Assamese literature
Encyclopedia
Assamese literature is the entire corpus of poetry, novels, short stories, documents and other writings in the Assamese language
. It also includes popular ballads in the older forms of the language during its evolution to the contemporary form. The literary heritage of the Assamese language
can be traced back to the c. 9-10th century in the Charyapada
, where the earliest elements of the language can be discerned.
s are often cited as the earliest example of Assamese literature. The Charyapadas are Buddhist songs composed in 8th-12th century. These writings bear similarities to Oriya
and Bengali
languages as well. The phonological and morphological traits of these songs bear very strong resemblance to Assamese some of which are extant.
After the Charyapadas, the period may again be split into (a) Pre-Vaishnavite and (b) Vaishnative sub-periods. The earliest known Assamese writer is Hema Saraswati
, who wrote a small poem Prahlada Charita. In the time of the King Indranarayana (1350–1365) of Kamatapur the two poets Haribara Vipra and Kaviratna Saraswati composed Asvamedha Parva and Jayadratha Vadha respectively. Assam is known as the state of Ekasarana Dharma. Because two great apostles, Srimanta Shankardeva and Madhabdev had undertaken pivotal roles in Assamese literature. The Kirtan Ghosa
, Dasham
, Ankia Nat, Gunamala, Namghosa are the most popular and widely held books in Assam. Srimanta Sankardeva
And Madhabdev has changed the literature of Assam by writing these books. The Borgeet written by both Sankardev And Madhabdev is known as the soul song of Assam. The Ankia Nat and Jumura are the first Indian cultural drama and these are acts that came before Shakespeare wrote Hamlet. Another poet named Rudra Kandali translated Drona Parva
into Assamese. But the most well-known poet of the Pre-Vaishnavite sub period is Madhav Kandali, who rendered Valmiki's Ramayana
into Assamese verse (Kotha Ramayana
, 14th century) under the patronage of Mahamanikya, a Kachari king
of Jayantapura.
) of the Ahom court
. The Ahoms had brought with them an instinct for historical writings. In the Ahom court, historical chronicles were at first composed in their original Tibetan-Chinese language
, but when the Ahom rulers adopted Assamese as the court language, historical chronicles began to be written in Assamese. From the beginning of the seventeenth century onwards, court chronicles were written in large numbers. These chronicles or buranjis, as they were called by the Ahoms, broke away from the style of the religious writers. The language is essentially modern except for slight alterations in grammar and spelling.
in 1836 in Assam after the state was occupied in 1826. Due to a sustained campaign, Assamese was reinstated in 1873 as the state language. Since the initial printing and literary activity occurred in eastern Assam, the Eastern dialect was introduced in schools, courts and offices and soon came to be formally recognized as the Standard Assamese. In recent times, with the growth of Guwahati
as the political and commercial center of Assam, the Standard Assamese has moved away from its roots in the Eastern dialect.
in Assamese prose by the American Baptist
missionaries in 1819. The currently prevalent standard Asamiya has its roots in the Sibsagar dialect of Eastern Assam. As mentioned in Bani Kanta Kakati's "Assamese, its Formation and Development" (1941, Published by Sree Khagendra Narayan Dutta Baruah, LBS Publications, G.N. Bordoloi Road, Gauhati-1, Assam, India) – " The Missionaries made Sibsagar in Eastern Assam the centre of their activities and used the dialect of Sibsagar for their literary purposes". The American Baptist Missionaries were the first to use this dialect in translating the Bible in 1813.
The Missionaries established the first printing press
in Sibsagar
in 1836 and started using the local Asamiya dialect for writing purposes. In 1846 they started a monthly periodical called Arunodoi, and in 1848, Nathan Brown
published the first book on Assamese grammar. The Missionaries published the first Assamese-English Dictionary compiled by M. Bronson in 1867.
One of the major contributions of the American Baptist missionaries to the Assamese language
is the reintroduction of Assamese as the official language in Assam
. In 1848 missionary Nathan Brown
published a treatise on the Assamese language. This treatise gave a strong impetus towards reintroducing Assamese the official language in Assam. In his 1853 official report on the province of Assam, British
official Moffat Mills wrote:
(জোনাকী) (1889), which introduced the short story form first by Lakshminath Bezbaruah. Thus began the Jonaki period of Assamese literature. In 1894 Rajanikanta Bordoloi published the first Assamese novel Mirijiyori (মিৰি জীয়ৰী).
The modern Assamese literature has been enriched by the works of Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla
, Birinchi Kumar Barua, Hem Barua
, Atul Chandra Hazarika
, Nalini Bala Devi, Navakanta Barua, and others.
In 1917 the Oxom Xahityo Xobha (অসম সাহিত্য সভা) was formed as a guardian of the Assamese society and the forum for the development of Assamese language and literature. Padmanath Gohain Baruah
was the first president of the society
,Monikuntala Bhattacharya,Mousumi Kondoli, Monalisa Saikia, Amritjyoti Mahanta and Arupa Kalita Patangia
.
Assamese language
Assamese is the easternmost Indo-Aryan language. It is used mainly in the state of Assam in North-East India. It is also the official language of Assam. It is also spoken in parts of Arunachal Pradesh and other northeast Indian states. Nagamese, an Assamese-based Creole language is widely used in...
. It also includes popular ballads in the older forms of the language during its evolution to the contemporary form. The literary heritage of the Assamese language
Assamese language
Assamese is the easternmost Indo-Aryan language. It is used mainly in the state of Assam in North-East India. It is also the official language of Assam. It is also spoken in parts of Arunachal Pradesh and other northeast Indian states. Nagamese, an Assamese-based Creole language is widely used in...
can be traced back to the c. 9-10th century in the Charyapada
Charyapada
The Charyapada is a collection of 8th-12th century Vajrayana Buddhist caryagiti, or mystical poems from the tantric tradition in eastern India. Being caryagiti , the Charyapada were intended to be sung. These songs of realization were spontaneously composed verses that expressed a practitioner's...
, where the earliest elements of the language can be discerned.
History
The history of the Assamese literature may be broadly divided into three periods:Early Assamese (6th to 15th century AD)
The CharyapadaCharyapada
The Charyapada is a collection of 8th-12th century Vajrayana Buddhist caryagiti, or mystical poems from the tantric tradition in eastern India. Being caryagiti , the Charyapada were intended to be sung. These songs of realization were spontaneously composed verses that expressed a practitioner's...
s are often cited as the earliest example of Assamese literature. The Charyapadas are Buddhist songs composed in 8th-12th century. These writings bear similarities to Oriya
Oriya language
Oriya , officially Odia from November, 2011, is an Indian language, belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family. It is mainly spoken in the Indian states of Orissa and West Bengal...
and Bengali
Bengali language
Bengali or Bangla is an eastern Indo-Aryan language. It is native to the region of eastern South Asia known as Bengal, which comprises present day Bangladesh, the Indian state of West Bengal, and parts of the Indian states of Tripura and Assam. It is written with the Bengali script...
languages as well. The phonological and morphological traits of these songs bear very strong resemblance to Assamese some of which are extant.
After the Charyapadas, the period may again be split into (a) Pre-Vaishnavite and (b) Vaishnative sub-periods. The earliest known Assamese writer is Hema Saraswati
Hema Saraswati
Hema Saraswati was amongst the earliest known Assamese writers, most known for his poem, Prahlada Charita, the earliest known poetic work in Assamese language. He was court poet under the patronage of Kamtapur's King Durlabh Narayan of Kamata Kingdom, who also provided patronage to his...
, who wrote a small poem Prahlada Charita. In the time of the King Indranarayana (1350–1365) of Kamatapur the two poets Haribara Vipra and Kaviratna Saraswati composed Asvamedha Parva and Jayadratha Vadha respectively. Assam is known as the state of Ekasarana Dharma. Because two great apostles, Srimanta Shankardeva and Madhabdev had undertaken pivotal roles in Assamese literature. The Kirtan Ghosa
Kirtan Ghoxa
The Kirtan Ghoxa is a collection of poetical works primarily of Srimanta Sankardeva meant for community singing in the Ekasarana religion. Its importance in the religion is second only to the primary text, the Bhagavat of Sankardeva....
, Dasham
Bhagavat of Sankardeva
The Bhagavat of Sankardeva is the Assamese adaptation of the Bhagavata Purana made by Srimanta Sankardeva in 15th-16th century in the regions that form present-day Assam and Cooch Behar...
, Ankia Nat, Gunamala, Namghosa are the most popular and widely held books in Assam. Srimanta Sankardeva
Srimanta Sankardeva
Mahapurusha Srimanta Shankardeva , was the greatest Assamese saint-scholar, playwright, social-religious reformer and a colossal figure in the cultural and religious history of Assam, India...
And Madhabdev has changed the literature of Assam by writing these books. The Borgeet written by both Sankardev And Madhabdev is known as the soul song of Assam. The Ankia Nat and Jumura are the first Indian cultural drama and these are acts that came before Shakespeare wrote Hamlet. Another poet named Rudra Kandali translated Drona Parva
Drona Parva
Mahabharata Book 7 Dronaparvan is the seventh Parva of Mahabharata.-External links:* by Kisari Mohan Ganguli....
into Assamese. But the most well-known poet of the Pre-Vaishnavite sub period is Madhav Kandali, who rendered Valmiki's Ramayana
Ramayana
The Ramayana is an ancient Sanskrit epic. It is ascribed to the Hindu sage Valmiki and forms an important part of the Hindu canon , considered to be itihāsa. The Ramayana is one of the two great epics of India and Nepal, the other being the Mahabharata...
into Assamese verse (Kotha Ramayana
Kotha Ramayana
Kotha Ramayana is a poem written by the powerful Assamese poet Madhava Kandali during the 14th century and is one of many versions of Ramayana in a regional Indian language other than Valmiki's Ramayana in Sanskrit...
, 14th century) under the patronage of Mahamanikya, a Kachari king
Kachari Kingdom
The Kachari Kingdom was a powerful kingdom in medieval Assam. The rulers belonged to the Dimasa people, part of the greater Bodo-Kachari ethnic group...
of Jayantapura.
Middle Assamese (17th to 19th Century AD)
This is a period of the prose chronicles (BuranjiBuranji
Buranjis are a class of historical chronicles written in the Ahom and Assamese languages. The first such Buranji was written on the instructions of the first Ahom king Sukaphaa who established the Ahom kingdom in 1228...
) of the Ahom court
Ahom kingdom
The Ahom Kingdom was a medieval kingdom in the Brahmaputra valley in Assam that maintained its sovereignty for nearly 600 years and successfully resisted Mughal expansion in North-East India...
. The Ahoms had brought with them an instinct for historical writings. In the Ahom court, historical chronicles were at first composed in their original Tibetan-Chinese language
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...
, but when the Ahom rulers adopted Assamese as the court language, historical chronicles began to be written in Assamese. From the beginning of the seventeenth century onwards, court chronicles were written in large numbers. These chronicles or buranjis, as they were called by the Ahoms, broke away from the style of the religious writers. The language is essentially modern except for slight alterations in grammar and spelling.
Effect of British rule
The British imposed BengaliBengali language
Bengali or Bangla is an eastern Indo-Aryan language. It is native to the region of eastern South Asia known as Bengal, which comprises present day Bangladesh, the Indian state of West Bengal, and parts of the Indian states of Tripura and Assam. It is written with the Bengali script...
in 1836 in Assam after the state was occupied in 1826. Due to a sustained campaign, Assamese was reinstated in 1873 as the state language. Since the initial printing and literary activity occurred in eastern Assam, the Eastern dialect was introduced in schools, courts and offices and soon came to be formally recognized as the Standard Assamese. In recent times, with the growth of Guwahati
Guwahati
Guwahati, Pragjyotishpura in ancient Assam formerly known as Gauhati is a metropolis,the largest city of Assam in India and ancient urban area in North East India, with a population of 963,429. It is also the largest metropolitan area in north-eastern India...
as the political and commercial center of Assam, the Standard Assamese has moved away from its roots in the Eastern dialect.
Influence of Missionaries
The modern Assamese period began with the publication of the BibleBible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
in Assamese prose by the American Baptist
Baptist
Baptists comprise a group of Christian denominations and churches that subscribe to a doctrine that baptism should be performed only for professing believers , and that it must be done by immersion...
missionaries in 1819. The currently prevalent standard Asamiya has its roots in the Sibsagar dialect of Eastern Assam. As mentioned in Bani Kanta Kakati's "Assamese, its Formation and Development" (1941, Published by Sree Khagendra Narayan Dutta Baruah, LBS Publications, G.N. Bordoloi Road, Gauhati-1, Assam, India) – " The Missionaries made Sibsagar in Eastern Assam the centre of their activities and used the dialect of Sibsagar for their literary purposes". The American Baptist Missionaries were the first to use this dialect in translating the Bible in 1813.
The Missionaries established the first printing press
Printing press
A printing press is a device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium , thereby transferring the ink...
in Sibsagar
Sibsagar
Sivasagar is a town in the Sibsagar district in the state of Assam in India, about north east of Guwahati....
in 1836 and started using the local Asamiya dialect for writing purposes. In 1846 they started a monthly periodical called Arunodoi, and in 1848, Nathan Brown
Nathan Brown
Nathan Brown may refer to:* Nathan Brown , American religious leader* Nathan J. Brown , political scientist & academic...
published the first book on Assamese grammar. The Missionaries published the first Assamese-English Dictionary compiled by M. Bronson in 1867.
One of the major contributions of the American Baptist missionaries to the Assamese language
Assamese language
Assamese is the easternmost Indo-Aryan language. It is used mainly in the state of Assam in North-East India. It is also the official language of Assam. It is also spoken in parts of Arunachal Pradesh and other northeast Indian states. Nagamese, an Assamese-based Creole language is widely used in...
is the reintroduction of Assamese as the official language in Assam
Assam
Assam , also, rarely, Assam Valley and formerly the Assam Province , is a northeastern state of India and is one of the most culturally and geographically distinct regions of the country...
. In 1848 missionary Nathan Brown
Nathan Brown (missionary)
Nathan Brown was an American Baptist missionary to India and Japan, Bible translator, and abolitionist.-Early life and missions to Burma and Assam:...
published a treatise on the Assamese language. This treatise gave a strong impetus towards reintroducing Assamese the official language in Assam. In his 1853 official report on the province of Assam, British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
official Moffat Mills wrote:
Beginning of Modern Literature
The period of modern literature began with the publication the Assamese journal JonakiJonaki (magazine)
Jonaki was an Assamese language magazine published from Calcutta in 1889. It was also the mouthpiece of the then Assamese literary society Oxomiya Bhaxa Unnati Xadhini Xobha in which the society’s aim and objectives were regularly expressed...
(জোনাকী) (1889), which introduced the short story form first by Lakshminath Bezbaruah. Thus began the Jonaki period of Assamese literature. In 1894 Rajanikanta Bordoloi published the first Assamese novel Mirijiyori (মিৰি জীয়ৰী).
The modern Assamese literature has been enriched by the works of Jyoti Prasad Agarwalla
Jyoti Prasad Agarwala
Jyoti Prasad Agarwala was a great Assamese playwright, songwriter, poet, writer and film maker from Assam. He was considered as Assamese cultural icon, deeply revered for his creative vision and output and is popularly called the Rupkonwar of Assamese culture...
, Birinchi Kumar Barua, Hem Barua
Hem Barua
Hem Barua was a prominent Assamese poet and politician from Assam.-Early life:Born on the 22 April 1915, at Tezpur, Hem Barua obtained his M.A. degree from Calcutta University in 1938 and joined the J.B. College, Jorhat, in 1941 as lecturer in Assamese and English. He left it next year during the...
, Atul Chandra Hazarika
Atul Chandra Hazarika
Atul Chandra Hazarika was a prominent Assamese litterateur from Assam. He excelled as a poet, dramatist, children story writer and translator...
, Nalini Bala Devi, Navakanta Barua, and others.
In 1917 the Oxom Xahityo Xobha (অসম সাহিত্য সভা) was formed as a guardian of the Assamese society and the forum for the development of Assamese language and literature. Padmanath Gohain Baruah
Padmanath Gohain Baruah
Padmanath Gohain Baruah was the first president of Axom Xahitya Xabha and a prominent name in the early part of modern Assamese literature.-See also:* Assamese literature* Mahapurusha Srimanta Sankardeva* Jyoti Prasad Agarwala...
was the first president of the society
Contemporary literature
Contemporary writers include Arupa Kalita PatangiaArupa Kalita Patangia
Arupa Kalita Patangia is a popular Assamese novelist and an English literature teacher based in Darrang, Assam, India. She completed her graduation with English Honors from Debraj Roy College, Golaghat under Dibrugarh University. She is the author of over several novels and more than half a dozen...
,Monikuntala Bhattacharya,Mousumi Kondoli, Monalisa Saikia, Amritjyoti Mahanta and Arupa Kalita Patangia
Arupa Kalita Patangia
Arupa Kalita Patangia is a popular Assamese novelist and an English literature teacher based in Darrang, Assam, India. She completed her graduation with English Honors from Debraj Roy College, Golaghat under Dibrugarh University. She is the author of over several novels and more than half a dozen...
.
See also
- List of Assamese writers with their pen names
- Assamese short story
- Assamese PoetryAssamese PoetryAssamese poetry, poetry in Assamese language.-History:Sanskrit literature, the fountain head of most of the Indian literature, supplied not only the themes of medieval Assamese literature, but also has inspired many a writer of modern Assamese literature to undertake creative writings in context of...
- List of Assamese poets
- Indian literatureIndian literatureIndian literature refers to the literature produced on the Indian subcontinent until 1947 and in the Republic of India thereafter. The Republic of India has 22 officially recognized languages....
- Bhabananda DekaBhabananda DekaProf Bhabananda Deka , is a multi-faceted writer of one hundred twelve books, textbooks on economics, literature and political science, and articles from Assam, a state in the north-eastern part of India.-Biography:...