Professor Dr. R.K. Singh
and Mitali De Sarkar
=======================================================================
SEARCH FOR ELYSIUM
=====================================================================
*Appeared in The Mawaheb International (Canada),
June 1998
Like Shiv K. Kumar, Keki N. Daruwala and Arvind
Krishna Mehrotra, Stephen Gill was born in Pakistan (Sialkot) and speaks
Punjabi, Urdu and English, as well as some other languages. These poets stayed
in different parts of India. Like several prominent authors, including Bharati
Mukherjee, Uma Parameswaran and Rohinton Mistry,
Stephen Gill migrated to Canada in search of better economic prospects,
not knowing his step could ultimately turn out to be a struggle to discover his
own identity.
Reading Gill's verses one finds he is his Indian self
seeking a voice in a new land. His social norms, standards and values are
neither fully Indian nor fully Western, but rather international. His concerns
are human and his contexts increasingly become global. Perhaps his
cross-cultural experiences enrich his creative sensibility even as he finds
himself a foreigner in his adopted country and a stranger in his homeland.
Caught between two cultures, Indian and Canadian, he
puts up with culture shock and adjustment conflicts, something every expatriate
faces :
In the valley of terror
my bones crack,
shooting
pains of insecurity,
while the
pride of my ego
shamelessly
mocks my nakedness.1
He feels like a "deer lost in the jungle"
and expresses his dismay when he says Often I have to caress/even those
thorns/which knowingly pierce/my feet.2
He tries to bring some disparate fragments of
experience into significant wholes-- as every good poet does-- building meaning
out of confusion. Ironically, he seems to challenge the mainstream Canadian
poets who are sceptical about immigrant Canadian poets like him.
I wish I could
capture you
in the rainbows
of my pen, but
I am not a poet
so skilled !3
Stephen Gill struggles for his identity in his country
of adoption just as he looks to his old country (India) for
appreciation
:
For you
often I have
tried to write
but alas
many more
wounds exist
than love's
wound.4
Immigrant
Psyche
Though Stephen Gill is not a Canadian by birth and his
sensibility is essentially international, his works add to the ethnic pluralism
of Canada. His poetry incorporates Indian consciousness that he offers from an
international perspective when he says :
Thy land and
life
and springs
thy summer and
fall
and skies
and joyful
birds--
delight-giving
sights--
breathe a new
life in me.5
Yet, reading his poems, novels and stories
one experiences an immigrant-consciousness at work: there is a conflict
between his Indian ethos and the forces of marginal existence and nagging
inconveniences in the country of his adoption. The poet evolves through raw
socio-cultural pressure, barriers of race, religion, colour, and nationality
making creative writing a survival process, a process of coping with the
uncertainties of the new environment, new social structure, new values, new
politics and new relations.
He suffers changes, swift and fundamental, shaking
even the most basic human conditions; the complexity, diversity and rapid pace
of change makes him appear a stranger in his own eyes, away from his own
familiar society, often leaving him nostalgic. He voyages into the future,
sometimes with an idealist tinge. He copes with his
surroundings and probes aspects of Canadian life--sometimes as a mainstream
Canadian and sometimes as an immigrant-- the two psyches ever active in his
mind.
The conflict between his loyalty to the land he has
come from and the new land-- his adoptive country, his willingness to accept
the new geophysical setting and the resistance or unconcealed hostility of the
host society leave an indelible impression in his thought process. The poet is
ever indignant of "xenophobic" nationalists whom he calls
"stinking vultures" that "rest in rusted tombs".6
Bewitched by the magic of Canada, the poet voyages to
this new land, which was unknown, untravelled, unexploited and so intriguing in
the beginning. It could possibly have provided a challenge, a new motivating
force by which to live his life. But the unsettling experience of racial
discrimination makes him feel uncomfortable. Once again he assesses his
status as a newcomer to Canada, as an individual, and as a human being,
"caught at the honeycombed crossroads" of "divided
humanity" , expressed in one of his trilliums : In the pots of
patriotism/poisons are often prepared/to kill the lily of peace.7
His creative exercises reflect the adjustment pangs of
an immigrant who has lived through and survived against
the hostility generated mainly out of the
uncosmopolitan profile of his so-called
cosmopolitan surroundings. The range of emotions and sentiments
experienced by Gill is common to most of the unfairly treated immigrants. The
supercilious attitude of the mainstream citizens, hurtful insults and motivated
racial assaults cripple them both physically and psychologically and, as a
reaction to the feelings of hurt, they take recourse in voicing their protest
through the medium of writing. He vehemently protests-- often with a touch of
desolation-- against the demons of bigotries :"... life will not be the
same/because the night of racial prejudice/chews peace/in the jaws of endless
depth."8 This protest is more vivid in "An Immigrant
Complains."9
Nostalgia
Since Gill did not live his
formative years in Canada nor grow up
in its landscapes that could speak to him directly-- he migrated as a
grown man-- he creates in terms of those cultural images with which he feels at
home. The luxuriant new landscape of Canada makes him nostalgic about the
villages and rivers he experienced as a child. There is a lurking feeling that
he is not able to love the new country as he is not able to love his country of
birth. This element of distance is always present both in his poetry and
fiction. This is not necessarily a negative element but rather one of regret,
because he seems to recognise the new environment as worthy of being his own,
yet it is not. Hence the tension, a feeling of belonging and not belonging.
His sensibility is constantly in interaction with the
new locale transmitting his experiences with the sort of creative tension every
writer feels, articulating his or her inner growth. In fact, his becoming a
Canadian citizen heightened his awareness of time and change: of the self
isolated from others, of alienation, of the need to adapt to the present:
In a cabin of
inaction
built with
beams of silence
often I long to
slumber
on a couch
with no flesh
of worries.
For me
soft drops of
harmony
shall produce a
lullaby
from the notes
of now.10
In this, he is similar to several contemporary
writers who blend their native tradition and the tradition of their country of
adoption into a personal style and manner with all its awkwardness that
includes trite imagery and expression, sentimentality, and weak
emotional, verbal or technical interest.
Despite being in the process of adjustment with his
surroundings, Gill demonstrates a sense of subtle nebulous links that are
latent within; he expresses inarticulate feelings and unrealised emotions
against a new perspective. We don't see a Canadian person in the interior
mindscape of the poet, we see an Indian person ruminating over beliefs,
customs, ideals and values that were his but are now collapsing in the
country of his adoption.
With the blurring of boundaries in the mental
landscape that once surrounded his entire being, Gill is subjected to a nomadic
subjectivity concerning his status in the new land. In this new setting
he is constantly territorialised,
deterritorialised and reterritorialised, creating a
gaping void of uncertainty that makes him nostalgic for his mother's warmth : I
wish to breathe undisturbed/within the walls of my womb...11
As Parthasarathy suggests,
"exile", self-imposed or otherwise, makes
one learn that "roots are
deep." Stephen Gill is an illustration of the truth of this
statement. It is perhaps his migration to Canada that explains his persistent
obsession with the Indian past, both familial and racial, and it is this
obsession that constitutes a major theme in all his poetry and is potently
expressed in another trillium: A root unprotected/I need a wind/loving and
kind.12
His memories of the moon
beams of his homeland, absorbed through the eyes of a sensitive and
observant boy, create an immediate need of
warmth in the dismal land he is inhabiting :
Move not away
moon
your beams I
need
for the dismal
land.13
Gill's nostalgia for his
homeland is not solely romantic, it is rather based on the
harsh realities of life, as everyday life in this new land has its own measure
of mystery and fear. His poems reflect an ironic consciousness of the
human loss and pain, a sense of disenchantment with spurious commercial
prosperity and a feeling of despondency at the world-crisis towards which the
society is heading.
Sociopolitical
Awareness
Stephen Gill has taken writing as
his mission or goal because his humanitarianism is seriously
challenged when he sees waste, loss and mutual
destruction again and again. He stridently denounces forces that
promote extreme and vicious nationalism or fundamentalism. He liberates his
mind through his poems and reveals his sociopolitical concerns by exposing
human animus that heighten existential agonies of modern life :
The land of
devils is empty
because its
occupants
extend desert
of savagery14
Gill delineates a basic struggle of the soul, the
mind, and the body to comprehend life in its totality; what he communicates
through the poetic medium is a confrontation of his whole being with reality
and his response to it in a pungent and straight-forward manner. The overall
atmosphere created in the poems reflecting his sociopolitical awareness is one
of gloom and despair with a degree of pronounced melancholia. Disappointment is
the keynote of this melancholia, whether with edgy complications of social
insecurity or with insoluble problems of political instability. The poet tries
to convey his message by instilling a sense of mortal fear and by extending a
sense of desperation into the sympathetic minds of his readers with the help of
strong words and phrases of arresting alliteration and assonance. The expressions
"murky marshes", "ruthless locusts",
"fetters ... cranking', "vomit violence", "ghosts of
sorrow", "gloom of violence", "dust of despicable
horror", "self-surrounding cells of egoism', "spiteful
robots", "suffocative islands" etc. reveal a picture of
devitalised society in the darkness of which the poet is jaded and lost.
He notices an unquenchable hunger for the manna whose
source seems to have dried up suddenly because noxious germs of anarchy are let
loose in the sociopolitical stratosphere : A sense of uneasiness about
our hastening confusedly towards unknown ends is all the poet can make out of
modern society. Gill, therefore, finds nothing in which to rejoice. For
example, on the eve of the New Year, which overwhelms him with a mood of gloom;
he finds this day the same as the days of the previous week or "even last
year".15 In the same poem, the poet ironically observes
that If nights were replaced by days/just by thinking,/the corners of
darkness/would have been lit by now./ Eaters of stale crumbs/in the
mornings/should have been welcomed/by the appetizing smells/of fresh and warm
foods./The hours of suffering/would have been reduced,/joys lasted longer/and
lives changed. The poem, like a prism, reflects the unchanging social scene which
is gnawed by hunger, death, sorrow and suffering, as ever, and life does not
wear another mantle;/only calendars become new.
Using classical/religious allusions to fallen angels
in the poem "Beelzebub of Demands", Gill cleverly mocks the
"seductive moans of social deities". Moral laxities, sexual
indulgences, and political corruption and exploitation strike a staggering blow
to the entire social system and the poet experiences an intense need to break
the strings. He asks But how can I do it/when the Beelzebub of demands/chop off
my wings.16
The poet believes that the channels of electronic
media entertainment have added to the isolation of individuals, and people have
increasingly become insensitive to simple pleasures like chatting over a cup of
tea :
I wish to sit
down
to talk and
talk
and talk more
about this and
that
over cups of
tea.
But how and
with whom
when all are
hooked
to their own
TV's.17
Sociopolitical upheavals causing loss of human values
make Stephen Gill acutely conscious of the spiritual barrenness of the times.
Gross human apathy towards the suffering of fellow-beings makes the poet
question the forces of racism in his poem "To Humanists" :
Which humanity
do you talk about ?
I saw her
grisly dance
yesterday
at the railway
station
where a
handful of hooligans
scorned and
hit a youth
of a different
shade.
A wave of
people rushed by,
either to
catch a train
or to go home.18
Gill is more than pained to see that "No
soul had the time/or maybe the courage,/to let those fallen angels know/they
have derided the Creator".18
His political poems reveal his anger at the foul play
and sinister game of senseless vendetta played by
"discriminators" who crown humanity
with thorns and hang it on the cross of dreams.
These "traders of dead bodies" squeeze the last vestige of blood from
life and "in the grave of aspirations" of human helplessness
"reptiles" find their "home". He sadly observes that the
"paucity of bridges" between the "islands of tensions"
thickens the "darkness of doubts."19 Gill asks war
mongers
:
Is this
message of
Christ
of saints and
wise
to raze
cottages
temples and
churches
monuments and
shrines...20
Anxieties related to war, terrorism, human
rights violations, religious radicalism,
hunger, racial discrimination and ecological
imbalances are some of the major issues that sit heavy on his conscience :
I asked my
conscience
if it had
perceived
in the eyes of
humankind
the unshed
tears
of hurts and
humiliations.
A touch of
scorn in its silence
nettled me to
ask
if it had ever
heard
the bricks of
my cries
falling
on the blades
of the environment.21
An overpowering panic in the poet's psyche caused by
the ravages of war seems to be the extension of his sociopolitical
concerns.
War
Consciousness
Humanity has witnessed the naked
dance of death in the form of world wars;
the worst spectacle was the use of atomic weapons during the Second World War.
The poet is aware of savagery across the globe : "Humans look for an
oasis/in human blood"22. However, the taste of blood was
not enough for "war mongers". All the wars fought so far left the
mute spectators of the whole world aghast at the large scale destruction caused
by sophisticated techniques of massacre. Gill's sensitivity is
aroused by these instances of ruthlessness.
The poet, a firm believer in democracy, decries war
which disintegrates society and tears apart a country with all-round
devastation: carnages waged,/the delights of countless wives/subdued;/numerous
men/lost their sight:/and many more maimed./ Lofty dreams crushed./Laps of
mothers are empty now./... Our homes now better adorned/with the thorns of
hatred;/... man is to breathe his last/in the smoke." 23.
War is self-defeating, it is fraud, declares Gill, and wonders "What
is today's man." He can't understand the puzzle, the contradictions
--- love for animals but hatred for humanity--perpetrated by the man of today.24
He pleads for love, harmony and peace, and knows peace cannot swim/on the
blood waves./ For a happier future/let us build bridges now 25 ,
killing the serpent within "that vomits the lava of hostility"26.
In poem after poem Gill points to the continually
deepening tribulations of people everywhere-- contentions and disputes, mutual
deceits, sudden calamities, misery and distress, the convulsions of war,
the spread of inveterate diseases, hunger and poverty,
religious fundamentalism and fanaticism-- that have upset the world's
equilibrium. To add to this, scientific advancement has made human being
"a prisoner of chaotic nights." He develops the feelings of
withdrawal from the world of violence and fanaticism in his poem "Me"27.
Increasing withdrawal from the world has inflamed a self-loving, shortsighted
tendency, creating a globe where the only certainty is that nothing is certain.
Upset over "pollution, panic, and poisonous civic life" and
prospects of a third world war, the poet seeks refuge in his own "calming
womb/beyond the embraces of robots/and bursts of inhuman cries" that
drives the dove of peace wild:
the urchins of
stinking strife-
and dusty
pride in the march
of technology
and science.28
and
Science would
write
the last
chapter
and religious
bigotry
shall provide
the title
to the last
dance on the hills
inhabited by
the children
of racial
insanity.
The clouds
shall rage
to bear
witness.29
He pities people who are proud of fiddling with
noxious gases/and of raining/virus and fire/to deface our mother-earth but who
are not proud of a single aircraft/accidentfree/to ensure our
travels/carefree". 30
Gill looks for poet-philosophers whose voice is
"mightier than cannons" just as the promoter of universal brotherhood
condemns the "fanatic mind" which is born of ignorance and is
"death's cradle".31 In his disappointment, Gill,
seeker of the global peace, prays to God : Give us wisdom/not to uproot our
orchard./The earth./Thy footstool,/enlivens all/o Lord/.... /Give us now/a gown
of humility/to wear/water of tranquillity/to drink/..32
The seeker in him considers war, for whatever
reason--political, economic, racial, ethnic, religious-- a derision of the
Creator, who cares for everyone and reveals
the secret of undisturbed peace. Since "the worship of violence ... leads
to the temple of hatred," he urges people and governments not to rest on
their political power, economic strength or armies but to follow the path of
justice and promote the highest interests of the whole of humanity.
A Search For
Elysium
Gill turns to poetry to search for unity in the
multiplicity of cultural norms. He tries to assimilate cultural diversity to
explore himself and discover his own creative tissues:
The womb of
life
fabric of
civilizations
author of
prosperities
mirror of
wisdom
sonata of
Peace.33
For him genuine poetry is an antidote to suffering,
which he can transform "into nutrients" with divine grace. As he
prays: "Display in them/Your will;/fuse them with Your beauty".34
The poet has a strong faith in poetry :
I wish my
poetry to be friendly
to pacify the
tiger of violence
and to
assemble flowers of all hues
into a single
bouquet.35
As a potent voice of humanity, he warns his readers
about the looming disaster which will befall humankind if the present
generation does not take concrete measures to maintain world peace and harmony.
He believes that Humans have to change/demons to go, and/rusted fetters to
break/before the glory of harmony/stretches soothing wings/over the decaying
orchards,..36
The poet looks for the ambrosia that can instill
corpuscles of love and tolerance into the masses whose leadership
indulges in internecine struggles. His poetic cult is the cult of humanity
which reverberates with universal love, manifesting itself in the form of
devotion through self-abandoning supplication, through love for nature, through
love for the beloved, and through commitment to peace and harmony.
Gill's poetry is, in fact, an embodiment of
philosophy as much based in Hindu metaphysics
as it is founded on Christian faith. The poems echo
oriental philosophy in that they make the readers turn inward in search of the
meaning of existence. It's only through knowing one's own self one can
understand the outer world and the society at large :
It was on the
crossroad of desires
where I met
Me.
Looking into
my eyes,
He shook my
hand at that cold moment
and then
dissolved slowly
like evening
in a crowd of
strange faces.
In his silent
sight
I perceived a
glow
despair
and the joy of
flying birds.
Under the brow
of cloudy skies
those deep
eyes
dropped the
dew of innocence
on the wings
of my guilt
which I carry
still
while
searching for Me.37
Christianity propagates love for humankind through
broadening one's outlook and realising the presence of God in one's being. In
search of love one need not look outside because it lies in abundance hidden in
one's own self. The presence of this divine love should be realised through
cultivating a harmonious feeling for fellow beings. In one of his poems he
says:
I live in your
veins
your blood is
my abode
I am the love,
search your
heart.38
Sometimes his poems sound like the sacred utterances
of a devotee madly in love with his goddess in the tradition of Mirabai and
Jaidev : "Your smiles emitted might/the blue eyes gave sign/I called you
shrine"... 39
His love for the beloved and Nature often swap places.
Whenever in dismay, he longs to see her face:
A melody
that I die to
hear
from my window
of dismay
when down goes
the sun
is your face.40
For him the moon, dew, flame, rain, rainbow, etc. are
life-giving sources, the blessed and positive aspects of life that carry cells
of love in their veins, i.e the "elysian charm" or "God's
wonder." He wants to submit himself to this eternal source of joy. In fact
he wants his love to culminate in joy. Even in the face of unhappiness, cruelty
and disillusionment, the poet in Gill wants to be rejuvenated by the grace of
love, which he seeks "not in dreams/and the thoughts in solitude" but
"along the serene self-composed clouds".41 Some of
his poems smack of several classical Indian poets who metaphorically compared
their lady-love with the 'mountains', 'buds', 'seas' and 'sun's rays' or as
distraught lovers moan:
Abandoning
all,
I longed to
kiss
your lips;
frozen
indifferent
they kept me
afar.42
Stephen Gill seeks to realise his love in "a
sinking star of the morning" even as his lady love might not bear the
"majesty of oceans" or "the secret of fragrance," or
"the pride of youth" or "the beauty of the moon." Aware of the fleeting
nature of time as he is, Gill faces the
reality of life and death, hope and dismay, gain and loss
with a sense of equanimity: "Under the ashes of the last
night/half-dead embers glow again/while thieving time passes by."43
The poet dreams a life that, against all odds and
limitations, shall give him all he desires. The "Elysian gleams" or
the "Elysian charm" he looks for in his experiences are in fact
indicative of an attitude, which is positive, constructive, and humane, with an
understanding of the discordant reality of life, especially greed, hunger,
pollution, and war. He seeks to live in the "dignity of hills/vision of
heaven"44 to counter his aloneness. As he imagines
romantically :
I shall build a
cabin there
with the stuff
simple
sleep there as
I wish
awake to music
serene
attuned one
with nature.
I shall
hibernate somewhere
in a lonely,
unvisited spot
amidst the
Elysian bounties
embracing peace
surpassing all.45
The idealist in Gill expresses a
longing for the Elysian fields free from social, political, territorial, moral,
ethnic and ecological pollution. He dreams of a world where people would
harmoniously co-exist forgetting petty discrimination on the basis of caste,
race, colour or nationality and would love each other accepting individual
differences. This love would metamorphose humans by healing and bestowing upon
them the power to heal. Professor Dr. Frank M. Tierney, supports this view when
he says:
“But there is in Tennyson's poems and Mr. Gill's volume a hierarchy of values.
The first and most important is, as John Henry Newman insisted, `growth from
within.' This growth requires spiritual priority. This principle leads
man to personal, national and international harmony through an understanding
that comes from love”.46
In one of his letters to the editor,
Stephen Gill confirms this view : "I believe in the Being who is all-love,
nothing but unconditional love. Realization of this type of love opens doors to
the fount of tolerance of the views and practices of others, and ought to
dispel the clouds of terror which hide the sun of peace."47
Conclusion
Gill's poetry testifies to
his inner need to live more deeply
with greater awareness, to know other's experience and to know his own
experience well. He recreates situations and experiences that are significant
and focused to derive a better understanding of the contemporary world. He
broadens and deepens experiences, using language as an instrument of persuasion
and as an aid to living in a world which is self-destructive. His purpose is to
arouse and awake, to shock one into life, to make one more alert and responsive
to the happenings around, to make one more alive.
Stephen Gill is a poet of values-- universal peace and
love, oneness and wholeness of the human race, respect for human rights, and a
social structure designed to produce and promote justice. The poet, who
considers his poems part of his spiritual self, urges abolition of racial,
religious, political and economic prejudices and seeks equal opportunities and
privileges for men and women, adoption of a world code of human rights and
responsibilities, and creation of a world federal government to heal the
dissensions that divide people. He knows religious fanaticism and hatred are a
world-devouring fire whose violence none can quench. God alone can deliver
humanity from this desolating affliction. Gill's principal concern is to rescue
the ignorant or fallen people from the slough of impending extinction. Features
like post-modernist self-understanding, sense of doubt, despair, uncertainty,
futility, rejection of European/American dominance and assertion of
individuality are some of the hallmarks of his creativity. Dr. Rochelle L.
Holt, an eminent American poet, put it in this way: "Yes, love is the answer
to the questions-- why no peace? It's as simple as that, but Confucius say :
`Simplicity is the last thing learned. It comes from simple thinking, not from
the conscious attempt to be simple."48
As an ethnic writer and poet, Stephen Gill enriches the
mosaic-tapestry of Canadian culture and values with his Indian background and
Asian learning. The immigrant sensibility of the novelist Gill extends into the
poet Gill, whose creative negotiation absorbs the conflict of cultures without
being bitter: A crusading idealism overwhelms him with the emotions of love and
tolerance just as his missionary zeal is a reflection of the utopian state he
fervently desires to achieve through aesthetic endeavour. The poet strives to
make "society more rational and more friendly" to promote
brotherhood; he loves the world and dedicates himself to the service of the
entire human race.
FOOTNOTES
1 Gill, Stephen. "Blind and Deaf" Gypsy 17, 1991. p.62
2 ---------------. "A New Canadian in Toronto," Star India,
July 9, 1993, p.15.
3 --------------.The Flowers of Thirst. Vesta, Canada, 1990, p. 88.
4 Gill, Ibid., p. 84.
5Gill, Stephen. The Dove of Peace. 2nd Ed. New York, USA, MFA
Press, 1993, p. 27.
6 Gill, Stephen. Songs For Harmony. New Jersey (USA), Rose Shell Press, 1993,
p. 13
7Gill. Ibid., 55.
8Gill. Ibid. 48.
9Gill. "An Immigrant Complains", al-mohajer, issue 1, Jan.
1994.
10Gill. Songs for Harmony. p. 19.
11Gill. The Dove of Peace. p.48.
12Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p.96.
13Gill. The Dove of Peace. p. 37
14Gill. Divergent Shades. Writers Forum, Ranchi, India, 1995, p. 47.
15Gill. "On the New Year," Seaway News, Dec. 28. 1994. p.2
16Gill. "Beelzebub of Demands," From Both Sides of
the Ocean, January-February, 1995, p.23.
17Gill. Ibid. p.23.
18Gill. "To Humanists," Al-Mohajer, Issue 2-3, Feb.-
March 1994.
19Gill. "Divided Humanity," From Both Sides of the Ocean,
Jan/Feb. 1995, p. 11.
20Gill. "War-Mongers," Nirankari, Feb. 1996, p.16.
21Gill. "A Conversation," Conscience Canada, No.
60, Winter, 1994
22Gill, Stephen. Divergent Shades, p. 47
23Gill. The Dove of Peace, pp. 13-14
24Gill. Ibid. pp. 18-19
25Gill. Ibid. pp. 22-23
26Gill. Ibid. p.37.
27Gill. "Me", Des Pardes, Fall 1993, vol 5, No. 5.
28Gill. The Dove of Peace. p. 48.
29Gill. "Last Dance", Twilight Ending, vol.2, May 1996, p. 21.
30Gill. The Dove of Peace. p. 15.
31Gill. The Dove of Peace. pp. 49-50
32Gill. The Dove of Peace. pp.52-53
33Gill. Songs For Harmony. p.27.
34Gill. Songs For Harmony. p.9.
35Gill. Songs For Harmony. pp. 11-12.
36Gill. Songs For Harmony. p. 27
37Gill. "A Handshake", Graffiti Fish, Carleton University,
Vol. 2, No.1, Ottawa (Canada), 1995, p.
21.
38Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 16.
39Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 38.
40Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 20.
41Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 56.
42Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 24.
43Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 23.
44Gill. The Flowers of Thirst. p. 24.
45Gill. The Dove of Peace. p. 44.
46Tierney, Prof. Dr. Frank. "Reflections of An Indian
Poet", Canadian India Times, Nov. 15, 1973, p.5
47Gill. "Love and Only Love Will Stop the Bloodshed," Daily
Standard-Freeholder, Aug. 5, 1994, p.4.
48Holt, Rochelle. "A Call For Love", The Pilot, USA, June 20,
1992.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOOKS :
*Who's Who in The Commonwealth, International Biographical Centre, Cambridge,
England;
181-glimpses
*Immigrants We Read About by George Bonavia,
International Production, Ottawa ;
*Who's Who In Canadian Literature, Reference Press, Toronto, Canada
*Ethnic & Native Canadian Literature : A
Bibliography by John Miska, University of Toronto Press ;
*Something About The Author, vol. 63,
Gale Research, USA;
* Hines,George, Ph.D. Stephen Gill & His Works
(an evaluation). Introduction by Dr. John Robbins, former Ambassador
to the Vatican, and President of Brandon University, Vesta, 1982
ARTICLES:
-Drake, Bobbie. "Flowers of Thirst", INDIA
GLOBE,
-Gamble, Rick. "Literature Said Vital Force
For World Peace", THE EXPOSITOR,
-Gaur, June. "Beyond Personal History: Zulfikar
Ghose's Confessions of A Native Alien", THE LITERARY CRITERIONS. vol XXX1,
N0.l & 2, 1996, page 64.
-Heward, Burt. "Newcomer to Canada,"
CITIZEN, Apr. 12, 1977, p.37
-Holt, Dr. Rochelle L. "Dove of Peace As a Call
For Peace," THE PILOT,
-Koch, Terry. "Ideas Don't Report To
Customs", AT YOUR LEISURE, Apr. 9, 1978
-Marshall, Valerie. "Writing Time Important For
Local Writer- Poet, STANDARD-FREEHOLDER,
-Nahal, Chaman. The New Literatures in English. New
Delhi : Allied Publishers Pvt. Ltd., 1985.
-Parthasarathy, R. Rough Passage. Delhi: Oxford
University Press, 1977, page 17.
-Penny, Margaret. "Time is True Test For Writer's
Ability", STANDARD-FREEHOLDER,
-Parakot, Manjula. "Interesting Indians",
THE CANADIAN INDIA TIMES, Nov. 18, 1976, p.9
-Shukla, Rajesh. "Peace & Understanding In
Gill's Reflections & Wounds", CHRISTIAN MONITOR, Oct.
2, 1981, pages 6-7
-Singh, Pritam. "Little Punjab in Canada--Stephen
Gill", ADVANCE, June 1990, p.14
-Tierney, Professor Dr. Frank. "Reflections of An
Indian Poet", CANADIAN INDIA TIMES, Nov. 15, 1973, p.5
*Mitali
De Sarkar has written several scholarly papers. She was with the Dhanbad School
of Mines in India. Dr. R.K. Singh, an award-winning prolific and committed poet and critic, has been
published widely in India and abroad. He has authored several collections of
poems that have been reviewed favourably. He is professor and head of the
department of English at Dhanbad School of Mines in India.