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The Exercise Book

RABINDRANATH TAGORE

utta, the fourteenth and

Rabmdranath Tagore (1861-1941) was born in Calc
r ha.I:of the_ nineteenth
youngest child in a rich and talented family. ~e !att.e
, a penod of mtellectual
century was an exciting time for the Bengali ehte
gal Ren:ii~~ancc·. Raja
and artisnc awakenmg, referred to as the 'Ben
ortant figure associated
Ramrnohan Roy, the social reformer, was an imp
ofTagorc's grandfather,
with the Bengal Renaissance, and v..ias a close mend
of the time.
Dwarkan.ith Tagore, also an emment personality
, Jnd ullt'S t:mding.
Many members of the Tagore family were illustnou
,,Tote and pnxluccd
and the Tagores ran t.heir owi1 literary magazines. and
t-story \\Tircr, nnvt.'list,
their own plays. Tagore lrnnself v:as a poet, shor
on who c..;rahlished
playwright and essayist; a pioneer in educati
ects for com munity
Sant1111kctan, an initiator of economic proj
conrext of nationalist
development, and an acavely engaged thinker in die
e for licerarure.
struggles In 1913. lie was a,varded che Nobel Priz
As a child, Tagore sho,..,-ed resistance to forma]
schooling. apart from
brothers. Ar seven«..~n,
whJCh hL \\'JS educated at homt: bv tutors and elder
of a different culture
he went to England and this wo-yea.r c:\-pericnce
about gender rcbrions
helped to raise \'anous social questions. particularly
indranarh. His close
in his own sonety in tht mmd of the )Oung Rab
his relationship with
expcncncc of the women\ quarter'>, particularly
itive insight imo the
older sisters-in lav,, had alrtady given him a sens
u. These engagements
constncaon and confinement ofwomen in his milie
y debates about the
of Tagore found an mtdlccnial contc:\"t in the man

rd by Sukanca Chaudhuri,
From : Rabi11dra11arh 'I'a_v,on Sclcctnl Shon ,">t11rit - Edit
Ddh1 and Oxford: Oxfo rd Univ ersity Prt~s, 2000. This story 1s trans lated by
Supriy:t Ch:mdhuri .
 RabmJranath '[ agore 77

,,osiuon and role of women and the des1rab1'1ty of reform, current m the
:ace nmetcenth and early twentieth centuries. Some of Tagore•~ finest
woi k!,, for instance the short story 'Strir Patra' or 'The Wife·s Letter'
(!914), are sem,itivc cxplorat1011s of women's lives and expcncnces m
contemporary Bengal.

Uma became a great nuisance as soon as she learned to write.

On every wall 111 the house, she would draw unsteady lines
and write with a piece of coal in big unformed letters-Rain
drops 0,1 tree tops.
She hunted out the copy ofHaridas's Secrets under her sister-
in-law's pillow and wrote in pencil on every page-Black water,
red flower.
With huge scrawled letters, she obliterated most of the
auspicious dates in the new almanac kept for the household's
constant use.
Right rn the middle of the credits column in her father's
account book, she wrote-

He who writes and st11dies hard

wm Otte day ride a lwrse attd cart.
So long she had never been th~rted in these literary
pursuits, but 111 the end, one day, there was a ma_,or d1s.1ster.
Unia's elder brother Gobmdalal looked moffens1vc enough,
but he was always writing m the newspapers. L1strnmg to him
talk, not one of his relatives or neighbours would ever think
him capable of deep thought; and mdced no one could ever
accuse him of thinkmg on any subject; but he \\'Tote. And }11s
views coincided entirely with those of most readers m Bengal.
Without any recourse to logic, depending solely on the effect
of his thrilling rhetoric, Gobindalal had composed ,1.n
 / rd '-vnrtJ

.
(Utdtammg tssay v1go1ous ly dcnwlicd1 ing the grave
''JJIIOl1S about 1l)hysiolo g)' t 1111 cn t ,1m o 11g p 11 rope fliis
l l lll" ~
a~
. , ienttsts. One day, in the afternoo n when 110 0 11e wa~ a~
to ok hri brother's pen .md ink ,md w1 ntc 0 11 th c~)lit,
Uma .ay
largc- kttcrs-G,v1,7[ i, ,1 t'CIJ' .~<l(lc/ be>}', /1(' cats whateve,•
m 'ef) , Is

gwcu l11m.
} do not think that b, her usr of the nam e 'Gopal' ' lJ Illa
had mtcnded am spr<. 1.1I refl ectio n on the t cadcrs of
h
brother's c,s, , But her brother's ange r knew no bou nds.
Fir:;
re
he heat her then he confiscated her carefull~ collected, rneag
t int
store of \\Tiring impleme nts- a stubby pencil and a blun
r.
stained pen. The humiliated little girl, unable fully to unde
r
stand the reason for so severe a punishment, sat in a corne
of the room and began to cry.
After the penod of disci pline was over, Gobindalal somewhat
over
remorsefully returned Uma 's looted property; and more
a
tried to assuage the little girl's grief by presenting her with
bound. ruled, stout exercise book.
this
L-_ .Dm a was then seve n years old. From that day on,
exercise-book spent its nights under Uma's pillow and its
days
, ,
under her arm or in her lap. When, her hair in a tiny braid
the
accompanied by a maid, she went to the girls' school in
of it
village, the exercise-book went along with her. The sight
in
would arouse wonder in some of the girls, greed or envy
others.
In the first year, she wrote carefully in her exercise- boo k-
of
Tht birds sing, the night is past. She would sit on the floor
and
her bedroom clutching the exercise-book, and write, read
cted
declaim loudly in a sing-song voice. In this way she colJe
many lines of prose and poetry.
n
In the second year, a few independ ent compositions bega
to make their appearance. They were very brief
but extre mely
may
pregnant, lacking both introduction and conclus1on. We
offer a few examples.
 Below wh r he had copi d ut
hcrou from Kathamala y u w uld m
he found in K{1lhamala, nor 6 r that matt r
htcrawrc to this day Th Im r.m 6 l] .... u"----- I
very much.'
Let no one thmk that I am 1bout to tell
was not an eleven or twelve -year- old
bourhood. She was an elderly ervan f the house
real name being Jashoda.
But it is impossible to gauge the real natur
girl's feeling for Jashi from this one sentence H who
to write a reliable history of this matter wou d find a
denial of the earlier statement JUSt -1vo pages later
This is not just one instance: ·hroug hout Uma s
positions, one might note thIS fault of self-contradict101
one place we might read-'I'll never speak to Han agam ' (N
a boy, Harich aran, but a girl schoolma·e of Uma' s ca ed
Haridasi.) But soon after thac was a statement which might
induce one to think that Uma had no dearer friend m all the
world than Hari.
Next year, when the little girl was nine years old, the strams
of the shehnai could be heard one morni ng m the house It
was U ma's wedding-day. The groom was called Pyanm ohan
he was a literary associate of Gobindalal's. Althou gh ht: was
not very old and had received some educ:mon, his nund had
remained entirely closed to new ·ways of thoug ht. For this
reason he was very highly regarded by his n~ighbours and
Gobin dalal tried to folio\\ his examp le, thoug h v.'lthout
complete success.
Draped in a Benarasi sJri, her little face veiled, l ma \vent
weeping to her husband's house. Her mother cold her: ·I!Sten
to your mothe-r-in-bw, darling; attend co the hou~eho1d, don't
spend all your time reading and writing.•
Gobindalal told her, 'Remember not to scratch letters on
,,
8

t11 II "• u·s not th.H kind of house And fnr he,l\'l'n·s k
\\ _ . • . . • sa e
don't ,cribbk l)ll am of Pyat 11110han s wntmgs.
The little gn]\ heat t quaked She rc,1l i?cd _tlut no one Would
l-.1.: atlo" anc1.:s for her in the h~usc to which she w,1s going.
11
Through many reprimands suffet cd o~'cr 111,111 ) days, she
"rould haw to learn \\·lut the, rcg,u dcd ,1s t.wlt. ,vh,ll a11 offence ,
\\ hat an o\'ersight
The shchnai ,,·a._ pla, ing .1g,1in that morning. But it is doubtful
\\ hether there was one person in the crowd who understood
,, hat was going on the tremblmg heart of that little girl covered
,,ith ornaments. m her Yeil and Benarasi sari.
Jashi went ,, ith Uma. It was understood that she would
fe,,
1sta, for a days to settle Uma in her in-laws' house, and
'
then return.
The kind-hearted Jash1, after much thought, took Uma's
exercise-book along \\ith her. The book was part of her paternal
house, a loving reminder of her brief stay in the house of her
birth. In crooked. unformed letters it told the abridged history
of her parents' love and care for her. It brought a brief sav~
of render freedom to the Ii ttle girl in the midst of her
premature wifeliness.
In the first few days after her arrival in her in-laws' house,
UrJU,.-:wrote nothing: she had no time. At length, some days
later, Jashi returned to her former residence.
That day. U ma shut the door of her bedroom in the
afternoon, took the exercise-book out of her tin box and wrote
'
tearfully in tt-'Jashi has gone home, I want to go back to
Mother too.'
Now Uma no longer had the leisure to copy anything out
of die Charupatlt or the Bodhoday, perhaps she did not have
the rnclmation either. So nowadays there were no great intervals
b tw n Uma's own brief compositions. Immediately after
th hove statement, we might read-'if Dada comes to take
rn home Just once, I'll never spoil his wntmgs again'.
 It ,s c; 11<l that Uma' fath r oft n att m
1iornc, but Gobmc.lalal t am d up with p n
ilicsc pl.inc;. J le said that n w a th tim ~
devotion to her husband, 1f he wa br ugl t
from her husb,ind' hou c mto th fam1har mb1t
Jove, her mind would be unn ce anlyd1 tr t d M
and mockery, he composed o excell nt an s y n t
that none of his like-minded read r uld r fr
admitting the undeniable truth of h1 exp m n
Having heard people say th1s, Uma wr t m her
book-'Dada, I beg of you, take me home J st nc I
. '
make you angry agam.
One day, Uma had shut the door and a wnnn
such meaningless triviality in her exerc e-b ok. H r
in-law Tilakmanjari become exceedingly cunous. She th ug ,
r must find out what Boudidi does when s e shuts th door
every so often. Through a crack in the door, she observ d at
Uma was writing. She was amazed. The goddess of learn ng
Saraswati, had never made even so secret a ,1.sr t the v. mens
.,,.. quarters of their hopse.
Her younger sister Kananmanjari also come m have a peep
And the still younger Anangam1njar1- she coo st0od n tiptoe
and looked with much dit1icultvI through the crack in the oor
~

to penetrate the mystery of the locked room.

As she was \\Titmg, Unu suddenh heJrd the laughter
three familiar voices outs1d~ thc room. She reahzed \\hat
happened. Hastil, shutting the l:'iook av-.ay m her box, ,he d
her face on the bed m sha1m.' and terror.
Pyarimohan was much disturbed b) thb ne,, ~- If,
began to read and "' rite, lllwels and plays \\ould ,oo
their \\ 1y 111to the home ,md 1c would be hard to up
household \'irtttt's. ~lt)rt'over, he had, b, speclll re \.
cvoh ed ,m ext t'edingl) subtk' theol). Ht' said th t t e
of the frmak ,md the power of the nuk togeth p xh ced
r 82 77,r [lldir-idual and Society
1
the sacred power of the conjugal relationship; but if the
of the female was vanquished through education and ~er
tu
the power of the male alone would be paramount. Thens d~
power would clash with male power to produce so ten;:ale
destructive energy that the power of the conjugal bond W01Jld le i
1 be completely destroyed, and so the woman would become
widow. To this day no one has been ab]e to refute this the a
On returning home in tfic evening, Pyarimohan sco~
Uma roundly. and made fun of~er ~ well, saying, 'We'll ~
to order a lawyer's turban; my Wife will go to office wuh ~ J>en
tucked behind her car.'
U ma was unable to understand all this. Smee he had Dot
read Pyarimohan's essay, she had not learnt to apJ rcc1:ate such
wit. But she shrank within hersel f-it seemed ro her th,u if
the earth opened, she would disappear rnto 11:S des ths to hick
her shame.
For many days after that. !ilH did not wntr 111 her book. Bt1
one day, on an autumn morning, a b~r-w onun \\"aS mging
an Agama ni song outside. Um2 sat ltsr:enm,g silenlf) at cht
window. resting hl'r face on bars. 111c autumn un m an)• QSt
brought back memo1 it'!> of childhood; on top of that, the
Agamam song was too much for Uma to bear
Uma could nor sing; hut sinoc learning ro wru:e, she Jud
developed the habit of writing down any song she heard, to
lessen the pam of not bemg able ro ~ing ir. Toda} 1he beggar·
woman was smgm g-

The folk of the city sa; to Uma'::; mother

'Your lost light has returned.'
At this, half-crazed, the queen rushes om-
Where are you, U ma, v. here are vou!
The queen says weepmg, 'My Uma, you\.,.e come~
Come to me, my darling, come to my arms,
Come to me, my darling, Jet me hold you jusr once.'
 Rabmdranath Tagore 83

At this, stretching her arms around her mother's nee~

vrna weeps m hurt pride and says so the queen,
•Why didn't you come to fetch your daughter?'

Resentful anguish welled up in Uma's heart, her eyes filled

with tears. She called the singer secretly to her room, shut the
door and began to write down the song in her eccentric spelling.
Tilakmanjari, Kmakmanjan and AnangamanJart observed
evervthtng through the crack in the door, and burst out, clapping
thcti hands, 'Boud1di we've seen what you're doing!'
Um;1 quickly unfastened the door, came out and began to
plcJd with them, 'Darling sisters, please don't tell anybody. I
hcg yo 11, please don't. I'll never do it again, I'll never wnte
aga11J-'
At length, U ma noticed that Tilakmanjari was eyeing her
excrc1sc-bool~. She ran and clutched the book to her chest.
I fer sisters m-law tried to take it away from her by force, but
when they dic.J not succeed, Anangamanjari went to summon
her brother.
Pyari111olia11 arrived and sat down grimly on the bed. He
said 111 a voice like thunder, 'Give me the exercise-book.' Seeing
dut his command was not obeyed, he lowered his voice a couple
of nocc~ and said 'Give it to me.'
The little girl clasped the exercise-book to her chest and
directed a glance of utter supplication at her husband's face.
Buc when she saw Pyarimohan was getting up to snatch the
book from her, she flung 1t down, covered her face with her
hands and collapsed on the floor.
Pyarimohan took the exercise-book and started to read the
litlc girl's compositions out in a loud voice. I Icaring this, Uma
clasped the earth in a still tighter embrace, while the other
three little girls were beside themselves with laughter.
After that day, U ma never got back her exercise-book.
Pyarimohan had an exercise-book too, filled with barbed essays
p
1
\.'nl)tt11dmg 111s elaborat e thcrn ics. But there w,1s. 110
hc i,ef
• . •'ctor
·~- :md dc~t, ny
l)f humankmd to M.: 121.. 1/,at hook It.

NOl F"i

leaves shake ':

Rain drops on tree tops: Literally 'water drops, the
to read.
a rhyme commonly taught to small children lea rning
banc hand ra
Har idas 's Secr ets: A sens ation al nove l by Bhu
Mukhopadhya)'a, published m parts between 1871 and 1873
, it became
nineteenth
popular 'forbidden· reading for Bengalis in the late
ccnturr
Vidyasagar's
Black water, red flower: Closely suggests Ishwarchandra
pioneering te>..'tbook Bamaparichay.
He who writes, etc.: A traditional rhym e popular
among primer-
le-class.
writers, reflecting the aspirations of the new educated midd
Madanmohan
The birds sing, etc.: The opening lines of a poem by
Tarkalankar. commonly included in textbooks .
Vidyasagar,
Kathamala: A book of animal fables by Ishwarchandra
mainly based on Aesop.
Charupath, Bodhoday: Popular school prim ers.
ess Durga to
Agamani song: A traditional song to welcome the godd
of Durga
her parents' home, which she is held to visit at the time
a.
Puja in early autumn. 'Uma' is another name for Durg

QUESTIONS

. What do
1. Analy~e the significance of the exercise book for Uma
die examples of Uma's writmg suggest about her?
for greater
2 Can this story be read as a strong reformist pica
en?
equality in educational opportunities for men and wom
3. Comment on the story's dep1ct1on of child marriage.
4. Can the sung for Durga be seen as an iron ic j uxtap
ositio n with
c?
Uma's s1tuat1 o n ~ What are the ways m which it 1s ironi
 S. Assc s the narratonal atntud r
py 1rimohan Analy e th fi llOW1ng d

(i) Uma b came a great nu n e

mite'.
(II) ' His [Gobmdalal ] VI omc d d
most readers m Bengal
(iii) 'He fPyarimohan] had by pec1al refl~~~~ ...., .-un1r-,..n

exceedingly subtle theory.

6. Do you think it is possible for a wnter seilSlt:I
to portray a situation that he may n t have per____ ,
Consider Premchand's 'Deliver.mce and Tagor
Book' with reference to this quesnon

/11-