Indian literature

A photograph from the 1920s shows Indian philosopher and poet Rabindranath Tagore, with Albert Einstein on the left. Tagore studied law in England but returned to Bengal to become part of the revival of Hindu culture there in the late 1800s.

Literature of the Indian subcontinent, written in Sanskrit, in the Dravidian languages such as Tamil, in the vernacular languages derived from Sanskrit, such as Urdu and Hindi, and, largely in the 20th century, English.

Sanskrit The oldest surviving examples of Indian literature are the sacred Hindu texts from the Vedic period of about 1500–200 BC. These include the Vedas and the later Upanishads 800–200 BC, which are philosophical reflections upon the Vedas. Of the same period are the Sutras 500–200 BC, collections of aphorisms and doctrinal summaries, including the Kamasutra on erotic love. During the epic period (400 BC–AD 400) two major epics were written down: the Mahābhārata (which contains the Bhagavad-Gītā) and the shorter Rāmāyana, both about 300 BC. By the classical period (from AD 400), lyric poetry, romances, and drama had developed, the leading poet and dramatist of the period being Kālidāsa. The Panchatantra, a collection of Hindu myths, were written down in the 4th century AD.

Dravidian The Dravidian languages of the south, which are unrelated to Sanskrit, had their own strong and ancient literary traditions, though gradually they were influenced by the literatures of the north. The two major works of Tamil are the verse anthologies the Pattuppattu and the Ettutogaiad, both 1st century AD.

Vernacular By AD 1000 extensive vernacular literatures had developed – largely through popularizations of Sanskrit classics – in those languages derived from Sanskrit, such as Urdu, Hindi, and Gujarati. From the 17th century, Urdu poetry flourished at the Mogul court, where it was strongly influenced by classical Persian literature. The poets Asadullah Ghalib (1797–1869) and Muhammad Iqbāl wrote in Urdu and Persian. Bengali literature in particular was encouraged by the wide use of printing presses in the 19th century. Bengali writers include Bankim Chandra Chatterji, Romesh Chunder Dutt (1848–1909), and Rabindranath Tagore who was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature 1913. The spiritual and political leader Mahatma Gandhi wrote in Gujarati.