“Blood mist blurs my vision”: Six poems by Sukanta Bhattacharya

Abstract

ABSTRACTSukanta Bhattacharya’s powerful, bittersweet verses portray experiences of shared loss and survival in colonial Bengal of the 1940s – a cataclysmic and watershed decade in the region’s history. The emotional intensity and intellectual honesty of his work led to his being regarded as a celebrated Bengali poet. While the appeal and relevance of his poems remain undiminished, the meagre efforts to translate them into English have hitherto confined his reputation to a restricted circle of Bengali poetry lovers. Six of his poems are presented here in English translation in order to introduce readers of poetry in English to his artistic sensibility and concerns. Uniting the communicative and aesthetic functions of literary translation, this project aims to surmount the inadequacies of most existing translations of Bhattacharya’s poetry that have not only failed to impress the target readership, but also diminished his poetic significance and marginalized his contribution to Indian and world literatures.