, aside from the development of the prose style of writing, were connected with the development of prose fiction; i. e., the novel and the short story, both of which appeared in the second half of the century. Central to the whole set of problems was that of the interrelationship between the events of the action and the participating characters. Dorothy Spencer has described part of the difficulty in her remarks with regard to the Indian

c Vidyasagar, Isvarcandra, gakuntald, 1854. This quotation is taken from " Aakuntalar Patigrhe Yatra," Path-Sarhkalan (Calcutta: Bisvabharat-, 1952), 5th ed., pp. 51, 52.

6 Datta, Michael Madhusudan, " KR'Iram DAs," Gaturd- dapadi Kabitdbali, 1866. Reprinted in Pdth-Sahkalan, pp. 3, 4.



3a6 Brief Communications

novel "in which the characters often have a static quality, do not develop, and are mere instruments in the plot." 7

A much larger study will be required to inves- tigate all of the factors which served as obstacles to the immediate accommodation of these forms. I shall only suggest briefly at this time two areas which bear investigation. (1) The social and philosophic environment in which the novel and short story developed in the West stood in direct contrast to that of India. The West was concerned with the individual's mastery of his fate, and ultimately, in this connection, the quest of his own identity. The cause and effect elements in the western plot are distinctly connected with this philosophic view. Indians, on the other hand, belonged to a well structured society in which problems of identity were not the same, if, indeed, they occurred at all. The individual knew what his role and end in life should be. His choice was limited to obeying or disobeying his dharma. Traditional Indian literature was not concerned, therefore, with a man's struggle to ascend the heights, or with his psychological and spiritual disintegration under a torrent of hostile events. It was concerned with the characterization of a set of conventional types and the illustration of their consistency of character in both adverse and for- tunate circumstances.

(2) Literary tradition is another area requiring careful examination. The novel and short stories are forms dealing with reality. By contrast, the first of the major Bengali novelists described the traditional literature of India as viewing human events as the story of the gods.8 Characters were drawn either larger or smaller than life. Their activities were controlled, or at least limited, by the intervention of the gods. In short, the stories of the Sanskrit and medieval Bengali traditions seemed to turn on this supernatural element. Its effect pervaded all aspects of a literary work, plot, characterization, description and ornamentation (the frequent use of hyperbole provides an example) .

Several novels had been written in Bengali prior to the appearance of Bankimcandra Chatterji's

Durgesnandini, but they did not establish a place for the novel in Bengali literature in the same sense Bankimcandra's did. It is true, however, that the voice of criticism was mingled with the cheers of enthusiasm following the publication of Durgesnandini. Critics claimed that Bankim had taken his plot directly from Sir Walter Scott's Ivanhoe. Many years later, Bankimcandra denied ever having read Ivanhoe, but, even though he may not have read the work, Scott's novels had gained such popularity in Bengal that the indirect influence of Scott on Bankimcandra seems highly probable. It is doubtful, however, that Bankim- candra really understood the techniques of the western novel. Yet his work met with great, success for a number of reasons, and from it the modern Bengali novel has received its heritage.9

Perhaps no other literature of the nineteenth century gives us a clearer insight into the problems of accommodation than Bankimcandra's novels. The intermingling of the two streams of tradition and the resulting conflicts are clearly evident. Nearly every major novel showed serious difficulty with the plot. Often Bankimcandra was forced to resort to the dens ex machina in order to rescue the situation, and he thereby lost control of the sense of reality he was obviously trying to create. His lack of control over his plots led him to greater problems with characterization. Here we observe the confrontation of the old Bengali technique of describing a character (as a hero, a devoted wife, a righteous sage) and narrating a series of episodes illustrating the various aspects of his stated attributes, with the western techniques of interplay between the situation and the characters. Thus Bankimcandra made certain assertions about his characters (a practice also in harmony with Victorian literary custom), but frequently did not succeed in manipulating the plot to sup- port his claims. The young widow, Rohini, in the novel Krsnakanter UiR is a case in point. Bankimcandra said repeatedly that she was totally evil, but the plot only succeeded in depicting her as particularly weak.

Nevertheless, these novels attained a number of positive achievements which provided an inval- uable contribution to the rich Bengali literature

'Spencer, Dorothy M., Indian Fiction in English (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1960), p. 29.

8 Chatterji, Bankimeandra, " BafigalAr Itihds," Ban- gadarsan, Migh, 1281 B. S.

9 For the early influence of Bankimcandra on Rabin- dranath, for example, see Tagore's ChelebeW, Rabindra Racanabal! (Calcutta: BisvabhArati, 1959), Vol. 26, p. 623.




of the twentieth century. In spite of his problems, Bankimcandra did bring a sense of reality to Bengali fiction. His settings and situations were usually close to the range of possibility in Bengali life although he dealt with the middle and upper classes. Along with a goodly number of stock characters from traditional literature (the hero, the righteous priest, the devoted and chaste woman, the comic Brahman, the clownish, but loyal ser- vants), Bankimcandra established in the novel a new group of characters who, though familiar and readily understood, had only recently entered the literature (the Babu, the Zamindar, the British traders and administrators, the fashionable nou- veau riche of Calcutta). Most important of all, Bankimcandra gave to the literature a style of language in which ,t could flourish. No translation of his work has come close to conveying a sense of the power of Bankimcandra's language. It was an artistic blending of the sddhu bhskd with the calit bhdsd (the colloquial language). In passages of description where elegance and a certain amount of ornamentation were required, he employed a fairly high level of the sadhu bhasa. A good illustration of this style is to be found in the opening lines of his first novel, Durgesnandini.

Toward the end of the summer in the Bengali year 997, a man on horseback was going along the pathway from Bisnupur to Mandaran. Seeing that the jewel of the day was prepared for its setting, the horseman began to urge his horse forward at a swift gait. The reason for it was that ahead lay a vast plain; who could know whether on that plain, if, in the manner of the season, a fierce rainstorm began at nightfall, one would have to endure incomparable hardship without refuge. Scarcely had he crossed the plain when the sun set; gradually the nocturnal heavens were encircled with garlands of deep blue clouds. With the coming of night, such thick darkness gathered on all sides that guiding his horse began to appear very difficult. The wayfarer started to make his way along the path illuminated only by the flashing of lightning.

Within a short time the summer storm broke forth with a great roar, and at the same time torrents of rain began to fall. The person on mount could determine nothing more of the path to be travelled. With the slackening of his reins, the horse began to wander at will. When he had gone some distance in this fashion, the horse's steps began to slip from the impact of some hard object against his feet. In the flash of lightning at that very moment, the traveller could see for an instant an object of huge, white form. With the thought that this white form would be a stftpa edifice, he leaped down to the ground. As soon as he had dismounted, he realized that his feet had slipped on contact with steps; knowing,

therefore, that a place of refuge was near at hand, he set his horse free. He himself began to advance slowly up the steps. Suddenly in the light of an electric flash, he discerned that the building in front of him was a temple. Arriving with skill at the small door of the temple, he saw that it was bolted; moving his hands over it, he realized that the door was not barred from the outside. The traveller was astonished and somewhat apprehensive that at a time such as this, in a temple on this deserted plain, someone had fastened the bar from inside. Streams were pouring down upon his head; therefore, no matter who the person lodged within the temple might be, the traveller began to pound heavily on the door time after time. No one came to unfasten the door. His desire was to release the door with a blow of his foot, but in his fear lest this be disrespectful to the temple, he did not go that far; nevertheless, a wooden door could not endure for very long the severe manner in which he was pounding on it, and in a very short time the bar gave way. As the door opened, the young man entered the temple. At once the sound of a muffled scream reached his ears, and at that very instant, the frail lamp that was burning there was extinguished by the strong gusts of the storm that entered through the open door.10

Where action was portrayed, the pronominal and verbal forms of the sddhu bhdsd were retained, but the syntax and, to a more limited degree, the vocabulary of the calit bhdas predominated. In many cases, dialogue, particularly dialogue between women, was written entirely in the calit bhdsa-. Bankimcandra had created, in fact, a basis in prose fiction for the artistic stories of Rabin- dranath which began to appear in the last quarter of the century.

Rabindranath accomplished what had remained outside Bankimcandra's reach, namely, a smooth accommodation of western theme and form to Bengali traditicn and world view. The short story, Khoklcbabur Pratydbartan, written in 1891, illus- trates the ways in which this statement is true. The plot of the story is highly reminiscent of AMapassant's story The Necklace, and the selection of the main character, Raicaran, a servant of simple mind and character, seems to reflect more of the growing influence of Tolstoi on Tagore than anything from the Bengali tradition. Never- theless, Tagore avoided the unrelieved shock effect of Maupassant's ending thus remaining faithful to the Indian aesthetic and philosophic tradition which did not admit great tragedy. Furthemore, Raicaran was depicted as a humble and devoted rustic (the picture is highly romanticized)

10 Chatterji, Bankimeandra, Durgegnandini, 1865.



358 Brief Communications

throughout the entire story. The manner in which Rabindranath was able to bring all of these strands of influence into a unified and artistic whole was accomplished by his technique of exploring the psychological pattern which governed the behavior of Raicaran. In so doing, he went a step beyond describing how a particular character type will behave in a given situation; he probed the causes for his acting in the manner described.

This technique was intimately related to the adjustment of the modern literature to its new emphasis. Indian and Bengali literature tradi- tionally have been largely purposive. The leaders of their societies were also the custodians and com- posers of their literatures in most cases. Their approach to the problems and regulations of society, however, was religious and philosophic. The new social debate of the early nineteenth century arising from the dialogue with the British reflected this traditional orientation. During the course of the century, concern for social problems shifted, though subtly, to the political arena. While one segment of the fiction literature (illustrated by the historical romances of Bankim- candra) was concerned with purely political problems, the psychological studies of Rabindranth's

stories gave impetus to concentration in prose fiction on the socio-political problems of the peasant and the humble folk."

A review of the literary developments of the nineteenth century, the age of experimentation, and of the elements that went into forming the modern Bengali literature, makes it clear that the basic process of its formation was the accommodation of innovations to the long standing Bengali literary tradition. Criticism can only be success- ful if it takes this fact into account, for examination of the modern literature in the light of western methods and techniques alone cannot achieve accurate analysis or description. Bengali literature of the modern period is the product of artists who introduced new form and method to a tradition which in previous centuries had attained sophistication and excellence in its own right.

RACHEL R. VAN METER UNIVER8ITY OF MIFNKSOTA

'I It should be clear that these problems were pon- dered in Bengali intellectual circles prior to this time. They were the subject of essays and articles by a number of prominent Bengalis such as Rajendralal Mitra and Bankimcandra Chatterji, but they became elements of fiction literature with the stories of Tagore.



innovation and tradition in nineteenth century bengali literature

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