DOCUMENT : The Nature and Purpose of Literature

Presidential Address of Munshi Premchand, delivered at the First All India Progressive Writers’
Conference, held at Lucknow on 10 April 1936. (Translated from Hindustani.)

This conference is a memorable occasion in the history of our literature. Hitherto we had been content to discuss language and its problems; the existing critical literature of Urdu and Hindi has dealt with the construction and the structure of the language alone. This was doubtless an important and necessary work. And the pioneers of our literature have supplied this pre- liminary need and performed their task admirably. But language is a means, not an end; a stage, not the journey’s end. Its purpose is to mould our thoughts and emotions, and to give them the right direction. We have now to concern ourselves with the meaning of things, and to find the means of ful- filling the purpose for which language has been constructed. This is the main purpose of this conference.