Indian English Literature

Indian English Literature

Indo- Anglian literature is the term defined as the contribution of Indian writers in the literature in English language. The Indo-Anglian literature is not essentially different in kind from Indian literature, it is a part of it.
With the consolidation of the British power in India, English the language of rulers also began to exercise  it's influence on the intellectuals of the country. And despite the fact that English is not their mother tongue many Indian writers in English were able to realise their creative effort through the medium of English.
It may be said that there are three types of Indian writers in English.
(1) Those who have acquired their entire education in English schools and Universities.
(2) Indians who have settled abroad and are constantly in touch with the living, growing idiom of their country of adoption.
(3) Indians who have acquired English as second language.

Difference between Indo Anglian and Anglo-Indian

Whereas Indo Anglian literature is the Indian effort in English language, the Anglo-Indian literature is used to devote the writing of Englishmen in English about India and Indian life. But the presentation of Indian life is often romantic than realistic as they interpreted. Indo-Anglian literature, on the other hand projects a favourable and truthful image of India.

Indo-English literature

The translated work of writers into English language from Indian language is the Indo-English literature. The Indo-English literature is further divided into Classical and Modern Indo-English literature.
Classical Indo-English literature requires a certain degree of interpretation and adaptation of meaning.
Modern Indo-English literature is the literal translation of original. The primary concern of translator, here is the fidelity to the original, and he is not given the liberties of the classical Indo-English literature, because he is not separated in time and space from the original author as the classical text translator is.
Shortcomings in the growth of Indo-Anglian literature
* Foreign language
* Flaw of imitation
* Conservative publishers

Different phases of Indo-Anglian writings

The First Phase Of Indo-Anglian Writings

Before Macaulay's policy in education few Indians had begun to use the English for creative expression. Henry Derozio's volume of poems was published in 1823 and Kashiprasad Ghose published his volume of poetry entitled The Shair and the other poems in 1830. These two poets are not great in their writings but their work is largely imitative of English writers. The English came in India and brought with them the number of translations. English classic were soon translated into various Indian languages and the growth of the novel and the short story in regional language was inspired by these translations. The English classics were the models for the Indians writing in English.
Bankim Chandra Chatterji became the first Indian writer of a novel in English. The first Indian play in English the Persecuted, was written in 1832. But the solid contribution to Indian drama in English upto date is that of Tagore and Shri Aurobindo Ghosh.

The Second Phase Of Indo-Anglian Writings

(a) Toru Dutt

The delicate and charming poetess Toru Dutt is an inheritor of unfulfilled renown. She was one of the Indian poets who gained recognition, in spite of her short literary career. She entered the literary world with her first collection of poems A Sheaf Gleaned in French Fields which was published in 1875.

(b) Sashi Chandra Dutt

He is another early poet who in his A vision of Sumeru and other poems tried to achieve Indianness. 

(c) Romesh Chandra

A brother of Sashi Chandra Dutt, gained greater renown as a Bengali and English writer.Few of his works are Lays of Ancient India (1894) and his classic rendering of Ramayana (1900) and Mahabharata (1898).
(d) Another great poet at the turn of the century is Manmohan Ghosh, the brother of the renowned Aurobindo Ghosh. His songs of Love and Death was published after his death      in 1926. His few poems express nostalgia for India, and there is very little of India in his poetry.

The Third Phase of Indo-Anglian Poetry

The third phase starts from the early twentieth century.

(a) Sarojini Naidu, an outstanding woman of her generation, a gifted poetess. Her poetry is pictorial, has the romantic colouring and smooth rhythms of the Georgians, and shows perfect mastery over her chosen medium. She achieve success in the handling of Indian imagery and the expression of Indian personality. Her Indian Weavers, Corn Grinders and such other poems are noted fir their rhythmic flow and characteristic Indian imagery.

(b) Tagore is a great phenomenon in the Indian literary Renaissance. He combines in himself three distinct roles - that of a poet, a philosopher and a patriot. His chief poetical world include the Gitanjali, The Gardener, The Crescent Moon, Fruit Gathering, Lover's Gift and Crossing. For Gitanjali he achieved international fame winning Nobel Prize for literature.

(c) Aurobindo Ghosh, a versatile genius, his outstanding achievement in prose, poetry and drama rank him as the great figure of Indo-Anglian literature. He wrote in English only his poems like Urvashi, Love and Death, Savitri are Hindu in sentiment and expression.

The Fourth Phase of Indo-Anglian Poetry Of The Post-Indipendence Era

A good deal of poetry continues to be written in English and there is much experimentation in and effort to achieve modernity. There is much 'image-hunting' and 'word-hunting' in contemporary Indo-Anglian Poetry, and one often doubts if anything really meaningful is being done. But there are a number of good poets like Dom Maraes, Nissim Ezekiel , p. Lal, Kamala Das, A.K Ramanujam and others.
As a historical phenomenon, it is engrossingly interesting that since 1947 a great deal of poetry has been written by Indians in English; that in both quality and quantity, this poetry compares well with the English poetry that Indians wrote from the days of Derozio and Kashiprasad Ghose till 1947.

Indo-Anglian Novel

The novel took a later start, still the novel has gone far ahead of poetry both in quantity and quality. Very few Indians seem to have a tempted fiction in English till the beginning of the present century. During the last quarter of the nineteenth century there was considerable literary activity.
Toru Dutt's Bianca, Ramesh Chandra Dutt's The Slave Girl of Agra: An Indian Historical Romance (1909) deals with Mughal times. Some other famous writings of early twentieth century are Mr. S.B Banerjee's Tale of Bengal(1910) and On The Sand Dunes (1923).
It was only with the Gandhian struggle for freedom that Indo-Anglian Novel really came to its own. With the publications of Mulk Raj Anand's Untouchable(1935) and Coolie(1936) and Raja Rao's Kanthapura(1938) , the novel n English may be said to have come of age.

Indian Drama in English

Indo-Anglian drama is not so rich as Indo-Anglian poetry is. The difficulty about the language in dialogue, which exists even in the novel, becomes much more significant in drama. In point of chronology, Indo-Anglian drama has a somewhat impressive record, for the first Indian Drama in English. Tagore and Aurobindo Ghosh are the only two writers who have made contribution to Indian drama in English. Tagore's Chandalika has done very well as both the play and a ballad.
Aurobindo Ghosh, the saint, mystic has also written some dramatic works, though they are in the tradition of poetic plays and are not fit for stage. The failure to capture speech rhythms and consequent artificiality characterizes Indian verse drama in general.
As a critic has said, Kailasam had undoubtedly the making of a great dramatist in him. But he never wholly mastered his art, and his english plays though they are among tge best in Indian writing, do not achieve greatness and the reason,this lies in the failure to find for himself an original style of writing suited to his matter and sensibility.

Indian prose drama

Indian prose drama in English also suffers from these very fault. Harinadranath's Five plays, Fyzee, Rahamin's Daughter of India, Asif Currimbhoy's, The Doldrummers and The Dumb Dancer and many other do not rise above ordinary conversation in their dialogue, and are dull, drab, flat and artificial. Such plays are the products of craft rather than of art. The dramatists have no individual vision of life.
A dramatist who has risen above mediocrity is Pratap Sharma, who has written some actable plays like A Touch of Brightness though even his plays are full of loopholes. The well known poet, Nissim Ezekiel has also written plays which are interesting in the sense that they succeed where most Indian plays in English fail. His plays Nalini and The Marriage Poem may in this respect be regarded as models for other Indian writers. Still one must confess that in the field of Indo-Anglian drama a great writer has yet to appear and no convincing achievement has been made so far.