Summary and theme of I Have Seen Bengal's Face Translation of Jibanananda Das's "Banglar Mukh Ami Dekhiyachhi" by Fakrul Alam- HSC English 1st paper

Summary and theme of I Have Seen Bengal's Face

Translation of Jibanananda Das's "Banglar Mukh Ami Dekhiyachhi" by Fakrul Alam- HSC English 1st paper

Because I have seen Bengal’s face I will seek no more;

The world has not anything more beautiful to show me.

Waking up in darkness, gazing at the fig-tree, I behold

Dawn’s swallows roosting under huge umbrella-like leaves. I look around me

And discover a leafy dome-Jam, Kanthal, Bat, Hijol and Aswatha trees-

All in a hush, shadowing clumps of cactus and zedoary bushes.

When long, long ago, Chand came in his honeycombed boat

To a blue Hijal, Bat and Tamal shade near the Champa, he too sighted

Bengal’s incomparable beauty. One day, alas. In the Ganguri,

On a raft, as the waning moon sank on the river’s sandbanks,

Behula too saw countless aswaths bats besides golden rice fields

And heard the thrush’s soft song. One day, arriving in Amara,

Where gods held court, when she danced like a desolate wagtail,

Bengal’s rivers, fields, flowers, wailed like strings of bells on her feet.

Theme: The central theme of the poem is to admire the beauty of nature of Bengal. Bengal is full of cultural and natural elements. Yet we the commons fail to get the note. The poet is one of the best citizens of the country. Jibanananda thus enumerates the presence and the importance of nature to us through this poem. He connects the inanimate with the living as well. The poem opens with the dawn time when the morning bird is sitting beneath a big leaf. The poet can see a lot of other trees and herbs. He names some of the least looked upon shrubs. Then he makes us remember of the heritage of the area. He says that this beauty of the Bengal shall be for even. This is eternal.