Goan literature
Encyclopedia
Small region
Goa has a population of around 1.4 million and an area of 3,700 sq. kilometres (1,430 sq. miles). For a small region, it has a significant amount of publication activity, possibly in part because its people write in a number of languages—as many as 13, according to one count—and also because of the large expatriate and diaspora population of GoansGoans
Goan is the demonym used to describe the people of the Indian state of Goa who form an ethno-linguistic group which is a result of assimilation of Indo-Portuguese, Indo-Aryan, Dravidian, Proto-Australoid, Indo-Scythian, Indo-Greeks and Indo-Iranians ethnic and/or linguistic ancestries.They speak...
settled across the globe.
It was the first place in Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
to have a printing press
Printing press
A printing press is a device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium , thereby transferring the ink...
, which was brought by the Portuguese
Portuguese people
The Portuguese are a nation and ethnic group native to the country of Portugal, in the west of the Iberian peninsula of south-west Europe. Their language is Portuguese, and Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion....
in 1556; Goa's Portuguese colonial rulers
Portuguese Empire
The Portuguese Empire , also known as the Portuguese Overseas Empire or the Portuguese Colonial Empire , was the first global empire in history...
also believed in meticulous record-keeping.
Early roots
Goa has had a long love affair with the printed word, although growth has been slow, and punctuated by problems like linguistic breaks and censorshipCensorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
.
Goans, with a long history of emigration
Emigration
Emigration is the act of leaving one's country or region to settle in another. It is the same as immigration but from the perspective of the country of origin. Human movement before the establishment of political boundaries or within one state is termed migration. There are many reasons why people...
and foreign-rule, seem to have also adapted, either out of necessity or choice, to writing in languages that had their origins in distant Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
, like Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
and English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
.
Writing by Goans in other languages
Professor
A professor is a scholarly teacher; the precise meaning of the term varies by country. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a "person who professes" being usually an expert in arts or sciences; a teacher of high rank...
Peter Nazareth
Peter Nazareth
Peter Nazareth is a major critic and writer of fiction and drama. He was born in Uganda of Goan and Malaysian ancestry, and was educated at Makerere University and at the universities of London and Leeds in England....
points out that that Goans have written in thirteen languages, of which the chief are Konkani
Konkani language
KonkaniKonkani is a name given to a group of several cognate dialects spoken along the narrow strip of land called Konkan, on the west coast of India. This is, however, somewhat an over-generalisation. Geographically, Konkan is defined roughly as the area between the river Damanganga to the north...
, Marathi
Marathi language
Marathi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western and central India. It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are over 68 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi has the fourth largest number of native speakers in India and is the fifteenth most...
, English and Portuguese. The first of these, is the mother tongue, being written in four different scripts. Nazareth is editor of an anthology of Goan writing, Professor of English and African-American World Studies and adviser to the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa
University of Iowa
The University of Iowa is a public state-supported research university located in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. It is the oldest public university in the state. The university is organized into eleven colleges granting undergraduate, graduate, and professional degrees...
. He writes:
Goans mediate between cultures, Goans live between different cultures, Goans are travelers from one part of the world to another. This, in my opinion, happened when East
Eastern world
__FORCETOC__The term Eastern world refers very broadly to the various cultures or social structures and philosophical systems of Eastern Asia or geographically the Eastern Culture...
and West
Western world
The Western world, also known as the West and the Occident , is a term referring to the countries of Western Europe , the countries of the Americas, as well all countries of Northern and Central Europe, Australia and New Zealand...
met in Goans under pressure with the Portuguese conquest. Since that time, our usefulness to the world, wherever we are, is that we can understand different cultures and help people from different cultures understand one another. The disadvantage is that if we don't work on it, we may end up not knowing who we are."
Edward D'Lima, who has done his PhD
PHD
PHD may refer to:*Ph.D., a doctorate of philosophy*Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*PHD finger, a protein sequence*PHD Mountain Software, an outdoor clothing and equipment company*PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
on the Goan writer Armando Menezes, argues that Goan writing in English goes back to the late nineteenth century, when Goans were migrating out of this Portuguese-controlled colony in favour of jobs in the growing English-speaking British-ruled colonial world. One early example was the writer from the village of Pilerne
Pilerne
Pilerne is a village situated in north Goa in the Bardez taluka of the North Goa district. The village is inhabited by Goan Catholics.-References:...
(in Bardez) named Joseph Furtado.
Dr. S. M. Tadkodkar http://savemylanguage@google.com, who was conferred Ph. D. degree by Goa University
Goa University
Goa University was established in 1985 and merged with the Centre for Post Graduate Instruction and Research of the University of Bombay that functioned at state-capital Panaji or Panjim. Goa University offers both graduate and post-graduate studies and research programmes...
for his exhaustive research work on Prof. Anant Kaakaba Priolkar, contends that while the Kannadd language of Karnataka province was dominating the Goan culture, Marathi language and culture was embraced by Goans. Now, Marathi has embraced the Goans and would not leave them, willingly. Maximum literature is published in Marathi. There are 8 Marathi dailies published from Goa. Prominent among them are Dianik Gomantak, Tarun Bharat, Lokamat, Navaprabha, Pudhari, Goadoot, Sanatan Prabhat.
Marathi daily Lokmat has the highest circulation (50000+) among all dailies.
Goans now read (and write) in different languages. English is probably the most influential. Marathi is another widely-read language. Konkani, the widely-spoken and official language of the region, is studied in schools.
Goan writers
- R.V. PanditR.V. PanditRaghunath Vishnu Pandit was a Goan poet. He is best known and most celebrated for his vast poetic production in Konkani. Pandit also produced a significant body of work in Portuguese after the Liberation of Goa in 1961...
(poetry) - Philip Furtado (poetry)
- Eunice De SouzaEunice De SouzaEunice de Souza is a contemporary Indian English language poet, literary critic and novelist. Among her notable books of poetry is Women in Dutch painting .-Early life and education:...
(MumbaiMumbaiMumbai , formerly known as Bombay in English, is the capital of the Indian state of Maharashtra. It is the most populous city in India, and the fourth most populous city in the world, with a total metropolitan area population of approximately 20.5 million...
-based, poetry and fiction) - Lino Leitao (short stories) used Goan imagery in plenty in his writing from North AmericaNorth AmericaNorth America is a continent wholly within the Northern Hemisphere and almost wholly within the Western Hemisphere. It is also considered a northern subcontinent of the Americas...
. - Lambert MascarenhasLambert MascarenhasLambert Mascarenhas is a nonagenarian journalist and writer from Goa. His family hails from the Goan Catholic community, a Christian community in Goa.-Career:...
' book Sorrowing Lies My Land carries traces of the Rammanohar Lohia-led anti-colonial movement launched in MargaoMargaoMargao and commercial capital of the Indian state of Goa. It is the administrative headquarters of South Goa district and of the Salcete taluka.- Etymology :...
in 1946. - Konkani writer Pundalik NaikPundalik NaikPundalik Narayan Naik is a noted Konkani language poet, short-story writer, novelist, playwright, and screenwriter from Goa. He has40 books and two films to his credit. He served as the President of Goa Konkani Akademi of the Government of Goa since 2002...
's short stories touches traditional themes very important in yesterday's Goa. His book from the 1970s titled 'Achev' (The Upheaval) was translated into English and published from New Delhi earlier this decade. It is a story based in a Goa wrecked by rampant mining. - Margaret Mascarenhas' Skin moves from a bar in CaliforniaCaliforniaCalifornia is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
to life in a Goan village. - Victor Rangel Ribeiro's Tivolem has earned praise as a well-written book.
- Vasco Pinho
- Melanie Silgardo (poetry)
- Joao da Veiga Coutinho's "A Kind of Absence: Life in the Shadows of History"
- Maria Aurora CoutoMaria Aurora CoutoMaria Aurora Couto is an Indian writer, historian and educationalist from Goa. Her family hails from the Goan Catholic community, a Christian community in Goa. She taught English literature in colleges in India and has contributed to periodicals in India and the United Kingdom.She lives in the...
's Goa: A Daughter's Story has received wide attention - Frank SimoesFrank SimoesFrank Simoes was an Indian writer born in Mumbai. He studied at St. Mary's School in Mumbai and began his career as a writer with the Times of India...
(advertising and journalism) - Jerry PintoJerry PintoJerry Pinto is a Mumbai-based Indian writer of poetry, prose and children's fiction in English, as well as a journalist. His noted works include, Helen: The Life and Times of an H-Bomb which won the Best Book on Cinema Award at the 54th National Film Awards, Surviving Women and Asylum and Other...
(poetry) - Melanie Silgardo (poetry)
- Abhay Sardesai (poetry, translation)
- Damodar Mauzo (fiction)
- Dom MoraesDom MoraesDominic Francis Moraes , popularly known as Dom Moraes, was a Goan writer, poet and columnist. He published nearly 30 books.-Early life:...
(poetry, belles lettres) - Sonia FaleiroSonia FaleiroSonia Faleiro, is an award-winning Indian reporter and writer. She grew up in New Delhi where she studied history at St. Stephen's College, and received her master's degree from the University of Edinburgh. While in graduate school, Faleiro started writing her first novel, The Girl, which was...
(Mumbai-based writer of fiction and narrative non-fiction. Her critically acclaimed first novel The Girl, was published by Viking in 2006. See www.soniafaleiro.com for more information.) - Nandita da CunhaNandita da Cunha-Notes:...
's fantasy novel 'The Magic of Maya' moves back and forth from a village in Goa to an imaginary world, Maya. - Silviano C. Barbosa's first Canadian/Goan romance novel, "The Sixth Night" taking you from a typically legendary life in Portuguese Goa in the fifties all the way to Toronto, Canada.
- Prakash S. Pariekar
- Dr. S. M. Tadkodkar
- Savia Viegas
- Alexandre Moniz Barbosa wrote the novel 'Touched By The Toe' (2004) and translated from the Portuguese to English essays by Jose Inacio de Loyola published in book form titles 'Passionate and Unrestrained' (2008).
Indo-Portuguese, Konkani writing
Besides English, Konkani and Marathi, Goans, particularly those of the past generation, have contributed significantly to writings in Portuguese.- Adeodato BarretoAdeodato BarretoJúlio Francisco António Adeodato Barreto , popularly known as Adeodato Barreto, was an Indo-Portuguese poet and writer....
Civilização Hindu (Hindu Civilization) and O Livro da Vida (The Book of Life)(poetry) - Francisco Luis GomesFrancisco Luís GomesFrancisco Luís Gomes was an Indo-Portuguese physician, writer, historian, economist, political scientist and MP in the Portuguese parliament. A liberal by political orientation, Gomes represented Portuguese India in the Cortes Gerais from 1861 to 1869...
, In the Land of Brahama - Nacimento Mendonca, Through the Mythical Ayodya
- Fanchu Loyola
- Laxmanrao SardessaiLaxmanrao SardessaiLaxmanrao Sardessai was a Goan poet and short-story writer. Considered one of the territory's finest writers in the Marathi language, he also wrote prose and verse in Konkani and Portuguese.Sardessai was born in 1904, in Savoi-Verem, and died in 1986...
(poetry) - Luís de Menezes BragançaLuís de Menezes BragançaLuís de Menezes Bragança , alternatively spelled as Luís de Menezes Braganza, was a prominent Indo-Portuguese journalist, writer, politician and anti-colonial activist from Goa. He was one of the few Goan aristocrats who actively opposed the Portuguese occupation of Goa...
(journalism) - Floriano Pinto (poetry)
- "Gip" Costa, author of Jacob e Dulce (Konkani flavour of Goa's spoken Portuguese)
- Alvaro da Costa (journalism)
- Manohar Sardesai (poetry)
- José da Silva CoelhoJosé da Silva CoelhoThe Goan writer José da Silva Coelho was the author of several hundred pieces of wickedly satirical short fiction in the 1920s and 1930s, published for the most part in the Portuguese-language newspaper O Heraldo.-Biography:...
was a short story writer active in the 1920s and 1930s - Mário da Silva Coelho (poetry)
- Ananta Rau Sar DessaiAnanta Rau Sar DessaiAnanta Rau Sar Dessai was a Goan short-story writer, radio playwright and poet. He wrote both in Portuguese and in Marathi. He wrote over 30 radio plays, some of which remained unbroadcast, some of which were aired via the former Emissora de Goa, some of which were published in the now-defunct...
(poetry and radio-theatre) - Alfredo Bragança (poetry)
- Júlio Gonçalves published short-stories called Os Contos da Minha Terra and Aventuras dum Simplicio
- Carmo Azavedo's From the Tip of the Pen (Ao Bico da Pena)
- Amadeo Prazeres da Costa (journalism)
- Alberto de Meneses Rodrigues published three novellas in Caminhos de Luz (Bastora, Goa: 1958) and a collection of short stories and novellas entitled Flor Campestre in 1968
- Fernando de NoronhaFernando de NoronhaFernando de Noronha is an archipelago of 21 islands and islets in the Atlantic Ocean, offshore from the Brazilian coast. The main island has an area of and had a population of 3,012 in the year 2010...
's Nostalgic Memories of the Past - Dr.Olivinho Gomes, former Officiating Vice chancellor of Goa University
- Dr Carmo D'Souza, Angela's Goan Identity, Portugal In Search of Identity and other books. In a recent lecture, Dr D'Souza himself traced the indigenous imagery, and the impact of Portuguese on Goan writing.
- Orlando Costa eminent novelist and poet, author of prize winning novels O signo da ira (1961) and O Último Olhar de Manú Miranda (2000) and of many other literary works. Died in Portugal in 2006.
- Carmo Noronha including Contracorrente (Panjim, Goa: 1991) and Escalvando na Belga (Panjim. Goa: 1993)
- Alberto de Noronha translated a collection of short stories written in Marathi, Konkani and English under the title Onde Canta o Moruoni (Panjim, Goa: Third Millennium, 2003). It includes stories by Damodar Mauzo, Olivinho Gomes, Uday BhembréUday BhembreUday Bhembhre is an Indian lawyer and a former member of the Goa Legislative Assembly. He is also noted for his role as the editor of the Konkani daily, Sunaparant and as an Konkani language activist.-References:...
, Laxmanrao Sardessai, Armando Menezes and Victor Rangel-Ribeiro, amongst others. - Vimala DeviVimala DeviVimala Devi is the pseudonym of Teresa da Piedade de Baptista Almeida, a Goan writer, poet and translator.-Life in Goa:Vimala Devi was born in 1932 in the village of Britona in the parish of Penha-de-Franca, across the Mandovi river from Panjim, the principal town of Goa...
(the pseudonym of Teresa de Almeida), author of 'Súria', 'Hologramas' and 'Telepoemas' (poetry) and 'Monção' (short stories) - Agostinho Fernandes published the novels Bodki (1962) and ...por além do além (Panjim, Goa: Third Millennium, 2008)
- Epitácio Pais, a writer of short stories, a collection of which was published under the title Os Javalis de Codval in 1974
- Maria Elsa da Rocha's Vivências partilhadas (Panjim, Goa: Third Millennium, 2006)
- Leopoldo da Rocha's Casa Grande e Outras Recordações de um velho Goês (Lisbon: Vega, 2008)
Resources for and about Goan writers
- The Goa Archives
- Fundação Oriente, Panjim-based Portuguese cultural body, which has helped some writers with small grants of a few thousand rupees.
Goa University
Goa University
Goa University was established in 1985 and merged with the Centre for Post Graduate Instruction and Research of the University of Bombay that functioned at state-capital Panaji or Panjim. Goa University offers both graduate and post-graduate studies and research programmes...
Library: It has a large collections in the languages of Konkani
Konkani language
KonkaniKonkani is a name given to a group of several cognate dialects spoken along the narrow strip of land called Konkan, on the west coast of India. This is, however, somewhat an over-generalisation. Geographically, Konkan is defined roughly as the area between the river Damanganga to the north...
, Marathi
Marathi language
Marathi is an Indo-Aryan language spoken by the Marathi people of western and central India. It is the official language of the state of Maharashtra. There are over 68 million fluent speakers worldwide. Marathi has the fourth largest number of native speakers in India and is the fifteenth most...
, English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
, Portuguese
Portuguese language
Portuguese is a Romance language that arose in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia, nowadays Galicia and Northern Portugal. The southern part of the Kingdom of Galicia became independent as the County of Portugal in 1095...
, French
French language
French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...
. It has old manuscripts, microfilms and prints of the 17th century in Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...
.
Central Library
Central Library
-United Kingdom:* Birmingham Central Library* Central Library * Bristol Central Library* Cardiff Central Library* Croydon Central Library* Leeds Central Library* Liverpool Central Library* Manchester Central Library* Newcastle City Library...
, which is run by the Government of Goa
Goa
Goa , a former Portuguese colony, is India's smallest state by area and the fourth smallest by population. Located in South West India in the region known as the Konkan, it is bounded by the state of Maharashtra to the north, and by Karnataka to the east and south, while the Arabian Sea forms its...
is the oldest library in the South Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...
. It is one of the largest depository of all printed volumes pertaining to Goan languages and literature since the 17th century.
Sources
"Goan Literature: A Modern Reader", Journal of South Asian Literature Winter-Spring 1983Translated in Manohar Shetty's Ferry Crossing