This essay revisits the years 1961-1963 through a selection of poems written by Rajat Neogy for T... more This essay revisits the years 1961-1963 through a selection of poems written by Rajat Neogy for Transition magazine. There is an inherent tension in Neogy’s surrealism between its imaginative exposé of symbolic planes of abstract existence, and the distressing reality of post-Independent Uganda for the Asian expatriates. Avant-garde and ambitious, Transition was founded by Neogy in 1961 as an intellectually autonomous forum for East African literary culture. The magazine’s cosmopolitan contributions reflected the cosmopolitan ambience of Kampala. Born in Kampala in 1938 to East Bengali immigrant parents, Neogy’s writings are influenced by and reflect the anxieties of the expatriate communities unsure about their identity and status in the post-Independent scheme of things.
One afternoon in November 1961, a young man with a “[b]ig beard, lots of hair [and] huge black br... more One afternoon in November 1961, a young man with a “[b]ig beard, lots of hair [and] huge black brooding eyes” (Hume 1967, 35), walked into a bar in Kampala carrying copies of an English-language magazine. As the young man pushed through the lunchtime crowd, an Englishman tore a copy, stomped on it, and shouted: “That’s what I think of your magazine!” (Hume 1967, 35).
This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which t... more This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which there has been a much-documented explosion of recent interest. A diverse group of scholars from Asia, Europe, and North America examine aesthetics, politics, and ideology in sequential art about South Asia and South Asian America. The book features contributions which address gender violence; authoritarian politics; caste discrimination; environmentalism; racism; and urban street art, amongst others. The unique interdisciplinary span of the volume considers mass popular comic books as well as the graphic novel. This edited volume would be of interest to those studying the influence of graphic novels, graphic narratives, and comic books in South Asia, as well as researchers interested in what these forms might have to say about important issues in society. This book was originally published as a special issue of the South Asian Review journal.
“We have heard your story from others / [...] Tell us all those stories in detail today / [...] T... more “We have heard your story from others / [...] Tell us all those stories in detail today / [...] Tell us of your joys and of your sorrows over there, / And in which months they occurred” (p. 45). Thus begins the first part of Book II of Chandrabati’s Ramayan (Translation: Poetry), Nabaneeta Dev Sen’s 2020 English translation of a work composed in the 16th century by the female poet Chandrabati, born in Kishoreganj, now in present-day Bangladesh. Of the hundreds of versions of the epic that exist in South Asia, Chandrabati’s irreverent retelling is the only one that reimagines the story from the perspective of Sita. Chandrabati, thought to have been the daughter of Bangshidas Bhattacharya, one of the authors of the Manasamangala, is also the author of two other notable works, Sundari Molua and Dasyu Kenaram. Chandrabati’s reassessment of Valmiki’s Ramayana is noteworthy for its Bengali rendition of the epic in the “Baromasi” (literally, “the twelve months”) lyrical tradition popular among village women across South Asia. In her retelling of the Ramayana, Chandrabati’s Sita is unencumbered by the divine trappings of her destiny and is turned into a human figure who earnestly comprehends the sorrows and lamentations of the everyday woman. The epic battle between Rama and Ravan are bypassed by Chandrabati who devotes all six sections of her Ramayan to women such as Mandodari and Kausalya and to worldly concerns of ordinary woman for whom the battle between Rama and Ravana is insignificant. It is notable that Bengali retellings of the Hindu epic, though not necessarily invested in the political and sexual equality of women, are “protofeminist” in the sense that the highpoint of such retellings is women’s experiences — from dominant mother goddesses to modest village women. In the popular and provincial songs called “Ramayan Gaan” (Songs of Ramayana) that prevail to this day in rural Bangladesh and Northeast India, Saymon Zakaria and Tutun Mukherjee, in “‘Ramayana Gaan’ or Singing the Ramayan in West Bengal, Assam and Bangladesh”, show that the indubitable authority of the goddesses Kali and Durga is imperative in the manifestation of the storyline. In the Bengali “Ramayan Gaan”, Sita manifests as Bhadrakali (Kali the protector), one of the many
his two forefingers outward, as if to exclaim his views emphatically. The subtitle, Reflections o... more his two forefingers outward, as if to exclaim his views emphatically. The subtitle, Reflections on his Life of Writing, indicates thought, contemplation, and identification of a wider community of readers with a deliberate marking of the difference Ngũgĩ made with his literary contributions. The book will be helpful to academics studying the influence of local language, or those who have interest in the social sciences, political sciences, or critical theory.
Wall art implores engagement with the urban spaces of the city: it demands to be looked at. One b... more Wall art implores engagement with the urban spaces of the city: it demands to be looked at. One becomes more aware of the physical space of the city by engaging with street art and graffiti. The mystery surrounding who produces these visual-verbal signs is as intriguing a question as who is watching or reading it. I argue that 'Subodh' exposes the untold stories of hardships that make and break a city. 'Subodh' encourages the spectator to look at the urban landscape of Dhaka in a new light away from the visions of sustainable development projects and housing projects to the drab realities of neglect and alienation.
The extensive epistolary correspondence across the far-flung peripheral regions of the British Em... more The extensive epistolary correspondence across the far-flung peripheral regions of the British Empire in the early decades of the twentieth century led to the formation of new associations and relationships. Letters, which are essentially gifts, led to the exchange of other kinds of gifts in the form of texts and manuscripts. This set in motion vibrant transcultural networks between scholars who communicated, collaborated and shared ideas through the exchanging and forwarding of letters. It is in this spirit of intellectual camaraderie vis-à-vis epistolary interactions that I examine the friendship between Akiki Nyabongo and Rabindranath Tagore, who in the span of a few months in 1937 formed an empathetic bond through letters in their joint opposition to diktats issued by fascist and colonialist regimes in Africa and India.
Insight, Queen’s College Oxford ISSN 2049-8349), 2015
The Akiki Nyabongo archive at Queen’s College Library contains an impressive collection of docume... more The Akiki Nyabongo archive at Queen’s College Library contains an impressive collection of documents carefully divided into personal letters, manuscripts of unpublished novels and short stories, lectures and speeches, and several anonymous photographs, which belonged to Nyabongo while he was completing a DPhil at the College in the early 1930s. The collection also includes a copy of Nyabongo’s DPhil thesis ‘The religious practices and beliefs of Uganda’ (1939) which critiques the British anthropologist Lucy Mair’s ethnographic study on Buganda in An African people in the twentieth century (1934). The bulk of Nyabongo’s works dating from the 1930s, which examine different aspects of Ugandan life under colonial government, can be divided into three permissible sections with evident overlaps: these are, his enquiry into the anthropological, the religious, and the educational avenues of enquiry.
As part of the recent worldwide cinematographic trend in adapting children’s fantasy and adventur... more As part of the recent worldwide cinematographic trend in adapting children’s fantasy and adventure stories into films, this article offers critical insight into contemporary West Bengali film industry’s reworking of this trend in its 2013 cinematic adaptation of Chander Pahar (1937) by the Bengali novelist Bibhutibhusan Bandapadhyay (1894–1950). I argue that in this adaptation the filmmaker deliberately expands on the author’s original vision of the intricacies of race relations. The film’s staging of the fateful encounter of Bengal with Africa is grounded on a common history of the past between India and Africa linked by migration and settlement and of more contemporary large-scale ventures in commerce and investment. A comparative analysis of Chander Pahar from fiction to film will shed light on the strategic shifts in Indian-African relations. The film’s updated vision of the growing affiliations between Africa and India is not only influenced by the impact of the Indian diaspora on the Indian economy but also by India’s changing role as an aspiring economic and political powerhouse.
This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which t... more This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which there has been a much-documented explosion of recent interest. A diverse group of scholars from Asia, Europe, and North America examine aesthetics, politics, and ideology in sequential art about South Asia and South Asian America. The book features contributions which address gender violence; authoritarian politics; caste discrimination; environmentalism; racism; and urban street art, amongst others. The unique interdisciplinary span of the volume considers mass popular comic books as well as the graphic novel. This edited volume would be of interest to those studying the influence of graphic novels, graphic narratives, and comic books in South Asia, as well as researchers interested in what these forms might have to say about important issues in society. This book was originally published as a special issue of the South Asian Review journal.
Research in African Literatures (Project Muse), 2020
Eastern African Literatures: Towards an Aesthetics of Proximity opens with the relentless rap rhy... more Eastern African Literatures: Towards an Aesthetics of Proximity opens with the relentless rap rhythm of the Kenyan poet, journalist, and eponymous “literary gangster” Tony Mochama, whose work communicates a “politics of agency, community and connectiveness” (viii). For Russell West-Pavlov, Mochama’s gangster diction and performance exemplify what the book sets out to accomplish, called an “aesthetics of proximity,” by presenting a compelling diagnosis of the field of contemporary East African literary production. The book offers an exciting insight into East African literary and cultural history since at least the middle of the twentieth century by demonstrating a discerning command of the regional politics, identities, and (hi)stories extant in its literary landscape in English. In exploring how this literary landscape asserts a characteristic regional distinctiveness, the book invites us to appreciate the nuanced implications of “proximity” as an aesthetic category in “East African” writing in English.
This essay revisits the years 1961-1963 through a selection of poems written by Rajat Neogy for T... more This essay revisits the years 1961-1963 through a selection of poems written by Rajat Neogy for Transition magazine. There is an inherent tension in Neogy’s surrealism between its imaginative exposé of symbolic planes of abstract existence, and the distressing reality of post-Independent Uganda for the Asian expatriates. Avant-garde and ambitious, Transition was founded by Neogy in 1961 as an intellectually autonomous forum for East African literary culture. The magazine’s cosmopolitan contributions reflected the cosmopolitan ambience of Kampala. Born in Kampala in 1938 to East Bengali immigrant parents, Neogy’s writings are influenced by and reflect the anxieties of the expatriate communities unsure about their identity and status in the post-Independent scheme of things.
One afternoon in November 1961, a young man with a “[b]ig beard, lots of hair [and] huge black br... more One afternoon in November 1961, a young man with a “[b]ig beard, lots of hair [and] huge black brooding eyes” (Hume 1967, 35), walked into a bar in Kampala carrying copies of an English-language magazine. As the young man pushed through the lunchtime crowd, an Englishman tore a copy, stomped on it, and shouted: “That’s what I think of your magazine!” (Hume 1967, 35).
This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which t... more This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which there has been a much-documented explosion of recent interest. A diverse group of scholars from Asia, Europe, and North America examine aesthetics, politics, and ideology in sequential art about South Asia and South Asian America. The book features contributions which address gender violence; authoritarian politics; caste discrimination; environmentalism; racism; and urban street art, amongst others. The unique interdisciplinary span of the volume considers mass popular comic books as well as the graphic novel. This edited volume would be of interest to those studying the influence of graphic novels, graphic narratives, and comic books in South Asia, as well as researchers interested in what these forms might have to say about important issues in society. This book was originally published as a special issue of the South Asian Review journal.
“We have heard your story from others / [...] Tell us all those stories in detail today / [...] T... more “We have heard your story from others / [...] Tell us all those stories in detail today / [...] Tell us of your joys and of your sorrows over there, / And in which months they occurred” (p. 45). Thus begins the first part of Book II of Chandrabati’s Ramayan (Translation: Poetry), Nabaneeta Dev Sen’s 2020 English translation of a work composed in the 16th century by the female poet Chandrabati, born in Kishoreganj, now in present-day Bangladesh. Of the hundreds of versions of the epic that exist in South Asia, Chandrabati’s irreverent retelling is the only one that reimagines the story from the perspective of Sita. Chandrabati, thought to have been the daughter of Bangshidas Bhattacharya, one of the authors of the Manasamangala, is also the author of two other notable works, Sundari Molua and Dasyu Kenaram. Chandrabati’s reassessment of Valmiki’s Ramayana is noteworthy for its Bengali rendition of the epic in the “Baromasi” (literally, “the twelve months”) lyrical tradition popular among village women across South Asia. In her retelling of the Ramayana, Chandrabati’s Sita is unencumbered by the divine trappings of her destiny and is turned into a human figure who earnestly comprehends the sorrows and lamentations of the everyday woman. The epic battle between Rama and Ravan are bypassed by Chandrabati who devotes all six sections of her Ramayan to women such as Mandodari and Kausalya and to worldly concerns of ordinary woman for whom the battle between Rama and Ravana is insignificant. It is notable that Bengali retellings of the Hindu epic, though not necessarily invested in the political and sexual equality of women, are “protofeminist” in the sense that the highpoint of such retellings is women’s experiences — from dominant mother goddesses to modest village women. In the popular and provincial songs called “Ramayan Gaan” (Songs of Ramayana) that prevail to this day in rural Bangladesh and Northeast India, Saymon Zakaria and Tutun Mukherjee, in “‘Ramayana Gaan’ or Singing the Ramayan in West Bengal, Assam and Bangladesh”, show that the indubitable authority of the goddesses Kali and Durga is imperative in the manifestation of the storyline. In the Bengali “Ramayan Gaan”, Sita manifests as Bhadrakali (Kali the protector), one of the many
his two forefingers outward, as if to exclaim his views emphatically. The subtitle, Reflections o... more his two forefingers outward, as if to exclaim his views emphatically. The subtitle, Reflections on his Life of Writing, indicates thought, contemplation, and identification of a wider community of readers with a deliberate marking of the difference Ngũgĩ made with his literary contributions. The book will be helpful to academics studying the influence of local language, or those who have interest in the social sciences, political sciences, or critical theory.
Wall art implores engagement with the urban spaces of the city: it demands to be looked at. One b... more Wall art implores engagement with the urban spaces of the city: it demands to be looked at. One becomes more aware of the physical space of the city by engaging with street art and graffiti. The mystery surrounding who produces these visual-verbal signs is as intriguing a question as who is watching or reading it. I argue that 'Subodh' exposes the untold stories of hardships that make and break a city. 'Subodh' encourages the spectator to look at the urban landscape of Dhaka in a new light away from the visions of sustainable development projects and housing projects to the drab realities of neglect and alienation.
The extensive epistolary correspondence across the far-flung peripheral regions of the British Em... more The extensive epistolary correspondence across the far-flung peripheral regions of the British Empire in the early decades of the twentieth century led to the formation of new associations and relationships. Letters, which are essentially gifts, led to the exchange of other kinds of gifts in the form of texts and manuscripts. This set in motion vibrant transcultural networks between scholars who communicated, collaborated and shared ideas through the exchanging and forwarding of letters. It is in this spirit of intellectual camaraderie vis-à-vis epistolary interactions that I examine the friendship between Akiki Nyabongo and Rabindranath Tagore, who in the span of a few months in 1937 formed an empathetic bond through letters in their joint opposition to diktats issued by fascist and colonialist regimes in Africa and India.
Insight, Queen’s College Oxford ISSN 2049-8349), 2015
The Akiki Nyabongo archive at Queen’s College Library contains an impressive collection of docume... more The Akiki Nyabongo archive at Queen’s College Library contains an impressive collection of documents carefully divided into personal letters, manuscripts of unpublished novels and short stories, lectures and speeches, and several anonymous photographs, which belonged to Nyabongo while he was completing a DPhil at the College in the early 1930s. The collection also includes a copy of Nyabongo’s DPhil thesis ‘The religious practices and beliefs of Uganda’ (1939) which critiques the British anthropologist Lucy Mair’s ethnographic study on Buganda in An African people in the twentieth century (1934). The bulk of Nyabongo’s works dating from the 1930s, which examine different aspects of Ugandan life under colonial government, can be divided into three permissible sections with evident overlaps: these are, his enquiry into the anthropological, the religious, and the educational avenues of enquiry.
As part of the recent worldwide cinematographic trend in adapting children’s fantasy and adventur... more As part of the recent worldwide cinematographic trend in adapting children’s fantasy and adventure stories into films, this article offers critical insight into contemporary West Bengali film industry’s reworking of this trend in its 2013 cinematic adaptation of Chander Pahar (1937) by the Bengali novelist Bibhutibhusan Bandapadhyay (1894–1950). I argue that in this adaptation the filmmaker deliberately expands on the author’s original vision of the intricacies of race relations. The film’s staging of the fateful encounter of Bengal with Africa is grounded on a common history of the past between India and Africa linked by migration and settlement and of more contemporary large-scale ventures in commerce and investment. A comparative analysis of Chander Pahar from fiction to film will shed light on the strategic shifts in Indian-African relations. The film’s updated vision of the growing affiliations between Africa and India is not only influenced by the impact of the Indian diaspora on the Indian economy but also by India’s changing role as an aspiring economic and political powerhouse.
This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which t... more This book explores the field of Comics Studies in South Asia, illuminating an art form in which there has been a much-documented explosion of recent interest. A diverse group of scholars from Asia, Europe, and North America examine aesthetics, politics, and ideology in sequential art about South Asia and South Asian America. The book features contributions which address gender violence; authoritarian politics; caste discrimination; environmentalism; racism; and urban street art, amongst others. The unique interdisciplinary span of the volume considers mass popular comic books as well as the graphic novel. This edited volume would be of interest to those studying the influence of graphic novels, graphic narratives, and comic books in South Asia, as well as researchers interested in what these forms might have to say about important issues in society. This book was originally published as a special issue of the South Asian Review journal.
Research in African Literatures (Project Muse), 2020
Eastern African Literatures: Towards an Aesthetics of Proximity opens with the relentless rap rhy... more Eastern African Literatures: Towards an Aesthetics of Proximity opens with the relentless rap rhythm of the Kenyan poet, journalist, and eponymous “literary gangster” Tony Mochama, whose work communicates a “politics of agency, community and connectiveness” (viii). For Russell West-Pavlov, Mochama’s gangster diction and performance exemplify what the book sets out to accomplish, called an “aesthetics of proximity,” by presenting a compelling diagnosis of the field of contemporary East African literary production. The book offers an exciting insight into East African literary and cultural history since at least the middle of the twentieth century by demonstrating a discerning command of the regional politics, identities, and (hi)stories extant in its literary landscape in English. In exploring how this literary landscape asserts a characteristic regional distinctiveness, the book invites us to appreciate the nuanced implications of “proximity” as an aesthetic category in “East African” writing in English.
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