Sujata Bhatt – A Different History Summary

The poetess Strata Bath, while writing this poem has given importance to the
culture and various religions in India. She has emphasized in her poem by
repeating words and questions and thereby making her poem stronger. She writes
about Indian traditions, lost identities, importance of language, cultural difference
to create different moods and themes. In the first part of the poem, she concentrates
on respect for education and learning. She claims that in Indian religion every
Object is sacred. There is God in trees. You should treat your books as the goddess
of knowledge.
You should be gentle when turning the pages of the book that you read for
knowledge of religion. She has written this poem describing the British
colonization days when the British oppressed the Indians. They force them to learn
the English language though in India various languages were spoken. She is
annoyed at this attitude of the British. She also explains how British tried to change
the identities of the people of India with a scythe. She claims that the future
generation will love this strange language like they love their mother tongue.

According to her language has been used as a weapon to target its victims in a
figurative sense. The poem appeals to the reader because it is full of culture off
different country. In the initial stage it is descriptive and then changes to
interrogative, the cultural background of Strata is reflected in the first part of the
poem. She has referred to God and books to talk about Indian culture. As you read
the poem further you realize that she is talking about learning a new language. She
admits that, in spite of having to learn 4 languages she had to adapt herself to the
English language.

She compares herself with any one, who would feel scared to learn a new language
because of ending up in making mistakes. She is of the opinion that when you
learn a new language, it starts dominating you especially when it is the lingua
franca of a particular country. It is just like the British forced upon India to adapt to
the English language. She also suggests in her line ‘languages kills’, she is against
this forced learning. But she claims that after a few years, they all speak the
language which they are forced to, sacrificing their culture.

In this way the children grow up forgetting their mother tongue and learn a foreign
language and even adapt to their culture. We feel that ‘A Different History’ is a
poem that tells us about a different language. It also tells how a change of culture
affects the people of a country. This is when a foreign rule forces you to adapt to
their elite style, learn their language and inculcate their culture in you. She makes
references to Indian gods and goddesses. This makes the poem appealing as the
reader wants to gain knowledge and learn about Indian culture.

But as you read further it is about learning a new language. She claims that she
found it very hard and had to go through great difficulties in learning the Indian
traditional language and the English language. She calls this language as a strange
language because at that time she was very young _ She refers to this foreign
language as an oppressor language. It affects not only the mother tongue of the
people but also changes their culture, way of living and many adapt to new
religion. Strata Bath was born in Pune in the year 1956.

At the age of 12 she migrated with her parents to the US. She completed her
education and received a Masters in Fine Arts from the University of Lowa. Later
in Canada she went on to be a resident writer at the university of Victoria in
Canada. In recent years she was in Pennsylvania at Dickinson College as a visiting
fellow. She is a well known poetess at present and resides in Bremen, Germany
with her daughter and husband. She has won accolades and awards for her poems
not only in Asia but also in other parts of the world. In 1991 she received a
Chlamydeous.

Strata considers language as a physical act of speaking, which is synonymous with

the tongue. She considers her mother tongue Guajarati and her childhood in India
as the deepest layer of her identity. Then ironically, she claims that she has chosen
English as the language she speaks in. She uses the same in her daily life and by
large chooses to right her powers in English. In most of her works she depicts
repercussions of this divided heritage. She explains the complex status of English.
She has the art to convey ironically the beauties of English and colonial
implications in her poem in a different history.

She informs about her grandfather being in prison during the British days who in
order to comfort himself during his time in prison read Tennyson. She has written
wonderful poems but all of them had some or the other relation with Indian and
Western culture. Strata acknowledges that language splits you from experience but
through the strength of her writing she brings you closer to it. In conclusion Strata
Bath expresses to the generation of today by giving example of the British rule in
India. How many Indians had to give up their culture, their mother tongue and
forced to do everything English.
Of course, today such type of an oppressive rule is impossible. You cannot force
someone to change his religion or culture and learn a foreign language under
duress. The British not only brought about a change in India but also in all its
colonies spread over the world. Today English has become an international
language. But if you ask anyone who is not a British how he feels about the
language, most of them will be proud to tell you like the poetess herself that they
have been educated in English. And this is the language in which they trebly
converse and they are comfortable with.
Analysis of 'A Different History' by Sujata Bhatt
Sujata Bhatt is an Indian-born poet, now settled in Germany. Her first collection of
poems, Brunizem, won her the Alice Hunt Bartlett Prize and the Commonwealth
Poetry Prize (Asia) in 1988. She has travelled around the world, and her
multicultural perspectives on art, culture and language come from her own life
experiences. A meditative and philosophical poet, her work shows a natural gift for
empathy across cultures and beautifully brings out the multicultural meaning of
language.
In the poem ‘A Different History’ the poet expresses her concern over the loss of
language and culture after colonization, and the consequent westernization, in
India. She describes her concerns with both bitterness and sadness. In an attempt to
show the gravity and the seriousness of the problem, the poet has not made use of
rhymes in the poem. The poem compels the reader to reflect upon their own history
and on the consequences of the next generation losing its identity, culture and
heritage.
The poet addresses the movement of culture across the globe in the very first line,
by mentioning the Greek God Pan. She talks about cultures moving with people
and lifestyles by implying that the God Pan has not seized to exist but simply
moved to India. By saying this Sujata Bhatt also indicates that there is a similarity
between the cultures of the east and the west.

The poet says that the gods in India roam disguised as snakes and monkeys. By
this she indicates that all the elements of nature, flora and fauna, are worshipped
here.

Bhatt also sheds light on the fact that Indian culture is very deep rooted. She shifts
her attention from worship of animals and nature to reverence and respect in India.
She talks about customs and behaviour by mentioning trees being treated as sacred
in India and how it is a sin to treat books shabbily.

While talking about Indian customs and traditions, Sujata Bhatt uses a book as an
example. She keeps repeating that it is a sin to treat books without respect, slam
them down on a table or touch one with the foot or toss it around.
While still on Indian customs and behaviour, Sujata Bhatt reveals how it is very
important in India to be careful, and not disturb the Goddess who resides in books,
“Saraswati”.

She indicates how religion is dominant in the region by describing the Indian
attitude towards something as common as a book. She talks about the need for
Indians to respect books so that they would not offend the tree sacrificed to make
the paper.

In this second stanza Sujata Bhatt addresses a number of key issues through
rhetoric. Using language as strain of culture and a representative of the people, she
asks the reader to understand and identify with the fact that people across the globe
at some time or the other have been oppressors or the oppressed.

Again in rhetoric and again using language to represent people, she throws light on
the fact that language is universal and is never intended to cause harm.

She goes on to hint at the influence of foreigners in the region by referring to the
freedom struggle as the period of torture. Bhatt asks the reader to try and analyse
and find a rational explanation as to why after the damage of invasion the foreign
culture continues to linger in India. She personifies India as having a face and a
soul, and refers to colonization and injustice as a long scythe.

Sujata Bhatt addresses the preference of English over native languages by

addressing the youth in India and the unborn, who are preferring the foreign
language at the cost of the extinction of native Indian languages and dialects.