Madhukari : Art of Honey-gathering

Set in the picturesque backdrop of the Kanha-Kisli forest reserve of Madhya Pradesh, Madhukari is a novel about Prithu Ghosh. Prithu had always wanted to live life on his own terms. Just as a tiger is not reliant on others, he too did not wish to be dependent on his wife, family and society. He was constantly at odds with the demands of polite society. He could not endorse their superfluity, hypocrisy, class-consciousness and a constant need to pull others down. Showing complete apathy for the high society to which he belonged, he went around with his motley group of friends whom his wife scorned as ‘riff-raff’. But can Prithu really live like a powerful tiger? Or will reality compel him to accept that man is far too frail and dependent on others to blaze his own trail? Human beings like Prithu have to go around to countless other men and women, begging from door to door with outstretched palms from the day they are born till the moment of their death. Is madhukari then another name of this wandering? This novel of epic proportions is not just an account of Prithu’s extraordinary story. The constant presence of nature in the novel makes it tantamount to a character in its own right. The fluidity of description, the dexterity of characterisations and the authority with which a wide variety of references is incorporated into the texture of the narrative make Madhukari one of the most skilfully and powerfully written novels of modern Bengali literature.