Don't write in English, they said,
English is not your mother tongue...
...The language I speak
Becomes mine, its distortions, its queerness
All mine, mine alone, it is half English, half
Indian, funny perhaps, but it is honest,
It is as human as I am human...
...It voices my joys, my longings my
Hopes...
(Kamala Das, 1965:10)
GARGESH, R. South Asian Englishes. In: KACHRU, B. B; KACHRU, Y.; NELSON, C. L. (Eds.). The Handbook of World Englishes. Singapore: Blackwell, 2006.
A poetisa Kamala Das, como muitos escritores indianos, escreve suas obras em inglês, apesar de essa não ser sua primeira língua. Nesses versos, ela