Beyond the Literal | Figurative Language in the Poetry of Rajiv Khandelwal

'Rajiv Khandelwal's seven poetry collections, published between 1998 and 2025, have generated considerable critical attention. What the existing scholarship has not provided is a systematic method for assessing his figurative language at the level of individual poems, asking not only what the poems say but how they say it, and whether the figures succeed or fail by any precise and accountable criterion.

This study applies five theoretical instruments to Khandelwal's complete poetry in English: Lakoff and Johnson's conceptual metaphor theory, I.A. Richards's tenor-vehicle distinction, Anandavardhana's classical Sanskrit concept of dhvani, Bakhtin's theory of discursive hybridisation, and Ricoeur's account of narrative configuration. Each is called on where the figurative problems of each collection require it. Every evaluative verdict is anchored to the quoted text of the poem, so that each claim may be tested against the poems themselves.

Named achievements and named failures receive equal analytical attention. The poems are the final arbiter.