Literary History: The Case of South Asia

This article considers the area of literary history in general and the literary history of South Asia in particular. It focuses on Sheldon Pollock's edited volume, Literary Cultures in History. Reconstructions from South Asia (2003). The article outlines the three broad approaches to literary history in order to clarify the methodology underlying Pollock's Literary Cultures in History, the additional problems which literary histories of South Asia must address, and it shows how Pollock's volume engages with these problems. Finally, it considers how this volume is an important and revisionary contribution to the study of South Asian literary history.