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{{for|the 2012 Bengali film|Na Hannyate}}
{{italic title}}
[[File:Na Hanyate.jpg|thumb|First edition]]
'''''Na Hanyate''''', or '''''It Does Not Die''''', is a [[novel]] written in 1974 by [[Maitreyi Devi]], an [[India]]n poet and novelist who was the protégée of the great [[Bengal]]i poet [[Rabindranath Tagore]].<ref>{{cite book|last1=Devi|first1=Maitreyi|title=Na Hanyate|date=October 1974|publisher=Prima Publications|location=89, Mahatma Gandhi Road, Kolkata - 700007}}</ref><ref name="chi-ma">{{cite web|title=It Does Not Die|url=http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/I/bo3646483.html|website=The University of Chicago Press Books|publisher=The University of Chicago|accessdate=15 March 2018}}</ref> The writer received [[Sahitya Akademi Award]] for this novel in 1976.<ref>{{cite web|title=AKADEMI AWARDS (1955-2016)|url=http://sahitya-akademi.gov.in/sahitya-akademi/awards/akademi%20samman_suchi.jsp#BENGALI|website=Sahitya Akademi|accessdate=6 April 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304084937/http://sahitya-akademi.gov.in/sahitya-akademi/awards/akademi%20samman_suchi.jsp#BENGALI|archive-date=4 March 2016|url-status=dead}}</ref> She wrote the novel in response to [[Romania]]n philosopher [[Mircea Eliade]]'s book ''[[Bengal Nights (novel)|La Nuit Bengali]]'' (titled ''Bengal Nights'' in English), which related a fictionalized account of their romance during Eliade's visit to India.<ref name="chi-ma"/>

==Background and publication==
Mircea Eliade came to study under Maitreyi Devi's father in [[Kolkata]] in 1930. She was 16 then, and Eliade 23. Her father was very proud of his daughter's intelligence and provided her with a liberal education unthinkable during that time in India. He even encouraged Mircea and Maitreyi to study together. Devi later wrote, "We were two good exhibits in his museum". During this time Mircea and Maitreyi became close to each other. On discovering their secret romance her father ordered Mircea to leave their house.<ref name="chi-ma"/>

Based on their relationship, Mircea's novel in Romanian '''Maitreyi''' was published in 1933.<ref name="terrible">{{cite journal|last1=Kamani|first1=Ginu|title=A Terrible Hurt: The Untold Story behind the Publishing of Maitreyi Devi|journal=Toronto Review|url=http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/143651.html|accessdate=27 March 2018}}</ref> Shortly after it was translated into French and published with the title ''La Nuit Bengali'', it became a huge success.<ref name="chi-mi">{{cite web|title=Bengal Nights|url=http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo3620205.html|website=The University of Chicago Press Books|publisher=The University of Chicago|accessdate=27 March 2018}}</ref> Maitreyi Devi's father found out about the book during his 1938-39 Europe tour and passed the information to his daughter upon returning home. In 1953, during her own Europe tour, Devi came across several Romanians who told her that they recognized her name from Mircea's novel. These encounters further piqued Devi's interest in reading the novel, though she was still unaware of the novel's full content. In 1972, Sergiu Al-George, a close friend of Mircea, came to Kolkata and told Maitreyi about the details of the book, informing her that the book described a sexual relationship between her and Mircea. Devi asked a friend to translate the novel from French and was shocked to find how it depicted their relationship.<ref name="terrible"/> Through ''Na Hanyate'', Maitreyi Devi responded to Mircea's novel and countered his fantasies.<ref name="chi-ma"/>

In 1973, Maitreyi Devi was invited by [[Chicago University]] to give lectures on [[Rabindranath Tagore]]. She went to Mircea Eliade's, who was a professor in the same university, office unannounced. During the next two months of her stay, they met several times, which was condensed to a single one at the end of her book. She confronted him about the claims he wrote in his book and, as a result, Mircea promised the book would not be published in English in her lifetime.<ref name="terrible"/> Five years after her death in 1989, the University of Chicago Press published it in English titled ''Bengal Nights''.<ref name="chi-mi"/>

Although ''La Nuit Bengali'' was published in 1933, it was several years before Devi discovered it. Though the two books relate a common event, they differ in many aspects of their [[plot (narrative)|plot]]s and perspectives. Taken together, the ''[[New York Times]]'' describes the two novels as "an unusually touching story of young love unable to prevail against an opposition whose strength was tragically buttressed by the uncertainties of a [[culture|cultural]] divide." In 1994, the [[University of Chicago Press]] published the two works in English as companion volumes.

==Adaptation==
The novel was loosely adapted as the 1999 [[Hindi language]] film ''[[Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam]],'' directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali.<ref>{{cite book|author=Mridula Nath Chakraborty|title=Being Bengali: At Home and in the World|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nkcsAwAAQBAJ&pg=PT170|date=26 March 2014|publisher=Taylor & Francis|isbn=978-1-317-81889-2|page=170}}</ref> although the film does not give credit to it. The film was a huge hit because of its melodramatic picturisation.

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/I/bo3646483.html Devi, Maitreyi It Does Not Die: A Romance]
*[http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/B/bo3620205.html Eliade, Mircea Bengal Nights: A Novel]

[[Category:Indian autobiographical novels]]
[[Category:1974 Indian novels]]
[[Category:Romance novels]]
[[Category:Novels set in India]]
[[Category:Mircea Eliade]]
[[Category:Indian Bengali-language novels]]

Na Hanyate - Revision history

imported>Graeme Bartlett: /* top */clean up, replaced: protegée → protégée