E-C-202:Indian Writing in English

Name: Nargis I. Saiyad

Paper: E-C-202: Indian Writing in English

Topic: Three Indian Poems

SEM: 2, Part: 1.

Year: 2011/12

Submitted To,

 Dr. Dilip Barad,

Dept.of English,

Bhavnagar University.

 An Introduction

                                                         -Kamala Das

 The poem 'An Introduction' is the masterpiece of famous Indian writer Kamala Das. Let's see the poem in the levels given by P.K.Thakar. They are,

(i) Phonological level

(ii) Meaning level

(iii) Grammar level

(i) Phonological level -

                               The poet has used the device alliteration in the poem by using the words 'those' and 'them', 'week' and 'with', 'brown' and 'born', 'critics' and 'cousin', 'all' and 'alone', 'it' and 'is', 'there' and 'that', 'the' and 'that' etc...

(ii) Meaning level -

                          "I don't know politics but I know the names of those in power, and can repeat them like"

     

                              By writing this, Das begins her poem. She says that she doesn't know politics but knows who are there in politics with power. She says that she can repeat their names like the days of week, names of months. She gives the names of Nehru there.

                          Then she writes very significant line that she speaks three languages. They may be Malayalam- her mother-tongue, Hindi- national language and English- the global language but she dreams only in one language, may be Malayalam.

                                 Sujata Bhatt in her poem 'Search for My Tongue' says that she wants to speak in her mother-tongue but she can't and so, she dreams and in her dream her mother-tongue arises. So, Kamala Das also wants to tell about her wish to speak the language whatever she want to. Then she says that her critics, friends, and visiting cousins all these tell her not to write in English.

                                       Then she talks about the natural way in which the woman's body develops. Here 'I' refers to every woman. She started to wear the costumes of her brother- his trousers, cut her hair short and tried to ignore her womanliness. But her society didn't accept this and advised her to wear saree, be girl, be wife, be cook and even be a quarrel with servants.

                                                      She talks about free life. In loneliness, she drinks at twelve in midnight. She says that she is sinner, saint, she is beloved and also the betrayed.

                                 The equality of love is represented here. Lover's individual personality extinct here and so, she wants to say that all the pain and happiness are shared by both equally and so, she is his life and his life is hers and so, she too call herself 'I'.

                                This remains one Gujarati saying,

                             'Aek sikkani be baaju'

                           (Every coin has two sides) 

          Here, in this poem, first she talks about the dependent woman of dominant society, independent woman of free and interdependent lovers of progressive society where both share the same again.

(iii) Grammar level -

                         The poet has used the devise of repetition by using the words, 'I', 'know', 'of', 'English', 'one', 'alone', 'speak', 'mine', 'Indian' etc... It is written in one stanza. She used the words 'crows', 'lions' from animal world.

            Thus, in the poem, the poet talks about love and sex for woman very frankly and it is her masterpiece and very popular poem.

                           Leaving India

                                                                                                - Rachna Joshi

# Meaning of the poem-

                          In the very first stanza, the poet herself asks a question that why she left India and next to it she also gives the reason that she was very young and full of ideas about studying poetry, travelling and finding true love.

        "Why did I leave India and come to North America."

                  In the second stanza, she says that North America was clean, sanitised and almost sterile. It was orderly and shining.

                        "Sweet, orderly and shining"

                The only order shows the mechanical life of the people. The life full of rules and regulations. It looks like as if the life of people is imprisoned life. After describing it she says,

                 "The crows smaller, more manageable."

                     Though she tells about her views in praising words, she does slander. It is true that small crowd can easily be managed but we/ Indians like to live in a crowd and how crowd can be smaller one? Crowd can be symbolized as a strength and unity of people.

                                  The colours of the trees red and orange refers to the glamour of their life. It is here,

  "The autumnal trees red and orange and the light golden and white."

                           And then she says about the colour light golden. How can golden be light? Golden means glamour here and white means no colour.

             "India is stark, ancient, ugly, magnificent, uplifting or degrading."

                        She in the first line says that India is stark, ancient and ugly. But in the next line, she writes that it is also magnificent, uplifting or degrading. It seems that the poet is backbiting of India if we see the first line but ancient refers to our long-old culture.

                      Then she says that in North America, there were no ruins, no myths and no ghosts. It means in India there are ruins, myths and ghosts. To loose something, we have to have something. It is in India but not in America means America has no precious thing to loose. It is proud to have myth in our India.

                            Then in the last stanza, she says that we may deny history, family and tradition but we wait for civilization that is continues from past years. India has five thousand years old continues civilization and it is just like a doting grand parents.

                    "lie in wait, like a doting grand parent."

                                    It shows that India has tradition so, in the surface level, it looks ugly but it is attractive.

# Structure of the poem -

                                                      The poet has not used any particular rhyming scheme in this poem. The words 'the', 'I', 'no', 'India' are repeatedly used in this poem. So, the device of repetition is used here. She also uses the language of paradox by using the words, like 'stark', 'ugly', 'ancient' and 'degrading' etc... This poem is one of the best example of using paradoxical language.

Search for My Tongue

                                                                       -Sujata Bhatt

# Theme-

                        In this poem, Sujata Bhatt talks about her pain of loosing her mother-tongue because in the foreign, she had to speak foreign language.

# Content-

                             The poet loves her mother-tongue a lot but she can't speak it now because no one in foreign country would understand anything from it.

                          In the very beginning, she asks a question to a foreigner that what you would do if you had two tongues in your mouth and could not really know the other, the foreign tongue.

  "I ask you, what would you do if you had two tongues in your mouth, and could not really know the other, the foreign tongue."

                                                       The concept of culture, cultural discrimination, problems of rootlesness is clearly seen. She shows her sorrow by saying that even if we can think in both languages, we have no freedom to speak in that way. She has suppressed her mother-tongue. She says if this would happen, our mother-tongue would rot and die in our mouth.

                                              She says that I think I can spit it out but the obstacle is the dream. While she dreams, her mother-tongue grows back, grows longer, grows moist, grows strange veins and it grows so much that the foreign language is tied in knots.

                                           She tells that in the dream, her mother-tongue is imagined as a bird. In her mouth, this bird opens. That bird pushes the other tongue aside.

       "Everytime I think I've forgotten, I think I've lost the mother tongue, it blossoms out of mouth."

                                                   Her attachment with her own language in her unconscious mind never let her forget it. And so, at the end in the last line she says,

                         "it blossoms out of mouth"

                                          Through this poem, the poet wants to say that cultural difference creates rootlessness. The feeling of rootlessness makes the person to feel like orphan.

# Structure -   

                            The poem has no any rhyming scheme used here. So, it looks like the thought of anyone. The poet has used the device of alliteration by using the words 'me' and 'mean', 'what' and 'would', 'you' and 'your' etc... The poem, we can say is a conversational poem. This is a small but a significant poem.