Abstract

The publication of Tarasaptak edited by Agyeya in 1943 initiated modernist experimentalism as a reaction against progressivism. The dogmatism of communist philosophy, modes of social realism and collectivism had lent to Hindi poetry a tedious repetitiveness. There was hardly any respite for articulations of subjective feeling in poetry and this triggered a stream experimentalist poetry grounded on individualism.
With the publication of 'Second Saptak' (DusraSaptak) in 1951, experimentalist poetry metamorphosed into ‘new poetry’ a term coined by Agyeya. Even as there is no significant difference between experimentalism and the tendencies of new poetry, yet the form and nature of the latter distinguished it from the conventional poetry.

Key words: experimentalism, progressivism, ‘new poetry’