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Sam Spencer
Mrs. Butler
English 11 AP
23 October 2020

Gandhi’s Letter
Gandhi’s letter to Viceroy Lord Irwin is one of genuine emotion and passion. Gandhi writes
from a perspective in which he wants nothing more than to resolve this without any further
action or hesitation. This is achieved by his various appeals to emotion, his choice of a personal
diction, and the deliberate and dramatic shift in tone when Gandhi begins to speak out against the
actions of Britain and the Salt Laws.

Gandhi starts off his letter by discussing his personal history with the British and using it in
order to segue into the possibility of changing one’s mind, and how he himself has done that in
his time fighting for India’s independence. “I want to serve them as I want to serve my own. I
believe that I have always served them.” (13-15) By stating how he has constantly been serving
the British even as he fights them now, he expresses his standpoint of not viewing this as a
conflict between the British and the Indians, but rather just people who are having a dispute. By
wording it in this way, it makes it sound like he is attempting to say that he is serving the British,
but what he truly means is that he is serving the people, which includes the British. This is a way
that Gandhi appeals to emotion within the letter, using the basic human instinct of empathy in
order to try to persuade Irwin into seeing the ideas behind Indian independence. He expands
upon this further with his own personal history; “I served them up to 1919, blindly. But when my
eyes were opened and I conceived non-cooperation, the object was still to serve them.” (16-18)
With describing how his background is more British than Indian, he appeals once more to
Irwin’s sense of empathy and his own ideals, instead backing it up with a literal example of how
one can view both sides as just people and how these people are the ones who deserve to be
served.

Gandhi uses this letter to be down to earth with Lord Irwin, to attempt to not perceive each
other as enemies but as people who are on different sides of a casual argument. By using
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pronouns like “I...” or “we...” Gandhi makes it seem as if he’s speaking to an old friend. For
example, “If we want to sever the British connection it is because of such evils. When they are
removed, the path becomes easy.” (29-31) By using words like “I”, “we”, “they”, and even
“easy” to an extent, these sentences are not as harsh as they could originally be perceived as.
This easygoing language is what Gandhi builds a lot of his primary argument on and uses it to
compliment his emotional appeals to Irwin. By doing this, it feels more personal and less formal,
which is precisely what Gandhi wants to do with this letter, to address Irwin as a person, not as a
title. Of course, he still shows respect to Irwin within the letter, and does not come off as
condescending. “I have no desire to cause you unnecessary embarrassment, or any at all, so far
as I can help it.” (63-64) is a perfect example of this attempt. Within this part of the passage, he
is literally saying that he does not wish to embarrass or shame Irwin for his sense of appeals, and
shows that he does genuinely respect the man, even if they have opposing ideals. It is these sorts
of interactions of kindness and forgiveness to even his enemy that Gandhi starts to build his
argument from, and it is one of the many reasons that it is so incredibly effective.

The shift in tone after the first few paragraphs is one that can be made clear from looking at the
entire passage initially. It is clear from any one even skimming the paper that there is one
paragraph that is much longer and takes up the entire bulk of the paper. In this paragraph, Gandhi
begins to transition from a relaxed tone into one that is rife with a quiet anger. “You have
unnecessarily laid stress upon communal problems that negatively impact this land.” (41-42)
This is the initial time in which Gandhi’s quiet anger is made perfectly clear. Once this initial
sentence is said, Gandhi does not hold back on what his demands are and how they can be met,
and the ultimatum if they are not reached. This shift in tone is an impactful one as it truly
highlights the gravity of the situation and why it’s an important fight to fight. “I regard this tax to
be the most iniquitous of all from a poor man’s perspective.” (51-52) This highlights how the
shift in tone would have been important, as this statement would’ve been far more shocking if
the preestablished tone was kept throughout the letter until this part. By changing the tone in
such a dramatic fashion, yet still holding respect for the fact that Gandhi needed to get his point
across, he appeals to Irwin’s emotions once again, but this time not focusing on empathy, but
trying to instill a sense of guilt in the Viceroy’s mind. This is made evidently clear by how he
structured his apology for unnecessary embarrassment close to where Gandhi makes his
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demands, as he directly mentions how the Viceroy should be feeling after reading the letter;
embarrassed and ashamed.

Gandhi’s letter to the viceroy is interesting, as it does not fully stay on one side or the other. It
is a perfect example of how to write a less formal letter for an incredibly important matter.
Gandhi’s use of emotion appeals, personal diction, and dramatic shifts in tone all add to creating
this sense of inherent guilt without completely dissuading the other side’s argument. By
Gandhi’s acceptance of the ideas of the British and using them in order to persuade an important
British man before something unseemly happens, it is evident that this is a letter of genuine
emotion and passion for one’s cause.