‘Termite’: Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay’s first novel tapped into urban alienation and existential drift

There are some novels that quietly unsettle you long after you’ve put them down. Ghunpoka, Bengali writer Sirshendu Mukhopadhyay’s first novel from the 1960s – now available in a new English translation as Termite – is certainly one of them. A haunting exploration of urban alienation and the modern existential drift, on its first publication the novel announced the arrival of a writer who would go on to reshape the Bengali literary landscape, turning away from conventional social realism towards a deep, inward, often unsettling focus on the uneasy terrain of the modern mind.

Calcutta, a psychological condition

Tapas Kumar Sen’s translation brings this early work to a contemporary readership with great care. In doing so, it also reintroduces a particular moment in Bengali literary history – when the city, especially Calcutta, began to be experienced not merely as a setting but as a psychological condition.

At the centre of the novel is Shyam, a young man who has drifted from the village of Banikhara in Bikrampur into the restless, indifferent sprawl of Calcutta. Despite a deep respect for his parents, Shyam represents a generation at odds with institutional authority. In a sudden burst of pride and existential fatigue, he resigns from his position at Saint and Miller...

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