Girish Chandra Ghosh - An Appreciation Part 3

Girish Ghosh was a Bohemian, in every sense. In his young days he destroyed a Durga idol that was mischievously put in his house by some people to embarrass the family. He chased an astrologer and a pretentious sannyasin away when he discovered their falsehoods. He flaunted his atheism to anybody and everybody. Nobody could argue with him as they were sure to get defeated by his tremendous intellectual acumen. But Girish also had a large heart. He collected a group of young boys and helped anybody who was in need - like takings the unwanted corpse for cremation, providing health care to the sick, providing financial help to the poor and needy and many such selfless activities. He first set up his theater, the National Theater, as an amateur actor and  produced Sadhabar Ekadashi, a satire written by Michael Madhusudan Datta, the famous poet, and Neeldarpan, based on the novel of the same name written by Dinabandhu Mitra against the brutal tyranny and oppression of the indigo planters on the poor cultivators of the Bengal province. It appears that Girish's portrayal of the villainous character was so real that Iswarchandra Vidyasagar, who was there in the audience for one of the plays, threw his sandal in disgust to Girish, forgetting that he was watching a drama. Girish of course took that as a compliment. He had a regular day job. He used to work diligently in his role as an accountant in a merchant office and at night he was busy with his theater. Later when he found it was impossible to continue in this wa he gave up his day job and fully focused on theater. How much a genius he was!  When somebody told him that it was impossible to translate the dialogue of the three witches in Macbeth into Bengali, he took that up as a challenge and wrote the entire Macbeth in Bengali. He lost the original manuscript while changing office and rewrote the entire piece from his memory. Not only that, he acted in the lead role and his depiction of the character earned many appreciations even from the English. From 1880 onward however he focused more on playwriting. He became the manager of the Minerva theater and later found the Star theater. He was such a great playwrite and poet that he once wrote 27 songs for his play in one night. He often used to dictate plays to his secretary who used to write it and so fast was his line of thought that his secretary, first Debendra Majumdar and later Abinash Chandra who was also his biographer, could not cope up with him. When his line of thought was interrupted he was extremely disgusted. He told his secretaries that if they were unable to follow they should just keep it blank instead of interrupting him and later he himself would fill in the gap. He often finished multiple plays in one night, all of them being super hit. In fact, often his name was sufficient to ensure that a play would be widely acceptable by the reviewers and the ordinary public alike. He wrote the songs and also composed music on them, some of the famous songs which are still sung are Juraite Chai Kothai Jurai from Buddha Charit or Keshaba Kuru Karuna Deene from Chaitanya Leela. It is said that he often wrote plays while another play was in progress and he was acting therein. He brought up greatest actresses of that time from ordinary and often fallen women. Notable names apart from Vinodini were Tarasundari and Teenkadi. The theater and his company was therefore often shunned by the puritans but Girish cared nothing for it. He was a veritable lion in the face of criticisms and cared nothing for the scandal mongers. From 1880 onwards his fame as playwrite spread and many memorable dramas came up during this period - Chaitanya Leela, Nimai Sannyas, Buddha Charit, Prafulla, Bibaha Bibhrat, Nasiram, Kalapahad, Bilwamangal Thakur, Jana were all plays based on Puran and bhakti traditions. Swami Vivekananda who was an ardent fan of Girish and often had intellectual debates and discussions with him when he was Narendranath, eulogized Bilwamangal Thakur saying that it was greater than any of Shakespeare's drama in terms of content, style, presentation and theme. Nasiram was largely based on Sri Ramakrishna's life and teachings. He himself acted in the role of drunkard but honest Yogesh in his iconic play on social evil, Prafulla, and his last dialogue brought tears to many - "Amar sajano bagan shkiye gelo", "My landscaped garden is all gone, withered," referring to the destruction of his big and prosperous family life through alcoholism, and treachery and evil deeds of his brother and the honesty and uprightness that brother's wife Prafulla who sacrificed her life. It depicted a major social evil - the problem of waywardness through chronic alcoholism which was prevalent during that time and also the rift within the families caused by greed.

Girish was betrayed by the same people whom he mentored, the group in Star theater who drove him out, whom he had helped during their most trying time by paying a large sum. But Girish bore no grudge for the mistreatment. He opened his new theater. Wherever Girish went theater lakshmi went there as well as crowds were drawn by him. Therefore in no time his erstwhile detractors came begging for help and Girish, the large hearted he was, forgave them and went back to their fold. During this time he had a series of misfortunes. He lost his guru Sri Ramakrishna, whose death he refused to accept. He lost his second wife Suratjumari, his daughters and his son whom he loved dearly. The only person he had with him was his elder son Danibabu, who was a famous actor himself. When series of misfortunes came up Girish, in order to calm his mind, took to mathematics. He was interested in science as well and enjoyed a cordial relationship with Mahendralal Sarakar, a leading scientist and homeopathic doctor of that period. Girish himself had expertise in homeopathy. It is said that he could cure chronic ailments fairly well by his will power. Girish could spot talent and nourish and nurture them. Many a theater artists were groomed by him who later became very good actors. He was the undisputed emperor of the Bengali stage at that time. His writings, whatever have been recovered, still covers around ten large volumes and may be even more. He was a prolific poet. He devised a new meter which was named after him as "Gairish". It is said that even Rabindranath  Tagore used this meter in some of his poems.

Girish was an expert on Puranic subjects, he was vastly read in Puranas and history. If anybody mentioned to him that Puranas were mere stories he simply said, "You don't know what you are saying." and nobody could ever win in debate with him, so sharp was his intellectual acumen and power of logic. Only one person could argue with him, that was Swami Vivekananda aka Narendranath. When the two sat across the table to debate, hours and hours passed and often quarrels ensued, but there was never any bitterness. Both of them enjoyed the discussions and arguments and they seldom agreed. In Girish's own words, "I have never enjoyed so much happiness as I have by quarreling with Naren." From 1905 onwards Girish's dramas turned swadeshi. His plays Mirkashim, Chatrapati (life of Shivaji), Sirajuddaulla were banned by the British Government. The plays were to inspire and instill patriotism by narrating the heroic tales of defiance against the usurpers. Again from 1908 he turned towards social evils and spirituality as subject matters. Sankaracharya, Pandav Gaurav etc. were the products during this time. He acted in several of his dramas. Whether the role was trivial, inconsequential or the main, Girish's name was enough to draw a large crowd. Even in his last play that was enacted in 1911, he had to act to get the crowd and that caused his final illness. When advised against acting in that play the king of the actors boldly replied that the body would fall anyway, why deprive people of enjoyment. Besides, they had been brought in by his name and the disciple of Ramakrishna would not compromise with truth under any circumstance. That was the last play in which he ever acted. He fell into illness and passed away in a coma and left a lasting legacy. When the news of his death spread the entire Calcutta had gathered in the cremation ground to pay tribute to the emperor of the stage.

Girish had his enemies as well, but he never cared about name or fame, he was indifferent to praise or blame. This was because of his unique relationship of Sri Ramakrishna. He was made a sannyasi by none other than Sri Ramakrishna, internally. W