Divided Rivers: Twin Teardrops upon Mother's Face
Riverine nostalgia in post-partition Bengali music
Monish R Chatterjee  2021
Since river valleys and riverbanks have perennially been the life-giving source of all flourishing human civilizations around the earth throughout history (Indus-Ganges, Nile, Tigris-Euphrates, Mississippi, Amazon and a great many more), it is quite natural that when politically and colonially engineered partitions of the homelands of people residing generationally on those riverbanks occur, beyond the multiple wounds inflicted by such partitions (both materially as well as in human terms), writers and especially poets and musicians behold the cruel irony in the artificial dividing of the rivers which carry a common heritage bloodline.
Therefore, there is a profusion of riverine Bengali music, a great many subsequent to the partition of undivided Bengal in 1947 by the British overlords (in conjunction with political enablers within the subcontinent), in which the common heritage and the harmonious lives of the denizens on both sides of the divide are recalled wistfully, and the river (or rivers prior to their dissolution in the sea) is portrayed as the life-giving resource gifted by the motherland.
In what follows, to establish how riverine music has in varying degrees of poignancy, depicted with wistfulness the pain and longing engendered by partition viewed along the lines of rivers, which were once a common resource for the people irrespective of religion, color, ethnicity, caste or social strata, I will cite three songs (out of a potentially large collection) by well-known artists of Bengal. Riverine (sometimes boatmen's, maritime or occupational) songs in Bengal are traditionally of two broad categories--the Baul and the Bhatiali.
The songs are first cited (either entirely or via selected excerpts) in their original Bengali, and thereafter followed by my translations and interpretive comments.
1. "" "" " degrees " degrees
" " degrees " š " - " " " " degrees degrees " ˜
" " " " " "
" ' " degrees " " "
" " " " " - degrees " Ÿ " " " " degrees "
" " degrees " š " - " " " " degrees degrees " ˜
degrees " degrees " " degrees " "
" " - " " " "
"" "" " degrees " " "
" " " "
- š " degrees "
" " " " š
Next Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
