From Colonial to Postcolonial

Abstract

Bangladesh emerged as an independent nation-state in 1971, but the origin of Bangla poetry of Bangladesh lies in the partition of India in 1947 when Bangla poetry diverged from its thousand-year-old history to form a separate poetic stream as the Bangla poetry of East Bengal. The creation of Pakistan by partitioning India resulted in the partition of Bengal, where Muslim-dominated East Bengal, today’s Bangladesh, became a part of the newly created state of Pakistan. Although the official march of Pakistan began in 1947, the signs of new Bangla poetry of an emerging nation became visible at the beginning of the 1940s, particularly by Bengali Muslim poets. I call these poets “the poets of transition”, as they not only experienced British colonial rule but also witnessed its end. These poets led Bangla poetry in a new direction in East Bengal in the post-partition period. They gave expression to the complex experience of transition from a colonial to a postcolonial existence. Their poetry bears the mark of colonization on the one hand, and, on the other, reflects the experience of postcolonial reality. In this essay, I argue that this poetry, written in Bangla vernacular, bears the essential characteristics of what is known as “postcolonial poetry”.