Novel
Bengal Nights
Maitreyi
Mircea Eliade · 1933
Synopsis
In Calcutta, Allan, a young European engineer, works for the engineer Narendra Sen. Sent to a region of heavy rains, he contracts malaria and returns to be treated; Sen then invites him to live at his home. Fascinated by India, Allan at first observes his host's daughter, Maitreyi, a young poet who was a pupil of Tagore, then falls in love with her, and their cautious flirtation becomes a love that custom forbids. According to his American publisher, the narrator reconstructs this story years later, from his diary of the time.
Context
The novel appeared in 1933 from the Cultura națională publishing house and made, according to ProTV, its author's literary fame. It transposes his affair with Maitreyi Devi, daughter of his professor, protégée of Tagore and later a writer. She published in 1974, in Bengali, her own version of the facts, which appeared in English under the title It Does Not Die, and the University of Chicago Press brought the two books together in 1994. The French translation of 1950 was immediately acclaimed; Nicolas Klotz made a film of it with Hugh Grant, released in the eighties.
Who it is for
A semi-autobiographical love novel, available in French and English; to be completed by Maitreyi Devi's reply.
Prizes and reception
A poetic love story and a stern account of the damage done by a discovery of the self: this is how the University of Chicago Press presents it.
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