Hindi Literature Research Articles

The Imagination of the Forest and the Fear of the Land: The Idea of Nature in Recent Hindi Fiction

This article examines the idea of nature in two Hindi novels set in central India: Dīvār Meṃ Ek Khiṛkī Rahtī Thī (A Window Lived in a Wall) by Vinod Kumar Shukla and Kāle Adhyāya (Black Chapters) by Manoj Rupara. Both novels feature an elephant as a symbol of the forest and its otherness from the human world. The article argues that the elephant reveals a complex and contradictory imagination of the forest in Central India, which troubles both the idyllic pastoral of Shukla’s small town and the story of the violent dispossession of the Gondi Adivasi community in Kāle Adhyāya. The article situates these novels in the context of Hindi literature’s engagement with nature, regionalism and the lower middle class. In so doing, the article contributes to the scholarship on regional literature in Hindi and the study of Hindi literature’s depiction of nature.

Crossing Borders Between Languages: The Great Transition of Hindi Literary Translation with Special Reference to Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand

The surging number of Hindi speakers in recent decades raises an intriguing question: does the expanding influence of Hindi across India lead to the commensurate pan-Indianization or globalization of its literature? Despite its widespread use within the country, Hindi literature often remains overshadowed by Indian English literature (IEL), particularly on the global stage. It appears to be somewhat confined within regional boundaries. However, a transformative event occurred in 2022 when Geetanjali Shree, a Delhi-based Hindi novelist, clinched the prestigious International Booker Prize for her work, Tomb of Sand, originally titled Ret Samadhi in Hindi. The prize was equally shared between Geetanjali Shree, the writer, and Daisy Rockwell, the translator. With this award, Tomb of Sand has emerged as a symbol of Hindi literary translation, heralding a significant transition in the Hindi literary translation scene. This paper aims to explore the challenges and prospects of Hindi literary translation in the era of the great transition, focusing specifically on the translation methods and strategies employed in Tomb of Sand. Through this analysis, I intend to contribute to the ongoing scholarly discourse concerning the promotion and appreciation of Hindi literature in international literary circles.

The Decline of Republican Democracy and Rise of the Techno-authoritarian State: Reading Dystopian Novels in Hindi Literature

The Decline of Republican Democracy and Rise of the Techno-authoritarian State: Reading Dystopian Novels in Hindi Literature

Reminiscence of the existentialism philosophy in Hindi literature

This article is focused on the peculiarities of the perception of existential philosophy in modern Indian literature of the late 20th–21st centuries. The research is based on the stories of Hindi writers – Kunwar Narain (1927–2017) and Nirmal Varma (1929–2005). Their works is the brightest example of existential literature. The research is also based on two English novels by Indian-born writers Anita Desai (born 1937) “Where Shall We Go This Summer?” and Upamanyu Chatterjee (born 1959) “English August”. Despite the renewed interest in existentialism in modern literature, known as neuro-existentialism , the study of which takes place with the participation of the latest achievements of neuroscience, there are still few analyses in Russian Indology that are aimed at studying the influence of this philosophical trend on Hindi works and postcolonial literature. The aesthetics of existentialism is quite pronounced, moreover, they, creating a new theme of literary works, remain within the framework of traditional poetics, referring to Indian images, plots, religious foundations of Hinduism, as well as to their own self-awareness. However, the philosophical implications of works in Hindi and English are different. Writers interpret the foundations of existentialism in different ways, and the characters choose different ways to solve their internal contradictions.In the light of the stated topic, the problem of why the psychological life of the characters of these writers is depicted differently is considered. If the heroes of K. Narain and N. Varma, accepting the absurdity of existence, do not see the infinity of suffering and death of meaning, building their lives around the belief in rebirth, then the hero of the works in English fatally accepts the frailty of existence, believing in his helplessness before fate.

Effect of Gandhism on Hindi Literature

Effect of Gandhism on Hindi Literature

Bāṇa, Vyomkesh Shastri, Stella Kramrisch: authority and authorship in Hazariprasad Dwivedi's Bāṇabhaṭṭa kī ‘ātmakathā’

AbstractHazariprasad Dwivedi's 1946 novel, Bāṇabhaṭṭa kī ‘ātmakathā’, has long been considered one of the most prominent historical novels in modern Hindi literature, canonised in literary history for its progressive view of the past and for elaborating an autobiographical voice for the seventh-century Sanskrit poet, Bāṇa. However, the many layers of fictive authorship that enfold the main narrative of the text are rarely taken into account. Examination of the metatextual materials of this text reveal, however, that Bāṇabhaṭṭa kī ‘ātmakathā’ is meant to be read in terms of the problem of its authorship, in such a way as to problematise the autobiographical voice that it presents to the reader. In this article, I analyse this material and argue that the actual author of the text, described as an Austrian woman named Catherine, is most likely inspired by Stella Kramrisch. Further analysis shows this novel to be deeply shaped by the intellectual milieu of interwar Bengal, where Dwivedi was a teacher at Shantiniketan and engaged in commenting upon the complex intellectual traditions that existed in part of that world.

Stylometric Analysis of Genre in Hindi Literature

The field of stylometry is the quantitative study of writing style. It is used for analyzing various patterns in writing text such as vocabulary, parts of speech, punctuations etc. In this paper a detailed analysis of various techniques of Stylometry analysis is being done and some of their applications are discussed. In this research, stylometric analysis of Genre in hindi literature is being done. , we have used a dataset of four Hindi stories each from four different famous Indian authors. Features are extracted from the preprocessed text data using the TF-IDF (Term Frequency-Inverse Document Frequency) technique. PCA is applied for dimensionality reduction. The results were good, effectively creating different groups that stand for different literary motifs or styles within the dataset.

Environment in Contemporary Hindi Literature (Current Environment)

Research paper 'Environment in contemporary Hindi literature is an important observation (in the present environment). There is a very close interrelationship between environment and man, it is also possible to imagine a person's life without nature, man and nature are complementary to each other. The components of nature, land, water, air, fire and sky, have created the existence of the entire human race. In this context, Goswami Tulsidas ji has also written in his Prabandha Kavya Ramcharitmanas-
 Chhiti Jal Pavak Gagan Samira |
 Panch Rachit Ati Adham Sarira ||
 Means, our life is made up of the components of nature, hence it is necessary that we always remain alert towards the conservation of nature. Human life can remain safe only by preserving nature and environment. 'Environment' means the environment around us which depends on our daily activities. The more importance we give to our lifestyle, the more beautiful the environment will be. In the present times, protection of the environment is as important as our breathing. Therefore, in our daily work, water conservation, forest conservation and tree plantation etc. are given equal importance as we give to food and water. In the present environment, decreasing area of forests, decreasing water level of rivers and other natural water sources and catastrophic flood situation at some places are having an adverse effect on the environment.
 Abstract in Hindi Language: 
 शोध पत्र 'समकालीन हिंदी साहित्य में पर्यावरण (वर्तमान परिवेश में) एक महत्वपूर्ण अवलोकन है।) पर्यावरण और मनुष्य में बड़ा निकटतम अंतर संबंध है,बिना प्रकृति के व्यक्ति के जीवन की परिकल्पना भी संभव है, मनुष्य एवं प्रकृति एक दूसरे के पूरक हैं। प्रकृति के घटक भूमि, जल, वायु,अग्नि एवं आकाश इसी से संपूर्ण मानव जाति का अस्तित्व बना है। इसी संदर्भ में गोस्वामी तुलसीदास जी ने अपने प्रबंध काव्य रामचरितमानस में भी लिखा है-
 छिति जल पावक गगन समीरा ।
 पंच रचित अति अधम सरीरा ॥
 अर्थात प्रकृति के घटकों से ही हमारा जीवन बना है,इसलिए आवश्यक है कि हम प्रकृति के संरक्षण के प्रति सदैव सजग रहे। प्रकृति और पर्यावरण के संरक्षण से ही मानव जीवन सुरक्षित रह सकता है। 'पर्यावरण' अर्थात हमारे आसपास का वातावरण जो कि हमारी दैनिक चर्या पर निर्भर करता है। हम अपने रहन-सहन को जितना महत्व देंगे, वातावरण उतना ही सुंदर होगा। वर्तमान समय में पर्यावरण का संरक्षण उतना ही महत्वपूर्ण है जितना कि हमारा सांस लेना। अतः अपने दैनिक कार्यों में जल संरक्षण, वन संरक्षण तथा वृक्षारोपण इत्यादि को भी उतना ही महत्व है जितना भोजन और पानी को देते हैं। वर्तमान परिवेश में वनों का घटता क्षेत्र फल,नदियों के घटते जल स्तर तथा अन्य प्राकृतिक जल स्रोतों में घटता जल स्तर तथा कहीं-कहीं बाढ़ की भयावह स्थिति का पर्यावरण पर प्रतिकूल प्रभाव पड़ रहा है ।
 Keywords: छिति, वैश्वीकरण

Bhartiya Parmpra evm Istri Vimarsh

In fact, women's discussion is contemporary thinking. Women's life has been the central theme of Hindi literature even in the initial period, but the fact is that in this either the life story of the woman remained in the center or her tragedy. In fact, women's awareness of their identity, self-consciousness and existence gradually developed in post-independence Hindi literature. Self-awareness, consciousness of one's rights and existence emerged as the main force of women's discussion.
 

William Jones and Indo-Persian Scholarship

ABSTRACT This article offers a brief examination of the role of early modern Indo-Persian (especially Mughal) philology and other scholarship in shaping Sir William Jones’s early career as an orientalist. Long before he went to India, Jones had already spent nearly two decades studying such Mughal scholarly works (at times with the help of Mughal tutors and other informants); and even after arriving in India, for the first few years before he began learning Sanskrit, his access to Indian knowledge systems was largely limited to whatever materials were available in Persian, such as Mughal translations of Sanskrit epics, works on Hindi literature, studies of Indian mysticism (both Hindu and Muslim), treatises on Hindustani music, and the like. Given Jones’s place as a central figure in the received narrative about the onset of intellectual modernity, then, the question arises: is there a place for such Mughal scholars and scholarship in a more globalized, less Eurocentric, history of the modern humanities?

Bhakti Kaal, the Golden Age of Hindi Literature: General Analysis

Acharya Ramchandra Shukla had divided the history of Hindi literature into four parts Drveeragathakaal, Bhaktikal, Ritikal and Modern period. Samvat 1050 to 1365 is in Veergatha Kaal, 1365 to 1700 in Bhakti Kaal, 1700 to 1900 in Riti Kaal and devotional poetry from 1900 till now comes in modern period. Bhaktikal is called the golden age of Hindi literature. Sur, Tulsi, Kabir, Jayasi, these four great poets were born in the period of devotion. This period gave birth to the sun and moon of Hindi literature sky. Although three currents flowed in this period, the path of love, the path of knowledge and the path of pure devotion, yet in these three streams only the inner source of devotion is visible flowing, hence it is called the period of devotion. Love is also a form of devotion. Bhakti poetry was divided into two streams, one stream and the other Saguna stream. The pioneers of the Nirguna stream emphasized the worship of the formless God. The nirguna stream also got divided into the path of knowledge and the path of love. Kabir was the main poet of Gyanmargi branch and Muhammad Jayasi was the master of Premmargi branch. Similarly, the poets of the Saguna stream emphasized the worship of the corporeal God. Surdas was the main poet of Krishna-Bhakti and Tulsi of Ram Bhakti branch.
 Abstract in Hindi Language: 
 आचार्य रामचन्द्र शुक्ल ने हिन्दी साहित्य के इतिहास को चार भागों में विभाजित किया थादृवीरगाथाकाल, भक्तिकाल, रीतिकाल तथा आधुनिक काल। सम्वत् 1050 से 1365 तक का समय वीरगाथाकाल में, 1365 से 1700 तक का समय भक्तिकाल में, 1700 से 1900 तक का समय रीतिकाल में तथा 1900 से अब तक का समय भक्तिकालीन काव्य आधुनिक काल में आता हैं। भक्तिकाल हिन्दी साहित्य का स्वर्ण युग कहा जाता हंै। सूर, तुलसी, कबीर, जायसी ये चारों महाकवि भक्तिकाल में ही उत्पन्न हुए। इसी काल ने हिन्दी साहित्य गगन के सूर्य और चन्द्रमा को जन्म दिया। यद्यपि इस काल में प्रेममार्गी, ज्ञानमार्गी और सगुण भक्तिमार्गी तीन धारायें प्रवाहित हुई, तथापि इन तीनों धाराओं में भक्ति का ही अन्तः स्रोत प्रवाहित होता हुआ दृष्टिगोचर होता है इसलिए इसको भक्तिकाल कहा जाता है। प्रेम भी भक्ति का ही एक रूप हंै। भक्ति काव्य दो धाराओं में विभक्त हुआ एक धारा दूसरी सगुण धारा। निर्गुण धारा के प्रर्वतकों ने निराकार भगवान की उपासना पर बल दिया। निर्गुण धारा भी ज्ञानमार्गी तथा प्रेममार्गी धाराओं में विभक्त हो गई। ज्ञानमार्गी शाखा के प्रमुख कवि कबीर थे तथा प्रेममार्गी शाखा के मलिक मुहम्मद जायसी। इसी प्रकार सगुण धारा के कवियों ने साकार भगवान की उपासना पर बल दिया। कृष्ण-भक्ति के प्रमुख कवि सूरदास थे तथा राम भक्ति शाखा के तुलसी।
 Keywords: भक्तिकाल, स्वर्ण युग, हिन्दी साहित्य, सगुण धारा।

Environment in Contemporary Hindi Literature - A Discussion

Discussion on the environment is very important for us at present, it is an important topic of our life and for the coming generations. Today we cannot run away from the various issues arising regarding the environment. Today, the environment which is being exploited by humans, which is directly affecting the nature. We have misused the things given by nature like water, air, forest, land, sky so much that today we are facing many problems. In this research paper, the environmental concern and consciousness expressed by the contemporary writers has been investigated.
 Abstract in Hindi Language:
 पर्यावरण पर चर्चा वर्तमान में हमारे लिए अत्यंत आवश्यक है यह हमारे जीवन का एवं आने वाली पीढ़ियों के लिए एक महत्वपूर्ण विषय है। आज हम पर्यावरण को लेकर उठ रहे विभिन्न मुद्दों से भाग नहीं सकते। आज मानव द्वारा जो पर्यावरण का दोहन किया जा रहा है,जिसका सीधा प्रभाव प्रकृति पर पड़ रहा है। जल, वायु, जंगल, जमीन, आकाश जैसी प्रकृति प्रदत्त चीजों का हमने इतना दुरुपयोग किया है कि आज हम कई संकटों से खेल गए हैं। इस शोध पत्र में समकालीन साहित्यकारों के द्वारा व्यक्त पर्यावरणीय चिंता एवं चेतना की पड़ताल की गई है।
 Keywords: पर्यावरण चर्चा, बहुराष्ट्रीय कंपनी, विस्थापन ।

Creations of Ch. S. Guleri and His Role in the Formation of a Small Narrative Form in Hindi Literature

The genre form of the story appeared in Hindi literature relatively late, in the first decades of the twentieth century. The formation and development of the short story genre in Hindi literature of the twentieth century attracts the attention of researchers both in India and abroad. In this regard, it is important to consider the work of Chandradhar Sharma Guleri, the author of one of the first stories written in Hindi. Together with famous writers Jayashankar Prasad and Premchand, Geleri is considered one of the founders of modern Hindi literature. He wrote mostly short stories. It is noteworthy that some sources drastically reduce their number, mentioning only three stories, although there are almost 20 of them. The writer’s stories attracted the attention of literary critics, who highly appreciated them. Some of Guleri’s stories have been translated into foreign languages, including Russian. The article examines one of the early stories of Ch. Sh. Guleri “She said”, in which the readers see almost the entire short life of the main character, from childhood to his heroic death. The article focuses on the content, characteristics of the artistic and stylistic features of this story, briefly examines its adaptation, and also characterizes a kind of literary continuation — the story of the famous Hindi writer Shailesh Matiani “She didn’t say”, which takes place during the Indo-Chinese conflict. Guleri’s story was translated into Russian in the 1950s, when Soviet-Indian relations began to develop actively.

Women empowerment in the story Vidha of Hindi literature

The rise and fall in the status of women in the Indian society is probably not seen in any other society in the history of the world. Change is the eternal law of nature. With the change of time, the restrictions made for women are getting relaxed to a great extent. Along with the spread of education, women are trying to stand equal to men in every field, but no matter how much the family attitude has changed, still women in our society do not have the freedom to voluntarily, for themselves. You can choose the field of your choice. On the other hand, women are discriminated on the basis of gender in the society. But at present women are challenging every situation by being empowered themselves. Women empowerment has appeared in both positive and negative forms in the story genre of current Hindi literature.
 Abstract in Hindi Language:
 भारतीय समाज में नारी की स्थिति में जितना आरोह व अवरोह रहा है, सम्भवतः विश्व के इतिहास के किसी दूसरे समाज में यह स्थिति देखने को नहीं मिलेगी। परिवर्तन प्रकृति का शाश्वत नियम है। समय परिवर्तन के साथ-साथ महिलाओं के लिए बने प्रतिबन्धों में काफी हद तक शिथिलता आती जा रही है। शिक्षा के प्रसार के साथ-साथ महिलाएँ हर क्षेत्र में पुरूषों के समकक्ष आ खड़ी होने को उद्यत हैं, किंतु कितना ही पारिवारिक दृष्टिकोण परिवर्तित क्यों न हुआ हो, फिर भी हमारे समाज में महिलाओं को यह स्वतंत्रता नहीं है कि वे स्वेच्छा से, अपने लिए मनचाहे क्षेत्र का चुनाव कर सकें। दूसरी ओर समाज में महिला के साथ लिंग के आधार पर भेदभाव किया जाता है। परंतु वर्तमान में नारी स्वयं सशक्त होकर प्रत्येक परिस्थिति को चुनौती दे रही है। महिला सशक्तिकरण वर्तमान हिन्दी साहित्य की कहानी विधा में सकरात्मक व नकारात्मक दोनों रूपों में ही प्रकट हुआ है।
 Keywords: महिला सशक्तिकरण, कहानी, कामकाजी, समाज, शोषण, आधुनिक सोच व पुरूष प्रधान समाज।

Defining a Tradition

Abstract Allison Busch's seminal work on the classical Hindi literature of Mughal India demonstrated how the composition of works of poetic theory (ritigranths) became a defining literary enterprise of vernacular court poets in the Mughal-Rajput milieu. Though firmly based in a Sanskrit worldview, Hindi intellectuals exhibited newness in their theorization of the art of poetic craft. Engaging with Busch's work on the ritigranth genre, this article demonstrates how the poet-scholars of Rajasthan who were experts in Brajbhasha and Marwari—or Hindi and Rajasthani, respectively, as they are largely understood today—theorized and created new knowledge systems to define their four-hundred-year-old Marwari literary culture. Keeping up with the theoreticians of Brajbhasha who blended Vaishnava bhakti (devotion) with poetic theory, the Rajasthani scholars placed their work in a multilingual literary culture that was increasingly expanding as India came under the knowledge regimes of colonialism.

Editors' Note

Editorial| August 01 2022 Editors' Note Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East (2022) 42 (2): 287. https://doi.org/10.1215/1089201X-9987723 Cite Icon Cite Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Permissions Search Site Citation Editors' Note. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 1 August 2022; 42 (2): 287. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/1089201X-9987723 Download citation file: Zotero Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search Books & JournalsAll JournalsComparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East Search Advanced Search The August 2022 issue opens with “Circuits of Culture in Early Modern South Asia: A Festschrift in Memory of Allison Busch.” A dear colleague and teacher, Allison Busch (1969–2019) was associate professor of Hindi literature in the Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies at Columbia University. Busch's work appeared first in the pages of this journal in 2004 with “The Anxiety of Innovation: The Practice of Literary Science in the Hindi/Riti Tradition” (24:2), which inaugurated a series of major works, including her own 2011 monograph Poetry of Kings, and productively opened up critical intellectual venues for rethinking the early modern for South Asia in comparative and literary cultures frameworks. In this Festschrift are mentors, peers, and students, celebrating with their scholarship the rich, field-defining insights of Busch and seeding the soil for generations to come.Two essays then explore the politics of knowledge and of... You do not currently have access to this content.

Mysticism and nature-illustration in Pant's poetry

The era that came after the Dwivedi era in the history of Hindi literature is known as Chhayavad. The main pillar poets of this era in which Nirala, Mahadevi Verma, Prasad, Pant have been. Who has presented language, expressions, verses, style of ornamentation, all these elements with a new expression. Which was given the name of 'Chayavaad' or 'Chhayavadi Poetry'. The poet of the Dwivedi era had a sense of absurdity due to the abundance of preaching and morality. Modern poetry is such a composition in the history of Hindi literature, which is related to the heart and the world. The heart is an object of experience. The world of emotion is the object of the experience of the people. In the first essay 'Kavi Swatantra' of Lekhmala, Mukutdhar ji said "Those who have any knowledge of the present condition of English or any western literature or Bengali literature will understand that this word has come for 'Mysticism

Literature, Print Culture, and the Indian New Wave

This article explores the rise and fall of the Hindi literary film, circa 1969–1995. I discuss three hybrid genres that emerged from collaborations between modern Hindi writers and Indian New Wave filmmakers: lighthearted, middlebrow comedies about urban life; an avant-garde cinema characterized by a mofussil modernism; and an activist cinema concurrent with the Indian human rights movement. The article concludes by identifying the factors that pushed Hindi literature and cinema apart in the 1990s, with changes in state policies, the growth of private television channels, and the provincialization of Hindi literary culture.

Science journalism in Hindi in pre-independence India: A study of Hindi periodicals

Science journalism in Hindi originated in the late nineteenth century. Hindi literary periodicals provided the first platform for science to be discussed along with literature. The onset of the twentieth century witnessed a remarkable advance in Hindi literary writing, and science writing also flourished with this advance. A remarkable overlap and a complementary relationship between the development of Hindi literature and Hindi commentaries on sciences is evident. Equally important in this context was the backdrop provided by a politically contentious process of evolution of a ‘modern’, ‘standard’ Hindi, and by the anti-colonial freedom movement, yoked to the idea of cultural and economic nationalism. The article surveys certain popular periodicals that regularly published essays and commentaries on science and scientific subjects. These periodicals were instrumental in shaping the popular discourses on science. The article also underlines an overwhelming effort by the intelligentsia to seek a philosophical commensurability between modern science and ‘traditional’ schools of thought. It concludes that the predominance of these characteristics in Hindi science journalism was a reflection of the agenda of the Hindi intelligentsia, shaped by linguistic nationalism framed alongside or in conjunction with a revivalist perspective.

Examining the Shifting Paradigms of Bhakti and Sanskrit Literature through Devotional Poetry of Jayadeva and Dadu

The wave of the Bhakti movement significantly affected India for over a period of twelve centuries. Considering that it left inerasable impressions on the history and culture of the land, this research paper argues that what only imbibed the feeling of pure devotion also became a tool in the hands of those who were desirous of radical religious, political and social changes. To prove this, the paper undertakes the translation of Dadu Dayal’s Sanskrit compositions. Additionally, the paper also questions the very model of Bhaktikal (the Age of Devotional Literature), propagated by the scholars of Hindi Literature, which divides it into two distinct theological categories, Sagun and Nirgun. By examining the devotional poetry of Jayadeva Goswami and Dadu Dayal, and their sectarian positions, it demonstrates that the proponents of the two diametrically opposite schools of Bhakti did not always honour such a distinction for bhakti’s spirit is above such schisms.