Friday, February 10, 2012

Discuss the following statement: "Biculturalism pervades Toru Dutt's 'Our Casuarina Tree."

I would be willing to argue that there is a sense of
divergent cultures coming together in Dutt's poem.  I am not entirely certain that these
are the traditional notions of culture.  Part of what makes Dutt's poem so powerful is
that she is able to bring the reader into the culture of the speaker and merge it with
the external world.  The tree is symbolic of the universe and the external world.  The
recollections that are brought out in the poem are powerfully subjective, internal in
their scope and drive in the attempt to bring the past into focus.  The culture clash-
the culture of the external world and the internal reveries of the speaker- is where
multiple cultures are present.  For Dutt, there has to be a way to bridge both of these
cultures, which is why her ending to the poem brings to light how painful "oblivion's
curse" can actually be.  It is in this light that Dutt is able to bring together the
culture of the personally subjective and the external culture into a realm where
experiences are validated, not negated, by both external reality and time.  It is in
this light where I can see multiple cultures evident in Dutt's
poem.

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