History of Bengali Language and Literature c11.45

c11.45

The last two books form a rich mine of idioms of the spoken dialect of Bengal, from which Tek Chand Ṭhākur took the cue for his style in the composition of his masterpiece in Bengali—the Ālāler Gharer Dulāla. Dr. Carey writes in the preface to his Kathopakathana: "That the work might be as complete as possible, I have employed some sensible natives to compose dialogues upon subjects of domestic nature and to give them precisely in the natural style of the persons supposed to be speakers." So he did not write the whole of the book himself, but the dialogues, other than those written on domestic subjects, are his composition, and they do him a great credit. He had a high regard for Bengali as a language. He says of it in the aforesaid preface, "This language... current through an extent of country nearly equal to Great Britain......when properly cultivated, will be inferior to none in elegance and perspicuity." He wanted not only to educate and elevate the masses of Bengal, but also to develop, as best he could, the resources of a language for which he had a great respect. The style of his colloquies inspired many of our countrymen to write in the current dialect, and not only do we find it imitated in a pre-eminent degree in Ālāler Gharer Dulāla and Hutum Pechār Naksā, but even in the style of a Bankima Chandra and Dina Vandu Mitra. I quote a passage from his colloquies. Dr. Carey appended an English translation which I adopt with some modifications.