Changes in Bengali Social Life as Recorded in Autobiographies by Women Srabashi Ghosh "Birds in a Cage", that is how Rasasundari, a self-taught lady and the first Bengali autobiographer described the condition of women in her book published in 1876. The autobiography of Manikuntala, a front-ranking leader of the undivided Communist Party, was published in 1982. In between we find quite a few autobiographies written by Bengali women. Their accounts span the better part of two centuries.