Mother of My Heart, Daughter of My Dreams

This book chronicles the rise and subsequent fortunes of goddess worship (Saktism) in the region of Bengal from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present. The primary documents are the lyrics directed to the goddess, beginning with those of the first of the Sakta lyricist-devotees, Ramprasad Sen (ca. 1718-1775), and continuing up through those of the gifted poet Kazi Nazrul Islam (1899-1976). McDermott places the advent of the Sakta lyric in its historical context and charts the vicissitudes over time of this form of goddess worship, including the nineteenth century resurgence of Saktism in the cause of Nationalist politics. The main thesis of the book concerns the democratizing and sweetening of Kali and the Bengalization of Uma (and by extension her husband Shiva). The esoteric tantric Kali of Ramprasad, McDermott shows, is transformed, losing much of her fierce, wild, dangerous, bloody character as she increasingly becomes apprehended as mother by her devoted 'children'. The remarkable and extensive body of poetry McDermott draws on in her study has never been translated into English. Her own translations of a selection of these poems will be published as a companion volume entitled Singing to the Goddess: Poems to Kali and Uma from Bengal.

ISBN 0195134354   DEWEY edition DC21 ISBN13 9780195134353 (What's this?)   Pages 456 Publisher Oxford University Press Inc   Volumes 1 Imprint Oxford University Press Inc   Weight (grammes) 778 Format Hardback   Published in New York Publication date 01 Mar 2001   Height (mm) 234 Non-book description xvii, 437 p. :   Width (mm) 156 Library of Congress 99089433   Spine width (mm) 34 DEWEY 891.441009382945   Academic level Professional / Scholarly

		Notes on Transliteration
		Introduction		3
Pt. I		The Lives and Contexts of Sakta Poets
1		The Historical Background in Bengal		15
2		Building Fences with Kali: Ramprasad Sen and the Popularization of the Tantric Goddess		37
3		"Born in Ramprasad's Line to Revive Bhakti": Sadhaka Kamalakanta		84
4		Inheritors of Tradition: Floating in the Sakta Stream		128
Pt. II		The Changing Genre of Sakta Poetry
5		Setting the Literary and Religious Scene in Eighteenth-Century Bengal		161
6		Dancing on the Heart-Lotus: Kali and the Ramprasad of Bengali Literature		176
7		Keeping the Legacy Alive: Kamalakanta Bhattacarya and the Sakta Padavali Tradition		204
8		"Ma, Come and Stay Awhile": Kali and Uma in Eighteenth-to Twentieth-Century Bengali Poetry		232
		Conclusion: Bhakti's Balm in Bengal		286
		Glossary		305
		Notes		317
		Bibliography		411
		Index		423

Offers a much-needed contribution to the field of South Asia studies and to the history of religions as a whole ... a remarkably thorough and powerfully argued study ... impressive. History of Religions

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