Bengali renaissance

The Bengali renaissance or simply Bengal renaissance, (Bengali: বাংলার নবজাগরণ; Bānglār nabajāgaraṇ) was a cultural, social,
intellectual and artistic movement in Bengal region of the Indian subcontinent during the period of the British Indian Empire, from
the nineteenth century to the early twentieth century. The Bengal renaissance can be said to have started with Raja Ram Mohan Roy
(1772–1833) and ended with Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941), although there have been many stalwarts, such as Satyajit Ray
(1921-1992), thereafter embodying particular aspects of the unique intellectual and creative output.[1] Nineteenth-century Bengal was
a unique blend of religious and social reformers, scholars, literary giants, journalists, patriotic orators and scientists, all merging to
[2]
form the image of a renaissance, and marked the transition from the 'medieval' to the 'modern'.

Contents
Background
Comparison with European renaissance
Science and technology
Arts and literature
Religion and spirituality
Contributing institutions
See also
References
Further reading
External links

Background
During this period, Bengal witnessed an intellectual awakening that is in some way similar to
the Renaissance in Europe during the 16th century, although Europeans of that age were not
confronted with the challenge and influence of alien colonialism. This movement questioned
existing orthodoxies, particularly with respect to women, marriage, the dowry system, the
caste system, and religion. One of the earliest social movements that emerged during this time
was the Young Bengal movement, that espoused rationalism and atheism as the common
denominators of civil conduct among upper caste educated Hindus.

The parallel socio-religious movement, the Brahmo Samaj, developed during this time period
and counted many of the leaders of the Bengal Renaissance among its followers.[3] In the
earlier years the Brahmo Samaj, like the rest of society, could not however, conceptualize, in
that feudal-colonial era, a free India as it was influenced by the European Enlightenment (and
its bearers in India, the British Raj) although it traced its intellectual roots to the Upanishads.
Their version of Hinduism, or rather Universal Religion (similar to that of Ramakrishna),
although devoid of practices like sati and polygamy that had crept into the social aspects of
Raja Ram Mohan Roy is
regarded as the "Father of Hindu life, was ultimately a rigid impersonal monotheistic faith, which actually was quite
the Bengal Renaissance." distinct from the pluralistic and multifaceted nature of the way the Hindu religion was
practiced. Future leaders like Keshub Chunder Sen were as much devotees of Christ, as they
were of Brahma, Krishna or the Buddha. It has been argued by some scholars that the Brahmo
 Samaj movement never gained the support of the masses and remained restricted to the elite,
although Hindu society has accepted most of the social reform programmes of the Brahmo
Samaj. It must also be acknowledged that many of the later Brahmos were also leaders of the
freedom movement.

The renaissance period after the Indian Rebellion of 1857 saw a magnificent outburst of
Bengali literature. While Ram Mohan Roy and Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar were the pioneers,
others like Bankim Chandra Chatterjee widened it and built upon it.[4] The first significant
nationalist detour to the Bengal Renaissance was given by the writings of Bankim Chandra
Chatterjee. Later writers of the period who introduced broad discussion of social problems and
more colloquial forms of Bengali into mainstream literature included Saratchandra Chatterjee.

The Tagore family, including Rabindranath

Keshub Chandra Sen is one Tagore, were leaders of this period and had a
of the early pioneers of particular interest in educational reform.[5]
Brahmo Samaj.
Their contribution to the Bengal Renaissance
was multi-faceted. Tagore's 1901 Bengali
novella, Nastanirh was written as a critique
of men who professed to follow the ideals of the Renaissance, but failed to do so
within their own families. In many ways Rabindranath Tagore's writings (especially
poems and songs) can be seen as imbued with the spirit of the Upanishads. His Rabindranath Tagore is Asia's first
Nobel laureate and composer of
works repeatedly allude to Upanishadic ideas regarding soul, liberation,
Jana Gana Mana the national
transmigration and—perhaps most essentially—about a spirit that imbues all anthem of India as well as Amar
creation not unlike the Upanishadic Brahman. Tagore's English translation of a set of Shonar Bangla the national anthem
poems titled the Gitanjali won him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1913. He was of Bangladesh and Kazi Nazrul Islam
the first Asian to win this award (and the first non-European/non-white person of the national poet of Bangladesh.
'colour' to win the Nobel Prize in any category). That was the only example at the
time but the contribution of the Tagore family is enormous.[6]

Comparison with European renaissance

The word "renaissance" in European history meant "rebirth" and was used in the context of the revival of the Graeco-Roman learning
in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries after the long winter of the dark medieval period. A serious comparison was started by the
dramatis personae of the Bengal renaissance like Keshab Chandra Sen, Bipin Chandra Pal and M. N. Roy. For about a century,
Bengal's conscious awareness and the changing modern world was more developed and ahead of the rest of India. The role played by
Bengal in the modern awakening of India is thus comparable to the position occupied by Italy in the European renaissance. Very
much like the Italian Renaissance, it was not a mass movement; but instead restricted to the upper classes.

Though the Bengal Renaissance was the "culmination of the process of emergence of the cultural characteristics of the Bengali
people that had started in the age of Hussein Shah, it remained predominantly Hindu and only partially Muslim." There were,
nevertheless, examples of Muslim intellectuals such as Syed Ameer Ali, Mosharraf Hussain,[7] Sake Dean Mahomed, Kazi Nazrul
Islam, and Roquia Sakhawat Hussain. The Freedom of Intellect Movementsought to challenge religious and social dogma in Bengali
Muslim society.

Science and technology

During the Bengal Renaissance science was also advanced by several Bengali scientists such as Satyendra Nath Bose, Anil Kumar
Gain, Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis, Jagadish Chandra Bose and Meghnad Saha. Sir Jagadish Chandra Bose was a polymath: a
physicist, biologist, botanist, archaeologist, and writer of science fiction.[8] He pioneered the investigation of radio and microwave
optics, made very significant contributions to plant science, and laid the foundations of experimental science in the Indian
subcontinent.[9] He is considered one of the fathers of radio science,[10] and is also considered the father of Bengali science fiction.
He was the first from the Indian subcontinent to get a US patent, in 1904. Anil Kumar Gain and Prasanta Chandra Mahalanobis were
leading mathematicians and statisticians of their time. Gain went on to found Vidyasagar University, while Mahalanobis laid the
foundation of the Indian Statistical Institute. Satyendra Nath Bose was a physicist, specializing in mathematical physics. He is best
known for his work on quantum mechanics in the early 1920s, providing the foundation for Bose-Einstein statistics and the theory of
the Bose-Einstein condensate. He is honoured as the namesake of the boson. Although more than one Nobel Prize was awarded for
research related to the concepts of the boson, Bose-Einstein statistics and Bose-Einstein condensate—the latest being the 2001 Nobel
Prize in Physics, which was given for advancing the theory of Bose-Einstein condensates—Bose himself was never awarded the
Nobel Prize.

Jagadish Chandra Satyendra Nath Bose Meghnad Saha Mohammed Fazle

Bose Rabbee

Arts and literature

According to historian Romesh Chunder Dutt:[11]

The conquest of Bengal by the English was not only a political revolution, but ushered in a greater revolution in
thoughts and ideas, in religion and society... From the stories of gods and goddesses, kings and queens, princes and
princesses, we have learnt to descend to the humble walks of life, to sympathise with the common citizen or even
common peasant … Every revolution is attended with vigour, and the present one is no exception to the rule.
Nowhere in the annals of Bengali literature are so many and so bright names found crowded together in the limited
space of one century as those of Ram Mohan Roy, Akshay Kumar Dutt, Isvar Chandra Vidyasagar, Michael
Madhusudan Dutt, Hem Chandra Banerjee, Bankim Chandra Chatterjee and Dina Bandhu Mitra. Within the three
quarters of the present century, prose, blank verse, historical fiction and drama have been introduced for the first time
in the Bengali literature...
 Ishwar Chandra Michael Madhusudan Bankim Chandra Bibhutibhushan
Vidyasagar Dutt Chattopadhyay Bandyopadhyay

Begum Rokeya Satyajit Ray Sukumar Ray

Religion and spirituality

Most notable Bengali religious and spiritual personalities are Atiśa, Tilopa, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, Ramakrishna, Sree Sree Thakur
Anukulchandra, Nityananda, Haridasa Thakur, Jiva Goswami, Ramprasad Sen, Lokenath Brahmachari, Swami Vivekananda, Keshub
Chandra Sen, Balananda Brahmachari,Vishuddhananda Paramahansa, Sri Aurobindo, Lahiri Mahasaya, Bamakhepa, Yukteswar Giri,
Debendranath Tagore, Swami Abhedananda, Bhaktivinoda Thakur, Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati, A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami
Prabhupada, Mohanananda Brahmachari, Sitaramdas Omkarnath, Ram Thakur, Lalon, Tibbetibaba, Soham Swami, Nigamananda
Paramahansa, Niralamba Swami, Pranavananda, Bijoy Krishna Goswami, Paramahansa Yogananda, Prabhat Ranjan Sarkar,
Anukulchandra Chakravarty, Anandamayi Ma, Hariharananda Giri, Anirvan and Sri Chinmoy.

Chaitanya Ramprasad Sen Ramakrishna Swami Vivekananda

Mahaprabhu

Sri Aurobindo Paramahansa A. C. Bhaktivedanta

Yogananda Swami Prabhupada
Contributing institutions
Asiatic Society (est.1784)
Fort William College (1800)
Serampore College (1817)
Calcutta School-Book Society(1817)
Hindu School (1817)
Hare School (1818)
Sanskrit College (1824)
General Assembly's Institution (1830) (now known asScottish Church College)
Calcutta Medical College(1835)
Mutty Lall Seal's Free School & College(1842)
Hindu College (1817) later Presidency College, Calcutta(1855) now Presidency University (since 2010)
Bengal Engineering College, Shibpur(1856) now known asIndian Institute of Engineering Science and T echnology,
Shibpur
University of Calcutta (1857)
Vidyasagar College (1872)
Hindu Mahila Vidyalaya (1873)
Banga Mahila Vidyalaya (1876)
Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science(1876)
Bethune College (1879)
Ripon College (1884) (now known asSurendranath College)
National Council of Education, Bengal (1906) (now known asJadavpur University)
Visva-Bharati University (1921)
University of Dhaka (1921)
Maharaja Manindra Chandra College(1941)
Seth Anandram Jaipuria College(1945)

The Asiatic Society Visva-Bharati Hare School Presidency University

University

Jadavpur University University of Calcutta University of Dhaka Calcutta Medical

College

See also
History of Bengal
Bengali people
Ramtanu Lahiri
 Ramtanu Lahiri O Tatkalin Bangasamaj
Adi Dharm
Prarthana Samaj
Ayyavazhi
Calcutta Youth Choir
Parineeta
Structure of Ayyavazhi
Tattwabodhini Patrika
Scottish Renaissance
Harlem Renaissance

References
1. History of the Bengali-speaking Peopleby Nitish Sengupta, p 211, UBS Publishers' Distributors Pvt. Ltd.ISBN 81-
7476-355-4.
2. Sumit Sarkar, "Calcutta and the Bengal Renaissance", in Calcutta, the Living City ed. Sukanta Chaudhuri, Vol I, p.
95.
3. "Reform and Education: Young Bengal & Derozio", Bengalinet.com (http://www.bangalinet.com/calcutta3.htm)
4. History of Bengali-speaking Peopleby Nitish Sengupta, p 253.
5. Kathleen M. O'Connell, "Rabindranath T
agore on Education", infed.org (http://www.infed.org/thinkers/tagore.htm)
6. Deb, Chitra, pp 64-65.
7. History of Bengali-speaking Peopleby Nitish Sengupta, p 210, 212-213.
8. A versatile genius (http://frontlineonnet.com/fl2124/stories/20041203003009100.htm)Archived (https://web.archive.o
rg/web/20090203202750/http://frontlineonnet.com/fl2124/stories/20041203003009100.htm) 3 February 2009 at the
Wayback Machine., Frontline 21 (24), 2004.
9. Chatterjee, Santimay and Chatterjee, Enakshi,Satyendranath Bose, 2002 reprint, p. 5, National Book Trust,
ISBN 8123704925
10. Sen, A. K. (1997). "Sir J.C. Bose and radio science".Microwave Symposium Digest. IEEE MTT-S International
Microwave Symposium. Denver, CO: IEEE. pp. 557–560. doi:10.1109/MWSYM.1997.602854(https://doi.org/10.110
9%2FMWSYM.1997.602854). ISBN 0-7803-3814-6.
11. Cultural Heritage of Bengalby R. C. Dutt, quoted by Nitish Sengupta, pp 211-212.

Further reading
Chatterjee, Pranab (2010).A Story of Ambivalent Modernization in Bangladesh and W
est Bengal: The Rise and Fall
of Bengali Elitism in South Asia. Peter Lang. ISBN 9781433108204.
Dasgupta, Subrata (2005).Twilight of the Bengal renaissance: R.K. Dasgupta & his quest for a world mind. the
University of California: Dey's Publishing.
Dasgupta, Subrata (2009).The Bengal Renaissance. Permanent Black. ISBN 978-8178242798.
Dasgupta, Subrata (2011).Awakening: The Story of the Bengal Renaissance. Random House India.ISBN 978-
8184001839.
Dhar, Niranjan (1977). Vedanta and the Bengal Renaissance. the University of Michigan: Minerva Associates.
ISBN 9780883868379.
Fraser, Bashabi edited Special Issue on Rabindranath Tagore, Literary Compass, Wiley Publications. Volume 12,
Issue 5, May 2015. See Fraser's Introduction pp. 161-72. ISSN 1741-4113.
Kabir, Abulfazal M. Fazle (2011).The Libraries of Bengal, 1700-1947: The Story of Bengali Renaissance
. Promilla &
Co. Publishers. ISBN 978-8185002071.
Kopf, David (1969). British Orientalism and the Bengal Renaissance
. University of California Press. ISBN 978-
0520006652.
Kumar, Raj (2003). Essays on Indian Renaissance. Discovery Publishing House.ISBN 978-81-7141-689-9.
Marshall, P. J. (2006). Bengal: The British Bridgehead: Eastern India 1740-1828 (The New Cambridge History of
India). Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0521028226.
 Mittra, Sitansu Sekhar (2001).Bengal's Renaissance. Academic Publishers.ISBN 9788187504184.
Pal, Bipin Chandra; Cakrabartī, Jagannātha (1977).Studies in the Bengal renaissance. the University of California:
National Council of Education, Bengal.
Sastri, Sivanath. A History of the Renaissance in Bengal: Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer
, London: Swan,
Sonnenschein (1903); Kolkata: Renaissance (2002).
Sastri, Sibnath (2008).Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer: A History of the Renaissance in Bengal
. BiblioLife.
ISBN 978-0559841064.
Sen, Amit (2011). Notes on the Bengal Renaissance. Nabu Press. ISBN 978-1179501390.
Travers, Robert (2007).Ideology and Empire in Eighteenth-Century India: The British in Bengal
. Cambridge
University Press. ISBN 978-0521059688.

External links
"The Tagores and Society", Rabindra BharatiMuseum Kolkata
Copf, David (2012). "Bengal Renaissance". In Islam, Sirajul; Jamal, Ahmed A. Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia
of Bangladesh (Second ed.). Asiatic Society of Bangladesh.

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