I Won't Let You Go (47 page)

san-hemp:
the
Crotalaria juncea,
L., Fabaceae, cultivated for its valuable fibre. Its yellow flowers make a pretty sight.

Santhal:
the name of an important tribal people of India whose largest
concentration
is to be found in the states of Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand and Orissa. They used to give their name to an entire district of Bihar and they are also numerous in the Birbhum district of West Bengal, where Santiniketan is situated. They are noted for their songs and dances, their various home-made brews, a marked aesthetic sense, and a festive spirit.

Santhal Parganas:
a district named after the Santhals (see the entry above), which used to be a part of Bihar, but is currently a part of the new state of Jharkhand, which has been carved out of the southern part of Bihar.

saptaparna:
also known in Bengali as
chhatim
, a large evergreen tree, the
Alstonia
scholaris, (L.) R. Br., Apocynaceae, with distinctive leaves in whorls and strongly scented greenish white flowers in many-flowered cymes. The name
saptaparna
implies that the leaves are in whorls of 7, but the number can vary. The pollen of the flowers can cause hay-fever and other allergies in those who are susceptible to such problems. People at Santiniketan have a special affection
for this tree, as it played a role in the foundation of the place as a Tagore
family
country-house. The story is that Tagore’s father, on his way to a friend’s country estate, got off the train at Bolpur and proceeded in a palanquin till he came to an open plain, where he sat down under a pair of chhatim trees for his evening meditation. He was so delighted with the spot that soon thereafter he bought the land, built a house, and laid out a garden, naming the place
Santiniketan
(see Kripalani, op. cit. in the Notes section, p. 48). It was here that Tagore later founded a school and, later still, a university. A leaf of this tree is given to each graduate at the convocation of the university.

Sarang:
a group of
ragas
pertaining to the middle of the day, from noon to 4 p.m., serious and contemplative in mood, suggesting the heat of the sun. In ‘The Nap’ it may well be the Vrindavani Sarang, much played at weddings. In the context of the poem, it is being played in the bride’s house on the day after the wedding day and will be touched with pathos, as the bride will soon leave her parents’ home for her husband’s home.

Saraswati:
the goddess of learning and the arts. She is white, holds a vina, and rides a swan.

seer:
a unit of weight which varied in different parts of India and also a
measure
of capacity for fluids. I remember milk being sold in seers in my childhood; four
powas
made a seer. Nowadays in cities milk is sold in litres. As a unit of weight the kilogram has replaced the seer.

serpent-maidens:
fabulous creatures belonging to myths and fairy tales.
Nagas
and their females,
naginis
, are important snake-spirits or genii in Hindu
mythology
. They dwell in rich underwater palaces and guard aquatic treasures. In the context of the poem ‘The Boy’, the suggestion is more of creatures from children’s fairy tales than of full-blown mythological figures. The maidens the boy imagines will be of the order of supernatural princesses. They may be
half-human
, half-serpentine, and will naturally be ambivalent in nature – alluring but dangerous.

Shachi:
the wife of Indra.

shaddock:
also known as the pomelo or pompelmoose, a small tree bearing fragrant blossoms and fruit resembling the grapefruit, but much larger in size. The English name
shaddock
is derived from the name of a Capt. Shaddock who is supposed to have introduced the fruit to the West Indies. The Bengali name,
batabi lebu,
i.e., citrus of Batavia, indicates that the fruit was probably brought to Bengal from the East Indies. Its botanical name in most old sources is
Citrus
decumana,
L., Rutaceae. I understand that its current name is – very
appropriately
–
Citrus maxima.

Shahana Ragini:
the mood of this nocturnal
raga
would be more serious than that of Sindhu Kafi, suggesting love mixed with a sense of pathos.

shajina:
a small tree bearing panicles of sweet-smelling flowers that develop into pendulous seed-pods. Leaves, flowers, and pods are all edible. Its current Latin name is
Moringa oleifera,
Lamk., Moringaceae. Not so long ago it was known as
Moringa pterygosperma,
Gaertn. f., Moringaceae.

shanai:
a wind instrument which may be called the Indian oboe, often played at weddings and other celebrations.

Shaon:
a soft version of the month-name
Srabon
(q.v.).

Shipra:
a river flowing by Ujjain (q.v.).

shirish:
a large deciduous tree with a broad crown, topped with spreading limbs, bearing fragrant flowers which are white with green-tipped filaments, the
Albizzia lebbek,
Benth., Mimosaceae. In the winter months the pods hang from completely leafless branches.

shishu:
a large deciduous tree yielding valuable timber, the
Dalbergia sissoo,
Roxb., Fabaceae. Its withered flowers hang from the branches for a long time and the dry seed-pods rustle characteristically in the wind.

shiuli:
the sweet scent of the flowers of this small deciduous tree, the
Nyctanthes arbor-tristis,
L., Oleaceae, is associated in the Bengali mind with the post-rains season and the Puja holidays. The star-shaped white flowers with orange tubes blossom at night and in the morning can be seen carpeting the ground beneath. Shiuli flowers are a perfect emblem of the transience of beauty. The orange stalks yield a dye.

Shiva:
the third deity of the Hindu trinity of gods and one of the most
important
gods of Hinduism, with many roles and aspects. He is the Destroyer, the Supreme Ascetic and meditative Yogi with matted locks, as well as the consort of the Hindu Mother Goddess (variously known as Parvati, Durga, Kali etc.). He is often worshipped in the form of a phallic symbol, and many
Westerners
will be familiar with bronze statuettes of this god depicted as the Cosmic Dancer. The trident is one of his war-weapons.

shulpo greens:
or
shulfa
, from
shatapushpa
, should probably be identified with an umbelliferous annual plant valued medicinally and cultivated for its seeds,
Anethum sowa,
the aromatic leaves of which are used in pickles and chutneys, but the term could also refer to what is called wild shulfa,
Fumaria indica,
Pugsley
, Fumariaceae (S. Bhattacharya,
Chiranjib Banowshadhi,
vol. 3, Ananda, Calcutta, 1978).

Sindhu Kafi:
the mood of this nocturnal
raga
would be a little light-hearted, with suggestions of nostalgia and romantic pain.

sitar:
Hardly needing any introduction to Western readers nowadays, this
stringed
instrument is descended from the vina. It is possible that there was some Persian influence on its development. The name itself is of Persian origin (
setar
).

Srabon:
the fourth month of the Bengali calendar and the second month of the rainy season, mid-July to mid-August.

Sumeru:
often identified with various trans-Himalayan mountains or highlands, but effectively a fabulous mountain which could be called the Olympus of Hindu mythology. Zimmer explains it as the central peak of the world, the main pin or vertical axis of the universe (Zimmer, op. cit. Notes section, p. 52). As a modern geographical term, the name refers to the North Pole, and in many contemporary Bengali compound words it is the equivalent of ‘arctic’.

tamal:
the one thing that is certain about this tree is that it has a dark bark, whence its name, and Tagore’s references to it are usually to evoke a scene and a mood, echoic, reminiscent of Kalidasa. Should we identify it with the
Xanthochymus
pictorius
of Monier-Williams’s
Sanskrit-English Dictionary,
or is it
perhaps
the
Diospyros tomentosa,
Roxb., Ebenaceae, as has also been suggested?

tamarind:
the
Tamarindus indica,
L., Caesalpiniaceae, a large beautiful tree with a dense round crown of feathery foliage, valued for its timber and acid fruit. The English name
tamarind
is of Arabic origin meaning ‘the date of India’. The Bengali name
tentul
is of Sanskrit origin. The tamarind is not famous for
its flowers, yet its racemes of fragrant pale yellow flowers streaked with red are lovely. The flowers develop into brown pods inside which the seeds are
embedded
in the soft brown acid pulp which is widely used in cookery, not only in India but also in the preparation of certain well-known bottled relishes in the British market, such as HP sauce and Worcestershire sauce.

Tamasa:
Geographically, there are several rivers in India bearing this name. What matters is that on the border of one of these the poet Valmiki (q.v.) is said to have uttered his first lines of poetry.

Taxila:
or Takshashila, an ancient and powerful city of the Punjab, the site of which is now in Pakistan.

Terai:
The word
torai
in Bengali primarily means any damp land at the base of a mountain. In the context of geography it can also refer specifically to the belt of marshy and jungly land lying between the Himalayan foothills and the plains. Because of the absence of capitalisation in the Bengali script there is nothing except the context to indicate the precise meaning. In poem no. 27 of
Shesh Saptak
both meanings would fit the context. I have chosen to translate it as I have for the sake of convenience. The name ‘Terai’ has been used in English in the context of geographical descriptions for two centuries.

tuberose:
the
Polianthes tuberosa,
L., Amaryllidaceae, a small plant growing from a tuberous root, with very fragrant white funnel-shaped flowers that shed their fragrance at night (hence the Bengali name
rajanigandha
, ‘night-fragrant’).

Ujjain:
properly Ujjayini, now in the state of Madhya Pradesh, has been an important city from very ancient times and is also one of the sacred cities of India. It was specially meaningful to Tagore because of its association with
Kalidasa
, who describes it in his
Meghaduta
.

Urbashi:
a celestial nymph and dancer at Indra’s court, whose advances to the hero Arjun were rejected by him.

Valmiki:
the supposed author of the Sanskrit epic
Ramayana
. The
Ramayana
itself relates how Valmiki, after bathing in the Tamasa, was wandering in the bordering woods when a hunter shot dead the male of a pair of mating birds. The female began to lament the death of her partner. Profoundly upset and moved, Valmiki uttered a curse on the hunter. Having done so, he was
astonished
at what he had done and slowly realised that he had uttered two lines in formal metre. In Indian tradition this is the birth of poetry, of genuinely human poetical composition, as different from verses which are divine
revelations
. In poem no. 3 of
Shesh Saptak,
the shaddock tree’s astonishment at its own self-renewal is compared to Valmiki’s primal astonishment at his own poetic creation.

vetiver:
the roots of a fragrant grass, the
Andropogon muricatus,
Retz.,
Gramineae
, which are made into mattings or screens called tatties and placed in door and window openings during hot dry weather, where they are kept constantly wet so that the air indoors becomes cool and aromatised. This grass seems to have a host of other Latin names. The current one could well be
Vetiveria
zizanioides
:
I saw it in a recent issue of the
New Scientist.
The word
vetiver
is
ultimately
from Tamil and came to English through French. The Bengali word,
khaskhas
(Anglo-Indian
cuscus
), is of Persian origin.

vina:
Described to me by a practising Indian musician as ‘the
mother-instrument
of the Indian stringed instruments’, the vina belongs to the lute family
and is still used. It has a very sweet tone and usually has two resonating gourds, one at each end.

water-lily:
refers to a tropical variety, Bengali
nal
, most probably the
Nymphaea nouchali,
Burm. f., Nymphaeaceae.