The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die - Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay

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The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die

by
Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay

general information | our review | links | about the author

Title:	The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die
Author:	Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay
Genre:	Novel
Written:	1993 (Eng. 2017)
Length:	167 pages
Original in:	Benglai
Availability:	The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die - US
	The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die - UK
	The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die - Canada
	The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die - India
	গয়নার বাক্স - India
	La tante qui ne voulait pas mourir - France

	from: Bookshop.org (US)

Bengali title: গয়নার বাক্স
Translated by Arunava Sinha
গয়নার বাক্স was made into a film in 2013, directed by Aparna Sen

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Our Assessment:

B+ : very nicely done

See our review for fuller assessment.

The complete review's Review:

       The four parts of The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die are alternatingly narrated by Somlata and her daughter, Boshon. Somlata comes from a poor family, and at eighteen is married off to thirty-two-year-old Chakor Mitra, from a once prosperous zamindar-family. While they still tried to give the appearance of a well-off aristocratic family -- "They never let go of an opportunity to impress people" -- they are just hanging on by selling off their once-extensive land-holdings and some of their gold.
       Somlata's husband was: "blissfully unemployed" when she married him: "Being the scion of a feudal clan, he had been utterly spoilt as a child, encouraged to be indolent". From the first, Somlata is completely devoted to and passionately in love with her husband: "I lived and breathed for him" -- while also recognizing his limitations.
       Various other family members live in the house into which Somlata moves when she gets married; among them is Pishima, her father-in-law's sister -- the aunt of the (English translation's) title --, who has three rooms all to herself on the second floor. Pishima was married when she was seven and already widowed when she turned twelve, and thus never experienced practically anything of life; as a widow, there's little she was allowed to do, and so she basically just roamed around her rooms: "There was nothing for her to savour in her life, no joy". The family only puts up with her because of her jewellery box, containing her dowry -- a fortune in gold. (The original Bengali title of the novel translates as 'jewellery Box'.)
       Soon after Somlata joins the household, Pishima dies. Somlata is the first to find her -- and is instructed by the dead Pishima to retrieve the jewellery box and hide it elsewhere; she doesn't want the family getting its hands on it. Somlata does as she's told, and lets others then discover the dead aunt. There's a fuss when the jewellery box can't be found, but Somlata manages to keep her secret. But she then also continues to be haunted by Pishima, hearing her voice, left wondering: "Why did fate have to hold such ghastly things for me ?"
       Eventually, Somlata does raid the jewellery box: the family's circumstances grow worse and worse and she knows something must be done, and so she nudges her husband to set up a shop and start earning some money. The ghost of Pishima is not supportive. Aside from her fury that Somlata sold some of her jewellery she curses her:

That shop of yours will perish. How could you turn a man from this family into a shopkeeper ? You'll be buried in a bucket of filth in hell. You'll have a stillborn baby, take my word.

       Somlata's husband is no born businessman, but nudged along by the always supportive Somlata he makes a success of it; eventually the family is doing well again. There are a variety of hurdles -- including a woman Somlata's husband was involved with as well as a man who is attracted to Somlata -- but Somlata stays true to the husband she loves over all else.
       The child they then have, Boshon, is adored by all -- and it is Boshon who manages to silence Pishima, who then disappears from Somlata's life. Yet her spirit apparently isn't entirely lost ....
       When we first encounter Boshon, in the first section she narrates, she is not yet identified as Somlata's daughter. An attractive young woman, she already has suitors but turns them away: "I'm free, and I want to stay that way". But even she wonders: "I still do not know why I cannot trust the male of the species". Later, she will insist on moving into the three rooms Pishima have lived in, and which had stood empty (except for all her furniture) since her death; she insists: "I love living alone", reveling even in the: "eerie desolation blowing through the three rooms". Pishima does not speak to her as she did to Somlata, but is clearly still a presence, with a strong hold on Boshon, who seems fated then to follow in at least some of her great-aunt's footsteps .....
       The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die is nicely, deftly told. Somlata depicts the family situation and the different characters in the household well, along with their difficulties adjusting to changed circumstances. Adaptation is ultimately relatively easy for most of them -- her husband and father-in-law balk at first, but quite quickly embrace the programme, with Somlata gently guiding them while staying in her role as traditional wife. Meanwhile, Pishima's bitterness is understandable, given her hard lot, and Mukhopadhyay neatly afddresses her sexual frustration.
       Boshon is of an entirely different generation -- yet family, in its various ways, has a hold on her as well, with the lightly supernatural touch here effective but fortunately not overplayed.
       The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die is a charming and agreeable short novel, impressively well-crafted.

- M.A.Orthofer, 30 September 2024

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Links:

The Aunt Who Wouldn't Die:

HarperVia publicity page
John Murray publicity page
Bee Books publicity page
Calmann-Lévy publicity page
Profile of Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay

Reviews:

গয়নার বাক্স - the film:

IMDb page

Other books of interest under review:

See Index of Indian literature

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About the Author:

Bengali-writing author Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay (শীর্ষেন্দু মুখোপাধ্যায়) was born in 1935.

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