Volume 35, Issue 6, March 2008 - Posoowa
Volume 35, Issue 6, March 2008 - Posoowa
Volume 35, Issue 6, March 2008 - Posoowa
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A Tribute to Xilo-Bhodro<br />
The Assamese writer Rebati Dutta<br />
Choudhury is no more. The news<br />
first registered on me rather casually.<br />
Personally, I did not know Dutta<br />
Choudhury very well. But the more I<br />
thought about him, the more I realized<br />
that I admired him a lot. My admiration<br />
for him was from a distance. I admired<br />
him first as a prolific Assamese short<br />
story writer. He wrote a total of about<br />
500 short stories. This compares well<br />
with popular short story writers like O.<br />
Henry who wrote about 600 short stories.<br />
Second, I admired him as an excellent<br />
teacher of mathematics. He was a professor<br />
of mathematics and he taught us<br />
higher mathematics in Assam Engineering<br />
College. I was very impressed by his<br />
casual and unassuming method of teaching<br />
higher mathematics. This made a<br />
lasting impression on me of him as well<br />
as of mathematics, which has always<br />
been one of my favorite subjects. His<br />
life showed that literature and mathematics<br />
go well together.<br />
Moreover, I admired him for the tidbits<br />
of life stories that I heard about him from<br />
his younger brother, Kalyan Dutta<br />
Choudhury--a close friend of mine.<br />
Kalyan was very close to his elder<br />
brother, a very compassionate person. I<br />
could sense how broken Kalyan was<br />
Reboti Mohan Dutta<br />
when he sent me the email from Berkley,<br />
California; "I was shocked to get the<br />
sad news this morning of my brother<br />
Rebati's (Xilo-bhodro’s) death. He was<br />
sick off and on for some time. But, who<br />
in his or her right mind would think of<br />
the death of a very dear one? He was<br />
more than a brother to me. He was like a<br />
solid responsible father-figure melded<br />
into a loving and lovable brother." I immediately<br />
called him, and tried to share<br />
his sorrow. We talked about his writings<br />
and much more.<br />
Rebati Dutta Choudhury was more<br />
Goodbye soldier! You always<br />
fought a clean and fair fight<br />
Iwas shocked to get the sad news this<br />
morning of my brother Rebati Dutta<br />
Choudhury’s (Shilabhadra) death. He<br />
was sick off and on for some time. But, who<br />
in his or her right mind would think of the<br />
death of a very dear one?<br />
When my wife returned from a recent trip<br />
home, she brought with her the two volumes<br />
of his collected works published recently.<br />
My brother lavished praise on the young<br />
publisher who had the same name as his life-<br />
long friend Benoy Tumuli. The two volumes<br />
were a gift for us, and each one was signed<br />
by him separately with his characteristic<br />
style: ‘Dear Moina’ form of addressing me,<br />
and ending with blessings and the signature<br />
‘Dada’. Nobody else had earned the right to<br />
call him Dada.<br />
He was more than a brother to me. He was a<br />
solid responsible father figure melded into<br />
a loving and lovable brother. Talking about<br />
his indulgence towards me, he would let me,<br />
Page 10 * POSOOWA, <strong>March</strong> <strong>2008</strong><br />
popularly known by his pseudo name,<br />
Xilo-bhodro, in the Assamese literary<br />
world. He was a prolific Assamese<br />
writer. Besides short stories, he also<br />
wrote some novels. But it is mainly for<br />
his short stories, I think he will be remembered.<br />
In his short stories, one finds<br />
a method of expressing complex ideas<br />
and themes in the most<br />
casual manner of writing.<br />
Coming from Gauripur,<br />
the western corner of<br />
Assam, his style of writing<br />
was not traditional<br />
Assamese This made his<br />
stories more beautiful and<br />
added a new color to the<br />
wider Assamese literature.<br />
He used to write stories<br />
about his imaginary<br />
hometown of Madhupur,<br />
which seemed as romantic<br />
as the town Gauripur<br />
from where he hailed. His<br />
writing always reminded<br />
me of another Indian writer,<br />
R.K.Narayan who also used to write<br />
about his imaginary hometown,<br />
Malgudi. In the style of writing also, one<br />
may find some similarity of writing<br />
simple expressions. Now when I think<br />
about his writing, I think his writings<br />
reflect the existential philosophy to an<br />
extent. I do not know if any other<br />
Assamese writer has been categorized as<br />
an existential writer. On a final note, in<br />
his death, Assam has lost a legendary<br />
writer who will be remembered for long.<br />
Rajen Barua<br />
Houston<br />
at my stubborn insistence, take a puff or two<br />
from his cigarettes when I was very young.<br />
He was a college student then. He went out<br />
of the way to meet all my monetary and<br />
emotional needs. When I was spending too<br />
much money, he would reluctantly let me<br />
know. In return, I paid no attention to him,<br />
and he didn’t care. All the expense of my<br />
marriage as well coming to the US was borne<br />
by him. I was, as usual, solid broke at those<br />
crucial time points.<br />
When our father died at an early age, I was<br />
barely two and he was fifteen or sixteen,<br />
barely out of high school. The solid bonds<br />
started then as a father figure, and the bond<br />
remained undiminished and unsullied over<br />
the long years.