Author: Rabindranath Tagore
Translator(s)/ Editors(s): Radha Chakravarty
Publisher: Penguin
Year: 2011
Language: English
Pages: 168
ISBN/UPC (if available): 9780143414032
Description
Rabindranath Tagore reinvented the Bengali novel with Farewell Song, blurring the lines between prose and poetry and creating an effervescent blend of romance and satire.
Through Amit and Labanya and a brilliantly etched social milieu, the novel addresses contemporary debates about ‘good’ and ‘bad’ writing, the nature of love and conjugality, and the influence of Western culture on Bengali society.
Set against the idyllic backdrop of Shillong and the mannered world of elite Calcutta society, this sparkling novel expresses the complex vision and the mastery of style that characterized Tagore’s later works.
ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR:
Radha Chakravarty teaches English literature in Gargi College, University of Delhi. She has co-edited The Essential Tagore for Harvard and Visva Bharati, and is the author of Feminism and Contemporary Women Writers (Routledge, 2008).
She has translated several of Tagore’s works, including Gora, Boyhood Days, Chokher Bali and The Land of Cards: Stories, Poems and Plays for Children. Other works in translation include Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay’s Kapalkundala, In the Name of the Mother by Mahasweta Devi, and Crossings: Stories from Bangladesh and India. She has edited Bodymaps: Stories by South Asian Women and co-edited Writing Feminism: South Asian Voices and Writing Freedom: South Asian Voices.
Expert:
Tagore was not only on immensely versatile poet; he was also a great short writer, novelist, playwright, essayist, and composer of Songs.
--- Amartya Sen
Contents
Introduction
1. Speaking of Amit
2. Encounter
3. A Backward Glance
4. All about Labanya
5. Introductions
6. Getting Acquainted
7. Matchmaking
8. Labanya’s Argument
9. Change of Abode
10. The Second Stage
11. Love’s Philosophy
12. The Final Evening
13. Apprehensions
14. Comet
15. Complications
16. Liberations
17. Parting Lines
Glossary