Reading formed a major programme of each day and her father of course encouraged this love for books. All the books in the library of Rambagan had been transferred to the Garden House, where there was much more space and Toru was able to read to her heart’s content. She was a rapid reader and remarked: “The reason why I can go through a book so fast is very plain and simple, it is simply owing to our quiet and retired mode of life; the time we would have had to give to dinner, lunch, breakfast, croquet, lawn-tennis, or picnic parties, is wholly given up to reading, and then I was always a book-worm, even when I was quite a child!”17 Her isolated mode of life is clearly evident here in this remark.
Thus lived Toru in the midst of her family, rejoicing the small things that made up her quiet life, and unostentatiously accepting the honours that came to her as a poet. Her wants were simple –a mosquito net for her canary, look at her horses in the early morning, pleasure in the glorious bloom of a seemul tree, song from her mother, the feel of her father’s hand in hers as she lies at death’s door, thus she lived her little life. Mlle Clarisse Bader writing after her death gives a picture, which lives on through the years. 18
The first few months after the Dutts returned home were spent apparently in collecting the translations of French poems by Aru and Toru and sending them to be published in the poet’s corner of the Bengal Magazine. A continuous output of fresh translations came pouring out from Toru and a few from Aru. Toru now enters into ‘a feverish dream of intellectual effort and imaginative production’, when we consider what she achieved in these forty-five months of seclusion.
At the turn of the year, quite early in 1874, both Aru and Toru fell ill. In March she wrote to Mary after an interval of three months, when she had recovered a little. Her cough was better and she was gaining weight, and by May she was almost well again because of the dry intense heat of Bengal. Aru, however, was not making the progress which had been expected.
It was when the family returned to Calcutta that the sisters were able to face their own world with some self-assurance and maturity of understanding. Then all at once Aru died. The heart – broken family could only fall back on their faith. She was so strong that it inspired Toru to exert herself doubly. She now realized that she could not escape her sister’s fate. She wrote to Mary from Rambagan in September “We feel lonely without her who was the life and soul of our small family.” In one of her translations she wrote:
Though childhood’s days were past and gone,
More innocent no child could be,
Though grace in every feature shone,
Her maiden heart was fancy free.
A few more months, or haply days,
And Love would blossom, -so we thought,
As lifts in April’s genial rays
The rose its clusters richly wrought.
But god has destined otherwise,
And so she gently fell asleep,
A creature of the starry skies,
Too lovely for the earth to keep.19
Toru’s sunniness however, remained although darkened now and then by the memory of a lost brother and a lost sister. This piece is taken from Chateau Briand’s poem ‘Romance’:
SWEET, Oh sweet is thy memory
My birth- place hid in greenery!
My sister, how the days seemed fair
When we
First breathed of France the liberal air
Down there!
Dost thou like me remember clear
How oft while we the hearth stood near
Our mother clasped us, nothing loth
My dear ?
And we her hair with answering troth
Kissed both? 20
Meanwhile she got ready her rendering from the French into English for the press, and these appeared in 1875 with the title A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields. Of the 165 pieces, 8 were by Aru, and Toru had also added notes on the French poets represented in the volume. Among the more well known of Toru’s translations was The Leaf by Arnault which has been much appreciated for its depth of thought. The leaf, dry and yellow, after being detached from its stalk in a tempest, transported by the changeful and rude wind, over mountains, hills and woods, surrenders herself to the will of God:
I go where they lead,
I fear not, nor heed,
Nor, ever complain.
The rose too must go,
And the laurel, I know,
And all things below.
Then why should I strain,
Ah me! to remain? 21
The same feeling of resignation we find in Toru’s outlook after the calamity that befell in her house. Toru felt alone and helpless as she lost her family members because of the same disease, consumption. Still, life resumed its normal course in Rambagan after Aru’s death .It almost seemed as if Govin and his wife and the one remaining daughter were determined to bury their sorrow deep within themselves and live for God alone, and for their scholarship and work. Toru was steadfast to her usual interests and in one of her letters she wrote to Mary about her love for England and her desire to shift there. Lonely and bereft Toru now seemed, in spite of her voracious reading to find time lagging and she wanted to brush up her arithmetic again.
After a few months, the Dutts again visited Baugmaree Garden house. They had not been able to bear staying at this retreat earlier as every nook and corner reminded them of Aru. She had filled the house with ‘her sweet disposition’.
The idea of starting to learn Sanskrit now began to haunt Toru. Govin was anxious to help her with the study of India’s great classical language. He felt that the bond between Toru and him would grow even stronger if they undertook this new departure in learning together. A deep understanding grew between father and daughter which Toru expresses so aptly in two of her poems, A Mon Pere, the last poem, an original poem and not a translation in the Sheaf, and The Tree of Life in the Ballads :
Broad daylight, with a sense of weariness!
Mine eyes were closed, but I was not asleep.
My hand was in my father’s, and I felt
His presence near me. Thus we often passed
In silence, hour by hour. What was the need
Of interchanging words when every thought
That in our hearts arose, was known to each,
And every pulse kept time. 22
Lines taken from Toru’s original poem A Tree of Life, beautifully describe the fine-tuning between the father and daughter. Her only consolation at that crucial moment was her father. One can easily imagine her present state of mind, how so disappointed and helpless she felt!
Toru was desperately in need of her roots, which she could find only in her own rich cultural and historical past. Her timely decision to learn Sanskrit was applauded by her father. Though Toru’s feeling for French seems indeed to have been as sensitive as her feeling for English. She nevertheless, was not slow to realize that her own oriental background of literature was so precious that she would have to commingle it with her earlier abundant knowledge of French and English.Toru Dutt, therefore, did not have to apologize to those Pundits who claim that mother tongues are the only languages which creative writers should use.
The literary and spiritual affinity of Toru Dutt to France, England and India complicates the problem of her identity. Moreover the fact of Toru’s devout acceptance of Christianity strengthens the impression of her complex identity.
Indian legends served for Toru Dutt an emotional bridge between India and her alienated psyche because of her warm familiarity with them through her mother. The ballads mark the young poet’s struggle to overcome the crisis of triple alienation, and to reassert her own Indian identity.
Many poems of Toru were published in the Bengal Magazine, for after Aru’s death Toru continued to appear in the Poet’s corner under the initials T.D. Toru seemed particularly interested in Leconte De Lisle, and at the end of 1874 published an essay on him in Bengal Magazine, with translations of some of his poems. Toru had a particular affinity w
ith this French poet. His poem La Morte DeValmiki naturally attracted an Indian. Edmund Gosse says :“This study, which was illustrated by translations into English verse, was followed by another on Josphin Soulary, in whom she saw more than her maturer judgement might have justified. There is something very interesting and now, alas! Still more pathetic in these sturdy and workmanlike essays in unaided criticism. Still more solitary her work became, in July 1874 when her only sister, Aru, died at the age of twenty.” 23
As mentioned above, we take one poem of Lecante De Lisle, which Toru praised in her notes attached with the Sheaf. This is Lecante De Lisle’s famous sonnet Autumn Sunset:
The wind of autumn has its course began!
With lamentations strange and sad adieus
Like far sea-murmers in the avenues
It sways the heavy branches; these have won
A tinge of evening’s rich Vermillion,
And balanced shed their leaves of various hues;
Look at these nests the bird’s no longer use!
And look-oh looks at the departing sun!
Depart, O Sun! Light’s fountain! Nature’s choice!24
In above lines we find a reflection of her broken heart and secluded life. In the same manner Toru also mentioned Josephin Soulary in her A Sheaf Gleaned in French Field’s. Here is one extract of his poem The Retreat:
That was my house and desert. There I played
And there I dreamed, oft mindless of the pledge
I left at home or school. There, eyes, ears and hearts
Revelled in rays and sounds, from men apart
O nook retired! O childhood’s best loved goal!
Can I not stretch myself in thee once more.
Ah me! What mighty magic may restore
That puny figure, and that free great soul! 25
Here once again we find an autobiographical strain as Toru herself again and again recollects her memories of her lost childhood and her house, with siblings.
Toru’s own ill health was also responsible for her alienation from society. By the end of 1874 Toru was again very ill. She was confined to bed and was spitting blood and had frequent bouts of fever. And yet she hoped to go abroad, and the doctor said this may be possible by the spring of the next year. But her wish could not be fulfilled.
Toru wrote and wished her friend Mary a happy new year on January 1, 1875. But in February she again fell ill. By the spring no preparations could be made to go abroad. She was busy in reading the poetry of Elizabeth Barrette Browning and Bleak House. A new batch of books had arrived from England. She fully absorbed herself to reading – as in one of her translation one finds:
The autumn had bestrewed the vale
With withered leaves, - the woods were left
Bare, and of mystery bereft
And voiceless was the nightingale;
Sad, almost dying in his dawn,
A sick youth wandered slow in tears
Once more in places far withdrawn
That he had loved in earlier years
Woods that I love, adieu! - Your gloom,
Your mourning suits me for I read
In every leaf that falls my doom!
The hour approaches and with speed.” 26
Perhaps Toru had heard the footsteps of approaching death.
Calcutta was wildly excited at the approaching visit of the Prince of Wales [Edward VII]. Govin Chunder was asked to join a reception committee. Apart from this coming event, life seemed to have been quiet, as usual, Toru tabulates her time-table for an average day; “We live a very quiet life here and I have very little news to give you. I got up at half past four. Prepare two cups of chocolate, one for myself and one for Papa. Then I go to dress and by the time I come out of the dressing room. Papa and Mama get up and I find the former smoking his morning cigar ….. At 12 we have our lunch, after which I read or write till three, when I either take a custard apple, or a slice of Batavian orange. At five we dress and go out, I generally for a drive and Papa and Mama to my Uncles garden. At seven we have our dinner, and at 8:30p.m a cup of tea and at ten to bed.”27
By now Toru had completed her Sheaf Gleaned in French fields.28 The concluding sonnet A Mon Pere was an original verse and a very beautiful one. It has been considered quite perfect by some critics.
The flowers look loveliest in their native soil
Amid their kindred branches; plucked, they fade,
And lose the colours nature on them laid,
Though bound in garlands with assiduous toil.
Pleasant it was, a far from all turmoil,
To wander through the valley, now in shade
And now in sunshine, where these blossoms made
A Paradise, and gather in my spoil.
But better than myself no man can know
How tarnished have become their tender hues
E’en in the gathering, and how dimmed their glow!
Wouldst thou again new life in them infuse,
Thou who hast seen them where they brightly blow?
Ask Memory. She shall help my stammering Muse.29
A beautiful piece, presents Toru’s sense of loss in a very apt manner. She was disturbed by the memory of her lost brother and sister and she knew very well that she couldn’t get back those fine days spent in the company of her family members. She was alone witness for the ruin that took place in her family.
Now that the book was complete, Toru had nothing much to do and started her long cherished wish to learn Sanskrit. She began her studies on December 4. Toru longed to read the Ramayana and the Mahabharata in original.
In the meanwhile the usual routine with a few outside contacts continued. At this time, Govin Chunder showed Toru’s French translations to a publisher, but Calcutta publishers were very timid. The publisher referred Govin to another publisher. Thus another year ended without the hope of publishing her first book.
Toru now set herself whole-heartedly to the task of learning Sanskrit and with her gift for mastering languages, was in a short time able to read it quite fluently. But ten months was all she was allowed. Her health now began to deteriorate so quickly that she had to abandon her new hobby under her doctor’s order by September of next year. By July 1876, she found the grammar very difficult, she had finished the three parts of RijuPat and was going to begin reading Shakuntala by Kalidasa; but all too soon her studies were cut short.
The Prince, whose visit was expected, had come and gone and Calcutta reposed smug and satiated after the visit. Toru enjoyed his visit.Babu Jagdananda Mukerjea caused much excitement when he invited the prince to his house and introduced him to some of the women of the family. In Bengali society most of the women were in purdah at the time and Toru comment that Babu Jagadnanda broke a Hindu convention. Bengalis felt that an insult and an outrage on Hindu society had been perpetrated. The Prince had not visited any house in a personal capacity .He only went to Jagadnanda’s home because the latter promised the Prince that he would introduce his ladies to him. One of the journals complained that it was an unpardonable action. This incident clearly portrays the picture of 19th century Bengali woman. It is quite noticeable that Toru, defied all the restrictions imposed on the woman of that time In fact she was against all those rigid conventions that makes a woman inferior to man .In one of her ballad Savitri she points out clearly :
“In those far –off primeval day”
Fair India’s daughters were not pent
In closed Zenanas.30
Like Sarojini Naidu, she was an ardent lover and a strong supporter of equality of man and woman. In one of her pictures, which was sent to her friend Mlle Clarisse Bader, from Calcutta both Aru and Toru were dressed in elaborate frilled Victorian frocks and one wonders why they did not wear the sari or if they ever dressed in Indian costume even when they returned home to Calcutta. This incident indicates that Toru’s mind was saturated with the western images and ideas in spite of her Indian background and teaching.
At last Toru’
s book was to be published and she was busy correcting the proof. Toru was now interested in a French Book entitled La Femme dans L’lnde Antique. She was so fascinated by this rendering of the lives of Indian heroine by a French woman that she asked the author Mlle Clarisse Bader’s permission to translate it. There after followed a friendship, which has become a part of Toru’s life and memory. Here again we notice that after the death of her sister Aru, Toru became companion less and suffered acutely from a lack of intellectual companionship, she found in her immediate environment, no one of her intellectual stature with whom she could discuss literary things or matters. She laments:
O Desert of the heart!
In our fresh youth, when all things are new-born
Before we love in our impatience, old.
We mourn our fates as though we were forlorn:
Then also how thou seemest vast and cold!
O Desert of the heart!
We long for love, we think the heavens are rude,
The future looks all cloud and storm and rain
And fierce against the barriers that exclude
Our bliss we strike but seem to strike in vain
O Desert of the heart. 31
4th March was Toru’s birthday and though only twenty, she wrote to Mary: ‘I am getting old n’st ce pas?’ Later she commented on a Parsee girl’s curiosity as to whether Toru had children and Toru’s answer that she was not married! Toru wrote to Mary: ‘Marriage, as you know is a great thing with Hindus. An unmarried girl of fifteen is never heard of it in our country.’ In Indian families one was almost a grandmother at twenty-four. Papa is getting old and so am I. I feel so old sometimes.’32 Here again we find a longing or a sense of unfulfilled desire. Toru felt herself estranged from the rest of the society, as she was unmarried even at the age of twenty.
In one of her novel Le Journal de mademoiselle de Arvers, the heroine of the novel Marguerite is torn between Louis and Count Dunois. She loves the latter, who loves the maid Jeannette, and kills his own brother Gaston on account of jealously, and later kills himself. After a long illness, Marguerite marries the worthy Louis and she becomes a mother and dies. Up to a point, Marguerite is Toru’s self portrait - a veiled picture of her imaginative life. One can say that there was a desire deep rooted in Toru’s heart for marriage and family life but the crucial hands of destiny snatched all her desires in a very early age. Though she is never known to have loved any one or to have thought of marrying, an unconscious desire for the love of a husband and children must have been hers, like that of any normal woman.
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