A Translation of Vishnubhatji Godse’s Majha Pravas

Vishnubhatji Godse
अनुवाद: Sukhmani Roy

Travails of 1857 is a unique literary masterpiece of great socio-historic significance that portrays the eyewitness saga of the trials and tribulations of 1857 from an observant, informed Indian perspective. The extent of Vishnubhatji’s direct involvement in it remains under wraps but the strange combination of compelling candidness and vague disjointedness off the narrative invites the readers to read between the lines and explore the unspelt-out aspects of the saga.

Praise for the book:

Sukhmani Roy’s translation of this landmark Marathi text is informed by her familiarity with the many conceptual issues raised by translation theorists in recent times.
Travails of 1857 is extensively footnoted to bring out the nuances of Brahmin modes of living in 19th century Western India. The detailed history of Varsai and the Godse family gives us a social context in which to place the travelogue. Sukhmani claims that she has sacrificed stylistic smoothness for precision, alluding to the enormous difficulty of translating cultural references.
Clearly her translation is all the more rigorous because of the layering she has done, which gives newcomers to the famous ‘Majha Pravas’ additional social and cultural texture to enhance the reading experience.

– Tejaswini Niranjana