Nirad C. Chaudhuri
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Nirad C. Chaudhuri (Bangla: নীরদ চন্দ্র চৌধুরী Nirod Chôndro Choudhuri) (23 November 1897 – 1 August 1999) was a celebrated Bengali Indian writer. He was born in Kishoreganj, then in the Mymensingh district of East Bengal (formerly East Pakistan, now Bangladesh). He was educated in Kishorganj and Calcutta (presently Kolkata). In his FA course he attended Ripon College (presently Surendranath college). Famous Bengali writer Bibhuti Bhushan Banerjee was his fellow student there. He attended Scottish Church College, Calcutta, graduating with honours in History. He topped the University of Calcutta merit list obtaining a First Class First. However during his final M.A. exams, at the same university, he did not attend all of his finals, and therefore did not earn his M.A. degree.
He started his career as a clerk in the Accounting Department of the Indian Army. At the same time, he started contributing articles to popular magazines. His first article on Bharat Chandra (a famous Bengali poet of the 18th century) appeared in the then most prestigious English magazine Modern Review. He left the job in the Accounting Department shortly thereafter, living the life of intellectual journalist and editor. He was involved with the editing of the then well-known English and Bengali magazines Modern Review, Probasi (Bengali) and Sonibarer Chithi (Bengali)
He himself ran two short-lived highly esteemed Bengali magazines Samasamayik and Notun Patrika
In 1938, he got a job as the secretary to Sarat Chandra Bose, a famous political leader during the freedom movement in India. As a result he was able to meet and mingle with the then renowned political leadership of India [Mahatma Gandhi], [Jawaharlal Nehru] and the more famous brother of Sarat Chandra Bose - Netaji. This resulting familiarity with the inner circle of how Indian politics funtions led him to be sceptical about its success, and he bacame progressively disillusioned about the ability of this leadership to take India into a new future.
He married Amiya Chaudhurani (nee' Dhar) in 1932 and had three sons.
Side by side his career as a secretary he continued contributing articles in Bengali and English to newspapers and magazines. He was also appointed as a political commentator on All India Radio - Calcutta branch. In 1941 he started working for the Delhi Branch of All India Radio. He moved to Delhi, and did not return to [Calcutta] again, except for two short visits.
Throughout his life, he followed the dicta of the great English Neoclassical poet, Alexander Pope:
- "This long disease, my Life"
- "The Proper Study of Mankind is Man"
His masterpiece, The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian (ISBN 0-201-15576-1), published in 1951, put him on the short list of great Indian English writers.
His 1965 masterpiece Continent of Circe earned him the Duff Cooper Prize, which was a rare honour for an Indian writer as he was the first, and still the only Indian, to be selected for the prize.
In 1972, he was the subject of a Merchant Ivory documentary, Adventures of a Brown Man in Search of Civilization.
In 1992, he was honoured by Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom with the title of Commander of Order of the British Empire (CBE).
He published a sequel to his autobiography, entitled [Thy Hand, Great Anarch!], in 1988. He died in[ Oxford,] [England] two months short of his 102nd birthday in 1999.
He was a productive and prolific writer till the very end; publishing his last work at the age of 99.Casting a dyspeptic eye on Indian Independence in 1947, he wrote his autobiography, which spanned the height of the British Raj in India to its eventual dissolution.
To his last day, he remained the quintessential Victorian English country gentleman, if not by birth, then by knowledge, habit, refinement and taste. He lived by the genteel standards of a Victorian squire till he breathed his last.
[edit] Books
He wrote the following books in English:
- The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian (1951)
- A Passage to England (1959)
- The Continent of Circe (1965)
- The Intellectual in India (1967)
- To Live or Not to Live (1971)
- Scholar Extraordinary[The Life of Professor the Right Honourable Friedrich Max Muller, P.C. (1974)
- Culture in the Vanity Bag (1976)
- Clive of India (1975)
- Hinduism:A Religion to Live by (1979)
- Thy Hand, Great Anarch! (1987)
- Three Horsemen of the New Apocalypse (1997)
- The East is East and West is West (Collection of pre-published essays)
- From the Archives of a Centenarian (Collection of pre-published essays)
- Why I Mourn for England(Collection of pre-published essays)
He wrote the following valuable books in Bengali also
- Bangali Jibane Ramani (Lady in Bengali Life)
- Atmaghati Bangali (Suicidal Bengalee)
- Atmaghati Rabindranath (Suicidal rabindranath)
- Amar Debottar Sampatti (My Sacrificial Property)
- Nirbachita Prabandha (Selected Essays)
- Aji Hote Satabarsha Age (Before Hundred Years)
His second son Kirti Narayan Chaudhuri is a leading historian now teaching in London. Amiya Chaudhurani died in 1994 in Oxford.
