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This volume explores the inter-relations between languages, literatures and cultures in the context of South Asia in general and India in particular. The essays examine the cultural practices of authors, critics, commentators and translators in relation to their multiple vernacular traditions with their disparate histories, to bring out the defining features of a cultural poetics of bhasha literatures as it has evolved over the centuries. The emphasis is on the ideas of circulation, negotiation, translation and exchange without any attempt to homogenise the diversities and differences into a narrative of uniformity. The essays also open up new ways of reading texts and ideas that address the dynamic interplay of socio-political and artistic-cultural contexts.
The editor: E. V. Ramakrishnan is a well-known critic in Malayalam and English, besides being an Indian English poet and translator. He is a former Professor and Dean as well as Professor Emeritus of Central University of Gujarat. He has published critical works in Malayalam and English. Some of his publications include Indigenous Imaginaries: Literature, Moderniy, Region (2017), Bakhtinian Explorations of Indian Culture:Pluralism, Dialogue and Dogma through History (co-edited, 2019) and Literary Criticism in India (edited, 2021). He is a recipient of Kerala Sahitya Akademi Award (1995), Odakkuzhal Award (2018) and Kerala Sahitya Akademi’s Vilasini Award (2018). He received the Sahitya Akademi Award (2023) for his Malayalam work, Malayala Novelinte Deshakaalangal.
Introduction: A Transregional, Transcultural and Translational Poetics for Bhasha Literatures E. V. Ramakrishnan
1. It there a “South Asian Poetics”? Mrinal Kaul
2. Towards an Indian Poetics Shamsur Rahman Faruqi
3. Revisiting Urdu Literary Culture: The Curious Case of Razmia Anisur Rahman
4. Scripture or Poetry? Anandvardhana on How to Read an Epic C. Rajendran
5. Spouses in thiNai Songs and Gaha Sattasai: A puththiNai Reading Nirmal Selvamony
6. Re-inventing the Literary: Two Moments in the History of Kannada Tradition Rajendra Chenni
7. A Local Habitation and a Name for Knowledge: The Case of Odia Bhasha Literature Debendra K. Dash, Dipti R. Pattanaik
8. World Literature and the Literary Historiography of Pre-colonial South Asian Vernaculars: Towards a Methodological Model Sachin Ketkar
9. Embodied Inheritance of a Dancing Philosophy: Text and Practice in the Chaitanya Charitamitra Sukanya Sarbadhikary
10. Visual Poetics of the Vaishnava Literary Culture of Assam: Towards a Multimedial Exposition Dhurjjati Sarma
11. The Social Imaginary and the Evolution of Modern Indian Literature P. Raveendran
12. The Search for Form and Authenticity in Bangla Novels: A Reading of Debes Ray’s Tistaparer Brittanta Subha Chakraborty Dasgupta
13. Kumaran Asan and the Poetics of Freedom Vipin K. Kadavath
14. The Lives of Aithihyamala: Textuality, Region, History B. S. Bini
15. Adaptation/Transformation: Locating Amar Chitra Katha’s Mahabharata within Indian Bhasha Narrative Traditions Tonisha Guin
16. Quest for a New Discourse in Literary Criticism in Nineteenth Century: Interface between Gujarati and English, 1850-1890 Hiren Patel
17. Domestication of English, Education and Perpetuation of Sexual Difference: A Study of Govardhan Ram’s Leelavati Jeevanakala Zarana Maheshwari
18. From the Poetics of Self-Knowledge to the Politics of Social Change: Sree Narayana Guru as a Social Reformer and Philosopher-Poet E. V. Ramakrishnan
Notes on Contributors