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Tolstoy in India: Translating Aspirations across Continents
- Ayesha Suhail (author)
Chapter of: Translating Russian Literature in the Global Context(pp. 437–444)
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| Title | Tolstoy in India |
|---|---|
| Subtitle | Translating Aspirations across Continents |
| Contributor | Ayesha Suhail (author) |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.11647/obp.0340.27 |
| Landing page | https://www.openbookpublishers.com/books/10.11647/obp.0340/chapters/10.11647/obp.0340.27 |
| License | https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ |
| Copyright | Ayesha Suhail |
| Publisher | Open Book Publishers |
| Published on | 2024-04-03 |
| Long abstract | In the first half of the twentieth century, many Indians were agitating for their country’s freedom, resisting both British brute force and soft power, especially literature. English novels daunted Indian imaginations by setting ‘civilization’ on an unattainable pinnacle. However, Russian literature had the opposite effect. This essay will focus on how Lev Tolstoy’s writings, in translation, encouraged the Indian spirit. Tolstoy’s name was familiar to the politically conscious public due to his correspondence with Mahatma Gandhi which inspired South Africa’s first anti-apartheid movement. Tolstoy’s Russia, a vast, untamable, agrarian nation crisscrossed by railways and oppressed by its upper classes, mirrored India’s oppressed situation and galvanized its activists. Indian readers were invigorated by Tolstoy’s enduring ideas. Tolstoy’s writings made it clear that great art could stay true to one’s national and cultural experience and find a place within canons. This essay will explore the deep imprint his work left on the Indian consciousness, its pathways of circulation in translation and the implications for literary history in the early twentieth century. |
| Page range | pp. 437–444 |
| Print length | 8 pages |
| Language | English (Original) |
Contributors
Ayesha Suhail
(author)Ayesha Suhail is researching a PhD on ‘Art and Ideology in Select Works of Leo Tolstoy’. Her areas of interest are nineteenth-century Russian literature, literary realism, the Orthodox Church, and life-writing. She has worked as an Assistant Professor at the Department of English and Teaching Assistant at Women’s College, Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), India.