Essay
Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer
রামতনু লাহিড়ী ও তৎকালীন বঙ্গসমাজ
Shibnath Shastri · 1904
Synopsis
Ramtanu Lahiri is born in Krishnanagar into a poor family of Kulin Brahmins. At twelve, his elder brother takes him to Calcutta; to enter David Hare's school, he runs for two months beside the founder's palanquin, then enters the Hindu College in 1828 and becomes a pupil of Derozio. Around this schoolmaster, who will later reject the Brahmanical thread, the book unfolds the history of the Bengal of his time: Rammohan Roy, English education, the schools and newspapers that are founded, the reforms of the Brahmo Samaj.
Context
The book appeared in Calcutta in 1904; the author paid homage to his teacher in it by giving his name to what is in fact a chronicle of Bengali society. The English version, translated by Sharat Kumar Lahiri, son of the old teacher, and edited by Sir Roper Lethbridge, former professor at the college of Krishnanagar and friend of the old teacher, appeared in London in 1907 with Swan Sonnenschein under the title Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer: A History of the Renaissance in Bengal. The Spectator reviewed it the same year.
Who it is for
A large book of memoir and history, written from inside the movement it recounts. No French translation; accessible in English since 1907.
Prizes and reception
Regarded as a major document on the Bengali renaissance and on the history of the Brahmo Samaj, often cited by historians.
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