Discovering CanLit in Bengali
Summer in Canada is very beautiful with the blazing blue sky, the bright and free sun, vibrant green trees and the rainbow of flowers. My introduction to Canadian literature was in a long summer day. It was my first year in Toronto and we saved up enough to buy a little house with mortgage. We were painting the house all day long just before we moved in and in one of the closets I had found hidden in a stack of outdated magazines a copy of The Secret World of Og by Pierre Berton. With my dust and paint covered hands I put the book aside and later after dinner I started reading it. The whole night I read the story of the children and their adventures in the mushroom-world. I have always been a bookworm but until then my literary exploration has been limited to only Bengali and some English (from England and America) books. I never even thought about Canadian literature, let alone knowing the popular writers and the books. But after The Secret World of Og I was curious, though didn’t know how to start. It made me very confused afterwards and I kinda sank into the real world with my studies, work and family. Then on a very lucky day at a magical place called McDonald’s, in Toronto, I was very lucky to be introduced with a kind man who took me under his wings and dug out my long lost interest of literature. An established writer of 26 books, he is the researcher and the literary activist Subrata Kumar Das. A year later at the same McDonald’s, I jumped up and down with excitement to get his newest published book”Kanadiyo Sahityo: Bichchhinno Vabna” (Canadian Literature: Some Snapshots).
In the elaborated prologue of the book Subrata quotes from the Pulitzer Prize winner novelist Carol Shields: “Write the book you want to read, the one you cannot find….” He expressed his urge to write this book about Canadian literature by this single quote as it is the very first time someone has taken the attempt to write a Bengali book about Canadian literature. Even though the Bengali writers have a very curious mind about world literature, our only chance to get to know the greatest literary works of the word was limited to the books that were translated. But Bengalis with their ever curious and adventurous mind loved to explore the world and migrated to every corner of the world. Canada being one of the 1st world countries adopted hundreds of thousands of Bengalis with her open arms. And people like Subrata made this new country their home.
And with his thirst for literature, Subrata has longed to get to know the literature of the new world as well. It is always very difficult to decide where to start the adoption process from. He says himself in the book that this feeling had driven him to write this amazing book in order to help those newbies to get a direction. I can only imagine how an avid researcher like Subrata has determined his massive work strategy. Also I believe he wanted to be a part of this great world of Canadian literature. Even though it is in Bengali but through this book he has established the bridge of knowledge between Bengali and Canadian world of literature. That’s why he mentioned Toronto poet Jim Johnston’s answer for a question “What should be the subject of our writing in Canada?” Jim had replied: “You should write about yourself, your words will be Canadian literature.” This shows how liberated and adoptive Canadian writers and readers are.
At the beginning of the book Subrata talks about Canada and how Canadian history of aboriginal and immigrants has moulded the literature of this amazing country. This is the second largest country and peoples from all over the world have come here to make it into their new home. They came with their own culture from their country of origin and added their ways and stories into the Canadian literature. As a result, we get to read about the stories of slavery, war, genocide, inventions, discovery, food, lifestyle, relationships, religion, myths, laughter etc. from the different parts of the world like Asia, Europe, South America and Australia. Canada has embraced these writings with great love and care. Thus, we got writers like John Degen, Arjun Basu, Sabyasachi Nag, Doyali Islam, Arif Anwar, Ayesha Banarjee, Durga Chew Bose, Medeleine Thien, Tima Kudri and many more. We get to see the world through their writings. We saw China, India, Hungary, America, Canada, Bangladesh and their culture, life, environment, society, food, people and literature. It’s amazing how Canada has enriched her literature with the taste of the world.
Subrata has described how the world of Canadian literature has opened his eyes slowly and carefully and he has got to discover the new country. He talks about 28 writers in his book. Each title of the articles helps the readers discover the basic idea of the literary figures’ significance. For instance, when he writes about Dorothy Livesay, he did not just write this poet’s name and the birth and death date. He actually personalized her as a “modern poet”. We can also mention the chapters like “The Sadness of Matt Cohen” or “Humorist Stephen Leacock”. Each heading makes the reader actually want to read the interesting facts about the writers. He also just did not fill his narrative with dry, tasteless information about the writers but he actually paints a person with their ups and downs, sorrows and happiness, their human side and their amazing contributions towards the literary world. He also mentioned the story behind their finest works and their location and circumstances during their writings of the books. This makes the reader very interested towards that particular writer and his/her work. It is amazing how Subrata has got these 28 authors for the Bengal readers just by mentioning and combining them altogether in his book. I’m sure, just like me, the readers will follow up using this book as the navigator and discover the world of Canadian literature in their own way.
Another very interesting fact that caught my eyes as a reader is the selection. Subrata has mentioned that he did not add the very well-known Canadian writers in this book because he wanted to present someone that are not too famous in the outside world. But his selection of writers is pretty amazing as we get to know about them in his book. But he was able to combine the male and female authors equally in this book. As a feminist I am truly honored and grateful to him. In this male dominated world he has shown how Canadian readers have embraced their amazing writers regardless their age, race and gender. This is another example of the great Canadian equality, freedom and acceptance.
Subrata’s main goal was to attract the Bengali readers towards Canadian literature and as a Bengali reader I can state for a fact that after reading his entire book I am longing forward to know about the little lost Syrian boy from Tima Kurdi’s book or the “Nonsense Novels” by Stephen Leacock. Subrata was successful as soon as I got interested in these writers and I’m sure there are many more like me out there.
The only improvement for the later editions that I can think of is it would be really helpful if he mentions the English and French spelling of the names of the writers and their books. That would make it easy to look for the books. Otherwise, I think it’s a perfect resource for the Bengali literature lovers to discover the world of Canadian literature. I express my gratefulness to Murdhonna Publications for bringing this book to market. The credit for the very relevant, attractive and artistic cover goes to Mostafiz Karigor.
Momo Quazi is a cultural activist living in Toronto.