துருவன் மகன்

by Amar Mitra

Tamil
944

**Contents and Sample Pages**

944 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2014

About the author

Amar Mitra (Bengali: অমর মিত্র (born 30 August 1951) is an eminent writer in Bengali living in Kolkata, West Bengal, India. A student of chemistry, he has been working for the Land Reforms Department of The Government of West Bengal. He was awarded with Sahitya Akademi Award for his novel Dhurbaputra (Bengali: ধ্রুবপুত্র) in 2006. He has also received the Bankim Puraskar from Government of West Bengal for his novel, Aswacharit (Bengali: অশ্বচরিত) in 2001, kAtha award for his short story 'Swadeshyatra' in the year 1998, Mitra O Ghosh award in the year 2010, Sharat puroskar in the year 2018 and edited the new generation Bengali Webzine Bookpocket.net and Katha Sopan, a Bengali literary Magazine. He participated in the First forum of Asian countries' writers held in Nur Sultan city, Kazakhstan in September 2019 and was present in the inaugural session presided by the hon'ble President Of Kazakhstan. Awarded with 2022 O' Henry prize for his short story, The Old man of Kusumpur (গাঁওবুড়ো). He is the first Indian language recipient of O' Henry prize for short fiction. His novel Dhapatir Char has been translated in to English and published by Penguin Random House, in their vintage section.

Reviews

[S Ashok · Rating 2 out of 5]

Read Dhuruvan Magan in Tamil, Bengali novel which got the prestigious Sahithya Academy award. It is a historical novel revolving around the city of Ujjain which is affected by a very bad drought. There has not been any rain for a prolonged time and in a way how the lack of rain affects the external and internal lives of people in the city is what the novel is all about. Monsoon rain signifies the order that controls the universe, the arrival of the monsoon clouds every year is like a gift from the gods, it signifies a contract the gods fulfill to the people. Hence the lack of rains is generally associated with some mistake on the part of the people or the king which has irked the gods leading to the drought. As rains set in motion the farm cycle in feudal societies, it controls almost all other activities. This novel is the wait of people to get the rain that has failed for many years.

I was very disappointed with the novel mostly as it felt repetitive and cliched beyond a point. We see multiple characters lamenting the same thing about the lack of rains. Also, the central characters are waiting for Dhuruvan a person who was forced to flee the city due to various circumstances. In a sense, there is a link people feel between the fleeing of Dhuruvan and the lack of rains. He brings back with words of the Megadhoota of Kalidas and once he is back at the end of the novel the rain comes back bringing the novel to close.

The novel is wafer thin and it could have been a good short story or a novella but its highly repetitive and the tangential stories are even very predictive.

The language is full of mistakes and beyond a point, I could not get into the novel at all. I somehow managed to finish it but I never felt it to be of literary merit.