With palms pressed together in respect,

I praise the lotus feet and magnificent girth of

the Lord Dak?i? R?y, Master of the Southern Regions, …

Against Ba?a Kh?n G?ji, the Great Sufi Warrior,

You waged war throughout the territory’s canals and channels,

but in the end you became close, fast friends.

—from the opening verse of the R?y Ma?gal of K???ar?m D?s

When the Hindu demigod Dak?i? R?y and the Sufi warrior Ba?a Kh?n G?ji meet in the field of battle with armies of tigers, God must intervene in the form of Satya P?r to broker peace. The two fight again, this time for G?ji’s reunion with his beloved princess C?mp?vat?. Then, in R?y’s battle with Bonbib?, the ruling matron of the Sundarbans, it is G?ji’s intervention that saves him from the latter’s wrath.

Satya P?r, who always watches over his disciples, aids Madansundar’s quest to find his lost merchant brothers. And Khoy?j Khijir (Khwaja Khizr) helps G?ji find the needle at the bottom of the sea, affirming his status as a jind? p?r, a ‘living’ saint.

Translated by award-winning scholar of early modern Bengali literature Tony K. Stewart, this collection of tales from the Sundarbans brims with fantasy and excitement. Tigers talk, rocks float, waters part and men magically grow into giants in these p?r kath?s, or stories of miracle-working Sufi saints. Bound together by the different characters’ pursuit of living honourably and morally in a difficult, corrupt world, these classic compositions from the 16th and 17th centuries also demonstrate how popular romances helped add ‘a natural Islamic substrate to local culture’.

Vividly retold Hindu and Muslim traditions of Bengal converge in these enchanting tales on timeless themes of human morality, social culture, and survival in the mangrove swamps of the Sundarbans.