Death in three scenes of recitation
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 4465397 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Simona Sawhney (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2013 |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 202-215 |
| Publication date | 2013-06-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Postcolonial Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1368-8790 • E-ISSN: 1466-1888 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/13688790.2013.823263 |
| OpenAlex | W2329163287 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 8 |
In the discourse of Bhagat Singh and his comrades, their own death is not presented merely as a necessary means towards a desired political end. Instead, it is often invested with an intense significance that exceeds its political function. This essay proposes that literary and poetic tropes borrowed from available languages of love, revolution, and religion played a central role in this imagining of death. It argues that we cannot comprehend the sphere of the political inhabited by Bhagat Singh, Ram Prasad Bismil, and their comrades without taking seriously this literary dimension. Political action, in this sphere, in large measure depended on "reciting"—that is to say, appropriating and performing—gestures, phrases, and stances learnt from an astonishingly varied repertoire of literary texts. The essay also critically examines contemporary recitations of the work of the revolutionaries, with special attention to the discourse of the right-wing Bhagat Singh Kranti Sena on the one hand, and that of the popular film Rang de Basanti (2006) on the other. It argues that such appropriations focus only on the revolutionaries' fidelity to the nation, while neglecting or repressing the critique of the state evident in Bhagat Singh's work, and especially in his admiration of the anarchists
Admiration · Aesthetics · Art · Gesture · Linguistics · Literature · Poetry · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · History · Indian History and Philosophy · Italian Fascism and Post-war Society · Law · Philosophy
Bhagat Singh's Corpse
Shaheed-e-Azam Bhagat Singh (1954)
New histories of political violence and revolutionary terrorism in modern South Asia
What awakens the nation? The figure of the revolutionary in Inquilaab, Krantiveer and Rang de Basanti
Echoes of Ghadr
Bhagat Singh
India's Revolutionary Inheritance
Politics and the Work of the Dead in Modern India
| Unique citing works | 8 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,67 |
| Citation span | 2014 - 2024 (11) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 8 |