Author Archives: secondsaturn

About secondsaturn

Independent Scholar. Polymath.

The Three Impressionists

Posted on September 14, 2021 by secondsaturn

I love the threesome, Vincent Van Gogh, Paul Cezanne and Claude Monet. I don’t think that they were a trio, but nonetheless I always thought of them together. They were born around the middle of the 19th century and lived … Continue reading →

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The White Winged Horse Called Pegasus

Posted on August 11, 2021 by secondsaturn

Memories of Pegasus returned to me after so many years with the snooping activities of the government. The present Pegasus is however a software that can tap into mobile phone conversations. The BJP government has been using this software to … Continue reading →

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Nusrat Jahan

Posted on July 1, 2021 by secondsaturn

The case of Nusrat Jahan has upset mainly the young, idealist, zesty and nationalist minded Bengalis much concerned with the pride and dignity of their culture, little realizing that it is the Renaissance and not the Sati that defines Bengal. … Continue reading →

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In a way, A Warning to the Muslims

Posted on July 1, 2021 by secondsaturn

A smart alec Muslim young girl, perhaps to be in the fashion fray of fiery women from Bengal in the likes of Mohua, Mimi and Nusrat and the hanger on Ms Hakim, decided to also write an open letter to … Continue reading →

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Kotal Kahini by Biswanath Lahiri

Posted on June 7, 2021 by secondsaturn

Biswanath Lahiri. Kotaal Kahini. Dey’s Publishing. Calcutta. 1971. When I was growing up in the early 1970’s, I often heard Madhuri mashi, whose death anniversary is today talk of Kotaal Kahini as though it were a novel. Only last week … Continue reading →

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Raja Rammohan Roy 250 years and not out…

Posted on May 22, 2021 by secondsaturn

When I recently, which is just about a year, started to study Raja Rammohan Roy both as a scholar and philosopher I realized that our history books had mistakenly written about him as being the first Indian to be fully … Continue reading →

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Raja Rammohan Roy

Posted on May 1, 2021 by secondsaturn

When I read about Raja Rammohan Roy in school, I was taught to believe that he preached a new religion that spoke of One God, making Hinduism in similar vein to Islam and Christianity, Judaism and Zoroastrianism. The ideas and … Continue reading →

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Michael Madhusudan Datta – Miusunderstood by Mediocres

Posted on April 2, 2021 by secondsaturn

Betrayed By Hope. A Play on the Life of Michael Madhusudan Dutt. Namita Gokhale and Malashri Lal. Harper and Collins. New Delhi. 2020. Betrayed By Hope is a slim volume consisting of a single play that seeks to investigate the … Continue reading →

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Keshub Chandra Sen – Pedestrianization of the Brahmo Samaj

Posted on March 1, 2021 by secondsaturn

Sanjiv Chattopadhyay. Dharmayuddha. Bengali. Dey’s Publication. Kolkata. 2011. The book is a biography of Keshab Chandra Sen, a prominent social reformer of Bengal who lived between 1838 and 1884 and occupies the mind of the Bengali intelligentsia as man of … Continue reading →

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Bankimchandra and Bangadarshan – Looking Into the Future of Bengali Language

Posted on February 4, 2021 by secondsaturn

Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay was already an established novelist and a well-entrenched bureaucrat under the British rule when he decided around the 1870’s to edit a Bengali literary magazine called Bangadarshan. The idea behind this was to expand the reach of the … Continue reading →

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