Toru Dutt
1856-1877 19th century
To keep writing to the end of a short life, and to hold in silence the hand of those one loves.
Who was Toru Dutt?
Born in Calcutta to a Bengali family that had become Christian, she learned Sanskrit from her father, French and English in Europe, and was writing in three languages before she was twenty. She lost her sister and then her brother to tuberculosis, and worked to the end in the garden house at Baugmaree. She died at twenty-one; almost everything she wrote appeared after her death.
In their own words
Broad daylight, with a sense of weariness. Mine eyes were closed, but I was not asleep, my hand was in my father's, and I felt his presence near me.
One leaf the Angel took and therewith touched his forehead, and then gently whispered 'Nay.'
But nothing can be lovelier than the ranges of bamboos to the eastward, when the moon looks through their gaps.
But not because of its magnificence dear is the Casuarina to my soul.