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There is always an irresistible tendency to compare an author’s work with her previous one, especially if it (The God of Small Things (1997)) was a huge success. That burden of previous success is something I would say is the first thing that hinges this one to its imminent fictional doom. However it is not just that. Add caption We are all familiar with the feeling of swotting before exams. It’s exactly how you will feel after r eading this novel. The novel begins with a promising field for a beautiful fiction. But what we see later on is the hastiness of Roy to do a marathon on a post Neo-liberal Indian political scenario, plagued by insurgency and religious intolerance. However the novel is not without any charm of its own. Some of the characters, especially Anjum, Naga, Saddam and Miss Jebeen stay with us for long. The graveyard concept of all kinds of rejects reaching Jennat Guest House is something I liked, which I believe is the state where the people at the helm has taken think...

·          Serious, imbalanced, straight forwarded, intellectual and sententious style. ·          Essays comprised numerous quotations. ·          Father of English prose. He avoided complexities. ·          Introduced his own structures. ·          Montague sympathized where Bacon never. ·          He discussed serious as well as trivial topics. Wrote 58 essays. ·          Aphoristic (maxims) and Proverbial style of writing. ·          In certain places he repeats his thoughts. ·          Often wrote in parallel paragraphs. ·          He showed renaissance capabilities in ...

Sidney wrote An Apology for Poetry as a response to the criticism of Stephen Gosson who wrote the book School of Abuse (1579)  in which he attacked poetry on many charges. Gosson had directly addressed the book to Sidney. However Sidney did not even mention Gosson’s name in his book. The four attacks against poetry by Gosson were: 1.        A man could employ his time more usefully than in poetry 2.        Poetry is the mother of lies. 3.        Poetry is the nurse of abuse. 4.        Plato has rightly banished poets from his ideal commonwealth. Sidney’s Apology is not just a response to the attacks of Gosson alone but against all those who did the same since Plato’s time. Sidney opines that poetry is the oldest of all branches and its milk enabled to feed afterwards tougher knowledge and that it is superior to philosophy by its charm, to history ...

We cannot learn literature. We can only learn about literature. Sciences like Physics and Chemistry can be learned. Art and literature is the subject of study and criticism is study itself; study of literature. Criticism in this manner is elevated to the dimension of sciences. Criticism is therefore systematic. Prosody, phonetic and philology are scientific in nature. Central area of criticism is the area of commentary but they have only little sense. They (commentators) always go after value, reflective comments etc. Casual value judgments do not help the promotion of criticism. Such criticisms are meaningless and we must get rid of them. These sentimental judgments are derived from non-existent categories and antitheses like life and books. Study of literature must be the central one or it should be the object of centripetal perspective. In order to do it successfully we need a coordinating principle . Literature is the inexhaustible source from which new critical discoveries are...

Preface to Lyrical Ballads is an essay written by William Wordsworth for Lyrical Ballads , a collection of poems that laid foundations of romantic poetry. He wrote this essay keeping in view the then following tradition of the neoclassical writers. Neoclassical writers looked forward to Cicero and Horace as their role models and based on their standards, formulated their poems. However Wordsworth did not favor the rule based system of neoclassicists like Milton and Spenser. He advocated a simplistic style which suited the common man and his tastes. Wordsworth’s Concept of Poetic Diction In the Advertisement of the Lyrical Ballads of 1798 he states his idea in adopting a simpler diction (poetic language) for his poems: ‘to ascertain how far the language of conversation in the middle and lower classes of society was adapted to the purposes of poetic pleasure’ .  When Wordsworth came up with this approach he was attacked by conservative opinions which forced him to expla...

The poem ' A Monologue ' by Raju Solanki is a depiction of a low caste man's self-talk. Here he declares his attitude towards high-caste people. He tells that others may call him a 'dirty scavenger' but he will not react to that. He will only pity the high caste people for their ignorance. And he will consider that as buffalo knocking against the stone wall which will only serve to hurt itself. So the poison of racial feeling destroys only those people who have it. All people, including the high caste people, cannot stand the flood of time, everyone will have to leave this earth. There is no difference among castes. Thus the man (low caste) finds no reason to feel hurt or to react against the ignorant insults of high caste people. This poem declares a new identity which the low caste people developed through centuries of their experience.

Meena Kandasamy has a way of adapting Indian myths to communicate what she has gotten to say. Princess in Exile is one such poems. Here she uses the story of Sita and Rama from The Ramayana,  an Indian legend. The Sita in The Ramayana  is a woman who was abducted by Ravana, a king from the south and Rama is the king with great morals who goes to rescue his wife from Ravana's captivity. However Ravana though abducted Sita from Rama, respected her purity, probably because the male society of the time wanted to see her only so. In Meena's poem she tells us that the Sita who is revered and praised in the spiritual world is different from the 'modern day Sita' who is reluctant to give in to the oppressive demands of a patriarchal society. She also says that the spiritual or religious realm which included her was carried away by the 'new age guru', referring to Science or Reason. In simple words she is of the opinion that the spiritual circle was overrun by Science...

The love of Siva is like a stream that is running to a dry land. A dry land will be waiting for water to come to it so that the moment it comes the land absorbs it. This is like Akkamahadevi waiting for her lord to enter her heart. And she also says that it is like rain pouring on plants giving them nurture and freshness and the parched sticks, their enlivened life. As we go along the coming lines we see she is comparing her love for God to this world’s pleasure and to the other world’s pleasure. Love for God, if it is so supreme, will not make any difference between this world’s pleasure and the other world’s pleasure. At this stage she goes beyond the stage of dichotomy and reaches a state of perfect oneness with her God. She then describes her lord’s feet ‘white as jasmine’. And as a conclusion, she describes her life, ‘was made worthwhile’. Akkamahadevi is associated with Vira Saiva movement of the 12 th century Karnataka. She was a great lover of Siva. Through her writings...

*Unfortunately it was not possible to include the 1 st part of the introductory chapter. *ppl=people, lang=language, commu=community Part 2 1962– a conference of African writers of English expressions (What is African literature was the theme) Thiango-the dominance of European language over African, he criticized Achebe. How far the borrowed tongue can carry African expressions? Asks Thiong'o 1884 African conference affected Africa with swords and bullets. Violence in the class room in the form of western education. Bullet-physical subjugation Education-spiritual subjugation. Part 3 First Part Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o -How native language plays the role of a cultural transmitter? The same African language is used in different contexts. The evenings of storytelling by elders to the children. Language has a magical power-how Part Two How English destroyed their culture. “The language of my education is not the language of my culture.” Childr...

When Gods are born on Earth Book Review of ‘The God of Small Things’ by Arundhati Roy. You take a book just because you don’t want to read it but because you want to catch sleep. But what happens when you start reading it is that it does not let you sleep and you don’t notice how many pages have you turned so fast. This is the first quality of the novel ‘The God of Small Things’ written by Arundhati Roy. One interesting feature of a good fiction is that it must be a good page turner. The innocence of Rahel, Estha and Sophie Mol catches us so fast that we become one like them and live in their crazy curiosities of the childhood. One gets an eerie feeling when one starts reading the death of Sophie Mol. Roy describes her death very cruelly that anyone with a tender heart will not be able to stand such cruel descriptions. But it is interesting to see how the tender heart of Rahel sees her cousin’s death. She notices the yellow walls of the churches and wonders at the fact that...

On the Sublime is a work on Literature by Longinus that falls into the category of Literary Criticism of modern world. This work is actually in the form of a letter written by Longinus to Terentian. (his friend)                                                                              I In the first chapter, he holds the opinion that Caecilius's attempt to define/interpret/explicate what 'Sublime is' was in vain. So, now he (Longinus) is going to define and discuss some important features of Sublimity through this letter to the friend we mentioned before. Sublime consists of a certain loftiness and excellence of language. But sometimes a lofty passage confounds and eclipses (covers) reason....Sublime thought is an important thing that makes a work Sublime.       ...

Plato on Poetry;  simple notes Poetry pleases us. But mere pleasure is not the true aim of poetry. Truth is the test of poetry and it should promote to virtue. In the ' Republic ' he says the good poets are those who write about beauty and perfection (From the goodness of their own natures) and perpetually influence people toward the good. Plato's Objections to Poetry As an art form Poetry is twice removed from reality. Therefore it takes people away from reality/truth. Poetry is the product of inspiration and not of logical meaning. Such inspired outpourings of the soul cannot be true. Poetry appeals to emotions not to reason.  ('Poetry activates impulses, emotions, feelings etc. but does not help promote to become more rational, logical or balanced'. Plato illustrates this point with the example of the tragic poetry, which makes people weep. Thus Poetry causes emotions to rule us, instead of we rule them. It is a kind of self indulgence) Poetry i...