Devdas

by Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay

All the world’s a stage, people put on masks, they become thieves, beggars, kings, queens – they make love, they speak loving words, they weep, as though it was all real.

I don’t know how Parvati is. I’ve not had the heart to inquire after her. Only, I feel a great pity for Devdas. Perhaps, you do too, having heard my tale. Yet, if you chance to meet a hopeless, heedless sinner like Devdas, say a little prayer for him, that he will not suffer the kind of death Devdas did. Pray, not that he live, but that at the time of death a loving hand may gently touch his head, that he may behold a loving face as his eyes close upon this world.