Zanna Słoniowska’s The House with the Stained-Glass Window is one of those rare novels where history does more than simply act as a backdrop, instead becoming inseparable from the lives of its characters. Set in the city of Lviv, the novel tells the story of four generations of women — great-grandmother, grandmother, mother, and daughter — whose private tragedies become intricately bound to the shifting tides of inter-generational politics. At the centre of their lives is the titular stained-glass window, a physical presence that also functions as a metaphor: fragile and fragmented, yet luminous and enduring, much like the inheritance of history itself.
For a Bengali-reading audience, this story has now been made accessible through translator Sulagna Mukhopadhyay’s Rongin Sharshiwala Bari, published by Rritobak. In taking on this project, Mukhopadhyay has opened a doorway to European history for readers in Bengal, while also reminding us of the universal resonances of memory, identity, and resilience. The stained-glass window of the tale now refracts its light anew, inviting us to find echoes of our own stories within its shards.
A city of shifting identities
To understand Słoniowska’s novel, one must first understand its setting: Lviv. Over the course of the 20th century, this city has been part of Poland, the Soviet Union, Nazi Germany, and Ukraine, with each regime leaving behind its imprint not only on the architecture and the streets of Lviv, but also on the everyday lives of its people. In this sense, the place is less a city than a vibrant, thriving palimpsest of identities, constantly being rewritten by the force of history.
Within this turbulent landscape, the house, of which the stained-glass window in question is a part, stands as both witness and participant. It shelters four women, each bearing the scars of her own era, yet connected by the threads of family and memory. Their intertwined narratives demonstrate how personal lives can never be separated from political upheaval: wars, occupations, and shifting borders all ripple through their destinies, shaping their loves, their losses, and even their silences.
Generations of women, generations of silence
The novel is remarkable in how it handles the transmission of trauma and resilience across generations. For Bengali readers, especially, this theme strikes a familiar chord; our own histories — Partition, the Bengal famine, migration, political unrest — are also marked by the interconnection of private trauma and collective upheaval. Families here, too, have carried forward silence as much as speech, grief as much as memory. In this sense, Słoniowska’s novel becomes far more than simply a tale of Ukraine or Lviv, but rather a ditty about how history marks us all.
Translation as a bridge
In conversation with t2, Mukhopadhyay reflected on how the project has deepened her understanding of contemporary history. “On February 24, 2022, when the Russia-Ukraine war broke out, the world witnessed a conflict whose roots lay deep in history. After the Second World War, this is the largest, most dangerous war the world has seen, and it has claimed the lives of countless soldiers as well as ordinary Ukrainian citizens. The House with the Stained-Glass Window first properly introduced me to this chapter of history, and if I hadn’t taken on this journey to translate the novel, then many aspects of this war would have remained unknown to me,” she said.
Mukhopadhyay also stressed how fortunate she has been to have encountered people who have helped her truly grasp the intensity of the world beyond the walls of Bengal. “I met Zanna two years ago. Her novel has won many awards, and was first translated into English by Antonia Lloyd-Jones for MacLehose Press. Without this first translation, mine would not have been possible. I am grateful to the poet Iryna Vikyrchak, because it is thanks to the many conversations I have had with her that I have come to know of Ukrainian culture and history. I am also grateful to Sushmita Basu Singh and Raja Mukhopadhyay of Rritobak Publications for their unwavering support.”
“Set against the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, the themes of Zanna’s novel felt contemporary and relevant, making it a story we were eager to share with Bengali readers,” added Raja Mukhopadhyay, co-owner, Rritobak Publications.
Why it matters today
The Russia-Ukraine war has once again forced the world to confront questions of sovereignty, belonging, and identity. The devastation seen in Ukrainian cities today echoes the upheavals of the past, the very history that Słoniowska captures in her novel. In reading about the women of Lviv, Bengali readers may find themselves reflecting on their own histories of displacement, survival, and resilience.
At the same time, the translation signals something important for our literary culture: the need to engage more deeply with world literature. Bengal has a long tradition of translation, and Rongin Sharshiwala Bari continues this tradition, reminding us that literature is at its richest when it is in conversation with other cultures.
Ultimately, what makes The House with the Stained-Glass Window so powerful is its universality. Though set in a specific city with its own complicated history, it tells a story that resonates far beyond Ukraine. It is about mothers and daughters, about the inheritance of grief, about how private lives are never immune from public events. It is about survival and endurance in the face of forces larger than oneself.
For Bengali readers, encountering this novel in translation is an opportunity not only to learn about Lviv but also to hold a mirror to our own history. The stained-glass window refracts its light into our own contexts, allowing us to see familiar patterns of trauma, silence, and resilience in new ways.
A window that opens both ways
Słoniowska’s novel is both tender and unflinching, lyrical and grounded. Mukhopadhyay’s translation brings that complexity into Bengali, offering readers here a chance to step into a world removed from theirs while recognising their own reflections within it. In a time when wars, rage, and identities are contested, literature such as this reminds us of the bonds that connect us across borders.