Palgrave Studies in Literary Anthropology

Series Editors Deborah Reed-Danahay Department of Anthropology The State University of New York at Buffalo Buffalo, New York, USA

Helena Wulff Department of Social Anthropology Stockholm University Stockholm, Sweden This book series aims to publish explorations of new ethnographic objects and emerging genres of writing at the intersection of literary and anthropological studies. Books in this series will be grounded in ethnographic perspectives and the broader cross-cultural lens that anthropology brings to the study of reading and writing. The series will explore the ethnography of fiction, ethnographic fiction, narrative ethnography, creative non- fiction, memoir, autoethnography, and the connections between travel literature and ethnographic writing.

More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/15120 Diana Dimitrova • Thomas de Bruijn Editors Imagining Indianness

Cultural Identity and Literature Editors Diana Dimitrova Thomas de Bruijn

Palgrave Studies in Literary Anthropology ISBN 978-3-319-41014-2 ISBN 978-3-319-41015-9 (eBook) DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-41015-9

Library of Congress Control Number: 2016957710

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2017 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made.

Cover illustration: © Robin Chittenden / Alamy

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This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland To my professors Monika Horstmann and Axel Michaels Diana Dimitrova Editors’ Preface

Palgrave Studies in Literary Anthropology publishes explorations of new ethnographic objects and emerging genres of writing at the intersection of literary and anthropological studies. Books in this series are grounded in ethnographic perspectives and the broader cross-cultural lens that anthropology brings to the study of reading and writing. By introducing work that applies an anthropological approach to literature, whether drawing on ethnography or other materials in relation to anthropological and literary theory, this series moves the conversation forward not only in literary anthropology but in general anthropology, literary studies, cultural studies, sociology, ethnographic writing and creative writing. The “literary turn” in anthropology and critical research on world literatures share a comparable sensibility regarding global perspectives. Fiction and autobiography have connections to ethnography that underscore the idea of the author as ethnographer and the ethnographer as author. Literary works are frequently included in anthropological research and writing, as well as in studies that do not focus specifically on literature. Anthropologists take an interest in fiction and memoir set in their field locations, and produced by “native” writers, in order to further their insights into the cultures and contexts they research. Experimental genres in anthropology have benefitted from the style and structure of fiction and autoethnography, as well as by other expressive forms ranging from film and performance art to technology, especially the internet and social media. There are renowned fiction writers who trained as anthropologists but moved on to a literary career. Their anthropologically inspired work is a common sounding board in literary anthropology. In the endeavour

vii viii EDITORS’ PREFACE to foster writing skills in different genres, there are now courses on ethnographic writing, anthropological writing genres, experimental writing and even creative writing taught by anthropologists. And increasingly, literary and reading communities are attracting anthropological attention, including an engagement with issues of how to reach a wider audience. Palgrave Studies in Literary Anthropology publishes scholarship on the ethnography of fiction and other writing genres, the connections between travel literature and ethnographic writing and internet writing. It also publishes creative works such as ethnographic fiction, narrative ethnography, creative non-fiction, memoir and autoethnography. Books in the series include monographs and edited collections, as well as shorter works that appear as Palgrave Pivots. This series aims to reach a broad audience among scholars, students and a general readership.

Buffalo, NY, USA Deborah Reed-Danahay Stockholm, Sweden Helena Wulff

Advisory Board Ruth Behar, University of Michigan Don Brenneis, University of California, Santa Cruz Regina Bendix, University of Göttingen Mary Gallagher, University College Dublin Kirin Narayan, Australian National University Nigel Rapport, University of St Andrews Ato Quayson, University of Toronto Julia Watson, Ohio State University Contents

1 Introduction: On “Indianness” and Indian Cultural Identity in South Asian Literature 1 Diana Dimitrova

Part I Indianness, Literature and Culture: A Critical Perspective 13

2 Of Many Indias: Alternative Nationhoods in Contemporary Indian Poetry 15 K. Satchidanandan

3 Reviewing Nirmal Varma, Jaidev and the Indianness of Indian Literature 35 Hans Harder

4 Indianness as a Category in Literary Criticism on Nay ī Kah ān ī 55 Thomas de Bruijn

5 Imagining “Indianness” and Modern Hindi Drama 77 Diana Dimitrova

ix x Contents

Part II Indian Cultural Identity and the Crisis of Modernity: Reworking of Myth and Tradition 93

6 The Indian Contexts and Subtexts of My Text 95 Krishna Baldev Vaid

7 Kishorilal Gosvami’s Indumatı̄ 111 G. H. Schokker

8 Indianness, Absurdism, Existentialism, and the Work of Imagination: Vinod Kumar Shukla’s Naukar kı̄ kamı̄z 131 Martin Christof-Fuechsle

9 ‘Subah kī sair’ and ‘Dūsrı̄ duniyā’, Two Short Stories by Nirmal Varma 147 Mariola Offredi

Index 163 The Editors

Diana Dimitrova obtained her Ph.D. in Modern and Classical Indology at the University of Heidelberg, Germany, in 2000. She is Professor of Hinduism and South Asian Religions at the University of Montreal in Montreal, Canada. Her research interests are Hindi drama and theatre, Bollywood film, modern and pre-modern literary and religious cultures of North India, especially sant and bhakti literary and religious traditions. She is the author of Hinduism and Hindi Theater (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016); Gender, Religion, and Modern Hindi Drama (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2008); and Western Tradition and Naturalistic Hindi Theatre (New York: Peter Lang, 2004). She is also the editor of The Other in South Asian Religion, Literature and Film: Perspectives on Otherism and Otherness (New York and London: Routledge, 2014) and Religion in Literature and Film in South Asia (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). Her articles include “The Treatment of Women and Gender in the Plays Asharh ka ek din and Adhe adhure by Mohan Rakesh (1925–1972)” in Tohfa-e-dil. Festschrift Helmut Nespital (Reinbek: I. Wezler, 2001); “Of Satis, Sitas, and Miras: Three Female Protagonists in Modern Hindi Drama” in Heroes and Heritage: The Protagonist in Indian Literature and Film (Leiden: Research School CNWS, Leiden University, 2003); “The Indian Character of Modern Hindi Drama: Neo-Sanskritic, Pro-Western Naturalistic or Nativistic Dramas?” in Theology and Literature: Rethinking Reader Response (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); “Upendranath Ashk’s Play Tufan se pahle and Hindu-Muslim Cultural Hybridity” in Voices from South Asia (Zagreb: Bibliotheca Orientalica of the Croatian Philological Society, 2006); “The Development of Sanatana

xi xii The Editors

Dharma in the Twentieth Century: A Radhasoami Perspective” The International Journal of Hindu Studies, Volume 1, Issue 1 (2007): 89–98; “Neo-Sanskritic and Naturalistic Hindi Drama,” in Modern Indian Theatre (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2011); and “Hinduism and Its Others in Bollywood Film of the 2000s,” Journal of Religion & Film: Vol. 20: Iss. 1, Article 10. 20 pages.

Thomas de Bruijn studied Indian languages and culture at Leiden University, where he obtained his Ph.D. in 1996 on a thesis on the poetics of Malik Muhammad Jayasi’s Padmāvat. Later, de Bruijn turned his attention to modern Hindi writing and published on various aspects of the Nayī Kahānī movement. Themes in his research are the esthetics of Hindi writing of both modern and pre-modern periods and its reception in historiography and literary criticism. During 2004–2005 he taught Hindi literature at INALCO in Paris. He is currently working in an administra- tive position in higher education in the Netherlands. In 2012 he published Ruby in the Dust: Poetry and History of the Padmāvat by the Indian Sufi Poet Muḥammad Jāyasī (Leiden: Leiden University Press, 2012). His publications also include “Under Indian Eyes: Characterization and Dialogism in Modern Hindi Fiction” in Chewing Over the West: Occidental Narratives in Non-Western Readings, ed. Doris Jedamski (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2009), 183–212; “A Discourse of Difference: ‘Syncretism’ as a Category in Indian Literary History” in Literature and Nationalist Ideology: Writing Histories of Modern Indian Languages, ed. Hans Harder (Delhi: Social Science Press, 2009), 282–304; “Dialogism in a Medieval Genre: The Case of the Avadhi Epics” in Before the Divide: Hindi and Urdu Literary Culture, ed. Francesca Orsini (Delhi: Orient Blackswan, 2010), 121–142; “Lost Voices: The Creation of Images of India through Translation” in India in Translation Through Hindi Literature: A Plurality of Voices, eds. Maya Burger and Nicola Pozza (Bern: Peter Lang, 2010), 77–102; and de Bruijn, Thomas and Sunny Singh, “Q&A on Sunny Singh’s Short Story A Cup Full of Jasmine Oil” Orientalia Suecana 60 (2012): 83–96. The Contributors

Martin Christof-Fuechsle obtained his Ph.D. in Indology at the University of Tübingen, Germany, in 1997. He currently holds a position as co-ordinator/researcher in a project entitled “Modern India in German Archives” at the Centre for Modern Indian Studies, University of Göttingen. He is the author of Rajputentum und puranische Geschichtsschreibung (Bern: Peter Lang, 1997) and the co-editor of Charisma and Canon: Essays on the Religious History of the Indian Subcontinent (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). His current research interests focus on modern Hindi literature and especially Dalit literature and on the history of the reception of India in German academ- ics and other facets of the Indo-German encounter. He is also working on the translation of some of the plays of Bhisham Sahni.

Hans Harder is Professor of Modern Indian Languages at Heidelberg University and director of the South Asia Institute Heidelberg. He obtained his Ph.D. in 1997 on a study of Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay’s Srimadbhagabadgita. He habilitated in 2006 at the University of Halle- Wittenberg, where he was a supervisor of a research group funded by the Volkswagen Foundation on Nationalist Ideology and the Historiography of Literature. His publications include Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay’s Srimadbhagabadgita: Translation and Analysis (South Asian Studies XXXVII. Delhi, Manohar, 2001); Der verrückte Gofur spricht. Mystische Lieder aus Ostbengalen (Heidelberg, Draupadi Verlag, 2004); Hans Harder, ed. Literature and Nationalist Ideology: Writing Histories of

xiii xiv The Contributors

Modern Indian Languages (New Delhi, Social Science Press, 2010); Sufism and Saint Veneration in Contemporary Bangladesh: The Maijbhandaris of Chittagong (London, Routledge, 2011); and Verkehrte Welten. Bengalische Satiren aus dem kolonialen Kalkutta (Heidelberg, Draupadi Verlag, 2011).

Mariola Offredi is a former associate professor of Hindi Language and Literature at the Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy. She retired on 1 November 2005 on superannuation. She earned a diploma in Hindi Language and Indian Culture in 1958 from the IsMEO (Institute for the Middle and Far East) of Milan and in 1961 was awarded a degree in Social and Political Sciences from the Catholic University of Milan with a dis- sertation thesis on Community Development in India. She has worked and published extensively on Hindi Literature (fiction, journalism and poetry) and translated works into Italian (Premchand’s Godan, 1970; Rudr’s Bahti Ganga, 1980; Alka Saraogi’s Kali-katha: vaya baipas, 2002, and Shesh Kadambari, 2004 [her translations of the three novels were the first ever into a foreign language]). She has published a book on the contemporary Hindi novel (1974), essays and books on Hindi poetry (1972, 1984, 1986, 1998, 2003, 2006) with translations of poems into Italian and a book on Hindi journalism from 1826 to 1926 (1971). Recently, she has researched and published three essays on Krishna Sobti (2007, 2008, 2009). She also researched and published her findings on the impact of industrialization on the tribal peoples of the Bastar district of Madhya Pradesh (1983), the Muslim weavers of Banaras and Mau (Uttar Pradesh) (1984) and contemporary Indian Art (1992). She has also worked on three unpublished manuscripts ascribed to Gorakhnath, publishing a book (1991) and essays on the same subject. She is currently researching on the Hindi fiction writer S.R. Harnot.

K. Satchidanandan is a Malayalam poet, essayist and translator and a bilingual critic and editor. He has a doctorate in post-structuralist poetics and was a professor of English at Christ College, University of Calicut, Kerala; editor of Indian Literature, the journal of the Sahitya Akademi (The National Academy of Letters); and later the chief executive of the Akademi. He then worked as a language policy consultant for the Government of India and has been associated, as editor, with Katha, Delhi, and the Foundation of SAARC Writers and Literature. He edits the poetry quarterly Kerala Kavita in Malayalam and the series of translations from South Asian literature, The South Asian Library of Literature in English. The Contributors xv

He retired in 2011 as director and professor, School of Translation Studies and Training, Indira Gandhi National Open University, Delhi. He is also on the Project Advisory Board of Indian Literature Abroad and the National Executive of the National Translation Mission and was member, Executive Board, Sahitya Akademi, besides being on the academic/gov- erning bodies of JNU (Delhi), Ambedkar University (Delhi) and Malayalam University (Kerala) and has been on the Ph.D. board of four universities. He has 22 collections of poetry in Malayalam, 16 collections of world poetry in translation, 4 plays, 3 books of travel and 23 collections of critical essays and interviews besides 4 collections of essays in English. He has edited several anthologies of poetry and prose in Malayalam, English and Hindi. He has 27 collections of his poems in translation in 17 languages, including 5 collections in English, 6 in Hindi and 1 each in Irish, Arabic, German, French and Italian besides all the major Indian languages. Satchidanandan has represented India in several international literary events like the international literary festivals in Sarajevo, Berlin, Montreal, Beijing, Moscow, Ivry-sur Seine, Rotterdam, Jaipur and Delhi, Hay Festival-Trivandrum and Medellin International Poetry Festival in Colombia and book fairs at Delhi, Lahore, Kolkata, Abu Dhabi, Frankfurt, Leipzig, London, Paris and Moscow. He has also read and talked at Bonn, Rome, Verona, Ravenna, Leiden, New York, St. Petersburg, Damascus, Aberystwyth, Manchester, Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Oman, Sharjah, Singapore, Colombia, Cuba, Peru, and so on besides most of the cities in India. Satchidanandan has been honoured with Knighthood of the Order of Merit by the Government of Italy, with the Dante Medal by the Dante Institute, Ravenna, and the India-Poland Friendship Medal by the Government of Poland. He has also been an activist for secularism, envi- ronment and human rights.

G. H. Schokker was reader of Hindi language and literature, as well as Bengali and Marathi at Leiden University, from 1966 until his retirement in 1994. He passed away in 2009. He studied Theology and Indian languages at the University of Groningen and at Leiden University. He was an expert of Sanskrit drama, of modern and pre-modern Hindi literature and of the history of Indian poetics. Among his publications are The Pādatāḍitaka of Syá̄milaka, part 1 (The Hague: Mouton, 1966), part 2 (in co-operation with P.J. Worsley) (Dordrecht-Boston: Reidel, 1976); “Study in Braja and Avadhi Grammar and in Keśavadāsa’s Rasikapriyā” in Early Hindi Devotional Literature in Current Research, ed. W.M. Callewaert xvi The Contributors

(Leuven: Katholieke Universiteit Leuven, 1980); with M.K. Gautam “The Language of Bhakti: Popular and Literary Expression in the Works of Tulasidasa” (Acta Indologica 6 (1984): 383–433; with A.G. Menon, “Linguistic Convergence: The Tamil-Hindi Auxiliaries,” Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 53,2 (1990): 266–282; with M.K. Gautam, eds. Bhakti in Current Research 1982–1985: Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Devotional Literature in the New Indo-Aryan languages, Noordwijkerhout 1985 [Kern Institute miscellanea 10] (Lucknow, 2000); “The Control of the Uncontrollable” in Bhakti in Current Research 1982–1985, eds. M.K. Gautam and G.H. Schokker (Lucknow, 2000).

Krishna Baldev Vaid obtained his M.A. (English) from Panjab University and his Ph.D. from Harvard University. He taught English and American literature at various Indian and American Universities such as Delhi, Panjab, State University of New York and Brandeis. He retired early in 1985 from State University of New York at Potsdam in order to devote himself exclusively to creative writing. He has published ten novels, eleven collections of short fiction, seven plays, four diaries and three books of miscellaneous prose in Hindi. He has translated and published several of his own novels, plays and short stories into English. A few of his works have been translated into French, German, Russian, Japanese and of course English. He has also published one book of literary criticism, Technique in the Tales of Henry James (Harvard University Press). He has translated Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot and Endgame, Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland, Racine’s Phaedra into Hindi and Nirmal Verma’s Veh Din and Muktibodh’s Andhere Mein into English. He is an important Indian writer known for his iconoclastic and innovative work. He spends most of his time now in College Station, Texas.