ISSN 0976-0814
Labyrinth
An International Refereed Journal of Postmodern Studies
Vol.5 - No.2 April 2014
Abstracted & Indexed at
Literary Reference Centre Plus, EBSCO HOST, USA
Editor
Lata Mishra
Dept. of English Studies & Research,
Govt. KRG (PG) Autonomous College,
Gwalior, MP
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reflect the views or policies of the Editorial Board.
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All disputes concerning the journal are subject to Gwalior Jurisdiction.
Table of Contents
Articles
1971: Fiction and History
- Vikarun Nessa
Epic and Empire: Voices of Imperial Rhetoric in Francis Ledwidge and
Wilfred Owen
- Claudio Sansone
Queer Sexuality: A Critical Study of Karim Amir's Sex Life in
The Buddha of Suburbia
- Mir Mohammad Tonmoy
Dreams within Dream in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's
Queen of Dreams: Psychoanalytic Approach as
Interpretive Tool
- Bir Singh Yadav
Brindavan: The Image of “Broken Homes, Shattered Hopes” in Indira
Goswami's The Blue-Necked God - Neha Arora
Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant Fundamentalist: A Critique of the Grand
narrative of Globalization
- Nitin Jarandikar, Shubhangi Jarandikar
Representation of Parsi Culture and Identity in Bapsi Sidhwa's
The Crow Eaters
- S G Puri
(Un) Silencing Chand in Heaven on Earth: A Study of Her
Oppression and Revolt
- Shivani Vashist
Kiran Desai's Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard: A Binding
Imaginative Comic Tale of a World Gone Slightly Mad
- Rooble Verma, Manoj Verma
Recreating the Self: A Study of Nancy Prince's A Narrative of the Life
and Travels of Mrs. Nancy Prince and Carolyn Vine's
Black and Abroad
- Pronami Bhattacharyya
Is Family Relationship an Art?
- Marie Evangeline H
Comparative Cultural Studies of Nascent Neocolonial
Literatures
- Anand Patil
Grand Narrative Rethought: A Postmodernist Reading of
J.M. Coetzee's Foe
- S.K. Nasim Ali
An Unaccustomed Return: A Critical Study into Diaspora with Special
Reference to Jhumpa Lahiri's Two Short Stories Unaccustomed Earth
and Hell-Heaven
- Kousik Adhikari
Portrayal of The Scattered: Diasporic Reading of Caryl Phillips's
Crossing The River
- Gils M. George, T. Deivasigamani
Postmodernist way of Narration: Relevance of Letter Series
in Amitav Ghosh's River of Smoke -Meenakshi De
5
11
23
33
42
52
58
63
68
75
82
86
99
105
111
117
Gender and Sexuality in Githa Hariharan's The Thousand
Faces of Night
- Nirmala Varghese
Self-reflexivity in Postmodern Theatre: A reading of Arthur Kopit's
Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and
I'm Feelin' So Sad
- Antara Choudhury
Estranged Identity: The Problem of Hindu Widows in Indira
Goswami's Nilakantha Braja
- Ravi Bhushan
The Theme of Plurality in Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence
- Punyajit Gupta, Shri Krishan Rai
Discourse of Dispossession in Dayamayeer Katha
- Kaustav Chakraborty
Thematic Concerns in Mulk Raj Anand's The Lost Child and
Other Stories
- Anand Atikant
Politics of Gender and Power in Vijay Tendulkar's Kamala and
Mahesh Dattani's Seven Steps around the Fire
- Santosh Kumar Sonker
Predicament of Women in Bharati Mukherjee's Miss New India
- H.N. Prasad
Kamala Markandaya's The Coffer Dams: A Tussle between Technology
- Supriya
and Nature
Khuswant Singh: The Absolute Secularist
- Anurag Bihari
Cultural Marginality and its Psycho-Social Impact on Children in the
Fictional Works of Toni Morrison - Abhilasha
The Subversion of the Divine Right of Kings in Richard II
- Hem Raj Bansal
SHORT STORIES
Attitude is Every Thing
- N D Dani
122
130
138
142
148
154
159
166
171
178
183
190
199
POEMS- by Albert Russo
Revenge By Proxy
Appeal To My Madonna
202
204
CALL FOR PAPERS
205
Our Esteemed Contributors
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 5-10
1971: Fiction and History
- Vikarun Nessa
Abstract: Freedom is coveted, only when it is fought for. It is this
specific reason which makes Bangladeshi Liberation war glorious for
people of Bangladesh. It needs to be stated that, Bangladesh's road to
independence was traumatic but priceless. Even though, everyone
wants to be free and Bangladesh was united in its struggle for
independence, yet in fiction and history reaction towards independence
has differed. This article aims to show the different reactions or
perspective towards Liberation war of Bangladesh through the two
primary texts; 1971 and After, which is a small anthology of short stories
written about or the aftermath of Liberation war and Ekattorer
Chithi,(Letters of 1971) a factual account of Liberation war, which is a
collection of letters written by freedom fighters and their families. The
short stories of 1971 and After and letters from Ekattorer Chithi show
different perspectives or point of views towards Liberation war;
depending on the author's and writer's sensibilities and sympathies.This
article's aim is to create a bridge between fiction and history and show
how Bangladesh's Liberation war got documented in them.
Keywords: Fiction, History, Liberation, Perspective.
I
Any fictional account of war is always two fold; one from the perspective
of the oppressors and another from the perspective of the oppressed.
Therefore, for Bangladeshi people the war of 1971 was a fight for
independence, for the then West Pakistani rulers it was a 'civil war' or a
'mutiny' that needed to be pacified. The stories of this article though are
fictional tales of this 'brutish' pacification yet, they are accounted for in
1
the historical document Ekattorer Chithi, (Letters of 1971) which gives
the stories credibility. In some stories victory is celebrated while in others
mourning for loss of lives and dignity becomes prominent. But the most
important purpose these short stories serve is; they document the history
of Bangladeshi Liberation war in a fictional yet genuine way. On the other
hand, Ekattorer Chithi, is a factual account that tells the tale of
Bangladesh's road to freedom. It is also a testimony of or back up for this
article's fictional narratives.
II
This article follows the basic critical concepts of the Chicago School of
New Criticism in the examination of the social order and the realism of
the subjective experience in and through narrative. The aim of this
method is total objectivity and emphasis on having strong evidence for
critical appreciation. As mentioned before, the stories of 1971 and After,
narrate the events of liberation war from different points of view. The first
story that this article explicates is Nineteen Seventy – One, by Humayun
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 11-22
Epic and Empire: Voices of Imperial
Rhetoric in Francis Ledwidge and
Wilfred Owen
- Claudio Sansone
Abstract: This essay examines the implications of writing out of an
Imperial setting when trying to speak against it. The analysis is
introduced with a general theoretical and historical framing. An initial
foray is made through a brief poem by Francis Ledwidge that – though
related to a different conflict – reveals a paradigm that can be applied to
the War Poets, specifically to Wilfred Owen. A close reading of Strange
Meeting makes up the core of the examination; the line-by-line
commentary hopes to elucidate and gloss the poem where critical
editions have failed to do in the past. The overall argument posita that
through the appropriation of epic sources Owen is able to construct a
brilliant critique of the War itself – yet he fails to overcome the very
language that permitted the War to appeal to young men in the first
place. This conclusion is highlighted by a look at Siegfried Sassoon's
Song-Books of theWar and Louis MacNeice's Autumn Journal, suggesting
perhaps that having lived out the Great War the latter might have been in
a better position to do what Owen hoped to do – and seems to have made
some initial efforts in the 'Irish' Canto of his work.
Keywords: Epic,War Poetry, Imperial Rhetoric, Dante
I.The Hegemony of Imperial Discourse
Writing after the Great War T. S. Eliot felt the rhetoric he inherited was
flawed, and that his predecessors were composing a‚ 'raid on the
inarticulate/with shabby equipment always deteriorating'.(Eliot, 1968,
189) Paul Fussell notes, the problem for the writer trying to describe
elements of the Great War was its utter incredibility, and thus its
incommunicability in its own terms […] unprecedented meaning thus
had to find precedent motifs and images,'that suddenly, the poetic
material – i.e. what the poet experiences and uses to form the poem and to
perform the poetic process – was no longer suited to express the
experiences of modernity(Paul, 137). Poets engaged with developing, an
appropriate rhetoric; and [this effort] implies the larger question of what
style is suitable for history‛(Paul,171-172). The British Empire had bred
generations of poets under a wide-spanning Imperial rhetoric, which like
the Roman Imperial rhetoric depended on calcified images and motifs, a
set of ancient myths chosen and excised from their democratic origins. It
allegorised them as far as it could into its own hierarchic interpretive
structures, and then celebrated the new plastic unity as superior. The
development was uncontested, born out of an aristocratic and bourgeois
heritage; its rise precisely approximates Nietzsche's description of 'active
11
Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 23-31
Queer Sexuality: A Critical Study of
Karim Amir's Sex Life in
The Buddha of Suburbia
- Mir Mohammad Tonmoy
Abstract: In the novel The Buddha of Suburbia, Hanif Kureishi has
depicted a bisexual boy's life. Though sexuality is undoubtedly
influenced by society and constructed by the environment still the
society itself questions the person who is not having 'compulsory
heteronormativity'. This paper gives us the impression of 1970s' sexual
situation of British society focusing on the main character of the novel,
Karim Amir and widely discusses the reason that has worked behind of
his being bisexual. To get the answer it has focused on religion, society,
identity crisis, family bondage, frustration, psychology and medical
consequences of having homosex. It also talks about queer theory and
the societal influences upon the construction of one's sexuality. The
paper demanded a wider research of greatest theorists like, Freud,
Kinsey, and Paul Cameron along with different magazines and research
works. It analyzes the queer sexuality of Karim.
Keywords: sexuality (heterosexuality, homosexuality, bisexuality),
religion, society, identity crisis, family bondage, psychology.
The story of the novel The Buddha of Suburbia by Hanif Kureishi presents
a new lens through which to view the sexuality, sexual identity of a person.
It is found that Karim Amir, the main hero of the story, having identity
crisis in both nationality and sexuality. Karim has indeed an ambiguous
sexual character. He is a bisexual man who says that he doesn't have any
choice to sleep with. He can sleep with a man or a woman and he does not
mind to do that. After going to London he also says that he does not care
about morality, all he wants is pleasure. So he has sexual adventures with
both the sexes. In Karim's life he has vast sex experience but for Charlie,
he has a great fascination. He is rejected by Charlie at one point of their
relationship. Though he is in fascination for Charlie, he also knows how
Charlie is. Readers also understand that through the words of Karim:
“Charlie was the cruelest and most lethal type of seducer. He extorted not
only sex but love and loyalty, kindness and encouragement, before
moving on.” (119). Karim is eager to have all kind of pleasure in life. He
strives to make his life exciting and for this he tries drugs, sexual
experiments and adventures with both the sexes. So, obviously
fascination and curiosity play a big role for his being bisexual. However,
his queer movements towards sexuality make the reader disturbed but
curious at the same time. It may come as a question in reader's mind that
why a person will practice homosexuality and heterosexuality at the same
time. Karim says that he does not mind to sleep with any of men or
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 32-41
Dreams within Dream in Chitra Banerjee
Divakaruni's Queen of Dreams:
Psychoanalytic Approach as Interpretive Tool
- Bir Singh Yadav
Abstract: Life being itself a big dream contains many dreams in its fold;
hence here we all are in dream world, and our dreams reflect what we
really are. Dreams are the language of unconscious as they don't say
things but they show things. Psychoanalytical approach is a reliable
interpretive tool to understand the language of unconscious. The trimodel of psychic zone comprising id, ego and super-ego roughly
corresponding to unconscious, conscious and conscience is governed by
pleasure, reality and moral principle respectively. There is intimate
reciprocal relationship between conscious and unconscious, and the
pre-conscious/ subconscious stands like a partition screen between
them. Dreams are the reflector of the self and the culture; moreover
some dreams are also regarded as divine inspiration- gift of gods
directing man. Divakaruni, a well known feminist and spiritualist, dilates
on the nature of different kinds of dreams- waking dreams, sleeping
dreams and spiritual dreams. Crossing the boundaries of western
thoughts, she concentrates on spiritual dreams rooted in altruism which
have transforming nature and can change our life for betterment if
properly understood.
Keywords: Conscious, Ego, Id, Latent Dream Content, Libido,
Manifest Dream Content, Sleeping Dreams, Spiritual Dreams, Super
Ego, Unconscious,Waking Dreams
Life is a big dream enfolding many dreams which define and shape our life
in the world and also prepare a design for our real self for its future
journey. Psychologists, philosophers, scientists, saints and literary bards
try to reflect and witness truth and reality by exploring the 'dream-world' in
their own different ways. To apprehend the overt and covert system of the
self and the external universe, psychologists like Sigmund Freud , Carl
Gustav Jung and Jacques Lacan dive deep into unconscious; philosophers
and scientists with their logic and rationality soar high in the imaginative
dream world; great saints and seers with their meditative practices
undertake interior journey within the self for their spiritual dreams;
linguists perceive a language beyond words in the unconscious, and the
literary legends enter the dream world with creative imagination. Almost
all the literary bards like Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, Coleridge,
Keats, Shelley, Whitman and Tagore reveal reality through dreams by
touching the unconscious- a mini universe within the self. Shakespeare
reflecting on the nature of life in this world also articulates in The Tempest,
“We are such stuff / As dreams are made of; and our little life// Is rounded
with a sleep”( Act IV, Sc.I: 171-173). Similarly Chitra Banerjee
Divakaruni in her Queen of Dreams has beautifully portrayed the dreamy
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 42-51
Brindavan: The Image of “Broken
Homes, Shattered Hopes” in Indira
Goswami's The Blue-Necked God
- Neha Arora
Abstract: Being born a girl in India (except few enlightened families) is
still a sin and widowhood is a curse. A woman loses her status in the
society, her right to exist and to be happy the moment her husband
passes away. The stringent laws of our religions (especially Hinduism, in
upper caste society) treat widows as untouchables and shun them from
the society. They are prevented from participating in any religious or
social ceremony and are often labelled as 'husband eater'. With many
restrictions (physical and psychological) imposed on them, they are
expected to lead a spiritual and chaste life. Often 'dumped' into the holy
cities like Varanasi, Mathura and Brindavan, the widows are forced to
eke out their living, live in isolation, struggle with economic insecurity
and protect themselves from the human-wolves, as also, suppress their
longing of emotional companionship. The paper looks into the case of
such widows who have to sacrifice their desires and hide their tears
under the garb of false smiles.
Keywords: Indian English Fiction, Marginal, Patriarchy
Indian English Literature has/is maturing in the postmodern period with
the sudden spurt of writers from every corner of the country, with
varieties of themes and experimentalist style. With no more influence of
the West, the Indian writers are busy in developing new areas of writing
that have the taste and flavour of their region, their people, and their
concerns. To use the words of R. S. Pathak: “The modern Indian English
is an accomplished and evolving genre and is trying, in the hands of its
practitioners, a fusion of form, substance and expression that is
recognisably Indian, yet also bearing the marks of universalism” (Pathak,
1). The regional writers contribute much in giving a national colour to
Indian literature. As a result, the much cornered North-East India has
also become vocal in the contemporary times. The North-East India is an
under-represented region, due to the geographical, political and other
similar reasons but at the same time, it must be accepted that off late there
is a profusion of literature from this region with writers like Temsula Ao,
Mamang Dai, Aruni Kashyap, Easterine Iralu etc. Like the socio-cultural
environment of the eight states that constitute North-East India, their
literature is also very diverse. By celebrating their traditions and folklores,
the writers aim at exposing their cultural varieties, at the same time
bringing their writings to the mainstream, thus connecting with the
mainland.Talking about the Indian literature in terms of themes, even the
women writers have become too vocal and bold in their subjects. They
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 52-57
Mohsin Hamid's The Reluctant
Fundamentalist: A Critique of
The Grand Narrative of Globalization
- Nitin Jarandikar & Shubhangi Jarandikar
Abstract: In the postcolonial and the capitalist phase, the phenomenon
of globalization ushered the promise of economic prosperity. In the
name of liberalization, it kindled a new dream of welfare society.
Consequently, the phase of globalization witnessed the emergence of
global citizenship and cosmopolitanism. However, the post – 9/11
scenario revealed 'cracks' and 'fissures' in the grand narrative of
globalization. It reasserted the global–vernacular divide which has
compelled the individual to re-locate oneself in the matrix of race,
language and culture. In that context, the postcolonial studies provide a
space to consider the phenomenon of globalization from a different
perspective. In the process of postcolonialism, the pendulum has been
shifted paradigmatically from the Euro – American narratives to the
non–canonical Asian, African and Caribbean narratives. The Reluctant
Fundamentalist (2007) by the Pakistani novelist, Mohsin Hamid is one
such narrative that represents the tensions between the dominant forces
and the ethnic minorities in the neo-avatar of the colonization. Mohsin
Hamid's national and ethnic identity and its anxiety in the global context
are well reflected in this novel. Though apparently seems to be a thriller,
the novel encompasses the larger issues rooted in the colonial discourse.
Keywords: global citizenship, 9/11 scenario, ethnic identity, mimic
stage, hybridity, stage of resistance
In the process of postcolonialism, the pendulum has been shifted
paradigmatically from the Euro–American narratives to the
non–canonical South Asian, African and Caribbean narratives. The
literary scene has now been dominated by the new voices emerging from
the erstwhile colonies. As far as the South Asian countries are concerned,
it can be observed that a good number of writers are contributing
significantly particularly, the writers from Bangladesh, Myanmar,
Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and of course, India. In case of Pakistan,
though there is a specific stream of “Pakistani novel (originally written) in
English)”, it is seen that it was overshadowed by the literary giants form
the neighbouring country India. But with the publication of The Reluctant
Fundamentalist (2007) by Mohsin Hamid a new wave of Pakistani fiction
in English has been erupted, which is getting a critical acclaim. Daniyal
Muennedin, Mohammad Hanif, Nadeem Aslam are some promising
writers from Pakistan writing in English. The present paper is an attempt
to analyse the predicament of the protagonist of Mohsin Hamid's much
acclaimed novel The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Mohsin Hamid (b. 1971)
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 58-62
Representation of Parsi Culture and
Identity in Bapsi Sidhwa's The Crow
Eaters
- S G Puri
Abstract: This paper aims to analyse the various intricacies of the
Parsee's culture and identity. Apart from this, Sidhwa's engaging
descriptions of the multiple facets of the life of Parsees ,their rituals,
their practices, remove the veil of secrecy which covered much of their
activities and made them an object of curiosity to other communities.
The approach of the writer behind articulating the ideas may be because
of bringing them from margin to center. Bapsi Sidhwa can also be brave
enough to risk criticism from her own community and do what she really
believes- depict her community with a vision which sees not just the
immediate future but a long term perspective.
Keywords: Parsee, ethnicity, culture, identity, Zarathustra,
Zoroastrianism, Navzote, subjugation
The Parsees are an ethno-religious minority community in India, living
mostly on the West Coast of the subcontinent, especially in Mumbai. In
Pakistan, Parsees reside in Karachi and Lahore. The Parsees are a
miniscule community as compared to other communities like Hindus,
Muslims and Christians. The origin of the word 'Parsi' is from "pars" or
"Fars",(Parsi Fiction Vol. 1) an ancient Persian province, now in Southern
Iran. When the Parsees came from Persia to seek shelter in India because
of the invasion of Arabs, the name of province was added to their identity.
The Parsees left their homeland over twelve hundred years ago in the
search for a safer place to maintain their identity and practice their
religion, both of which were threatened by the Arab invasion of Persia.
The Parsees stayed for about nineteen years at the port of Diu before
finally shoring up at the port of Sanjan in Gujarat. Sanjan was then ruled
by a liberal king by the name of Yadav Rana. The Dastur, who was the
priest of the Parsi community, met Yadav Rana and urged him to grant
them shelter in the new land. Initially,Yadav Rana was hesitant to give in
to the wish of these refugees from Persia. He asked them what they wished
from him. They replied that they desired freedom of worship, freedom to
bring up the children in their own religion and land for cultivation so that
they could be self-sufficient. Yadav Rana ultimately agreed to accede to
their request to stay at Sanjan and also granted them their wish to be able
to live on their own faith and be self-sufficient. But he also stated five
principles which they had to accept if they wanted to stay at Sanjan. The
five principles stated by Yadav Rana were as follows. The Parsis would
have to adopt Gujarati as their language. Their women would have to
adopt the life of Indian women. Men were supposed to handover their
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 63-67
(Un) Silencing Chand in Heaven on
Earth: A Study of Her Oppression and Revolt
- Shivani Vashist
Abstract: Eminent Feminists like Kate Millet, Simone de Beauvoir etc
have tried to voice the concern regarding women's right and privileges.
Indian sub-continent too witnessed many changes in this front. People
worshipped women as 'devis' but at the same time suppressed them by
inflicting violence. Chand in the movie Heaven on Earth undergoes
transformation from a naïve girl married to an NRI with eyes full of
hopes and dreams into a New Woman. The movie resonates with
Chand's struggle and revolt to establish her free life and identity.
Keywords: Patriarchy, subjugation, psychological trauma, identity
It was in 1928 that Virginia Woolf said about women “They are simple. So
much has been left out “unattempted” in her famous lecture called “A
Room for One's Own”. Nobody could imagine that it will give rise to a
new thinking on issues pertaining to the status and role of women. For
achieving racial, social and economic equality with men, women are
stepping out of the stereotypical rigid sex roles assigned to them
traditionally. Simone de Beauvoir, a French existentialist philosopher,
political activist, and feminist theorist, is of the view that history of
humanity is history of attempts to silence the female. According to her the
truth is that some extremely antique traditions survive even today. She
says:
We open factories, the offices, the facilities to women, but we
continue to hold that marriage is for her the most honourable career
freeing from the collective life (The Second Sex, 1986, p.167).
Betty Friedan an American writer, activist and feminist admits in her
book The Feminism Mystique that the core problem for women is not sex
but identity which has always been denied to them. Frieden declares that
For woman, as for man, the need for self-fulfillment – autonomy self
realization, self actualization- is as important as the sexual need, with
as serious consequences, when it is thwarted ( 1963, p.282).
No doubt the young women of today are becoming aware of the biased
attitude of society. They have started asserting their individuality by
challenging the taboos and destructive social norms. While the orthodox
women accept their false conditioning into subordination and
dependence without demur, the sensitive and iconoclastic women accept
the need for individuality and revolt against the established norms by
leaving a marriage that has become an emotional wasteland for them.
Hence they defy the institutions and break away from their destroyers to
seek self-fulfillment. Awareness in a woman that she can live a different
but happy and purposeful life asserts self-confidence in her. She emerges
as a New Woman, to be more precise, an Iconoclastic Woman, though the
process of awakening in her is quite slow and revolt comes after much
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 68-74
Kiran Desai's Hullabaloo in the Guava
Orchard: A Binding Imaginative Comic
Tale of a World Gone Slightly Mad
- Rooble Verma & Manoj Verma
Abstract: Kiran Desai's first novel Hullabaloo in the Guava
Orchard (1998) is undoubtedly a conquest in comic storytelling.
The novel presents Desai as a fresh and highly self-confident
voice. It is her first book and won the top prize for the Betty Trask
Awards in 1998. Desai is at her very best in translating the very
word 'hullabaloo' into madness. Her imaginative tale is so
fantastic that the readers are kept engrossed throughout. No
doubt this is a magical tale of a world slightly gone mad. The
imaginative satire dominates the entire novel.
Keywords: Hullabaloo, orchard, madness, monkey..
The new generation of Indian writers in English have penned extremely
absorbing literary pieces and kept the heads of their predecessors high.
Kiran Desai, the daughter of renowned Indo-English writer mother Anita
Desai continued the rich legacy of her mother and other writers of Indian
writing in English in a brilliant way. She touched the glorious heights of
fame when her just second novel The Inheritance of Loss (2006) bagged the
coveted Booker Prize of 2006. She inherited the skills of writing from
quite an early age and made a name for herself with her debut novel
Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard (1998) as a writer with exceptional
talent. It is her first book and won the top prize for the Betty Trask Awards
in 1998. In her debut novel Kiran Desai is at her best in the art of
storytelling. In a way she has fused “myth with history and politics”
(www.themanbookerprize.com/perspetive/qanda) The story opens in the
sleeping town of Shahkot where Sampath, a male child is born to Kulfi, a
twenty one years old newly married to Mr. R.K. Chawla, Head Clerk in
Shahkot Reserve Bank and during the time of trouble the birth of the
male child brought happiness in the family. After a period of 20 years the
Chawla family are now 5 members in the family Mr. Chawla, his wife
Kulfi and their two children Sampath and Pinky and the oldest of them all
the old mother of Mr. Chawla who is called Ammaji by the members of
the family. Sampath has now grown into 20 year old young boy who has a
past full of failures as a student. Despite Sampath's failures Mr. Chawla
somehow managed to use his links and earned him a job in the post office
of Shahkot. Mr. Chawla thought that a job in hand would make Sampath
serious towards his work but his belief was turned wrong by Sampath
absolutely. All advice of Mr. Chawla fell into deaf ears of Sampath and he
enjoyed the pampering of his grandmother and mother. Kiran Desai
presents humorous picture of the post-office where Sampath worked. He
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Labyrinth: Volume-5, No.2 April-2014
ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 75-81
Recreating the Self: A Study of Nancy
Prince's A Narrative of the Life and
Travels of Mrs. Nancy Prince and
Carolyn Vine's Black and Abroad
- Pronami Bhattacharyya
Abstract: The paper is a comparative study of two African-American
female travel writers, Nancy Prince's A Narrative of the Life and Travels of
Mrs. Nancy Prince (1853) and Carolyn Vine's Black and Abroad (2010),
more than a century apart in time. It is about how and why the gaze of a
"black" female traveler is different from that of a black male traveler and
a white male/female traveler. Both the narratives reflect the task of
recovering and recreating a new and distinctive identity that the black
women have been denied so far.The paper garners an interesting read.
Keywords: Black American women, travel gaze, historical/cultural
baggage, societal taboos, home/abroad.
Travel has been traditionally associated with the male body, especially the
white. Travels and thereby the travel texts of the black body have been
largely ignored over the centuries. But these marginalized bodies,
whether as active or passive travelers, have been on the move ever since
the concept of travel came to the fore. The repressed female subject has
largely been a site of silence and immobility rather than one of meaning
production. Study of the black female travelers is a genus that has
received a steep rise in the recent decades. A female traveler, gazing at
different places and people therein has a variety of marked specificities of
her own and several differences than that of a male travelers' gaze. As
such, a black female traveler's gaze, given the history of the race to which
it belongs, and its own particular gendered quandaries, creates an array of
interesting images of the world around, which makes their texts a
reasonably remarkable read. The aim of the paper is to make a
comparative study of two black female travel writers belonging to two
different centuries, Nancy Prince (19th century) and Carolyn Vines (20th21st centuries).
Nancy Prince: Described by a contemporary as “a colored woman of
prominence”, Nancy Prince Gardner arose from humble origins. Often
cited as a reformer and abolitionist, she was born in Newburyport,
Massachusetts, in 1799. Nancy lived in dire poverty serving as a domestic
servant till she got married to Nero Prince in 1824, the black sailor and
traveler. With the marriage, Nancy shifts to a new place, the Tzarist
Russia, the something 'other'. Most part of her narrative includes her
experiences in Russia, the people she met and the difference/s therein.
Being a black slave woman until her marriage and drowned in the toil of
household work to support her mother and siblings, Russia was a
welcome change to her. It was the land of the King and Queen, of pomp
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Is Family Relationship an Art?
- Marie Evangeline H
Abstract: This article discuss about the relationships in the novel of The
Dark Holds no Terrors by Shashi Deshpande. She depicts the woman's
voice and describes the limited choices available for her protagonist
against the overarching presence of the tradition. Moreover she clearly
states the conflicts between father and daughter, mother and daughter,
husband and wife, even brother and sister. She discusses about the major
or minor issues in between these relationships. She clearly depicts the
role played my each character in her novel. She presents a picture
regarding the possibilities of change through her protagonist who
successfully overcomes the immediate obstacles on her way to selffulfillment.
Keywords: Indian English Fiction, Familial relations, The Dark Holds
no Terrors
Family: there can be many ways to define this word, but in common we can
say it is 'caring'. Regardless of many types, nuclear family, a stepfamily, a
single-parent family, or an empty-nest family, it usually consists of related
people who care about each other and be nurtured and strengthened from
time to time.
Find joy in everything you choose to do.
Every job, relationship, home…
it's your responsibility to love it, or change it.
- Chuck Palahniuk
After all, life is a movement in relationship, otherwise there is no life at all,
and if that life is based on an idea, or a spectacular assumption, then such
theoretical living must inevitably bring about a relationship which
becomes a battlefield. Relationship in a family between human beings is
based on the image-forming. In all our relationships each one of us build
an image about the other and these two images have relationship, not the
human beings themselves. The wife has an image about the husband –
perhaps not consciously, but nevertheless it is there – and the husband has
an image about the wife. One has an image about one's country and about
oneself. We are always strengthening these images by adding more and
more to them. And it is these images which have relationship. The actual
relationship between two human beings or between many human beings
completely ends when there is the formation of images. Such formation of
images are well developed in between the characters in the novels of
Shashi Deshpande, whether it to be father, mother, sister, brother, or
husband and wife. Each build an image regarding the other and tend to
believe it to be true. Family to Deshpande is an important institution
responsible for the predicament of the woman. She depicts her heroines
as a sensitive, intelligent and career – oriented. She finds them caught up
in a conflict between their family and professional roles, between
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Comparative Cultural Studies of
Nascent Neocolonial Literatures
- Anand Patil
Abstract: Defining post-colonial studies in Asian context (Shu-MeiShih) with “home-grown” theory is a new challenge for South Asian
scholars, who have not yet “entered into their own ignorance” of neocolonialism in so called “new” literatures. The dependence on post
colonial theories and their applications by elite/ high-caste critics and
NRIs in Conferences held in Europe and America determines our
study of “emerging” literatures. Why Indians have not followed the
counter discourses and resistance aesthetics neither of Frantz Fanon
nor M.K. Gandhi, Kwame Nkrumah nor Kumau Braithwaite but
Gayatri Chakravarty Spivak's leftist stance sans caste based culture
study. The present paper proposes to discuss various aspects of
emerging new literatures from the comparative and cultural
perspectives. It explains the international contexts of Euramericacentricism in neo-colonial texts and pleads for interdisciplinarity. It is
the need of the time to introduce new cultural literacy of structures of
literary feelings which are at work in production of the hybridity of a
literary work. Comparative analysis of literary imperialism is the main
objective of this key-note- address.
Keywords: Dneo-colonialism, cultural hegemony, emergence of
literature, post-colonialism, Post-colonial Project, twin process of
literary acculturation, cultural hegemony, Euramerica-centricism,
resistance aesthetics, dependence complex, entering ignorance.
These people change thought at every moment. They have a proverb that color
changeth at every seven year.They are like the pendulum of a watch, they can't be
stable. Anyone who shouts and does anything straight or crosses or throws party,
it is sure that they will begin to beat his drums, take it that the parliament of such
people will be like them only. One thing they have, they will never allow their
country to be ruled and if anybody ignores it, they will pierce his eyes. But it is not
that they are righteous or it cannot be claimed that they should be imitated. If Hindustan
will imitate British people, I am sure that it will be totally ruined. (Emphasis added) M. K. Gandhi. Hind-Swarajya.1909, translation from Marathi is mine. Pawanar:
Paramdham Prakashan, 2009.19.
Gandhi's resistance aesthetics is more violent than Frantz Fanon's
theories of anti-colonial violence. While describing the overall condition
of Britain in the first decade of the previous century, when Fanon was
not born, he had harshly criticized not only the western civilization but
called the British Parliament a “prostitute.” He had juxtaposed the ethics
and diversity of Indian culture against hedonist materialistic and moral
less western civilization. His ideology was overshadowed by worst forms
of imperialism. His aesthetics of resistance could not come to the center
of Asia and we are paying the price for it today. In the hierarchy of
colonized elite Indian critics, comparatist Jaidev used it in his Culture of
Pastiche: Existential Aestheticism in Hindi Novel and turned the whole
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Grand Narrative Rethought:
A Postmodernist Reading of
J.M. Coetzee's Foe
- Sk. Nasim Ali
Abstract: The eminent French Marxist theorist, Louis Althusser,
views society not as a monolithic whole, but as consisting of
“ideological state apparatuses” presented through diverse institutions
such as religious, educational, legal, familial, political, cultural and
literary institutions. Each of which is marked by a “relative autonomy”
and the ideology of which is exercised by a kind of discourse which
ultimately gratifies the demand and interests of the ruling class.
Foucault visualizes discourse as controlled by power- politics which
work through language, culture, knowledge, customs and conventions.
But, Postmodernism breaks down all such concepts, posing a denial
and subversion of the authority. Hence, postmodern texts resort to
metafiction which typically includes alternative narratives and parodies
them. Set against the 18th century established canonical text, Robinson
Crusoe by Danial Defoe, Coetzee's counter canonical novel, Foe,
deliberately parodies the structural pattern of the father novel by
inverting the roles assigned to the characters in Robinson Crusoe and by
adopting an epistolary technique. The neglected, oppressed and
enslaved character, Friday, epitomizing master-slave dialectic is
foregrounded and though he is robbed of his power of speech, he builds
up a resistance against the authority as Susan Burton firmly speaks in
favour of 'giving voice' to Friday. At the end of the novel, we see that
Friday becomes he controller of the story of the readers .Thus the novel
ends on a note of renunciation and repudiation of the authority. The
present paper proposes to analyze the novel, Foe, in the light of this
theoretical proposition and to show how the novel typifies
postmodernism.
Keywords: Marginality, Resistance, Giving voice, Subversion, Parody
I
Postmodern texts refer to those literary works which resort to
metafiction, literally meaning fiction about fiction.In a metafiction, the
novelist's departure from and parodying of novelistic conventions is
deliberate anditsdrawing of attention of the readers to its own fictional
status is open and clear. So, metafiction is self-referential and “can play
an extremely important role vis-à-vis the establishment of a particular
ideological position in a work of fiction”(Hawthorn, 2003, p. 208).Thus,
metafictional representation shows that postmodernist novelists make a
typical inclusion of alternative narratives in the same text i.e. a
postmodern text becomes in fact, to quote from Julia Kriesteva, an
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An Unaccustomed Return: A Critical
Study into Diaspora with Special Reference
to Jhumpa Lahiri's Two Short Stories
Unaccustomed Earth and Hell-Heaven
- Kousik Adhikari
Abstract: The word diaspora originated from the Greek word which
originally referred to the Jews and then to American people, has
become increasingly a dominating subject in literature and social
sciences. More and more critical issues are being attached with it,
which makes the term increasingly complex in the present era. In this
age of globalization, when national boundaries are becoming thinner,
human migration with its cultural and psychological effects are being
portrayed more conclusively in the field of literature. Jhumpa Lahiri,
the Pulitzer winner author and the woman born of Bengali couple,
residing in America has very poignantly pointed out the difficulties,
cultural innuendos and the ever meaningful gaps that her diaspora
characters experience. The present essay aims to show these gaps of
culture in diaspora as presented in her two short stories, Unaccustomed
Earth and Hell-Heaven.
Keywords: diaspora, globalization, culture, characters, short stories.
Ÿ The word 'diaspora' derives from the Greek word that signifies
scattering or dispersion and from that sense there emerges another
meaning that is the human migration and movement away from a
perceived homeland. The concept of diaspora and its related transnationalism has gained a very prominent position as a research area in
both literature and social sciences, becoming a window through which to
look at the new world of international and intercontinental migration of
population with its shifting borders between countries and also the
thinning, closing of margins between different communities
subsequently. Diaspora is often being used to connote religious or ethnic
national groups, estranged from their homelands. It should also be
necessary to point out to the fact that diaspora, despite of its recently
originated momentum as a research area in both literature and social
sciences, is certainly not a new concept. On the other hand, it is a
repeatedly recurring subject though may be relatively new in academic
pursuits, researches and debates.The mourning of biblical Ruth living in
an alien land, the pandavas living in Virat out of their Indraprastha,
Rama's leaving Aoudhya for twelve years for living in forest, can also be
termed, seen and projected in and with diasporic eyes. Thus diaspora is an
old concept whose formulations and meanings have acquired an
academic status lately. It should be also taken into consideration that
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Portrayal of The Scattered:
Diasporic Reading of Caryl Phillips's
Crossing The River
- Gils M. George & T. Deivasigamani
Abstract: Caryl Phillips's Crossing the River (1993), depicts the history
of the African diaspora, their shattered families, and the struggle for
survival.The present paper examines how Phillips depicts the shattered
life of the African diaspora in his structurally fragmented novel Crossing
the River. It also examines Phillips's use of various formal strategies
which serves as complementary for portraying the scattered life of his
characters in Africa, America, and Europe. The novel discusses notions
such as home, question of belonging and unbelonging, racism,
hybridity, and the silenced history of Atlantic slave trade and its
consequences for the African diaspora. Phillips employs fragmented
nature in the novel which acts complementary to the theme he deals
with. He inextricably intertwines these fragmented narratives even they
are spatially, temporally, or even culturally distant, but still share a
similar sense of dislocation and solitude.
Keywords: Racism, Hybridity, Diaspora, Fragmented Narratives.
Caryl Phillips is one of the most reflective British writers of his
generation. He has multi cultural allegiances as he was born in St: Kitts,
grew up in Britain and lives in the United States. Like his life, Phillips's
works are marked by complexity and plurality. His writings reflect
notions such as home, question of belonging and unbelonging, racism,
hybridity, and the silenced history of Atlantic slave trade and its
consequences for the African diaspora. His works often render a
fragmented nature which acts complementary to the theme he deals
with. He inextricably intertwines these fragmented narratives even they
are spatially, temporally, or even culturally distant, but still share a
similar sense of dislocation and solitude. Caryl Phillips's Crossing the
River (1993), depicts the history of the African diaspora, their shattered
families, and the struggle for survival. The present paper examines how
Phillips depicts the shattered life of the African diaspora in his
structurally fragmented novel Crossing the River. It also examines
Phillips's use of various formal strategies which serves as complementary
for portraying the scattered life of his characters in Africa, America, and
Europe. Phillips' Crossing the River shows how the legacy of slave trade
between a destitute African father and the English master of a slave ship
reverberates through two hundred years of oppression and alienation.
The novel portrays the story of three black children- Nash, Martha, and
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Postmodernist Way of Narration:
Relevance of Letter Series in Amitav
Ghosh's River of Smoke
- Meenakshi De
Abstract: According to Marx, Ideology is a 'false consciousness', but
Althusser, the French neo-Marxist believes that ideology is 'selfmisrecognition', because the dominant class keeps the dominated class
of people in such an 'illusory' situation that the human subject feels its
existence and sees its image in the 'mirror' (mechanism) of dominant
ideological discourse. This is the 'imaginary' dimension of human
subject in Althusserian view. The purpose of this 'imaginary'
representation is that the unpalatable truth of real condition of human
relationship must be masked by some dominant mechanisms. But
postmodernism challenges dominant authority and defies
Enlightenment's grand narrative which supresses the representations of
diversified realities of the subjected people. Multiple realities can be
manifested by introducing gossiping, diary writing, storytelling, letter
writing, filmy version, and advertisements which are used as parts or
tools for carrying counter-narrative mode in the fiction. The
omniscient narrative stance tends to be subverted by the incorporation
of meta-narrative structures. Letter writing is one of such narrative
modes which, by challenging Grand narrative, tries to assert its
existence by breaking down the 'imaginary' dimension of human
existence. The present paper wishes to focus on how the letter series in
Amitav Ghosh's River of Smoke act as the tool for postmodernist stance.
Keywords: Letter writing, Challenging dominant ideology,
Metanarrative structure, Subversion, Breaking down of imaginary
existential dimension.
I
Postmodern Theory and Ideology : Postmodernism argues that
reality is not a monolithic structure, rather reality is constituted by
diversified, heterogeneous, and nonsynchronous realities, because
reality is not a single and fixed one, rather reality is plural in nature and
different realities are always reacting with one another. The action and
counter - action are always going on in the whole social system. The
presence of the ruled and the dominated class creates an opposing force
to the dominant class. Gradually this opposing force becomes so strong
and forceful that the dominant ideology is directly challenged. Then
what happens is 'the loss of the real'1 as termed by Jean Baudrillard, the
French Postmodernist. This 'real' is similar to Althusser's concept of
'imaginary' dimensions of human existence - it is that 'imaginary'
dimension within which the dominant class tries to keep the dominated
class. That's why Althusser views that ideology is not 'false
consciousness'(as Marx viewed), rather it is 'self-misrecognition'2
(Althusser, 2006, p.116). Althusser's 'imaginary' is not false or unreal,
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Gender and Sexuality in Githa Hariharan's
The Thousand Faces of Night
- Nirmala Varghese
Abstract: Postcolonial literature calls into question the kinds of
identities demanded, recognized and imposed by families. Postcolonial
women writers see woman as being colonized by their own men.
Patriarchal society attributes particular values to the woman's body and
the woman assimilates these values. Feminists have objected to several
kinds of objectification of the woman's body as self sacrificing mothers
or faithful wives. The lived experience of the Asian woman involves a
deep engagement with spirituality and religious beliefs. The Asian
woman battles against patriarchy using religion and spirituality. Githa
Hariharan 's novel The Thousand Faces of Night shows how Gender and
sexuality have influenced the lives of women. Indian culture and
mythology too have shaped the lives of Indian women. The concept of
Swayamwara is explained to Devi through the mythical stories of her
grandmother. All her grandmother's stories were a kind of preparation
to her future married life. The three women in the story, Mayamma ,
Sita and Devi are victims of the patriarchal system.They struggled for a
means of survival to fashion their lives. Women must make their own
choice. They need not be restricted by the roles imposed on them by
patriarchy. A woman's choice should lead to her transformation into an
empowered woman. She would then learn to defy gender and sexual
oppressions. The spiritual power in her would lead to her self
empowerment. She has to liberate herself from the age old notions of
womanhood cherished by the patriarchal society. The redeemed
woman is thus reborn into a new woman.
Keywords: Gender, myth, sex, swayamwara, patriarchy, quest, myth,
empowered woman.
Within the gender- sexuality paradigm of postcolonialism, postcolonial
women's literature calls into question, the kinds of identities demanded,
recognized and imposed by families. Their concern over the assumption
of heterosexuality and heterosexual relationships as the norm within
families and society is often thematised as the quest for alternative forms
of relationships. Associative links between ethnicity and sexuality have
been explored by South Asian and South East Asian diasporic writers of
the postcolonial period . Postcolonial women writers see woman as being
colonized by their own men. Patriarchal society attributes particular
values to the woman's body and the woman assimilates these values.
Feminists have objected to several kinds of objectification of the woman's
body as self-sacrificing mothers or faithful wives. Postcolonial feminisms
have evolved out of specific contexts in Asia, Africa and the diasporic
cultures of Black Britain or Asian American communities. This lived
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Self-reflexivity in Postmodern Theatre:
A reading of Arthur Kopit's Oh Dad, Poor
Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet
and I'm Feelin' So Sad
- Antara Choudhury
Abstract: Self-reflexivity is a postmodern phenomenon in which the
genre calls attention to its self-conscious nature. Self-reflexive theatre is
also known as metatheatre, a term given by Lionel Abel in his book
Metatheatre (1963). It also stands for anti-representative play with
techniques such as play-within-the-play (which can be both explicit or
implicit), self-conscious role-playing by the characters, intertextuality
with other literary texts, dramatic sequences which seem like
improvisation, abrupt song and dance sequences, anti-closure or antitotalisation. Metatheatrical plays such as Luigi Pirandello's Six
Characters in search of an Author (1922) affect the audience with a sort of
Brechtian alienation effect or Verfremdungseffekt. The purpose of the
present paper is to analyze Arthur Kopit's Oh Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's
HungYou in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad (1959) and find out whether
the postulates of metatheatre can be applied to the play. This play, with
its absurd and incredible happenings lead to estrangement and
defamiliarization. The paper will deal with various themes such as
intertextuality, paranormal devices, play-within-the-play, theme of
imprisonment, anti-closure and parody of genres and attempt to testify
whether these helps in breaching the fourth wall between the stage and
the audience.
Keywords: Self-reflexivity, metatheatre, play-within-the-play, parody,
intertexuality.
The American dramatist Arthur Kopit's (born 10 May, 1937) play Oh
Dad, Poor Dad, Mamma's Hung You in the Closet and I'm Feelin' So Sad
(1959) has been basically read as a play in the absurd tradition due to its
incomprehensive happenings. Reviewers like John Gassner have dealt
with its psycho-sexual dimension such as fear of sexuality, psychological
violence and associated trauma. This paper, however, will look into the
performative aspect in terms of its self-reflexive nature. Self-reflexivity is
considered to be a major aspect of postmodernism. The period from the
1960s and 1970s have seen numerous subjects being prefixed with '
meta- 'such as Jean-Francois Lyotard's 'metanarrative' (1979), Hayden
White's 'metahistory' (1973), Roman Jacobson's 'metalanguage' and
Lionel Abel's 'metatheatre' (1963). Among them, Lionel Abel's (19102001) term metatheatre stands for a kind of theatre which selfconsciously reveals its own status as performance. The salient postulates
of metatheatre claim that the characters are self-conscious of their role as
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Estranged Identity: The Problem of
Hindu Widows in Indira Goswami's
Nilakantha Braja
- Ravi Bhushan
Abstract: Nilakantha Braja (The Blue-necked God) written by famous
Assamese writer Indira Goswami highlights the plight of Hindu widows
living in the sacred city of Vrindavan. It depicts the despicable and
undignified life and even death experienced by widows. Indira Goswami
through her protagonist Saudamini, a young widow raises a basic
question on the practice of widowhood – is there anyone as lonely as
widows? Known as Radheyshamis (widows who sing devotional songs in
temples for a pittance) in Braj these widows sing bhajans (hymns) on
empty stomach so that they could accumulate enough money for their
last rites. The Braj seems to be obsessed with death. For some it is a
means of livelihood, for some it is an escape from the drudgery of life
and for a few, a direct gateway to heaven. The stigma attached to
widowhood has been there in Hindu society since ages. It was for social
reformers Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (1820-1891) and Raja
Rammohan Roy (1772-1833) in prachin (ancient) Bharat and Sulabh
International (an NGO) in adhunik (modern) Bharat that efforts have
been made to emancipate Hindu widows. My paper is an attempt at
understanding the uglier side of widowhood in Hindu traditions and
mental agony Indira Goswami experienced herself on becoming a
widow.
Keywords: Widowhood, Braj, Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar.
Introduction: Braj, the holy place where Lord Krishna spent his
childhood and adolescence, comes across as a complex abstract painting
that reveals some hidden meaning every time one looks at it. Assamese
novelist Indira Goswami in her beautiful novel Nilakantha Braja (1976),
translated into English as The Blue-necked God highlights the plight of
widows living in the sacred city of Vrindavan, who are left by their
relatives to live an undignified life and die an even more undignified
death. The protagonist Saudamini, a young widow, is forced to leave her
Christian lover and make Braj her new home, along with her parents. She
roams around the streets in search of an answer to her question – is there
anyone in Braj as lonely as she? She finds her answer in characters that she
encounters. Shahsiprova is another young window who shares a room
with a priest in the name of jugal upasana (worshipping the divine as a
couple). There are the old Radhesyamis, (widows in Vrindavan, who sing
devotional songs in temples for a pittance) sing bhajans in praise of Lord
Krishna on an empty stomach so that they can accumulate whatever
pittance they earn from the temple priests in order to afford their last
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The Theme of Plurality in Rushdie's
The Enchantress of Florence
- Punyajit Gupta & Shri Krishan Rai
Abstract: Postcolonial literature expresses the plural versions of
world's history. On one hand it dissolves the cultural boundaries by
establishing universality. But on the other hand it also becomes the
manifesto of alternative realities of any culture. Rushdie as a
Postcolonial writer tries to break the colonial jinx of stereotype
perception of 'us' and 'them'. He after challenging in his earlier works
the colonial stereotype presentation of local history tries to re-interpret
world's history of overlapping renaissances in his The Enchantress of
Florence. Therefore, this paper intends to highlight the theme of
plurality in Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence from Postcolonial
perspective. Postcolonial literature has always voiced against the
universal imperialistic hegemony of colonial discourse. It represents
cultural regeneration among the colonized people. It reflects diverse
forms of resistances in varied cultures of people with colonized
background against their composite picture of derivative civilizations
promoted through the colonial discourse. But in the case with India this
postcolonial resistance acquired varied dimensions. This happens only
with India because since antiquity she remains a patron of pluralistic
culture. The present endeavour discusses this plurality threadbare with
special reference to Rushdie's The Enchantress of Florence.
Keywords: Postcolonial Fiction, Plurality, Rushdie, Culture
Indian civilization since her cradle days has been at home with
righteousness. This righteousness withheld itself against the tides of
many external aggressions by dint of her resilience and power of
assimilation. Consequently, with plurality in their vein, Indian writers of
Postcolonial literature in English have even appropriated English to
redefine the finer points of India's relationship with the World. To name a
few writers who through their writings has established Postcolonial
literature of India in English in the high table of world culture are Sir
Salman Rushdie, Amitav Ghosh,Vikram Seth etc. Of all these writers
Salman Rushdie founded a new trend of Historical novels/fictions
dealing with pluralistic voices of India. His famous work Midnight's
Children was awarded Booker of the Bookers, rocked the world wide
readers with its inverted history of India. Similarly in his other works,
Rushdie highlights different submerged perspectives of Indian history to
enable the reader with more space for comprehension of reality. Hence
we find the pluralistic version of history of Indian Sub-continent in his
novels like Shame, The Moor's Last Sigh, The Shalimar the Clown and The
Enchantress of Florence. But in the novel The Enchantress of Florence
Rushdie revives not only medieval India but also the medieval world
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Discourse of Dispossession in
Dayamayeer Katha
- Kaustav Chakraborty
Abstract: Sunanda Sikdar in Dayamayeer Katha reveals two aspects of
partition memory: first, the sense of trauma, thus she wants to forget or
conceal them; and second, the sentiment of nostalgia, the element of
attachment. This paper intends to highlight how, conceived within a
sense of trauma and tragedy, Dayamayeer Katha maintains a completely
different relationship to the event of partition of Bengal, leading to
Indian independence. The paper also endeavours to argue that,
contesting Foucault's notion of 'knowledge as power', the manner in
which Sunanda Sikdar has labored to forget her past, even at the extent
of substituting her public-identity from Dayamayee to Sunanda, that in
turn has enabled her in a kind of myth-making, shows how
projected/manufactured ignorance is also one of the aspects of power.
Keywords: Partition, History, Memory,Trauma.
Scripts and plans serve as guides for individual acting and become
indispensable in the pursuit of complex social activities (Doleˇzel, 65). A
plan is made up of general information about how actors achieve goals
(Schank and Abelson, 70). Scripts are “organized by goal structures that
are used to make sense of the need for them” (Schank and Abelson,
227).According to Alan Palmer: “In a role theme, a particular actor's
goals are determined by his role. . . . Once a role theme is invoked, it sets
up expectations about goals and actions” (Fictional Minds, 132–33). The
preface to Dayamayeer Katha explains the intention of the writer's
lettering of her remembrance: “My childhood memories, that are
exclusively mine, would remain perpetually silenced within-such was my
plan. But with time, the burden of reminiscence became too much to
bear with; the only way out left was scripting them down”. These
statements of Sunanda Sikdar reveal two aspects of partition memory:
first, the sense of trauma, thus she wants to forget or conceal them; and
second, the sentiment of nostalgia, the element of attachment. A
traumatized memory, according to Dipesh Chakrabarty, has a narrative
structure which works on a principle opposite to that of any historical
narrative. A historical narrative would lead up to the event, explaining
why it happened and why it happened at that very time. For historical
analysis of the event of partition, the event itself would have to be
fundamentally open to explanation. Conceived within a sense of trauma
and tragedy, Dayamayeer Katha maintains a completely different
relationship to the event of partition of Bengal, leading to Indian
independence. Sunanda Sikdar does not centrally come to it in her
narrative but only refers to that as her backdrop—the author who
confesses that she has been trying to forget the ten years of her life in East
Bengal, seems to be in a perennial sense of stunned disbelief at the fact
that it could happen at all, that she could be adrift in the sudden and
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 154-158
Thematic Concerns in Mulk Raj Anand's
The Lost Child and other stories
- Anand Atikant
Abstract: Mulk Raj Anand is an artist filled with the fragrance of
reality and the needs of ideals.The cosmos of literature and the scenario
of our country are garnished with his superb presentations of the
portraits of Indian life and customs.We find the customs, traditions and
cultures reflected in a very apt way in his writings.The History of Indian
English Fiction has witnessed the shining of his brilliant production in
the form of an authentic study of human conditions and human
necessities. If we think of his age, we see that he belongs to a different
age but in the treatment of subject-matter, he is very modern even more
advance than the people of our age. The philosophy projected is very
genuine and sublime. What we talk today and think of discussing so
many things at present times, he has described almost everything in his
writings before such a long time.
Keywords: Indian English Fiction, Mulk Raj Anand.
Anand and his great contemporaries R.K. Narayan and Raja Rao have
done great contributions in the field of fiction writing. All the three
writers are very significant in making Indian English fiction a thing of
beauty and a joy forever.
It was these three who defined the area in which the Indian novel was
to operate. They established the suppositions, the manner, the idiom,
the concept of character, and the nature of the themes which were to
give the Indian novel its particular distinctiveness.(Walsh: 247).
The social concerns that we find in his presentations are very significant
in terms of a balanced social life. Unless the ideas are used in practice, the
society would not be an ideal one. When we put a glance on his literary
wealth, we come across a good number of diamonds glittering and
showing a way to the people of every age and every clime.We may make a
mention of his important books like Untouchable, Coolie, Two Leaves and a
Bud, The Village, Across the Black Waters, The Sword and the Sickle, The Big
Heart, Seven Summers, The Private Life of an Indian Prince, The Road,
Confession of a Lover, Little Plays of Mahatma Gandhi, The Lost Child and
other stories and Nine Moods of Bharata: Novel of a Pilgrimage. Most of the
works are directly related to our day-to-day life. The persons and their
descriptions are very living in their treatment in these books. The
handling bears a fragrance of our country in a very native way. The
situations and circumstances are essentially Indian. He seems to be a
guide to the coming galaxy of future writers.
Mulk Raj Anand is the first writer to give the Indian novel in English
a definite tone and texture. He explodes the myths that afloated
abroad about the Indian of the Yogis, Sadhus and Beggars and an
earthy presentation of human conditions in the Indian
society.(Saleem: 13).
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 159-165
Politics of Gender and Power in Vijay
Tendulkar's Kamala and Mahesh
Dattani's Seven Steps around the Fire
- Santosh Kumar Sonker
Abstract: As we know, “gender”, the most debatable term in the
literary academia, signifies socially defined roles assigned to women.
Previously the gender discourse was limited to the exploitation of
women in the patriarchal society which exploits power politics to
subjugate women but contemporary studies made in this realm has
extended discussion to the pitiable plight of trans-gender as well.
Eunuchs like other marginalized sections such as dalits and tribals
residing on the periphery of the society are badly treated at the hands of
privileged people. The gender study of the present age has also brought
into dialogue the exploitation of men at the hands of women; this aspect
of the gender study has given a new direction to the literary academia.
Vijay Tendulkar and Mahesh Dattani have shed light on the problem of
gender relations in India and have argued that the socially defined roles
are followed more strictly in the upper strata of the society. Taking into
account the middle-class social milieu, Tendulkar in Kamala and
Dattani in Seven Steps around the Fire have presented that sense of
marginality is more severe for middle class women than other deprived
sections of society like eunuchs and tribal women who are free to act on
their own at least in their domain.
Keywords: gender, hegemony, tribal, media, police administration
Critics' claims about the meager achievement of Indian English Drama
fail to vindicate its authenticity when the plays by the playwrights such as
Girish Karnad, Vijay Tendulkar and Mahesh Dattani are considered.
Drama in the hands of the last two has become a medium of social
awakening instead of being mere instrument of entertainment. While
Vijay Tendulkar deals with the multifarious aspect of violence, Mahesh
Dattani has trained his critical gaze at revealing the hidden realities
which are denied though they are very much present in the society.
However, the issue of gender discrimination in face of power politics
works as a bridge between them and both of them meet at the point of
voicing the voiceless with their differences. The present paper aims at the
study of gender relations, the violence it perpetuates and the complexity
it creates in the family. Vijay Tendulkar's Kamala discusses the issue of
violence and media and brings to light the incorporation and
perpetuation of violence through media. Dealing with the marketing of
tribal women, the play questions the role of contemporary media to stop
malpractices of society. But the playwright very adroitly depicts the
subjugation of a woman in the family of a journalist and her resistance
against it. Maya Pandit argues: “Kamala dealt with the problem of the
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 166-170
Predicament of Women in Bharati
Mukherjee's Miss New India
- H.N. Prasad
Abstract: The novel Miss New India talks about several aspects of
novelist. The predicament of women in the novel is very much
philosophical. The present paper tries to analyse the condition of
women in the society. The novel has a central character Anjali, she
attempts to start her life in new way which is assisted by an expat
teacher Mr. Peter, but it is contradictory to her parents' wish. But lastly
she returns to her home town. It is an attempt to see the condition of
women in traditional set up as well as modern set up of society.
Keywords: Diaspora, immigrant, humiliation, violence.
Bharati Mukharjee is a novelist of Indian diaspora. She is a Professor of
English at University of California, Berkeley. The corpus of her writing
contains the treatment of class, ethnicity and gender of contemporary
society. She portraits the conditions of women in traditional set up as
well as non traditional. She has a very living interpretation of two
cultures of the east and west, past and present, old and new. Her view
over gender and women is really carrying a great attention of the scholars
and critics of the present time. Nagendra Kumar's book The Fiction of
Bharati Mukherjee: A Cultural Perspective and R. K. Dhawan's The Fiction
of Bharati Mukherjee : A Critical Symposium critically analyse her works in
different perspectives. Nagendra Kumar describes that the novels of
Bharati Mukherjee deal with the philosophy of an expatriate, transition
and immigrant. He states as :
Writing in an atmosphere marked by sex and violence Mukherjee's
works, seldom border on obscenity which again explains the
constraints of her Indian roots despite avowed links with traditional
American writers.The nuances of Indian cultural life provide a
living ambience to Bharati Mukherjee, sometimes accepted, and at
times, even revolted against but they are invariably her terms of
reference to perceive and penetrate the Western ethos. ( Nagendra
Kumar 149 ).
R.K. Dhawan studies Mukherjee's works and he articulates that her
opinion about women's predicament is central. She interprets the
problems of women in different ways. She portrays women who have
some irritancies with sex which proves to be an ephemeral bond, despite
so much love, there is a filling of emptiness in their relationship. While
Mukherjee writes about women status in the light of sex and gender in
traditional society and modern society, there is a reminiscence of Judith
Butler 's view about sex and gender as an important aspect for women,
how does it take its role to women in society. Judith Butler in her book
Gender Trouble (1990) wrote about gender identity and the relations
between gender and sex. She undermines the distinction between sex
and gender and tells that sex is a natural, given category and gender is an
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 171-177
Kamala Markandaya's The Coffer Dams: A
Tussle between Technology and Nature
- Supriya
Abstract: A techno-critical reading of Kamala Markandaya's The
Coffer Dams offers an insight into the problem in an impressive manner.
The controversies regarding mega dam projects with social activists
taking a stand against the construction of the dam for the avowed
purpose of providing irrigation facilities to the rain parched areas and
the recent devastations caused due to the indiscriminate construction
in the name of modern facilities in the hilly terrains of north India
imparts the novel an authentic immediacy. The article proposes to
appreciate the novel from the techno-critical perspective that has raised
certain vital ethical and socio-cultural issues. The novel gets an extra
edge because the dynamics of the tussle of supremacy between
technology and Nature takes place in the backdrop of colonial
consciousness and conflicting cultural value system.
Keywords: Techno-critical, technology, primitive, socio-cultural.
The crucial and commanding role of science and technology in the
alleviation of impoverished living conditions remains unchallenged in
the present setup. The modern civilization has climbed the stairs of
techno-scientific researches and inventions and is ready to investigate
and explore the possibility of setting up a new world within or beyond the
solar system. The advanced means of communication and modes of
conveyance has squeezed the vast world into a neighbourhood and all
kinds of information are just a button-push away. Genetic engineering
has made human cloning a possibility besides the expertise of
regenerating human organs from embryonic stem cells. Scientific
researches are on to stop and even to reverse the ageing process.
Nevertheless, there are certain vital ethical and socio-cultural issues that
emerge from the man's material achievements riding on the waves of the
technological advancements. After the devastating nuclear bombing on
Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a poignant issue regarding its indiscriminate
and inhuman use emerged which is still relevant. In fact, the involvement
of technology in man's natural life has led to a situation of confusion and
dilemma in the modern thinking process. Literature effectively captures
the nuances of changing paradigms of people's aspirations and
apprehensions in the search of a balanced worldview. In the nineteenth
century, which saw some pioneering scientific research work, Mary
Shelley's Frankenstein, the story of the scientist becoming a slave of his
own scientific creation, raised some ethical issues that emerge from such
researches and those ethical issues are more relevant today than they
were in Mary's age. S. Haldar rightly concludes that “Frankenstein has
become a cultural myth of the modern world and has provided with a
metaphor for the potentially disastrous results of unmindful scientific
aims.” (Haldar: p.9)
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 178-182
Khuswant Singh: The Absolute Secularist
- Anurag Bihari
Abstract: The image of Khushwant Singh comes into relief through
the thirty-three brief chapters of his latest work, Absolute Khushwant
(2010), inter alia, is that of a confirmed and diehard secularist marked
by the typical Punjabi spirit of Chardi Kala–never say die. But Singh is a
whole man who has lived a full life with courage and conviction, never
daunted by setbacks or disappointments. Like a typical Sikh, he has
fought through his life, neither tempering nor compromising even
when faced with upsetting odds. As in his earlier works-fiction, nonfiction, or history–in this rather tenuous work of reminiscence, too, he
never minces words or pulls his punches.
Keywords: Khushwant Singh, Communalism, Secularism.
Secularism is one of the so many subjects on which Khushwant Singh,
India's grand old man of letters, reminisces and comments. He tells us
about his life, his love and his work. He writes on happiness, religion,
honesty and what not, in the book. He writes about his successes and
confesses his failures, tells us about his strengths and weaknesses and the
ups and downs of his life. He also lets us in on the secrets of his health and
longevity. He also reveals his worst fears and tells us about what he holds
dear. There is hardly a subject that he does not touch upon—sex,
marriage, religion and death. As he does so, he also refers to people
whom he admires and also those whom he detests. Absolute Khushwant,
in the ultimate analysis, may be said to be a collection of candid essays
that may be read with the fluency of a piece of conversation. It is a
veritable tell-all. The subtitle makes it all clear-“The Low Down on Life,
Death and Most Things in Between”. As one reads on one finds that he is
equally frank about his distress at religious fundamentalism and his
admiration of Sikhism and the scriptures of all religions
notwithstanding his agnosticism Absolute Khushwant is unmistakably
autobiographical, presenting a profile of the remarkable man that is
Khushwant Singh.
Khushwant Singh's secularism derives primarily from his agnosticism.
He is a secularist by conviction and not impelled by any convenience or
expedience. It is not a matter of politics or diplomacy for him, but one of
principle and ideology. In this sense of secularism, we find him in the
same fraternity as Pt. Jawaharlal Nehru. But there is also a basic
difference between them. Though an agnostic, Khushwant Singh is
deeply interested in religion–Sikhism, Islam, Jainism, Christianity and so
on. Nehru by contrast, had prectising little to do with any religion or
scriptures. He never wrote about professing or practicum any religion in
particular. But Khushwant Singh in the chapter “On Religion” observes,
“If I had to choose a religion to follow, it would be Jainism”(p-153). He
goes on to explain his preference for Jainism, “It comes closest to
agnosticism and the code of ethics to which as a rationalist, I
subscribe”(p-153). Though not believing in the dogma of Sikhism,
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ISSN 0976-0814; pp. 183-189
Cultural Marginality and its PsychoSocial Impact on Children in
Toni Morrison's Fiction
- Abhilasha
Abstract: There is a close relationship between society and literature
and sometimes either theories influence literary work or in turn get
influenced by them. For example, sociological theory of
marginalization, (whether societal, cultural or structural) has been
influenced by the African-American literature and vice-versa. This
paper is an attempt to establish this relationship in concrete form with
the help of literary works by African-American author Toni Morrison,
the first black woman to receive Nobel Prize for literature in 1973.
Keywords: Culture, marginalization, African-American fiction.
Introduction: The concept of marginality is closely linked to identity,
for the simple reason that we tend to live our lives in and through
“identity shelves”: males-females, dominant-nondominant etc. Either
directly or indirectly when we discuss marginality we are probing the
degree to which power is held and/or exercised by one individual, group
or nation to the detriment of other individuals, groups or nations. The
consequences of this power-powerlessness or dominancenondominance dialectic are situational and contextual. But we can note,
using history as a guide, that the marginalization of one group is often
not accidental but results from a carefully crafted desire to exploit, use or
abuse power and dominance to secure or maintain an historical position,
or to marginalize another in order to acquire such a position or place.
In his book, The Neighbor: The Natural History of Human Contrasts,
N.S.Shaler (1904) examined the problems of the African as the African
was affected by the counter stresses of his own native culture and that of
the European colonizer's. In the meantime, the problem of status
dilemma incident to colonization, slavery, migration of freed slave, etc.
had long been recognized and addressed in American literature, and
relevant views were expressed in literary terms, often by writers who
personally were involved and/or directly concerned. The best example of
this is contained in two writings of W.E.B. DuBois. In Religion in the
South (1928) he discussed the freed man as the confused person who was
torn between glowing promises and the realities of actual treatment.
Earlier in his book, The Souls of Black Folk, DuBois in 1903 commented
on the subjective aspects of this status confusion: “It is a peculiar
sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at
one's self through the eyes of others”. He also referred to it as a “twoness” feeling, like “an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two…
strivings, two warring ideals in one dark body” (Stonequist 145). Park's
concept of the “marginal man” officially appeared in 1928 in his article:
“Human Migration and the Marginal Man”. Park defined the marginal
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The Subversion of the Divine Right of
Kings in Richard II
- Hem Raj Bansal
Abstract: The desire to enjoy unlimited power is rooted in human
psyche since the evolution of human race. In the case of kings,
monarchs and rulers, this wish to rule has found vociferous expression
in their acts, noble as well as brutish. The issue of the Divine Right of
Kings in England is a widely known phenomena which states that the
king is not accountable to people for his deeds but to the God only.
Shakespeare seems to question this theory of the Divine Right in
Richard II (1595). The acts such as the banishment of Bolingbroke, his
cousin and to heavily tax people to wage a war against Ireland speak
volumes about the incompetence of Richard II as a ruler and the
growing public outrage against him. His greed and complacency make
Richard not only lose support of the populace but also render him
prone to conspiracy and plots. The Bard thus poses the biggest relevant
question of Renaissance which remains pertinent or relevant even
today. Here we find two attitudes toward kingship and the power that
goes with it. Whereas Richard considers it his right to rule since he is a
legitimate ruler, Bolingbroke lets his will to rule prevail by thinking it to
be the desire of his subjects.The play is a negotiation between these two
attitudes and Shakespeare asserts that 'common will of the people,' as
said by Rousseau in his The Social Contract (1762) should be taken into
account. This paper, therefore, examines that it is wrong on the part of
Richard II to usurp the land of his uncle, John of Gaunt when he dies
and heavily fine the nobles for the crimes which their ancestors had
committed. The paper, however, doesn't valorize or justify the action of
Bolingbroke who usurps the throne after dethroning Richard but
necessarily puts forward a thesis of the accountability of kings to his
subjects or common people.
Keywords: Power, Subversion, Divine Right, Government, Downfall,
Democracy, Dethronement
Richard II, a history play by Shakespeare, is believed to have been written
in approximately 1595. Based on the life of King Richard II of England
who ruled from 1377 to 1399, it is the first part of a trilogy, referred to by
some scholars as the Henriad, followed by three plays on Richard's
successors: Henry IV, Part I, Henry IV part II, and Henry V. The second
edition of Raphael Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland and Ireland
(1587) remains the primary source for Shakespeare's Richard II. Apart
from this, Shakespeare may have referred to an anonymous play
Woodcock or Daniel's Civil Wars. Niccollo Machiavelli's (1469-1527) II
Prince (The Prince), written in 1513 and published in 1532 five years after
his death, is a treatise on how should a new prince attain power and
consequently what are his duties. This book had been banned by the
Catholics and the Protestants in the Elizabethan times. However, the
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Our Esteemed Contributors
Ÿ Abhilasha, Associate Professor, Department of English & Foreign
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Languages, Indira Gandhi National Tribal University, Amarkantak,
Madhya Pradesh.
Anand Atikant, Department of English, B.R. Ambedkar Bihar
University, Muzaffarpur, Bihar.
Anand B. Patil, Former Professor and Head of the Department of
English, Goa University, Goa.
Antara Choudhury, Department of English, Assam University
Diphu Campus, Assam.
Anurag Bihari, Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities and
Social Science AIT, Lakhisarai, Bihar .
Bir Singh Yadav, Associate Professor, Department of English,
Central University of Haryana, Mahendergarh, Haryana.
Claudio Sansone, English Studies Scholar, Department of English,
Trinity College, Dublin 2, Ireland.
Gils M. George, Ph.D., Research Scholar Department of English,
Annamalai University, Annamalai Nagar, Chidambaram, Tamil
Nadu.
Hem Raj Bansal, Assistant Professor, Department of English and
European Languages, Central University of Himachal Pradesh,
Dharamshala, Himachal Pradesh.
Kaustav Chakraborty, Assistant Professor, Department of English,
Southfield (Loreto) College, Darjeeling,West Bengal.
Kousik Adhikari, Assistant Professor, Department of English,
National Institute of Technology, Durgapur,West Bengal.
Manoj Verma, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Govt.
College Nagod, Satana, Madhya Pradesh.
Meenakshi De, Ph.D. Research Scholar Department of English,
Vidyasagar University,West Bengal.
Mir Mohammad Tonmoy, Lecturer, Department of English,
Southeast University, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Marie Evangeline. H, Assistant Professor, of English, Idhaya
College of Arts and Science for Women, Pakkamudayanpet,
Puducherry.
Neha Arora, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Central
University of Rajasthan, Rajasthan.
Nirmala Varghese, Assistant Professor, Department of English,
Christian Christian, Chengannur, Alapuzha, Kerala.
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Labyrinth | Vol.5 No.2 (April 2014)
Ÿ Nitin Jarandikar, Assistant Professor, Radhanagari Mahavidyalaya,
Radhanagari, Kolhapur, Maharashtra.
Ÿ Pronami Bhattacharyya, Research Scholar, Dept. of English &
Foreign Languages,Tezpur Central University, Assam.
Ÿ Punyajit Gupta Assistant Professor, Department of English, Bengal
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College of Engineering and Technology Durgapur,West Bengal.
Ravi Bhushan, Assistant Professor, Department of English, BPS
Mahila Vishwavidyalaya, Khanpur Kalan, Sonepat, Haryana.
Rooble Verma, Associate Professor, School of Studies in English ,
Vikram University, Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh.
S.G. Puri, Associate Professor, Department of English, Lucknow
University, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh.
S.K. Nasim Ali , Ph.D. Research Scholar Department of English,
Vidyasagar University,West Bengal.
Santosh Kumar Sonker, Assistant Professor, Department of
English & Foreign Languages, Indira Gandhi Nation Tribal
University, Amarkantak, Madhya Pradesh.
Shivani Vashist, Assistant Professor, Department of English, Shri
Mata Vaishno Devi University, Katra, Jammu and Kashmir.
Shri Krishan Rai Assistant Professor of English, Department of
Humanities and Social Sciences, National Institute of Technology
Durgapur,West Bengal.
Shubhangi Jarandikar, Assistant Professor, Department of
English, Shri Venkatesh Mahavidyalaya, Ichalkaranji, Kolhapur,
Maharashtra.
Supriya, Associate Professor & Head, Department of English,
Ranchi Women's College, Ranchi, Jharkhand.
T. Deivasigamani, Assistant Professor, Department of English,
Annamalai University, Annamalai Nagar, Chidambaram, Tamil
Nadu.
Vikarun Nessa Lecturer, Department of English, Southeast
University, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
The other esteemed contributors are at the Editorial Board of Labyrinth.