হিন্দি ও বাংলা উপন্যাসে প্রতিফলিত উত্তরপ্রদেশ ও বঙ্গসমাজে নারীর বৈধব্য জীবনের সংকট : তুলনামূলক অবলোকন/ The Crisis Of Women’s Widowhood in Uttarpradesh and Bengali Society reflected in Hindi and Bengali novels : Comparative Observations

Abstract

In Indian society, widowed women have long been victims of social neglect, religious taboos and mental loneliness. A burning problem in women's lives is their premature widowhood. This is like a terrible curse on women's lives. Through widowhood, a woman enters another world, separated from her normal life; where she has to give up all her hopes and aspirations, and all tastes and colors are taken away from her food and clothing. Widowhood is the biggest curse in the life of a Hindu woman. Their lives were very difficult due to social customs and traditions rather than classical customs. Widows were considered evil or inauspicious in society. In Bengali and Hindi literature, women novelists have highlighted the pain of widowhood, silent protest and crisis of self-identity in women's lives with deep sympathy.  Bengali novelist Bani Basu's 'Shwet Patharer Thala' (1991) and Hindi novelist Maitreyi Pushpa's 'Betba Bahati Rahi' (1994) - these two novels in different languages highlight the pain of widowhood and their psychological complexities in the context of reforms. Women novelists in both Bengali and Hindi have not only highlighted the oppressive aspects of widowed women's lives, but have also explored women's self-identity. In their writings, widowed women are silent but not powerless, they ask questions and gradually a sense of self-awareness awakens in them. Keeping the two novels in question in front of them, a comparative assessment of the crisis of widowhood in women's lives in the writings of two different languages, different novelists, and different spatial backgrounds, rural and urban, can be made.