Poetry
Singing the Glory of Lord Krishna
শ্রীকৃষ্ণকীর্তন
Baru Chandidas · 1400
Synopsis
Radha and Krishna are celestial beings destined to be born on earth. Radha, married to the cowherd Ayan, a eunuch, lives with her aunt Barai and goes to sell milk and curds at Mathura. Krishna, intrigued by the portrait given to him of her, sends her a declaration, which she rejects in the name of her marriage; he then bars her way and demands a toll from her. Thirteen sections follow, from the betel to the boat, from the parasol to the flute, in which pursuit and resistance keep trading places.
Context
The manuscript was found in 1909 by Basanta Ranjan Ray in the cowshed of a resident of the village of Kankilya, near Bishnupur, in Bankura. Lacking its first and last pages, with no title or date, it was named by its editor and published by the Bangiya Sahitya Parishad in 1916. It comprises four hundred and eighteen songs according to Banglapedia, each bearing its raga and its tala, and has shed light on the history of the Bengali language. M. H. Klaiman translated it into English in 1984.
Who it is for
A long poem in songs, with no French translation, which exists in English. It requires accepting a pushy Krishna, very far from the tender god of later devotion.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as the most important work of Bengali literature after the Charyapada and as a masterpiece of medieval Bengali.
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