The Insectesimal tall tale: Historical catachresis and ethics in the science fiction of Premendra Mitra

Jagadish Chandra Bose and the anticolonial politics of science fiction

“…Their genealogy of Bangla SF then moves on to Hemlal Dutta’s “Rahasya” (“The Mystery”), published in 1882 (erroneously dated to 1892 [287]), and Bose’s 1896 “Niruddesher Kahini” (“The Story of the Missing One”), as “Palatak Tufan” (“The Runaway Storm” or “Runaway Cyclone”) was originally titled. 6 In a later article on the young adult Bengali SF of Premendra Mitra (1904–88), Bhattacharya and Hiradhar read “Runaway Cyclone” as a tall tale (2018: 175). In reference to Mitra’s fiction, they define the basic premise of tall tales to be their “truth value”: “it is not the narration of the events themselves that calls its truth value into question; the non-verifiability of the tale emerges from the uncertain position that the narrator occupies” (2018: 175).…”

“…In reference to Mitra’s fiction, they define the basic premise of tall tales to be their “truth value”: “it is not the narration of the events themselves that calls its truth value into question; the non-verifiability of the tale emerges from the uncertain position that the narrator occupies” (2018: 175). Bhattacharya and Hiradhar argue that “Runaway Cyclone” is a tall tale because it ends, in the characteristic style of the genre, “with an all-too-simple scientific explanation of an extraordinary event” (2018: 175). However, and crucially, Bhattacharya and Hiradhar cite the 1896 version of Bose’s story, which lacks the origin story of the hair oil and instead ends on the brief explanatory paragraph as published in the scientific journal quoted.…”