Refractions of Kabīr and Tulsīdās in post-independence Hindi literature

The book explores the adaptations, uses and refractions of Kabīr and Tulsīdās in post-independence Hindi literature. The historical period covered in the book is from the 1950s to the 1970s. During this arch of time, the poetry of the two early-modern bhakts (devotional poets) was at the crossroads of many aesthetical, sociocultural and ideological questions that have impacted the Indian public sphere during the post-independence period. Using the methodological framework theorised by Lefevere on the nature of literary refraction (1981a, 1981b, 1982a, 1982b, 1995), the study examines the contribution of many Hindi literary critics, historiographers and creative writers to the reception and subsequent construction of a historical image of these autors. Great relevance is given, especially in the second half of the book, to the role played by the members of the Nayī kahānī ("New Short Stories") and by literary satirists in the canonization of the aesthetical and ideological value of the poetry of Kabīr and Tulsīdās.