Swami Vivekananda , livre ebook

SANKAR

SWAMI VIVEKANANDA
The Feasting, Fasting Monk
Translated from Bengali by Malati Mukherjee
PENGUIN BOOKS

PENGUIN BOOKS
Contents
Author s Note
Translator s Note
Author s Preface
Quotes
Vivekananda
Illustrations
Bibliography
Acknowledgement
Follow Penguin
Copyright
PENGUIN BOOKS
VIVEKANANDA
Sankar (Mani Sankar Mukherji), one of Bengal s widely read authors in recent times, is the creator of Kata Ajanare ( The Great Unknown ), Chowringhee , Jana Aranya ( The Middleman ), Seemabaddha ( Company Limited ), Ghorer Madhye Ghar ( Thackeray Mansion ). Seemabaddha and Jana Aranya were made into films by Satyajit Ray. Many of Sankar s non-fiction works, including books on Ramakrishna and Vivekananda, have been bestsellers and translated into several languages. Sankar lives and works in Kolkata.
Malati Mukherjee is a writer, translator and editor. She is a storyteller who has published Nature Songs of Tagore , a book of songs of Rabindranath Tagore translated from Bengali to English. She has edited (and part-written) a 200-page coffee table book, The Legendary Fr. E.H. McGrath SJ-Revered Teacher, Inspiring Forever . She has translated Bitan Chakraborty s novellas Redundant and Collapsed, which are awaiting publication. Malati runs Words and Space, a writing and editing service. Born in Dakshineswar, Malati now lives in Coonoor, in the Nilgiri hills of South India.
OTHER TITLES BY SANKAR
The Monk as Man: The Unknown Life of Swami Vivekananda
The Great Unknown ( Kato Ajanare )
Chowringhee ( Chowringhee )
Thackeray Mansion ( Gharer Madhye Ghar )
The Middleman ( Jana Aranya )
Company Limited ( Seemabaddha )
Dedicated to Dr Sanjiv Goenka, Chairman, RP-Sanjiv Goenka Group, my three-in-one employer, student and teacher.
-Sankar
Author s Note
Sometimes at a royal banquet served on a golden plate, sometimes sharing a poor man s hunger in a tiny hut and sometimes experiencing the meagre fare of a sanyasi on a pilgrimage through a lonely forest, the last two decades of Swami Vivekananda s years tell an amazing story of a phenomenal life struggle.
Over the last 150 years, a lot of research has been going on, in several countries, on Swamiji s culinary interests. This includes hitherto unknown stories of Swamiji spreading the art of making biryani , pulao and khichuRi (khichri-a dish made with rice and lentils), along with his propagation of the Vedas, in the United States of America.
Although today s social philosophers wonder greatly at this world-renounced monk s immense enthusiasm for teaching Indian cooking, it is not quite clear why no complete book about our culinary expert Maharaj Vivekananda has ever been published in any language.
Vivekananda-The Feasting, Fasting Monk is the humble, researched illumination of this thousand-faceted diamond, by me, Sankar.
Translator s Note
My introduction to Sri Mani Sankar Mukherji was through his first book, Kato Ajanare ( To So Much That s Unknown ), which I devoured over two days as a schoolgirl. Years later, having begun translating books in earnest, I harboured a desire to one day translate this book.
Last year, when my cousin was to interview Sankar Babu, he asked me half in jest whether I had anything to ask the great author. I replied in the same tone, that he should ask Sankar Babu whether I could translate one of his books to English. I was stunned and elated when the next day my cousin gave me Sankar Babu s response, which was an offer to translate two of his books!
I grew up in Dakshineswar, in my grandfather s home, filled with books, photographs and thoughts of both Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa and Swami Vivekananda. Occasionally skipping alongside my grandmother on her pre-dawn trips to Kalibari, the famous Kali temple that was Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa s abode, I was more interested in the trains that thundered over the bridge above the Ganga than in the energy pervading that revered space.
And in all these years, I have never attempted to read a book about either Thakur or Swamiji. Never opened a page of the Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita that sat on my father s bookshelf in a deep blue binding with gilt-lettered titles. Once when a sanyasi in the ochre robes of the order visited my father s home, he urged my father to initiate us children into reading the Kathamrita , quoting Thakur as saying that the parrot learnt to speak only if it was taught young. I felt a sense of pride as I heard my father say, I would rather they grew up and decided whether to read Thakur s Kathamrita or not.
And as I grew up and moved away from Calcutta, my thoughts veering completely to staying afloat in the world of an English-medium education, I unconsciously decided I would rather not. My grandparents passed on, and Dakshineswar and the temple faded in my memory. Now, while translating this book, those memories have reached out and touched me.
With the convenience of the Internet, I have found myself reading many letters, stories and anecdotes of Swamiji and getting my fill of the writings I have missed out on. It has been an amazing journey, not just of translating the really difficult language, but also breaking off to read about Swamiji as seen through the eyes of his adoring devotees in India, the UK and the US.
This book focuses partly on the foodie aspects of Swamiji, but even more, on his love for cooking and feeding people-feeding his disciples, who could not complain about the red-hot spice and had to eat it up quietly, as well as others he met along life s way and decided, impulsively, to cook for. It speaks of the pain and hurt he felt when he encountered hunger for the first time, and how it changed his perspective forever. Of how he could not bear the anguish of another human being suffering from hunger.
Sankar Babu has meticulously researched through many books to come up with gold nuggets of stories and anecdotes that will thrill the hearts of Vivekananda s admirers. The first part of the book also gives us interesting insights into the history of food and cooking in Bengal. Of how coal came into the state, of the homes before the advent of electricity and how water kept outside overnight turned to ice! It gives us a clear picture of how global warming is slowly turning all our cities warmer by the day.
The second part of the book touches upon the deep relationship that developed between Thakur Ramakrishna Paramahansa and his chief disciple, though young in years. It tells the story of Thakur s last days and how, after his death, the Ramakrishna Mission was set up by twelve young lads, and the untold struggles they went through to discover themselves, and their path.
It also covers Swamiji s travels through India and abroad, and the warmth, love and respect he received almost everywhere he went. Delightful stories abound-on Swamiji s conversations in the US and England and of the opportunities he found to cook his beloved Bengali food for friends and disciples. We owe a huge debt to Swamiji s brother Mahendranath, who in his later life, after Swamiji s death, wielded the expert pen to give us some treasured gems from the life and travels of the Datta family and, in particular, of Swamiji.
The last part speaks of Swamiji s advice to all of Bengal. Having travelled across the world and sampled first hand the food and culture of various countries, he was filled with determination to share the knowledge and advice with the people of his beloved Bengal-on what to eat, how to live and what to practice. Each of these pieces of advice is even truer today than when these books were first published.
This book is the result of deep research into many sources and comes up with stories that may not always be in chronological order. They are delightful anecdotes from each of the three phases of Swamiji s life. They contain pearls of wisdom shared by him with his many disciples in this country and abroad.
An interesting realization for me was that Swamiji did not believe in the concept of vegetarianism for the hardworking poor of our country. He insisted, on several occasions, that while the well-to-do-who do no physical labour and face no real hardships in life-may well indulge in the luxury of vegetarian fare, the poor who have to struggle every day with the hardships life throws at them, need the protein and strength that they can only receive through inexpensive and easily accessible non-vegetarian food.
Through it all, we get a glimpse of Swamiji the person-his abiding love for humanity, his prankish humour and his deep understanding of and belief in the human spirit. Although this is not meant to be a spiritual book, many gleaming truths come through, which help us realize what it means to be a sadhak or a seeker.
All translations are demanding. It is very challenging, sometimes impossible, to convey the meaning of the beautifully worded gems of one language in an alien one. This book is even more difficult because of the several words on every page that describe particular items and dishes that do not even exist in other cultures.
On the question of transliteration of the Bengali words in the book, I have used the capital R to emphasis the hard r sound, but for the rest, I have decided to go with whatever is the simplest representation of the actual Bengali sound. For example, the Indian barfi becomes the Bengali borfi .
My deepest gratitude and pranam to my father, for always urging me to seek the Unknown amidst the known.
My deep gratitude to Sri Mani Sankar Mukherji for the opportunity to immerse myself in the world of Swami Vivekananda and Sri Ramakrishna Paramahansa and for the uplifting experience of getting to understand a little bit of who they were.
My deep gratitude also to my cousin and friend Sri Aditya Chatterjee, through whose intervention this project came into being, but even more, for his painstaking editing and tireless responses to my hundred questions about those aspects of Bengal to which I hav