MANIFESTATIONS OF POVERTY IN WORLD LITERATURE

Abstract

This study would like to examine manifestations of poverty in the light of world literature. For this purpose, it would like to investigate the selected-literary texts, like Kazi Nazrul Islam’s “Poverty”, Thomas Montague Traherne’s Poverty, and Charles Dickens’ Hard Times. It aims to look at the real picture of poverty of the age, which has been reflected in their works. It would like to focus upon the manifestations of poverty and its relation with the current age. Nazrul, Dickens, and Traherne have led their personal lives with great hardship, bitterness experiences, psychological problems, like trauma and paranoia during their life span. They have tried to draw a light upon personal inflicting senses and mental disorders of the poor communities through their literary works. They have wanted to explore the practical circumstances and dark aspects of human society, community, and culture with a view to bringing about revolutionary changes of the poor community of the world around. Of course, such writers and their literary works are the symbol of today’s society as well as literature. In this sense, it may be expressed that Nazrul, Dickens, and Traherne are the representatives of the age. The researchers’ goal is that poverty is profoundly dealt with human life; no literature can express his perfect feeling and imagination if he has not tasted the bitterness experience of poverty in life. In many countries of the world, many litterateurs have focused upon the practical experiences of social problems of their hard times in the name of poverty. Thus, this study would like to foster unexplored-glaring themes of poverty through investigating the selected-works as well as the critical comments regarding poverty made by critics and scholars.Keywords: Poverty, Hard Times, Spiritual Crisis, Nazrul, Traherne, and Dickens.