Old Women: Statue; And, the Fairytale of Mohanpur

by Mahasweta Devi, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak (Translator)

The two stories in this collection are touching, poignant tales, in both of which the protagonists are old women.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction

104 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Mahasweta Devi was an Indian social activist and writer. She was born in 1926 in Dhaka, to literary parents in a Hindu Brahmin family. Her father Manish Ghatak was a well-known poet and novelist of the Kallol era, who used the pseudonym Jubanashwa. Mahasweta's mother Dharitri Devi was also a writer and a social worker.

She joined the Rabindranath Tagore-founded Vishvabharati University in Santiniketan and completed a B.A. (Hons) in English, and then finished an M.A. in English at Calcutta University as well. She later married renowned playwright Bijon Bhattacharya who was one of the founding fathers of the IPTA movement. In 1948, she gave birth to Nabarun Bhattacharya, currently one of Bengal's and India's leading novelist whose works are noted for their intellectual vigour and philosophical flavour. She got divorced from Bijon Bhattacharya in 1959.

In 1964, she began teaching at Bijoygarh College (an affiliated college of the University of Calcutta system). During those days, Bijoygarh College was an institution for working class women students. During that period she also worked as a journalist and as a creative writer. Recently, she is more famous for her work related to the study of the Lodhas and Shabars, the tribal communities of West Bengal, women and dalits. She is also an activist who is dedicated to the struggles of tribal people in Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. In her elaborate Bengali fiction, she often depicts the brutal oppression of tribal peoples and the untouchables by potent, authoritarian upper-caste landlords, lenders, and venal government officials.

Major awards:
1979: Sahitya Akademi Award (Bengali): – Aranyer Adhikar (novel)
1986: Padma Shri[2]
1996: Jnanpith Award - the highest literary award from the Bharatiya Jnanpith
1997: Ramon Magsaysay Award - Journalism, Literature, and the Creative Communication Arts
1999: Honoris causa - Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU)
2006: Padma Vibhushan - the second highest civilian award from the Government of India
2010:Yashwantrao Chavan National Award
2011: Bangabibhushan - the highest civilian award from the Government of West Bengal
2012: Hall of Fame Lifetime Achievement Sahityabramha - the first Lifetime Achievement award in Bengali Literature from 4thScreen-IFJW.

মহাশ্বেতা দেবী একটি মধ্যবিত্ত বাঙালি পরিবারে জন্মগ্রহণ করেছিলেন । তাঁর পিতা মনীশ ঘটক ছিলেন কল্লোল যুগের প্রখ্যাত সাহিত্যিক এবং তাঁর কাকা ছিলেন বিখ্যাত চিত্রপরিচালক ঋত্বিক ঘটক। মা ধরিত্রী দেবীও ছিলেন সাহিত্যিক ও সমাজসেবী। মহাশ্বেতা দেবী বিখ্যাত নাট্যকার বিজন ভট্টাচার্যের সঙ্গে বিবাহবন্ধনে আবদ্ধ হন। তাঁদের একমাত্র পুত্র, প্রয়াত নবারুণ ভট্টাচার্য স্মরণীয় কবিতার পঙ্‌ক্তি ‘এ মৃত্যু উপত্যকা আমার দেশ নয়’ এবং হারবার্ট উপন্যাস লিখে বাংলা সাহিত্যে স্থায়ী স্বাক্ষর রেখে গেছেন।

তাঁর শৈশব ও কৈশোরে স্কুলের পড়াশোনা ঢাকায়। দেশভাগের পর চলে আসেন কলকাতায়। এরপর শা‌ন্তিনিকেতনের বিশ্বভারতী বিশ্ববিদ্যালয় থেকে ইংরেজিতে অনার্স এবং কলকাতা বিশ্ববিদ্যালয় থেকে স্নাতকোত্তর ডিগ্রি নেন।

১৯৬৪ খ্রীষ্টাব্দে তিনি বিজয়গড় কলেজে শিক্ষকতা শুরু করেন । এই সময়েই তিনি একজন সাংবাদিক এবং লেখিকা হিসাবে কাজ করেন। পরবর্তীকালে তিনি বিখ্যাত হন মূলত পশ্চিমবাংলার উপজাতি এবং নারীদের ওপর তাঁর কাজের জন্য । তিনি বিভিন্ন লেখার মাধ্যমে বিভিন্ন উপজাতি এবং মেয়েদের উপর শোষণ এবং বঞ্চনার কথা তুলে ধরেছেন। সাম্প্রতিক কালে মহাশ্বেতা দেবী পশ্চিমবঙ্গ সরকারের শিল্পনীতির বিরুদ্ধে সরব হয়েছেন । সরকার কর্তৃক বিপুল পরিমাণে কৃষিজমি অধিগ্রহণ এবং স্বল্পমূল্যে তা শিল্পপতিদের কাছে বিতরণের নীতির তিনি কড়া সমালোচক । এছাড়া তিনি শান্তিনিকেতনে প্রোমোটারি ব্যবসার বিরুদ্ধেও প্রতিবাদ করেছেন ।

তাঁর লেখা শতাধিক বইয়ের মধ্যে হাজার চুরাশির মা অন্যতম। তাঁকে পদ্মবিভূষণ (ভারত সরকারের দ্বিতীয় সর্বোচ্চ নাগরিক পুরস্কার,২০০৬), রামন ম্যাগসেসে পুরস্কার (১৯৯৭), জ্ঞানপীঠ পুরস্কার (সাহিত্য একাডেমির সর্বোচ্চ সাহিত্য সম্মান), সার্ক সাহিত্য পুরস্কার (২০০৭) প্রভৃতি পদকে ভূষিত করা হয়।

২০১৬ সালের ২৮ জুলাই, বৃহস্পতিবার বেলা ৩টা ১৬ মিনিটে চিকিৎসাধীন অবস্থায় তিনি শেষনিশ্বাস ত্যাগ করেন।


जन्म : 1926, ढाका।

Reviews

[Jo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two stories of old women in rural, poverty stricken areas of India are sparely written but still touch the heart, Statue more so than Fairytale as being twice the length we get to spend more time with Dulali or Pishi. Widowed as a young child and loved by a freedom fighter who was killed committing a crime, blamed by his and her own family for his death and left to waste away, only her great nephew Nabin cares for her.

Fairytale focuses on Gobindo and her eyes and the village tyrant Naskar and was harder to read in its short sentences where it’s unclear who’s speaking and the introduction of multiple characters one after another. Both are still affecting though and show not only the poverty of these villages and the inefficiencies and corruption of government but how family ties and honor can lift up or oppress their members.

‘Desolate, melancholy-making afternoon. Nabin wants to bind this silent indifference in a paved road and take it into the lap of the present.’ (Statue)

[Chitra Ahanthem · Rating 4 out of 5]

Old Women by Mahashweta Devi translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak brings together two stories of two women nearing  the sunset of their lives. The two stories not only threads the personal space they are in, their home and family dynamics but also the larger socio political fabric in terms of how society has treated them. In case of the second story, The Fairy Tale of Mohanpur, there is a commentary on the structural failure of the public health system juxtaposed into the hopes that the less privileged have pinned onto it.
Statue, the longer story in this book unravels various layers: of caste and social practices, how the agency of young lives are trodden upon by age old belief systems and the concept of history. The 'statue' in question is of a newly discovered freedom fighter and we can only marvel at how Mahasweta Devi was ahead of her times in the way she has flagged the how history can be used to suit the mood of the times. As the story behind the actual person who is set to be commemorated as a statue opens up, we begin to see the depth of despair and broken dreams that Dulah is forced to remember in her old age.
In the second story, we have Andi who puts all her hope in the system and is unaware of its many failings. Hers is a romantic notion but we also see that it helps her to remain unaffected and unfettered by disappointments and the awareness of things beyond hope or resolution. In both stories, Mahasweta Devi fleshes both her women protagonists as victims of circumstances beyond their control to a certain extent but by shining a light on how each reclaim a certain agency by the way they are, she shows how victimhood does not have to be a cross to bear and how the person in such a circumstance is deserving of dignity and respect.

[Rahul Singh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I want to begin this review by stating how gobsmacked I am after reading the two stories in this book. ‘Statue’, the first story, explores the obsession of celebrating past at the cost of a miserable present. The story focuses on the rural, tribal problems faced by the people. The rustic ambience proves as a powerful setting to understand how deeply religious myths, supernatural pre sentiments regulates the life of people. The author’s observations of the caste, class and religious clashes showed how vivid and intense life can be when social differences overpower interpersonal relationships. The sharp observation of caste and class differences made me think of how negligent we, the socially privileged bunch, are of the concerns of the ‘other’. It made me think of the crises pervading the India state today. How gloriously we have all forgotten the millions of suicide occurring on a day-to-day basis of Dalits, trans, women, farmers, migrant workers in our country but the suicide of a socially privileged man was mourned and is still mourned even today by the nation as a whole. Pain and suffering become normal among certain categories but an anomaly among the privileged, sigh. The second story resonated the themes, nuances, pain and struggles of rural like the first one. At the heart of it, the stories eulogises the lives of two old women who are symbolically dead by all the suffering and heartbreaks in a man’s world. These mere words are not enough to measure the pain that such prose makes you think of. I am looking forward to read more of Devi’s works.

[Pavan Dharanipragada]

It's a short book with just two stories. The first one, called Statue is a heart-breaking tale about failed love and failure of the state. It is set in a remote village in Midnapore, West Bengal, without a road connecting it anywhere, and hence with no facilities like a school, health centre and so on. The unfortunate old woman of this story is from a relatively well-off landlord family, but widowed at a young age. The village is neglected the same way she is neglected and cast aside. The tale is extremely moving and the nonlinear unravelling of the old woman's past is masterfully done.

The second story is about an old woman from a much much worse-off family, but she's much happier. Her life is hard and she copes through fairy tales she makes up about her past and spaces that are closed to her. It is quite cute.

[Vinayak Hegde · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a book with two stories about old women and their experiences. The first one - "Statue" - takes up almost three-fourth of the book. Nominally it is a story of woman and her past while also being a social commentary on the caste system, patriarchy (and their unfairness to various people affected) and the politics of convenience and tokenism. The story revolves around a child widow who falls in love with a upper caste Brahmin who dies young as a freedom fighter. All the blame though is heaped on the lady and she is treated as an outcaste by her village and her family except her grandson who is progressive. The grandson's story (that also runs in a parallel thread) also illustrates the hollowness of political opportunism and tokenism as the freedom fighter's statue is erected in the village with no accessible road, hospital school or electricity. It is all too familiar sad tale of rural India that still resonates till this day.

The second story revolves around a village and an old women which seems to be in perpetual penury thanks to the zamindari system. The old women develops a fascination to eat decent food regularly at the hospital but it isn't possible for her to visit it. This is also a social commentary on how society treats women especially older women and the strict stratified serfdom of the Zamindari system up until the time it was slowly dismantled after independence. It also showcases the corrupt bureaucracy that pilfers public money for their own personal use while trying to hobnob with the ruling class. The more things change the more they remain the same.

A note of the stories and translation - The stories are well written though sometimes it is sometimes hard to follow who is saying what. The translator could have done much better job preserving the essence of the story. Though I don't know Bengali, I could often read between the lines of what the actual author is alluding to but the translator has done a hack job in many places. The story shines in spite of that.

[K · Rating 4 out of 5]

Old Women contains two short works by Mahasweta Devi. The first, "Statue", was amazing in how it slowly reveals the life story of a woman, and how she was and is treated by individuals and by her community overall. She bears the blame for many things beyond her control, but lives with dignity. The second, "The Fairy Tale of Mohanpur", was less compelling, but did show how its healthcare system is failing India's citizens, and the dangers of being poor and isolated when needing medical care.

[Moitreyee Mitra · Rating 5 out of 5]

Poignant.
Statue; of someone that was never owned or recognised, by people that ruined him, not for someone who actually wants to forget but suffers a lifetime of persecution and neglect. Naïveté of youth.
Fairytale of modern India's blindness to the classes and castes continually suffering even as records show success stories.

[Khyati · Rating 4 out of 5]

Please do yourself a favour and read Mahasweta Devi's works.

Symbolised by two women, the novellas depicts the impact of social regulations on interpersonal relations within a similar set of communities.

[Pretty Little Bibliophile · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book for the #FemmeMarchAtWomaniyat where we dedicate the month to reading books by and about women - more specifically, Indian women in this case.
This was my first read of Mahasweta Devi's writings and it is definitely not going to be the last. I loved the nuances of her work and the themes they revolved around. OLD WOMEN is a collection of two short stories - Statue, and, The Fairytale of Mohanpur.
As the name suggests, the two central characters of these stories are old women - subaltern humans, in a way.
When we talk about feminism, intersectional feminism, or even womanism for that matter, we often tend to get unwittingly ageist and forget to think and read about the women that time (and we) have forgotten. The way Devi has plotted out the stories is also super nuanced. When you just start reading the stories you would never imagine that they are about these old women. I remember wondering why the title was so, when I was just a few pages in.
But I think this is just Devi's way of making us realize how we tend to forget the old people in our lives. We dehumanize them and forget that they too were once young like us and have their own experiences and memories.
As the stories progress we also see various other themes being women in - narrow-minded societies, forbidden love, caste/class differences, the advantages people take because of power (financial or otherwise), etc. Now that I am writing this, I think the stories talk about power in the core (or lack thereof).
Overall, I think this was an amazing collection and I am definitely looking forward to reading more of Devi's works. Perhaps I will pick up MOTHER OF 1084 next.

[Nikhil · Rating 4 out of 5]

I preferred the second story. Both stories chronicle the exploitative relationship between the rural poor and the state, despite the vocal assurances the government makes otherwise. In the first, the government is distant and unresponsive, preferring to commemorate the dead rather than aid the living. The second depicts the betrayal of the poor by the non-Naxaliate branch of the Communist Party (CPI - M). A venal local official swindles sharecroppers and landless peoples while staying in the good graces of Calcutta. Both stories show a betrayal and systematic abandonment of the goals of Independence.

These stories were written in 1979. I wonder how sharecropping relations have changed since.

[Mandar Mutalikdesai · Rating 3 out of 5]

2 stars for the quality of translation, but 4 stars for the stories themselves.

The stories are wonderful. I loved the characterization of Nabin, Dulali, Gobinda, and Andi. The narratives simultaneously invoke empathy and despondency throughout. However, the translation's attempts to preserve the Bangla constructs and colloquialisms from the original seem to be in vain.