Revelry, Rivalry, and Longing for the Goddesses of Bengal: The Fortunes of Hindu Festivals

by Rachel Fell McDermott

Annually during the months of autumn, Bengal hosts three interlinked festivals to honor its most important Durga, Kali, and Jagaddhatri. While each of these deities possesses a distinct iconography, myth, and character, they are all martial. Durga, Kali, and Jagaddhatri often demand blood sacrifice as part of their worship and offer material and spiritual benefits to their votaries. Richly represented in straw, clay, paint, and decoration, they are similarly displayed in elaborately festooned temples, thronged by thousands of admirers.

The first book to recount the history of these festivals and their revelry, rivalry, and nostalgic power, this volume marks an unprecedented achievement in the mapping of a major public event. Rachel Fell McDermott describes the festivals' origins and growth under British rule. She identifies their iconographic conventions and carnivalesque qualities and their relationship to the fierce, Tantric sides of ritual practice. McDermott confronts controversies over the tradition of blood sacrifice and the status-seekers who compete for symbolic capital. Expanding her narrative, she takes readers beyond Bengal's borders to trace the transformation of the goddesses and their festivals across the world. McDermott's work underscores the role of holidays in cultural memory, specifically the Bengali evocation of an ideal, culturally rich past. Under the thrall of the goddess, the social, political, economic, and religious identity of Bengalis takes shape.

392 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2011

Reviews

[Riju Ganguly · Rating 4 out of 5]

The West has been always fascinated with the festivals of Bengal, especially the Pujas of Durga and Kali. While the worship of Durga has got the deserved attention in the shape of well-curated compilations like "Nine Nights of the Goddess" and seminal field-studies like "Ritual Worship of the Great Goddess", it was difficult to find a tome entirely dedicated to the festivals as they take place in Bengal. Even rare were works that concentrated upon the emotional aspects of these festivities.
The book under discussion meets exactly those demands.
To do so, the discussion had been organised into the following chapters~
1. Puja Origins and Elite Politics
2. The Goddess in Colonial and Post-colonial History
3. Durga the Daughter: Folk and Familial Traditions
4. The Artistry of Durga and Jagaddhatri
5. Durga on the Titanic: Politics and Religion in the Puja
6. The "Orientalist" Kali: A Tantric Icon Comes Alive
7. Approaches to Kali Puja in Bengal
8. Controversies and the Goddess
9. Devi in the Diaspora
* Conclusion
This core text has been followed by an irrelevant and inadequate Appendix (An Overview of the Press in Bengal up to 1947). But the "Notes" and "Bibliography" adheres to the rigorously high standards of academia. The "Index" follows suit as well.
The book is bound to boggle the mind of those who are new to Pujas in Bengal. But for us this is old hat. Also, the book suffers from numerous errors and over-simplifications while talking about the socio-political landscape of the Pujas. However, the third and the sixth chapters are simply brilliant in their over-arching approach that crisscrosses the PoV of the worshipper and the worshipped again and again, through various songs, gestures and iconography.
Overall, this is a solid piece of research, but obviously not complete or exhaustive. Nevertheless, for an initiate, this is a very good starting point.
Recommended.

[Nivedita · Rating 4 out of 5]

A detailed study of the history of Durga Puja that includes an erudite understanding of its historical, social, cultural, religious, literary, and aesthetic legacy in the contemporary world. A detailed analysis of the significance of the puja for Bengalis especially since the colonial times; it’s relevance for the Bengali diaspora; and how cleverly it borrows and/or do-opts the Vaishnavite traditions form the core of the book. It was enlightening and engaging for me as a non-Bengali.

[Phil · Rating 4 out of 5]

Revelry, Rivalry, and Longing for the Goddesses of Bengal: the Fortunes of Hindu Festivals is a fascinating study of three important yearly Bengali festivals dedicated to the goddesses Durga, Kali and Jagaddhatri. Rachel Fell McDermott describes the development of these large public festivals, their growth from the 1700s onwards, and their relationship to social power, aspiration and status, and the commercialisation of the modern “puja industry”. She discusses how the representation of the goddesses has changed over time – and, in particular relation to Kali, what relationship modern representations of Kali bear to Her tantric past, and also highlights some recent controversies, such as the environmental impact of the pujas, and tensions over animal sacrifice; to the use of dirt from the doorways of sex workers in Durga Pujas.

Revelry, Rivalry, and Longing for the Goddesses of Bengal highlights the hidden history and politics behind the Bengali goddess festivals and the complex tensions over what constitutes “traditional practices”. If you want to understand more about the history and workings of these large public festivals and how they relate to different modalities of Indian religosity, this book is an excellent place to start.