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Category: Books

Sangeet Benode, 1913

In my possession is a manuscript that is now more than a century old, comprising of 300-350 handwritten pages. The name of the book is Sangeet Benode and can best be described as a treatise on Indian Classical Music. Written in Brajbhasha, khari-boli, and Sanskrit, it is a collection of over one hundred original bandishes or compositions in different ragas.

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In pursuit of a prayer

What however caught my particular attention was the reference made to a 5-page prayer handwritten by my forefather that was included in one of the volumes. I was able to make out the invocation at the start of the text which said Ya Rab, Mushkil Kusha (O Lord, Remover of Difficulties) which certainly sounded like a universal and enduring entreaty, and the right note on which to start this voyage of discovery.

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Robi: The lost magazine

The magazine is an edition of a publication of a Bengali magazine ‘Robi’, translated from Bengali as ‘The Sun’ dated January 1930.

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Baba’s Kitab-Ghar

Baba’s books represent an amalgamation of varied interests. From key writings of Tolstoy, Gorky, modern Russian literature and politics to British literature on farming and horticulture; from the works of Dinkar, Benipuri and Renu to books of portraits; as a child, I was never able to see his literary interests in one light or shall I say to put him in a box.

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Conversations with my father

It’s been almost two decades since I first grew curious about a locked cabinet in my parent’s dresser. Inside it, stacked horizontally, lay an intriguing collection of Bangla literature, almost all of them dated 1973 along with short handwritten notes on the title pages. The books ranged from Tagore’s seminal literary treatise, Sahityer Pathe, to Gour Kishore Ghosh’s 1969 revolutionary drama, Sagina Mahato.

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About

The Museum of Material Memory is a digital repository of material culture of the Indian subcontinent, tracing family history and social ethnography through heirlooms, collectibles and objects of antiquity.

Through storytelling, each post on the Archive reveals not just a history of objects and the people they belong to, but also unfolds generational narratives about the tradition, culture, customs, conventions, habits, language, society, geography and history of the vast and diverse subcontinent.


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