That the Indian approach to literature has always been different from the Western one would be a trite observation. To add that the Indian tradition distinguished literature, or more specifically poetry, from art, because the aims of the two were different would be correct but not sufficiently explanatory. To arrive at a fair appreciation of the predicament of the contemporary Indian writer who is heir to two incompatible literary traditions, it is most useful to compare the traditional or classical author-audience relationship in India with the one obtaining now and set the two in the perspective of historical development.