A Concise History of Indian Literature in English

This book is a history of two hundred years of Indian literature in English, from 1800 to now. It is a revised, updated, text-only edition of An IIlustrated History of Indian Literature in English, which was published to wide acclaim in 2003. It starts by looking at the introduction of English into India's complex language scenario around the beginning of British rule. It then takes up the canonical poets, novelists, and dramatists, as well as many injustly forgotten figures, who have made significant contributions to the evolution of Indian literature in English. The book comprises twenty-four chapters, written by some of India's foremost scholars and critics. Each chapter is devoted either to single Author (e.g. Kipling, Tagore, Sri Aurobindo, R.K. Narayan), or to a group of authors (e.g. the Dutt family of nineteenth-century Calcutta; the Indian diasporic writers of the twentieth century), or to a genre (e.g. the beginnings of the Indian novel; poetry since Independence). Though the contributors are all experts in their chosen areas, they have written this book for the non-specialist general reader. Biographical information on major literary figures is provided, and in most cases their work is historically contextualized. The chapters can be read selectively (for example, to follow the development of a genre), or in the order in which they appear, which is chronological. For anyone interested in the story of English in India, or in the finest English storytellers of India, this is the essential book.