Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay: The Author of Devdas

Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay was poor for most of his life. He did not become famous until he was nearly forty.

Yet his stories were later adapted for the screen about 90 times. This lesson covers his life, his novels, his politics and the exam traps.

1Who was Sarat Chandra?

He was a poor Brahmin boy who became Bengal’s most loved storyteller.

• He was born on 15 September 1876 at Debanandapur, in Hooghly district.
• His family was Brahmin and poor.
• His mother was Bhubanmohini Devi. She raised him through years of family hardship.
• He spent part of his youth at Bhagalpur, at his maternal uncles’ house.
• Poverty cut his formal education short.
• Even so, the University of Dacca gave him an honorary Doctor of Literature in 1936.
• Admirers call him Aparajeya Kathashilpi, the “unconquered storyteller”.
• He wrote in simple Bengali, close to everyday speech.
• He published almost nothing of note before the age of 37.
• After that he wrote steadily for about two decades.
• He died on 16 January 1938 in Calcutta, aged 61.

2What did the Burma years change?

He found a job far from home, and found his voice there.

• He left for Burma in 1903.
• Burma was then a province of British India. It became a separate colony in 1937.
• He worked there for about 13 years.
• He ended up at the Burma Public Works Accounts Office in Rangoon.
• He kept reading and writing in his spare hours.
• In 1913 he began writing again for the Bengali magazine Jamuna.
• Readers loved his work almost at once.
• He returned to Bengal in 1916 and wrote full-time.
• Exams may ask where he worked before fame. The answer is Burma.

3What are his major works?

His books are about family, love and social pressure.

• Devdas was published in 1917.
• It has been adapted for film and television more than 20 times.
• Famous film versions include P. C. Barua’s 1935 film, Bimal Roy’s 1955 film and Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s 2002 film.
• Parineeta (1914) is another well-known novel.
• Srikanta came out in four parts, from 1917 to 1933.
• Grihadaha followed in 1920.
• Other novels include Pallisamaj (1916), Charitraheen (1917) and Datta (1918).
• Late in life he wrote Shesh Prashna (1931).
• Together these books deal with village life, widowhood, class and love.
• Pather Dabi came out in 1926.
• Many of his works were filmed in Bengali, Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and other languages.
• Across languages, his works have been adapted for the screen nearly 90 times.
• In 1978 the film Swami won the Filmfare Award for Best Story. It was based on his story.

4What was his link with politics?

His novels were mostly about home, but he was active in the Congress.

• He served as president of the Howrah District Congress Committee from 1921 to 1936.
• That was the era of non-cooperation and the Swaraj Party.
• He was close to Chittaranjan Das and Subhas Chandra Bose.
• Pather Dabi is the clear exception among his novels. It is openly political.
• It was critical of colonial rule.
• The government banned it in 1927.
• The ban stayed in force until 1939.
• For the wider movement, see The Non-Cooperation Movement.

5What is his legacy?

He wrote about people, not parties, and that helped him travel far.

• His stories have also been staged as plays and shown as television serials.
• Many readers still know them first through films, not books.
• His fiction gives close, sympathetic portraits of women’s lives.
• Biographers link this partly to his mother’s hard years.
• Most of his novels avoid direct political argument.
• That helped them travel across Indian languages and regions.
• In 1923 Calcutta University gave him the Jagattarini Gold Medal.
• In 1936 the University of Dacca gave him an honorary doctorate.
• He is among the most translated and most adapted Indian authors.
• He came after Bankim Chandra in Bengali fiction. Many readers now rank him as equally popular.

6What are the exam traps?

No indexed past paper names him directly. Expect a “which novel is his?” question.

• Do not mix up Devdas (1917) with Parineeta (1914).
• Do not mix up his novels with Bankim’s. Bankim wrote Anandamath.
• Only Pather Dabi was banned. It was banned in 1927.
• Do not call him a political writer. Most of his work is about family and social life.
• Do not confuse him with Sarat Chandra Bose, who was Subhas Chandra Bose’s elder brother.
• Remember the Burma link: 1903 to 1916.
• Remember the two Bengali giants of the novel in order. Bankim came first, with Anandamath in 1882. Sarat came later, with Devdas in 1917.
• If a question gives a plot about love, regret and ruin, think of Devdas.