The term "Commonwealth Literature" has been often labeled as Third World Literature. New Literature in English, Minority Literature and Post-Colonial Literature, as terms of convenience. It also maintains that African writing is the only one which can be called post-colonial literature, the reason being that is was written after the continent was free from human bondage. The study of New English Literature is concerned with colonial and post-colonial writing which emerged in former British colonies such as parts of Africa, Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, Caribbean Islands, India, Malaysia, Malta, New Zealand, Pakistan, Singapore, islands in the South Pacific and Sri Lanka. All great literature is primarily universal, rather parochial in appeal and therefore, the response to it ought to be independent of our knowledge of the author's native environment, yet we believe that though the appreciation of a work from the stance of the layman is important, it is no more than an instinctual response to the work and therefore, of lesser value than the methodic evaluation of the scholar which calls for the fuller response to the work than the common reader can make. It is for that total appreciation of the work where nothing is taken for granted or overlooked for ignorance, that one needs to familiarize oneself with history, geography, politics, religion, values, tradition of people whom the writer is portraying in a manner distinct form that in which they have been portrayed in other literatures.
Professor, Department of English, M.R.M. College, Lalbagh, Darbhanga
