Tagore’s chaturanga (quartet) is a short novella set in 19th century Bengal. The philosophical questions which are raised in the course of the story make this one of his most complex and metaphorical works. A social novel centred on four characters, it raises pointed questions about religion and atheism, dabbling in the complex hues of the man-woman relationship. Published in 1960, this novel is considered a landmark in Bengali literature. The story revolves around the four pivotal characters with just one woman in the midst of three males. And the protagonist sachis–the most tormented soul–is torn between natural human longings and a forced imposition of spiritual emancipation. It is a struggle between the form and the formless. Subtle psychological interpretations of the minds of the characters lead relationships from the physical to the mystical and draw the reader to look beyond the apparent, deeper into the workings of the human mind. Quartet, the present translation of chaturanga, lends a contemporary flavour to the novel. It successfully brings out Tagore’s profound understanding of the human subconscious, without sacrificing the underlying playfulness in the language and the unique style of the original work.
Rabindranath Tagore, sobriquet Gurudev, was a Bengali polymath who reshaped Bengali literature and music, as well as Indian art with Contextual Modernism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Author of Gitanjali and its "profoundly sensitive, fresh and beautiful verse", he became the first non-European to win the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913. Tagore's poetic songs were viewed as spiritual and mercurial; however, his "elegant prose and magical poetry" remain largely unknown outside Bengal. He is sometimes referred to as "the Bard of Bengal. Translator Former Director, National Book Trust, India, and former Director, K.K. Birla Foundation, New Delhi, Nirmal Kanti Bhattacharjee was also the Editor of Sahitya Akademi’s prestigious journal Indian Literature. He taught comparative literature and English literature at Jadavpur University and Gauhati University respectively, in the early years of his career. Prof. Bhattacharjee was the Editorial Consultant of the Multi-volume Documentation Project of the Rashtrapati Bhavan from 2013 to 2016. An accomplished translator from Bengali to English and vice versa, his English translations of the writings of Mahasveta Devi, Sunil Gangopadhyay, Manik Bandyopadhyay, and Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay have all been very well received. He has also translated a Kannada short story collection of U.R. Anantamurthy and a Marathi novel by Viswas Patil into Bengali in collaboration with the original authors. Recipient of the best translator’s award from IBBY Congress held in London in 2012, Prof. Bhattacharjee has edited a collection of stories of displacement from Assam (Barbed Wire Fence, Niyogi Books) and co-edited Best of Indian Literature (1957-2007), published by the Sahitya Akademi.
