Rabindranath Tagore, "Subha" (1892/translated 1918) (Short Story)
Tags: Disability (Aphasia), City vs. Country, Arranged Marriage
SUBHA
When the girl was given the name of Subhashini, who could have guessed
that she would prove dumb? Her two elder sisters were Sukeshini and
Suhasini, and for the sake of uniformity her father named his youngest
girl Subhashini. She was called Subha for short.
Her two elder sisters had been married with the usual cost and
difficulty, and now the youngest daughter lay like a silent weight upon
the heart of her parents. All the world seemed to think that, because
she did not speak, therefore she did not feel; it discussed her future
and its own anxiety freely in her presence. She had understood from her
earliest childhood that God had sent her like a curse to her father's
house, so she withdrew herself from ordinary people and tried to live
apart. If only they would all forget her she felt she could endure it.
But who can forget pain? Night and day her parents' minds were aching on
her account. Especially her mother looked upon her as a deformity in
herself. To a mother a daughter is a more closely intimate part of
herself than a son can be; and a fault in her is a source of personal
shame. Banikantha, Subha's father, loved her rather better than his
other daughters; her mother regarded her with aversion as a stain upon
her own body.
If Subha lacked speech, she did not lack a pair of large dark eyes,
shaded with long lashes; and her lips trembled like a leaf in response
to any thought that rose in her mind.
When we express our thought in words, the medium is not found easily.
There must be a process of translation, which is often inexact, and then
we fall into error. But black eyes need no translating; the mind itself
throws a shadow upon them. In them thought opens or shuts, shines forth
or goes out in darkness, hangs steadfast like the setting moon or like
the swift and restless lightning illumines all quarters of the sky. They
who from birth have had no other speech than the trembling of their lips
learn a language of the eyes, endless in expression, deep as the sea,
clear as the heavens, wherein play dawn and sunset, light and shadow.
The dumb have a lonely grandeur like Nature's own. Wherefore the other
children almost dreaded Subha and never played with her. She was silent
and companionless as noontide.
The hamlet where she lived was Chandipur. Its river, small for a river
of Bengal, kept to its narrow bounds like a daughter of the middle
class. This busy streak of water never overflowed its banks, but went
about its duties as though it were a member of every family in the
villages beside it. On either side were houses and banks shaded with
trees. So stepping from her queenly throne, the river-goddess became a
garden deity of each home, and forgetful of herself performed her task
of endless benediction with swift and cheerful foot.
Banikantha's house looked out upon the stream. Every hut and stack in
the place could be seen by the passing boatmen. I know not if amid these
signs of worldly wealth any one noticed the little girl who, when her
work was done, stole away to the waterside and sat there. But here
Nature fulfilled her want of speech and spoke for her. The murmur of the
brook, the voice of the village folk, the songs of the boatmen, the
crying of the birds and rustle of trees mingled and were one with the
trembling of her heart. They became one vast wave of sound which beat
upon her restless soul. This murmur and movement of Nature were the dumb
girl's language; that speech of the dark eyes, which the long lashes
shaded, was the language of the world about her. From the trees, where
the cicalas chirped, to the quiet stars there was nothing but signs and
gestures, weeping and sighing. And in the deep mid-noon, when the
boatmen and fisher-folk had gone to their dinner, when the villagers
slept and birds were still, when the ferry-boats were idle, when the
great busy world paused in its toil and became suddenly a lonely, awful
giant, then beneath the vast impressive heavens there were only dumb
Nature and a dumb girl, sitting very silent,--one under the spreading
sunlight, the other where a small tree cast its shadow.
But Subha was not altogether without friends. In the stall were two
cows, Sarbbashi and Panguli. They had never heard their names from her
lips, but they knew her footfall. Though she had no words, she murmured
lovingly and they understood her gentle murmuring better than all
speech. When she fondled them or scolded or coaxed them, they understood
her better than men could do. Subha would come to the shed and throw her
arms round Sarbbashi's neck; she would rub her cheek against her
friend's, and Panguli would turn her great kind eyes and lick her face.
The girl paid them three regular visits every day and others that were
irregular. Whenever she heard any words that hurt her, she would come to
these dumb friends out of due time. It was as though they guessed her
anguish of spirit from her quiet look of sadness. Coming close to her,
they would rub their horns softly against her arms, and in dumb, puzzled
fashion try to comfort her. Besides these two, there were goats and a
kitten; but Subha had not the same equality of friendship with them,
though they showed the same attachment. Every time it got a chance,
night or day, the kitten would jump into her lap, and settle down to
slumber, and show its appreciation of an aid to sleep as Subha drew her
soft fingers over its neck and back.
Subha had a comrade also among the higher animals, and it is hard to say
what were the girl's relations with him; for he could speak, and his
gift of speech left them without any common language. He was the
youngest boy of the Gosains, Pratap by name, an idle fellow. After long
effort, his parents had abandoned the hope that he would ever make his
living. Now losels have this advantage, that, though their own folk
disapprove of them, they are generally popular with every one else.
Having no work to chain them, they become public property. Just as every
town needs an open space where all may breathe, so a village needs two
or three gentlemen of leisure, who can give time to all; then, if we are
lazy and want a companion, one is to hand.
Pratap's chief ambition was to catch fish. He managed to waste a lot of
time this way, and might be seen almost any afternoon so employed. It
was thus most often that he met Subha. Whatever he was about, he liked a
companion; and, when one is catching fish, a silent companion is best of
all. Pratap respected Subha for her taciturnity, and, as every one
called her Subha, he showed his affection by calling her Su. Subha used
to sit beneath a tamarind, and Pratap, a little distance off, would cast
his line. Pratap took with him a small allowance of betel, and Subha
prepared it for him. And I think that, sitting and gazing a long while,
she desired ardently to bring some great help to Pratap, to be of real
aid, to prove by any means that she was not a useless burden to the
world. But there was nothing to do. Then she turned to the Creator in
prayer for some rare power, that by an astonishing miracle she might
startle Pratap into exclaiming: "My! I never dreamt our Su could have
done this!"
Only think, if Subha had been a water nymph, she might have risen slowly
from the river, bringing the gem of a snake's crown to the
landing-place. Then Pratap, leaving his paltry fishing, might dive into
the lower world, and see there, on a golden bed in a palace of silver,
whom else but dumb little Su, Banikantha's child? Yes, our Su, the only
daughter of the king of that shining city of jewels! But that might not
be, it was impossible. Not that anything is really impossible, but Su
had been born, not into the royal house of Patalpur, but into
Banikantha's family, and she knew no means of astonishing the Gosains'
boy.
Gradually she grew up. Gradually she began to find herself. A new
inexpressible consciousness like a tide from the central places of the
sea, when the moon is full, swept through her. She saw herself,
questioned herself, but no answer came that she could understand.
Once upon a time, late on a night of full moon, she slowly opened her
door and peeped out timidly. Nature, herself at full moon, like lonely
Subha, was looking down on the sleeping earth. Her strong young life
beat within her; joy and sadness filled her being to its brim; she
reached the limits even of her own illimitable loneliness, nay, passed
beyond them. Her heart was heavy, and she could not speak. At the skirts
of this silent troubled Mother there stood a silent troubled girl.
The thought of her marriage filled her parents with an anxious care.
People blamed them, and even talked of making them outcasts. Banikantha
was well off; they had fish-curry twice daily; and consequently he did
not lack enemies. Then the women interfered, and Bani went away for a
few days. Presently he returned and said: "We must go to Calcutta."
They got ready to go to this strange country. Subha's heart was heavy
with tears, like a mist-wrapt dawn. With a vague fear that had been
gathering for days, she dogged her father and mother like a dumb animal.
With her large eyes wide open, she scanned their faces as though she
wished to learn something. But not a word did they vouchsafe. One
afternoon in the midst of all this, as Pratap was fishing, he laughed:
"So then, Su, they have caught your bridegroom, and you are going to be
married! Mind you don't forget me altogether!" Then he turned his mind
again to his fish. As a stricken doe looks in the hunter's face, asking
in silent agony: "What have I done to you?" so Subha looked at Pratap.
That day she sat no longer beneath her tree. Banikantha, having finished
his nap, was smoking in his bedroom when Subha dropped down at his feet
and burst out weeping as she gazed towards him. Banikantha tried to
comfort her, and his cheek grew wet with tears.
It was settled that on the morrow they should go to Calcutta. Subha went
to the cow-shed to bid farewell to her childhood's comrades. She fed
them with her hand; she clasped their necks; she looked into their
faces, and tears fell fast from the eyes which spoke for her. That night
was the tenth of the moon. Subha left her room, and flung herself down
on her grassy couch beside her dear river. It was as if she threw her
arms about Earth, her strong silent mother, and tried to say: "Do not
let me leave you, mother. Put your arms about me, as I have put mine
about you, and hold me fast."
One day in a house in Calcutta, Subha's mother dressed her up with great
care. She imprisoned her hair, knotting it up in laces, she hung her
about with ornaments, and did her best to kill her natural beauty.
Subha's eyes filled with tears. Her mother, fearing they would grow
swollen with weeping, scolded her harshly, but the tears disregarded the
scolding. The bridegroom came with a friend to inspect the bride. Her
parents were dizzy with anxiety and fear when they saw the god arrive to
select the beast for his sacrifice. Behind the stage, the mother called
her instructions aloud, and increased her daughter's weeping twofold,
before she sent her into the examiner's presence. The great man, after
scanning her a long time, observed: "Not so bad."
He took special note of her tears, and thought she must have a tender
heart. He put it to her credit in the account, arguing that the heart,
which to-day was distressed at leaving her parents, would presently
prove a useful possession. Like the oyster's pearls, the child's tears
only increased her value, and he made no other comment.
The almanac was consulted, and the marriage took place on an auspicious
day. Having delivered over their dumb girl into another's hands, Subha's
parents returned home. Thank God! Their caste in this and their safety
in the next world were assured! The bridegroom's work lay in the west,
and shortly after the marriage he took his wife thither.
In less than ten days every one knew that the bride was dumb! At least,
if any one did not, it was not her fault, for she deceived no one. Her
eyes told them everything, though no one understood her. She looked on
every hand, she found no speech, she missed the faces, familiar from
birth, of those who had understood a dumb girl's language. In her silent
heart there sounded an endless, voiceless weeping, which only the
Searcher of Hearts could hear.
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- Short Stories by Rabindranath Tagore Amardeep Singh