Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature

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Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature
The six volumes of the encyclopedia
CountryIndia
LanguageEnglish
SubjectIndian literature and language
PublisherSahitya Akademi, New Delhi
Publication date
  • Vol. 1: 1987
  • Vol. 2: 1988
  • Vol. 3: 1989
  • Vol. 4: 1991
  • Vol. 5: 1992
  • Vol. 6: 1994
Media type6 volumes, hardbound
OCLC
430192715

The Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature is a multi-volume English language encyclopedia of Indian literature published by Sahitya Akademi, India's National Academy of Letters. The idea for the project emerged in the mid-1970s, and three volumes were planned to cover all Indian literature, including that in native vernaculars. The scope of the project expanded as several editors-in-chief succeeded one another; six volumes were published between 1987 and 1993. The work received a positive reception, though a number of critics noted occasional inaccuracies in entries regarding a few of the subjects surveyed in what was otherwise hailed as a landmark in Indian scholarship.

History

At the 1975 annual meeting of the General Council of the

steering committee was also to be established. Once these recommendations were approved, the project was launched.[1]

While the compilation of lists of topics was in progress, dissatisfaction with the General Council emerged, and the location of the encyclopaedia unit at Trivandrum was questioned. To resolve the issues, a special meeting of the Executive Board was convened in 1976 to re-examine the project, and the board decided to relocate the encyclopaedia unit to

Vidya Niwas Misra. Iyengar felt that the Encyclopaedia was "the most ambitious project" undertaken by the Akademi and that it might take years to complete. Yasaschandra was more optimistic, being certain that all three volumes could be published by 1982. By the time he withdrew from the project and the Akademi in 1982 the first volume had yet to be published. Amaresh Datta joined the project as the new editor-in-chief in 1984. Members of the editorial staff were recruited on an ad hoc basis for specific languages or zones and the work was expedited. The encyclopaedia as published ran to six volumes, and over five thousand demi-quarto-sized pages.[1]

Publication

The first volume in the series was published in 1987, under the auspices of the then

Apabhramsa as distinct categories.[2]

Datta also edited volumes 2 and 3, published in 1988 and 1989 respectively. He retired from the Akademi on reaching seventy in 1990. Mohan Lal succeeded him as the editor-in-chief and it was under his direction that the fourth and fifth volumes, respectively published in 1991 and 1992, came out. After Lal's death in an accident, the sixth and final volume, edited by Param Abichandani and K. C. Dutt, was published in 1994. K. Ayyappa Paniker was appointed editor-in-chief of revisions.[3][4]

Reception

The first volume, published in 1987, was widely acclaimed.

The Hindustan Times, on 25 October, hailed the encyclopedia as a landmark for reference books on Indian culture. The Times of India, on 10 April 1988, considered the volume a first step in advancing towards a more extensive overview of Indian literature, and expressed hope that realizing such an end would eventually lead to academic courses and the issuing of a library of Indian masterpieces and a fresh wave of new critical studies. The Indian Book Industry, commended the volume in July 1987, "Lovers of Indian literature, both at home and abroad, owe a deep debt of gratitude to the Sahitya Akademi for bringing out this Encyclopaedia, a work of pioneering nature indeed".[3]

The reviewer of The Statesman, published on 2 July 1988, thought otherwise:

To mention all instances of carelessness, errors of fact, omissions in the work and its entries will require 100 pages and it will be tiresome reading. On the whole the first volume of our Sahitya Akademi's Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature has been unworthy of the institution which has produced it. It is not well designed and whatever design it may have has not been properly executed... There is nothing in the work to show that it has passed through the hands of an able, responsible and hard-working editor.[3]

In 1990, Vinayak Purohit of the Indian Institute of Social Research, Bombay, appealed to Prime Minister

Vishwanath Pratap Singh "to stop the publication of further volumes of this shameful Encyclopaedia"; he cited numerous instances of error of fact, repetition, balance, and other lapses. He wrote to the new editor-in-chief Mohan Lal: "Please do not work at the futile break-neck pace of one volume per year. Encyclopaedias are never produced with such bureaucratic targets."[3][4]

Defamation suit

Ujjalkumar Majumdar's article on Bengali poet

The Telegraph wrote of "A controversial critique and a raging poet". The Sunday Mail reported "A poet defends his habits". After a year, the controversy died down and the matter was eventually settled[how?] in 1989.[5]

See also

Notes

Citations

  1. ^ a b c Rao 2004, p. 107.
  2. ^ Rao 2004, p. 108.
  3. ^ a b c d Rao 2004, p. 109.
  4. ^ a b Rao 2004, p. 110.
  5. ^ Rao 2004, pp. 194–195.

Sources

  • Rao, D. S. (2004). Five Decades: The National Academy of Letters, India : a Short History of Sahitya Akademi. New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi.
    ISBN 978-81-260-2060-7
    .
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