Modern Indo-English Poetry

Modern English poetry in India is one of the many new literatures which began to emerge at the end of the Second World War, after the end of colonialism. Unlike the Africa and Caribbean creative writings, modern Indian poetry in English did not have an obvious direct relationship with the cultural movements that had led to national independence. The emergence of modern English poetry was a part of modernization which included urbanization, industrialization, mobility, independence, social change, increased communication (in the form of films, television, radio, journals and newspapers), national and international transportation networks, mass education and the resulting paradox that as an independent national culture emerged and it also participated in the international modern usually westernized world.

Gradually with passing time the English language poetry became more indianized in nature. The change that came about reflected the change in mentality that had ushered in among the Indian poets. Such Indianisation had been proceeding for several generations and is prominent in the poetry of Kamala Das and Pritish Nandy and present although more nuanced in the work ofKeki N.Daruwalla it is more likely to be felt in the verse of Nissim Ezekiel and Jayanta Mahapatra or in the kind of rapidly expressed ironies found in the poetry of Ramanujan.

The modern poets as a group tended to be marginal to traditional Hindu society not only by being alienated by their English language education but also more significantly by coming from such communities as the Parsis, Jews and Christians or by being rebels from Hinduism and Islam or by living abroad. Many of the writers came from the families that had already been partly westernized or that moved extensively during their childhood.

There are identifiable periods when Indian English poetry took new directions. In the early 1960s poets, like, Kamala Das and Ezkiel, focussed on the actuality of personal and family life;