Introduction
‘India’ is a patriotic poem of Shoshee Chunder Dutt who was a historian and writer. He had patriotism and historicity as important elements in his poetry. This poem reflects dream of the poet about Indian independence.
Central Idea
India poem reflects idea of Indian independence. Poet first presents future as an enigma who no one can see. But there is nothing wrong in dreaming our future and he saw a dream of independent India. He aspires this dream shouldn’t remain a dream only and questions the land of fathers is their any hope of you gets freedom?
Themes
a) Indian Freedom – The main theme of the poem is freedom of India. India was under British rule and poet felt ‘strange and wild delight’ after watching a dream. This dream was about Indian independence. He sees freedom’ shrine is again illuminated, morning light is above the clouds, tears have dried up on beauty’s (Motherland) cheek and science has regained its status of old times and reached to new heights.
b) Uncertainty of Future – Poet has called future a ‘sealed book’ as no one knows for sure what will happen in it. Future has God’s ‘mystic secrets’ which is beyond our comprehension. This theme makes background for the dream of the poet regarding Indian freedom.
c) Some dreams should come true – Poet mentions that it is no sin to watch dreams but after explaining his dream of India’s freedom he says that this dream should not remain dream only. It should become reality. This dream was not only the poet’s dream it was dream of many people hence poet wants this dream to come true.
Figure of Speech
1. Metaphor – ‘The Future is a sealed book to man’. Here future is implicitly compared to a sealed book whose contents can’t be read. Hence it’s a metaphor. Similarly ‘Clouds’ are indirectly compared to adversities and obstacles in the path of freedom.
2. Alliteration – ‘Dreamt a dream’ has repetition of /d/ consonant sound at the starting of words hence it’s an example of alliteration.
3. Assonance – ‘again aspired’ and ‘smiling strand’ has repetition of vowel sounds /a/ and /e/ hence these are assonance examples.
4. Transferred Epithet – ‘Smiling strand’ is a beautiful example of transferred Epithet as smiling adjective is not used for strand noun but for some other noun i.e. people here. Hence meaning of the smiling is transferred to other noun.
Writing Style
Poet has adopted mixture of Elizabethan and Romantics. The structure of the poem is Elizabethan as it follows Shakespearean pattern while the vocabulary, theme and imagery is more inspired from romantics esp. theme of freedom and nature images.
Structure and Rhyme Scheme
This a sonnet written in the style of William Shakespeare. It can be divided into three quatrains and a couplet. It has rhyme scheme of ABAB CDCD EFEF GG as the Shakespearean sonnet has.
Henry Louis Vivian Derozio : Critical Appreciation of ‘The Harp of India’ – http://ourguruji.in/2023/12/16/critical-appreciation-of-the-harp-of-india-henry-l-derozio/
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Ru mai iss format se pass kar de ge??? ya fir reference to context about the writing background development of…
I have made the corrections in other poems too. Thanks for telling me. I didn’t know that the two sections…
Thank you so much. This might be a bit of work to ask but other poems have the same issue…
I have made the changes…
reference to context alag cheej hai…wo explanation me chahiye hoti hai critical appreciation me nahin…critical appreciation to aap is format…