Prof.K.Latha gave an enlightening lecture on Indian literature in English – from end 19 century onwards, detailing on a whole generation of important and globally known writers who preceded Independence - Tagore, Aurobindo, Sarojini Naidu, Toru Dutt, Michael Madhusudana Dutt, etc.
She touched upon Bruce King, who maps uncharted territory, provides ideas toward a poetics of Indian poetry in English, in his pioneering book "Modern Indian Poetry in English", where he asserts that Indian poetry in English has been heading towards a canon. ["a canon of Indian English poetry has been forming.."]
Talking about the First Generation writers of the pre-Independence period, Prof.Latha said that the giants of Indian Literature - Tagore, Aurobindo, Toru Dutt et al had as their most important concern - the Independence movement. Their two major concerns were: Nationalism and the Reformist movements - bothe went hand in hand, glorifying the nation. Even in the novels we find that there is an engagement with social issues, and these writers mostly derived their influence from the English Romantic Tradition. Hence, sometimes reading Toru Dutt and Sarojini Naidu can be like reading Keats - probably they used it as an escape. Even in the Gitanjali we find the Romantic tradition coming in. One main reason for the influence of the English Romantic tradition was that, they didn't have models to write in English (that includes Henry Louis Vivian Derozio and his Derozian school).
Speaking next on general trends in poetry in the first generation writers, she said that, there was a marked difference from the previous generation – both in themes and in technique. They moved away from idealistic nationalism to a personal engagement with the problems of a newly formed, extremely diverse nation. National identity especially became a problem since many of these poets
i) either came from communities that are not well integrated within the mainstream like Adil Jussawalla, Keki Daruwalla, Gieve Patel (all Parsi), – Nissim Ezekiel (Jewish), and Jayanta Mahapatra (Christian from Orissa),
(ii) or had a long stint in the West, resulting in a feeling of alienation from and nostalgia for their own culture and the inability to identify themselves with culture they emigrated to. e.g. Ramanujan, Parthasarathy, South Indian writers, who come from families rooted in Indian tradition, middle class families, Western educated, who grew up in an environment with a strong presence of the English language, - but sought to move away to the West and write very often about the sense of alienation and the experience of being in exile.
to be contd...
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