What They Kindly Said

An endless, tireless and dynamic flow of intellect. What power, attraction and fascination! That is Chinmoy, Chinmoy Guha.---MRINAL SEN

It would be difficult to find a worthier man in the whole of India.----TAPAN RAYCHAUDHURI

Epoustouflant! (Breathtaking!)Il est doué pour les langues!---JACQUES DERRIDA

I sometimes wondered if there were linguists, historians and thinkers of the enormous stature of Suniti Kumar Chattopadhyay, Nihar Ranjan Ray and Nirad C Chaudhuri in our time. Chinmoy Guha, the noted thinker and linguist, is one such. The pride of our time.---SUNIL GANGOPADHYAY

His scholarship is unique. I may be permitted to say that learning has not blunted his taste. I still despair of having his mastery of the English language. His mastery of Bengali and French adds to his qualifications. I have reports of his excellence as a teacher.---R K DASGUPTA

What hard work and labour! What expanse of knowledge, what discipline! Young people have so much to emulate him.---MAHASWETA DEVI

Chinmoy has proved that the most beautiful images, the truest and the most daring are enclosed in our everyday words.--NRISINHA PRASAD BHADURI

Few can match him in India.---FRANCE BHATTACHARYA, PARIS, French Translator of Pather Panchali

He builds bridges across our cultures. A sailor.---J M G LE CLEZIO, NOBEL LAUREATE IN LITERATURE, 2008

He has gone deeper into the French origins or sources of Eliot than any other commentator I have encountered.----FRANK KERMODE

He demonstrates how literature does more than open the door into unfamiliar civilisations. His mastery of three different literatures gives him a unique capacity to produce original perspectives. He is a rare bird, with a range of interests and knowledge seldom found in academia or anywhere else.---THEODORE ZELDIN

In the field of criticism it is as if Dr Chinmoy Guha had unearthed a rosetta stone and cracked its code, all in one.---JOE WINTER

Not only an extraordinary scholar of French, but an indefatigable researcher in Bengali and English. A true comparatist.--NABANEETA DEV SEN.

When we hear about the decline in intellect in the universities, we have the opposite example of Chinmoy Guha. His scholarship is so reassuring in the midst of ruthless consumerism and ugly tastelessness.---ASHOK MITRA

It is great that one of us has reached international level, is appreciated and admired! We feel proud. Does the mentor group of "international" Presidency University know that someone called Chinmoy Guha teaches at Calcutta University about 30 yards from there?---NABARUN BHATTACHARYA

Chilekothar Unmadini

Chilekothar Unmadini (Ananda Publishers) is reprinted for the 4th time. 3rd reprint of Ahammaker Abhidhan (Gangchil).

My Bengali translation of Mrinal Sen's My Chaplin is going to be published by a major publisher at the end of the year. I am so happy that I could finally keep my promises to Mrinal da. It is the surely best of all his books on Chaplin.

Overwhelmed

I am overwhelmed by the compliments from some of the greatest writers in the world. I thank the legendary French journalist Patrick Poivre PPDA for his special appreciation: "On put aussi assister à un entretien enrichissant avec le Professeur Chinmoy Guha, un polyglotte très érudit installé à Calcutta et qui parle un français aussi limpide que celui des auteurs qu’il traduit.." I thank the legendary Edwy Plenel of Mediapart too. It is nice to be called "the finest model of Francophonie in the world" by Jean-Noël Schifono.

Wiki mischief

After my recent title of Knight of Arts and Letters, a few gentlemen from another University have mutilated and vandalised the Wikipedia article on me! This can happen only in Bengal. They have chopped off the Times of India's comment on me as "India's best-known French scholar" and omitted the passage on Derrida's admiration for me, elaborately reported in Times of India and Hindustan Times after his visit. This reminds me of the Bengali gentleman who had actually gone to court to prove that Amartya Sen hadn't won the Nobel Prize!! Psychological problem? Citations are removed, and then demanded by these miscreants. The list of my CIIL documentaries have been mutilated. The names of the two ministries--the French Ministry of culture and that of National Education--chopped off. Mindless vandalism.

Oxford

Now working in Bodleian, Oxford. One of the most fruitful research works I have done. And Oxford is so beautiful now..so much light and joy! Enjoyed the poets' meeting.

Documentaries of the Central Institute of Indian Languages

I have anchored on-screen the following documentaries on Indian Literature for the Bhasha-Mandakini project of the Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore. Rabindranath Tagore (Letters) Arun Mitra Buddhadeb Bosu Krittibas Ojha Kaliprasanna Singha Peary Chand Mitra Bibhutibhushan Mukhopadhyay