Introduction

Abstract

The ‘Introduction’ helps the readers situate Hindu and Brahmo women’s literary outpourings within the wider sociopolitical context of nineteenth-century Bengal. It locates the eager penmanship of Bengali women within the larger and growing milieu of print literature; the tension between formal and informal forms of Bengali language; and the statistical analysis of ‘books in print’. The startling fact of the price of woman-authored books being on par with male-authored ones is a revelation about the market for women-authored texts. Extant literature on women authors in the nineteenth century considers the major scholarly epitomes that have appeared in the last 50 years in Bangla and English on women’s writings in Bengal. The ‘Chapters’ Overview’ deals with autobiographies, diaries, didactic tracts, novels, and travelogues written by women writers to examine how their literary production varied in style, content, and language form within and across genres. It demonstates both divergences and convergences in literary creations amongst male and female writers.