The term ‘diasporic’ is of Greek origin which literally means a scattering or dispersion of a group of people to a foreign land. Sensibility refers to the emotional impression, susceptibility and sensitiveness of an individual integrated as a cultural domain. A. K.Ramanujan is an expatriate poet who had opted to settle abroad but tried to maintain his Indian roots by constantly writing poems on India and Indian subjects. He believed in influencing Indian outlook and system from the outside. While the other poets like Ezekiel and Shiv K.Kumar returned to India, disillusioned by their experiences of the west, he decided to remain in the west even after fully realizing its true nature. He considers himself as the hyphen between ‘Indo-American’ representing the lingering nostalgia of a Diaspora. Till the age of thirty three he lived in traditional south Indian family. His psyche was deeply rooted in tradition and culture. His linguistic oeuvre was made up of English, Tamil, Kannada and Sanskrit. Alienation and detachment sprung in his poetry when he migrated to Chicago. The western culture made him see the Indian culture in a new light. Ramanujan depicted India through language and themes being physically absent but mentally present. As a poet of the Indian diaspora, one of Ramanujan concerns in his poetry is to evaluate his experience as an Indian living in the United States. Like many immigrants, he lived in two distinct culture and linguistic worlds. There is also a cross-culture influence in his poetry. The commonly found elements in his poetry are 1.History 2.Myth 3.Superstitions 4.Family 5.Political situations 6.Displacement 7.The impact of modernization or globalization on Indian society. In representing them in his poetry he frequently employs the poetic style of irony and parody in an effective manner. In his effort for relocating himself, he has created a new idiom, the Indian English idiom in his poetry. This not only helps him in joining his roots but also distinguishes him from other third world poets who also write in English. Lastly the use of typical Indian themes, symbols and metaphors gives his poems an Indian liveliness and make him acceptable to the Indian literacy circle without much difficulty.
Research Scholar, Dept. of English Ranchi University, Ranchi
