Paper Vi: New Literatures in English

PONDICHERRY UNIVERSITY (A Central University) DIRECTORATE OF DISTANCE EDUCATION NEW LITERATURE IN ENGLISH (Paper Code: MAEG2001) MA (English) – II Year DDE – WHERE INNOVATION IS A WAY OF LIFE PONDICHERRY UNIVERSITY ( A Central University) DIRECTORATE OF DISTANCE EDUCATION MASTER OF ARTS In ENGLISH Second Year Course Code:60 Paper Code: MAEG2001 New Literatures in English PONDICHERRY UNIVERSITY ( A Central University) DIRECTORATE OF DISTANCE EDUCATION MASTER OF ARTS in English New Literatures in English TABLE OF CONTENTS Title UNIT - I UNIT - II UNIT - III UNIT - IV UNIT - V Master of Arts in English New Literatures in English Expert Dr. H. Kalpana All rights are reserved. For Private Circulation only. NEW LITERATURES IN ENGLISH Course Objective: The course aims to aim introduce the learner to the growth and development of literatures outside Britain. It also envisages acquainting the learner with the richness and diversity of literary creativity. To know a wide range of writing across continents. To form a background to further study in English literature To identify different theoretical assumptions and practices in literature. 1 UNIT 1 Contents: LESSON 1 Introduction Defining New Literatures Themes in New Literatures LESSON 2 . African writing LESSON 3 . Chinua Achebe . Things Fall Apart LESSON 4 . African Poetry . Wole Soyinka & ‘The Telephone Conversation’ . Ama Ata Aidoo & ‘Motherhood and the Numbers Game’ LESSON 5 . Nadine Gordimer . Six Feet of the Country 2 Preface: Hi, We are happy that you have chosen New Literatures as your optional paper. I know you may all be wondering what new literatures are. Don’t worry about the nomenclature and your fear in what this course contains. So I suggest you just sit back with this book and race through various continents learning values, cultures and traditions of different societies. However, don’t forget you still have to write an examination. So gear up your mind towards that end also. Moreover, remember to get the novels and poems and read up because what we provide you is only further help to understand the new literatures syllabi. Well, now let me first introduce you to new literatures before we look at any country. 3 UNIT 1 LESSON 1: INTRODUCTION OUTLINE: Idea of New Literatures Definition and Scope Theoretical Perspectives LEARNING OBJECTIVES: After reading this lesson you should be able to Understand the concept of New Literatures Know the different genres in New Literatures Figure out the background and rise of New literatures In this section we will introduce to the significance and scope of new literature, and then take you on a short voyage through the background to the rise of New Literatures. This section would enable you to understand the literatures that you deal with in the later units. What is New Literatures? If you recall your history you may remember that at one time in the past, Britain had taken control of many regions and ruled many parts of Africa, Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, and Caribbean. It had also gained control over countries such as India, Malaysia, Malta, New Zealand, Pakistan, Singapore, South Pacific islands, and Sri Lanka. Since New Literatures deal with places that have once 4 been colonized the literatures of these countries are also called as postcolonial literatures/writings. Well, now that you remember your history we will briefly address issues relating to the term postcolonial. The term postcolonial is however very broad and has been part of different versions. One of the definitions states, that the term 'post-colonial' refers to all the culture affected by the imperial process from the moment of colonization to the present day. This sort of a statement is made because it is perceived by many that the European conquest in many places had given rise to similar conditions. But such a statement is easy to make but when one studies it carefully one may find that it is not easy to give a clear definition to the term ‘post-colonial’. Here I will just introduce you to some of these problems and definitions. Postcolonial emerged to indicate the period after colonization in simple terms. According to Ania Loomba, the term is a vague concept with no crystallized definition. One other argument that comes up is by Elleke Boehmer, who thinks in such a case of colonization most modern and contemporary literatures could be called colonial or postcolonial as Britain was conquered by the Roman Empire. Therefore she is of the view that literature written in English would be a better choice to indicate the term. Deepika Bahri, another post- colonial critic is of the opinion that “the term 'post-colonial' as applied to the literatures of the former colonized countries has been subject to endless debates due to its “internal complexity”. One of the earliest theorists in post-colonial 5 criticism is the work, The Empire Writes Back by Bill Ashcroft, Helen Tiffin and Gareth Griffith which tries to point out the inability of European theory to deal adequately with the complexities and varied cultural provenance of post- colonial writing. They feel that the complexity and cultural difference of the colonized provinces is so great that an appropriate idea of either new literatures or post-colonial literatures is problematic. In order to understand the concept of post-colonial literature it is necessary to be familiar with colonialism. As you are all aware colonialism means the Imperialism and Expansion. Elleke Boehmer argues that colonial literature is "writing concerned with colonial perceptions and experience, (...) mainly by metropolitans, but also by creoles and indigenes during colonial times [and] therefore includes literature written in Britain as well as in the rest of the Empire". She makes a distinction between colonial and colonialist literature which is written "from the imperialists' point of view". She cites the example of Forster’s Passage to India and Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. In this case post-colonialism becomes an important reflection because it displays the emergence of indigenous writing from the colonized countries and reveals the cultural complexity of the new writing. One of the important reflections of post-colonial theory is that it addresses issues of power using as its tool, language. Writers seek an individuality and identity by using language that is used innovatively. Therefore, "post-colonial writing abrogates the privileged centrality of 'English' by using language to signify difference while employing a 6 sameness which allows it to be understood.” Ashcroft et al. add that "in many post-colonial societies, it was not the English language which had the greatest effect, but writing itself." They continue arguing that the seizing of the means of communication and the liberation of post-colonial writing by the appropriation of the written word become crucial features of the process of self-assertion and of the ability to reconstruct the world as an unfolding historical process. In a way new literatures are an important realm to display the reconstruction of identities and to remake new structures of power. Growth of Post-colonial Literatures: Now that you have understood the problem associated with the term post- colonial literature let us see how these new literatures shape out over a period of time. When the colonies were established many of the people who colonized the societies wrote fiction, poetry, essays which were mostly their notion of the culture that they encountered. Thus as a critic mentions, “during the imperial period writing in the language of the imperial centre is inevitably, of course, produced by a literate elite whose primary identification is with the colonizing power”. These works were written by settlers, administrators, soldiers, travelers, visitors and memsahibs. As already mentioned they were representatives of the colonizers in some form or the other. Therefore they did not reveal the true nature of the colonized land or people. 7 The second stage in the literary field is the work written by writers who are natives but who produce documents which are licensed by the rulers. One of the examples is the large body of poetry and prose produced in the nineteenth century by the English educated Indian upper class, or African 'missionary literature'. The writers display their gaining of power by entering into the colonizers space by using their language and education. Even though some of these writings did touch upon social evils they still were written under the sanction of the imperial power and therefore could be considered to be objective and unprejudiced. The final stage of the evolution of independent literatures came when the colonizers power was subverted and used in newer and innovative ways. One example of this is Raja Rao’s Kanthapura. Well, your question is that how can one through fiction/drama/poetry come up with subversions or innovations. The answer is that the writers used the tools of literature namely language to reveal power structures in society. In fact today post-colonial or new literatures as we address it is largely a dialogue about the method by which the language of power, and the writing of authority, has been wrested from the dominant European culture. In order to focus on the complex ways in which the English language has been used in these societies, and to indicate the different cultural patterns that emerge which are deviant from the 'standard' British English inherited from the empire, critics distinguish between the terms, ‘English’ and 8 ‘English’. If English is indicative of the colonizers standard format, English is response of the post-colonial nations. Another thing you will have to remember at this point is that even though British imperialism resulted in the spread of the English language, the English of Indians is not the English of Jamaicans, Maoris, or Kenyans. As a critic states, “We need to distinguish between what is proposed as a standard code, English (the language of the erstwhile imperial centre), and the linguistic code, English, which has been transformed and subverted into several distinctive varieties throughout the world”.

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