Concerning Indian Writing in English

With particular reference to poetry

I

Comparative literature dawned when Goethe pronounced the word “world literature” to Eckermann in 1827 and Matthew Arnold sounded it in England. Enter the cosmopolitanism of Eliot, Pound and Joyce. It is said that world literature is dawning. Perhaps in the sense that in the literatures of the various languages of the world there will be a search for affinities, an extending of hands across borders, it has. Eliot re-discovered “the mind of Europe” – “re.discovered” in the sense that that entity of the mind of Europe was already there, just as the mind or soul of India has always been present through the ages. Rilke, Pasternak, Proust, Yeats and Joyce displayed intra-European affinities. Pound stepped outside of Europe in his poems to the threshold of Japan and China. Eliot, Thoreau and Emerson show an acquaintance with the Bhagavad Gita. The American Eliot made England his home. The English Auden made America his home. Notwithstanding these phenomena, a baby born in Puduchatram in Tamil Nadu will not lisp in English, nor his mother sing cradle songs to him in English.

One may have a pooling of world literature in a language, probably English which is the lingua franca or link language of the world. This is not just a probability. It is already a fact, though not realized in fulness. America has set herself assiduously to this task, in the spirit of her Henry James who wrote, “We can deal freely with forms of civilization not our own, can pick and choose and assimilate and in short (aesthetically) claim our property wherever we find it,” and in the spirit of her Ezra Pound who said, “Our opportunity is greater than Leonardo’s; we have more aliment. We have not one classic tradition to revivify, we have China and Egypt and the unknown lands upon the roof of the world–Khotan, Kara-shar and Kan-su.” It has been suggested byProfessor Henry Gifford that “possibly American literature, or rather the common literature of all people writing in the English language, will provide one approximation to world literature.” Roy Harvey Pearce foresees “there will be no American poetry in the next half-century ... it will be a new international poetry.”

However, the well-known truth is that language is the soul of literature. It is also the soul of a people. We may even say that language is the objective embodiment of its people, their culture, modes of thinking and particularly of feeling. Words in any language are powerful things, with lives of their own. In this respect we may say (in Indian terminology) that every word is a minor “Om”, symbolic of the Self of the individual speaking it, and also symbolic of the Over-Self or the Universe as he sees it. Words have gossamer connections, mystic resonances, indwelling individual, pre-natal and racial memories.

“Poetry differs from every other art” says Eliot, “in having a value for the people of the poet’s race and language which it can have for no other ... No art is more stubbornly national than poetry ... one of the reasons for learning at least one foreign language well is that we acquire a kind of supplementary personality; one of the reasons for not acquiring a new language instead of one’s own is that most of us do not want to be a different person.”

Language embodies the sensibility of the race. It is a functional manifestation of society, with a reciprocal relationship to society, each developing and modifying the other, fashioning in literature a medium of the shared values of the people. Writers who fashion this medium are significant only in the context of their society or race. Even their creations draw their existence from the language. It has been said that Shakespeare did not invent Hamlet but discovered him in the English language. So was Rama born of the Sanskrit language through Valmiki, though he re-incarnated later in the other sister-languages. So were Kannaki and Manimekhalai born of the Tamil language through Ilango and Sattanar.

Language may survive social changes but not transplantation. It requires a local base. This, in essence, is the problem of Indians writing in English. The question whether English can express Indian life, “express Indian feelings” or fit into Indian modes of thought is only relatively valid since Indian works have been, and are being, translated into English all the time, and this question is posed more often and more uncompromisingly by those who themselves do not or cannot write creatively in English than by those who somehow, even if by perversity of circumstances, feel called to express themselves in English.

The crux of the matter has been stated by F. R. Leavis as follows:

Literature...cannot be understood merely in terms of odd individual works illustrating “processes” and “modes”; it involves a literary tradition. And a given literary tradition is not merely, as it were by geographical accidents of birth, associated with a given language; the relation may be suggested by saying that the two are of each other. Not only is language an apt analogy for literary tradition; one might say that such a tradition is largely a development of the language it belongs to...

II

It is thus natural that, while creative writing in English has spread over the world, there is, along with this spread, a search for national cultures, a search for national identities. This phenomenon does not exclude America or even England, both of whom want to define their individual qualities as distinct from each other. Prof. Henry Gifford writes:

It may be said that while the languages of the world today are continually learning from each other and meeting in common experience, they also insist jealously on their uniqueness. The mother-tongue may admit step-children, an occasional Joseph Conrad; but it is to be guarded as peculiar to themselves, and in certain ways incommunicable. It has the duty of maintaining our selfhood, our traditional emphasis and reserves; the privacy of the individual is bound up with the intimacy of language. No foreigner can ever penetrate all the recesses of a language, but he may learn to recognize its characteristic modes and to catch its intonation. The student of comparative literature has to accept that here is a threshold on which he must halt. Half the fascination of his work will derive from a growing sense of the irreducibly singular, the idiosyncratic, that gives every literature its own beauty and its own enigma.

Among the English-writing nations outside England, America is “a special case” for very obvious and just reasons. And with what effect? To quote Professor Gifford again:

The English writer and reader in the present age can feel everywhere this mighty presence (of America), by no means entirely welcome. The home stretches of our language, its most sensitive and intimate areas, are being invaded: the Englishness of English begins to capitulate, By now it has become utterly impossible to ignore American writing, which more and more sets the pace and determines the direction in our literature. English poetry today owes much of its impulse to American example ….. Here is an opportunity no less than an obligation. We are bound as participators in a common heritage (it is largely that) to know, interpret and judge American literature. It concerns the English writer and reader not only because the progress of America bears on so many issues affecting the whole world, but also because the language which educates our feelings and guides our thought is rocked with the American impact ...

A culture that ignores what is happening outside very soon gets provincial and fails….Rising to take the challenge, it (English literature) could achieve a radical perception of its own nature, of the traditions that have moulded it and are still not beyond recall, and also of the divergent American tradition. This would be a service from which both these literatures within one literature could benefit...The very beat and cadence of American English has to be recognized as a new phenomenon. American speech demands its own measures. While American and English writing seem to converge, the course has changed and American literature draws English after it.

The Americans, on their side, feel that the precolonial phase of English literature does not belong to them. They have imparted their own measures and cadence to English speech. “I see New-Englandly,” said Emily Dickinson. In Hawthorne, Henry James sees a “certain reflected light” which “springs from American life,” and he counsels the reader to “look for his (Hawthorne's) local and national quality between the lines of his writing and in the indirect testimony of his tone, his accent, his temper, his very omissions and suppressions.” Wallace Stevens observes, “Nothing cou1d be more inappropriate to American literature than its English source since the Americans are not British in sensibility.”

The impact of English on less virile languages has naturally been different. The Scots language was lost, and with it, as Speirs remarks, a distinctive traditional life, and the Scots poet is obliged to have recourse to writing in English. Yeats prescribes for the writing of Irish poetry in English “a more subtle rhythm, a more organic form” and the preservation of “certain ardent ideas and high attitudes of mind which were the nation itself.” Further he employed Irish symbols of expression while “seeing all in the light of European literature.” By these means he brought an Irish accent into his poetry.

It is not likely that all the nations writing in English, will contribute, between themselves, to form a single tradition. The probability is that the European literatures may constitute an orchestra. On the other hand, writing in English pre-supposes a ground of English tradition, at least in memory, if not in current consciousness. Prof. William Walsh writes, “All English literature, and indeed all writing in English, flows from the one great fact of Shakespeare, all other writing being fragments of the universal whole collected in his genius.” He succintly continues, “I said that the whole of English literature proceeds from Shakespeare and that the universe of the English novel derives from Dickens. In the same way, all literatures in the English language, supremely because of this very fact, proceed from English literature in the narrower sense. Or to put it in another way, they too go to and gather their force and identity from Shakespeare and Dickens. English literature is the ocean from which others are evolved.”

The Indian writer in English will pause at the word “identity” in this extract.

III

The considerations set forth above are pertinent to the situation of any foreigner taking to writing in English. To the reader who may demur at the length of the consideration of what look like preliminaries, I may say what G. K. Chesterton, in his introduction to one of the novels of Charles Dickens, in a similar situation of apparent preliminary meandering says, “I have been coming to my subject all the time.”

The commitment of any writer to write anything in a particular language does not arise because he has consciously pondered over and nicely weighed diverse considerations of this sort and then bestirred himself to writing in that language. It simply arises from his self, his urge and his human predicament, overriding all other considerations.

The situation and compulsions of the Indo-English writer are well brought out in the revelation of the late Manjeri S. Isvaran in his introduction to his volume of poems in English “Catguts” (Madras, 1940) in the form of a letter to a critic:

I belong to the category of those who cannot help writing in English. You know that. The trouble, as somebody said–I would alter it to devil–came out of Thomas Babington Macaulay’s inkpot; the Indo-Anglian pedagogues, who pretend to be Priscians too, are the limbs of that devil perpetuating their creator’s philistinism. I am not nude amid all this “academic nudity,” I am no eunuch in a harem of beauties. I refuse to be policed by these pundits. Let them grind their gerunds and leave my grammar alone. For anacoluthons have the sudden habit of transfiguring themselves into anacondas, and no prey is delicious to their palate as these pundits who play the role of paracritics...

The future destiny of the Indo-English writer is likewise subject to the compulsions of history.

IV

Among the community of nations writing creative literature today in English, America is a special case for two reasons as it appears to Indian eyes. One is that America grew up inside a perfected language which it inherited, and on which it might play a variation in accord with its own genius, and this language contained a vast literature on which it could draw. The other reason is that today, in the context of English writing produced by other nations, it has “a long literary history of its own and writers of world class,” as Bruce King has put it.

Vastly different is the situation of Indo-English writers in India which is saturated with great, noble and rich literatures and languages which had arrived at their “Shakespearian moment” long before the English language came into existence. America may exult in its freedom from tradition, viewing tradition as a chain and a trap thwarting creativity, but the paradox of the situation is that those disowning tradition strive to build a tradition themselves–of their own brand. Their view of tradition is at best a half-truth. Tradition gives a base to creative genius from which to take off. The writer may write differently with different values, but without the tradition he may not be writing at all. To fashion a given instrument according to new needs is the necessary obligation and privilege of the writer and the poet.

The essential point of difference between the Indo-English writer and the American is that the American writer, given the language, strives to create a new literature and to find his identity in it, while the Indian, dowered with an immemorial identity, desires to express it in a new language. It will be seen that both the parameters are the reverse of each other in the two cases.

In order to perfect for our use the instrument of the English language, with which we have found ourselves provided owing to an accident of history, we have to equip ourselves with the English literary tradition which, as Professor Walsh says, stems from Shakespeare and Dickens. While we have to gather our force “force” from them, it does not by any means follow that (as Professor Walsh has expressed himself) we have to gather our “identity” from them. With an identity shaped by millennia, we shall still cultivate not only Shakespeare but also the great stars of the English literary galaxy in order to handle the English language effectively. Indeed, through English, our encounter will extend to the whole world. In this encounter we may well be adding a new dimension to our own personality, resulting from the interaction between our tradition and the new language.

V

If the basic situation in India is different from that in America, the environment in which the situation is to be solved is similar in the two countries. Like America, India has been a crucible for the mixing of races, cultures, languages and religions. This she has been from the dawn of human history. To quote Sister Nivedita (Margaret E. Noble), “One of the master facts in Indian history, a fact borne in upon us more deeply with every hour of study is that India is and has always been a synthesis. No amount of analysis–racial, lingual or territorial–will ever amount in the sum to the study of India. Perhaps the axioms of Euclid are not axioms at all. Perhaps all the parts of a whole are not equal to the whole. At any rate, apart from and above all the fragments which must be added to make India, we have to recognize India herself, all-containing, all-dominating, moulding and shaping the destinies and the very nature of the elements out of which she is composed … … No Indian province has lived unto itself, pursuing its own path, going its way unchallenged and alone. On the contrary, the same tides have swept the land from end to end.” Maybe, an aspect of this inclusiveness is manifested in Indo-English writing, India’s task of taking its identity to a foreign language is perhaps a harder one than America’s of taking the heritage of nations to its own language.

Furthermore, for reasons we have just stated, we may apply with equal truth to India what Professor Gifford has said of America. We may say that world literature is no less an easy concept to the Indian than to the American who is (in Professor Gifford’s words) “accustomed to the mingling of races on his own soil.” We may also say that India, no less than America, (again in Professor Gifford’s words) “is born to comparisons.” At every turn, for example, we view Tamil in the light of Sanskrit and in the light of English; we view Marathi devotional poetry in the light of Tamil devotional poetry; we view Tamil and Kannada musical compositions in the light of Telugu compositions; we view Hindustani music in the light of Carnatic music; we view the dance and painting and sculpture in a part of India in the light of these in the other parts of India and elsewhere in the world.

VI

We mentioned that Yeats prescribed and followed certain modalities to introduce Irish accent into English. What will be ours to introduce our accent into English?

The Indo-English writer, particularly the poet, has the spiritual reservoir of Sanskrit, his own mother-tongue and the other Indian languages, from which to draw sustenance. He will steer clear of the Scylla of alien modes of thinking, feeling and speaking, and the Charybdis of outworn attitudes and all-too conventional and traditional mannerisms in expression and speech. On the other hand, his habits of thought, his range of feeling, his idioms and accent will flow into his writing, of their own accord, and these may make his style individual. He will employ Indian symbols of expression, viewing them however in the light of the genius of the English language. He would have taken pains to perfect his instrument, the English language, as well as he may, and this will be an arduous task, involving a study of the main current of English literary tradition. He must gain full mastery over his experiences, following them to their utmost implications if he is to break effectively the language barrier.

Modifying the words of T. S. Eliot, we may say that the Indo-English poet will write not merely with his own generation in his bones but with the feeling that the whole literature of India from Valmiki and Valluvar, and with it the whole literature of his own language, have a simultaneous existence and compose a simultaneous order with each other and with the literatures of Europe and America or Asia, wherever his affinities may lead him. If he has searched his heart and found the jewel of sincerity, a national tone or accent will naturally find its way into his writings, particularly in his poetry.

As Eliot says, “the spiritual communication between people and people cannot be carried out without the individuals who take the trouble to learn at least one foreign language ...and who consequently are able, to a greater or less degree, to feel in another language as well as in their own.” Indo-English writers are called to this high destiny. Indo-English writing will be not only a tributary, but a vitalizing tributary to the main stream of Indian literature, carrying strange fertilizing riches from abroad, in the absence of which there will be a great danger of our getting provincial and our culture isolated and failing.

VII

We may sum up the predicament of the Indo-English writer as follows:

We may not presume that we shall be able to present England with a new-accented or new-cadenced English acceptable to them as a variant of their own. Again it is hard for a transplanted language to survive in vigour on a new (I shall not say, a foreign) soil unless there is active communication between the two peoples, and we, at the same time, make English our own. It is not likely that many from the ranks of Indo-English writers will be recruited to England’s rolls. Indo-English writers will have to have find their fulfillment, by and large, on the Indian soil. This will come about only if there is an actively interested large audience for them in India. How far they will fit into the Indian milieu is an open question. Abroad they will be recognized, I guess, (if I may put it that way) a shade more than creative translators, although their writing may be their own.

I can do no better, by way of summing up the predicament, than quote the late Indo-English poet, Manjeri S. Isvaran. In his foreword to his book of poems, “Penumbra”, (Madras, 1942) writes:
The gift of the English language to Indian writers has been twisted with a curse at the very moment of its bestowal. While in England their work is regarded – and this apropos of the medium only – as something finely, beautifully exotic, and respected for its individual and indigenous qualities of feeling and imagery, in their own country it is called hybrid sneered at, denigrated, and sealed with the seal of bastardy. Behind the amiable English fairy smiling and bestowing her choice gift, materialized the gaunt Oriental witch croaking her curse. Could it be that the amiable fairy donned the disguise of the gaunt witch, for a moment inclined to sinister humour? No. Assuredly no. Comforting thought that awakens to an angelic affirmation of voices that albeit few, in adepressing milieu, have not lost their robustness nor raciness.

In India, today, it is the twilight of the literary apes ...Their turn for hallucination is only equalled in notoriety to their incapacity to take those pains and make those sacrifice necessary to perfect the medium they have adopted…

We may follow this up, for the completion of the statements, with an extract from his introduction to his collection of poems, “Catguts” (Madras, 1940) where, in the form of a letter to a critic, he writes:

What is this tragedy or threnody of the Indo~Anglians (may their tribe increase!) that I hear you talking about? Does it move with the orderly movements: adagio, allegretto, andantino? Or is it a sheer crescendo? My dear critic, there’s no tragedy; no, not even the raw materials of a tragedy. There should be one violent genius at least among the Indo-Anglians who will kick his countrymen to shudder at and admire what he writes; he is yet to be born; they are all shorn lambs bleating and bleating, and the critical god is not tempering the wind for them. Poor darlings! And now you have charged like a ram, a battering ram into their midst, and you are surprised to find yourself charging at space. This is to me is the real tragedy.

And towards the end of the letter, these words with their pathetic, shall I say tragic, overtones:

And my art ... exists solely for me and does not depend on the appreciation of others; what I am anxious about is that I shall have my say and make myself heard in spite of the ideals and eidolons that a fickle public sets up from time to time in the realm of the creative like unto fashion modes in feminine haber-dashery. And as for my medium, it will continue to be English till I fill my bucket full and kick it to the carnival of creation; I am an Indo-Anglian among indo-Anglians, and belong to Indo-Anglia, perhaps the eighth of the kingdom of the ancient octarchy.

VIII

We may sum up the problem of Indo-English poetry in its wider perspective as follows:

American and English poets today may be characterized broadly as possessing either a “European” or an English sensibility. For reasons not difficult to understand, more American than English poets belong to the first group. The “European” poet, as though in a reaction to a collapsing system of old values, classical learning and religion– “things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; mere anarchy is loosedupon the world”–looks around him for elements of civilization wherever he can find them in the world, and holds onto them, and derives from them an integrated attitude of the mind. The specific sensibility of the language that he uses is of secondary concern to him. He is more concerned with the social, and, to some extent the political, world around him (the latter a depersonalized one). Appreciation of his work requires a wide acquaintance with European and English literatures and culture.

The poet with the English sensibility, on the other hand, is a poet with language sensibility. He goes to his own heart to quarry his poetry. With the tool of his urgent heart he explores the possibilities of the language. He has less recourse to learning and the poetry of others. It is clear that the two groups cannot be mutually exclusive, and that each group will be a mixture of the two groups in different proportions.

We cannot pretend to be born to the exploration and extension of the possibilities of the English language. Even the “European” English poet uses his own instrument, the English language. If his sensibility is determined by the disorder and decay (cultural, social and political) that he finds around him, the Indian writing in English has within him this disorder and disarray raised to the second degree, in that this has extended to his language. However any action produces an equal reaction, and his performance will be similarly determined. In his reaction he may reach farther than one who has had no similar struggle. Ifthe “European” poet of the English language holds onto the values of a collapsed Europe and thence extends his view to the whole world, the Indo-English poet holds on to the values of (I was about to say, “a collapsing”) India. Being himself India, he cannot escape from India. In addition, while India is vast and significant like Europe, an educated Indian, in general, knows more about Europe and England and America than the Westerners know about India. It may well be the destiny of the Indo-English poet to mould a style in which to express the disarray of his–I shall not say “schizoid” personality, I shall rather say his double-faced Janus personality, or even a triple-faced (originally four-faced)Brahma personality. But onlythose who spend “the night alone and the day on fire” may be called to this high destiny.