Upanyas Samagra 6 by Bimal Kar [Hardcover]

In the sixth volume of the Upanyas Samagra, three novels are included. The first novel is Deewal. It has been more than half a century—over seventy years—since the events of this time, and in all these years, we have forgotten many things. But it is important to remember that the crisis humanity faced, particularly between 1941 and 1945, which we still refer to as World War II, is unparalleled. It was a strange story across the entire world. Never before had so many books been written about this war in so many different languages. Not only in many Indian languages, but even in Bengali, all the major writers of the time wrote novels about it, but these were all written during that period. At the time, Bimal Kar was a young man, not yet a writer or journalist—just a student. But the brutal experiences of that time impacted him so deeply that, a decade later, in 1954-55, he began writing the first part of Deewal. He was a newcomer to literature then. Over the next seven years, he completed the remaining two parts. It is worth mentioning that this lengthy novel was never serialized in any magazine. However, many consider this novel to be one of Bimal Kar's finest works. This novel has been repeatedly mentioned in various parts of Bengali literature.

The second work in this volume is Shamik. It is difficult to recall any truly nihilistic novel in Bengali literature, and Bimal Kar had the ambition to write such a novel in Bengali. Shamik, based on the complex social landscape of Bengal, is his attempt at this. Whether he succeeded in this endeavor is for the readers to decide. Granthy, based on the fictional actress Tara, who died prematurely, was written in her memory. The relationship between the actress, her mother, and her son—full of hatred, love, attachment, and affection—has been crafted with such subtlety that this novel can be called the author’s finest story. The famous Bengali film Nayanthara was based on this novel.