[Nalina Basanta / The Tempest translated into Bengali by Hemchandra Bhattacharya]

This early transcreation, or free-translation, of The Tempest in Bengali by poet Hemchandra Bhattacharya was published in 1893 titled Nalina Basanta/ Nalini Basant/ Nalini-Basanta / Nolini-Basanta., Hemchandra Bhattacharya is considered to be "the best poet during the time gap between Micheal Madhusan Datta nd Rabindranath Tagore. He graduated from Calcutta University in 1859, and the influence of the English teaching he experienced is evidenced throughout his life's work . The influence of English studies upon Hemchandra ranged from epigraphs that quoted from Byron or Spenser, Goethe or Longfellow, a common practice borrowed from English poetic convention at the time, to publications such as Chhayamoyi (1880), in which, in his own words, he had 'attempted to capture a slight aura of the famous European poet Dante's unrivalled poem the 'Divina Comedia' in this small book.' In his translations of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (Romeo-Juliet, 1895) and The Tempest (Nalini-Basanta Natak, 1868), he makes the same apologetic gesture, calling them mere shadows of the originals rather than translations, due to the inestimable differences between the two languages.", In this transcreation, Hemchandra chooses to Indianize the names of Shakespeare's characters, but keeps their characteristics. Although the plot and characters are altered to please his audience, it does stay true to the original story. Tapati Gupta states in hear essay "Shakespeare Re-Configured: Hemchangdra Bandyopadhays Bagla Transcreations" that "we do find Hemchandra's Prospero - Baijayanta - is endowed with a native tenderness and becomes a sentimental Bengali father. Gonzalo - Procheta - is likewise sentimentalized." Gupta also states the there is no record of this play having ever been performed, and that Shakespeare's blank verse "becomes in Hemchandra's hands, a monotonous un-dramatic rhymed verse."
A gift of the Home Department, Government of India to Her Majesty's (Queen Victoria) Secretary for the State of India (Sir R.R Cross [Viscount Cross from 19 August 1886]), and thence by the India Office, London. Since 1964 the Library has been held on deport at the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust., Original list entry: Bengal 10. Nalini Basanta. An Adaptation of the Tempest.