Colonizing the Realm of Words
Author | : Sascha Ebeling |
Publisher | : State University of New York Press |
Total Pages | : 386 |
Release | : 2010-09-28 |
ISBN-10 | : 9781438432014 |
ISBN-13 | : 1438432011 |
Rating | : 4/5 (011 Downloads) |
Download or read book Colonizing the Realm of Words written by Sascha Ebeling and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2010-09-28 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A true tour de force, this book documents the transformation of one Indian literature, Tamil, under the impact of colonialism and Western modernity. While Tamil is a living language, it is also India's second oldest classical language next to Sanskrit, and has a literary history that goes back over two thousand years. On the basis of extensive archival research, Sascha Ebeling tackles a host of issues pertinent to Tamil elite literary production and consumption during the nineteenth century. These include the functioning and decline of traditional systems in which poet-scholars were patronized by religious institutions, landowners, and local kings; the anatomy of changes in textual practices, genres, styles, poetics, themes, tastes, and audiences; and the role of literature in the politics of social reform, gender, and incipient nationalism. The work concludes with a discussion of the most striking literary development of the timeāthe emergence of the Tamil novel.