When the Time Is Right

Bose Buddhadeva

Description

Buddhadeva Bose s greatest novel When the Time Is Right is a grand family saga set in Calcutta during the last two decades of British rule. Of Rajen Mitra s five lovely daughters; it is the youngest the beautiful; intelligent Swati who is the apple of her father s eye. As she grows from an impetuous; spirited child to a lonely young woman; Swati is witness to the upheavals and joys of the Mitra family even as the country slides towards the promise of independence and the inevitability of war. Anxious to ensure that his daughters find suitable husbands; Rajen-babu realizes it is only a matter of time before his favourite child too must leave home. While the boorish entrepreneur Prabir Majumdar decides that she will make him a fitting wife; Swati finds herself increasingly drawn to Satyen; the young professor who introduces her to a world of books and the heady poetry of Tagore and Coleridge. First published in Bengali as Tithidore in 1949; When the Time Is Right is a moving tale of a family and a nation.

Informations

• Publié par: Penguin Books Ltd
• Date de parution: 01 janvier 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9788184755909
• Langue: English

Extrait

BUDDHADEVA BOSE
When the Time Is Right
Translated from the Bengali by Arunava Sinha
PENGUIN BOOKS
Contents
Book One
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Book Two
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Book Three
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Copyright Page
Book One
First Sari, First Rain
1
Rajen-babu was a man of delicate taste. But he was not a dandy. He had no objection to rolling his dhoti up to his knees and plunging into the filthy vegetable-and-fish market with a shopping bag in each hand; but he needed a little fragrance on his pillow at night. He would go to work in the same clothes six days in succession, but wouldn t drink water in anything other than a crystal tumbler. If the maid stayed away, he would get out of bed before sunrise to light the stove, then sit bare-bodied on a rickety plank on the veranda, humming a morning raga.
These small fancies of his greatly amused his wife Shishirkana-named for a dewdrop-when she finally came to stay with him, having been married at fifteen and spending another year in her parents home. She had even indulged him a little, hiding vials of fragrant wood under his pillow, and, on some nights, even tying at the end of her sari a few bokul flowers she d collected with the help of her maid. Fragrance was good; but there was nothing wrong with making the source of the fragrance even better.
When Shishirkana became pregnant a few months later, and Rajen-babu said, This is wonderful! A lovely little baby girl-perfect! she retorted, not very pleased at this new fancy of her husband s, Baby girl? Why a baby girl?
A boy is nothing but shorts and bat-and-ball. But think of a girl! Frocks of different colours, ribbons, long curly hair-and then, when she grows up a little, just imagine!
But Shishirkana did not appear elated at the prospect of increasing the population of her tribe. The future mother echoed what she had heard from her own many times over: Frocks, ribbons-wonderful! Excellent education for your daughter!
Whatever you may say, a daughter will light up our lives.
A few months later, their lives were indeed lit up; and three days later, Rajen-babu demonstrated another example of his delicate taste: he named his daghter Shweta.
Please, no, said Shishirkana s widowed aunt from the door to the labour room, don t call her Sita-Sita had such a sad life.
Not Sita-Shweta, said Rajen-babu gravely, enunciating the name clearly to show the difference with the tragic heroine of the Ramayana.
We can t pronounce all those foreign names, but yes, your daughter will certainly be as lovely as a white girl.
But it s not foreign
Rajen-babu was cut short by a different voice coming from the labour room. Why do you pay attention to him, Pishima? You know what he s like! I ve named her Manju. Shishirkana made sure to declaim the last few words extra loudly, so that they would accurately find their intended target.
They did, but the target was unmoved. Within a month or so, a battle broke out over the name. Shishirkana would coo to her daughter, holding her to her breast, Manju-Manjul-Manjulee while Rajen-babu would harmonize, Manju-Jhumjhum-Lozeng-eu! Then coming nearer to his daughter, he would stroke her cheek, saying, Shweta.
The daughter would blink rapidly, as though this was the name she preferred-which was quite possible, given that her fair complexion lived up to her name.
Those who say that the first child is a thorn in the father s side must never have seen Rajen-babu. He rocked her to sleep on his knee, fed her her milk in a bottle, walked up and down with her in his arms all evening and changed her sheets at night. Not once during the first six months was the new mother s night-time sleep disturbed-nothing could be more surprising in a Bengali family.
But there was a price to be paid for this pleasure.
Where s Shweta s frock?
Can you pass Shweta s powder?
See how soundly Shweta s sleeping today.
Having to hear things like this all the time, even Shishirkana referred to her as Shweta sometimes. At first, she would jokingly say your Shweta -for instance: Everyone s admiring your beautiful Shweta or Have you seen how your Shweta smiles? And eventually, just Shweta. Not Sita, not Situ-it was Shweta, pure and simple. Manju was exiled, having lost the war; like a great warrior, Rajen-babu accepted his victory with humility.
When another daughter was born one and a half years later, Rajen-babu immediately named her Mahashweta. The third daughter didn t even wait that long-just fourteen months afterwards, Saraswati came to Shishirkana s arms.
No more! Don t go showering your love on them any more with your names, Shishirkana exclaimed.
But they do have to be named, do they not.
Rot! Shishirkana rhymed unknowingly.
She had been convinced that her second child would be a boy. Still, she had tolerated Mahashweta for the sake of future expectations. But again! Three girls in a row. Her annoyance, her unhappiness could no longer be hidden.
What lovely hair Saraswati has, said Rajen-babu.
All right! Enough, go now Out of the corner of her eye, Shishirkana glanced at the newborn s head full of curly hair.
Three lovely girls-don t you love this?
I see. You want more daughters. It s because of you that I keep having girls. Don t even talk of girls any more.
But so what if he didn t, when it came to fulfilling this one fancy of Rajen-babu s, the Almighty proved extraordinarily efficient. After lying low for seven years, Shishirkana was galvanized into activity again. And after seventeen years of married life, Rajen-babu was the father of five daughters. A son also popped in between them, however. Highlighting the difference between him and his sisters, Rajen-babu named him Bijon, the solitary one.
What! Shishirkana s eyebrows shot into her hair. The world has been turned upside down with the glory of the daughters names, but the son is merely Bijon!
Simple names are best for men. You don t know what he will grow up to be-saddling him with a mouthful of a name now
And what kingdoms are your daughters going to be princesses of?
Well, considering they re my daughters, they are Raj-kanyas-princesses.
Then why shouldn t the son be a prince too?
That doesn t mean he can be named Vikramaditya now, can he?
With just the one son to speak for so many years of pain, Shishirkana couldn t tolerate her husband s indifference about him. Flaring up, she said, Here you are losing your head over your daughters! I guarantee they re going to heap disgrace upon you one day.
It was true that Rajen-babu was a little too taken up with his daughters. And as luck would have it, you couldn t turn your eyes away from whichever of the five girls you looked at. While Shishirkana was an old-fashioned beauty-fair of complexion, with almond eyes-and Rajen-babu was handsome too, no one could have predicted that each of the girls would turn out to be so beautiful. It could so easily not have happened that way. And it was not just beauty, either.
Of course, Rajen-babu wasn t fortunate enough to have all five of his daughters living at home at the same time; Shweta was married before Swati was born. Shishirkana-who had married relatively late by the customs of the time-clearly remembered not being happy until she got married; it was as if marriage had saved her. So, no sooner had her eldest daughter turned fifteen than she became restless for her wedding. Shweta s beauty earned her the son of a minor landowner from Mymensingh as a groom. Shishirkana approved of the groom from his photograph; the groom s father approved of the bride after viewing her in person. The wedding took place.
Swati was seven months in her mother s womb at the time. Shishirkana did feel a little embarrassed in the presence of her new son-in-law. But what option did she have?
Bijon had been born two years earlier. He wanted a brother, being reluctant to grow up alone in the company of sisters-such was Shishirkana s logic. It didn t work. Yet another daughter! When the thirteen-year-old Mahashweta, the twelve-year-old Saraswati and the five-year-old Saswati crowded around the door to the labour room, if she didn t slap all of them soundly, it was only because she lacked the strength even to get up.
Rajen-babu said, This is nice-one daughter gets married and leaves, and another one arrives.
Shutting her eyes, Shishirkana prayed, Let this be the last one, O Lord.
The lord heard her prayer. However, by mistake-since he made such mistakes quite frequently-he granted a little more than was asked for. Within a few months of Swati s birth, it became clear that not only would Shishirkana not bring any more lives into existence, but her own life was also waning.
A month went by, a year went by, her health simply did not mend. Fed up with the doctor, Rajen-babu took two months leave. At great expense, he took his huge family off for a change to Mihijaam. Shishirkana recovered greatly, even being well for some time after their return to Calcutta. But again her health deteriorated, she had to take to her bed once more.
She finally settled down to this state of existence. Sometimes the doctor had to be called and the treatment worked, but as soon as the doctor said, you will definitely recover now, there was a new complication. Sometimes she would be quite well even without treatment; at other times she would have to stay in bed a fortnight. Rajen-babu made it a point to whisk everyone off for a holiday once a year-the seaside, the mountains, places with dry climate, medicated natural springs-but all to no avail. One fine day Shishirkana suddenly lost her appetite, and with it her spirit. And so it was back to bed.
Chaos ensued in the household; they kept running out of things. From her bed, Shishirkana helplessly watched the servants pilfering, the daughters extravagance, the son s ragamuffin-like