A life, which could have been hers, only if Mohan hadn’t jilted her.īihari, Mohans, childhood friend, is the only sane character in this book. A widow, she has come to take care of her aunt Rajalakshmi but ends up envying what Asha has, i.e. Will her trust & innocence give her something in life or would she end up being the loser?īinodini**, the temptress. She is an innocent waif and trust comes to her very easily. She chooses her husbands love over her duties towards her home. Mohan thinks he has modern in thinking but in reality he is simply “Insecure & Immature”.Īsha, **Mohan’s wife, still a child ready to be molded in to any mold. He marries Asha because Bihari had decided to marry her. Confused? Well, he wants to have that thing in life which Bihari has. But yes, his decisions are made by what others want. Mahendra**, fondly known as Mohan, is the son of Rajalakshmi, pampered to the hilt. The book centers around Mahendra, Asha, Binodini, Bihari, Rajalakshmi & Annapurna. It’s a story of love, friendship, desire, ego and deceit…it’s a story of entangled relationships.
The Indian Bengali-language television serial Chokher Bali, which aired on Zee Bangla from 2015 to 2016, was adapted from the novel.A Grain of Sand….is a story set in late 19th century.
Other versions have been produced on screen and television, for example, Chokher Bali by Rituparno Ghosh in 2003, and in the television series Stories by Rabindranath Tagore in 2015. A stage adaptation was first performed in 1904, and a film version directed by Satu Sen was released in 1938, which Tagore saw and he expressed his satisfaction with the performance in the film. Ĭhokher Bali has been adapted a number of times in film, television and theatre. A transliteration in Devanagari script, with footnotes in Hindi, was also published by the Sahitya Akademi in 1961. Mahendra Bora, published by Sahitya Akademi in 1968) and Urdu. It has also been translated into other non-Indian languages including Russian (1959) and Chinese (1961) and into most of the Indian languages including Hindi, Gujarati, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Punjabi, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, Assamese (translated by Dr. It was then translated into English by Krishna Kripalani, and published under the title of Binodini in 1959 by the Sahitya Akademi. The first translation of Chokher Bali was by Surendranath Tagore which appeared in The Modern Review in 1914. Promotional booklet for a production of Chokher Bali, 1938 Some passages were deleted in the initial serialization and publication, but partly restored in the anthology Rabindra Rachanabali published in 1941, with more restored in an independent edition in 1947.
It was first serialized from 1902 to 1903 in the periodical Bangadarshan, then published as a full book in 1903. He began working on the novel in 1898 or 1899, and a draft version was completed in 1901. Tagore prepared himself for writing the novel by writing a spree of short stories and it was his first serious effort at a novel. Tagore had used a working title Binodini before its publication. "Eyesore" was used as the title for its first English translation by Surendranath Tagore published in 1914.
The title of the book can be translated as "a grain of sand", a "constant irritant to the eye", or an "eyesore".