BLiterature-Apratim

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fighter and eventually a martyr (though not literally) in the war against tyrant alien
rulers. And all these traits perfectly vindicate his status as the ‘Rebel Poet’ of Bengal.
Bishnu Dey (1909-’82)
Bishnu Dey is one of the pioneering Modernist poets. He is also the foremost
person of Marxist poetry in Bangla; and in fact, one of the greatest Marxists of world
literature.
Bishnu mainly tells us of social discrimination, its impact on culture, common
people’s deprivation, crudity and curse of poverty, and its overall effect. He left his
light on the communal riots during the country’s partition, its people’s deprivation,
poverty and a humiliating lifestyle. He has a sage-like patience. His voice is not
shrouded in a helpless frustration; he is optimistic. And his outlook of self gripped by
the world’s disturbances is tinged with a god-like aloofness.
He is the most brilliant among the accomplished elevators of Tagore’s poetic
technique and diction. He is superior to Sudhindranath, Samar, Sukanta, Subhash
and many other contemporaries. Also many poets from later generations were
influenced by his diction, for example – Amitabha Gupta, Shankha Ghosh and Anik
Mahmud.
Bishnu’s world-view is not confined to Marxism; he gives a philosophy of
man’s achieving a high order of existence. He envisions an equalitarian society
which will attain for itself a resplendent world of supreme consciousness. On the
surface, he announces his Marxist dream and in the deeper sphere of contemplation,
he is found playing on a universal music. Amidst endless bloodsheds in Calcutta’s
unrest streets, he is optimistic of future –
“Arriving at evening sward, I see in the selfless sky –
A calm, auspicious being keeps awake
Rinsing a wrong moment gathered by the flow of time
Certain, rather ascetic like a humble lotus
Speechless in the sense of work
A flawless and perfect being
As a star of the night in the sky of sane existence –
A bunch of free, white jasmines.”
(Translated by the author)
Sometimes an exotic sense is integrated into his dialectical materialism.
Some critics have evaluated Bishnu’s such essence of life and the world as ‘Marxist
mysticism’. In this respect, he has a higher position than Manik, the other great
Marxist.
His world-view is comparable to Plato’s. He wanted to reform this world in
both of its material and spiritual aspects. Thus we even can call him a Platonist poet.
Not only that; his words are well-chosen and his diction is highly standard. Through
his high category of verse, he appears as a prophetic philosopher.
And love in his poems is not confined to two persons’ mutual matter; it
develops into a collective consciousness, a wider concept leading to the concern of
the civilization’s welfare.