THE POETICS OF PAIN AND SURVIVAL IN SELECTED CARIBBEAN AND SOUTH EAST ASIAN POETRY

Abstract

This paper focuses on the selected poems of some South East Asian and
Caribbean poets and seeks to demonstrate that South East Asian and Caribbean poets have rapidly created new national literatures serving as the cultural side of decolonization and the new nationalism, an indication of their continuous quest for survival. It further demonstrates that colonialism has had a negative impact on the South East Asians and the West Indians socially, politically and economically. However, the paper evolves on the hypothesis that although writing and evolving within two varying sociocultural backgrounds, the poets under study are united by their poetic vision which consists in debunking the traumatic experiences of the colonized peoples of the world. The paper concludes that colonialism has not only affected the culture of the people but has equally affected their psychological stability. As such, it has generally made life painful and miserable, thus, pushing the people into a quest for Intheir survival. In terms of methodology, we will employ some of the tenets of new historicism and postcolonial theory will be employed to buttress our analyses.