Introduction

An intense sense of awareness of the cultural loss and recovery that

came with the negotiation with 'other cultures is a recurrent feature
of the literatures of the seven north-eastern states. Each small com
munity or linguistic group has responded through its oral or written
communication to the encounters with the majoritarian cultures from
either mainland India or from outside the borders of the country, in its
own distinctive manner. The main waves of cultural invasion that have
wrought significant changes in the literary world of the region originated
in the Bhakti movement, followed by the various reformist dispensations
of the nineteenth century, colonialism and the Christian missionary
activities that accompanied it, and the new culture of development that
has become a part of global culture. Each of these encounters resulted
in different forms of resistance as well as appropriations. The clash of
cultures has often led to che loss of traditional forms and the adoption
of new cultural icons that threatened the existing ones.While there have
been attempts at reviewing and critiquing one's own society and culture
inthe light of the new ideas that have invaded the region from time to
xiv Introduction

time, yet whenever the xenophobic fear of the 'outsider has seized a
community, a tendency to retreat into the cocoon of cultural isolation
has been quite evident. In Assam, Manipur, and Tripura, this process of
cultural intermixing began long before the advent of colonialism. Shaiva,
Shakta, and Vaishnava forms of Hinduism together with Buddhism
and Islam spread their distinctive influences in the region, while the
Tai-Ahoms who entered Assam from the east and ruled the country for
almost600 years till the advent of the British in 1826, made immense
contribution towards the creation of a syncretic culture in the region.
It is significant that the literature of the pre-colonial period in all these
three kingdoms was deeply rooted in the wonderfully mixed cultural
life of their respective societies. Colonialism, however, superimposed
a Eurocentric concept of modernity derived from the Enlightenment
on the literatures of the region, thereby creating a rupture between the
past and the present. The Christian missionaries took the lead in usher
ing in a print culture by establishing printing presses and bringing out
textbooks, books on grammar, and Christian literature and journals in
the local languages. The standardization of the Assamese language that
took place as a result of this encounter, however, led to the margin
alization of the other spoken dialects of the language, thus creating a
distance between the oral and the written. This interference with what a
recent historian has termed the 'robustly polyglot character'of the pre
colonial administration of Assam, helped the colonial administrators to
cope with the problem of managing the bewildering and mindboggling
heterogeneity of speech which they encountered in the colonial prov
ince of Assam which constitutes much of what is called the 'North-East
today. The initial attempt of the British to impose a standardized form
of Bengalito serve as the vernacular of Assam, met with stiff resistance
from the Assamese literati of the time who received unexpected support
from the American Baptist missionaries. The creation of a standardized
print language in Assam was, therefore, the result of a joint effort by the
missionaries and the Assamese intellectuals schooled in the metropoli
tan culture of Calcutta in the nineteenth century. This language, which
emerged as the medium for the new literary creations of the nineteenth
century, contained elements from many existing speech practices of the
various indigenous communities of the region as well as from Persian,
Hindi, Bengali, and other languages of the neighbouring communities

I Bodhisatrva Kar, 2008, "The Tongue has No Bones; ixing the Assamese
Language c. 1800-c. 1930', Studies in History, Vol. 24, No.1, February.
 Introduction X

with which the pre-colonial rulers of Assam used to carry on political and
commercial intercourse. The modern Assamese language has, therefore,
been termed as a 'philologist's paradise'2 because of the heterogeneous
elements mobilized within its structure.
The Assamese language in its various oral forms has also served as the
lingua franca amongst many of the hill people in the neighbouring states
of Arunachal Pradesh and Nagaland. But these oral forms of the lan
guage have remained as pidgin languages and are, therefore, termed as
'non-language' even by the speakers who use these forms of the language
for communicating with people from the neighbouring tribes. It may
be noted that before the advent of identity politics amongst the various
ethnic communities in the region whose mother tongue is not Assamese,
the writers from the different communities used the Assamese language
as the medium for creative writing. This resulted in the language
acquiring distinctive characteristics because of the infusion of elements
peculiar to the culture of the different indigenous communities. In this
collection, the translations from the Assamese writings of Lummer Dai
and Yeshe Dorjee Thongchi belonging to the Adi and the Sherdukpan
communities respectively, an excerpt from an Assamese novel of the
Karbi writer Rong Bong Terang, poems of the Mishing poet Jiban
Narah, and those of the Bodo poet Anupama Basumatari, would show
how alanguage acquires new dimensions and vibrancy when handled by
writers from other cultures.
While setting out to compile this anthology, the most daunting task
has been to make the best possible selection from the available works
in English and in translation. Of the three generations of writers of the
post-Independence period included here, a significantly large number
of the younger writers are writing in English. Avariety of reasons may
be cited for this phenomenon. Many of them have had the privilege of
being educated in English-medium schools and they are more capable
of handling that language rather than their mother tongues. This new
band of writers writing in English is bound to grow in number because
most of the hill-states of the region have adopted English as the official
language, thus ensuring that it would be the first language of the new
generation of literates and it would be used to the best advantage both
in the professional as well as in the academic arena. While whether
the English language would be able to replace the regional languages
Maheswar Neog, 2004, Essays in Asamese Literature, Delhi: Omsons, p. I.
See my essay, 'Crossing Linguistic Boundaries: Two Arunachali Writers in
Search of Readers' in this volume.
xvi Introduction

in creative writing may be a contested question, it is a fact that some

of the best writings from the North-East have been produced in
acquired languages, including English. Moreover, given the small
sizes of the linguistic groups to which many of the writers belong, it
is understandable that the aspiring writers should choose to write in
a language through which they can reach out to a wider reader base.
Indeed, many of the writers writing in English have reaped the benefits
of acquiring a worldwide audience through national and international
forums. Reflecting on this phenomenon, Nigel Jenkins, a Welsh scholar
who has edited acollection of Khasi poetry in English and Welsh, has
expressed the hope that the Khasis would go back to their own language
after the 'purging of the clutter' that is under way at present. He says:
'lt is a painful fact of literary life for certain young writers that although
Khasiis their everyday medium, they are not sufficiently confident in
the language to make poems in it. This real or imagined incapacity is
largely the fault of an education system which obliges secondary school
pupils to abandon their native tongue and matriculate in English.'* In
contrast, a completely diferent view has been expressed by Salman
Rushdie who finds no reason to be apologetic about the choice of the
English language by Indian and diasporic writers. Commenting on the
status of the Indian writers 'working in English', he says: 'English is
the most powerful medium of communication in the world: should
we not then rejoice at these artists' mastery of it, and at their growing
influence? To criticize writers for their success at "breaking out is no
more than parochialism (and parochialisn is perhaps the main vice of
the vernacular literatures)."5
In the present anthology, the English poetry of Temsula Ao,
Mamang Dai, Robin S. Ngangom, Desmond Kharmawphlang, Esther
Syiem, Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih, Thanesia, Cherie L. Chhangte,
Lalrinmawi Khiangte, Easterine Iralu, Monalisa Changkija, Nini
Lungalang, and Aruni Kashyap represent the new voices in the literature
of the North-East. These poets have effectively combined the music,
rhythm, and patterns of their own languages and cultures with the
forceful communicative power of the English language.

4 Nigel Jenkins, 1995, 'Introduction', Khasi in Gwalia: An Anthology of Poetry

and Prose from the Khasi Hills in North-east India, West Glamorgan: Alun Books,
p. 18.
5 Salman Rushdie, 'Introduction', in Salman Rushdie and Elizabeth West (eds),
1997, The Vintage Book of lndian Writing (1947-1997), Vintage.
 Introduction xvii

The lack of first-rate translations of Indian literature in vernacular

languages has been mentioned by most editors who have compiled
anthologies of Indian writings. Though the effort of Sahitya Akademi
and some other institutions in collecting and publishing Indian writings
in translation is laudable, yet many areas have still remained untouched.
Despite the claims of somescholars that 'in India we keep translating every
moment of our active life' and that much of the pre-colonial literature
in India was founded on translations of the epics and the puranas, it is
sad that some of the best writings in the Indian languages can be read
only by the readers who belong to the same linguistic community as that
of the author.
Most of the communities from north-east India can pride themselves
for possessing a vibrant storytelling tradition. The culture of the 'face-to
face communities" which is distinguishable from the abstract nature of
social relationships in the 'modern' world, is a distinguishing feature of
the oral and it has continued as the dominant influence on the literary
creations from the region. After the introduction of print culture into
the region during the colonial times, collecting, re-telling, and prining
the folklore of the different communities became an important part
of the colonial ethnographic agenda of mapping the region for more
cffective administrative control over the bewildering variety of races
that the British encountered herc. P.R.T Gordon, J. Shakespeare,
T.C. Hodson, Major A. Playfair, J.P. Mill, Sidney Endle, and many
other colonial ethnographers had collected, translated, and printed a
rich body of folklore material, the latest in the line being the valuable
additions made by Verrier Elwin in the post-Independence period.
Collecting and printing the oral and written literature of one's own
community also became a part of the nationalist agenda of identity
assertion. People whose history and civilization had been pushed to the
margins as not conforming to the norms of the Eurocentric concept of
moderniry, took up the task of re-creating their past and re-inventing
tradition so as to represent the present as a stage in the continuous
process of marching from the past to the furure. Amongst many
indigenous communities of Africa and America too there has been a
resurgence of a conscious attempt to adopt elements from their own
oral tradition in order to create a modern literature of their own which
would resist the colonial project of a denial of history or literature to
6This phrase has been used by Madhu Dubey in Postmodern Geographies of
the U.S. South, in Saurabh and Ishita Dubey (eds), 2006, Unbecoming Modern:
Colonialism, Modernit, Colonial Modernities, p. 101.
xvii Introduction

the colonized. But Temsula Ao, whose own writings display a sensitive
blending of the oral and che written, claims that che 'new literature, rich
with indigenous flavour' that is being created by the modern storytellers
and poets from the North-East, does not seem to have a political agenda
like the postcolonial literature that is emerging in Africa and amongst
the Native Americans in recent times. Drawing a dividing line between
African and native American literatures and that of north-east India,
she says:
. . he people of North East India seem to have attained a new 'maturity in their
perceptions about themselves, that the 'other' of their position vis-à-vis mainland
India was not 'them' elsewhere but very much within their own sense of isolation
in an oral culture. Once articulated through the written text, similarities of world
views with other cultures have helped forge new affinities, and at the same time
enabled them to accept the differences as only uniqueness of any given culture rather
than as denominators of any deficiency or inferiority."
This new-found confidence that attempts to erase the boundaries
between subaltern traditions and 'Great Traditions', however, in itself,
is an assertion of a political awareness on the part of communities that
have been seen as living in enchanted spaces' bearing unpronounce
able names. Significantly, for mainland India, the region known as
the 'North-East' has never had the privilege of being at the centre of
cpistemic enunciation, except perhaps at some ancicnt time when
Assam was recognized as the centre of occult knowledge associated with
tantric worship, magic, and astrology, and, strangely enough, the imagi
nation of the 'mainland' has even today not outgrown those constructs
of the mysterious 'other'.
The sense of being denied fair representation in the great Indian
civilizational discourse or even in the nationalist discourse, has deeply
affected the emerging literati of many of the regions of north-east India
in the post-Independence era. A recurrent note in the journalistic as
well as academic writings of Assam from the colonial times till the
present has been the resentment at the province being turned into a
virtual colonial hinterland of Calcutta. Assamese creative literature of
the post-Independence era, however, displays a more mature sensibility
of focusing on the more complex issues facing the composite state of
Assam in the years immediately following Independence. For instance,
7Temsula Ao, 'Writing Orality', in Soumen Sen and Desmond
Kharmawphlang
(eds), 2007, Orality and Beyond, New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi, p. 109.
8 The term has been borrowed from Saurabh Dube,
'Mapping Oppositions:
Enchanted Spaces and Modern Places', in Unbecoming Modern.
 Introd
21/370

the problems of forging new cultural identities through interaction

with different communities living within undivided Assam becomes
the subject matter of much of Assamese fiction of this period. The
crisis of identity brought about by the re-drawing of boundaries that
began with the Partition of the Subcontinent affected the Assamese
self-representation more than any of the other states in the region. This
crisis has been best reflected by the writers from the state in their works
of fiction.
Making a choice bertween the path of armed resistance and the road
to peace through dialogue has long remained the unresolved issue before
the post-Independence generation of the region, and this becomes the
central theme of Birendra Kumar Bhattacharyya's novel Mrityunjay
published in 1970. Birinchi Kumar Barua's Xeuji Pator Kahini (1954),
which he wrote under the pseudonym 'Rasna Barua' and from which
an excerpt has been included in this anthology, is a sensitive portrayal
of the relationship betwcen the indigenes and the immigrant tea-planta
tion labourers who constitute a sizeable proportion of the population
of the state and whose status, vis-à-vis the locals, still remains uncertain.
Rong Bong Terang writes about the transformation brought about by
'modernization' to asecluded Karbi village. His Rongmilir Hanbi (1981)
traces the process of social mobilization amongst the new generation of
the hill-people who learn to articulate their demands for the protection
of their distinct identity on the eve of India's Independence. Moushumi
Kandali takes up from where Terang left. In her story, Lambada Machor
Sesbot (The Crossroads of Mukindon') written in a refreshingly original
style, she holds up a disturbing portrait of the dilemma faced by the
younger generation of the same Karbi community, poised at the cross
roads between a traditional way of life and a metropolitan modernity
with its alluring temptations that can sweep away the ground beneath
their feet:.
The invasion of an alien culture that lays exclusive claim to modernity
and progressivenessand compels the indigenes to be apologetic about their
ownculture has been the subject matter of much of the satirical writings
from the region. In Assamese literature, Anglophiles had been the target
of ridicule in the works of many nineteenth-century satirists, including
Lambodar Bora and Lakshminath Bezbaroa. Saurabh Kumar Chaliha's
Golam (1974) is thematically in the same tradition, though structurally
it represents the innovative style which was introduced into modern
Assamese short-fiction by Chaliha. The stories by Wan Kharkrang.
S.J. Duncan, and Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih of Meghalaya are also
 Introduction

in the tradition of the comic satire, exposing the social and academic
pretensions of a newly emerging urban middle class amongst the small
ethnic communities. While S.J. Duncan givesa hilarious version of the
old story of the women being smarter than men in business matters and
Kharkrang tells a simple comic tale of the effect of sartorial changes on
awould-be sahib, Nongkynrih's is a ruthless exposure of the intellectual
emptiness of a new class of people with academic pretensions.
While the first generation of fiction writers from Arunachal Pradesh
represented here by Lummer Dai and Yeshe Dorjee Thongchi wrote in
Assamese because that was the language through which they received
their school and college education in the early years after Independence,
the situation has changed now after the shift in the language policy
of the government. The new official policy is guided by the agenda
of integration' of the tribes with the Indian 'mainstream' through the
induction of Hindias the medium of instruction in secondary schools.
At present, however, the new generation has accepted the prime position
of English in the intellectual sphere of the country and would rather
write in that universally powerful language than in their mother tongue
or any of the Indian languages. The change in the medium of expression
has brought about some significant innovations in the choice of the
subject matter as wel, and this has happened within a short span of
a decade or so. Lummer Dai and Thongchi have sought to depict the
sensitive questioning of the values represented by the traditional institu
tions which give little space to the voices of the youth and the women.
These two writers may be considered counterparts of the litterateurs
of the Indian Renaissance of the nineteenth century who encountered
the challenges posed by the ideals of 'modernity' and 'progress' aggres
sively pushed forward by the Europcan Enlightenment. Mamang Dai's
The Legends of Pensam (2006) is written in lyrical prose and evokes the
memories of an entire community of people. It represents che predica
ments of the sensitive young minds in contemporary Arunachal Pradesh,
who too are at crossroads and find it difficult to come to terms with
the inevitable break with the enchantment of the past and to re-model
their lives according to the demands of the changing times. In her
powerfully lyrical style, inverse as well as prose, Mamang Dai depicts
the experiences of the new generation inhabiting what she calls the
'in-between' places of the mind.
A sizeable number of the selected stories is about the growing
awareness of the effect of the wanton destruction of the forests and
wildlife in the name of development. Yeshe Dorjee Thongchi's "The
 Introduction xi

Forest Guard', Monalisa Changkija's The Hunter's Story', Vanneiht

luanga's 'Innocence Wears Another Look, and Arupa Patangia Kalita's
"The Conflict reveal this growing awareness about the problem of the
ecological balance being disturbed in the states across the North-East.
It is surely not a coincidence that the dominant theme of the fiction
writing included in this collection happens to be that of violence
perperated by various militant outfits as well as by the armed forces
in their counter-insurgency operations. Violence features as a recurrent
theme because the story of violence seems to be a never-ending one
in this region and yet people have not learnt 'to live with it, as they
are expected to do by the distant centres of power. Writers across the
states of Assam, Manipur, Nagaland, and Tripura are deeply concerned
about the brutalization of their societies by the daily experience of
human rights violation and the maiming of the psyche of a whole
people by the trauma caused by violence. Manoj Goswami, Imran
Hussain, Atulananda Goswami, Temsula Ao, Manorama Das Medhi.
Yumlembam Ibomcha, Tayenjam Bijoykumar Singh, Shekhar Das,
Kallol Choudhury, Haribhushan Pal., and Bimal Choudhury. all depict
their perceptions of the traumatic experience ofa people living in the
midst of terror and fear and yet cherishing hopes that human values
will triumph some day and a new dawn of peace would emerge out of
this trial by fire. The feeble child born in the midst of every possible
form of adversity in Manorama Das Medhi's 'A Time to Come' holds
out some promise of a new life against all odds.
Not all the states of the North-East' have produced an equally large
harvest of good poetry in the last 50 years and it is even more difficult
to come across translations that are reasonably satisfying. Ultimately,
therefore, a compromise had to be made between established names
and quality translations so that at least some of the representative
names from cach region could be included in this anthology. The selec
tion has not been totally fair in the case of the states that have a richer
production of poetry. An honest attempt has, however, been made to
include at least some of the significant poets who have initiated new
trends in the modern poetry of the region. Another problem faced has
been the need to maintain a judicious balance so that the amount of
space allocated to the states with a richer corpus of literary works is
not disproportionately large. This has, however, not always been pos
sible and the only way to justify the selections is to assert discreetly that
for the purpose of this anthology at least the whole of the 'North-East
should be viewed as one unit.
xii Introduction

Three Assamese poets, Nilmani Phookan, Navakanta Barua, and

Hiren Bhattacharya have dominated the post-Independence poetic
scene of Assam with their distinctive styles that bear the marks of a
variety of influences from Anglo-American and European modernist
poetry, combining these with elements from the classical Indian tradi
tion. Phookan and Barua delve deep into the world ofa modern man,
trying to discover logical connections between the shattered images of a
modern post-war situation and the inner world of apoet which strives to
establish some logical connections between the inner and the outer world.
Navakanta's language has great evocative power and his poems as well as
novels reflect a deep sense of history. Some of the most memorable im
ages in his poetry spring from this historical sense. Nilmani Phookan has
been considered as a gifted poet whose poems are 'concentrated as well
as chiseled'9 Though his craft has received much attention from critics,
his treatment of a variety of themes that signify the tragic dilemma of
the modern man deserve equal attention. Hiren Bhattacharya's poems
are unique in their capacity to bind together a deep commitment to
a socialist cause, especially in his early poetry, with his brilliant han
dling of words which gives his language a life of its own. According to
Harekrishna Deka, it is difficult to capture in translation 'the hypnotic
magic of the sounds' in the poetry of Hiren Bhattacharya. ° Harekrishna
Deka's early poetry seeks to explore the human unconscious, but his
mature poetry concentrates on 'the facets of hideous violence confront
ing man' and the complex relationships of urban life." All these poets
have assimilated a variety of trends from the modernist poetry of
England, America, and Europe with the tradition which they have in
herited from Indian literature of the past. Their innovative handling of
language, form, and imagery has left its mark on the new generation of
Assamese poets. The younger group, represented here by Nilim Kumar,
Anubhav Tulasi, Sameer Tanti, Jiban Narah, Anupama Basumatari, and
Aruni Kashyap, reflect the heterogeneous sensibilities of a truly polyglot
culture. Images, metaphors, myths, and folklore drawn from the different
linguistic communities of the region have enriched their poctic language
and given it alife of its own. Similarly, the poets from the Barak valley of
Assam, like their counterparts in Tripura, have given a new dimension to

9 Hirendra Nath Dutta, 2005, 'Introduction', One Hundred Years of Assamese

Poetry, Guwahati: Publication Board Assam, p. 16.
10 Harekrishna Deka, "The Modern Era in Assamese Poetry: From Romanticism
to Modernism' (unpublished essay).
11 Hirendranath Dutta, p. 17.
 Introduction xoxiii

the Bengali language by bringing in the unique experiences of adiasporic

community. Some of the Bengali poems of Shaktipada Brahmachari and
Pijush Raut have been included here.
The rich and powerful poetic voices from Manipur have been repre
sented here by the selections from the poetry of Yumlembam Ibomcha,
Saratchand Thiyam, R.K. Bhubonsana, Robin S. Ngangom, Gambhini
Devi, Memchoubi, and Thangjam Ibopishak. The history of modern
Manipuri literature, as has been discussed in the article by Thingnam
Kishan Singh in this collection, marks a significant departure from
the general pattern that is visible in the emergence of a new literature
during the colonial period in the other states of the region. The
Christian missionaries could not make much of an inroad into the
Manipur valley where a vibrant Vaishnava culture patronized by the
ruling dynasty of the kingdom was strongly entrenched. This Vaishnava
tradition continued to exercise its hegemonic power over the cultural
arena throughout the colonial period and it almost seemed as if the
Manipuri writers had not taken any notice of the entry of the British
intothe region after the Anglo-Manipuri war of 1891. It is significant,
therefore, that the birth of modernism in Manipuri literature in the
carly years of the twentieth century was not marked by the missionary
enterprise of translating Christian texts and Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress,
but by the growing awareness of the indigenous Meitei identity which
had been suppressed during the ule of the Manipuri kings who had
offered active patronage to the alien Vaishnava culture. The roots of
the present-day militant idenity movement in Manipur, therefore, can
be traced back to the early part of the twentieth century which was
marked by the cfforts of the writers to re-invent a glorious Meitei past
for Manipur. The poems in this collection, even in their translated
form, display a maturity and vigour of expresion that come from a
sensitive tapping of the rich resources of the Meitei language. Modern
Manipuri poctry, according to Ngangom, was born amidst the ravages
of the Second World War, of which Manipur remains a forgotten
theatre.2 The political events that followed soon after the War-the
departure of the British, the questionable accession of the kingdom
of Manipur to the Indian Union, the disillusionment with the new
political arrangement, and the subsequent militant resistance move
ment were all reflected in the literature of the post-War period. The

12 Robin S. Ngangom, 2007, 'Contemporary Manipuri Poetry: An Overview',

Muse India, Issue 16, November-December.
Xxiv Introduction

anti-romantic trend that characterizes much of the modernist literature

of post-War Manipur is reflected in the work of all the poets included
in this selection. The poetry that has been published in the 1980s and
1990s, unlike the writings of the 'angry young poets' of the 1970s, is
marked by adeeper probe into the social reality and the journey inwards
into the tortured soul of the poet.
The history of modern Manipuri fiction is in many respects similar
to that of poetry. Though the tradition of the prose narrative can be
traced back to an ancient text umit Kappa written probably in the
tench century AD, modern fiction in Manipur emerged in the first
halfofthe twentieth century.l Afer the events ofthe Second World War
which left their indelible marks on the popular psyche of this castern
state, ficion writers abandoned the romantic tradition of the Bengali
novel which had inspired a few earlier writers, and wrote boldly about
the new social realities and the changing patterns of human relationship.
The short stories included in this volume are picked from the writings
of the post-1970s when fiction writers began to display a deep concern
about the destruction of the traditional way of life and the wanton
violation of human rights by the different militant organizations and
the security forces involved in counter-insurgency operations.
The scribal tradition is a recent one amongst the Nagas and before
the development of a script for the Naga languages through the efforts
of the American Baptist misionaries, literature was confined only to
the oral form. Amongst the 14 major Naga tribes, speaking about 30
different languages, there is a rich tradition of the oral. So adaptations
and transcreations of oral literature constitute a significant part of print
literature in modern times. Since, under the initiative of the missionaries
most of the Naga writers from the first group of literates honed their
literary skills on translations of the Gospels, written literature of the
early phase took on a moralistic note. Amongst the Ao Nagas, who were
the first to come into contact with the Christian missionaries stationed
at the adjacent district of Sibsagar in Assam, the first printed book
was one of alphabets in the Roman script published in 1880 by Rev.
Edward Clark who came to work among the Ao Nagas in 1876. The
story of Ao literature was later repeated in other areas of the Naga
Hills where Christianity gradually spread in the rwentieth century. For
example, the Tenyidin (Angami) language was given a written form

1S For details, see Tayenjam Bijoykumar ingh, 2002, 'Fiction in Manipur, New
Frontiers, Vol. V.
 Introduction xxv

by the missionaries in the third decade of the twentieth century, but

secular literature in its written form began to take shape only under
the initiative of the Angami Literature Committee in the 1970s." The
literature that developed in the different Naga languages during the
early years of their acquiring written forms, bore the recognizable stamp
of the style, imagery, and diction of the Bible.
The change came after the outbreak of the war between the Naga
underground army and the Indian government forces which completely
transformed the cultural etchos of the people, bringing in significant
changes in what was considered the 'Naga way of life'. The possibility of
making quick money by providing supplies to the military contractors
or amassing wealth through corruption in government service, raised
great expectations about 'progress' and 'development' which are inimical
to the notions of a distinctive old-worid tradition. Commenting on this
change, Temsula Ao says, "The sudden displacement of the young from
a placid existence in rural habitats to a world of conflict and confusion
in urban settlements is also a fallout of recent Naga history and one
that has left them disabled in moreways than one.'15 In the rural areas
too, the regrouping of villages during the operations of the Indian army
against the Naga underground resulted in displacements of another
kind that also snapped traditional ties. The post-1950s generation of
Naga writers have journeyed through territories of the mind which are
distant from the world of simple Christian pieties upheld by the newly
converted Christian writers of the earlier period. The new literature,
most of which is in English, has sprung from the staccato cry of the
machine guns and reflects the revolutionary ideals of the militants as
well as the disillusionment with their ways that followed. The course
of the struggle has also transformed the whole idiom of poetry as well as
prose fiction and words with sinister connotations have crept into the
vocabulary of commonspeech.l6 In a recent biographical note, Easterine
Iralu writes about her experience of growing up in Nagaland: 'Curfews
and continued periods of gun-fire were ll a part of growing up in
Nagaland.'"7 Yet, the new literature that is emerging from Nagaland is

14 D. Koulie, "Tenyimia Folklore and Verse: Quest for Beyond', in S. Sen and
Desmond Kharmawphlang (eds), Orality and Beyond. p. 128.
15 Temsula Ao, 2006, These Hills Called Home: Stories from a War Zone, New
Delhi: Zubaan, p. x.
l6 Ibid., pp. 11-12.
17 Easterine Iralu in CORN International Cities of Refuge Network, Norway.
Autumn 2006.
xxvi Introduction

not all soaked in blood. The old storytelling tradition, which is common
to all oral cultures of indigenous people, has been creatively integrated
into modern literary genres to give a distinct identity to the literature
of this region.
Modern Mizo literature too draws from a rich oral tradition. While
much of the secular prose literature is derived from myths and folktales,
the poetry draws inspiration from the rich corpus of folk songs that
the various Mizo groups possess. As has been discussed in Margaret
Zama's article 'Mizo Literature: An verview', included in this anthol
ogy, the coming of Christianity to Mizoram infused a 'non-secular
mindset' which determined the character of the songs and narratives
written during the early phase of written literature in Mizoram. The
Christian missionaries entered the Lushai Hills, then a district in the
colonial province of Assam, in the last decade of the nineteenth century,
accompanied by British colonization. As in Nagaland and Meghalaya,
the Roman script was adopted for the Luesi dialect of the Duhlian lan
guage which became the standardized Lushai language, by the Christian
missionaries. The first major literary task accomplished by them was
the translation of the Bible into the Lushai language. The rich secular
tradition of oral literature of the pre-colonial period was almost mar
ginalized in order to underscore the success of the 'civilizing' mission of
the British. But the natural genius of the people stood out even during
the height of the religious phase, in the writings of Biakliana and others.
During the period of insurgency when normal life was paralysed in the
hills, a new trend developed in Mizo literature which was subversive in
nature but reflected the anguish of the people traumatized by violence.
The Mizo militant movement and the counter-insurgency programme
undertaken to curb it, led to social upheavals that changed the character
of the communities and the social institutions. B.G. Verghese and
others have discussed the effects of the village regrouping programmes
of the Indian government on the whole social structure of the com
munity:.. it was a painful interlude resulting in an erosion of village
institutions, the social fabric and traditional way of life.'l8 These events
also accelerated the process of urbanization of the society, thus paving
the way for the emergence of a new literature that is now taking shape
in Mizoram through the efforts of a host of writers who can handle
both their mother tongue as well as the English language with equal
confidence and skilI.

18 B.G. Verghese, 1996, India's Northeast Resurgent: Ethniciry Insurgency Gover

nance, Development, New Delhi: Konark Publishers, p. 143.
 Introduction xorvii

The Khasis,' says the Welsh scholar Nigel Jenkins, 'were weaving
stories long before the Bible-thumping, hymn-crazy Welsh arrived on
the scene."19 The same story of a colonial 'civilizing' mission persuading
a people to abandon their rich indigenous oral tradition and to adopt
an alien way of life which was projected as the only 'universal' civili
zational model, was repeated in the Khasi-Jaintia Hills as elsewhere in
the region. The Khasi language which belongs to the Mon-Khmer
group of languages, was rich in the oraltradition, though in the absence
of a script of its own, written literature developed only in the nineteenth
century. It was a traditional practice to compose Phawars or thyming
couplets orally to celebrate important social events. In the pre-colonial
times, the Khasi rulers used the Assamese, Bengali, Persian, or Devana
gariscripts to maintain administrative contact with their neighbours, 20
Significandy, the New Testament was translated into the Khasi language
at the Serampore Baptist Mission in 1831 and this massive work, run
ning into 898 pages, was in the Bengali script.21 The Welsh missionaries
were the first to introduce the Roman script for giving a written form
to the Khasi language and they took the initiative for almost 40 years
to publish hymns, moral fables, and Bible stories in the Khasi language.
However, 'a great cultural revival' took place in the Khasi Hills towards
the end of the nineteenth century when three Khasi writers and a so
cial activist following on the footsteps of S.M. Amjad Ali, a Bengali
poet who wrote secular lyrics in Khasi, initiated a new secular trend in
Khasi literature and posed 'a purposeful challenge to the influence of
Christianity and the mssionaries' monopoly over the intellectual and
cultural affairs'.22 The leading personalities in this group who went
about in a bold and determined way to create nationl awakening
amongst the Khasis were Rabon Singh, Radhan Singh Berry, Soso
Tham, and Jeeban Roy. Soso Tham laid the foundation of a new trend
in Khasipoetry by exploring the world of myths, legends, and folklore
to find new idioms and subject matter for his poetic creations. The
poems included here are written by a new generation of Khasi poets
who share adeep sense of cultural loss which came with the conquest
19 Nigel Jenkins (ed.), 1995, Khasia in Gwalia: Poetry and Prose from the Khasi
Hills in North-east India, Port Talbot: Alun Books, p. 10.
20 Hamlet Bareh, 2003 [1962), AShort History of KhasiLiterature, Shillong: Don
Bosco Press, p. 13.
21 Ibid., p. 25.
22 R.S. Lyngdoh, Ka Histori ka Thoh ka Tar: Bynta lII (in Khasi), 1983, quoted in
Kynpham Sing Nongkynrih, 2004, Hiraeth and the Poetry of Soso Tham, unpub
lished thesis, p. 37.
xxvii Introduction

of the territory and the mind by waves of colonizers of different hues.

While they strive to seek out roots that would firmly bind them to the
racial memory of the past, at the same time, they also display an eager
ness to master the new modernist poetic idioms that can link them with
a global audience.
Tripura's cultural history has been greatly influenced by its long
history of close proximity to Bengal. Though the ruling dynasties of
this small kingdom had always belonged to one of the indigenous
tribal communitics of the state, the cultural dominance of the plains
by people from the neighbouring Bengal under the patronage of the
Tripurirulers continued to create tension in the region. The unending
migration of Bengali-speaking people from the neighbouring districts
of eastern Bengal during the colonial period, increased steadily during
the pre-Partition days, until the small state became a 'safe haven' for
Bengali migrants escaping from communal conflicts in East Bengal,23
After Partition, the problem of refugee influx took on frightening
dimensions, altering the demographic map of the area completely and
reducing the local inhabitants to asmall minority. At present the Bengali
speaking population constitutes about 70 per cent of the population
while only about 900,000 people belonging to the eight indigenous
communities speak Kokborok. The inevitable fallout of this was the rise
of ethnic mobilization and a long-drawn militant struggle for identity
preservation by the tribal groups of the region comprising the five
major groups-the Tripuri, Reang, Jamatia, Noatia, and Halam. Since
the Bengali language had been receiving royal patronage and it was
the language used for administrative purposes, a vibrant tradition of
Bengali literature had developed in the region. Rabindranath Tagore
was often a royal guest in Tripura and Maharaja Birchandra Manikya
Bahadur (r. 1870-96) and his daughter published several books of
poetry of their own in Bengali. It was only after the rise of militancy
amongst the indigenous groups of Tripura that the Kokborok language
attained its status as an official language, and at present conscious
attempts are being made to retrieve the rich oral culture of the people
which reflects the economic and social life of the communities. It is
significant that while the modern Bengali literature from Tripura strives
to follow the tradition of mainstream Bengali literature, yet as in the
case of the Sylheti writers of the Barak valley in Assam, the writers
23 Tbid., p. 168.
24 Sisir Sinha, "The Poetry of Tripura: Past and Present', Indian Literature.
Vol. 191, New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi.
 Introduction xix

from Tripura too are struggling to come to terms with their diasporic
existence and the need to search for new tap roots for their literature.
The modern literature that is taking shape in the Kokborok language,
on the other hand, displays a self-confidence and a rootedness in the
lived experience of the people. Some of the poems and stories translated
from Kokborok which have been included in this collection are
refreshingly original, and in their depiction of certain enduring truths
about life they defy ll stereotypical constructions about notions of
mainstream and peripheral culture.

II

A collection of writings which represents awide variety of cultures,

nationalities, and languages cannot be subjected to any accepted notion
of compiling an anthology based on similarity of style or content.
Considering all the practical limitations mentioned carlier, the present
collection like other such existing collections, does not make any claims
of comprehensiveness. But at a time when the region is striving to reach
out to the rest of the world from its historically and geographically
marginalized position, the diverse writings which this anthology has
brought together, representing acomplex region posited at a historically
difficult time, would serve as yet another attempt at the synthesizing
of intellectual opinions. The response of the writers to the onslaught of
the 'modernity' of the postcolonial state, their negotiations with the idea
of the gradual erasure of the notion of community, their understanding
of human relationships, especially the complex relationships berween
communities which had only marginal links with each other in the
past, their sensitive approach to the problem of violence and its after
effects--all these could be some of the distinguishable markers that
bind together an anthology of this nature.
The stories, extracts from novels, poems, and essays included here
are from the post-Independence era. Most of the writers who find a
place in this anthology are, in a sense, the children of violence. Many of
them have grown up in close contact with people who have memories
of the Partition of the Subcontinent and its tragic after-effects in the
North-East. Others have experienced at close quarters the violence
associated with the insurgent movements in different parts of the region
that have changed the very character of the societies in many ways. Still
others, including the large influential group of younger writers, are
living through the traumatic experience of those daily incidents of
 XXX Introduction

violence that disturb the seemingly idyllic surroundings of the region

and leave a deep scar on the sensitive mind.
Care has been taken to include some of the representative works in
fiction and poetry which have introduced new trends in contemporary
literatures from the seven states. Some of the well-known works of an
earlier generation of writers have been included not only because they
are pioncering works that show anew awareness about the emerging
social and intellectual concerns of the post-Independence period, but
also because of the evocative power of their language or other finer quali
ties of style. These are also the resources from which the newer group
of writers has drawn inspiration. Many of the new writers whose works
find a place in this anthology are perhaps yet to produce their best works,
but they hold promise of new possibilities in creative writing from the
region. In literary compositions, especially poetry, aesthetic qualities
may be considered more valuable than didactic ones. This anthology,
however, while endeavouring to follow that ideal, has not lost its focus
on the social, political, or moral issues that are of intense concern to
contemporary life in the region. It is not merely accidental, therefore,
that most of the fiction writings in this volume, and some of the poems
too, represent the deep-seated concern of the writers for social issues.
While an overwhelming majority of the stories reflect on the theme of
violence and peace, yet there are quite a few which deal sensitively with
the theme of human endurance and the beauty of relationships in the
midst of terror and violence. There are also a few enduring tales on
the theme of the growing awareness about the nature-man conflict and
the need for conservation of nature which is incrcasingly being threat
cned by human rapaciousness. Dissenting voices at the crossroads of
history, which question the relevance of cultural practices that are totally
at odds with the modern notion of rights of the individual as against
communitarian rights, also find a place in this collection.
And finally, it is necessary to mention another departure that this
anthology makes in the nature of its collection of fiction. Inclusion of
oral literature in an
anthology of contemporary writings may be consid
ered unacceptable by some critics because it questions the often implic
itly accepted hierarchy between the written and the oral. However, the
old definition of folklore as the strange and exotic material produced
by a 'primitive, backward' culture no longer holds good after the dis
semination of a host of exciting modern ideas about the significance of
oral literature as a lens through which to view the negotiations with the
various practices of modernity. Traditional myths, in their transmuted
 Introduction xxxi

form, have often helped modern poets to give shape to their unique
visions of the world. They have also continued to exist as a vibrant part
of the living present of many cultures, merging with newly created
rituals and traditions and giving a new lease of life to the ancient lore.
Further, the need to mythologize could also be a response to a sense of
loss--subversion as it were-of the changing social order in the region.
This could perhaps explain the recovery of orality in recent times by a
significant number of writers. Some of the oral narratives selected for
this anthology have been retold or 'transcreated' by the modern writ
ers because they are an intrinsic part of the literature from the region.
Some of them may be interpreted as civilizational myths that have some
relevance to the understanding of the cultural identity of a community.
As Esther Syiem discusses in her essay 'Social Identity and the Liminal
Character of the Folk', the oral discourse which has always been central
to the Khasisociety may seem to have shifted to a peripheral space in
a more complex modern situation, but it has never ceased to occupy a
significant position in the worldview of the community.
The essays included here range from the philosophical to the ana
lytical and the descriptive. There are essays that deal specifically with
the literature and culture of particular ethnic or linguistic groups of
the Norh-East, and there are also studies that reflect on the different
dimensions of the multi-ethnic and multilingual cultures of the region.
In his philosophical essay on the different traditions of spirituality in
the West and in India, "The Spiritual and the Moral', Mrinal Miri com
ments on che uniqueness of the tribal vision of life which is applicable to
the world of the tribesman in the North-East as well. He points out the
'moral lapse' involved in the dismissive tendency amongst many scholars
when they judge the concept of sclf-knowledge amongst the tribesman
as 'irretrievably erroncous or lacking in autonomy'. Birendranath Datta,
in his discussion of the distinctive features of the culture of the region,
highlights the significance of the mixture of 'Hindu-Aryan' and 'Indo
Mongoloid' elements in the culture of the region in relation to what is
generally known as the 'mainstream' culture of India. He provides a
comprehensive overview of the syncretistic culture of the North-East,
highlighting the distinctive features of its 'physical folk-life' as well as
the verbal folklore.
The umbrella term North-East', which is often used as an emotive
connotation for the seven states nestled together in one corner of the
country, does not actually denote anything more than a geographical
region. But, as it happens elsewhere in the world, geography is history
xXxii Introduction

in many ways. The 'seven sisters of the North-East which had only
marginal historical links with each other in the pre-colonial times, had
their doors open towards South-East Asia, eastern Bengal, Bhutan, and
Tibet--regions with which they shared boundaries and lively commer
cial and cultural contacts. It was only after the Partition of the Sub
continent that the region became totally landlocked with almost all the
doors closed except for a narrow corridor that kept it linked with India.
This geographical isolation has led to erasures and marginalization on
multiple levels, the effect of which is clearly discernible in the writings
from the region.
The creative writers from all the small ethnic communities whose
works find a place in this collection, have sought to reach out from the
level of the personal to that of the universal. A clear evidence of this may
be seen in the flexible attitude of most of the writers towards language.
Contrary to the stereotypical notion of the region being prone to chau
vinistic, xenophobic tendencies, almost every writer in this anthology is
bilingual if not multilingual. Several writers have been writing with equal
confidence and facility in both English as well as their mother tongue
or in one of the other languages of the region. Boundaries and barriers
which hampered an carlier generation of writers are being crossed easily
by a new group which believes in sharing of experiences. A tangible
evidence of this aspiration is the effort being made in recent years to
set up writers' forums which are taking the initiative in translating and
publishing literary works from the region.
The task of compiling and editing this anthology has been an
immense learning experience for me. Not only have I had the oppor
tunity to interact with writers and translators from all the seven states
(and in that process making new friends), but while reading through
the stories, poems, and essays I have discovered that in the midst of
all the plurality there are certain elements of commonality which give
a sense of distinctiveness to the writings from the region. At a point
in history when no community can afford to live in isolaion despite
all the myths that have been circulated about the 'self-sufficiency' of
societies geographically isolated from each other and from the rest of
the country, the discovery of emerging affinities amongst a new group
of creative writers for whom boundaries have ceased to interfere with
thought processes is, in itself, a rewarding experience.
October 2010 TILOTTOMA MISRA