Book Review: Narach

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Of late Bengali literature has been mostly focusing on historical novels. Narach by Debarati Mukherji is such a novel that specifically revolves round the rise of New Generation of Bengal's reformers and liberal ideologies amidst the backward social structure and barbaric English rule.

          

About the author:

One of the most celebrated figures in contemporary Bengali literature, Debarati Mukhopadhyay is a high level Government officer whose literary works have been highly praised and awarded. Her works include vivid research work and a very easy language to resonate with every reader. 

Mini Synopsis

A widowed girl and her painful plight with the backdrop of the 1880s Bengal and its various people, mixed with fictional characters and references of famous reformers and literary figures of that time, along with Nawab Wajid Ali Shah's life in Kolkata- this book has covered that era of Bengal and its polarizingly striking parallel worlds that existed.

Review

Narach is one of the few recent reads that has made a lasting impact on me. No wonder this has been considered as one of the best Historical representation of Bengal of the 1880s in recent years. The mention of famous personalities like a young Rabindranath Tagore or Upendra Kishore Roy Chowdhury and the elaborate description of the extent of the kind of genuine work that the reformers were carrying out in those times are bound to garner interest in the readers. The parallel contrasting lives of the common people, the hidden slavery being carried out by the British rulers and the oppression of the rich on poor establish a strikingly polarizing society. 

Overall Narach is a must read for those interested in the history of 19th Century Bengal.

Its English translation by Arunava Sinha is " Chronicles of the Lost Daughters".


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