Chapter I

Introduction
 1

The Subject of Enquiry

The present study proposes to undertake an analysis of first,

the concept of the sublime, second, to explore some area of

intersection or parallelisms on the concept, if any, in the

Indian tradition and third, to find the possibility whether "The

Sublime and Indian English Poetry" can exist together, in

other words is there anything sublime in Indian English

Poetry.

The Sublime

On the Sublime is a work attributed to Longinus. Longinus

argues in favour of an underlying property of great writing I

grand style and designates it by the word 'hypsous' (usually

translated as the sublime). This is not one of the many

qualities which great writing I grand style should possess, but

its very essence, its soul. It is the name given to the effect

achieved by a proper fusion of the other qualities (which

Longinus qualifies under five heads and refers to them as the

sources of the sublime). These qualities are :

(1) the ability to form grand conceptions (the most

important of all the sources) :

(2) the stimulus of powerful and inspired emotion

 2

(3) the proper formation of two types of figure - the

figures of thought and the figures of speech ;

(4) the creation of a noble diction which includes the

choice of words, the use of imagery and the

elaboration of style, and

(5) the total effect resulting from dignity and elevation

(a source which embraces all those already

mentioned).

Of these, the first two are innate - they refer to the state of

the poet's soul and may be said to pertain to the 'content'

while the last three refer theoretically to the 'form'. These are

the products of art and refer most specifically to the use of

the language. All these, however, presuppose as a common

foundation 'the command of language without which nothing

worthwhile can be done' (On the Sublime, 8. 108).

Longinus is associated with passion and ecstasy, with

e nth usi asm, ins pi ration and transport, and his treatise 0 n the

Sublime is hailed as a victory of passion over verbal rhetoric.

Many a time in the treatise he talks of immoderate passion,

profusion of passions, unconquerable passions, grandeur and

passion. To quote Longinus, 'nature has adjudged us men to

be creatures of no mean or ignoble quality --- she has

implanted in our soul an unconquerable passion for all that is

great and for all that is more divine than ourselves'. Passion
 3

is considered as the very soul of poetry by romantic

theorists. 'If the poet's subject be judiciously chosen' said

Wordsworth, 'it will naturally --- lead him to passions' and

maintained that 'the end of poetry is to produce excitement in

coexistence with an over balance of pleasure' and its effect

is 'to rectify men's feelings', to widen their sympathies, and

to produce or enlarge the capability of 'being excited' without

the application of 'gross and violent stimulants'. Wordsworth

defines poetry as 'the spontaneous overflow of powerful

feelings' and as 'emotion recollected in tranquility' (Preface

to Lyrical Ballads). Keats longed, 'for a life of sensations

rather than of thoughts !' ( "Letter to Benjamin Bailey", 22

November 1817). Coleridge forcefully affirms that 'poetry

does always imply passion' by which he means 'an excited

state of the feelings and faculties' (Biographia Literaria,XVIII,

1817) John Stuart Mill in his essay "Thoughts on Poetry and

Its Varieties" (1859) writes that 'the object of poetry is

confessedly to act upon the emotions', and it 'does its work---

by moving' and James Henry Leigh Hunt writes in "An Answer

to the Question What is Poetry", that 'Poetry---is the

utterance of a passion' and ' ... it seeks the deepest

impressions'.

Naturally, Longinus for his association with passion and

ecstasy, enthusiasm, inspiration and transport has been

called 'the first Romantic critic'. 1 But this should not make us

1
R.A. Scott James, The Making of Literature (London : Seeker and Warbury, 1958), p. 80.
 4

forget Longinus's remarks on language which as Wimsatt and

Brooks have noted fills a very large part of what survives the

work. 2 Any discussion which leaves out the linguistic

dimensions of the subject may not do justice to the sublime.

What is important, therefore, is to take both equally and give

them equal importance. Passion and mode of expression

proper to a literary text, if used with propriety, sway the

reader and take him out of himself.

Whether Longinus takes into account the different kinds of

styles suited to literary expressions is a matter of some

debate. It is true that distinction of this kind is not explicitly

stated in the treatise, though this is probably because three

or four kinds of verbal styles had been generally accepted by

his time, and Longinus took the subject to be part of a

common language. We may even conjecture that there was a

passing reference to them in one of the lacune, most

probably in the one appearing at the end of the second

chapter. At any rate, when the third chapter resumes

Longinus is in the middle of a discussion of the vices

bordering on sublimity, of which three are named: (1) tumidity

or bombast, (2) puerility, the complete antithesis of grandeur

and (3) parenthyrsus or false sentiment.

Besides, Longinus's awareness of the different modes or

styles is illustrated by his treatment of the five sources of the

2
cf. W.K. Wimsatt, Jr., and C. Brooks. Literary Criticism A Short History (Calcutta, Bombay and
New Delhi: Oxford and IBH Publishing Company, Pvt. Ltd., 1957), p. 101.
 5

sublime which implies that anyone of the sources, or any

combination of them, can lead to the sublime. He was

evidently conscious of the different kinds of sublimity.

In his discussion of the nature of the sublime and the means

by which it may be acquired, Longinus gives due importance

to the work of a genius which is innate. However, he

suggests 'that there is a case for the opposite point of view

when it is considered that, although nature is in the main

subject only to her own laws where sublime feelings are

concerned, she is not given to acting at random and wholly

without system--- the function of a system is to prescribe the

degree and the right moment for each to lay down the

clearest rules for use and practice' (On the Sublime, 2.101 ).

This is one of the many other topics which Longinus

discusses in his treatise. He, however, constantly ta I ks of

ecstasy and trans port, enthusiasm and in spi ration and

discusses most of his sources in terms of the irresistible

effect, force and mastery of great writing I grand style.

Longinus exercised a remarkable influence in the shaping of

a tradition of the sublime and is held in the greatest esteem

by his successors. A revival of interest in his treatise had

far-reaching effects on poetry and criticism in the 18th

century. His name constantly appears in the writings of

English critics from Dryden onwards. For the Augustan critics

one of the most important classical influences was that of

 6

Longinus. A favourable judgement on Shakespeare was often

arrived at by an appeal to the authority of Longinus, and

Pope's praise of Homer's 'fruitfulness' in the. Preface to his

translation of the Iliad and An Essay on Criticism is also in

the true Longinian spirit : Be Homer's works your study and

delight, I Read them by day, and meditate by night (An Essay

on Criticism). Addison familiarized his readers with the notion

that_Milton was the poet of the sublime, par excellence. In a

series of eighteen essays on Paradise Lost in The Spectator

papers Addison compares Milton with Homer and Virgil and

says that the action in Milton excells---Milton's subject was

greater than either of the former (The Spectator, No.267,

Saturday, January 5, 1712). Longinus was frequently

appealed to, in the 18th century against the neo-classical

standard of 'correctness' and sublimity was thus associated

with a poetic style and diction which was daring, irregular,

romantic. Passages in Thomson's "Seasons" which excited

awe or terror were admired as 'sublime'. The odes of Gray

especially "The Bard", were 'sublime'. In critical writings later

than the eighteenth century the term 'sublime' tended to be

replaced by others, e.g. the 'grand style'. 3

Indian Tradition

Although not a comparative study of any sort, the present

work discusses in brief the Indian theoretical tradition with a

3
Alex Preminger ( ed. ). Princeton Encyclopaedia of Poetry and Poetics (London : Macmillan, 197 5)
p. 635.
 7

view to get some parallelisms on the concept of the sublime,

if any, in Indian tradition. It beg ins with the origin of the

Indian literary tradition in the Vedas, the Ramayana, and the

Mahabharata and quickly moves on to Bharat, the first

enunciator of a theory in the Indian theoretical tradition.

Bharat's theory of rasa, with forty-nine bhavas makes a claim

to the whole human experience. As a theory of aesthetic

experience it takes into account emotions and its effect on

the spectators. The bhavas are the mental states ; they bring

rasa into being and pervade the mind of the spectators.

Bhavas mean that which cause something to be, bhavna,

which is capable of weaving grand conceptions into sublime

verbal structures. 4 Bharat's elaborate description of 'bhavas'

maybe said to take due care of Longinus's first two sources

viz (1) the ability to form grand conceptions; (2) the stimulus

of powerfu I and ins pi red emotion. Bha rat's description of the

sattvikbhava relates especially to Longinus's elaboration of

nobility of soul which plays the most important part of all the

sources of the sublime (Each rasa according to Bharat has

three subtypes-three-fold division of almost everything on

the basis of the three gunas-sattva, rajas, tamas-provides

the basis for classification, Abhinavbharati on Natyasatra).

His discussion of language, of 'diction' and 'style' - the thirty

six excellences, the four figures of speech and the ten merits

and ten faults relate to a discussion of language and hence

4
K.C. Pandey, Comparative Aesthetics: Indian Aesthetics (Varanasi: The Chowkhamba Sanskrit
Series, 1959), 2nd Edn. Vol. 1 p. 28.
 8

may be said to encompass Longinus's remaining sources of

the sublime viz. (3) the proper formation of figures (4) the

creation of a noble diction (5) the total effect. The critics who

take On the sublime as a discourse on elevated I grand style

will be pleased to note that Bharat talks of different styles 5

and recommends different sentiments 6 for them. Thus he has

bharati 7 (verbal) for the pathetic and the marvellous ; sattvati 8

(grand), a style endowed with the spirit (sattva) for the heroic

and the marvellous ; kaisiki 9 (graceful) for the erotic and the

comic and arbhati 10 (energetic) for the terrible, the odious

and the furious. In short, all the sources of the sublime - of

content as well as of form, may be suitably traced in Bharat's

theory of rasa and his elaborate views on diction, style and

language.

Bharat was followed by Bhamaha who considered figurative

expression, the grammatical accuracy and the pleasantness

of sound to be the locus of literariness. Dandin discussed

wholistically the excellences and the faults both of content

and form of literary composition. Then comes Vamana who

considers mode of expression riti to be the soul of poetry. He

talks of three kinds of mode : vaidarbhi, gaudi and pancali.

5
Natvasastra XXII (tr.). Manmohan Ghosh (Calcutta: Manish Granthalaya, 1967 and Calcutta:
Asiatic Society. 1961 ), pp. 25-28
6
Ibid. XXII, pp. 63-64.
7
Ibid. XXII, p. 25.
8
Ibid. XXII, p. 26.
9
Ibid. XXII, p. 27.
10
Ibid. XXII, p. 28.
 9

As vaidarbhi is replete with all the gunas and does not have

even the slightest faults, it is the ideal mode of expression.

Vamana's definition of riti as 'particular arrangement of

words' seem to correspond at least in essence, to the last

three sources of the sublime, in other words to the 'form'

~
I ite rature which involves different aspect of word

arrangement. His 'arthaguna' possesses features that do not

have any direct connection with word - arrangement, but are

related to the meaning or 'content' of literature. The first two

sources of the sublime also refer to content, and as such are

similar in kind to 'arthaguna'. Arthagunas, arthadosas and

arthalamkaras refer more properly to the ideas of I iteratu re,

hence to the 'content' of the composition. Further

parallelisms may be found in Longinus's first source of the

sublime, i.e., the ability to form grand conceptions which

originates from the nobility of the soul and Vaman's

arthaguna slesa as well as the first variety of meaning whose

comprehension constitutes the arthaguna samadhi. Both rely

on grand and clever ideas for their effectiveness.

Bhamaha, Dandin and Vamana emphasized 'form' and

therefore, they could be styled as 'Expressionists' 11 Next

comes Anandvardhan who emphasized suggestion,

manifestation or revelation - dhvani, vyanjana prakasa.

Suggestion is a unique process and could be employed even

11
cf. Alex Preminger opp. cit. p. 383.
 10

in realms where the primary or secondary meanings of words

were enough to convey an idea. Even figures could be

rendered more attractive by suggestion; in fact suggestion

added to a new dimension to speech, and reinforced the

power, of the limited medium of language. It may be the

symbolism of suggestion that even the message of a whole

work was conveyed by a poet. Anandvardhan thus

emphasized 'content' or emotions as against the formal

features, style, figures etc. The formal features, were to be

evaluated in relation to the emotion which they were to

suggest and this relative value of expression called aucitya

(adaptation or appropriateness) was developed by

Ksemendra as a life giving complement to the principle of

emotional suggestiveness. 12 Ksemendra's theory of propriety

or appropriateness claims that in all aspects of literary

composition, there is a possibility of a perfect, the most

appropriate choice - of subject, of ideas, of words, of

devices. Hence it has close affinities with Longinus's theory

of the sublime (On the Sublime). 13 Further parallelisms are

found in Kuntaka whose theory of vakrokti, deviation or

marked expression, claims that the characteristic property of

literary language is its 'markedness'. While elucidating the

different excellences Kuntaka emphasizes the choice of

felicitous phrases. Longinus, too, underlines the importance

12
Ibid. p. 383.
13
Kapil Kapoor, Literary Theory : Indian Conceptual Framework (New Delhi : Affiliated East-
West Press Pvt. Ltd., 1998), p. 27.
 11

of words and phrases to produce the effect of sublimity when

he says that 'words finely used are in truth the very light of

thought'. Kuntaka's attachment of importance to figures in his

enunciation of vakya-vakrata parallels Longinus's acknowl-

edgement of figures as one of the sources of the sublime,

and his concept of ahlada largely approximates Longinus's

concept of ecstasy or transport, belauded by him as the final

result of reading poetry. 14

Abhinvagupta accepted Nayak's theory of generalization or

universalization and pointed out that aesthetic experience

was a unique category : it was a cycle which started with the

poet and the poem and completed itself in the heart of the

responsive or sensitive reader who had become by constant

literary activity, attuned to the poet and was hence called

'one of the same heart'. The nature of aesthetic experience I

enjoyment I bliss was further discussed by Viswanath and

Jagannatha in terms of supersensuous (lokottara) wonder and

supermundane bliss (lokottara - ah/ada) respectively. Thus,

from Bharat (2nd c. B. c.) to Jagannatha (17th c. B. c.) the

Indian theoreticians enumerate certain properties of literary

composition. These properties fall into the following groups: 15

(1) of language and composition

R.S. Tiwari, ~ Critical Approach !Q Classical Indian Poetics (Delhi : Chaukhambha Orientalia,
14

1984), p. 262.
15
Cf. Kapil Kapoor, opp. cit., p. 72.
 12

(2) of meaning

(3) of figurative devices

(4) of literary experience

We have already noted how Longinus talks of all the above

properties of literary composition in his treatise On the

Sublime. The above properties may be further reduced to two

major divisions :

( 1) of substance or experience or content

(2) of craft or representation or form

One may be tempted to ask what else does Longinus talk of

in his treatise On the sublime, if not these two. As already

noted, the first two sources belonging to the innate nature of

the poet's soul largely pertain to the content of the

composition while the last three which are the products of art

refer most specifically to the use of language, in other words

to the 'form' of the composition.

Indian English Poetry

After attempting a definition of what constitutes Indian

English Poetry a brief survey of its history is made from its

inception to its present day. It is noted that the history of

Indian English Poetry began in 1827 with Henry Vivian

 13

Derozio's book of poems entitled Poems. It is also noted that

of the many poets writing in the nineteenth century, the most

remarkable poet to emerge during the period was Toru Dutt

(1856-77) whose poem "Our Casuarina Tree" is taken to be

the first major poem of Indian English Poetry. It 'heads a long

list of distinguished poems written by Indian poets.' 16 Toru

Dutt is preceded and followed by a number of poets but in our

recounting of the history of Indian English Poetry we have

focussed on the lives and works of the major poets.

It is found that the corpus of Indian English Poetry may be

conveniently divided into two halves - from 1901 to 1950 and

from 1951 to date. Interestingly 1950 is not only the

numerical half of the century, but also the year of the

publication of Savitri, and the year of the death of its author,

Sri Aurobindo. As regards the first half of the century the

prevailing critical opinion seems to converge on the four or

five well- known names, prominent both in literary as will as

socio-historical, political and cultural fields, viz., Manmohan

Ghose, (1869 -1924), his brother, Aurobindo Ghose (1872-

1959), Rabindra Nath Tagore (1861-1941) and Sarojini Naidu

(1879- 1947). It is also noted that though Tagore exercised

an enormous impact and influence on Indian English poets

writing in the first half of the century, the inclusion of his

works in the corpus of Indian English Poetry has been

16
G.J.V. Prasad. Continuities in Indian English Poetry: nation language form (New Delhi :
Pencraft International, 1999). p. 27.
 14

questioned and found to be unjustifiable. 17 Tagore wrote only

one poem, The Child in English. All other works of his,

available in English, are translations. It is for this reason that

we have excluded Tagore from our discussion.

The number of poets writing in the second half of the

twentieth century is enormous. There is quite a formidable
list of modern Indian English poets 18 (according to a report,
there are three hundred and odd Indian English poets
belonging to this school). We have tried to focus on the major

poets associated with the movement of 'modernism' in Indian

English Poetry. It is noted that 'modernism' in Indian English

Poetry came as late as the fifties with the publication of

Nissim Ezekiel's A Time to Change in 1952. Modern Indian

English Poetry has had two patriarchal figures ensconced at

two ends of India : P Lal in Calcutta, and Nissim Ezekiel in

Bombay. They have worked in different ways. Lal by

publishing poets from Nissim Ezekiel to Vikram Seth and

Ezekiel by offering critical guidance to younger poets. Apart

from Nissim Ezekiel (1924-) and P. Lal (1929-), the other

poets discussed are: A.K. Ramanujan (1929-1995), R

Parthasarathy (1929-), Jayant Mahapatra (1928-), Shiv K.

Kumar (1921-), Arun Kolat kar (1932-), Kamla Oas (1934-),

K.N. Daruwalla (1937-), Dom Moraes (1939-), Gieve Patel

(1940-), Adil Jussawala (1940-), Pritish Nandy (1947-) and

A.K. Mehrotra (1947-). All these poets who began writing in

17
Ibid., opp. cit., p. 30.
18
In an interview on being told that there are 300 poets in Indian Writing in English, A.K.
Ramanujan is reported to have said, 'I say good luck to them. Three hundred is not a large number
for such a large country.' P.K.J. Kurup, Contemporary Indian Poetry .ill English (New Delhi :
Atlantic Publishers and Distributors, 1996), p. 9.
 15

the second half of the twentieth century, in the 5u's or 60's or

even in the early 70s as in the case of Shiv K. Kumar whose

work Articulate Silences was published in 1970 are said to

belong to 'the first generation of Indian poets' 19 of the second

half of the twentieth century. Mention has also been made of

the poets who published their first works around the 1970s

and 1980s and are said to belong to 'the second generation

of I n d i a n p o e t s ' 20 writ i n g i n t h e sec on d h a If of t h e t we n t i e t h

century and of 'the poets of the third generation' 2 \ i.e. the

contemporary poets who began publishing around the late

1980s and 1990s. Some of the major themes such as love,

nature, self, sexuality, mysticism, legends and myths,

spiritualism, exile and urbanity have been noted and

discussed and observations have been made on both the

content and form of Indian English Poetry.

The Method of Enquiry

We have noted that the end ~state of literary appreciation

envisaged by Longinus and Indian theorists is almost

identical, that both give due importance to the content and

form of literature. In our final analysis of Indian English

Poetry we shall confine ourselves to these two natural

correlates of poetry.

19
cf. Nila Shah and P.K. Nayar, Modern Indian Poetry ill English: Critical Studies (New Delhi :
Creative Books, 2000), p. 11.
20
Ibid., p. 12.
21
Ibid., p. 13.