chanDa maddaLe (Drums )
This fifth collection of
Adiga's poems is "modernist". and the influence of T.S. Eliot is
obvious. But this influence, it is necessary to say, was on a poet who
had already recognised the emptiness of the romantic stance and on a
poet who refused to swing from adolescent and romantic themes to
"spirituality". chanDa maddaLe came out in 1954 and two essays
Adiga wrote about this time -- "Hosa Kaviteyannu Kuritu" (Regarding
New Poetry) [July 1953] and "Indina Jivana Klishta Endarenu ?" (What
Do We Mean When We Say Modern Life is Complex ?) [May 1954] --
indicate that the "modernity" of these poems sprang from a complex
response to the Indian situation. Eliot's poetry possibly drew Adiga's
attention to the possibility of finding a form and an idiom which
could successfully organize and articulate his responses to
contemporary life. We find Adiga using myths, allusions and similar
"modernist" techiques to communicate a simultaneous awareness of the
past and the present. The rhythmical patterns are no longer musical;
the idiom and the rhythm are closer to those of contemporary speech,
and the choice of words and rhythms are governed by the thematic
pattern of the poem and not by a preconceived notion of the poetic.