Michael
Madhusudan Dutt (25 January 1824 – 29 June 1873) was
a all the rage 19th-century Bengali poet and author.He was born in Sagordari on
the bank of Kopotaksho River, a village in Keshabpur Upazila, Jessore District,
East Bengal (now in Bangladesh). His father was Rajnarayan Dutt, an well-known
lawyer, and his mother was Jahnabi Devi.
From an early age, Dutt aspire to be an
Englishman in form and style. Born to a Hindu landed-gentry family, he rehabilitated
to Christianity as a little man, to the ire of his family unit, and adopted the
first name Michael. In later life he regret his attraction to England and the Occident.
He wrote passionately of his mother country in his poems and sonnets from this stage.
Early life and education
His childhood education happening in a
village named Shekpura, at an old mosque, where he went to learn Persian. He
was an remarkably gifted student. Since his infancy, Dutt was recognised by his
teachers and professor as being a intelligent child with a gift of fictitious
expression.
He was very creative. Early experience to
English education and European journalism at home and in Kolkata encouraged him
to imitate the English in taste, manners and intelligence. An early authority
was his teacher, Capt. D.L.Richardson at Hindu College. Dutt adopted his
support of Thomas Babington Macaulay without realising it.
He
dreamt of achieve great celebrity if he went out of the country. His youth,
coupled with the spirit of thinker enquiry, influenced him that he was born on
the wrong side of the planet, and that conventional .He believed that the
"free thoughts" and post-Enlightenment West would be more receptive to his original genius. He self-possessed
his early works—verse and drama—approximately entirely in English.
Literary life
Influences
Dutt was mainly inspired by both the life
and work of the English Romantic poet Lord Byron. Dutt was a determined bohemian
and Romantic. Dutt's gallant epic was Meghnadh Badh Kabya, although his
journey to periodical and recognition was far from soft. on the other hand,
with its publication, the Indian poet illustrious himself as a serious musician
of an wholly new genre of heroic poetry, that was Homeric and Dantesque in carry
out and style, and yet so essentially Indian in theme. To cite the poet
himself: "I awoke one morning and found myself famous." nonetheless,
it took a few existence for this epic to win gratitude all over the country.
In his own words
“
|
Where man in all his truest glory
lives,
And nature's face is exquisitely sweet;
For those fair climes I heave impatient sigh, There let me live and there let me die |
”
|
Madhusudan embrace Christianity at the cathedral of Fort William in spite of the objection of his parents and relations on 9 February 1843. Later, he escaped to Madras to avoid maltreatment. He describe the day as:
“
|
Long sunk in superstition's night,
By Sin and Satan driven,
I saw not, cared not for the light That leads the blind to Heaven. But now, at length thy grace, O Lord! Birds all around me shine; I drink thy sweet, thy precious word, I kneel before thy shrine! |
”
|
On the eve of his leaving to England:
“
|
Forget me not, O Mother,
Should I fail to return
To thy hallowed bosom. Make not the lotus of thy memory Void of its nectar Madhu. |
”
|
(Translated from the original Bengali by
the poet.)
Work with the sonnet
He enthusiastic his first sonnet to his
friend Rajnarayan Basu, which he accompanied with a letter: "What say you
to this, my good friend? In my humble view, if cultured by men of intelligence,
our sonnet in time would rival the Italian."
When
Dutt later stayed in Versailles, the sixth centennial of the Italian poet Dante
Alighieri was being renowned all over Europe. He composed a poem in honour of
the poet, translate it into French and Italian, and sent it to the king of
Italy. Victor Emmanuel II, then monarch, liked the poem and wrote to Dutt,
saying, "It will be a ring which will attach the familiarize with the
Occident."
Work in blank verse
Sharmistha was Dutt's first effort at blank verse in Bengali
literature. Kaliprasanna Singha organised a felicitation ceremony to Madhusudan
to mark the introduction of uniform blank verse in Bengali poetry.
Praising Dutt's blank verse, Sir Ashutosh
Mukherjee, experimental:
"As long as the Bengali race and Bengali
literature would exist, the sweet lyre of Madhusudan would on no account cease
playing."
He added: "Ordinarily, reading of poetry causes a monotonous
effect, but the invigorating vigour of Madhusudan's poems makes even a sick man
sit up on his bed."
In France
Dutt was able to return home only due to the unstinting
generosity of Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar. For this, Dutt was to regard
Vidyasagar as Dayar Sagar (meaning the ocean of kindness) for as
long as he lived. Madhusudan had cut off all connections with his parents,
relatives and at times even with his nearby friends, who more over and over
again than not were wont to observe him as an iconoclast and an outcast. It was
during the course of his sojourn in Europe that Dutt realised his true personality.
He wrote to his friend Gour Bysack from
France:
“
|
If there be any one among us anxious to
leave a name behind him, and not pass away into oblivion like a brute, let
him devote himself to his mother-tongue. That is his legitimate sphere his
proper element.
|
”
|
Marriage and family
Dutt had refuse to enter into an arranged marriage which his father had decided for him. He had no high
opinion for that custom and sought after to break free from the limitations of caste-based
endogamous marriage. He formed the Brahmo Samaj for reform in conservative
Hindu religion which become a becon of reform among Hindus His information of
the European institution convinced him of the pre-eminence of marriages made by
mutual consent (or love marriages).
Dutt married twice. While living in Madras,
he married Rebecca Mactavys, of English descent. They had four children mutually.
He wrote to Gour in December 1855:
“
|
Yes, dearest Gour, I have a fine
English Wife and four children.
|
”
|
Dutt returned from Madras to Calcutta in
February 1856, after his father's death. There he marital Henrietta Sophia
White, who was also ethnic English. His second marriage lasted until the end of
his life. They had a son Napoleon and daughter Sharmistha.The tennis player Leander Paes is a
direct descendant of his.
Death
Dutt is widely consider to be one of the
greatest poets in Bengali literature and the father of the Bengali sonnet. He
pioneered what came to be called amitrakshar chhanda (blank verse). Dutt
died in Kolkata, India on 29 June 1873
দাঁড়াও পথিক-বর, জন্ম যদি তব
বঙ্গে! তিষ্ঠ ক্ষণকাল! এ সমাধিস্তলে
(জননীর কোলে শিশু লভয়ে যেমতি
বিরাম) মহীর পদে মহানিদ্রাবৃত
দত্তোকুলোদ্ভব কবি শ্রীমধুসূদন!
যশোরে সাগরদাঁড়ি কবতক্ষ-তীরে
জন্মভূমি, জন্মদাতা দত্ত মহামতি
রাজনারায়ণ নামে, জননী জাহ্নবী
Legacy and honours
Dutt was largely overlooked for 15 years
after his death. The delayed tribute was a tomb erected at his gravesite.
His epitaph, a poetry of his own,
reads:
“
|
Stop a while, traveller!
Should Mother Bengal claim thee for her
son.
As a child takes repose on his mother's elysian lap, Even so here in the Long Home, On the bosom of the earth, Enjoys the sweet eternal sleep Poet Madhusudan of the Duttas. |
”
|
Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar
said:
“
|
Meghnad Badh is a supreme poem.
|
”
|
In the words of Sri Aurobindo:
“
|
All the stormiest passions of man's
soul he [Madhusudan] expressed in gigantic language.
|
”
|
Major works
- Tilottama, 1860
- Meghnad Bodh Kavya (Ballad of Meghnadh's demise), 1861
- Birangana
- Choturdoshpodi kobitaboli
- Brajangngana
- Sharmishtha
- Ekei Ki Bole Sovyota (Is this is called a civilisation)
- Buro Shaliker Ghare Rown
- Ratnavali
- Rizia, the sultana of Inde.
- The Captive Lady
- Visions of the Past
- Rosalo Sornolatika
- Bongobani
- Sonnets and other poems
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