Though the Tagores had been at the forefront of dress reform in Bengal and in devising a new form of saree and blouse suitable for appearing in public, by the time Shesher Kabita came to be written in 1928, you can sense a distinct disapproval on the part of Rabindranath Tagore for the new Westernised woman.  This passage describes the hero Amit Rai’s sisters, Cissie and Lissie. His fiance, Ketaki “Katie” Mitter meets with similar disapproval.

Several decades later you can’t help feeling a little sorry for them….perhaps fuckyeahindianflapper.tumblr.com is in order! Or at the very least Cissie and Lisse are definitely the Calcuttan counterparts of Eloise and Ramona and need to be  similarly illustrated.