How Sujata Bhatt Convey Her Conflicting Emotions Regarding Her Identity in the Poem a Different History

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Sujata Bhatt who is of Indian origin, left her native India at the age of twelve and grew up in the UK and the USA. As a poet and being the product of a bilingual bicultural upbringing, her questions regarding her identity are left clearly in her work and particularly in “Different History” which delves into India’s colonial past. In the first stanza, Sujata shows that she is proud of her roots and attached to her culture. She assimilates language with gods: “You must learn how to turn the pages gently without disturbing Sarasvati” to create a link between the reader and the Hindu culture. In order to emphasize the fact that language is sacred, she used the lexical fields of religion: “Great Pan” (god a nature), “the gods”, “sacred” and the repetition of “a sin” which make the second stanza look like a sermon. Thereby she believes that literature, religion and nature are strongly linked together and this is understood as she says: “every tree is sacred and it is a sin to be rude to a book”. Moreover the continuity and therefore the serenity of her thoughts are translated with the size of the lines (longer) and the numerous enjambments, such as “and it is as sin to be rude to a book” or “You must learn how to turn the pages gently without disturbing Sarasvati”. At last the use of the letters “s” and “f” which are soft consonants add to the peacefulness of the poem. As her respect for her religion and origins she chooses a very calm tone. However on the other hand, she’s denounced the British colonialism in India and how they destructed their culture. You can feel a change in her voice from the first stanza to the second stanza she is calm listening to the nature but then she sounds more aggressive, as the use violent verbs such as: “to shove”, “to slam”, “to toss”. The rhetorical questions: Which language has not been the oppressor’s tongue?” or “Which

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