Analysis Of Nissim Ezekiel's Poetry

Nissim Ezekiel is the most important name in the field of Indian English poetry. He not only liberated Indian English poetry from the narrow imitative amateur stance but also provided it the status of serious business. He is rightly credited with the honour of bringing modernity to Indian English poetry. For him poetry was more than a leisurely pastime; it was a profession to be devotedly followed.
Ezekiel’s poetry evinces an acute awareness of the modern life. It is intensely personal and voices Ezekiel’s preoccupation with the ‘personal quest for a satisfactory way of living in the modern world.
Ezekiel is a conscious poet. He continuously tried to decipher his own predicament in the environment in which he was living. It included, in addition to his life in Mumbai, the fact of his being a Jew in India. He seems to have come to reconciliation after initial struggle as far as his identity is concerned. He made Indian English poetry truly the voice of the educated urban modern Indian.
Though Ezekiel’s poetry abounds in numerous references to his status as a member of a religious minority, his poetry never displays any kind of bitterness or any kind of acute sense of alienation with the majority Hindu culture. There are references here and there to his being a minority Jew and there are references to the predicament of the Jews all over the world, but this never betrays the hatred or even the anguish of an embittered minority. Ezekiel always sounds generous, large-hearted