Premchand
1880–1936
Biography
Premchand (1880–1936) was the pen name of Dhanpat Rai Srivastava, a writer who worked in both Hindi and Urdu and became one of the defining voices of modern Indian literature. He was born in a village near Varanasi, trained as a teacher, and spent much of his working life in schools and in the world of newspapers and magazines. That experience gave him a close knowledge of the families and communities he later wrote about. The honorific Munshi, which often appears before his name, marks a man of letters or a teacher.
He wrote more than a dozen novels, some three hundred short stories, essays, and translations into Hindi from other Indian and foreign languages. He also edited and published periodicals, among them the Hindi literary monthly Hans and the newspaper Jagran. From the early years of the twentieth century his fiction took up the pressing problems of the day: dowry and unequal marriage, the position of widows, caste discrimination, the hardships of peasants and labourers, and the struggle against British rule. He is remembered as a pioneer of social realism in Indian fiction, and his stories are still read and taught across the subcontinent.
Three of his books on this site are in Hindi: ग़बन (Gaban), गोदान (Godaan) and कायाकल्प (Kayakalp). Godaan, which is generally counted as his last complete novel, follows Hori, a poor peasant whose lifelong wish to own a cow drags his family into debt and humiliation. Gaban is about a man's embezzlement and the pressure that money and social display put on a household. The title Kayakalp, meaning a renewal or transformation, names the theme of change that runs through the book.
This biography was written by a language model. The sources below are where to check it; treat details with care.
Books
कायाकल्प
by प्रेमचंद
A long novel of the 1920s that moves between a princely state and its court, the towns around it and several families drawn together by love, religious quarrels and politics. Premchand also weaves in a tale of rebirth that gives the book its title, which means a change of body.…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.ग़बन
by प्रेमचंद
Ramanath, a young clerk in Allahabad, cannot bear to disappoint his bride Jalpa, who loves jewellery, and begins to spend and promise more than he earns. Premchand's 1931 novel follows what a vain little lie about money grows into, in a city of clerks, shopkeepers and the…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.गोदान
by प्रेमचंद
Hori, a poor tenant farmer in a village of Awadh, scrapes together the money to own a cow, then watches debts, moneylenders and caste custom take everything he has built. Premchand's last and greatest novel sets the peasant's long defeat beside a lighter story of the city…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.नव-निधि
by प्रेमचंद
Nine stories by Premchand, among them the Rajput tales Raja Hardaul and Rani Sarandha and moral stories of sacrifice and remorse. The title means the nine treasures, and the book shows the author's early taste for history and heroic example. This book uses the racial and other…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.निर्मला
by प्रेमचंद
Nirmala, a girl of fifteen, is engaged to a young man, but her father's sudden death leaves her mother unable to keep the match, and she is married instead to a middle-aged lawyer who already has grown sons. Premchand's short novel, first serialised in the magazine Chand in…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.पाँच फूल
by प्रेमचंद
Five stories by Premchand from the collection Paanch Phool, including Mantra and Jihad, each a short tale of conscience and pride set among doctors, officers and townspeople. This book uses the racial and other slurs of its period as written; the Book Guide explains these words…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.प्रेम-द्वादशी
by प्रेमचंद
Twelve of Premchand's stories, in the eighth edition of 1938, including Shatranj ke Khiladi, Panch Parmeshwar, Bade Ghar ki Beti and Atmaram. They range from a quarrel of two chess-playing nobles to village justice and family pride. This book uses the racial and other slurs of…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.प्रेम-पंचमी
by प्रेमचंद
Five stories by Premchand from the 1930 Ganga-Pustakmala edition: Mrityu ke Pichhe, Abhushan, Rajya-Bhakt, Adhikar-Chinta and Grih-Dah. Each is a quiet study of family, money and loyalty in the India of his time. This book uses the racial and other slurs of its period as…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.प्रेमाश्रम
by प्रेमचंद
The peasants of a village in Awadh live under a landlord's agents who take their labour and their rents, while a young landowner returned from his studies hopes to set things right by goodwill. Premchand's 1922 novel, written in the years of the Gandhian movement, is his first…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.मानसरोवर १
by प्रेमचंद
The first volume of Mansarovar, the collected stories of Premchand, gathers twenty-seven tales of village and town life, among them Idgah, a small boy's day at the festival fair, Thakur ka Kuan and Poos ki Raat. The stories of poor farmers, widows, clerks and children show the…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.रंगभूमि
by प्रेमचंद
Surdas, a blind beggar of Banaras, owns a small field at the edge of town, and when a rich manufacturer wants it for a cigarette factory the old man refuses to give it up. Premchand's long novel of 1925 sets the beggar's stubborn dignity against the money, machines and officials…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.सप्तसरोज
by प्रेमचंद
Premchand's first collection of stories in Hindi, published in 1917, holds seven tales including Bade Ghar ki Beti, Panch Parmeshwar and Namak ka Daroga. It is where many readers first meet his clear, humane way of telling a story about honesty, pride and village life. This book…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.समर-यात्रा
by प्रेमचंद
Seven stories of the freedom struggle by Premchand, among them Jail, Thakur ka Kuan, Sharab ki Dukan and Julus. They follow ordinary people, a village woman, a student, a picketing volunteer, who are drawn into the civil disobedience movement.
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.सेवासदन
by प्रेमचंद
Suman, the proud daughter of an honest but poor police constable in Banaras, is married to a clerk far humbler than the household she hoped for, and her father's debts and her family's pride shape what follows. Premchand's first great Hindi novel (written in Urdu as…
Summary written by Claude Sonnet 5.5.