‘Ananta Jauvana’ (woman of immortal youth) ,a book and a gold mine of information and knowledge hits the stands
By Our Correspondent
Agartala, December 9, 2025
Aptly entitling a book is an art as old as penning a book itself. Any sensible reader becomes conscious of this crucial fact while flapping through the pages of a delectably covered and elegantly printed new book. James Headley Chase,a renowned crime thriller author had entitled one of his best sellers ‘Flesh in the Orchid’ way back in 1948. The thriller based on the life of an abandoned and insane girl with homicidal tendency in a sanatorium who managed to flee her shelter , fall in love with a Norwegian settler who was murdered by hired assassins fascinated the readers ready to suspend disbelief for the time being . The sequence of bizarre events happened during her short-lived reversion to normalcy as she avenged the murder of her beloved in the course of a dour struggle before slipping back to her insane state and returning to the sanatorium for the remainder of her life. The titling of the thriller, based on the life of the abandoned insane daughter of a millionaire, struck perceptive readers with its aptness , given the theme on which it was based.
Viewed from this perspective, Tripura’s leading Editor Arun Nath’s ‘Ananta jauvana’ , a stimulating collection of historical anecdotes and episodes spawned by the social as well as conventional media may seem to be lacking in contextual relevance. But, be that as it may, the sleekly printed and covered ‘Ananta Jauvana’ edited and published by Arun Nath charms a reader with its gold mine of information carefully collated from a variety of social and conventional media sources with an underlying message of morality and idealism.
How many of the youngsters of the present internet generation know the kind of struggle Raja Ram Mohan Roy and Pandit Vidyasagar had to wage to have the barbaric rite of ‘Sati’ abolished and the law on widow remarriage act enacted by the colonial British government ? How many of us know that celebrated scientist and winner of two Nobel prizes for physics and chemistry, Madam Curie had been requested by the Swedish Nobel committee not to physically appear to receive the second prize because of her reputation of immorality ? How the great ‘Bharat Ratna’ Sanai maestro Ostad Vismillah Khan had adopted a Hindu girl as foster daughter and married her off with a Hindu man or the trials and tribulations of revered scientist Albert Einstein’s domestic life are not normally known to lay readers . The painful story of composer, lyricist and singer Kamal Dasgupta who had bonded nuptial bonds with ‘Nazrul Geeti’ singer Feroza Begum and spent the last years of his life as a grocery shop owner in Dhaka , having been forced to convert to Islam and adopt the name of Kamaruddin is also largely unknown. Similarly fascinating is the last days of Macedonian conquer Alexander who, before his premature death at ancient Babylon on way back home, had directed his courtiers to ensure that his doctors carry his coffin to grave-yard, his lifeless hands hang on two sides of his corpse and all his gold and silver are spread on both sides of his cortege on way to the grave-yard. “ I wish to leave three important lessons for mankind : doctors can not save a man or woman destined to die, the stock of gold and silver I amassed in my life will not go with me to heaven or hell and that I came empty-handed and am dying empty-handed” the great conqueror had said as a rationale behind his instructions when asked.
These refreshing anecdotes based on lives of great individuals and historical events form the kernel of Arun Nath’s edited work . A refreshing lesson to intellectually alive people who will care to pore through the pages. What enriches the book further is the proverbs, adages and maxims that adorn the pages of Nath’s labour of love. The book has already hit the stalls and is likely to be show-cased in the upcoming in the Agartala Book Fair.
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