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Sandeep June IJLESS International Journal of Languages, Education and Social Sciences, Vol. 01, Issue 02, June 2012 WWW.IJLESS.COM ISSN: 2278-3970 Diaspora : The Different Aspects in V.S. NaipaulNaipaul’s’s’s’s Novels Sandeep 1, Dr. Asha Sharma 2, Jyoti Malik 3, Vinay Sharma 4 1Research Scholar, CMJ University, Shillong, Meghalaya (India) 2Dr. Asha Sharma, Astt. Prof., Vaish College of Education, Bahadurgarh, Haryana, (India) 3 Research Scholar, CMJ University, Shillong, Meghalaya (India) 4 Research Scholar, CMJ University, Shillong, Meghalaya (India) Abstract J. M. Coetzee, writing in The New York Review His novels are replete with the metaphors of of Books in 2001, described Naipaul as "a master homelessness and represent the divided selves of of modern English prose". In 2008, The Times the shipwrecked Diaspora who have got trapped ranked Naipaul seventh on their list of "the 50 into the elusive realities of the alien territory. greatest British writers since 1945". Here, the book traces the shifting paradigms of His supporters often perceive him as offering a Diasporas’ ambivalence in the novels of V.S. mordant critique of many left-liberal pieties Naipaul who happens to be considered a literary while his detractors, such as cultural sojourner dispassionately handling all the critic Edward Said and Derek Walcott accuse intricacies of displacement. However, the him of being a neo-colonial apologist. He has concepts of globalization, de-territorialization also excoriated Tony Blair as a "pirate" at the and multiculturalism might have trivialized the head of "a socialist revolution", a man who was Diasporas’ debates but the present study attempts "destroying the idea of civilization in this to resuscitate and sustain the charm of the country" and had created "a plebeian culture". subject by exploring the uncharted territories of Nobel Laureate’s fictional representation. In his book dealing with the influence of Islam Keywords: Diaspora, Friction Work, Novel on non-Arab Muslims, Beyond Belief: Islamic Discussion. excursions among the converted peoples, Naipaul state the following about Islam: Introduction The cruelty of Islamic fundamentalism is that it allows to only one people—the Arabs, the In 2001, Naipaul was awarded the Nobel Prize in original people of the Prophet—a past, and Literature. He has been awarded numerous other sacred places, pilgrimages and earth reverences. literary prizes, including the John Llewellyn These sacred Arab places have to be the sacred Rhys Prize (1958), the Somerset Maugham places of all the converted peoples. Converted Award (1960), the Hawthornden Prize (1964), peoples have to strip themselves of their past; of the WH Smith Literary Award (1968), converted peoples nothing is required but the the Booker Prize (1971), the Jerusalem purest faith (if such a thing can be arrived at), Prize (1983) and the David Cohen Prize for a Islam, submission. It is the most lifetime's achievement in British uncompromising kind of imperialism. Literature (1993). IJLESS WWW.IJLESS.COM 1 IJLESS International Journal of Languages, Education and Social Sciences, Vol. 01, Issue 02, June 2012 WWW.IJLESS.COM ISSN: 2278-3970 In March 2002, Salman Rushdie denounced Samuel Selvon and Ismith Khan's early Naipaul for supporting experiences of journalism on the island the RSS, VHP and BJP led Indian government influenced their leanings towards expanding the on the anti-Muslim 2002 Gujarat riots: Rushdie literary tradition in social realism tradition. said Naipaul was "a fellow traveler of fascism Naipaul himself credited this work in a meeting and [he] disgraces the Nobel award". with Rampersad on his visit to Trinidad in 2007, acknowledging that Finding a Place revealed Naipaul is a strict vegetarian. aspects of writings by his father. In early 2007, Naipaul attracted media controversy with V. S. Naipaul made a long-awaited return to his statements about women he made in a May 2011 homeland of Trinidad. He urged citizens to shrug interview at the Royal Geographic Society, off the notions of "Indian" and "African" and to expressing his view that women's writing was concentrate on being "Trinidadian". In 2008, inferior to men's, and that there was no female writer Patrick French released the first writer whom he would consider his equal. authorized biography of Naipaul, which was Naipaul stated that women's writing was "quite serialized in The Daily Telegraph. different", reflecting women's "sentimentality, the narrow view of the world". He had Fiction Work previously criticized leading female Indian authors writing about the legacy of colonialism • The Mystic Masseur – (1957) (film for the "banality" of their work. Version: The Mystic Masseur (2001)) • The Suffrage of Elvira – (1958) He was elected a Foreign Honorary Member of • Miguel Street – (1959) the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in • A House for Mr Biswas – (1961) 1990. In 1993 Naipaul was awarded the • British David Cohen Prize for Literature. Mr. Stone and the Knights companion – (1963) In 1998 a controversial memoir by Naipaul's • The Mimic Men – (1967) sometime protégé Paul Theroux was published. • A Flag on the Island – (1967) The book provides a personal, though • In a Free State – (1971): Booker prize occasionally caustic portrait of Naipaul. The • Guerrillas – (1975) memoir, entitled Sir Vidia's Shadow, was • A Bend in the River – (1979) precipitated by a falling-out between the two • Finding the Centre – (1984) men a few years earlier. Theroux supposedly • The Enigma of Arrival – (1987) blamed Naipaul's second wife, Nadira Naipaul, • A Way in the World – (1994) for driving the two apart. • Half a Life – (2001) In 2002, Kris Rampersad released Finding A • Magic Seeds – (2004) Place, a ground breaking study that gives context to much of Naipaul's perspectives on Diaspora as Social Form colonialism, the Caribbean and Trinidad and Tobago, placing his writings within the context The first meaning which can be derived from of some 200 years' gestation in Trinidad and its contemporary literature is the most common; peculiar social, economic, political and literary hence this section rehearses many well known evolution. She argues that the society's complex connotations. ‘The Diaspora’ was of course, at oral and literary antecedents propelled his one time, a concept referring almost exclusively acclamation as a 20th century Lord of the to the experiences of Jews, invoking their English language and that his, and his traumatic exile from an historical homeland and predecessors including his father Seepersad dispersal throughout many lands. With this Naipaul, legislator/authors as F.E.M Hosein, experience as reference, connotations of a Dennis Mahabir, and near contemporaries as ‘Diaspora’ situation were usually rather negative IJLESS WWW.IJLESS.COM 2 IJLESS International Journal of Languages, Education and Social Sciences, Vol. 01, Issue 02, June 2012 WWW.IJLESS.COM ISSN: 2278-3970 as they were associated with forced sister is sent to live with a wealthy aunt and displacement, victimization, alienation, loss. uncle, Tara and Ajodha, while Mr Biswas, his Along with this archetype went a dream of mother, and two older brothers go to live with return. These traits eventually led by association other relatives. to the term’s application toward populations such Mr Biswas is withdrawn prematurely from as Armenians and Africans. school and apprenticed to a pundit, but is cast out Novel Discussion on bad terms. Ajodha then puts him in the care of his alcoholic and abusive brother Bhandat A House for Mr Biswas which also comes to a bad result. Finally, Mr It is a 1961 novel by V. S. Naipaul, significant as Biswas now becoming a young man decides to Naipaul's first work to achieve acclaim set out to make his own fortune. He encounters a worldwide. It is the story of Mohun Biswas, friend from his days of attending school who an Indo-Trinidadian who continually strives for helps him get into the business of sign-writing. success and mostly fails, who marries into the While on the job, Mr Biswas attempts to Tulsi family only to find himself dominated by romance a client's daughter and his advances are it, and who finally sets the goal of owning his misinterpreted as a wedding proposal. He is own house. Drawing some elements from the life drawn into a marriage which he does not have of Naipaul's father, the work is primarily a the nerve to stop and becomes a member of the sharply-drawn look at life that Tulsi household. uses postcolonial perspectives to view a vanished With the Tulsis, Mr Biswas becomes very colonial world. unhappy with his wife Shama and her In 1998, the Modern Library ranked A House for overbearing family, which bears a slight Mr Biswas number 72 on its list of the 100 best resemblance to the Capildeo family into which English-language novels of the 20th Naipaul's father married. He is usually at odds century. Time magazine included the novel in its with the Tulsis and his struggle for economic "TIME 100 Best English-language Novels from independence from the oppressive household 1923 to 2005". drives the plot. The Tulsi family (and the big decaying house they live in) represents the Plot traditional communal world, the way life is Mohun Biswas is born in rural Trinidad to lived, not only among the Hindu immigrants of parents of Indian origin. His birth is considered Trinidad but throughout Africa and Asia as well. inauspicious as he is born "in the wrong way" Mr Biswas is offered a place in it, a subordinate and with anextra finger. A pandit prophesies that place to be sure, but a place that's guaranteed and the newly born Mr Biswas "will be a lecher and a from which advancement is possible. But Mr spendthrift. Possibly a liar as well", and that he Biswas rejects that. He is, without realizing it or will "eat up his mother and father".
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