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Kiran Desai As a Modern Writer

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Kiran Desai As a Modern Writer International Journal of Academic Research ISSN: 2348-7666; Vol.4, Issue-3 (1), March, 2017 Impact Factor: 4.535; Email: [email protected] Kiran Desai as a Modern Writer B. Suresh Kumar Research Scholar, Dept. of English, Osamania University, Hyderabad Abstract: Kiran Desai novels manage to explore with intimacy and insight, just about everything related to contemporary issues globalization, multiculturaltsm, economic inequality and fundamentalism. She has an artistic power to express the invisible emotional reality. She has experimented with varied forms of narrative techniques in fiction. Her talent in the use of irony and humor make her novels worth reading. There is no doubt that, she is an outstanding and iconic writer of the contemporary age. Key words: fiction, fundamentalism, globalization, multiculturaltsm, Narration : Today, Indian writing in English narrates the story of a man Sampath Chawla, has come to occupy a respectable position in who escapes from his responsibilities. He starts the global village. A new breed of writers is living in a guava orchard in a tree and spreads emerging, who are multi ethnic, multicultural rumour about himself that he is a holy man. and multiracial. The trend is new and This is a hilarious story of life, relations and infectiously successful, because they bring love portrayed in the cultural spectrum of about a gust of freshness in fiction and in Indian subcontinent and touches many global English Literature. They form the new complications that are associated with human generation of the global village, born in one beings. Desai became a celebrity with her first continent, raised in another and living in book and her second creation is another highly another. They have a large following and a acclaimed example in literature setting up very wide readership around the world. many milestones with praises from all over Asia, the United States and Europe winning Among them is the Indian born, 43- prestigious awards. year-old Kiran Desai, daughter of Anita Desai. she was born on 3 September 1971 and part of Desai's very first novel Hullabaloo in her early life was spent in Chandigarh. Pune the Guava Orchard put her in the whim of and Murabai in India after which she migrated famous South Asian Diaspora writers. The to Great Britain at the age of 14 and then to the story depicts illusion of identities, voice of United States. She studied at Bennington resistance to assimilation with different culture College, Hollins University, and Columbia by migrants, and correlates historical changes University. Due to her rich cultural in motherland with traits and behaviour of background, Kiran Desai, is a born story teller. migrants in the countries of their new residences. Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard (1998) and The inheritance of Loss (2006) are Sampath Chawla's story is narrated the two novels by Kiran Desai, which make her with a background with drought, which ended representative of South Asian Diaspora with his birth. This makes his villagers believe literature and a trendsetter in narrating identity that he was born to be a great man. He is conflict by people who live in two sets of considered auspicious and this makes his cultural spaces in their imaginary world after parents proud. However, they get disappointed migrating from their motherland. Published in when he fails in "School and does not do 1998 Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard unfolds anything significant except getting a in an Indian village Shahkot in Punjab and government job in the postal department. He- International Journal of Academic Research ISSN: 2348-7666; Vol.4, Issue-3 (1), March, 2017 Impact Factor: 4.535; Email: [email protected] spends most of his time dreaming and Shahkot might be because of the wandering around in tea stalls and gardens. He problems lying in the currents off the West is lazy loves gossiping and tries his best to African coastline. His gossiping reaches a escape from his responsibilities. Despite, all his climax when he blames Iraq for attempts to sullen, life, his grandmother retains, the belief steal monsoon by deliberately creating low that Sampath would be a great man some day. pressure over desert provinces and deflecting She says, Wait and see! Even if it appears he is winds from India. Desai's sense of humour going downhill, he will come un the other side. makes readers laugh their lungs out when Yes, on top of the world. He is just taking a Sampath says, "Hungarian musician offers to longer route. draw rain clouds from Europe to India via the One day Sampath runs away to a music of his flute. As far as South Asian Guava orchard just to take a nap without readers are concerned, Sampath is similar to disturbance and settles in a guava tree. any of them or somebody in their However the incidents which occurred after neighborhood. The scene of Sampath sleeping this, made him famous as a holy man without in a room with many people snoring and his actually doing anything. Sampath Chawla father's scolding for not "doing anything become famous suddenly but his new significant to make his life better are very popularity puts entire Shahkot in chaos. His common scenes in Indian families or in the sister becomes fond of Hungry Hop Tee Cream houses in neighboring countries. The specialty boy. Sampath's guava tree becomes a holy of this story is there is nothing so special about place but a huge crowd of monkeys surround it the characters described. Every things seems so always. Sampat's father tries to take advantage common and so familiar that readers get of his son's sudden fame and transforms his connected with the rhythm of this novel and guava orchard into a place of benefit. Majiy that shows Kiran Desai is successful in what people of Shahkot become jealous of she aimed by' narrating this story. The scene Sampath's popularity and some of them start descriptions, the creativity with words, fiction spying to know the truth. This novel evokes and landscape and an equated balance in her interesting images with good sense of humour narration, makes Desai a deserving author to be that makes readers laugh loud. Kiran Desai, beckoned with the Betty, Trask Award, which through this novel depicts daily life of an the Society of Authors for the best novels by ordinary man unlike many Diaspora writer, citizens of the commonwealth of Nations gives who spend pages and pages describing Indian to young authors below 35 years. culture and traditions due to their nostalgic addiction to homeland. In the novel, The Inheritance of Loss, Biju and Sai are two main characters. Biju is In the novel Hullabaloo in the Guava living; in America as an illegal migrant from Orchard, Kiran Desai's scene description is India, His father works in Sai's home. Sai is a marvelous. That summer the heat had girl who lives in Kalimpong, the place where enveloped the whole of Shahkot in a murky Desai has based this story. Sai's maternal yellow haze. The clutter of rooftops and grandfather is Jemubai. The time span showed washing lines that usually stretched all the way here in the story begins from 1986. Thus, story to the foothills at the horizon grew blurred and shows two places side by, side with Biju's life merged with the dust-filled sky. In the story in the United States as an illegal migrant and Sampath reads from newspaper citing the Sal's grandfather who lives in India but in very drought as a result of volcanic ash thrown up in westernized way. The story also brings the latest spurt of activity. Later he starts colonialism and its impact on characters' lives another gossip that the drought in his village. in the novel and exhibits how the Indian way of life has changed drastically, it also comments International Journal of Academic Research ISSN: 2348-7666; Vol.4, Issue-3 (1), March, 2017 Impact Factor: 4.535; Email: [email protected] on the English Indians who try to undermine inherited from one generation to other and Indian culture. Gurkha movement also comes from one place to another place as an essential as a background even in the novel. While element Overall, The Inheritance of Loss is a Jhemubhai Patel does not like Indian ways and mixture of extraordinary observation of daily traditions despite living in India. He eats life characters, comedy and satirical chapati's with knife and forks. He does not like descriptions. She can be taken as a writer to his father and his wife and leave them. Yet he show the realities of developing and developed fails to impress the Englishmen. His world simultaneously in most natural, funniest granddaughter Sai is an orphaned child breaks and romantic way (Mishra,2006). Her novel the rhythm of peace in Jhemubhai’s house, explores many contemporary burning issues Desai's novel depicts families and daily events including conflicts of culture, inequalities very minutely and in an elegant manner. Sai is between haves and have net's, global ization compelled to live with her grandfather after and insecurities about identity which make it being orphaned and had to live her convent relevant more today despite the background of school. Her grandfather, who lives in a 1980s set by Desai in the book. Together the crumbling house feels more British than Indian combination of realities and imagination and his cook Nandu, Biju's father always lives expose an intersection of socio-cultural and with fantasies that Biju would bring fortunes in political Clements of India and the United his family by earning in the United States.
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