Postmodern Themes and Techniques in Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and Shashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel – A Critical Study

A thesis submitted to Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN ENGLISH

by S. VEERAMANI (Ref. No. 33821/Ph.D.2/English/P.T./April 2007)

under the guidance of Rev. Dr. A. SEBASTIAN, SJ Principal & Associate Professor in English St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli

DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH ST. JOSEPH’S COLLEGE (AUTONOMOUS) (Nationally Re-accredited with A+ - College with Potential for Excellence Affiliated to Bharathidasan University) TIRUCHIRAPPALLI - 620 002, INDIA

APRIL 2012 Rev. Dr. A. Sebastian, SJ, MA, MPhil., PhD Principal & Associate Professor of English St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous) Tiruchirappalli - 620 002 India ______

CERTIFICATE

This is to certify that the thesis entitled Postmodern Themes and Techniques in Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s

Children and Shashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel - A Critical Study submitted by Mr. S. Veeramani is a bona fide record of research work done by him under my guidance in the Department of English, St. Joseph's College (Autonomous),

Tiruchirappalli and the thesis has not previously formed the basis for the award of any degree, diploma, associate ship, fellowship or any other similar titles. The thesis represents the independent wok on the part of the candidate.

Rev. Dr. A. Sebastian Anand S. J. Research Advisor

Tiruchirappalli-2 April 2012 S. Veeramani St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous) Tiruchirappalli - 620002

––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

DECLARATION

I hereby declare that the work entitled Postmodern Themes and

Techniques in Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, Salman Rushdie’s

Midnight’s Children and Shashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel - A Critical

Study has been carried out by me under the guidance of Rev. Dr. A. Sebastian, SJ,

Principal, St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli and the work has not been submitted either in whole or in part of any other degree or diploma at any other University or Institute.

S. VEERAMANI

Tiruchirappalli-2 April 2012

iv

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

At the outset, I thank almighty God for making all in right.

I thank Rev. Fr. Dr. S. John Britto, SJ, Rector, St. Joseph’s college,

(Autonomous), Trichirappalli for rendering his benevolent support to me to the completion of my thesis.

I thank Rev. Fr. Dr. A. Albert Muthumalai, SJ, Secretary St. Joseph’s

College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli for encouraging me to do this research work successfully.

I extend my gratitude and thanks to my Research Guide and Principal

Rev. Dr. A. Sebastian, S. J., M.A., M. Phil., Ph.D., St. Joseph’s College

(Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli for having taken me as his ward. I chisel my special thanks to my beloved guide for helping me to under go the research with his scholarly advice and channelization of my ideas in proper way in my research work.

Personally the members of my family are owed to him. Moreover he is a lighthouse in the Department of English, St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli.

I extend my thanks to Dr. S. Papu Benjamin Elango, M.A., M. Phil., B.L.,

Ph.D., Head, Department of English, St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous),

Tiruchirappalli for having encouraged and motivated me to do the research work with his fullest cooperation. Besides , he is a man who stands for a candle in a church. v

I thank Prof. G. Ravindran, M.A., M.Phil., former Head, Department of

English, St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli for having encouraged and helped me to complete my research work.

I thank Dr. Dhanalakshmi, M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D., Associate Professor,

Department of English, Periyar E.V.R. College, Tiruchirappalli; Prof. A. J.

Mariadas, Vice-Principal, St. Joseph’s College (Autonomous), Tiruchirappalli;

Dr. K. Gunasekaran, M.A., M.Phil., Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of

English, Periyar E.V.R. College, Tiruchirappalli; Dr. T. Jayakumar, M.A., M.Phil.,

Ph.D., Associate Professor, Department of English, Periyar E.V.R. College,

Tiruchirappalli for having helped me in various ways to complete my thesis with out any hitch.

I thank all my school and college teachers for having enlightened me to the world of knowledge.

I thank my colleagues, friends, and well wishers in all the ways for showing me right path.

I thank my parents, sister and brother for having given me a peaceful ambience to complete my research.

S. Veeramani

CONTENTS

Chapter No. Title Page No.

Acknowledgement

I Introduction 1

II Postmodern Themes and Techniques in The Crying of Lot 49 35

III Postmodern Themes and Techniques in Midnight’s Children 63

IV Postmodern Themes and Techniques in The Great Indian Novel 89

V Comparative and Analytical Study of The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel 121

Conclusion 157

Works Cited 173

Appendix: Paper Publication 181



INTRODUCTION . .

Exclusively in art, modernism is a trend in which a plethora of intellectualism took

place. The era modernism is the product of enlightenment project, which is

commonly acclaimed as rigorous movement. It is worth mentioning here that the

introduction is to throw some lights on modernism and its impact on the child

baptized as postmodernism. Modernism defines itself as anything which is ‘new’ or

review an art or in any field, whereas in literature modernism spells out with a

higher degree of Elitism. Elitism is an intellectualism in literature. This sort of art

can be understood by sophisticated people in knowledge.

This term is used by various critics in various ways to refer to ‘a body of

literature’ produced mostly in the first half of the twentieth-century; most

critics think that it has now been superseded by post-modernism, although

there are the Rome, who argue that vigorously today. Authors generally

classified as modernists take often very different styles; from the novels of

Joseph Conrad (1887-1924) and D. H. Lawrence (1873-1957); the poetry of

T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) and Ezra pound (1995-1972), or the drama of Bertolt

Brecht, fascination with literary experiment, with making a ‘new’ literature

that was deliberately unlike the ‘realist’ art of Victorian culture. Modernist

literature is often startling and challenging; it may, for example, be written in

a fractured or peculiar style, or it may advocate the overturning of traditional

value. (Roberts 2000: 99)

2

Adam Roberts has classified the writers above quoted in the level of experimental prose, poetry, and drama. These genres are reviewed in different styles and the style of strange realism of victorism culture is superseded by so-called modernism.

Realism stands for unromanticization and pragramticity.

David Forgacs identified in modernism the following features: first, it is or,

was about novelty; it was a set off artistic practices which shared a

commitment to ‘make it new’ in Pounds phrase ... Many modernist artists

envisaged political change in terms of a radical and often violent break ...

It has been argued that modernism was an art of ‘depth’ not of ‘surfaces’.

(Forgacs 1995: 9-1)

One of the things that is significant for Jameson’s purposes is that the most famous

‘modernist’ works were products during the 1930’s, at a time when Adolph Hitler was coming to power in Germany, and Benits Musolini in Italy (Robert 2000: 100).

Modernism is not only in art, but also in the scientific development and politics. By the invention of atomic bomb during Rooswelt regime America bombarded Japan. Hitler did Jew-massacre in Auschwitz. This massacre is well known as the Holocaust. Mussolini also did the same cruelty. All the effects of modernism are exposed in art, culture, politics and the like.

Critics and writers turned towards seeking pleasure and peace. They wanted to embrace a ‘new life’. This new-life, may be termed as ‘post-modernism.’ 3

It is said by Wolf Gang Welseh that the term postmodernism was first used in 1890s. Postmodernism found its place in 1926. Then, in 1977, the term postmodernism was published and made its establishment by Michael Kohler in

“Postmodernismus” einbegriffs geschichtlicher Uberblick; in this stage of use only it has come to flash.

In 1947, Arnold Toynbee used this term postmodernism in the condition of the western history and that has come to the darkness and he authentically made use of this term to point out that it is a continuity of modernism. From 1950 onwards

Charles Olson made use of the term postmodernism to proclaim that this is a movement that is against modernism.

After the world war second, Postmodernism has been oxygenated with full force of literature; and postmodern production accepts mass culture, pop music, pop art, by decentering Elitism and Eliotization. Modernity indicates the green signal for universality, certainly center, homogeneity, whereas postmodernity welcomes de-universalization, decentralization and heterogeneity by and the like.

Just as Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity is established by an individual’s frame of reference, likewise, the manner how one views the universe in accordance with his own subjective experience is ‘relativism’. Relativism in literature and life is accepted by postmodernism. What postmodernism depicts is that there is no absolute objective value. 4

The leading theorists of postmodern movement are Jean Francis Lyotard, and

Jean Bandrillard, who believe that people live not in a world of image but of

only Simulations. Jacques Derrida, who attacks western philosophy into

understanding of reason and is concerned with deconstruction of texts; and

Michel Foucult, who challenges the compact of history as a chronology of in

aitatle facts and replaces it with supered and unconscious thought out history.

(A. H. Tak 2008: 52)

Nietzsche says that the idea of the death of the God may also be called a postmodern thinking, because postmodernism refutes foundationalism. In India

Budhism can also be termed as the influential concept on some writers and critics in and around the world. ‘Dubiosity is the primary triggering point to restructure and redefine literature, and some system of belief and other arts in the world’. The element of ‘dubiosity’ can be found in postmodernism.

This is what Grimer says, “Since postmodernism is not a systematic or structured way of knowing a subject, a discipline or a branch of knowledge into ontological character is dubious” (Tak 2008: 83).

Critics and writers define postmodernism in different manners. It is a thought to create and to define because it is a relative term. Some peoples’ definitions can be taken as quoted above for the better understanding of the term.

The demise of Marxism, which emphasized up on seeking the universality has left a new life to skepticism and nihilism, which were once acclaimed as 5

‘negativity’ in social life, but positively they are, whose concept-hoods add the endorsement with postmodernism.

The philosophy of postmodernism can be the extension of skepticism.

Skepticism does not accept and question therefore, aforementioned concept

‘dubiosity’ can be found in postmodern literature and art.

Postmodernism can be found in various fields such as philosophy, politics, feminism, art, architecture, music, literature, law, medicine, science, technology etc.

Most importantly, the era and its term postmodernism came into being widely only in architecture. The proto-practitioner of this is Charles Jenks in 1970’s. Modern architecture states and has patchy-mention of international style and a building of glass-raised boxes. On the contrary, postmodernism architecture establishes hybrid buildings. And it has local colour association, as Jamezon mentioned.

In 1980, the postmodern architecture was made to come into being by Venice

Biennale in the influential essay, ‘The presence of the past’. Jameson says that the

Italian architect Paolo has revitalized the high modern architect against the programme of modernist (Le Corbusier, Wright, Mics).

Two ‘Jeans’ are seminal philosophers in the scene of postmodernism. One is

Jean Baudrillard. And the other one is Jean Francois Lyotard. Jean Francois Lyotard can also be called the father of postmodernism, because he is said to have given a number of definitions and contributions to the development of postmodernism in the world by producing his book which is seminal. 6

The postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge

Lyotard has explained clearly what is meant by the prefix ‘Post’. The ‘Post’ in postmodernism is not simply that spells out ‘Chronology’; rather it extends its valuable definition.

What Lyotard says is that post may be classified into three indispensable meanings. They are: Inauguration of new art, Humanity, and Ana.

Lyotard argues that the prefix ‘post’ takes a new life - a new direction. In addition to it, he points out that it is a conversation on discourse on a dialogue. The conversation between the modern and the new one is called counter action that has produced postmodernism. The term ‘post’ states historical chronology, performances of the traditional way of practising Christianity and concepts established by the Westernisation. That is why Lyotard says that the first meaning of Post is ‘The Inauguration of New Direction’. The inauguration of new direction takes place in architecture and in some other arts. The newness of the ‘post’ is not to depend on the Westernisation; at the same time it may be the extension of modernism; therefore the ‘newness’ of the ‘post’ is not embracing the surface level meaning of it. Similarly, the newness of new of postmodernism is trans-modernism.

The second meaning of the ‘Post’ is ‘humanity’. Lyotard himself reads out that the modern scientific era is hood-strained. By the advent of techno-scientific world, the sense of humanity is less practised. At all costs, the technocrats, scientists and the writers of modernism had to establish only the ‘universality’ and the 7

‘sameness’ rather than ‘difference’. Lyotard also refers to the place, Auschwitz, where Jew - massacre was perpetrated by Hitler. During the modern period, more scientific developments and mass-killings were done. That is why it is against humanity. In the use of post at the second phase, Lyotard wants to emphasise

‘humanity’. Therefore, humanity is celebrated in postmodernism.

The third place of ‘post’ is ‘ana’ which means ‘analysis’, ‘Anamnesis’. What does it analyze? What is the cause to analyze? What happened? To answer all these three questions, Lyotard used the third phase of meaning that is ‘ana’.

The third ‘post’ analyses what happened and what went wrong in modernism. It also questions some concepts in modernism.

Lyotard concludes the essay ‘Note on the meaning of Post’ in literature that post of postmodernism is not to say that this is not the movement, which welcomes and accepts the situation and contextualizes the previous one.

This thesis endorses the concept and the ideology of revitalization of modernism and re-examination of modernism. Besides, Lyotard centers his ideas of the ‘newness’ of new of post in the first place to give the meaning for the prefix

‘post’.

Therefore at this stage, it is better to understand what is ‘Post’ in postmodernism.

For the definition of postmodernism, myriads of writers and critics have contributed. But Jean Francois Lyotard has given as clear as crystal that is 8 panoptically accepted. He adds that knowledge lies in the form of narration. If the narration is difficult to maintain the state of its proper definition or disseminating, narration is falling.

Lyotard says, “I define postmodern as incredulity towards metaphysical narratives” (Postmodern Condition XXIV).

This definition is well-known to define what is postmodernism. He speaks of

‘metanarratives’. Metanarratives do not mean merely the technique of narration, but it is a nihilistic approach towards Marxism. Marxism stands for universality and is based on dialectical materialism. What Lyotard says is meta-narratives that strictly adhere to western religious dogmaticities, authoritarianism, authenticity, claiming reason and all other ‘strictness’. Metanarratives can also be called ‘grand narratives’. Meta-narration spells out that individual creativity is restricted.

Individual freedom is constrained; that is why Lyotard gives ‘humanity’ for the second meaning to the prefix ‘post’ in postmodernism. The antonymic word for meta-narratives is ‘little narratives’. Little narrative embraces the individual feelings and ‘creativity’.

It is said that little one is better than bigger one. The book Libidinal Economy

(1974) written by Lyotard is more influential on postmodernism that attacks

Marxism and other authoritative narrations. The ‘local disorder’ is celebrated by the rejection of ‘universal order’. As the universal order occupies a higher place, the 9 individual’s ‘disorder’ so called ‘creativity’ is lost. Therefore, ‘creativity’ is accepted in postmodernism.

That is why Baudrillard says, postmodernism is ‘anything’ it goes: which clearly explains to the people about anything it goes is any ‘event’ that happens in the world it accepts; the term ‘acceptance’ is befallen in the postmodern condition.

Jean Francois Lyotard mainly establishes himself in explaining meta- narratives and advocating ‘little narrative’ and the reintroduction to the sublime. To amplify the voice of Lyotard, Jean Baudrillard contributes himself in capstones of three major concepts that are:

 Simulations / Simulacra,

 The hyper real, and

 The implosion of meaning (Lane 2000: 2).

1. Simulations: For simulation he argues the image on the picture seems more

real than the real one. So the artificiality makes one feel the absence of the

very real experience. To give a more vivid picture of simulation, Baudrillard

states three phases:

a) The counterfeit - this stage explains that a structure or a system of

‘classicalism’ moves from Renaissance to Industrial revolution and that

domineering mode destroys reality.

b) Production - this phase signifies the ‘industrial age’ which produces

infinite reproducible things. It is mainly facing mass production. 10

c) Simulation - this term simulation reads out that there is ‘no’ and proper

relationship ‘with’ or ‘to’ reality. This leads to ‘hyper reality’.

2. Hyper Real: This term shows the ‘loss of the real’. It is a collusion of the real

and the image. Advertisements on Television, the image of refined things and

the reality are lost. Baudillard exemplifies ‘Disneyland in America’.

3. The Implosion of meaning: Taking a cue from this, the implosion of meaning

is a meaning of determined concepts but it is a ‘play’. Because the

aforementioned two terms also point out the third concept of implosion of

meaning.

Therefore postmodernism celebrates ‘the presence of absence’. Leslie Fiedler, an

American critic has published one influential essay entitled ‘Cross the Border Close the Gap’. In that essay Leslie Fiedler has given three important elements in the postmodern literature. These elements are:

 The Western

 Science Fiction

 Pornography.

In the essay in the first part ‘Close the Gap Cross the Border’, to which he mentions the earliest English novels such as Robinson Crusoe and Pamela. In

Robinson Crusoe one can find the adventurous events that stand for something interesting and unreal. Again that ‘event’ is presented in literature after several years in a new paradigm. And then Fiedler takes the three postmodern elements 11 above mentioned and he matches the modern novels or olden novels. This kind of process becomes ‘Closes the gap’.

Therefore, ‘the western’ implies that it is not the westernization in philosophy, art and literature. But the western implies that the ‘Red Indian’ and their life and enjoyment.

The second element ‘science fiction’ signifies that it is also one of the major elements in postmodern novels. When one reads the novel or work based on science functionality, he/she can have some unreality and draw pleasure.

The third element is everywhere found among the young world.

‘Pornography’ makes people feel something interesting, because, this kind of tendency is from one ‘Psyche’. According to postmodernism, psychic feelings and its tendencies are to be given top priority. This element probably stands for ‘mass- culture’.

The ‘Age of Eliot’ was over Leslie Fiedler announced in 1969, replaced by

the popular culture of American youth with its science fiction, westerns and

poronography. (Peter Brooker 1996: 83)

T. S. Eliot is one of the most influential writers in modern art especially in literature. Especially his poem ‘The Waste Land’ is a typical example for modernism. 12

Eliotization in literature is de-eliotized in literature by the emergence of pop art popular culture. Recently, the postmodern condition is based on media space and the rejection of ‘deo space’ and ‘cyber punk’ (David Bell 2007: 62).

Media space and Deospace are used by the anthropologist Arjun Appadurai - media space is equivalent to ‘relativism’. Deospace is equivalent to ‘meta narratives’. Cyber punk is another quasi-genre in science fiction. It originated in

1980’s associated with Gibson, Bruce Sterling. Cyber punk is fully concentrated on new technologies, especially computers and virtual reality. Therefore, it is better comprehended that the postmodern condition is illusion, hyper reality and presence of absence.

In all the art, the concept of beauty would be dominating. The conventional way of domineering aspect is beauty but the postmodern art is does not accept mostly the concepthood of beauty. Umberto Eco points out that postmodernism is defined by its inter-textuality and knowingness and by its relation to the past - which postmodernism revisits at any historical moment with irony (Raman Seldon

2005: 209).

Inter-textuality is also one of the elements in postmodern literature. The relation between present and the past with irony is a parody. Because, what postmodern condition says is that every creator is subjective interpreter. The writing of history is also based on subjectivism. Therefore, the historicity in the history and a novel which has historical narration are parodied. Some critics and novelists are 13 central to the postmodern world. Thomas Pynchon, Ishmael Reed and John Barth are from America. John Fowles, Italo Calvino, Salman Rushdie and Umberto Eco are from Europe. Fredric Jameson, Jurgan Habemas, Hutcheon and Hassan are the intellectual critics.

In the scene of higher intellectualism, postmodern great thinkers Derrida,

Focault, Barthes, Delueze, Guttarie and Lacan, through their writings and seminal books have shown the other side of the world.

Patricia Waugh is also accepting the voice of Lyotard by giving a new term

‘new humanism’. The second meaning by Lyotard is adopted.

It is better to say that postmodernism celebrates not ‘has’, ‘have’, or ‘got’,

Postmodernism celebrates the principle of Schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is not in the real term used in psychology. As Jameson puts Schizophrenia is “an experience of isolated, disconnected, discontinuous material signifiers which fail to like up into a coherent sequence” (Connor 2004: 49).

What Jameson points out is that Schizophrenia is a split personality. It has no relation between thought and action which shows lack of cohesiveness, and irregularity; therefore he says that ‘it’ has not logical continuity and relation between past, present and the future. There is no room for ‘the self identity’. Here only Baudrillard’s concept of ‘anything it goes’. The ‘it’ and ‘it’, ‘has’, by having all these, there are ‘diplo-its’ - which means ‘two its’. The first ‘its’ refers to the 14 action of schizophrenia in postmodern world. The second ‘its’ refers to the postmodern condition which accepts anything.

In the postmodern condition, Lyotard clearly explains the problems in modernism. As far as Lyotard is concerned, modernism has got the domineering modes. That is divided into two:

 Metaphysics

 Enlightenment (Postmodern Condition 1: 29-30)

1. Metaphysics - means that the mythical structure myth and metaphysics are the

henchtolls to narrate. Myth and metaphysics say that God has created the

universe. God directs the people according to their wish. This kind of narration

is given through myth and metaphysics. People create myth but in reverse the

myth creates the people. This process is called ‘structuring’. Structuring in the

society is a meta-narrative. People’s freedom and their wishes are determined

by metaphysics and structure. Postmodernism has disappeared metaphysics.

2. Enlightenment Project - Though Lyotard accepts Enlightenment Project, he

has a little contrary elements in it. He has acknowledged that the emancipation

has showered in human beings, because, mythical bondage and more scientific

development de-humanized. This sort of development has led to the

emergence of psychology and the ammunition, atomic bomb inventions

(Postmodern Condition 29). 15

For many critics postmodernism is against ‘foundationalism’. Lyotard himself says in the Postmodern Condition: “Lamenting the ‘Loss it meaning’ in postmodernity by boiling down is mourning the fact that knowledge is no longer principally narrative” (Postmodern Condition 26).

The higher degree use of the word ‘principally’ which is itself an anti- foundationalism principle is a structure. If something is principally narrated, that is where the sense of ‘individuality’ is lost. Creativity fails to sprout out. The unprincipled way of narration is called ‘fragmentation’. Not only is Lyotard talking about ‘narration’ but most of pro-post modernists also perform it. Narration is not a mere executed action but it is a technique. Therefore technique may take a lion’s share to determine its content in postmodern literature in the advent of the technique of ‘untechnicality’. If postmodernism is alive it is because of the blood of ‘re’, ‘de’,

‘neo’, ‘post’, ‘plurality’, ‘heterogenity’ and ‘difference’ - these concepts are the basic tools for the development of postmodernism: a) Plurality of meaning in a text, b) Heterogeneity in culture, and c) Difference in narration and ideologies.

In the essay ‘Is the post - in postmodernism the post in - postcolonial’,

Appiah uncovers that postmodernism is not a culture or era but it is a condition found ubiquitously. It is not to be epoch making. As he states in his own language:

Postmodern culture is the culture in which all postmodernism operate,

sometimes in synergy, sometimes in competition and because contemporary

culture is, in a certain sense to which I shall return, transnational, postmodern 16

culture is global - through that emphatically does not mean that it is the

culture of every person in the world” (Mongia 1996: 59).

As the above mentioned quote speaks out, it is ‘global’, ‘transnational’.

Postmodernism is not only in America or European countries, but also prevalent even in India, Canada and other nations. It is better to say that postmodernism celebrates the tension of ideologies, tension of identity, politics of thoughts.

Postmodern culture is not to mention unwittingly that it is meant for only pop culture and mass-culture. Postmodern critics do not accept the Holocaust. Not only the holocaust, but also the atomic or other bombardment is the cause for the development of the postmodernism. The holocaust destroys the environment.

Recently postmodernism has evolved eco-based literature. The paradigm shift is nature vs. culture.

Culture is meant for the act of anthropocentrism. Nature is for eco- centricism. People now are living in one step ahead that is eco-based criticism and theory. Under these perspectives, postmodernism views the world with humanistic sense against the holocaust and ecological devastation. Postmodernism itself has more concern over ecology. This postmodernity must be revisited in the world, not for the sake of pop culture but for the sake of good condition in the ecological system.

In Postmodern Literary Theory: An Introduction (1997), Lucy has stated that the Department of English has been transmogrified into the department of cultural 17 studies. In addition, he has explained literary theory is the ‘queen’ of the humanity.

‘Humanity’ - this term is now dominating in most of the literary works and other social discourses. Again it is better to be said that the second meaning given by

Lyotard for ‘Post’ is prevalent.

Postmodern world accepts any type of film and actors. In this part

Baudrillard is the central figure in postmodern film. Baudillard speaks that the real world is lost, because in his book Simulations he talks about hyper-reality.

Baudrillard’s famous four conceptions for the postmodern film:

1. Traditional mimetick function

2. Marxist conception

3. Absence of basicality

4. No relation to reality.

As Shakespeare says, nothing comes out of nothing; the traditional mimetic theory on function must be the basic for all production. It needs no further explanation. Marxist conception is nothing but the ‘ideological one’. As Louis

Althuser, one of the leading Marxist critics, says ‘Ideological State Apparatus’ - ideology dominates; when it dominates, there is a total loss of reality. The absence of basic reality, spells out too much of hyperbolic action in which people are watching and enjoying more and more. The last one with no relation to reality is a product of literature and thought are like Schizophrenia. 18

Even in India also postmodern film is dominating the people; for instance, it is an amalgamation of the classical music with western dance and vice-versa.

As Heisenberg says the observer or observing instrument and observed cannot be separated, which signifies that the observer and observed are one and the same. That is why postmodern literature says that everything is ‘the subjective’.

According to postmodern concepts, literature is not an autonomous body. It is a body of floating and producing in all the fields such as reflecting, music, art and politics etc.

Ihab Hassan (1925) is sometimes called the pioneer of postmodern critic. He only clearly does the dichotomy between modernism and postmodernism. He gives the two seminal terms ‘immanence’ and ‘indeterminacy’.

Hassan is a leading American postmodern critic. He points out that postmodernism celebrates the following major categories that are: 1. Playful,

2. Fragmentary, 3. Self-reflectivity, and 4. Self-referential (www.shitennoji.ac.j p 383).

To the theory of postmodernism Hassan has contributed more in the field of postmodernism. He terms Para-criticism. In Greek, ‘para’ which means besides, fault tales etc. Hassan himself says that it is to denote ‘multivocation’ and

‘tentativeness’ and it will not stick on to sameness or one idea. And he says beyond the conventional orthodoxy; besides he says ‘playful’, ‘discontinuity’ Hassan clearly defends his term para criticism with telling that it is totally against the 19 impersonality, the objectivity and the uncommitted. Therefore the critic’s role is a

‘duality’ and ‘dubiosity’.

In The Disemberment of Orpheus, Hassan has listed the difference between modern elements and postmodern elements as follows. He has classified all these elements according to various fields like, anthropology, political science, theology, literary theory and cultural studies. On the contrary, the clear-cut dichotomy between modernism and postmodernism has some analogy between them. It can be found in some of the postmodern and modern literature. The following dichotomies are:

Modernism Postmodernism Romaniticism / Symbolism Pataphysics / Dadaism Form (conjunctive, closed) Antiform (disjunctive, open) Purpose Play Design Chance Hierachy anarchy Mastery / Logos Exhaustion / Silaence Art Object / Finished Work Process / Performance / Happening Distance Participation Creation / Totalization Decreation / Deconstruction Synthesis Antithesis Presence Absence Centering Dispersal Genre / Boundary Text / Intertext Semanties Rhetoric 20

Modernism Postmodernism Paradigm Syntagm Hypotaxis Parataxis Metaphor Metonymy Selection Combination Root / Depth Rhizome / Surface Interpretation / Reading Against Interpretation / Misreading Signified Signifier Lisible (Readerly) Scriptible (Writerly) Narrative / Grande Histoire Anti-narrative / Petite Histoire Master Code Idiolect Symptom Desire Type Mutant Genital / Phallic Polymorphous / Androgynous Paranoia Schizophernia Origin / Cause Difference - Difference / Trace God the Father The Holy Ghost Metaphysics Irony Determinancy Indeterminacy Transcendence Immanence

The tendencies may lead to a perfect understanding of postmodernism. The postmodern tendencies are given by Ihab Hassan:

i) Indeterminacy / Indeterminacies

ii) Immanences 21

‘Indeterminacy’ is meant by Hassan in producing a number of concepts such as: discontinuity, heterodoxy, pluralism, randomness, ambiguity, deconstruction, disinterment, re-definition and all these concepts tend to question the constructivism.

‘Immanences’ is meant by Hassan in giving concepts such as dissemination, interplay, communication, inter-dependence. The concepthoods of ‘interminancy’ and ‘immanences’ are the major concepts of postmodernism. According to Hassan, some important critics and writers are there in various fields: In the essay, ‘Towards a Concept of Postmodernism’ (The Postmodern Turn, 1987) most important authors are listed out in different fields:

Philosophy

 Jacques Derrida

 Jean - Francois Lyotard

History

 Michel Foucault

 Hayden White

Psychoanalysis

 Jacques Lacan

 Gilles Deleuze

 R. D. Lanig

 Normal O. Brown 22

Political Philosophy

 Herbert Marcuse

 Jean Baudrillard

 Jurgan Habermas

Philosophy of Science

 Thomas Kuhn

 Paul Feycrabend

Dance

 Merce Cunningham

 Alwin Nikolais

 John Cage

 Karlheinz Stockhausen

 Robert Rauschenberg

 Jean Tinguely

 Joseph Beuys

Architecture

 Robert Venturi

 Charles Jencks

 Brent Bolin

Literary Theory

 Roland Barthes

 Julia Kristeva 23

 Wolf Gang Iser

 The Yale Critics

(www.mariabuszek.com)

Among all the classifications the highly dominating schools are philosophy, cultural theory, literary history and psychoanalysis, because mostly people are bound in those fields. They take any one of the schools in their life. Relativism is the postmodern condition. Hassan meticulously has given some crucial elements: Play,

Parody, Pastiche and Pluralism.

Postmodernism and Literature

If modernism is epistemological, postmodernism is ontological. Postmodern art or literature has no strict form, whatever may take place in events or happenings, because the term itself is an anti-foundationalism. In one phase Marxism itself embraces the quality and characteristic of postmodernism.

Postmodern artists find it difficult to create their own new form or identity and new perspectives.

“They operate as bricoleurs ... and takes the form of pastiche” (Connor 2004:

48). Constable explains that ‘bricoleurs’ which mean that the process of ‘recycling’ of the yester works of styles or movements. This type of artifact can be called

‘inter-textuality’. It takes the extreme stage, which is lying to produce ‘pastiche’.

Bricolage is a term used by anthropologist, Levi-strauss, to state ‘primitive man’.

Derrida also adopts the same word ‘Bricolage’ - he means fragments, inter-texts and 24 influences. The postmodern people and critics take up this form for the idea of knowledge which is more fragmented and not organized.

Pastiche

Pastiche is the most popular element in postmodernism. Science fiction, detective stories and others are called pastiche in the postmodern literature.

The Name of the Rose and The New York Trilogy are very famous examples for postmodern pastiche.

Fragmentation

Fragmentation means conclusively giving the open-ended and multiple ending. It is not because of writing but also the interplay of works in the terms of

Saussure signifiers. Fragmentation is not only in the thematic level, but also in the technique level. The technique means the narrative technique or the fusing of ideas and themes in one basket at the fragmentary level. Fragmentation may mean the attitude of schizophrenic world.

Postmodernist Schools

Postmodernist schools are Post-structuralism, Deconstruction, Feminism,

Post-colonialism, New Historicism and so on.

Post-structuralism

Post-structuralism and postmodernism reject ‘realism’. Post-structuralism is a movement. It was established in France by Roland Barthes in 1950. This theory is based on the linguistic theory of Saussure. After Roland Bathes, it was adopted and 25 widely practised by Derrida. Post-structuralism was a movement; then it became a technique to interpret and analyze a work of art. It has decentred the mythical criticism and structuralism. It mainly remarks about the signifiers in a text. And it takes a grudge against the ‘signified’ in a literary text. Structuralism and its practice is itself a sort of Post-structuralist tendency. Post-structuralism has another movement. Clearly it can be stated as ‘Deconstruction’.

Deconstruction

This term deconstruction came into existence from 1882. In various ways deconstruction is practiced by Jacques Derrida. Deconstruction has effaced the metaphysics and its characterization. De Man has deconstructed many texts in the literary field. In the practice of deconstruction (aporia) binary oppositions are major tools. Deconstruction reads out that it is used to dig out ‘What is unread?’.

Miller says that deconstruction is not to dismantle a structure of a text and it is used to say that it is already dismantled by itself (Wolfreys 2001: 124). If readers read a text intellectually, they come to know that it is already deconstructed.

‘Heterogeneity’ appreciated rather than ‘homogeneity’. Deconstruction is a technique in the postmodern world.

Feminism

Feminism is a movement, which is popularized by de Beauvoir in

The Second Sex. She takes her re-active principle from Existentialism. The ‘Other- self’ is to be destroyed by the effacement of the higher degree of the self: the self- 26 signifies male-chauvinism. She establishes that there is no significant difference between man and woman. Feminism is not to devalue man or be against the man, but it seeks for the equal rights from men. In 1929, A Room of One’s Own written by Virginia Wolf, she describes the socio-cultural restriction to women. Feminism has developed in a new field called eco-feminism. Eco-feminism is feminism which has relationship with nature. Both nature and females are dominated with a special relation to nature. This movement has added support to feminism.

In the Bible, God created the environment and other plants; then his creation goes to the human beings. What this type of creation spells out is that the top priority goes to save the environment. Without the environment no human beings can live. This statement speaks that environment must be protected. Postmodernism is not accepting the mechanical and technological word, but reducing the annihilation of environment, problem and issues. Therefore eco-based literature is also one of the major fields and themes and techniques in the interpretation of postmodernism. There are postmodern fiction, poetry, novel, drama and the like.

Among these genres, postmodern novels are taken into this study.

Post-colonialism

Post-colonialism is also one of the branches under postmodernism. It is better understood that the postmodernism is not a separate entity, but it has and gives more conceptualities. Post-colonialism has again given birth to the literature of Common Wealth and subaltern literature. Homi K. Bhabha’s The Location of 27

Culture is a seminal book for post-colonialism, because it produces ‘hybridity’.

Post-colonialism is not to redominate the colonized but to get the freedom in their native land.

New Historicism

New Historicism is a movement as well as a technique to analyze and interpret especially the Shakespearean studies especially and renaissance studies

Louis Montrose and Stephen Greenbelt are seminal figures in the field of New

Historicism. Stephen Greenbelt is considered as the father of New Historicism. New historicism is to redefine history in literature. In postmodern literature themes and techniques are going neck and neck to interpret a work of art.

In Postmodern literature, especially, in fiction, McHale has argued that postmodernist fiction represents a conceptual shift in emphasis from

‘epistemological’ dominant of modernism to the ‘Ontological’ dominant of postmodernism (Tim Woods 2010: 58).

In culture and literature postmodernism has evaluated a few indispensable elements:

1. Historical narratives are redefined with the distancement of subjective

narration in the traditional narrativity.

2. The linguistic fixation in meaning is in determinacy. It produces

deconstruction.

3. Culture of orthodoxy is redefined by the embracement of pop-culture.

4. Plurality of meaning and peoples’ instant enjoyment are appreciated. 28

In The Beginning Postmodernism, Tim Wood has summarized some characteristics of postmodern fiction:

1. A pre-occupation with the viability of systematic representation.

2. The decentering of the subject by discursive systems, and the inscriptions of

multiple fictive selves.

3. Narrative fragmentation and narrative Reflexivity; narratives which double

lack on their own presuppositions;

4. An open-ended play with formal devices and narration artifice, in which

narrative self-consciously alludes to its own artifice, thus challenging some of

the pre-supposition of literary realism.

5. An interrogation of the ontological bases of and commotions between

animating and subjectivity.

6. An abolition of the cultural divide between high and popular forms of culture

embracing all in a ménage.

7. An exploration of ways in which narrative mediates and...... ???? (Wood

2010: 66).

The elements found in these postmodern fictions are:

1. Self-reflexivity

2. Historiographic meta-fiction

3. Meta-fiction 29

4. Parody

5. Fragmentation

6. Non-linear narration

7. Deconstructive reading of text

8. Pastiche

9. Neo-satire

In this thesis, Thomas Pynchon’s novel The Crying of Lot 49, Salman Rushdie’s

The Midnight’s Children and Shashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel are taken up to analyse the above stated elements and techniques and meanings critically.

Thomas Pynchon was born on 8th May 1937 in United States. He is an

American novelist. Even though he had studied Engineering Physics, he also studied in Arts and Science College. Pynchon is not only a novelist, but also a short story writer. He published stories in the selection journals like, ‘The Small Rain’,

‘Entropy’ and ‘Under the Rose’. Pynchon has written many works such as V, The

Crying of Lot 49 and Gravity’s Rainbow, etc. The Crying of Lot 49 is one of the best examples of postmodernism. The novel V is acclaimed that it is a fragmentation and consists of two tales. The Crying of Lot 49 is a novel which is a good example of postmodernism. It is a metafiction.

The metafictionality is found both in The Crying of Lot 49 and

The Gravity’s Rainbow. According to Leslie Fiedler, ‘science fiction’,

‘pornography’ and ‘the western’ are predominant elements in postmodern literature. 30

In that manner science fiction is traced out in The Gravity’s Rainbow. Besides, it deals with metanovelity like The Crying of Lot 49. The Gravity’s Rainbow portrays multi-science like rocket, science, and physics and others. In The Crying of Lot 49, the absence of character and inducting element are given. Oedipa is not able to know what is happening to her, when she is in search of fortune, because she is also the legacy of inveracity. This novel is purely based on giving pleasure to the audience and it mocks at the people’s living condition in California. Wherever

Oedipa is in search of someone or something, she is not able to find out and she could not realize what happens to her.

In The Gravity’s Rainbow, one comes to know how people are counteracting to the technological world and how they are immersed with it. In some aspects The

Gravity’s Rainbow presents anti-humanism by means of showing the complexity of different sort of fields. This novel is an allegorical one to narrate about the V-2 rockets, which were sent during the final months of the Second World War.

Dehumanization of character and parodic mode of narration are also some of the elements in postmodern fictions. Metafiction can lead to two elements such as romance and science fiction. In these two novels the above said elements are prevalent. These are the novels of American postmodernism The Gravity’s Rainbow is constructed fully from the scientific words, psychosexual therapy and Cybernetics and etc. 31

Sir Ahmed Salman Rushdie was born on 19th June 1947. He is a novelist mixed with the culture of England and India. His second novel The Midnight’s

Children is very influential and vital as a post-modern and a post-colonial fiction. It got Booker Prize in 1981. Rushdie interest in most of his novels is the performance of the term ‘magical realism’. He mostly focuses on historicity, functionality and the connection between Eastern and Western culture in the context of Indianism.

Satire is redefined in the post-coloniality and post-modernity. This idealism can be found in The Great Indian Novel also. This novel was awarded the best of bookers in 2008.

The Midnight’s Children can be considered a postmodern novel. In its narrative technique it comes under non-linear narration. The forms and techniques are not in a cohesive order. It has gone haywire in its narration. The Midnight’s

Children is a mock epic genre and there is an identity crisis of Adam.

The Midnight’s Children is also a meta-fiction. According to Patricia Waugh,

“Meta-fiction is a term given to fictional writing which self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as an artifact in order to pose questions about the relationship between fiction and reality.” Thus the author of meta-fiction undermines the illusion of the fictional world.

The Midnight’s Children is also called a historiographic meta-fiction, because it talks about the history between 1947 and 1978. Mostly the postmodern writers mock at the systems and conventional practices in life. Especially they have 32 mocked at history, which means the serious study of history. But the aim of rehistorizing the historyis to mock at the historical experiences and the postmodern history is used to interweave the subjectivity in history. This is what Salman

Rushdie has practised in The Midnight’s Children.

The Midnight’s Children is to depict the history of the nation to replicate the personal life of Saleem Sinai. Another important perspective in postmodernism is ‘inter-textuality’. The Midnight’s Children reverberates Gunter Grass’s

The Tin Drum. The Midnight’s Children is an allegory, which chronicles the history of modern India. It has a magic realist fantasy with postmodern reflection upon narrative.

Shashi Tharoor, an Indian writer, was born on 9th March 1956. He took many higher officiate positions. Now he is a member of the Indian parliament. He assisted the UN Secretary General Kofi Annan at United States. He was born in

London but his nationality is India. He is a key political figure in the Congress party. Among his publications, The Great Indian Novel is the primary one to perform the function of a postmodern novel. It won the Common Wealth Writers

Prize in 1991. This novel is a parody of Indian history and inter-textuality as in The

Midnight’s Children.

Shashi Tharoor is an Anglo-Indian writer. The Great Indian Novel is a historiographic meta-fiction and it is in the perspective of inter-textuality. Inter- textuality and meta-fiction are the key basic elements in most of the postmodern 33 novels. The Great Indian Novel is a kind of an Indian epic. It is to satirize India’s political history and nationalist movements. It is traced out that this novel is about the retelling of the history of India through the Mahabharata. In this novel there are eight books.

In the Mahabharata the narrator is Veda Vyas. In The Great Indian Novel the narrator is Veda Vyas (VV). In his novel, each chapter is like one book. The novel consists of eighteen books. Each book’s title is replicating the other one that celebrates inter-textuality. The Bhagavad Gita consists of eighteen books. For instance, in his novel the sixth book is entitled, ‘Forbidden Fruit’ with the biblical and Miltonic echoes. The eighth book refers to Salman Rushdie’s The Midnight’s

Children. Tharoor mocks at the history of modern India through the employment of fiction with the characterization of historical and political figures. In applying deconstructive reading and misreading the text, it becomes an ahistorical and an apolitical novel. Since misreading is applied to deconstruct the ideas, it comes under postmodernist novel.

Postmodernism is a broad term in the society. This thesis is tended not to dig out new ideas but to present a critical study of the postmodern themes and techniques in the select novels. All the select novels are by skilled post modern writers. The postmodern elements are inter-textuality, historiographic meta-fiction, absence of character, science fiction, the western and pornography and other elements. These elements are critically viewed in the select novels stated above. 34

Very often any reader can come across these dominant terms such as historiography meta-fiction and inter-textuality. Among the novels, two are Indian novels

(The Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel) and the one is an American novel (The Crying of Lot 49). To give further information to this critical study, the two Indian postmodern novels are of rehistorizing in a postmodernist history, and it is like a mock epic series and the other one is by an American writer and it reflects upon the postmodern history and science fiction.

_____

Chapter-I

POSTMODERN THEMES AND TECHNIQUE IN THE CRYING OF LOT 49 . .

The Crying of Lot 49 is the best and notable example of Postmodern fiction

and the shortest of Pynchon’s novels. This novel deals with the conflict between the

mail distribution companies, Thuren and Taxis and the Trystero (or Tristero).

Pynchon has adopted a scholarly technique, that is, he is not directly giving the

information in the novel but he involves the readers to search for the meaning and

cull out the message from the text. It is once again upto the readers to find out the

swing between the real and the imaginary world.

Oedipa Mass, the Protogonist, almost becomes a detective and begins to

unravel the conspiracy in southern California. Actually, she starts her quest for

finding out her ex-boyfriend’s holding. Later, many characters in this novel too try

to find the same. In the reader’s opinion, the characters in the text are in search of

the property which really does not exist. This is the important aspect of

postmodernism. People seriously involve/indulge in a search which they are not

sure of.

One ought to know the complex and ambigious contemporary issues of the

text to understand the parody in Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. The novel begins

with the ambivalent atmosphere. Oedipa, the protagonist and a homemaker in

America, sets out to investigate the holdings of her ex-lover, Pierce Inverarity, but

36 she ends up discovering the underground organization named Tristero working in subversion to the V. S. Mail.

Oedipa is treated indifferently by some of the men, whom she comes in contact with, starting from Mucho Mass, Oedipa’s husband, who is the least bothered about Oedipa’s quest. Then, Driblette, the play director questions

Opedipa’s tenaciousness on Mike Fallopian, who she thinks would disclose more about W.A.S.T.E. mail system.

This text is the narration of painful efforts undertaken by Oedipa in order to find Tristero’s presence in America through studying various textual variations and corruption and many personal interview with men. But all her efforts in resolving the issues end up in magnifying the same till the end of the text. The tedious efforts, which she has taken up to unknot the mystery, finally lead her to doubt her own sanity. Pynchon ends up the novel abruptly without any proper conclusion.

In The Crying of Lot 49, the author makes the readers come across several passages where some of the serious issues are comically interrogated. The text begins with Oedipa’s quest for Pierce’s property but as the story proceeds she involves herself in investigation and finding out the truth of the clues she comes across.

All the scattered clues make the reader arrive at a secret system named

‘Tristero’. 37

The Tristero system in its present-day manifestation is that underground

America made up of all the ‘disinherited’ - racial minorities, homosexuals,

the poor, the mad, the lonely and the frightened. It also contains

revolutionaries from both extremes of the political spectrum who are crazily

dedicated to the overthrow of the present society. which Oedipa “Traces back to the 16th century Europe when it started as a rival group to the Thurn and Taxis postal system, later coming over to America at the time of the Civil War” (V and V2, p. 40).

A strange contradiction exists in the text along with the element of fantasy.

It is not clear whether Tristero really exists or not, in the same way, whether Oedipa is hallucinating everything or it is a game to fool Oedipa Mass by her ex-lover,

Pierce Inverarity. According to Rosemary Jackson, “A fantastic mode, structured upon contradiction upon an ‘impossibility becomes, a disturbingly appropriate medium in Pynchon’s texts to represent the fullness and emptiness of secularized culture” (Fantasy: The Literature of subversion, p. 169).

Pynchon takes his readers in the state of confusion whether the events happen in real world or in an imaginary world or somewhere in between the two.

The place projected in The Crying of Lot 49 is slightly a different America. It is not exactly the real existing America. Pynchon portrays a utopian place, where Oedipa begins her quest and finally ends up without unveiling the mysterious things which she comes across and without finding out the properties of her ex-lover. To the 38 readers, all the events occur in an imaginary world of Oedipa Mass, because while adhering / nearing the discovery of Tristero, she says “Shall I project a world?” (p.

56). This is a clue for the readers that Oedipa is presenting a new world. But it is not altogether an imaginary world. There is a slight touch of contemporary America, because Tristero is a symbol seen among the minority culture.

In this text, there is a symbolic religious element. It is not presented outwardly or directly but the major character, Oedipa, has this experience. Before her quest begins, there is a hint given to the readers, “She was to have all manner of revelation” (p. 12), then her experience in San Narciso states the same, “…there were to both outward patterns a hieroglyphic (hieroglypic means sacred religious writing) sense of concealed meaning of intent to communicate.” (p. 15). “She and

Chevy seemed parked at centre of an odd, religious instant” (p. 15). In this page the narrator deals with her religious experience.

According to Mendelson, the significance of forty-ninth Lot is:

Pentecost is the Sunday seven weeks after Easter – forty-nine days. But the

word Pentecost derives from the Greek for ‘fiftieth’. The crying – the

auctioneer’s calling – of the forty-ninth lot is the moment before a Pentecost

revelation, the end of the period in which the miracle is in a state of potential,

not yet manifest.

Finding the reality of Tristero-maker, Oedipa gets exhausted and her contacts with various men in finding the mystery of Tristero ends up in vain, making her highly 39 exhausted. In the state of exhaustion, she comes across the underground world, where she sees downtrodden people belonging to various cultures calmly waiting for Tristero’s empire.

In California, Oedipa comes to know that for the alienated Americans, that are for drug addicts, anarchists, homosexuals, Alameda country Death cult and so on, the only source of communication is Tristero. These isolated people believe that

Tristero’s Empire will restore the post-war America from its social evils. Her visit to underworld seems a new path for unveiling the secrecy of Tristero but her visit meets a monotonous ending that is making the mystery of Tristero more complex and highly mysterious. The fruit of her visit is nothing but making her more tired.

This night’s profusion of post horn, this malignant, deliberate replication,

was their way of beating up. They knew her pressure points, and the ganglia

of her optimism, and one by one, pinch by precision pinch, they were

immobilizing her. (p. 85)

Here, Pynchon makes the readers feel that he is untying the complex knot but later the readers come to know that he is not untying the knot but adding one more knot to make it further complex.

Dreams of Oedipa Mass enhance the complexity of the text as well as her quest. Oedipa has the habit of hallucination, which is treated by a Psychiatrist,

Dr. Hilarius. Pynchon says this ahead “What fragments of dreams came had to do 40 with the post horn. Later, possibly, she would have troubled sorting the night into real and dreamed” (p. 81).

She is haunted by nightmares,

She fell asleep almost at once, but kept waking from a nightmare about

something in the mirror, across from her bed. Nothing specific, only a

possibility, nothing she could see. When she finally did settle into sleep, she

dreamed that Mucho, her husband, was making love to her on a soft white

beach that was not part of any California she knew. When she woke in the

morning, she was sitting both upsight, staring into the mirror at her own

exhausted face. (p. 69, 70)

Oedipa’s adventure in finding the truth of Tristero makes her meet various layers of people with different mentality and class, which make her aware of the contemporary America which is almost unfit to live because of the filthy atmosphere and decaying morality as the result of the post World War.

Pynchon presents one of the dimensions of America, where an ageing night- watchman nibbles at an Ivory bar soap. Through this character Pynchon reveals the pathetic living condition of the poor in America. These poor people would consume anything to subdue their hunger because of their poverty. Oedipa Mass comes across a strange place that is homosex bar, which is named as the Greek Hay.

Homosex bar represents the decaying morality prevailing in America. 41

Oedipa suffers in the brutal clutches of evil society, which is corrupted with depravity, social inequality and vulgarity of thought and expression. The protagonist is treated only as an object of sex by the men whom she comes across, like her lawyer, Rosemen; her co-executor, Metzger; and the inventor of Maxwell’s

Demon, John Nefastis. Roseman, Metzger and John Nefastis use Oedipa to fulfil their sexual desire in the process of helping her in her quest and finding out the mystery of Tristero.

There are many evidences in this text that Oedipa is hallucinating. She is not in her normal mental state. Oedipa’s tired some quests for Tristero makes her abnormal and even it makes her feel insane. She asks her Psychotherapist, Dr.

Hilarius to tell her that she was dreaming and there exists nothing called Tristero and she feels that she is badly in need of rest (p. 91). The same idea probes up in her mind during her night walk in San Francisco: “She had only to drift tonight, at random, and watch nothing happen, to be convinced it was purely nervous, a little something for her shrink to fix” (p. 75).

Pynchon presents the mental imbalance of people, who suffocate and who cannot accept the reality of contemporary America. Such people would start dreaming and hallucinating for the simple reason of escaping from the strenuous reality of life, and this is a stage before becoming insane. Oedipa is presented as a nominee of such people. 42

Most of the Americans suffer from this problem because they are isolated from the society. Especially, after the World War, people started to believe in

Darwin’s Theory. As a result, they started questioning the religion. Thus the religious belief among people slowly began to diminish. In addition to this, the impermanency of life during this period paved the way for the immoral life of many

Americans. Because of the extra marital affairs, many illegitimate children were born. These children were deprived of their rights, identity and individuality.

The people who have lost their identity, who are denied of love, who have been suppressed for a long time, who are alienated from the society and who cannot express their feeling and emotions are the people who mostly have nightmares and they seek the remedy for this in the form of taking drugs. Thus they become victims of narcotics till the end of their lives.

One such character in this text is Mucho Mass, the husband of Oedipa Mass.

He suffers because of his nightmares while working as a used-car salesman. Though he has changed his profession as disc jockey, he is hunted by the conscience of his profession. He had many sleepless nights which made him feel that he is nothing.

His continuous mental crises about his profession made his life filled with voidness.

Oedipa begins her quest, and so leaves Mucho alone; thus Mucho is deprived of

Oedipa’s love too. So, he is altogether alienated. Hence, he becomes the victim of

LSD and leaves Oedipa towards the end of the text. 43

Even Roseman, Oedipa’s family lawyer, had many sleepless nights.

Roseman has cultivated a special interest on Perry Mason television programme. He wanted to become a successful trial lawyer at once, like Perry Mason; but he could not become a successful lawyer as Perry Mason. So Roseman undermined Perry, so that he could destroy Perry. Roseman was taking up the very same therapy session, which Oedipa was also taking up (p. 11). This clearly shows that most of the characters in this novel suffer from the mental stress and mental illness. So they fantasize or seek the help of LSD or take up some therapy to get rid of it.

Mc Hale explains in a crystal clear manner that Cyberpunk is another important aspect in post modernism. MC Hale deals with cyberpunk in his fiction.

Thomas Pynchon too follows the same in his Gravity Rainbow. “This can be picturised as interactive or hyper-texture and that work is a source at many jokes, scenes and subplot”, says MC Hale.

In Every word of Pynchon’s Gravity Rainbow MC Hale sees the cyberpunk behind it,

Indeed, Pynchon’s unpresentability within or to postmodernism generally is

often remarked upon, frequently in relation to The Crying of Lot 49 usually

what is held to mark out this notoriously enigmatic little book as an

exemplary (if not inaugural Postmodern text is its supposed theme at

paranoid subjectivity… (Thwaites 23-24). 44

The plot locations can be traced out in the works of Pynchon. He has amalgamated the cyber punkism and the electroworld in his novels. He is taking more vital role to play to infuse the nature of postmodernity and its influences among the readers of

Pynchon. Cyber punkism is a world in a cyber world. It can be flashed out at the miniature stage. Post modernism is not only for the sake of the pleasure of human being but also the people’s ardent fascination towards the electro and electronic world and computerized mechanism to draw the pleasure from it and their demolition.

The word bothered him as much as ‘Trystero’ bothered Oedipa. But it was

too technical for her. She did gather that there were two distinct kinds of this

entropy. One having to do with heat engines, the other to do with

communication. The equation, for one, back in the 30’s had worked very like

the equation for the other. (p. 72)

Further John Nefastis is a scientist obsessed with perpetual motion. He has tried to invent a type of maxwell’s demon.

The Demon passes his data on to the sensitive and the sensitive must rely on

kind. There are untold billions of molecules in that box. The Demon collects

data on each and every one. At some deep psychic level he must set through.

The sensitive must receive that staggering set of energies, and feedback

something like the same quality of information. (The Crying of Lot 49, 72) 45

This working of the demon seems to be confusing, Tomy Thwaites in his Miracles:

Hot air and Histories at the Improbable explains this clearly. James Clerk

Maxawell, had once postulated a tiny intelligence, known as Maxell’s demon. The demon could sit in a box among air molecules that were moving at all different speeds, and sort out the fast molecules from the slow ones. Concentrate enough on them in the same place and we have a region at high temperature. We can use the different temperature between this hot region of the box and any cooler region of the box to drive a heat engine.

John Nefastis invention, the demon acts as a metaphor. It is the matter of

“arrive at an Aphrodite knowledge out of doubt, the metaphor which fuels the argument is always rather temptingly end proleptically Maxwellian” (Thwaites

266).

Pynchon has adopted scientific concepts and aspects of it for the literary purposes. He uses them to construct metaphor to develop characters and present a chaotic situation. Anti-utopia novels were against the misuse of science. Pynchon too condemns science by giving comic presentation and parodies at its principles.

The novel starts with a typical interesting start. The narrative is also fine- made. Oedipal is always going behind the fragmented information. The mystery of trystero is not for oedipal but for the readers to get involved in reading the novel fully with full enthusiasm. The accidental meeting of people in the novel may be the well-made one. Postmodern plot is not a simple one on the surface level of 46 meaning. But it is a meaning of dual purpose and the duality of meaning. Plot does not mean only the consequence of the chain of events in post modern novels but it shows how it gets the mysterious and double ending and the open-ended.

The plot of the plot is nothing but the underground postal system called trystero organization. It is to twist the readers’ comprehension in the novel. The

Trystero organization runs under the banner of W.A.S.T.E. Its expansion is We

Await Silent Trystero’s Empire. Oedipa gets flommoded with the literal one word, meaning “not valid”. The sort of confusion leads Oedipal to go around the different places to stitch the concept of ‘plot – around – go’. It is also a kind of mockery and it has relevance to the plot construction in this 140 page novel.

The novelist has also portrayed the unpleasant contemporary life in America.

He has not stopped with presenting the unhappy life but also has looked back into the history to let his readers know the origin as to why the people are suffering and leading an unhappy life.

Pynchon gives the necessary detail of the injustices of European history, especially the struggles for freedom of 1848 and also the fight between the Trystero and the Thurn and Taxis. This struggle continued till 1849. Earlier America was a land owned by none, but later people started to move to America and started owning the lands to explore and dig the land in search of gold. For finding the gold, many slaves were brought to this land during 1849. The slaves struggled a lot. The cry and struggle of those slaves in 1849 in California is named as The Crying of Lot 49 by 47 the novelist. ‘49’ in the title of this novel may signify the last two numbers of the year 1849.

Language and Style

Pynchon, unlike in V and Gravity’s Rainbow, has followed a unique style and technique in The Crying of Lot 49. In this novel, there are many number of incoherent narrations, which really confuse but also sharpen the mind of the readers.

Brain Mc Hale in his Postmodern Fiction says, “Pynchon not only anticipates but encourages a modernist reading in order to sabotage contemporary habits of mind that derive certain of the assumptions of modernism” (Hite 5).

In The Crying of Lot 49, Pynchon employs a different style of writing in presenting the exciting discoveries of Oedipa. Pynchon’s use of language in this text is very complex and difficult for the readers to understand because the author makes use of advance scientific and technical language to express the feeling of various characters especially Oedipa Mass.

He uses the language of computers and electronics. When Oedipa feels that she is being trapped, Mucho Mass thoroughly gives him up to the music, which he plays. When Oedipa, for the first time, looks at San Narciso, she is reminded of the circuit inside the radio set.

Here, Pynchon compares the electronic circuit to the city of San Narciso. He makes the readers realize that the modern technology has its great impact over the modern society even in constructing and designing the houses. Towards the end of 48 the text, Oedipa looks back at San Narciso. Here the author uses the language of meteorology (studying weather condition),

San Narciso was a name; an incident among our climatic records of dreams

and what dreams became among our accumulated daylight, a moment’s

squall-line or tornado’s touchdown among the higher, more continental

solemnities - storm-systems of group suffering and need, prevailing winds of

affluence. (p. 123)

Through this language, Pynchon depicts the reality of American society, which is branched into the rich and the poor. Pynchon uses this sort of complex usage of language to state the diversity which prevails in the united society, that is, diversity in unity.

Because of the usage of slang, the text becomes complicated. The text becomes still more complicated when the narrator presents the mind of Oedipa

Mass, because it becomes hard for the readers to understand whether all the questions and problems arise in the mind of Oedipa or all are from the perspective of the narrator. Pynchon has cleverly fused the mind of both Oedipa and the narrator making the unidentifiable know whether the thoughts are poured out from Oedipa’s mind or from the narrator’s.

This technique is effectively adopted by the author, which makes the text not only complex but also cultivates a special interest, and this is one of the reasons for the success of this text. For example, Oedipa questions her experiences, “How many 49 shared Tristero’s secret, as well as its exile? What would the probate judge have to say about spreading some kind of a legacy among them all, all those nameless, may be as a first instalment?” (Chap. 6).

It is uncertain and unclear whether the above two questions crop up in the mind of Oedipa or the narrator. Similar examples occur in the sixth chapter of this text, where Oedipa walks on a stretch of railway track.

The complexity of the text grows because of the inclusion of a large number of songs in the text. Because of these songs the storyline is interrupted for a while and slowdowns the speed of the text as well as the interest of the readers. It diverts the attention of the readers in understanding of the text. In addition to these songs, the vivid description of the The Courier’s Tragedy becomes another hurdle for the readers in focusing the main storyline of the text.

Pynchon parodies the Revenge Tragedies in the third chapter. He imitates the revenge drama in order to mock and make fun of. The vocabulary employed by

Pynchon does not seem artificial. It flows like a natural stream expressing

Pynchon’s mastery over the language, which enhances the style of the text.

Satire

The Crying of Lot 49 is a masterly written novel of Pynchon. This novel raises different and difficult questions regarding the way of life led by the contemporary Americans. Satire is nothing but criticizing the social issues by 50 making fun of it. This novel is actually a satire on the American lifestyle and its degrading culture.

In this novel, Oedipa Mass comes across various people who have the habit of drinking, using drugs and watching senseless programmes of television and so on. They indulge in the above activities to escape from the reality of life. The bitter reality of the society after the World War was very hard to accept and to live. So people find it highly difficult to cope with the existing insecure society. Thus they seek remedy for this in the form of closing themselves from the society with the help of the drugs.

During this period sanity was a questionable one. In this text, Mucho Mass, was very much disturbed by the dreams, and to get rid of this he sought the help of

Dr. Hilarius, who gave Mucho L.S.D. treatment. But Mucho becomes insane towards the end. This aspect is also criticized by the novelist.

Loveless life lived by the Americans is also presented in this novel. Oedipa lives a loveless life. Her husband is not a much promising man. A real husband ought to support his wife and should help her when she is in need of help, but

Mucho fails in playing the role of a good husband. So, Oedipa is deprived of love from her husband. Thus, to help her in her quest, Oedipa seeks the help of many men but from none she experiences the real love; instead she is just treated as an object of sex. Here, the novelist finds fault with the society, which treats woman as a thing of enjoyment. Women lack their respect and honour in the society. 51

Towards the end of the novel, Oedipa is left alone without anybody as her husband becomes insane totally. Thus throughout the novel she is deprived of love.

This is the case of most of the Americans. They are not bound with the lovely feeling of love. So they experience the insecurity of life. This aspect is brought out by the narrator via Oedipa. Pynchon actually ridicules this sort of existence and the society which promotes this sort of living, which leads to free sex. As Oedipa is denied love, she indulges in free sex to experience the feeling of love. Pynchon has employed Oedipa as the representative of the American people who lack love.

Pynchon in this text has not failed to criticize the unnatural way of living led by the Californian society. When Metzger and Oedipa arrive at Fangoso Lagoons,

Oedipa sees a large number of identical houses near the ocean. Because of huge livings the ocean is corrupted to the core and even fishing is not free. Fishing is the primary job for most of the people who reside in the coastal region. But here the people are not allowed to fish though they live very close to the ocean. This pathetic condition of the poor people is depicted by the author in this novel. This condition arises because of the business men like Pierce, who most of the time thinks of money making and nothing more. Because of such people the basic rights of the poor and the needy are denied. Pynchon employs the term ‘ordered swirl of houses’ to the houses constructed in California to show the mindset of the people. The people have become highly mechanical in their mindset. They live a highly ordered life where there is no space for them even to think creatively. They live a 52 monotonous, unnatural life in a corrupted society. This strange unnaturalness is sensed by Oedipa as she travels through a landscape. She could not travel at speed for long because the land was not at all free to travel. It was covered with huge buildings making the natural place artificial to live in.

Sunday has sent them all into silence and paralysis, all but an occasional real

estate office or truck stop. Oedipa resolved to pull in at the next motel she

saw, however ugly, stillness and fout walls having at some point become

preferable to this illusion of speed, freedom, wind in your hair, unreeling

landscape - it wasn’t. What the road really was, she fancied, was this

hypodermic needle, … (p. 16).

No place is left free. Many businessmen occupy the lands and invest their money in real estate. They leave no space even for graveyards. They go to the extreme of ploughing the graveyards too for flouring their business:

San Narciso lay farther south, near LA. Like many named places in

California it was less an identifiable city than a group of concepts – Census

tracts, special purpose bond - issue districts, shopping nuclei, all overlaid

with access roads to its own freeway. (p. 14)

The novelist cleverly hits the attitude of moneymaking people. This attitude is revealed through the characters like Winthrop Tremaine, Yoyodye, Pierce Inverarity and so on. 53

Winthrop Tremaine is the shopkeeper, who makes use of the evil memory of

Nazi Germany for making money. But he never cares for his Black employees.

Yoyodyne is another such character who values money more than the human life.

He along with his company members happily sings and enjoys the financial success of the company without thinking of the destruction, which would befall because of the process of making the nuclear weapons. Pierce Inverarity is the best example.

He earns a lot in buying many lands and constructing huge buildings in it. He never thinks of others. He always thinks of raising his financial status and power. This mentality of Pierce Inverarity is revealed in his action of keeping a bust of Jay

Gould, who was a wicked and hard hearted businessman.

The above characters’ major purpose is to become richer and richer; and to become more and more powerful even at the cost of any sort of destruction which may ruin the life of others. Pynchon finds fault with the people who live a selfish life.

Pynchon, in this novel presents the slavish mentality of the American society. Mankind has become a slave to money and machines. The irony of this is money and machines are man-made things for living a sophisticated life and they are supposed to rule / operate these things but the reality is different. Though in the beginning man ruled everything, later everything changed. Man has come down from his saddle and has become a slave for the products which he has created, that is, money and machines. Man invented machines to make his work simpler, but in 54 the process of using the machines, he has become so addicted to it that he is unable to do any work without the help of the machine. Instead of living a sophisticated life with the equipments, which he has created, he has lost his life for the sake of money, in preserving property, in search of things and so on. In this process of earning and gaining and preserving, he has lost all his happiness, humanity, spirituality, and finally sanity too.

One such character is Oedipa, who in want of money loses everything she possesses and at last remains empty. She, in the desire of possessing the property of her ex-lover and leaves her husband, but towards the end she could not find out the property and loses her husband too. Even she goes to the extreme of doubting her own sanity.

This attitude of people is mocked at by the novelist. The people begin their search for money from their saddle. In the course of this quest, money takes over the saddle and finally rules the mankind making man as slave to it. This is the pathetic condition of selfish men, which is criticized by the writer.

Oedipa Maas, who is the protagonist in The Crying of Lot 49 is in a dilemma as to whether to face the reality of absolution or the unreality of absolution.

Absolution and its highest point in literature are well-established in literature of modernism. Reality of absolutism is overwhelmed by the unreality of absolutism.

This novel is a parody of American present culture especially in California.

The Crying of Lot 49 is a second novel of Pynchon. In this novel he has infused 55 more elements of Postmodernism. It is an adventurous novel. As Leslie Fiedler crosses the border, Pynchon goes back to the adventurous novel. The adventure

Oedipa undergoes is searching with all her full enthusiasm and anxiety to identity who is Trystero and to know what is lot 49. Oedipal Maas, who is the central character, undertakes a series of adventures.

Adventure finally must reach a destination but in the case of Oedipa Maas adventure could not reach a prefect destination. At the end she wants to know who

Tristero is but in vain. Molly white says: “The Crying of Lot 49 is so thoroughly

Apocalyptic in structure that the final revelation cannot occur” (49).

Finality is non-existent in the postmodern novel. In the end, finality of an adventure of Oedipa is not fulfilled. She also leaves the readers to have open-ended non-conclusive action.

Absence of character and events are celebrated in the thematic study of

Postmodern fiction, novel and works. At the end the absence of non-conclusive event is also celebrated in The Crying of Lot 49. Themes are hidden by the novelist.

The cryptic way of writing by Pynchon is celebrated in the postmodern world.

Oedipa Maas is in the mind of oscillation. The oscillation takes place in her and she is not able to dichotomize the nature of the world where she lives with the unnaturality of her adventures throughout the novel. Finally the unnaturality succeeds over the reality of her world. 56

Fragmentation is also one of the themes in this novel. Fragmented events and the disconnectivity of a character between the sequences may be the celebration of postmodern characteristic nature. Fragmentation and discontinuity are vividly practised by a postmodern writer.

To say the story to some extent, Oedipa Maas is the executrix of her ex- lover, Pierce Inverarity. He is a tycoon in California. She wants to go and attain a portion of her ex-lover’s property. To achieve this she takes the support from her lawyer, Roseman. At Echo Motel in San Narciso, she sleeps with Metzer, who is a co-executor. During her adventure she has came across so many events which are very mysterious to her and she could not find anything as in reality. Meanwhile she is getting confused with the secret and underground mailing service by the name, which is very mysterious to her, Tristero. She has seen letters W.A.S.T.E. She goes to meet many people. The persons whom she meets are sometimes absent. She has undergone certain studies of historical records. Finally all her efforts are in vain.

Pynchon parodizes the communication which is dead and non-reality. Pynchon adopts and employs colloquial expressions and uses songs in between the novel.

This type of new combination makes and adds more colour to the post modernist fiction.

In this novel The Crying of Lot 49, it is considered that Oedipa, who is the protagonist of the novel questions herself about the world in which she lives and 57 experiences not only that but also whoever she meets in the way of her adventure to seek who is Tristero.

The question of the world outside and inside of a human being is complicated. The complication is not in the mind of the people but it is found in the world itself. Isolation may be a central part in the life of Oedipa. At the outset itself, she feels something gloomy and bereft of hope. She doubts the world and the reality which is around her. Parody is a main theme in this novel. Bakhtin says that parody is a mockery expressed about serious form and serious events and it is a form or any genre which is conglomerated with prose and fiction and other elements. As

Bakhtin states parody is a form of expression which includes some other genres.

In The Crying of Lot 49 also it is found that the mixture of prose and verses and the serious events are expressed in a simple and cool manner. That type of expression is also called black humour.

Satire and parody are widely and alternatively used interchangeably. Being a satire, it must first have a comic element or ridiculous element. These things are found in the novel. It is mainly understood that the serious events are expressed in a way of kidological sense. It is found in The Crying of Lot 49.

Oedipa Maas, protagonist in the novel, is going on the search for her own identity with another world, which is misconstrued by her. In order to know the real world, she wants to take up another world which is not real. But all that takes place in the illusion. She tests the real truth by meeting some people whom she encounters 58 in the processes of taking adventure to know who Tristero is, and the reality of the real world. She meets people and gives personal interviews.

All these are in illusion but she could not get satisfied fully. That dissatisfaction may also be one of the quasi-postmodern themes in the novel.

Oedipa is not able to realize the reality in her world. She feels the isolation and gloom in her life. Oedipa Maas feels that she is in the predicament of her vision and her world in and around. The reality of illusion which is fostered up on oedipa is exhibited. Her way of interpretations over the symbols and patterns are not clear to her. She also thinks that Driblette’s The Courier's Tragedy is his own private vision.

By having that kind of conceptual-illusion, Oedipa begins to interpret the meanings by her own way. She says: “shall I project a world” The world that Oedipa wants to project and show is the world in which she feels and interprets the world by herself.

That sort of event shows that the 'subjective', interpretation can be appended.

'Subjectivity' over the objective value is also the element and the major theme in postmodern fiction. To endorse with this ideology, Oedipa also helps the reader to understand.

Pynchon has used satiric technique, parody and metafiction in his narration.

Narration is not a mere kind of telling and retelling a story or a plot but it only shapes and reshapes the theme and the content of a story in any literature. 59

The novel has a structure called self-explanatory. Self-explanation can also be called in one sense metafiction. Metafiction is also one of the techniques in the postmodern literature.

While a reader reads the novel of Pynchon, he/she comes to know the concepthood of intertextuality as stated and coined by Julia Kristeva; because, his novel is amalgamated with different cultures and histories and all are revisited in some other forms. That type of interconnectedness is termed as intertextuality.

The Crying of Lot 49 is a novel based on metafiction, parody and satire.

Metafiction is a term given to fictional writing which self-consciously and

systematically draws attention to its status as an artifact in order to pose

questions about the relationship between ‘fiction’ and ‘reality’. (Waugh 2)

This novel is in linear narration throughout. “One summer afternoon Mrs. Oedipa

Maas came from a Tupperware party whose hostess had put perhaps too much

Kirsch in the fondue to find that she, Oedipa…” (Lot 49, 5).

This text has produced the complex analysis and ambiguity. The ambiguity may be called a satiric and parodic element. It is understood that the first page of the novel is a kind of complexity to comprehend the meaning.

In the narrative structure Oedipa is in search of Tristero and she proceeds to interview various people. She is in search of a book which is about Tristero. Finally she could not find it. This ends with some doubts. 60

“Oedipa peered. There it was again, her WASTE symbol showing up black, a little right of the centre” (Lot 49, 66).

After some sort of narration Oedipa finds the underground postal courier service. That service is termed out with ‘WASTE’ - WASTE is centre of the novel as well as the people’s life in California in America. That use of word has its own satiric and parodic elements.

The novel has two elements in narration, its story and the theme. These two elements: on the one hand make the readers understand that the passages and the concepts are ‘defamilirized’. The conventional practices are defamiliarized, because, the statements are not inter connected fully. It makes the reader not to comprehend fully and questioning is more and more. On the other hand, the text makes a parody of its own. Pynchon has foisted the problematics of ultimate interpretation of this world through the difference between chaos and order which is not enough to interpret the world, to Oedipa’s question whether there is purposive order or meaningless chaos. Finally the novel does not give any ful-fledged answer.

“Oedipa took out her… shall I project a world? Box 573? (Lot 49, 60). The world is nothing but the world of Tristero, with the muted post horn symbol, is poisted as an awaited alternative, for the decadent contemporary America.

In The Crying of Lot 49 the interaction between the reader and the text is metafictional one. And it is also conventionality projected in the fictional form. And the relationship between the reader and the technique is a hetero-logic one. The real 61 fact is that the text and the signifiers in the novel are fascination for the morals of low quality in the American contemporary life. That is why the novelist himself parodies the culture of contemporary America.

A parody imitates the serious manner and characteristic features of a

particular literary work, or the distinctive style of a particular author, or the

typical stylistic and other features of a serious literary genre, and deflates the

original by applying the imitation to a lowly or comically inappropriate

subject. (A Glossary of Literary Terms, p. 40)

The postmodern elements are many. Among these ‘pornography’ and sexual feelings are portrayed publicly in the postmodern novels in such a way that the language and the writings are very delectable. At the same time it has the obscenity in its narration.

“Is this… put her left breast in the region of Metzger’s” (Lot 49, 22). Though the novel starts with linear narration as a decent one, it goes up to the words of horny.

“Come on… of her bra… off” (Lot 23)

“Six pairs of panties… three brassieres”

These lines show that the novel is a typical postmodern novel. These words are celebrated in the novels of postmodernism, because the people in the world of postmodernism are interested in the pop-culture or mass culture. These cultures project that any wish of the humans are accepted. That is why Jean Baudiallard says 62 that ‘anything it goes’. There are many examples in the novel. Pynchon’s is an unusual and abnormal and idiosyncratic nature. Oedipa’s mind is projected as a hallucinators’ and experienced with hyper reality.

The Crying of Lot 49 is more than a criticism of the contemporary world. It values and devalues: both the ideas are ideated with the application of paradoxic- satire; because, on the one hand, it accepts the contemporary culture of America in

1960 and demeans the peoples’ schizophrenic attitudes in the same world. It is not a mere more than criticism but a social satiric-criticism. In the novel’s culmination, the psychotric Mr. Dr. Hilarius goes mad in the due course of the time. Most of the people are mad and the man who cures the insanity, himself goes mad. That shows that the entire world around America is portrayed as a world of chaos. The chaoticity is also celebrated in postmodern narration.

_____

Chapter-II

POSTMODERN THEMES AND TECHNIQUES IN MIDNIGHT’S CHILDREN . .

In 1980’s Indian English novel had a quantum leap from the modernism

which was based on rational, logical means to gain knowledge to Postmodernism

which praises the aspects of indeterminate state of knowledge. Salman Rushdie has

contributed much to this kind of writing through his works namely Shame and

Midnight’s Children. Of this Midnight’s Children has received Booker of Booker’s

Prize. This novel celebrates the aesthetic style of postmodernism. This novel has the

post modernistic elements like fragmentation, self-reflexivity and multiplicity. It

takes liberty in hallowed tradition and the conventions of history and fiction.

Rushdie rejects totalizing world-views, challenges even the facts which is nothing

but an imperfect construction of human mind. Hence he criticizes the basic customs

and rituals of the religion. It fulfils all the major features of postmodernism, both in

theory and practical applications.

Rushdie, in his novel Midnight’s Children, has portrayed the contemporary

scenes of pre-independent and post independent India. Midnight’s Children is one

of the most important works of the ‘Post-colonial’ period and it is considered as a

great postmodern epic. Rushdie has employed fantasy and magic realism in this

novel. Rushdie through his postmodern writing has inscribed his inscription in his

Midnight’s Children. In order to understand the techniques employed by Rushdie

64 clearly, it is to know what modernism and postmodernism are and the difference between them.

After the devastation of the First World War, modernism came into existence and it questioned the coherence and function of the contemporary society.

Modernism tried to relate the disordered society of the present with the ordered society of the past. Modernistic writer and critic, T. S. Eliot has conveyed the same in his essay ‘Tradition and Individual Talent’. He has clearly argued that the past and the present cannot be separated because it is intertwined, without the association of the past, present becomes meaningless and invalid. Modernism gains meaning for the present only when it is associated with the past, whereas postmodernism cuts its relationship with the past and focuses the present isolately.

Though postmodernism questions modernism, it is not entirely different from modernism, at the same time it is not a spreading out of modernism. Postmodernism welcomes the existence of disorderness and fragmentation. It even analyses the problems deeply and even questions and criticizes that, but it never tries to resolve those issues which are raised. Hence, the problems and questions analyzed are left unanswered. Postmodernism examines the problems so deeply that it makes the problems more problematic rather providing a solution for it.

Postmodernism collides against the traditional mode of writing, which has a proper beginning and an end. Postmodernist narration is a fragmentary narration because it begins somewhere in the middle, then moves to the end and then ends 65 with the beginning. It is not a linear narration but it is a circular narration. This sort of narration is employed by Rushdie in his Midnight’s Children. The novel begins in the middle and oscillates between the past and the present, that is, the novel begins on the day on which India got its independence (15th August 1947) and it swings between the pre-independent and the post-independent India. Rushdie makes the narration complex by weaving one story on the other, which is digressive.

In this novel, Rushdie covers three generations of pre-independent and post- independent India. The stories in the novel are composed in a cyclic order because the beginning becomes an end; and that end becomes the beginning of another story, finally not reaching the ending point the story moves around.

Though Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children seems to be epical, he employs various techniques for his narration. An epic contains not a single story but various sub-stories in it. Similarly, Midnight’s Children too contains several stories in it; but the only difference between an Epic and Midnight’s Children is the arrangement of the stories. The stories are arranged systematically in an Epic whereas in Midnight’s

Children the stories are not arranged in a systematic sequence. Rushdie has deliberately done this to complicate the novel because most of the postmodern novels sound complex because of the narrative style of the authors.

Rushdie blends the history of India with his imagination, which makes the novel interesting. The novel begins with the narration of Saleem Sinai’s birth and the novelist associates the birth of the protagonist with the independence of India. 66

The novelist takes over the novel by relating the events that happened in the Indian history to the life of the protagonist very carefully.

Midnight’s Children is a Meta-fiction. meta-fictional writers deliberately sound to their readers that they (readers) are reading a fictional work which is far different from reality. Meta-fictional writers want their readers to be too conscious even while reading the novel. The same idea is expressed by Patricia Waugh in his

“Practising Postmodernism: Reading Modernism”. “Metafiction is a term given to fictional writing which self-consciously and systematically draws attention to its status as an artifact in order to pose questions about the relationship between fiction and reality” (Waugh 2).

Midnight’s Children begins in such a manner that the readers are consciously aware that they are about to read a fictional story. Saleem Sinai narrates the story to his note taker, Padma. The narration is not continuous. Often there exits discontinuity in the part of narration of the story because of the interruption of conversation between Saleem and Padma. The author intentionally interrupts the course of the narration to remind his readers that they are reading a fictitious story which is not a real one.

I was born in the city of Bombay ... once upon a time. No, that won’t do,

there’s no getting away from the date I was born in Doctor Narlikar’s

Nursing Home on August 15th, 1947. And the time? The time matters, too.

Well then: at night. No, it’s important to be more... On the stroke of 67

midnight, as a matter of fact. Clock-hands joined palms in

respectful greeting as I came. Oh, spell it out, spell it out: at the precise

instant of India’s arrival at independence, I tumbled forth into the world.

(Rushdie, 3)

Even in the beginning of the novel, the narrator seems to be highly agitated because the narrator presents himself as if he wants to be more specific in his narration. The narrator sounds too conventional in his narratology by using the phrase ‘once upon a time’, which reminds the readers of the conventional mode of telling a mythical story.

When the story is narrated to Padma, she comes out with various doubts which are resolved by the narrator, Saleem. Padma not only plays the role of the note taker but also the role of a reader. When she raises up questions, it is not the question of Padma, but the question of the readers who are in need of clarification.

Though Padma does not become the part of the main story, she is highly responsible for bringing out the novel in a successful manner. The author brings clarity to the story through Padma via her questions, though the narrator, Saleem fails in doing that. Thus Padma plays the role of a note taker, reader and critic. In this novel, the author involves the readers unconsciously through the character, Padma. The unconscious contribution of the reader makes the novel interesting as well as complex and meta-fictional. 68

Midnight’s Children can also be termed as historiographic meta-fiction because Rushdie has created a new history by retelling/rewriting the existing historical events with making some changes in it. While referring to the historical events, he commits mistake twice. The novelist has made the errors appear natural.

The narrator and protagonist being afraid of losing his life, narrates the story hurriedly, so that he could register his memory.

Now, however, time (having no further use for me) is running out. I will be

soon be thirty-one. Perhaps, if my crumbling, over-used body permits. But

I have no hope of saving my life, nor can I count on having even a thousand

nights and a night. I must work fast, faster than Scheherazade, if I am to end

up meaning – yes, meaning – something. I admit it: above all things, I fear

absurdity.

And there are so many stories to tell, too many, such an excess of intertwined

lives events miracles places rumours, so dense a comminling of the

improbable and the mundane! (Rushdie 3, 4).

Thus the mistakes appear to be acceptable. The narrator even tells the readers that the information may not be authentic and he even states that the mistakes committed will not make the novel or the rest of the historical events recorded in the novel invalid. So he bends the history according to his need. While referring to the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, Saleem commits mistake by mentioning the wrong year, he happens to discover it when he re-reads it. But Saleem does not take 69 any effort in correcting it because he feels that the single error will not invalidate the whole fabric. He also states that he is retelling the history in such a way that he places himself at the centre. And he feels that he is forced to complete what he has started (229-230).

Rushdie in his essay Imaginary ‘Homelands: Essays and Criticism’ says:

History is always ambiguous. Facts are hard to establish, and capable of

being given many meanings. Reality is built on our prejudices,

misconceptions and ignorance as well as on our perceptions and knowledge.

The reading of Saleem’s unreliable narration might be, I believed, a useful

analogy for the way to ‘read’ the world. (Imaginary Homelands 25)

As Rushdie has fused his imagination all the historical events furnished in the novel are not always authentic. Rushdie has made his imagination glide over the history of

India. Hence Midnight’s Children is a historiographic Meta-fiction.

Characterization is another important element in postmodern novels. In most of the postmodern novels the characterization of characters are not well portrayed by the authors. It takes a lot of time for the reader to know the characters; in addition to this the author introduces too many characters in the novel having no relevance but just they appear and disappear. The same is seen in Midnight’s

Children too. The characters are not introduced well. It steals the time of the readers to know the characters and there are also some characters, which emerge and vanish in the novel with no purpose. 70

The characters in Midnight’s Children can be classified in various categories.

Characters like Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Mahatma Gandhi, General San Manesksha,

Moraji Desai, General Ayub Khan, Bhutto and Major Sulfikar fall under historical characters because the above listed characters are not fictitious characters but the historical figures who really have made their presence to be felt in India. Aadam

Sinai, Naseem, Amina, Emerald, Alia, Hanif, Nadir Khan, the Brass Monkey,

Mustafa, Main Abdulla, Methwold, Padma and Ahmed Sinai fall under normal characters because they are the characters which are neither drawn from history nor who possess any special powers. Saleem, Shiva, Parvathi, Durga, Mary Pereira and

Joseph D’ Costa fall under mythical as well as symbolic characters.

Mary and Joseph D’ Costa can be associated with Mother Mary and Joseph in the Holy Book, The Bible, because Mary and Joseph D’ Costa bring forth

Saleem, who is the central character in this novel, like their son but actually he is not their son. Shiva symbolizes the Hindu God Shiva, who is responsible for destruction. Shiva, in Midnight’s Children, is responsible for the devastation of the midnight born children of 15th August 1947 in the novel, who have supernatural powers in them. Parvathi can be associated with the Hindu Goddess Parvathi because she has an affair with Shiva and brings forth Adam Sinai who has huge ears like Lord Ganesha. Durga, in this novel, can be associated with the Hindu Goddess

Durga, who has extreme power within her. Rushdie has created his characters very 71 carefully and he has made three categories of characters to mingle with each other in bringing forth the success of the novel.

Another important postmodern narrative technique used by the author is magic realism. Gabriel Garcia Marquez is one the famous postmodern writers. In his One Hundred Years of Solitude, he draws the characters from the real world and makes the characters extraordinary by attributing some special powers to them. In the same way, Rushdie too takes his characters from the world of mythical fantasy, where the characters gain magical powers. Rushdie fantastically does this by culling out some of the events from the Indian history for his novel and matching those events with the characters he has created. The novel begins on the exact date and time on which India gained its Independence. 1001 children were born between

12:00 midnight and 1:00 a.m. on 15th August 1947. These, midnight born, children have some inborn magical powers in them. The protagonist, Saleem Sinai too has a magical power in him. One day he discovers that he has the power of conversing with five hundred and eighty one people of the MCC through telepathy. He has the ability to explore the feelings and minds of the people, and he even examines the great leaders like Morarji Desai, and Nehru. Saleem’s intention is to help the country through the Midnight’s Children Conference (MCC), but unexpectedly and unfortunately it ends up with the issues like caste and inequality. Most of the midnight born children are destroyed because of Mrs. Gandhi’s Emergency of 1976.

Later in this novel, Saleem gains another extraordinary power after losing his 72 memory, that is, olfactory power. Through this power he easily smells the intension and emotion of people. He helps the Pakistan Army’s tracking unit in tracing out and arresting Sheik Mujibar Rahman and his Swami League members.

Not only Saleem has this sort of magical power but also some of the characters in the novel possess the magical qualities. One such character is Parvathi, the witch, who has the power to make the people invisible. Once she hides Saleem in her basket by making him invisible. Shiva has powerful knee. He has affairs with many women and kills them later.

In reality, nobody can posses this sort of power. This can happen only in the world of fantasy. The author has fantasized these characters and makes them exist in the real world and has created many twists and turns in the novel. Rushdie has tactfully used the technique (magic realism) in sustaining the interest of the readers, though the novel is voluminous.

Post modern writers use unrestricted imagination in their novels not to flee from reality but to present the reality more colourfully. With the help of fantasy, the writers try to enchant the readers. Hence postmodern writers deliberately use fantasy in their works of art. Rushdie too employs fantasy consciously in his

Midnight’s Children. Rushdie has made sure that the reality has not been dominated by the fantasy. He has a complete control over fantasy. He cleverly fuses fantasy with reality in such a manner that it helps the novel to go ahead smoothly without 73 any break ups. Fantasy is a powerful tool used by writers to say which is unsaid, to see which is unseen, and to unveil which is veiled in reality.

Rushdie has portrayed an ageless character called Tai, who is a boatman. In reality nobody can be like Tai. Tai is an imaginary character because he continues to look the same for a long period. People hardly remember Tai being young. He stands in the same hunched position and plays the same boat between Dal and

Nageena lakes. Rushdie presents Tai almost like an eternal character in the novel.

In the novel, there is a character who can inflict wounds through the words which she utters; there is another interesting character whose finger is so greenish that is capable of growing plants and trees even in the desert. There is another character who consumes metals. Even there is a character that emerges from the surface of reflection when he steps into the mirrors. Likewise there are so many characters that are too far from reality. Another one such imaginary interesting character is Reverend Mother Nasim, because she is capable of entering into the dreams of her daughter.

There is another strange character in the novel, that is, Main Abdullah. He is known as Hummingbird. It is said that his hum when falls low will give toothache, and when it rises to the highest pitch, it has the power of “inducing erection in any one”, and it is clearly stated that his secretary Nadir Khan, who is quite often attacked by the hum, behaved according to his master’s wish (p. 55). 74

A country like India, has many stories which are filled with fancy. As the author has India as the setting of his novel, he explores fancy and spins the unreal story, that is fancy, around the real one.

Rushdie comically criticizes some of the religious practices in this novel.

“My grandfather bent his forehead towards the earth. Forward he bent, and the earth, prayer-mat-covered up towards him. And now it was the tussock’s time”

(Rushdie 7).

The author even comments on the practice of using parda. Saleem’s grandmother, Naseem, gets treated by his grandfather Adam Aziz by exposing only the affected part of her body. Adam imagines Naseem by seeing her inner parts through the perforated sheet but heedlessly. When he sees her face, he falls in love and marries her, but after the marriage Naseem becomes unhappy.

Rushdie even questions the existence of God in this novel. He presents the trauma of the human mind, which is not sure of the existence of God and not sure of believing or disbelieving it.

Three drops fell. There were rubies and diamonds. And my grandfather,

lurching upright, made a resolve. Stood. Rolled cheroot. Stared across the

lake. And was knocked forever into that middle place, unable to worship a

God in whose existence he could not wholly disbelieve. Permanent

alteration: a hole. (Rushdie 7) 75

Rushdie draws a parallel story from Hindu mythology. In Hindu mythology, Lord

Shiva, the God of destroyer and Goddess Parvathi are husband and wife. Because of their union Lord Ganesha emerges. It is believed that Lord Shiva beheaded Bala

Ganesha out of rage, then Lord Shiva replaced an elephant head because of the plea of Parvathi. From that day onwards Ganesha is portrayed with elephant head and human body. In Midnight’s Children too, Aadam Sinai is born out of the illicit love between Shiva and Parvathi. Aadam Sinai has very big ears which is almost like elephant ears and reminds the readers of Lord Ganesha.

Rushdie employs inter-textuality in his novel, which is one of the postmodern techniques. Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and Sashi Tharoor’s

The Great Indian Novel look similar, because both the authors draw the characters from myth and make use of history for their work of art. Rushdie neither undermines history nor makes fun out of it, whereas Tharoor presents history to the readers comically by parodying it.

That Rushdie is influenced by Gunter Grass is explicitly seen in Midnight’s

Children. The author has the similar protagonist in Midnight’s Children to that of

The Tin Drum. Both the novels Midnight’s Children and The Tin Drum begin with the birth of the protagonists Saleem and Oskar. Both the heroes are particular about recording the history with the date. Some ambiguity is presented in the birth of both

Saleem and Oskar. Saleem has two fathers and three mothers whereas Oskar has one mother and two fathers. Hence, there is a chaotic parentage. 76

Saleem has the power of telepathy and olfactory. On the other hand Oskar has the power of drumming and glass shattering voice. Both the characters lose the first extraordinary power and gain the other under different accidents. Even the titles of the novels resemble the same. Title like ‘The Perforated Sheet’, ‘Accident in the washing’, and ‘Under the Carpet’ can be equated with ‘The Wide Skirt’, ‘In the clothes cupboard’, and ‘Under the raft’. Both the narrators are in their thirties and they narrate the stories to their listeners Padma in Midnight’s Children and

Bruno in The Tin Drum.

Ambiguity is another postmodern technique which is explicitly seen in

Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children. In the beginning of the novel Saleem introduces

Aadam Aziz as his grandfather; later he states that Ahmen is his father and Amina is his mother; and he belongs to Muslim religion. But in the course of his narration, he states that he is actually the son of an English man, William Methwold, and a

Hindu-Indian woman, Vanita. So, by birth he is a Hindu. Similarly, Shiva is the biological son of Ahmed and Amina, but he is brought up in a Hindu family. So it is hard to say whether Saleem is a Muslim or a Hindu likewise whether Shiva is a

Hindu or a Muslim.

Aadam and Naseem get married only after falling in love, but after the marriage Naseem leads an unhappy life. Adam hides Nadir Khan, the poet and secretary of a political leader, Mian Abdullah, (during the assassination of Mian

Abdullah) in his house. By this time Mumtaz, the daughter of Aadam and Naseem, 77 secretly marries the poet yet does not become pregnant. Later, Mumtaz herself renames as Amina and marries Ahmad Sinai because of the departure of her ex- husband Nadir Khan.

Saleem falls in love with Jamila Singer, who is the daughter of Ahmen and

Amina. Though Jamila Singer is not the biological sister of Saleem, the love is incestuous, because she is his sister. Later, he falls in love with Parvathi, the witch, but he refuses to marry her. As a result, Parvathi has an illicit relationship with

Shiva and gives birth to Aadam Sinai, who becomes the adopted son of Saleem.

Rushdie confuses the readers by many ambiguous relationships. Saleem has

Muslim parents but he is not a Muslim by birth. He has incestuous love, but Jamila is not his sister. He marries Parvathi and has a son, but he is not his biological son but adopted son. Hence, the relationships that exist in this novel are complicated.

Rushdie ends his novel by stating that this sort of confusion in relationship will continue to exist in future too.

Yes, they will trample me underfoot, the numbers marching one two three,

four hundred million five hundred six, reducing me to specks of voiceless

dust, just as, all in good time, they will trample my son who is not my son,

and his son who will not be his, and his who will not be his, until the

thousand and first generation, until a thousand and one midnights have

bestowed their terrible gifts and a thousand and one children have

died, because it is the privilege and the curse of Midnight’s Children to 78

be both masters and victims of their times, to forsake privacy and be sucked

into the annihilating whirlpool of the multitudes, and to be unable to live or

die in peace. (Rushdie 647)

Not only in describing the relationship is the author ambiguous but also in the part of narration. Rushdie uses flashback technique for his narration. Saleem, the narrator who is in his thirties, goes back thirty years and describes his birth and he even goes back to the life of his grandfather. In this way the story swings between the present and the past as stated before. Saleem’s urge to tell many stories hurriedly, makes the narration spiral which makes the entire novel ambiguous.

Rushdie has thrown various themes in his novel Midnight’s Children. These themes coincide with many postmodern novels.

Fragmentary love is one the themes seen in this novel. The first love in this novel takes place between Aadam Aziz and Naseem. Aadam, the grandfather of the narrator falls in love with Naseem in parts. The fragmentary exposure of Naseem’s body was seed for the sprout ‘love’, but after the marriage when the ‘whole’ is revealed voidness is created in the love.

Aadam and Naseem’s daughter Mumtaz’s love with Nadir Khan ends up very soon. But Mumtaz continues to have an affair with Nadir after her marriage with Ahmed in the name Amina. So Mumtaz’s/Amina’s love is not a real or a perfect love. 79

Lila Sabarmati and commander Sabarmathi are bounded together with the bond of marriage. Yet Lila has an extra marital affair with Homi Catrack. When this illicit love is discovered by commander Sabarmathi, he kills Lila and gets arrested.

Love takes away the life. Hanif and Pia fail to have a happy life. Pia has many affairs after the death of Hanif. Saleem too falls in love with Jamila, but she refuses because she is his sister. This love makes Saleem not to marry Parvathi at first, which leads Parvathi to have affair with Shiva.

There are many love stories in the novel, but no love is pure and complete.

Love creates destruction to the culture and tradition as it is fragmentary. Saleem has various experiences in his life, so he gets confused. Being confused he is unable to judge and could not emerge as a complete person. This incompleteness is also due to the insecurity and uncertainty of his life. When he met with the accident, he

(Saleem) loses his conscious, he even forgets his name. In the course of the novel, he feels that he is literally disintegrated, he also feels that he is being tarred; he finds hard to argue because he has failed to agree with himself, he feels that all his memories are being engulfed by darkness and that makes him a senseless person.

His social conscious existence reduces him to the level of voiceless dust.

India’s historical past oozes out from the literally disintegrated Saleem Sinai.

Thus Saleem contributes much in the making of the Indian history. The fragmentation in society and politics form the theme of the novel. Saleem stands like an icon of fragmentation, even his face is so, and the writer describes Saleem’s 80 face thus: he had a very big face in a perfect round shape, nose in rampant cucumber, stunted horns and so on. Even in the face Saleem lacks unity. It is full of disorder. Both inwardly and outwardly Saleem is filled with fragmentation just like the novel.

Singularity in pluralism is another important theme. As stated before there are variety of characters like historical, realistic and symbolic characters. They are united and fused in this novel. They are made to interact with one another to create

‘wholeness’ in the novel. Multiple religions are brought and messed up together.

Saleem, while discovering his telepathy power, hears many languages. He is the one to unite all the Midnight born Children of August 15th 1947, across India together.

Saleem is associated with Muslim religion as he bears the muslim tag and brought up, he is linked with Hindu religion being the son of Vanita; and he becomes a part of British empire because his father is William. Thus Saleem proved to be a part of the Hindu, the Muslim and the English. He is the part of both rich and poor. Saleem stands as the unifier of variety and diversity.

Identity crisis is another important theme that emerges out in this novel. It is hard to answer the questions,

 Who is Saleem?

 Who are the parents of Saleem?

 Is he a Hindu or Muslim?

81

 Is he an Indian or English?

 Is he a reliable or unreliable person?

There are many incidents and events which arouse confusion in the minds of the readers and question the identity of the narrator.

Construction versus Destruction is another theme in this novel. Saleem, though physically cramped and unable to construct, is able to narrate stories and creates the novel. He is responsible for the conference of Midnight born children.

Thus he plays the role of the creator, Shiva, who is one of the Midnight’s Children, and who has the powerful knee, plays the role of the destructor. Shiva betrays the midnight children by joining his hands with the Indian Army and becomes responsible for the ruin of the Midnight’s Children. Shiva has illicit affairs with many women and brings forth many illegimate children. Saleem suspects that Shiva has killed many women after having affairs with them. By destroying the lives of people, Shiva continues to exist and becomes a Major in the Indian Army. Saleem being the creator can be compared to Brahma, the Hindu God who performs the task of creation, and in contrast Shiva being the destructor can be compared to Lord

Shiva, who is known for destroying evils in the world.

Displacement is another theme in Midnight’s Children. When Saleem, as a new born baby, is separated from Vanita and Methwold, his mother and father, his migration begins. When this truth is discovered, Saleem is sent from Ahmed and

Amina to his Uncle Hanif, which is his second exile. Later his move from Bombay 82 to Karachi, a place in Pakistan, is another displacement. After losing his memory, once again he comes back to India with the help of Parvathi which is another exile.

Throughout the novel it is seen that displacement leads to destruction and disintegration. These exiles make the protagonist lose his confidence and make him docile and desperate; and make him lose his identity.

Colonialism is another important feature in Midnight’s Children. Methwold, who is one of the representations of colonialism, seduces the Indian woman Vanita.

This shows how Englishmen seduced many Indian women and they are responsible for many illegimate children. Cruel behavior of Englishmen is seen in Jallianwala

Bagh, when Brigadier R. E. Dyeer, Martial Law Commander, orders his men to fire at the poor Indians. After killing many people, he feels happy and he appreciates his men for doing such a brutish task.

They have fired a total of one thousand six hundred and fifty rounds into the

unarmed crowd. Of these, one thousand five hundred and fifteen have found

their mark, killing or wounding some person. ‘Good shooting,’ Dyer tells his

men, ‘We have done a jolly good thing’. (Rushdie 42, 43)

Though Doctor Aziz is an Indian, he behaves like an Englishman because of his education. He always finds fault with his wife Naseem for wearing parda. He says that Naseem covers herself from neck to ankles and he says that there is only face and feet left to see and that is a deep shame (Rushdie 38). 83

Carnival use of language is another postmodern technique used by many postcolonial and post modern writers. According to Mikhail Bakhtin, Carnival language became popular and entered into literature because of the Menippean satire. Bakhtin in his ‘Rabelais and His World’ explains carnival as,

This led to the creation of special forms of marketplace speech and gesture,

frank and free, permitting no distance between those who came in contact

with each other and liberating from norms of etiquette and decency imposed

at other times. (Rabelais and his world 10)

Postcolonial writers involve in carnival use of language, which is too frank and far from decency, to express their emotions freely without any hindrance.

Through carnivalesque use of language they have created a special identity. Rushdie in his novel has used words from many Indian languages such as ayah, angrez, ekdum, barfi, nibu pani, bhel puri and so on. He does not stop with that, he moves to the extent of merging words together ‘whatdoyoumeanandhowcanyousaythat’,

‘overandover’, ‘blackasnight’, ‘downdowndown’, etc, which makes the language complex to understand. Rushdie even half-breeds the official language and creates a comic effect out of it (‘Chutnification’, ‘Bombayness’, ‘Historyless’, ‘Dupattaless’).

The carnival use of language by most of the postcolonial and postmodern writers make the readers feel that they have a special identity and there is no need for them to associate themselves with the so called colonial power. Rushdie fuses the languages not only to create a comic effect but also to sound Indianised. Moving 84 away from the civilized language by taking oaths and cursing others are some of the traits of Carnivalesque language. The same idea is expressed in ‘Rabelais and His

World’ by Bakhtin. He says,

Abuses, curses, profanities and improprietites are unofficial elements of

speech… These elements of freedom, if presented in sufficient numbers and

with a précis intention, exercise a strong influence on the entire contents of

speech, transferring it to another sphere beyond the limits of conventional

language. (Rabelais, 187)

Too many abuses and curses are seen in Midnight’s Children. Especially, Tais are known for their abuse. They mostly use unofficial language. Saleem Sinai is often abused by the female Tai, she abuses him by calling him ‘sistersleeper’. She calls

Saleem so, because of his love for his sister Jamila Singer. Not only Tais curse people but also many characters in the novel curse using filthy language.

Prophesy is another aspect in this novel. The birth of Saleem Sinai is prophesied by many. The mother of Saleem foresees and states that she is with a child and she is giving that man her shelter (p. 100). When Amina announces this in the crowd, the child has become a public property on that day onwards. Saleem’s birth is prophesized by Ramram Seth too. He says that Saleem will neither be older nor be younger than his motherland. He will have two heads but only one will be visible. He foretells that he (Saleem) will be praised a lot; he will be brained by

Spitoons; drained by doctors; then claimed by deep and dark forest; and later 85 reclaimed by wizards. He will have sons but not his, before becoming old, he will look so; and before dying he will die.

The language is highly chaotic, because there are many contradictions in the prophecy and it becomes hard to judge whether the prophecy is true or false. But in course of the novel partly the prophecy comes true. According to the prophecy, the man with two heads refers to Saleem and Shiva. There is a reference to knees and nose which again refers to the same. It is too ambiguous to know whether Shiva and

Saleem are one and the same or they are two different people. When Parvathi hides

Saleem in her basket, he loses his conscience; he regains everything when he is hit by the Spitoon. When Saleem loses his memory and regains it, is almost like a rebirth.

In ‘Third World Literature in the Era of Multinational Capitalism’ Fredric

Jameson says that almost all the third world texts ought to be read as national allegories. He feels that though the text is about an individual, it deals with the culture and society of the nation. In allegory the story which is told is not the one which is intended to be told. The readers have to decode the meaning of the existing text to decipher the ‘real meaning’ which the author really wants to be conveyed. In allegory unseen text or the hidden meaning of the text is more important than the seen or visible or existing text.

In Midnight’s Children, Rushdie gives a picture of Bombay: fishermen lived there in the beginning. There were coconuts and rice. They had Mumbadevi as their 86

Goddess. But after the invasion of India by Portuguese, the place was named as

Bom Bahia for its harbor. Later East Indian Company constructed its fort; and later was Mountbatten’s ‘ticktock’.

Rushdie through the above description is not about to say the changes that took place in Bombay but he reveals to his readers how India was before the colonial period, then how it was being colonized and the result of being colonized.

Methwold parodies ‘Mountbatten’s ticktock’. ‘Ticktock’ refers to discipline. The word shows the mindset of the colonizers over the Indians. They expected strict discipline from the Indians.

Shiva, in the novel, represents the poor proletariat whereas Saleem represents the colonial rule. Both Saleem and Shiva are segments of India, neither of them represent the whole but fragments. Shiva, who has a strong knee and strength, is very close to the soil. He is blessed with the gift of war. Shiva shouts at Saleem stating why he (Shiva) is poor but Saleem is rich. (Saleem is rich because he is in the place of Shiva, actually Shiva should have been rich but it was not so.) Saleem becomes popular and enjoys all the privileges because Saleem is in the position of

Shiva.

This is where, Rushdie presents the national allegory tactfully. As stated before, Saleem who has western ideology dominates Shiva, by taking over the position of his (Shiva’s), in the same way, westernization slowly entered in to India and took it over and started their domination over the native people, who were the 87 real son of the soil. Westerners, like Saleem in the novel, enjoyed the benefits of the

Indian soil whereas the sons of the soil were denied of the same. This irony is expressed by Rushdie through the interchange of the characters.

Throughout the novel allegory is presented. Indira Gandhi is elevated to the height of Goddess. She is presented like Mother-goddess who tries to save people by using power. Indira Gandhi reminds of Lord Indra, who is easily frightened by evil spirits and finally seeks the help of Lord Shiva or Lord Vishnu to help him out from the problems, in the same way Indira too gets agitated by the Midnight born children who have some magical powers in them. So to demolish the midnight born children, she seeks the help of Shiva who has powerful knees.

Women are considered as weaker sex and as unintelligent sex in the male centric society. In a male chauvinistic society women are down trodden, devalued to the core. Suppression of women is seen in this novel too. Padma, maid of Saleem helps him in almost all the ways. But she is not respected by Saleem. She enjoys doing everything for Saleem – she feeds him properly, she prepares bed for him, and she proves to be a devoted soul. Yet Saleem has no regards for her. She becomes the victim of the male dominated society. Throughout the novel she is portrayed like an animal. Saleem describes Padma as a ‘bitch-in-the manger’; he never hesitates to call her so. He gives a negative picture of Padma, he says that she snorts, and moves her hand up and down, and smacks against the forehead, she has a hairy forearm etc. He almost compares Padma to a giant. He does not have a great 88 attitude towards her, because of her action and because she is an illiterate. Saleem never takes any pain to educate her whereas Padma becomes too busy for Saleem but Saleem mostly ignores her. Indian society keeps women uneducated. The society has a notion that women are supposed to cook, nurse the people at home, and do all the household works but not get educated.

Padma fulfils the desire of Saleem but Saleem does not fulfil the desire of

Padma. Saleem fails to satisfy the physical demands of Padma. He says that Padma is a sensual raven and he uses vulgar expressions to state her sexual urge. But later,

Saleem feels that he was not physically fit and the mistake is his and not Padma’s.

Padma, a Hindu girl thinks that love is her world, she truly falls in love with a

Muslim widower, Saleem; but his concentration is only on writing. Her submissive soul longs for true love but she does not get the same from Saleem.

The narrator discusses his history to Padma, he merely uses her as a tool for his writing, and he never gets any suggestion from her. Padma is even deprived of identity, liberty. Though the readers sympathize with Padma, the narrator does not show any sort of sympathy towards Padma. Padma even thinks of converting herself as a Muslim woman for the sake of Saleem. She thinks of changing her name to

Naseem Sinai from Padma Mongril. She adopts herself in a male dominated society just to win the heart of Saleem, her love. Padma is a woman who bends her will for the sake of Saleem. She proves to be a perfect, typical Indian woman who is in tune with submission, suppression and domination.

Chapter-III

POSTMODERN THEMES AND TECHNIQUES IN THE GREAT INDIAN NOVEL . .

India has a vast history on its culture, tradition and beliefs. Many writers

have presented it directly or indirectly in their writings. Shashi Tharoor is one

among such writers who has used India’s greatest Epic for his fictional work

The Great Indian Novel. The author has retold the modern Indian History of India

by taking the plot and characters from one of the greatest epics of India

the Mahabharata. The Mahabharata was initially written in India’s first classical

language namely Sanskrit and later translated into almost all the languages in India

and across the world. It is a work of art which is based on the struggle for the

possession of the Ganesh valley, by the descendent of the great king Bharata. Shashi

Tharoor has problematised the discourse by re-visioning and re-writing the history

of India.

As in John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, Tharoor has used allegory to

mould this novel. The author has not specified it anywhere in his novel. According

to the author, the novel’s title is the complete translation of the great epic the

Mahabharata, his, “primary source of inspiration”. In his essay ‘Myth, History and

Fiction’ Tharoor acknowledges that the novel is an attempt to retell the political

history of India during the time of independence by recasting the events, episodes

and characters from the Mahabharata. Though it is not mentioned anywhere, any

90 reader who is familiar with the epic, can easily understand that the novel is a recasting of the Mahabharata.

Tharoor has attempted to retell the story of a nation through this great epic because the Mahabharata has a huge number of western and Indian audiences, when it was serialized in Indian televisions. The author has used the plot of

Mahabharata and redesigned it to tell the political situation of India during the twentieth century, through the vein of parody, allegory and satire.

The Great Indian Novel can be categorized as a post colonial novel, since it has pictured the colonial period and the period after independence up to the twentieth century. A work can be categorized as post colonial, when it creates an independent identity by decolonization, retrieval and creation. The writings should express the cultural, aesthetic sense of the native through an alienated language, but the work should not be alienated from the native touch because of the alienated language.

Tharoor being a postcolonial writer has projected postcolonial and postmodern elements in his novels. Most of the post colonial writers have revisited history through fiction in order to create a new identity for them as well as for their writing. These writers used fiction as a vehicle to travel through history in order to attain a new perspective. This attempt has dismantled and collapsed the historians and colonial masters. These post colonial writings enable the readers to know 91 beyond history. This leads to a negative impact on history as such, since it does not possess any cultural background and nativity.

Raja Rao, Salman Rushdie and Tharoor are very important writers in post colonial writings. These writers have used historical narratives as an important tool in their language to emphasis their post colonial writings. For post colonial writers, language has been a back bone to rebel against the oppressors. The post colonial empire is constructed in order to create a counter discourse to the colonial writers.

Postmodern, postcolonial and allegorical writing not only contextualize and sabotage the colonial discourses, but also change the actuality of the ideas of history and at the same time redeems and convalesces the past. The allegorical frame which is set in The Great Indian Novel is framed to retell the story of the great epic The

Mahabharata, which brings in the story of the British Empire in India and the surfacing of independence under the leadership of Gangaji (Gandhi).

The narrator and the protagonist of the novel Ved Vyas has set the novel in the petty state of Hastinapur, which is soon annexed by the British. This novel has been written in a form in which the narrator narrates his story to his stenographer

Ganapathi and the novel swings between the past and the present. The novel tells,

“of past, present and future, of existence and passing of inflorescence and decay, of death and rebirth; of what it is, of what it was, and of what it should have been”

(GIN 18). 92

The author of this novel has mentioned all the important historical events that took place during the period of independence in his novel The Great Indian

Novel. Though the narrator has made a remark on all the incidents starting from the surfacing of Hastinapur, Mahatma Gandhi’s (Gangaji) entry to politics during the

British rule (British Raj), the fall of Janatha government and the emergence of

Congress party which succeeded in forming a government under the leadership of

Mrs. Indira Gandhi (Priya Duryodhani) as the Prime Minister of Independent India, he has not mentioned any dates in his novel. The entire novel is a blending of ancient history and the modern political history, which is recreated by the author in eighteen chapters. The readers are expected to move at both levels carefully to understand, since it is buried as a sub-text. By making such an attempt of blending ancient and modern history, the author tries to establish a fact that history cannot be ignored.

The novel starts with the narrator who expects a stenographer to take down his complete narration without interrupting or disagreeing with his recitation. The narrator finds Ganapathi as his stenographer and makes an agreement with him that he has to be dedicated in his work and asks him to take down every word that he narrates. The narrator thinks that the entire narration is problematised. This is because the narrator Ved Vyas is very strong and firm against the western countries’ notion, that India is an under developed country. He challenges them that a deep 93 look into the past of India would prove and make them understand that India is, “a highly developed one in an advanced state of decay” (GIN 17).

This novel is an ordinary fiction which deals with history. Owing to the objectivity in the narration, this novel is not categorized as historiography meta- fiction. This objectivity is obtained because of the narrator of this novel. The narrator Ved Vyas is not only the narrator of the novel, but he is also a main witness and a direct participant in the historical events. Since he is a direct participant, it is possible for him to give a firsthand version of all historical events. The narrator has used history as a base to introduce the post modern and post colonial theme through irony, allegory, humor, parody and subjectivity.

Postmodernist and Postcolonialist Themes in the Novel

In the 1980s Salman Rushdie becames the pioneer of postmodern writing in

India. There is a general belief that Indian English novels have a small impediment from modernism to postmodernism. The travelling from ancient period and modern period to postmodern takes place in the work of Salman Rushdie (Midnight’s

Children) as well as in the work of Tharoor (The Great Indian Novel). Tharoor has rewritten the ancient epic with a flippant humor and high entertainment to state the recent Indian history. The Postmodern theory and practical application are meticulously fulfilled by these works of art. According to S. Chakravarthy, a critic, this venture by Sashi Tharoor can be called, “a dazzling leap beyond into post- modernism”. 94

Postmodernism is effectively revolutionary. Postmodernism disregards and disrupts almost everything in traditionalities of the past, present and future. It did not have tangible validity of the received ideas or understanding of language, the text, the author, the social background, and the political influences. Postmodernism and postmodernists are staunch opponents to the theory of assigning ‘The’ meaning to a text. It refuses to assign an absolute and transcended value to a text.

Postmodernists have changed the trend from ‘certainty to uncertainty’. They have questioned the static way of thinking and writing. They define that thinking and writing should be dynamic. According to postmodernism, fixing a center plot and arresting the text according to it are not the right ways of using the language. They say that the text should speak of it and about it, and the external or extra information should not give a particular meaning to the text. Postmodernists have given important task as defamiliarzation, decentring and deconstruction.

Tharoor through the characters of the great epic The Mahabharata makes his readers learn and understand the “tryst with destiny” of our country. Every character in this novel is subjected to face his/her destiny. For example Gandhi is cast in the role of Gangaji (Bhishma), who plays an important role in this novel. His intention is to fight against the British rule through non-violence. In order to unite people and make them feel one, he tried his level best to solve the basic disputes like untouchability in the country. He practised truth and non – violence throughout his 95 life. He is referred to in the novel as Gangaji (Ganga Datta) and described by the

British Viceroy, Sir Richard, as “public Enemy Number one” (GIN 113).

The son of Vichitravirya and the disciple of Gangaji is Dhritarashtra who is blind. Since he had a harrowing experience in Indian education, he is sent to

London, where he learns Fabian socialism and becomes the first Prime Minister of

India. Pandu is the brother of Dhritarashtra. He is expelled from one of the best colleges in India for striking the British teacher who had called him an Indian dog.

Pandu is physically strong but mentally weak. He is also against the rule of the

British. He does not accept the idea of Gangaji that is non-violence to obtain freedom. He wants freedom through Yuddha. Hence he started the ‘civil service’ in

India. He is the seed for Indian National Army. This character is similar to Subash

Chandra Bose in this novel.

Kunti the mother of Pandavas gives birth to a fruit of error in her adolescence. This child is named as Mohamed Ali Karna who is adopted by a rich man’s car driver. He becomes a lawyer. His face is as bright as sun. He wants to form a new country of his own. Later he becomes the founder of a Muslim state

Karnistan (Pakistan) which is carved out from India. This is made possible with the help of Dhritarashtra’s only daughter Priya Duryodhani. The teacher of five pandava brothers, who have an engineered birth, is the bearded socialist named

Jayaprakash Drona. 96

The source of inspiration is based on Hindu mythology. In this mythology they believe that Lord Ganapathi has to be worshipped first before they start any new work. In order to bring in this ideology the narrator at the opening of this novel introduces a character named Ganapathi. He also brings in the basic belief of

Hinduism by stating “in my epic I shall tell the past, present and future, of existence and passing, of the death and rebirth, of what is, of what was and what should have been” (GIN 18). The ideas of external present are presented in an ingenious manner by Tharoor in his novel. He cleverly fuses two frames into one. The two frames are the old epic and the modern history. The fusion is done in such a way as to proclaim that the character, events, situations of the old can even have an impact or relevance at the present and even in the future. By recording the life and times of Ved Vyas, the author claims, ‘nothing less than The Great Indian Novel’. The history is transformed into myth and the epic characters become figures of contemporary history. The dividing lines between fact and fiction, myth and history do not draw a clear sense.

The opening of the novel witnesses the act of electing the president for the

Kaurava party. Gangaji is elected and appointed the president to lead the freedom struggle. This party gets splitted after independence. As there were Pandavas and

Kauravas in Mahabharata, they formed two wings. One goes to Priya Duryodhani

(As Kauravas having Duryodhanan as the head in Mahabharata) and another wing goes to senior politicians. After all this chaos in the party, the only child of 97

Dhritarashtra that is Priya Duryodhani becomes the President of the country. She imposes ‘siege’ on the country. The novel ends with the death of Priya Duryodhani.

She is murdered by her own security guard as it happened for Indira Gandhi the

Prime Minister of India, who was murdered by her own security guards.

The Great Indian Novel has multiaccentuality and interpretations of reality.

Well known facts of history and ancient legends are presented in a new and unfamiliar way. This novel shows that the author has a deep rooted knowledge about Indian history, but he did not use it to sequence it in a proper way. The author has taken much liberty on the Indian history as well as the epic The

Mahabharata, especially the characters in this novel, but at the same time myth is no reliable guide to reality. Many of the characters, incidents, events and issues are based on the Indian people and are correlated to the great Epic. Certain scenes in the novel are recasting of situations in the epic,

I have taken too many liberties with the epic, Again, the lives, deals and even

famous characters of historical figures like Gandhi, Nehru, Subhas Chandra

Bose, Jinnah, Maulana Abdul Kalam Azad and Mountbatten are to depict

familiar maters in an unfamiliar way. Many of these respected leaders go

down like nine pins in the novel. (GIN48)

As Rushdie did in his novel Midnight’s Children, the author has also framed the

Indian freedom struggle and the subsequent experiment with democracy. Both the novelists try to retell the fact with some fictional incidents. This effort leads to 98 defamiliarisation, demystification and negotiation of history. This is neither a complete work of fiction nor a complete work of facts and reality; they are intertwined by the author Tharoor.

I have told ... Every perception I have conveyed, there are a hundred equality

valid alternatives I have omitted and of which you are unaware ... This is my

story of India I know, with its biases, selections, omissions, distortions, all

mine. But you cannot derive your cosmogony form a single birth Ganapathi.

Every Indian forever carries with him, in his head and heart, his own history

of India. (GIN 373)

There are no proofs for the historical incidents and figures which are said by

Tharoor in his novel. He has taken too much of liberty in narrating the incidents of the past. All these incidents are out of the author’s own experiences and perceptions of the society he lives in. Tharoor suggests that this novel is more than the history and the culture of the nation.

It is my truth Ganapathi, just as the crusade to drive out the British reflected

Gangaji’s truth, and the fight to be rid of both the British and the Hindu was

Karna’s truth which philosopher would dare to establish a hierarchy among

such verities? (GIN 164).

Postmodernism which celebrates the multiple truth in existence acknowledges the multiple version of reality. They assert that there is nothing called ‘The Truth’. 99

Tharoor also agrees with this western postmodernist theory and echoes this in his novel.

Hence, he does not claim any conclusiveness for his novel “what happened

in the end ... ‘the end’ was an ides that ... meant nothing to me. I did not

begin the story in order to end it the essence of the tale lay in the telling.

‘what happened next?’. I could answer, but ‘what happened in the end?

I could not even understand. (GIN 162)

These statements state that there is no end to life. The story of life does have pauses.

History and truth are given an awful nudge in the novel. The traditional aspects like certitude, fixity and identifiable representation are thrown away by the author.

Postmodernist writers like Joyce, Beckett, Salman Rushdie and Thomas believe in no certitude to a particular concept. Thus Tharoor too follows their foot prints and does not present any particular view on myth and history. Tharoor wants to tell the readers that one must accept the sufferings, doubts and diversity in his/her life. Thus, his Yuthistir declaims at the end of the novel. There are no classical verities valid for all time; and he states:

No more certitudes ... Accept doubt and diversity. Let each man live by his

own code of conduct so long as he has one. Derive your standards from the

world around you and not from a heritage whose relevance must be

constantly tested. Rejected equally the sterility of ideologist and the

passionate prescriptions of there who think themselves infallible ... Admit 100

that there is more than one Truth more than one right, more than one dharma

I woke up to the echo of a vain and frantic barking. (GIN 418)

This novel accepts the impartibility or attainability of a centre. It celebrates fragmentation of truth, multiplicity, doubt and angst. Ved Vyas, wakes up from his dream in today’s India at the end of the novel. Today’s India is a land of computers and corruptions, a land of politicians and myths and a box-Wallas with plastic briefcases. To an India overwhelmed with uncertainties, muddling chaotically through the twenty-first century. Ved Vyas dreams again so as to end the story.

The reader can understand that Tharoor has utilized the zero degree technique phrased as the last line which ends the novel begins with the same last line in the beginning of the novel. Therefore the conscious use of the circularity of writing style is used in this novel. Readers may come to know that the traditional parameters of creating a fiction or novel are in the place of inadequacy. When he begins to write the novel, he acknowledges that his own creation lies in it. On the contrary, the reader might come to apprehend that it does its own fictionality. It may be called a quasi-metafiction.

In the eighteenth century fiction, most of the writers used the interactive method in their writings. Tharoor in his novel The Great Indian Novel introduces a character consciously who interacts with the reader.

Right, Ganapathi? So, we have got the genealogies out of the way, my

progeny are littering the palace at Hastinapur, and good old Ganga Dutta is 101

still safely ensconced as regent. No, on second thoughts, would better cut out

that adverb. ‘safely’ wouldn’t be entirely accurate. A new British Resident,

successor of the bewhiskered automobilist, is place and is for from sure the

likes what is going on. (GIN 35)

In this novel the narrator has a direct role into the work which he narrates. Since the narrator tells the story of his own family and relates it with the historical events and backgrounds, it can be said as meta-fictional work. The novel also illustrates the author’s involvement with the readers through his interaction with them. The text opposes the practice of the modern writers whose emphasis is more on objectivity which is the traditional method of writing. The author has made a clear blend of fact and fiction. So the distinction between fiction and fact, history and legend, prose and poetry is not made in his work. He sporadically breaks into poetry and light verse and thus affirms the ineptitude of Standard English prose for his story.

In the novel, the fusion of two genres is made exceptional. He has synthesized the politics in poetic form. He has contributed to well known ‘blurring of the genre’ of postmodernism. The novel is a highly revolutionary work which has fused the ancient myth with modern Indian History and politics and also has neglected the purity in Indian democracy and freedom struggle. Even some characters in this novel have a fusion of both Indian and British origin. Draupadi

Mokarasi is often referred to as D. Mokarasi who is born on January 26, 1950 as a 102 result of illicit and furtive union between Dhritarastra and Georgina Drewpad, wife of Viscount Drewpad who oversees the transfer of power and partition of India.

The author has taken too much liberty with the old esteemed tradition. He has also assumed a periodic deportment to his mythic material and seems to suggest that all narratives whether epic or historical – are subject to interpretation and rewriting, deconstructions of canonical text as well as the socio political, religious and cultural myths of the country, and the dismantling of the underlying assumptions are the contributions of Tharoor to Indian Writing in English.

The author has taken much liberation in writing this novel; however the concept of postmodernism is manifested in this novel. Though this novel is narrated through a mythical background, the history which underlies in this novel is real, which is even substantiated by the narrator himself,

How easily we Indian see the several sides to every question, that is what

makes us such good bureaucrats, and such poor totalitarians they say new

international organization set up by the worth fully optimistic ... . (GIN 373)

Nations like indeterminacy, multiplicity, circularity, absence of finality and the impossibility of getting at the Truth uttered, for example, in the epistemological view of Jainism, which appears as a protest movement against the supreme authority of the Vedas that firmly believes in the existence of the transcendental supreme reality. It views reality as ‘pluralistic’ and ‘relative’ and it looks upon any quest for the absolute as vain. 103

The novel’s imminent may, thus be said to be a subsidiary of India’s pluralistic culture. The novel actually grows out of, and speaks for, an India that acknowledges and welcomes multiplicity and credits all interpretations of veracity, of the world and the text as potentially legitimate. This novel gained an additional implication in this troubled time of religious intolerance or intransigence which wants to proclaim the supremacy of one religion, one GOD and one interpretation of reality.

From the post colonial pint of view, this novel gives expression to colonized experience and undermines the colonist encounter. It is a widely felt fact that the history of colonized is much smashed and tampered by the colonial rule. It is the duty of the colonized to reclaim their history and retrieve the old memories and register it, so as to carry this to their future generation. The people who have suffered mentally and physically because of colonial rule have to reclaim from their experience. All these are made possible through the works of art which are created after the colonial period.

The colonial people became acute on their culture and civilization after the decolonization. After decolonization, the colonialist expressed that India is an underdeveloped country. Tharoor being a postmodernist and post-colonialist completely objects to these colonialists. He states in his novel: “India is not an underdeveloped country but a highly developed country but a highly developed one in an advanced state of decay” (GIN17). 104

Tharoor in his novel brings in the Indian history, critically scrutinizes the colonial relationship and resists colonialist perspectives in his novel. The ideological determined patterns of historical relationship are criticized much by him. Tharoor has devastated the idols of imperial history.

The book seeks to unshackle the formerly colonized people from the British

Indian government. At that time, the imposing figure of Mountbatten who takes up the role Viscount Drewpad in this novel is significantly reduced to a trivial, vainglorious and insensitive individual and also the General Regional Dyer who is known as Rudyard Kipling is considered as a human tyrant. Edwina Mountbatten that is Georgina Drewpad who is the wife of Mountbatten is used by her as a seducer. She has acted as a clandestine weapon to win over the Indian leaders by her charm. “amatory adventuress of libelous renown” (GIN229).

The mistakes done by the British during their rule in India are criticized by

Tharoor in this novel in paradoxical statements. The author has taken cognizance of the spiteful effects of indoctrination of Indian school children. This is expressed by the author as “the bastard educational institutions of the British sired on us”

(GIN47), and the imperial policy of British to ‘divide and rule’ has ended up with disastrous consequences.

As done by Salman Rushdie in his novel Midnight’s Children, Tharoor has used the ‘novel of memory’ as a political weapon to disprove the imperialistic version of truth and reset the absentmindedness which has induced by their 105 distortion even amendment of historical facts. In this novel Tharoor has taken much endeavor to record the British history of colonized India which chip away at the colonizer’s view of India.

The Colonial attitudes and policies are given a full form by the narrators’ narration. He has expressed it with strong emotions. The novel has recorded the historical events of India till nineteenth century when colonialism has consolidated into a totalitarian system. In this novel Sir Richard, the British Resident of

Hastinapur has illustrated the withering attitude of the colonizers to the native culture, customs, beliefs and languages. “There native Languages don’t really have much to them, you know. And it’s now as you having to write poetry in them. A few crucial words sufficient English for ballast, and you’re sailing smoothly”

(GIN37).

The main aim of British government to introduce their language in India was that they needed Indian labors to work in their industries and companies. They also needed people to serve as a bridge between them and the Indian rulers, so that they could easily capture India and rule them with the help of their own people. The colonial policy of British led the Indian peasants to starve. It is the plan of British army to create a country wise alarm when Ganga Dutt (Gandhiji) is addressing a huge mass of people at Motihari. They believed that many would turn up for his speech and they executed a big massacre. 106

This Massacre is a historical event in Indian Independence War. This is called Jallianwala Bagh massacre which is termed as ‘Bibigarh Garden Massacre’ in this novel. This is named as Bibigarh Garden in order to be a paradox to the incident that is Bibigarh rape in Paul Scoot’s Raj Fiction The Day of the Scorpion. This leads

Rushdie to write ‘Midnight’s Children’ with full of irony and paradox.

On the day of massacre 1600 bullets are fired by the British soldiers. After this vicious attack, 379 people are killed and 1,137 people are injured. The General

Rudyard expresses his sense of satisfaction after this attack. For his attack of cruelty he has been awarded 50 million dollars by the British government after his retirement.

The viciousness of the imperialists and their complete lack of human feelings in them forced the narrator to come to a conclusion that ‘the Raj was no just evil but satanic’ (GIN41). This novel has given a complete view of the ill effects of British rule in India. The British came to India in search of gold. Later they established their company to get profit. But this establishment led the nation to poverty, scarcity and stress. It affected the Indian economy to a greater extent. The British killed the

Indian artisans; they left Indians as landless labourers. They exported our full- employees.

The author criticizes the British Policy of ‘divide’ and ‘rule-policy’, in which the British officers divided the nation into two parts, so as to create a glide between

Muslims and Hindus. Hence, India’s partition and the haphazard division of the 107 country on the basis of religion, led to unparalleled violence and mass evacuation.

Even though the colonizer has left, this struggle and disparity continue in India.

According to Tharoor, the period of British rule in India is a fitting target for side-splitting lampoons and impassioned frontal attacks. The unrestrained behaviors of the British Raj are luminously mocked at, side by side; the novel also depicts the country struggle against the British rule under the energetic leadership of Mahatma

Gandhi (Ganga Dutt) who heralded the ‘dawn of new epoch’. Gandhiji not only attracted the freedom fighters but also motivated every citizen in India to fight against the British rule. The students, lawyers and journalists and everybody flocked to Gandhiji’s side. They found a new politics in him. A nation was rising, with a small balding, semi-clad saint at its head.

Tharoor has used his critical way in presenting the novel ‘The Great Indian

Novel’. The titles which are used by the author in this novel like ‘The Dual with

Crown; The powers of silence; A Raj Quartet; Passages through India; The man who could not be king; The far Power-Villain’ are the literary works written by some of the British writers namely, M.M. Kaye, E.M. Forster, Paul Scott and

Rudyard Kipling.

These authors and the characters in these novels are reincarnated by Sashi

Tharoor in this novel as colonial figures. For example, A passage to India, reappears in ‘The Great Indian Novel’ as a typical representative of the colonial rule, which is despicable of the natives and their culture. Maurice Forts, who is just down from 108

Cambridge and calls young boys E.M. Foster and Rudyard Kipling is represented as colonel Rudyard, a tactless and tyrannical army officer who ordered his soldiers to open fire on an unarmed crowd in Bibigarh Gardens. The parody of the colonialist literature written by the British about India embodies the imperialist point of view.

Intertexuality and Narrative Technique

The shaping of a text by another text is called intertexuality. It is nothing but the author transforming or borrowing of text from any other work or at the reader’s point of view it could refer to one text in reading another. Poststructuralist

Julia Kristava coined this term in 1966. She states that “the notion of intertexuality replaces the notion of intersubjectivity” when we realize that a meaning is not transferred from the author to reader directly. And if it is conveyed through a median or if it is conveyed through “codes” imparted to the writer and reader by other texts, intertexuality is nothing but a production within texts, rather than a difference or the relationship between the texts.

Intertexuality can be categorized into three types. They are, hypertext, intertext and supertext. Though they come under texuality which deals with the text, the notion of supertext, hypertext and intertext is different. For Example,

‘The Great Indian Novel’ which is written by Tharoor employs “intertext” from

Rushdie’s novel ‘Midnight’s Children’. For the concept of “supertext” it combines female and male version of “itself”. For the concept of “Hypertext” it has links with 109 different articles within itself. This can be said as another definition for intertexuality that is interconnection of thought flow, works and texts.

The terminology and the theory of inter texuality are new but the concept of interconnection and reference of text has been there in literature or in any work of art from ancient times. The New Testament passages and quotes are from The Old

Testament. Most of the preachings or the answers of Jesus Christ in New Testament are the words of Old Testament. This interconnection later extends to paintings and poetry. The mythological and historical references are made in most of the work of art from the Greek, Latin and Roman records. Hence they have a textual network within them.

Rushdie’s ‘Midnight’s Children’, Rudyard Kipling’s ‘Kim’ and Paul Scott’s

‘Raj Quartet’ have a significant relation with Tharoor’s novel ‘The Great Indian

Novel’. He has alluded to some characters and titles from these works. Taking

Rushdie’s ‘Midnight’s Children’ into consideration there is much relevance in their theme of them. They have attempted to bring out the history of nation through the story of a particular family in that nation. They have covered the same duration of time that is the pre-independence and independence in their novel. They have captured some of the vital incidents during the struggle of independence like,

Jallainwala Bagh massacre, assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, the internal war for the partition and Pakistan, birth of new nation named Bangladesh, the declaration of

Emergency by the Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and so on. While the Midnight’s 110

Children is about “broken Promises” (TKG16), The Great Indian Novel is about the

“betrayed expectations” (TKG16) of people. Both these novels can be categorized as memory novels in which they have used orality as the mode of nation.

In this novel there are a number of alluded titles; for example, “The Twice

Born Tale” counterparts the Mahabharata, “The Book of the Beginning”, “The

Dual with Crown”, “The powers of silence,” “A Raj Quartet”, “Passages through

India”, “The man who could not be king”, “The far Power-Villain”, “The son Also

Rises”. “Midnight’s Parents” and “Darkness at noon”.

Tharoor has presented the history of India in this novel from a subjective point of view as an individual. He seems to suggest like Rushdie that biased repossession of the past, provides a version of truth which is legitimate for an individual. As the narrator Ved Vyas says, “It is my truth, Ganapathi; just as the crusade to drive out the British and the Hindu was Karna’s truth” (GIN104). The certainty of the history is destabilized by the authors Rushdie and Tharoor through their narration of individual truth.

Tharoor has focused on drawing a line between the politico religious war

Kurukshetra in the novel the Mahabharata and the freedom struggle against the

Colonial rule in the novel The Great Indian Novel. This novel cannot be just said as a work of fiction. The author has made an attempt to face the reality through the fictional spectacles. This novel becomes the historiography to revisit the mythical past with irony and parody. The Mahabharata a multi-dimensional text, is to give in 111 unambiguous parody and irony in The Great Indian Novel. The role of irony in this novel is not simply a structural device but a mode of discernment. The narrator has parody in his tone and attitude in the novel.

Tharoor builds up a complex network of connotation on several levels which eventually results in an exceptional parody. Parody determines not only style and technique of the novel. In the opening chapter of the book one “The Twice-Born

Tale” the narrator describes Ganapathi who has been sent to the narrator by his old friend Brahma to serve as his scribe:

The next day the chapter appeared the amanuensis. Name of Ganapathi,

south Indian, I suppose, with a big nose and shrewd, intelligent eyes ...

something about him, elephantine tread, broad forehead and all impressed

me. I agreed. (GIN18)

The impertinent attitudes of the narrator towards the celestial notch and the resultant wit and irony all depend on the parody effect, which is conscious to be produced by an implausible of tradition and modernity, the past and the present, the sanctified profane. This stance is maintained throughout this novel. The narrator has created a complex intertexuality in the novel. The intertexuality of history and myth is the basic idea in this book. The reader should have deep, back ground knowledge of the

Mahabharata and the history of India to have a better understanding of this novel.

Even the exposure to other novels which are correlated in this would be an additional advantage for learning the irony and parody of this novel. 112

Every novelist has a unique pattern in creating the characters as well as the relevant circumstances for those characters. Some novelists hit a great height in that. Even today, one should accept that the novels of the English novelists like

Charles Dickens and Jane Austen have obtained a special place among readers of that nation. In the same way every country has its own tradition, culture and belief based epics in which the characters can be spotted out in the universe. India has two great epics namely the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. These epics have been translated by Rajaji in to English. He did this translation in order to bring to light their dignity and opulence of the major characters standing for certain ideas.

The Great Indian Novel is a book of all time, according to Ruskin. He says that the young are fascinated in knowing the anecdotes of the imperative characters and the philosophical - old people are wrapped up in the philosophy of life, moral and ethical codes, the persona of unblemished women, the subjugation of good over evil and the remarkable qualities of a politician.

The greatness of the author lies in the fact that he has taken the great epic, the Mahabharata and expediently divided The Great Indian Novel into eighteen chapters which represent the Kurukshetra that took place for eighteen days and he has conveyed a valid message and information through each chapter. As the epic the

Mahabharata brings in the story of Kauravas and Pandavas struggle for the kingdom, this novel throws light on the concealed India under the British Rule, the struggle for freedom under the leadership of Gandhiji, and the dawn of Indian 113 republic. In the conservative grandeur and greatness of the epic and in most of the characters, his imagination runs leaving the readers in a world of confusion and dilemma.

The narrative technique adopted by Tharoor has to be appreciated. He has used first person narrative and the epic is dictated by Ved Vyas and written by

Ganapathi, his worthy amanuensis. The chapters are taken from the captions of great interest for his work of art. The first paragraph itself brings in a confused state for the reader,

They tell me India is an underdeveloped country. They attend seminars,

appear on television even come to see me ... they would realize that India is

not an underdeveloped country but a highly developed one in an advanced

state of decay. (GIN 1)

The story of modern India is inscribed by Tharoor into an ancient epical narrative; the author positions a fictional structure wherein the narratives of antique and modern India struggle with each other and preserve a holistic portrayal of India’s cultural inheritance, “of past, present and future, of existence and passing of inflorescence and decay, of death and rebirth; of what it is, of what was, and of what should have been” (GIN18).

Tharoor works out the ideas of the external present in a resourceful manner.

He has fused two time frames into one. Actually he has used the ancient age and modern age simultaneously in this novel to structure the story, which would take 114 two time frames. But the fuse leads to a single time frame, character construction, events, situations which are pertaining to the present scenario. For example, the description of Ganga Datta and going to the forest with his guests to meet the head of the fishermen and ask the hand of Satyavathi for Shantanu the father of Ganga

Datta serves as an illustration.

Ganga Datta didn’t travel alone either. In later years he would be

accompanied by non-violent army of Satyagrahis so that the third class train

carriages he always insisted on traveling were filled with elegantly

scarification elite of his followers ... but on this occasion it was a band of

ministers and courtiers took with him to see Satyavathi’s father. Ganga Datta

would always have a penchant for making his most dramatic gestures before

a sizeable audience. (GIN 23)

The employment of anti-climax in this novel is done in an admirable manner by the author, while describing Gangaji’s method; he satirically quotes the political events of the Indian freedom struggle and the episode of the great epic, the

Mahabharata from two basic components of the epic with actual men and women from the History of India during the struggle for independence. Epic characters are given imaginary parallels from the Indian History. For example, democracy is

Draupadi and Mokrasi. The novel starts with India under the rule of the British in nineteenth century, moves till it becomes independent and ends in the post emergency period. This novel covers all the important events, characters and 115 movements which emerged for independence and after independence, the attainment of independence, constituting of parliament, partition of Pakistan, war with China etc.

Tharoor has used prose as well as poetry simultaneously in this novel. The author has not only fused ancient and modern history but also employed fusion in writing the novel. The verses of prose written by him have a special mention. The prosperity of Hastinapur is expressed in a remarkable manner by the author. It has an easy flow, and he has played with verses.

All was well with the world

From the richest down to the poor

The harvests were good

The land gave a beautiful yield

The rains came in time

To was off the grime

And to ripen the wheat in the field

The man at the plough

And the bird on the bough

And sang of their peace and content

The fruit in the trees

Flowers, sunshine and breeze

Were all on happiness intent, 116

The city was crowded

All fears were unfounded

There were money and goods in the shops;

And Although the Taj

Was still ruled the Raj

The glory of Indian came out tops. (GIN 402 and 441)

In the above passage Tharoor has described the richness of India. There was peace, prosperity and unity in plenty. All was well with rulers and the ruled. But this unity is questioned during the struggle for independence. There was some dissimilarity between Gangaji (Mahatma Gandhi) and Pandu (Subhash Chandra Bose). Mockery is there in the lines of author. The press tried its level best to put an end to the emergency. Arjuna received advice from Krishna during the war that he should not have a wavering mind; the politicians received the same advice during the problematic situation. And they believed that it would be the only solution.

Tharoor greatly owes a favor to Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children where in the protagonist, Saleem, is born at the midnight of Independence. Saleem narrates the past of his grandfather’s experience during the struggle and his father’s experience and his own. In the same manner, the narrator of The Great Indian Novel Ved Vyas records the happenings with the metaphorical sense of a new century. He has attempted to record the modern political history of India from the time of his birth to the present. As Saleem has inter-related his personal experience with the Indian 117 political status, here Ved Vyas has blended his personal relationship and significant political facts in an exquisite manner. In the last section of the novel, Tharoor has condemned the imposition of emergency; he has advocated that imposing of emergency is against democracy. India being declared as democratic country, cutting down the basic freedom of an individual is absurdity. He has said that evil should not be allowed to last long. He quotes that the election is not Kurushetra.

The struggle between ‘Dharma and Adharma’ is real Kurushetra. This struggle would be there every day till we exist and each of us has to take part in it. In a land

“where there should be Government of the people, for the people and by the people”, the autocratic rule of one woman that is the rule of Priya Duryodhani

(Indira Gandhi) should never be tolerated.

The last section of the novel resembles the sage counsel of Krishna to Arjuna in the great epic the Mahabharata. Arjuna is taken aback at the last day of the battle in which he has to fight with his own teacher Drona, his own cousins and uncles as well as his dearest Kingman. Knowing the wavering mind of Arjuna, Krishna advised him and waxed eloquently that for the total destruction of Adharma, this is only an act of Dharma. He teaches him the philosophy that everything that exists in this world is God’s and God is present in everything that exists. Human beings must transcend all likes and dislikes to realize what life is. The last section of The Great

Indian Novel too brings in the same concept of eradication of ills that prevail in 118

India. The author has painstakingly expressed his flaming description of the ills in

India, which have to be rooted out, stock, and barrel.

Today’s India is a land of adulteration black marketing, corruption,

communal strafes, dower’s – killings, where mediocrity, were the greatest

cause is the making of money, where dishonesty is the most prevalent act

and bribery the most vital skill, where power is an end in itself rather than a

means, where the real political issues of the day involve nor principles but

parochialism”. (GIN 412)

All the ills which eat up the harmony of society are clearly portrayed by the author.

Money making by any means has become the trend of society. Corruption has become a way of life. The novelist feels that in fostering all these ills in abundance there is no inviolability in India. Let each man live his own code of demeanor so long as he has one-standard from that world around and not form a heritage whose significance must be constantly tested. Reject equally the sterility of dogma and fanatical prescriptions of those who drink themselves flawless, uphold, courtesy and compassion and affirm the basic values of our people which do not change and leave the rest single-handedly: “Admit that there is more than one Right and more than one Dharma” (GIN 418).

It can be argued that some of the characters like Gandhiji and Nehru are silly and unwanted since they are much projected, but in order to register the Indian

History of Independence it is ultimately impossible to neglect them and picturise. 119

As depicted by the author, it is so pathetic that another merrier should be born to see the country is shorn of these demoralizing ills.

The author has used sarcasm, satire and parody as a technique to put forth the

Indian history. Though the author used the real personalities of history he has never made any mention that he or she is a leader. But the reader of this novel would definitely get a clear depiction of what India is like in the present context.

Tharoor has presented clearly the pastness of the present and the presentness of the past of Indian political history during Independence in his novel The Great

Indian Novel. The novelist has skillfully handled the political and historical views.

The predominant style that is used in this novel is satire, parody, allegory, irony and allusion. The novel aims to achieve the connection of myth, reality, history, autobiography, non-fictional elements, fantasy and verse in a humoristic manner.

For example the ‘Mango March’ was an important movement for independence in

India, and the freedom fighters have chosen August 15th, the grand Independence

Day. But the author paradoxically answered using this date, “What made you choose such a date? It’s my wedding anniversary. Drewpad responded innocently”

(GIN 222).

Tharoor’s attempt has created an access between the contemporary and an ancient India through a nifty use of mythological setting. The Great Indian Novel being a post-colonial and post-modern text, it encompasses intertexuality and utterance covering a vast canvas of mythical and political events. The author has 120 made an attempt to say a real story with mythical back up. He has tried to convey many stories and this is revealed thus: “This story, like that own country, is a story of betrayed expectation yours as our characters” (GIN 411).

The events which are narrated in this novel have been given mythical names and identical phrases. For example, instead of naming ‘Pakistan’, the author has named it as ‘Karnistan’; in the same way Bangladesh became ‘Galaly Desh War’;

Democracy is renamed Mokarasi and disrobing is the Emergency, which is referred to as ‘Siege’.

This novel begins with the auto-biographical remarks of Ved Vyas the narrator followed by the stories of Parasar, Shanthanu, Vidur, their childhood and marriage till the vow of Ganga Datta. These episodes are left unchanged as it is in the original epic. Thus it resembles the Mahabharata.

As soon as Gangaji joins the national struggle for freedom, the frame work of allegory peeps into the novel. It continues with sowing of communal seeds, harvest of hatred in the form of partition, World War II and the downfall of British

Empire, Invasion of Kashmir by Pakistan, Indo China War, Pakistan-Bangladesh altercation, the problems of refugees, the thirst and lust for power and authority, rise of new leaders, the public disturbances, press and army watchfulness, nationalization of banks and the threat and death of democracy because of announcing Emergency.

_____

Chapter-IV

COMPARATIVE AND ANALYTICAL STUDY OF THE CRYING OF LOT 49, MIDNIGHT’S CHILDREN AND THE GREAT INDIAN NOVEL . .

The rise of the novel in India was not purely a literary phenomenon. It was a

social phenomenon as much, rather the fulfilment of a social need. It was

associated with social, political and economic conditions which were

comparable to those which favoured its rise in England. (Ramamurti, 24)

These are the words of K. S. Ramamurti in his essay ‘The Indian Novel in English -

Its Genesis’. According to Ramamurti, Indian English Novel is fully based on social

issues and culture. Moreover it is based on politics. Politics, culture and social myth

are the founding fathers of Indian English Novels. Politics is not merely what the

people do in the news papers but hidden truth is also revealed. The rise of Indian

English novel is not to show the talents and the writing skills of Indian English

writers. It competes with the other writers by using the English language which

becomes post-colonialism. Postmodernism and post-colonialism are not mere fancy

terms but are cultural phenomena. As F. W. Bateson says, literary objects are

produced from the society, the literary objects that go and reflect the society.

Myth and politics are the backbone of a nation like India. Culture is also

formed by myth. Though myths are not necessary in this world of science and

122 technology, the importance of myths is still needed. Jacques Lacan and Sigmund

Freud also proclaim that myths are needed even now.

Beiser has classified the rise of history into three levels: History, Context and

Organism

i) History: It means the specificity of historical development. It includes

politics, social customs, laws, institutions and mythical beliefs. These are all

dynamic.

ii) Context: It means that all cultural and political beliefs and institutions belong

to particular geographical and socio-economic conditions.

iii) Organism: All beliefs, social practices and cultures are interwoven. The

totality of all the beliefs is in the same system. It takes development. It

includes origin, development and demise.

These elements can be found in The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The

Great Indian Novel.

In the evolution of postmodernism and diasporic literature, the department of

English has been changed into the department of cultural studies. The reason behind it is that literature deals with culture, psychological perspectives and sufferings of human beings.

Nial Lucy explains: “the demise of English department has produced the cultural studies. This thesis titled Postmodern Themes and Techniques deals with culture, traditionality, multi accentuality, and plurality of meaning and using a new 123 technique in literature. More postmodern elements are found in the literary works produced between 1960s and 1990s. As such these three novels The Crying of Lot

49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel have postmodern themes and techniques. Techniques include elements, style, language and especially narrative technique.

Multi accentuality in post structualist views is dealing with themes, plurality of meanings and the critical play of signs. Post-structuralists view language as black marks on white pages. There is a crisis in the signified rather than the signifier.

When a signified has magisterial voice over the other, the readers, who are disturbed, put forth an argumentation. If a signifier has a power of producing multiple-meaning, it is better to comprehend that there is less crisis in meaning.

This is what deconstruction constructs. Not only deconstruction, but also postmodernism. Despite the failure of postmodernism, modernism is still prevalent.

Modernism celebrates “grand narration” but postmodernism celebrates “little narration”.

In postmodern literature a reader can come across ‘grand narrative’ and ‘little narration’. The former describes the sophistication, which is a difficult task for an ordinary reader to understand a literary work. The latter explains that an ordinary reader can understand easily. Therefore the very words little and grand etch their own quality. For the grand narration, the credit goes to ‘Elitization’ and for the little narration the credit goes to ‘Lyotardian’. 124

Though this thesis deals with postmodern elements, it is still in need of the assistance of comparison. Comparison is one of the schools to disseminate and understand knowledge in a full-fledged way. Comparison is not merely to compare two or more pieces of literary work, but, to club in to one from different genres and literatures. When a work of art is compared, the indepth meanings and techniques of different works written by various authors have paved a path to understand the works. While similarities and dissimilarities are found in different works, comparison can be done.

The novels taken for the study are produced from different cultural positions by various authors. The Crying of Lot 49 is written by Thomas Pynchon, who is a leading American postmodern writer. Midnight’s Children is written by Salman

Rushdie. Rushdie is acclaimed as a diasporic writer about Indian history connected with politics. Sashi Tharoor who wrote The Great Indian Novel is an Indian writer.

The writing style of Indian writer; the writing style of diasporic writer; and the writing style of American writer are critically discussed. Moreover, this thesis deals with narrative techniques and thematic analysis. Lyotard strives to explain the term narrative from the etymological reference. The root of narrative is ‘gnarus’. It has a greek origin and it is a verb. This word gnarus means to know. The term narrative refers to a set of knowledge. From this it is known that a narrator is a person who knows. The quality of narrator is to affix the past and the present to the future audience. 125

Roland Barthes is a critic of structuralism cum post structuralism. He himself says that narrative is universal. Because of the concept of universality in modernism, the concept and meaning crisis took place. The point understood here is the “duality”. In postcolonial term this action can be called “ambivalence’. Frederic

Jameson also calls the central function of human mind narrative. With the tone of narrative and execution of structural styles, meanings are produced.

In the postmodern period or era it is better understood that some “prefixes” like ‘de’, ‘re’, ‘neo’, and ‘un’ are playing a vital role to develop and produce meanings.

These three novels are based on history, myth, culture and social satire. In all the above mentioned elements history has a vital role to play. Every narration becomes history. Roland Barthes, Focault and Lyotard say that history is still in need of its own status. This uniqueness of history is not only in the exclusive use of history as a subject but also in literature and sub-literature. Postmodern writers are writing literary texts with conscious mind. The unconscious ideas and arrangement of thoughts are written consciously, “The unconsciousness is consciousness” in postmodern writings.

In the previous chapters postmodern themes and techniques were analysed critically. It is very common to say that themes are not produced by a mere historical background of an author. In the olden days the critical response and critical writings were judged by symbolism or imagery. The Postmodern way of 126 interpreting a text or postmodern writings is based on signs and narrative techniques. The comparison of these three novels has focused on plurality of meanings. The American postmodern writer, Thomas Pynchon, is a pantheon of leading postmodern writers. Biographical background is avoided to deal with deconstructive heading of a text. But critics of Thomas Pynchon have dealt with his background.

Psychology plays a crucial role to play in human life. Human life is not mere a biological development but it is also based on psychological development.

Therefore a human psyche is modified by two important factors:

Environmental factor, and

Biological factor.

These two psychological factors are also discussed in the three novels taken for the study. These environmental and biological factors are the stem of Pynchon’s The

Crying of Lot 49. Sassure, a swiss linguistic says that diachronic and synchronic views can create linguistic structure.

i) Diachronic views a language from its history or beginning.

ii) Synchronic views a language at present. Along with the assistance of these

terms a work and its author can be compared.

 Diachronic  Biography

 Synchronic  Text 127

Deconstructive reading of a text is compared with synchronic method. At the same time mere synchronic views cannot fulfil the reading of postmodern texts.

Therefore, Diachronic, Synchronic, myths, politics and elements of postmodernism are used to analyse and compare the texts taken for the study.

Deconstruction and Saussurian concept accept synchronic views. But to interpret these three novels, it is worth getting the knowledge of both diachronic and synchronic, because, the authors Thomas Pynchon, Salman Rushdie and Sashi

Tharoor have poised their background – studies in these novels, The Crying of Lot

49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel respectively. Pynchon has studied science especially physics to understand the novel thoroughly, because it is also intertwined with thermodynamics. Moreover, the reader must have psychological knowledge. Psychological terms of diseases are used to elaborately understand the novel.

In this comparative study themes and techniques are critically compared. The novel, The Crying of Lot 49, is a real postmodern novel in English. The following techniques have been adopted and utilized in the novel :

 Neo-satire

 Parody

 Cyber language

 Black humour

 Meta-language 128

The Crying of Lot 49 is acclaimed as a complex and a postmodern novel. It is said that a criticism about the contemporary life starts from 1960s and 1990s. The way in which the people live in the society is a kind of schizophrenic life. The life depicted in the postmodern novels is a mere life but not a real life. In this thesis the term neo-satire is used to refer to the people’s life and their way of living during the years between 1960s and 1990s. Neo satire defines that it criticises the life of modernism, for which the tool itself is also modernism. As this thesis deals with postmodernism, it is said social criticism. Therefore, The Crying of Lot 49 can be called a neo satire about contemporary society in America.

Landscape - myth is also stated that Oedipa, who is in search of her own identity as well as Lot 49. All the landscapes are modified into artificial one. And she is also changed into artificiality. Oedipa, the name, is also derived from

‘Oedipus’ - a mythical character. Pynchon has used this name to represent a psychic patient. The main character in the novel is Oedipa, along with, every action and narration goes on. This is a name which has two significances:

 Mythical

 Psychological

From this point of view, mythology also influences psychology and psychology influences mythology. Both have important roles to play in the society.

Satire is a social criticism and neo satire is an apt term to refer to postmodern criticism. But parody is also yet another important ideo-term which gives effects to 129 the readers to understand the comic and the uselessness of modernism. Therefore, postmodernism is a continuity of modernism. Postmodernism is parodying the life of modern people, technological developments and transformation of people’s life in modernism. The Black peoples’ bones are used to sell in the form of cigarettes.

Besides, it parodizes homosexual-bars. Oedipa encounters so many people in her adventure of knowing what Lot 49 is. Among the people, some people are drug addicts and psychic patients.

Drug addicts and psychic patients are parodized. Moreover, this is a condition prevalent in both modern art life and postmodern art life. From this point of view, postmodernism is fully based on modernism. Modernism can function independently but postmodernism cannot to some extent. In her adventure, Oedipa faces selfish people, people with lack of love and care. From this novel it is better understood that this novel called The Crying of Lot 49 is parodying both modernism and postmodernism. Because, pornographic sense is a major point and term to be involved in postmodern novel. The two important tools like satire and parody have led to the second meaning for ‘post’ ‘humanity’. Humanity brings freedom.

Freedom brings happiness. The freedom can make all the possibilities for happiness.

As Freud says a human half-character is shaped by his or her libidinal experience and libidinal thought.

In this novel the hotel manager, Miles, Nefastis, the lawyer of Oedipa, have the same sense of libidinal feeling towards Oedipa. For them Oedipa becomes 130 libidinal object. A woman is physically weak. The physical weakness of a woman is the strength of a man. Even though American women have freedom to go and live anywhere, Oedipa is projected as a sexual object to all the people whom she has encountered in her life. It shows male chauvinism. Feminism has given courage to all women. Even though Oedipa enjoys feminism, at certain stages, she is exploited by her lawyer and other characters. It is stated that this novel itself parodies both modernism and postmodernism.

In Midnight’s Children Rushdie has also used the same tools of technique, satire and parody. He satirizes modern history and parodies modern politics. More than that Rushdie has utilized magic realism. The very term magic and the sense of magicality are also hidden in myth. Myth is unconscious belief of human conscious ideology. In Midnight’s Children the narrator is Saleem Sinai, who was also one of the children born at midnight before Indian Independence. Midnight’s Children is in the non linear narrative technique. Pynchon has used linear narration but Rushdie has used non-linear narration. In The Crying of Lot 49, the language of physics and science are used. But in Midnight’s Children Indian language and own coinages are used to narrate the story. History and politics are the backbone of the story in

Midnight’s Children.

The implement of parody and satire is fused by Rushdie in Midnight’s

Children. In Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children, the traditional way of telling story, that is the oral technique, is used as the mode of narration. As the same, playfulness is 131 also one of the techniques in Midnight’s Children. Mythical elements are made use of in this novel. Besides, Midnight’s Children exposes the post independent society and it is parodized with irony, comic, subjectivity, and playfulness. Midnight’s

Children can be acclaimed as a reminiscent novel. Rushdie is weak in narration because his memory of things in India and historical events are traced in the novel fragmentally.

The parody and satire as above said are the backbone of these novels taken for the study. Midnight’s Children is narrated from the voice of both Saleem and

Padma. Rushdie knows how a novel and the dates should be written exactly. But, he has committed mistakes especially in chronology. To give an example about mistaken dates in the history: The General election took place in 1957. According to

Rushdie, “On election day, 1957, the All-India Congress was badly shocked.

Although it won the election, twelve million votes made the communist the largest single opposition party” (MNC 307).

Deliberately Rushdie wants to misdate the general election. It is also a kind of satire or parody to say that the congress party itself is not able to administer the country, because he has the power of telepathy and magical power.

Moreover Gandhi’s death date is also misfixed. In India the General Election and Gandhi’s death are very crucial events for the people. But the writer deliberately has written the dates wrongly. It is a parody about two major issues in

India. 132

“Shiva and I were born under Capricorn rising; the constellation left me alone, but it gave Shiva its gift. Capricorn, as any astrologer will tell you, is the heavenly body with power over the knees” (MNC, 307).

In The Crying of Lot 49, as it is stated that Oedipa is a name derived from myth – it becomes magic. In Midnight’s Children also the above said quotation states that magic. The very words like ‘capricorn’, ‘astrologer’, ‘heavenly body’ – these words are having the magical reference and impact on the people’s real life.

Therefore, Rushdie has been popular for using magic realism. Not only has Rushdie used the technique called magic realism, but also other many writers have used; for example, Marquez in his One Hundred Years of Solitude has adopted the same technique.

In Midnight’s Children, The Crying of Lot 49 and The Great Indian Novel, the narrative technique, uses ‘mythology’ as its base. Mythology also produces theme. In Midnight’s Children, names from the states of Gujarath, Kashmir,

Dravidian and Portugal are found.

Midnight’s Children is also a novel of ‘self consciousness’. Sarma in his essay ‘Fantasy as a Method in Midnight’s Children’ says “I think of fantasy as a method of producing intensified images of reality” (Rushdie). The narrative technology adopted by Rushdie is derived from Indian epic and traditional oral story telling. 133

Realism and Fantasy are the key elements to produce magical realism. It is a new nation freed from white people. The mode of narrative in Midnight’s Children does not follow the traditional and Aristotlean manner. It is called non-linear narration. Saleem tells Padma about the story and in The Crying of Lot 49 the author tells and narrates the story and in The Great Indian Novel Ved Vyas narrates the story.

In the narratological aspects of these three novels, The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children are found with the Indian traditional culture, whereas the

American novel The Crying of Lot 49 is not depending on the narrator.

Midnight’s Children is also a parody as is evident from the starting line of the novel: “I was born in the city of Bombay… once upon a time. No, that won’t do, there is no getting way from the date: I was born in Doctor Narlikar’s Nursing

Home on August 15th 1947” (MNC, 3).

The above pointed quote from the original text itself is a parody. From the beginning it starts as a traditional one. When it develops it fully acknowledges a non-linear narration. At the same time the very word can be interpreted with postcolonial tendency. That shows that Saleem was born in the hospital owned by the English man ‘Narlikar’.

Fantasy and magical realism are interwoven in Midnight’s Children. Fantasy and magical realism can be used to combine reality and fictionality. Fiction is created on the basis of real life. Rushdie’s popular technique is magical realism 134 which makes the reader feel that he/she is reading a novel. This can be called self- reflexive or self-conscious novel.

In the same way, The Great Indian Novel is also an important postmodern novel. The Great Indian Novel is a satire. It is well said that the novel is called Neo- satire about Indian political events and historical events with the assistance of the great Indian epic The Mahabaratha. The modern India has politics and colonial domination. These events are analysed critically. Even in this novel, parody and satire, these two terms are utilized to interpret the postmodern text.

Even though it is a novel written after the postwar period, it has the Indian traditional effects in the novel by taking advantages from epic and oral story telling.

Ved Vyas is a narrator of this novel. As Rushdie excutes his memory to write

Midnight’s Children, Tharoor also uses his memory to write The Great Indian

Novel.

In these three novels: The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and

The Great Indian Novel, the domineering characters are there. Each narrative character in the novels represents the culture, history and politics (Table-1).

Table-1

Novels Narrative Characters

The Crying of Lot 49 Oedipa

Midnight’s Children Saleem

The Great Indian Novel Ved Vyas 135

Louis Althusser has classified two cultural and political domineering ideas as follows:

 ISA

 RSA

ISA expands as ‘Ideological State Apparatus’. ISA defines the ideologies in the world such as ‘religion’, ‘culture’ and ‘institution’. RSA expands as ‘Repressive

State Apparatus’ RSA defines the repressive things such as ‘law’, ‘politics’,

‘ministeral’, ‘power’ and ‘court’.

In these three novels, the Ideological state Apparatus and Repressive State

Apparatus are parodied with the agents of domineering characters said above.

The major technique used in the The Great Indian Novel by Tharoor is ‘Inter textuality’. In the olden days inter textuality was used to hide the real source but the new meaning for inter textuality is to show the source deliberately. That is the reason for these two authors, Tharoor and Rushdie using inter textuality in these novels. Tharoor’s inter textuality is based on various captions and novels from other writers. One title echoes the other. Inter textuality can give a well-combined combination to one another.

According to Brian Mc Hale, there are two ideological concepts derived from the book Postmodernist Fiction:

 Epistemological

 Ontological 136

The origin of epistemology is derived from Greek – ‘episteme’ means knowledge and ‘logos’-means discourse. Therefore modern fiction or novel stands for knowledge.

The term ontology is derived from Greek ‘ontos’- which means be (or) being. Ontology means the scientific study of ‘being’. Satre also deals with the same ideology under a school of ‘existentiatism’. Mc Hale’s ideas can be refuted.

By simply ‘being’ is not a postmodern novel. Postmodern novel is dynamic or produces plurality of meanings. If the novel is simply being, there is a possibility for a single meaning. These writers have used languages and techniques deliberately. Deliberation is nothing but a sense of consciousness. The use of inter textuality shows chronology of texts. Inter textuality has included various terms such as:

 Source-study

 Allusion

 Reference

 Influence

 Parody

 Pastiche

 Quotation. (Shastri, 6) 137

As Shakespeare says in King Lear, “Nothing comes out of Nothing”. In The Great

Indian Novel,Midnight’s Children and The Crying of Lot 49 the above mentioned terms are used.

Inter textuality is not a mere term, but it can be said that it is a domineering one which has all the above said terms analysed in these three novels taken for the study. In The Great Indian Novel there are eighteen books. The eighteen chapters are named eighteen books in a single book. Each book’s title echoes the other one.

For example the book IX in The Great Indian Novel ‘His-, or, The Far Power –

Villain’ is a parody of M.M. Kaye’s Raj fiction, The Far Pavillion. And yet another example is book X that is titled ‘Darkness at Dawn’ is also reflecting Arthur

Koestler’s Darkness at Noon.

In The Crying of Lot 49 a number of references are used to parodize the

Californian culture. Some sources are taken from Christianity. In Midnight’s

Children, Rushdie represents Islamic practices with a parody. In The Great Indian

Novel it is important to note that the starting line ‘They tell me India is an under developed country’ (11) is the same as the concluding line in the novel (GIN, 418).

This sort of conclusion is called a ‘zero degree’ - according to Tamil popular writer

Charu Nivedita. Many postmodern novels are open ended but here in The Great

Indian Novel both the starting and concluding lines are the same. Therefore, it is a conscious way of writing. Tharoor gives a narrative and problem in the names of 138 parody and references but finally he himself concludes. It shows within the text that all the aspects are analysed.

To bring The Crying of Lot 49 to its narrative method the beginning line is

“one summer afternoon Mrs. Oedipa Mass came home from a Tupperware party whose hostes had put perhaps too much” (Lot 49, 5)

“Tupperware party means that it is a trade name for airtight plastic containers used for keeping food fresh. Tupperware parties are organized to promote the sale of such container” (Nicholas, 18)

Pynchon starts telling the story through Oedipa Mass which is a celebration.

Party, the very word itself is a celebration. Party has two significations

Party

Celebration Commercial

Fig-1

Therefore postmodern novel deals with celebrations and its commercial aspects. At the end of the novel the reader can understand that Oedipa is eagerly waiting for the

Lot 49. The auctioneer cleared his throat, and Oedipa settled back, to await The

Crying of Lot 49. In The Crying of Lot 49 the author deliberately did not complete the novel with a clear cut concluding statement. It is open ended. This kind of open ended statement states that there is a freedom given to the reader to interpret. The 139 aim of open-ended concluding statement is a kind of invitation to the reader to re- read and to give plurality of meaning.

Compared with Midnight’s Children, the writer says that, “I was born in the city of Bombay… once upon a time.”(MNC, 3) the starting line is also a traditional way of narration, like ‘one summer afternoon’ in The Crying of Lot 49. But in the end in the Midnight’s Children there are a few lines which are drastic in the world and which has imprinted an impact on the society. These lines are as follows:

They will trample my son who is not my son, and his son who will not be

his, and his who will not be his, until the thousand and first generation,…

annihilating whirlpool of the multitudes, and to be unable to live or die in

peace. (MNC, 647)

At the end of the novel Midnight’s Children the nurse swaps the newborn children.

Mary who is a mid wife swaps the children. Mumtaz who is very rich expects a child and Vanita who is very poor also expects a child. Unfortunately the midwife

Mary swaps the two new born children.

For this unexpected action Rushdie compares Hinduism and Islamism with

Christian God. Mary who belongs to Christianity is the root cause for annihilating social and religious discrimination. This statement is also said indirectly by Rushdie

(MNC, 137).

Moreover Rushdie narrates that within the nation itself people are fighting with each other, especially the poor against the poor, Bengali against Bengali. Even 140 today it happens in India. Therefore Rushdie is a real prophet and gets a power of magical realism.

There is a little difference between T. S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ and

Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. In T. S. Eliot’s ‘The Waste Land’ a reader can understand that it is difficult to comprehend the meaning, because the reason might be cross-references and allusions. The language is hard to understand. As such in The Crying of Lot 49, the language parts are difficult for the readers to understand the language employed by the author. For instance: ‘Tupperware Party’,

‘Bartok’, ‘LSD’, ‘A Rorschach bolt’, ‘Fu-Manshu’, ‘a car pool’, ‘Benzine’,

‘Bismarck’, ‘the William of orange’, etc.

T. S. Eliot is a modern popular poet and his era is no more, according to postmodern critic. But the same allusion and cross-reference are executed even in the postmodern text. Especially in The Great Indian Novel, allusions and parody, and more over pastchie are utilized in the novel. Therefore the reader must have the full-fledged understanding of The Mahabaratha and Indian political events. Again the reader can find difficulty to understand the postmodern text.

The Crying of Lot 49 is a representative of modern and postmodern text. It is neither a postmodern text fully nor modern text fully. It is an ambivalent mix of modern and postmodern text.

In the novel The Crying of Lot 49, the main character is Oedipa. Oedipa is affected by the disorder called ‘paranoia’. Paranoia is a psychological disorder. The 141 disorder paranoia means that it is a mental disorder with ‘fear’ and ‘suspicion’. The condition of postmodern world is connected with ‘suspicion’ and ‘fear’. From the execution of the domineering character ‘Oedipa’, it is said that the novel of postmodern and the life in postmodernism are parodied. This execution of the character ‘Oedipa’ is a clear representation of the postmodern world. To get a clear understanding of the word, paranoid is rooted from the Greek origin; ‘para’ means

‘beside’ and ‘noos’ means ‘mind’. Taking a cue from this term is a representative of beyond knowledge.

Endorsing with the point Patric O’ Connell in his essay on ‘New Essays on

The Crying of Lot 49’ explains that chaos and meaninglessness are combined together in paranoia. Connell says that Pynchon’s novel, The Crying of Lot 49 resembles Farina’s fiction. To some extent The Crying of Lot 49 echos Farina’s fiction. This is what postmodern novel or fiction or work has ‘reference’ or

‘influnce’. Metaphors and fantasy can be found in the work of Thomas Pynchon. It parodies culture bound and romanticized concepts. To marginalize culture-bound and romanticized the postmodern texts emerged.

“Culture, in its broadest definition, refers to that part of the total repertoire of human actions and its products, which is socially as opposed to genetically transmitted” (Mitchell, 45). As Mitchell quoted culture is “most anthropological definitions of culture have been modifications of that of E. B. Tylor: Culture or

Civilization is that complex whole of which includes knowledge, belief, art, morals, 142 law, custom and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society” (primitive culture, Vol. I. 1871) (Mitchell, 45).

Acknowledging and explaining the above said quotes, to unpack culture itself is self dynamism. Not only in culture but also in science changes take place.

For instance, Ptoloney discovers that the old is geocentrism. Newton says that the time is constant. But Einstein has disproved it. Of late CERN group is in the position of changing the concept of Einstein. From this point of view, the man made culture and scientific invention are dynamic. The culture is not static. It has the quality of cyclical process.

Analysed critically, Midnight’s Children is corporate with the language of carnivalisation. According to Nandini Bhattacharya, Midnight’s Children is a text of retaliation. According to Mikhail Bakhtin carnivalisation or carnivalesque is a medium to marginalize all kinds of law restrictions and ideologies that prune the desire of different people. Mock Crowing and uncrowing the magisterial power of king is deliberately used by Bakhtin. Carnivalisation is another kind of technique to establish Midnight’s Children as a postcolonial text through the following words:

Ekdum, angrez, nasbandi, dhoban, zenana, ooper neechay, sarpanch,

crorepati, ayah, nibu-pani, khichri, chutney, gulabjamun, jalebi, barfi, bhel-

puri; arbitrary joining of words to form comic polysyllables ‘overandover,’

‘downdowndown,’ ‘suchandsuch,’ ‘birthanddeath,’ ‘whatdoyoumeanand-

howcanyousaythat,’ ‘blackasnight,’ ‘nearlynineold,’ ‘almostseven,’ 143

‘godknowswhat,’ ‘dirtyfilthy,’ etc. Rushdie generates the effect of

onomatopoeia with typically Indian sounds like doomboombadoom, thai

thai, khrikkkhrikk, dharraaammm. Rushdie attacks the officious seriousness

of English by inventing new forms of English words through hybridizations

like ‘mediocrely,’ ‘dislikeable,’ ‘writery,’ ‘suicidally,’ ‘unbeautifully,’

‘sonship,’ ‘memoryless,’ ‘historyless,’ ‘dupattaless,’ ‘Bombayness,’

‘chutinification.’ He uses nonsense back-up words which is a typical Indian

language habit such as ‘writing-shiting writer-shitery,’ ‘club-shub,’ ‘joke-

shoke,’ ‘pumpery-shumper,’and startlingly literal translation, translation of

typically Indian expressions like ‘piece-of-moon,’ ‘God-knows-what.’

Rushdie shows total indifference to grammatical rules in Midnight’s

Children to create topsy-turvy speech patterns such as “green and black the

Widow’s hair and clutching hands and children mmff and little balls and

one-by-one-torn-in-half and little balls go flying green and black her hand is

green her nails are black as black. (Midnight’s Children 422) (Mohit K. Ray,

73)

Carnivalisation is not only merely a technique but a mock and abuse of the fundamental English writing. And it is to establish Indianism with English. This is what Rushdie calls ‘chutnification’.

In The Crying of Lot 49 Pynchon has mocked the technological development in America. Oedipa when she takes her adventure, has to encounter the building, the 144 houses in the farm of technological circuit like a radio and she is reminded of the electronical circuit in a radio and she wants to analyse the deeper sense of meanings of her life. But she could not do it, because she is affected by the disorder that the person himself or herself does not know that she or he is the victim of the disease.

And finally finds nothing. Pynchon has used the language of electronics, weather conditions, meteorology, science and computer course, like second law of thermodynamics, IBM typewriters, and entrophy. Pynchon uses imaginative use of science. The imaginary science can be called pataphysics. Science cannot be imagination but in The Crying of Lot 49 imaginative science is used. Pynchon has incorporated with electrical circuits and pataphysics to parody the scientific development in California. It is a point to understand that this novel is a metafiction.

Metafiction is a fiction about a fiction. The next quality of using a metafiction is to make the reader feel that the reader is reading a fiction.

In these three novels memory takes place in greater place. These three writers have used same techniques to represent different cultures. In The Crying of

Lot 49 epistemology, thermodynamics and information theory are the intellectual manifestations. Pynchon’s use of language of science and technology is to make feel the reality of Californian culture.

In The Great Indian Novel history and politics are the main tools to describe the postmodern text. The Great Indian Novel is also a kind of postcolonial text.

Indian mythical characters are executed to speak English. In The Great Indian 145

Novel imaginary epic characters are speaking about historical facts through the modern political figures. Language is simple and readable. In The Great Indian

Novel Tharoor has used different types of meters. But 138 lines are under the title of

HIM-OR, the fear power-villain. Tharoor is influenced by blank words and a comic one the song in the narrative aspect goes like:

To tell the tale of Pandu

Will not detain as long;

His slogan was ‘can do!’

And on his lips a song. (The Great Indian Novel, 176)

For instance ‘Pandu’ is the last word of first line of the poem. ‘can do’ is the last word of the third line of the poem. Pandu is not an English word; it is a proper noun. Proper noun can be pronounced and spelt as a person wishes. The words “can do” is an incorrigible to different verbs. The International Phonetic Alphabet has given a specific pronunciation for the word ‘do’.

Typical English pronunciation and mythical proper noun’s pronunciation are mixed critically in order to maintain the strength of post modernism. It is a pulp poem. Pulp poem means that it can be read by all ordinary people and people can enjoy the poem. In the fourteenth book “the man who could not be king”, Tharoor writes five line poems numbering about 130 lines. In the same book under the title

‘The rigged Veda’ eight lines poem numbering about 112 are found. In the eighteenth book under the title the path tool salvation 182 line poems are written by 146 the same author. The last book i.e. the eighteenth book expresses the path tool salvation. This is not the mere title. Tharoor tells the reader that the way people can take is accepted. In The Great Indian Novel one can find many songs. In Greek drama chorus has a vital role to play to proclaim the next scene and the foretelling.

Likewise that influence is also there in The Great Indian Novel. These three novels:

The Crying of Lot 49, The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children can be called postcolonial texts. At the textual level postcolonialism can be given a kind of respect. But in the world of today there is no room for it. Separately, India has two colonizations now:

 Ultra-modern-colonization

 Intra-colonialism

For celebration and refreshing, post modernism accepts the artifactuality.

Artifactuality meant by Derrida, is, that without suggesting that time used to be real before it was made over into ‘text’, Derrida’s argument is that present –day time needs to be understood in terms of modern (or ‘postmodern’) processes and practices of textualization” (Lucy, 2).

The above said quote states that present time and present condition must be understood by the modern art or postmodernism. Moreover, all the three novels, The

Crying of Lot 49, The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children are based on one more important technique called ‘metafiction’. 147

As for the themes in the three novels: The Crying of Lot 49, The Great

Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children, multiple themes are produced. It is not only in the postmodern texts, but also any other texts, the multiple themes can be culled out. But the aim of postmodern novels or texts, can make more paths to reader to interpret the texts. In that manner The Crying of Lot 49, The Great Indian Novel and

Midnight’s Children have more rooms to apply any theory of postmodernism.

The Crying of Lot 49 deals with the theme of ‘emptyness’ in her adventure.

In every event the steps that she takes up every day is ‘null-and-void’. Through

Oedipa’s character Pynchon has criticized the Calofornian culture. At the last,

Oedipa waits for the cry for 49, but nothing happens. “The auctioneer cleared his throat. Oedipa settled back, to wait The Crying of Lot 49,” (The Crying of Lot 49,

127). Pynchon has projected Oedipa as follows:

148

Postmodern Writer Circle

Fig. 2

Oedipa projects the multiple themes:

i) The theme of unhappiness

ii) The theme of disappointedness

iii) The theme of endless searching

The end of the line quoted from The Crying of Lot 49, is, “Oedipa settled back to wait The Crying of Lot 49’. This one statement has got the power to produce multiaccuntuality in the fiction.

When Oedipa is in search of her own identity, she finds nothing. In her every attempt she reaches failure. She wants to find who Tristero is, but she could not do. 149

The unhappiness makes her go in for endless searching. The endless searching also results in failure. Finally, she waits for The Crying of Lot 49, but nothing takes place. This act makes her disappointed.

Thomas Pynchon has also used the central theme of lack of spirituality in

The Crying of Lot 49. The title The Crying of Lot 49 has a sign of lack of spiritual strength among the American people. Centering lack of spirituality in postmodern novel is lack of post modernity in postmodern novel.

The phrase, of course, refers back to the novel’s title. The number forty-nine

may recall the immigration of 1849, and the gold rush to California of that

year. In view of the auctioneer’s gesture, like a descending angel, it may also

suggest Pentecost when the Holy spirit descended to Christ’s followers forty-

nine days after his crucifixion. (Nicholson and Stevenson, 58)

Pynchon either consciously or unconsciously can misname the title for the novel

The Crying of Lot 49, if he insists on religion. The postmodern Reader Circle can be:

150

Postmodern Reader Circle

Fig. 3

The narrator and domineering character in The Crying of Lot 49 has a contradictory mind state with the reader, in order to make him/her feel that he/she is reading ‘just’ fiction. Therefore, when Oedipa gets disappointed and searches for her own identity, the reader enjoys reading this novel. It shows the umbilical chord between the reader and the writer or a narrative character or an important character in The Crying of Lot 49.

A Critical analytical study of Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian

Novel reveals that both the authors differ in technical mode but in thematic level, they go hand in hand. At the same time Tharoor and Rushdie differ even in 151 technical level. Tharoor and Rushdie differ especially in narrative mode. That is linear and non-linear narration. These two writers are using what are available in their memory. Therefore memory takes a vital role.

Tharoor, deliberately mocks at the ‘The Emergency’, 1975 and ‘Dhandi

March’. Tharoor criticizes ‘Dandi March’ (Mango March / Salt Sathya Gragha).

Gangaji (Gandhi) is criticized by his writing. Gandhi did protestation against the

British For ‘Salt Sathya Gragha’. In India there are two great famines. The second famine in India in 1876-78 killed six and half crore people. The British Government was very adamant that it should not reduce tariff for land and salt: The tax for land destroys the land owners. The tax for salt destroys low class people in India.

Gandhiji knows that land owners and ordinary people are the stem for future India.

That is why Gangaji starts ‘Dandhi March’ in 1930.

Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel is depicting Gangaji’s protestation for freedom and it is also critized. Tharoor has not given any reference to the great second famine in 1876-78 in which, more than six crore people died. Because the death rate was high, Gangaji started ‘Salt Sathya Gragha’. This protestation is also critized by Tharoor. When Gandhi wanted to speak about ‘Salt Sathya Gragha’, the congress party people opposed it. This may be the cause for Tharoor to criticize the

‘Dandi March’. Tharoor has used The Mahabaratha and its characters to fuse the modern political leaders. The narrator Ved Vyas stands for ‘dharma’. The

Mahabaratha stands for a combat between ‘dharma’ and ‘adharma’. 152

Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel is based on The Mahabaratha: Indian political history and leaders are real. But the great epic The Mahabaratha is not a real one but it is acclaimed as an ‘epic’ by all Indians. The Mahabaratha has the element of magic and magicality. Tharoor has inter-related magicality with Indian

‘history’. Therefore, one can understand that the novel The Great Indian Novel has also a kind of ‘magical realism’. Tharoor himself writes that “But the new messiah lay on his sick bed” (The Great Indian Novel, 408), which spells out that the novel and the characters are the redeemers of the Indian society. But the characters are intermingled with history and myth. When myth and reality go together, there will be a ‘dubiosity’. Therefore this novel, The Great Indian Novel is meant for just reading for pleasure.

Moreover the existential philosophy is also there and the Hindu mythology is also criticized in The Great Indian Novel.

We are all in a state of continual disturbance, all stumbling and tripling and

running and floating along from crisis to crisis. And in the process, we are all

making something of ourselves, building a life, a character, a tradition that

emerges from and sustains us in each succeeding crisis. This is our dharma.

(The Great Indian Novel, 245)

This is a quote extracted from The Great Indian Novel. It shows that there are many crises. Even though there are many crises, the people and leaders create a new world for them. And there is a statement which parodies the culture. 153

The concoction of The Mahabaratha and The Great Indian Novel shows that the values and absurdities can take place in India. Both are possible in India. The same ideology is also depicted in Midnight’s Children. Traditionalities, cultural values and the western impacts are expressed in Midnight’s Children. Rushdie unpacks that corruption and political disappointment among the people. These irregularities are there in modern India. Rushdie states that India has multi-layered place: Tragic and comic, absurdity and seriousness, reality and magicality. These elements can have its accommodation in India. Fragmentation can be the top thematic aspect in Midnight’s Children. Fragmentation does not mean discontinuity but means that irregularities and unexpected things can take place in India. In accordance with Rushdie ‘purity’ or ‘purification’ is nothing but cultural adamant.

If a Hindu is talking about purity in his/her religion, it means that he/she is a Hindu adamant. If a Muslim does so, he/she is an Islamic adamant. If a Christian does so, it means that he/she is a Christian adamant. Through this analysis Rushdie in his novel Midnight’s Children expresses it. Fragmentation has its different shapes.

Tharoor also criticizes Gandhi’s Emergency and Rushdie also does it. Rushdie influenced Tharoor to write The Great Indian Novel. Both novels can resonate in different ways. Rushdie shows that in India. Pluritheism has spread and is prevalent in all the places in every corner of India. Rushdie also depicts different types of rituals and cultural festivities. At the same time, Rushdie praises monotheism that is

Islam. Therefore Indian philosophy is mixed with many ‘isms’ theories and ideologies. In Midnight’s Children one can find it difficult to state its genre. It is a 154 labirynthine of fact and fiction, myth and history. This novel has got the quality of history telling and metafiction. It can be called ‘historiographic metaficion’.

Historiographic metafiction has fused the demarcation between history and fiction.

This novel shows the pastness of past; presentness of present; and future life in the modern India. Tharoor also deals with history and politics; Pynchon also uses history and culture; Rushdie uses history and politics.

Above all ‘myths’ and mythical elements are the very base for these novels:

The Crying of Lot 49, The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children.

Postmodernism has produced one of the techniques called ‘Deconstruction’.

Deconstruction rejects biography or autobiography. History itself is a kind of biography of a nation. Midnight’s Children can be self-reflexive or self-conscious novel. This story of the novel is based on the greeting letter written by the Prime

Minister of India.

Dear Baby Saleem, my belated congratulation on the happy accident of your

moment of birth! You are the newest bearer of that ancient face of India

which is also eternally young. We shall be watching over your life with the

closest attention. (Midnight’s Children, 122)

Prime Minister was Nehru on those days. The nation’s history is from Saleem.

History is given an important place in the novel. When the theory ‘deconstruction’ is applied to this novel, History is not necessary and that means ‘biography’ or 155

‘autobiography’ is decentred. Even though it is a postmodern novel, history has many roles to play.

Analysing all these ideologies from these novels taken for the study one can find that the term postmodernism is itself self-contradictory and a self-parody.

In these three novels; The Crying of Lot 49, The Great Indian Novel and

Midnight’s Children, one can find that there is a great reverence for ‘pastiche’.

Steven Connor has quoted to explain what postmodernism is. He has accepted the view that bringing the old style in a new one is called pastchie. As Connor quotes:

“In a world in which stylistic innovation is no longer possible, to speak through the masks and with the voice of the styles in the imaginary museum” (As quoted by

Connor, 48).

Connor, who is an important postmodern critic and writer, says that postmodern themes and techniques are going back to the olden styles. By the term

‘pastiche’, postmodernism escapes from its inability to establish a new identity.

Pastiche is an important element which creates the postmodern themes and postmodern techniques:

Pastiche

Techno-sphere Themato-sphere

Fig. 4 156

Literature, music, songs, art, and psychology are mixed up together in a piece of art. Likewise, Pastiche is a Techno-sphere. The term Techno-sphere has produced and accepted many kinds of techniques. The term Techno-sphere includes language, structure of any kind and narratology.

Themato-sphere accommodates plurality of themes and pluri-intrepretations.

Because of the techno-sphere and its importance, postmodern writers give top priority and privilege to techniques for the multi-layered meaning.

_____

CONCLUSION

. .

Conclusion deals with the language, style, narratology, the structure, themes

and thematic variations in this research. The convergent and the divergent aspects of

various segments in The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great

Indian Novel are analyzed comparatively. The diasporic writers of India; Shashi

Tharoor, Salman Rusdhie and an American postmodern writer, Pynchon criticize

politics, history and culture with the use of techniques like parody and the peculiar

language of their own. Tharoor uses many metaphors, similes, and allusions but

Rushdie uses the coinages of his own. Both the writers have used non linear

narration. Pynchon uses linear narration, scientific words and the aspects of

detective mode. In America, Pynchon has contributed much to Postmodernism as

Tharoor and Rusdhie have done in India. In the three novels, the themes are varied

at certain stages. The target of these writers is to disseminate the theme of

‘dissatisfaction’. It is stated that a country is bound with culture, history and

politics. These writers criticize culture, history and politics, in order to proclaim that

Postmodernism is not under any institution. These authors have made an indirect

mention of gala attitude of ‘singularity in pluralism and plurality in singularism’.

Jean Baudrillard says that postmodernism is ‘anything it goes’. It is better

understood that mulitiaccentuality of themes and techniques can be accommodated

in a text. Thomas Pynchon is a postmodern writer and his shortest novel The Crying

158 of Lot 49 is a typical epitome of postmodernism. In the novel, the protagonist,

Oedipa undergoes a series of searching attitude. It could be said as the Romance in the old sense of the term. In these three novels The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s

Children and The Great Indian Novel postcoloniality, diasporic element, post modernity, allusion, parody, mocking attitude and deconstruction are traced out. In

The Crying of Lot 49 metafiction and parodizing practice are traced out. Parody of

Californian culture is depicted through the character, Oedipa.

Even in The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children, it is said that metafiction and parody are interwoven. In India, by the reading of these two novels

The Great Indian Novel and Midnight’s Children, one can come to know that the politico-history is a foundation to make postmodern novel successful. But in

The Crying of Lot 49, the American culture is mocked at by the author. In this novel, open-ended conclusion is deliberately given, because, towards the end

Oedipa finds nothing and there is no concrete conclusion.

Rushdie and Tharoor are not very particular about the correctness of the year in the novels. When a historian writes history, he or she has to be very particular about the dates and events. But these two writers are not doing so to weave with fictionality. The technique of postmodernism has left it to the readers to comprehend the themes. Theme is not determined by technique by any means. But techniques produce the plurality of meaning. Though every writer has his own style 159 in postmodern literature, these three authors have used parody, metafiction, intertextuality, pastiche and mocking element uniformly.

Thomas Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49, Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s

Children, and Sashi Tharoor’s The Great Indian Novel are taken for the postmodern critical study. In Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel Indian history, politics and myths are focused. Myths are the basic elements for structuralism.

Structuralism is the condition of a society. Tharoor and Rushdie have used these structural elements in Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel in order to parody modernism. But racial discrimination and caste-oriented problems are not focused in large measure. Modernism accepts the Grand narration. Postmodernism celebrates little narration. South Indian history has a little role to play in Midnight’s

Children and The Great Indian Novel. Tharoor uses the Mahabaratha to write The

Great Indian Novel. Hindus believe the Mahabaratha to be a social justice epic and it mends the wrong ways of the people. In the researcher’s point of view The Great

Indian Novel is also bound with Grand narration. Grand narration can accept religious oriented narration. The Mahabaratha is venerated by the Hindu people, but Tharoor uses it as a technique of inter textuality to parody the modern political scenario. Tharoor depends on The Mahabaratha to produce postmodern text. To comprehend the story and techniques of The Great Indian Novel a reader must have read The Mahabaratha. The Mahabaratha is a structuralist text: structuralism has an ideology of ‘structuring’. Structuring means that a myth is created by a man. The 160 same myth forms a man. Therefore again there is an element of modernism. From this point of view, a reader is forced to read The Mahabratha along with Indian political situation.

There is a concoction of Epistemology and ontology in these three novels:

The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel. The duality is revealed by Pynchon, Rushdie and Tharoor.

In Midnight’s Children the racial discrimination and caste-oriented problems have less place to remain. Rushdie also deals with Indian politics, religion of Islam and myth in Midnight’s Children. Indian novels and the diasporic: Midnight’s

Children and The Great Indian Novel deal with myth and culture. The act of swapping the children born on the eve of Indian Independence and their possession of magical powers are the stem of the novel, Midnight’s Children. The quasi- autobiographical elements are traced in Midnight’s Children. Human psyche faces unnatural elements and magic and enjoys it in vain. As such, when a reader reads a novel of magical realism, he or she enjoys it. In accordance with Midnight’s

Children, there are two elements of magical realism traced out:

i) Magic stands for enjoyment

ii) Reality stands for facing

Taking a cue from these two facing the enjoyment is the primary aim of the technique called magical realism. 161

Tharoor has used Mahabaratha as a supporting material to describe with parody Indian politics and mythical elements. From this point of view, a reader can understand that The Great Indian Novel is a post-colonial writing. The reason for that writing is that the great Indian epic The Mahabaratha has a vital role in Indian

English Novel. Without having the knowledge of Mahabaratha and Indian history, a reader can find it difficult to understand the meaning of The Great Indian Novel.

This is a kind of strategy used by Tharoor to re-fix the Indian great epic The

Mahabaratha in The Great Indian Novel. This is how a reader can find the practice of de-colonization in Indian English writing. This de-colonization can also be called seeking for ‘identity’ in ‘identity crisis’. From this point of view, postmodernism also has elements of modernity to establish itself as a postmodern text.

Grand Narration or Metanarration can be defined as :

i) Religious-oriented Narration

ii) Systematic Narration

iii) Well-structured Narration

iv) A package of difficult term: Terms of myth, terms of cyber language, and

terms of science.

On the contrary, little narration means that an ordinary reader can understand a text or a work of art easily. Little narration is meant for pulp-literature. There is a combat between little narration and grand narration. The following classification can make a reader understand clearly: 162

 Modernism vs Postmodernism

 Grand/Meta Narration vs Little Narration

 Elite people vs Ordinary people

The researcher has found that the postmodern text itself depicts the amalgamation and continuation of modernity. At this juncture there is a sign for the difference between ‘Modernism’ and ‘Modernity’. Modernism is defined as new and elite. Modernity means the quality of modernism. The quality of modernism can stem from the elements of modernism. This act is called ‘pastiche’ in postmodern terms. In Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian

Novel, the presence of ‘pastiche’ is found.

A reader can understand the romantic poetry, because romanticism has its own identity. Again, a reader can understand classicism because of its identity in a work of art. Apart from postmodern text, a reader can cull out the meaning and know the identity either through technique, which involves language or the particular period, which involves history.

But the postmodern text accepts all kinds of writing techniques. Therefore postmodernism paves a path to techniques.

As far as the researcher is concerned, Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel have so much scope to say that these are typical postmodern novels. But Thomas Pynchon’s Crying of Lot 49 can take a higher position to be called a quasi-postmodern novel. By bearing the label of postmodern 163 novel, Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel give more emphasis upon modernism and modernist novels. That is why the researcher has found that postmodern period which lasted long, is, from1960 to 1990. These thirty years have made some important changes in literature. Inspite of thirty years of celebration, these years depend on the previous modern era.

This research goes beyond the general opinion of typical postmodern novels.

Heterogeneity is the primary stimulation to attain success in postmodern novels.

Heterogeneity is mixed with various systems and narrations. This research ocuses on techniques. The reason for giving importance to techniques is that postmodern writers are conscious to bring out the unconscious. By this point of view Thomas

Pynchon, Rushdie and Tharoor are giving importance to techniques consciously. To some extent these writers have forgotten to affix the historical date correctly.

At one point Pynchon, Rushdie and Tharoor have maintained to parody culture, society and human life of meaninglessness in Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s

Children and The Great Indian Novel. Humour is different from parody. Parody is to show one’s dissatisfaction and mocking one’s culture and society.

As for the different themes discussed earlier in this research, Pynchon could have used a male character in the place of Oedipa. On the contrary Pynchon has used a female character ‘Oedipa’. This kind of characterization is also one of the themes in postmodernism specifically called ‘feminism’, when a reader reads a novel through ‘Oedipa’. Therefore Oedipa, a female character is emphasized. 164

The postmodern themes deal with beyond race, culture, religion especially

ISA and RSA. But in The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great

Indian Novel, one can find the impact of the author’s religion.

Diasporic influence is also found in Midnight’s Children and The Great

Indian Novel. Rushdie and Tharoor have witnessed diasporicity by mentioning the historical dates and events.

Myth and epic are in the state of timeliness. But the very term ‘myth’ is still needed to shape the society and culture, but the meaning and different notions are there in myth. Myth can shape human being partially, not fully. Because the development of modernism is still taking place, modernism replaces postmodernism again in the world.

Modernism has witnessed scientific development and mass killing. Both are even now possible. The emergence of postmodern fiction proclaims the death of

‘Eliotization’. Even though Eliotization is over his era of modernism is still there both in postmodernism and in post-theory era.

Postmodern themes and techniques accept allusions, parody and cross- references. These elements are used to understand that the text is postmodernism based. If postmodernism has given freedom to the people and liberty to write for maintaining the human wishes, the text also should give liberty to the reader to understand. But the researcher has found that in the postmodern texts: Crying of

Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel, again there is advent for 165 re-visiting difficult and technical terms. There is not a big difference between modern text and postmodern text. In order to draw a diachotomy between modern text and postmodern text these three writers have deliberately (consciously) used the technique called ‘metafiction’.

Postmodernism is associated with local colour. And the literature of postmodernism also belongs to its period. Bringing in this context of local colour and biographical influence, Rushdie is much more influenced by Islamic religion and Indian politics. Therefore postmodern literature is also the continuity of the former ideologies and is based on modern ideologies.

Just because Pynchon has studied physical engineering, he is influenced by the scientific terms and knowledge. The novels taken for the study: The Crying of

Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel have once again modern way of narration. Modernism stands for rationalism; postmodernism stands for enjoyment. Postmodern readers need to have modern intellectualism to understand the postmodern text. That is why postmodernism can be called by the researcher a

‘meta-modernism’.

Meta-modernism means that postmodernism retells about modernism and its qualities. In short it is better understood that postmodernism is about modernism.

This ideology is seen in these novels that are taken for the study.

In the evolution of meta-modernism the researcher can find one more term called meta-parody. Postmodernism is parody about modernism. This is why parody 166 has a vital role to play in postmodernism. When a reader reads a postmodern novel, he/she can have knowledge of modernism. The postmodern novel is not necessary to parody modernism. In the name of parodying modernism, it is better understood that it is a self-parody. Postmodernism itself is a self-parody.

Parody, meta-parody and self-parody are found in these three novels: Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel.

It is found that postmodern text itself is a self-contradiction rather than self- reflexivity. Self-contradiction is found in these three postmodern novels. In accordance with postmodernism, new historicism is also one of the terms or schools. New historicism acknowledges that every sign is called a ‘text’. The terms like parody, meta-parody and meta-modernism can give a clear meaning towards the reading of the postmodern text.

Postmodernism accepts that anything is possible in the world. All the literatures are produced from the society. There is a relation between the literary object and the society. Literature has a vital role to play in shaping the society. If it fails to do it, it is a mere sign. Postmodern work is beyond the tradition and culture.

A literary text belongs to its culture. Even though a work speaks beyond the culture, it is to be understood that a work belongs to its culture.

Likewise a modern work belongs to modern era and postmodern text belongs to postmodern era. Therefore a postmodern text itself is bound with culture. Once again modernism and modernity revisit in the form of literary work as well as in 167 real life. Postmodern critics and writers are against Auswitch and therefore through the text, postmodern writers provide pleasure for the readers.

Even now the same genocide was also witnessed in Srilanka. Nearly about one lakh Tamilians were killed and the people who are alive are still in the camp.

Either in modernism or postmodernism the same event is taking place. Therefore postmodern texts have given no influence or impact on the society to lead a life with peace.

The draw back in postmodern text is a technique called ‘metafiction’.

Because, metafiction makes a reader think that he is reading a novel. The question is why such an attitude? If a reader thinks that he or she is reading a novel, after finishing a novel of postmodernism, there is no impact on it or on the society.

How to understand a postmodern text? with reference to: The Crying of

Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel. To understand a postmodern text is to comprehend the postmodern text, in two aspects of knowledge:

i) Knowledge about modernism, and

ii) Knowledge about postmodern techniques.

According to these two statements, the researcher has used a hyphenated term meticulously. That is ‘bi-episteme-modernism’.

Lyotard’s ideology ‘incredulity towards metanarration’ has less place to establish in literature, as long as traditional and social institution, and mythical 168 importance are there in the society. Therefore the element of metanarration is still prevalent even in The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian

Novel

The fusion and employment of historical characters compared with, reflect that magical reality. Magical reality is one of the techniques which deface history.

History has its own valuable place. When a magical reality is applied, the particular history becomes less-meaningless.

In The Great Indian Novel, Tharoor has used the word ‘messiah’. Messiah means a person who saves or redeems. This word is questionable. From which clutches has Tharoor redeemed?

The Mahabaratha has godly characterization. Gods and political powers are the magisterial ones. Again The Great Indian Novel goes back to ancient culture and authority. Crossing the border of culture and authority is called postmodern element. On the contrary, these writers reiterate the elements of modernity. From this point of view, postmodernism is called meta-modernism or meta-parody.

At the same time postmodern literature or art is a mixture of many elements.

The very word heterogeneous can be apt to mention here. Postmodernism alone may not be able to give or produce heterogeneous nature in literary work. One can understand that the term heterogeneous can be found in every product of literature.

Just because there is a word play and the signification of different signs deal with heterogeneity, Pynchon, Rushdie and Tharoor are very conscious about narrating a 169 story through the important characters, Oedipa in The Crying of Lot 49, Saleem in

Midnight’s Children and Ganesh in The Great Indian Novel. The important characters are dominating in narrating the story even in the postmodern novels.

When talking about decentering the authority, the authority is centered even in postmodern novels. That is why the researcher has found out the meta-parody.

Moreover the concept of self-contradiction is also found. When talking about plurality of meaning, a reader can apply any theory to cultivate multi-meanings in any text belonging to any era. But in the postmodern text, it need not apply any theory to cultivate meanings of pluri-kind. Just because postmodernism is a self- contradiction, meanings can be produced in different ways.

Virtual reality is also celebrated in postmodern novels. Virtual reality can lead to a new world, where people can find enjoyment. Four basic ideologies can be traced out in these three novels taken for the study: The Crying of Lot 49,

Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel.

With relation to virtual reality, the readers of postmodern texts feel that they are between reality and non-reality. To sustain this mixed ideology of reality and non-reality, the researcher has found out the following ideologies.

The ideologies of postmodern world that lead to New-world

i) Losing memory

ii) The new messiah

iii) Disappointment

iv) Lack of spirituality 170

These are the tracks to lead to postmodern world. The following ‘IF’ table has four major techniques and has raised questions:

Table-2

SL IF Question

IF1 Parody What is the necessity of it?

IF2 Metafiction Why should a reader feel he/she reads a novel?

IF3 Just fiction celebration Why is there no influence?

IF4 Intertextuality What is meant by intertextuality?

The researcher has consolidated these terms under important postmodern techniques. In postmodern text, meanings cannot be interpreted by the author, but it is up to the readers. On the contrary, the author has a vital role to play to lead a reader to find out and understand the meanings by a unique technique.

IF1 - Parody

Parody is not a new term. It has no authoritative place to be played in postmodernism. Parody gives the unread meaning in modernism which has not satisfied the people in the world. The disappointment and dissatisfaction are once again portrayed in the form of meta-parody in the postmodern text.

IF2 - Metafiction

An author must have a relationship with a reader. Similarly the reader must have relationship with the author. The concept of dissatisfaction and disappointment is to feel the previous era’s modernism and to change. On the contrary Pynchon, 171

Rushdie and Tharoor have used the technique ‘meta-fiction’. Meta fiction gives a diachotamy between the reader and the author in terms of the reader reading a novel. Why does the author make that kind of parting-line? If a literary object is produced from the society, it should have a relationship with the society. The relationship also cuts off by the technique ‘metafiction’.

IF3 - Just a fiction celebration

Again this ideology goes back to Arts for Art’s sake. It means that a novel remains as a novel. If it is just fiction, it means that the author’s unconscious narrativity can be read by the conscious reader. The use of just fiction is a kind of escapism. This sort of technique also may come under ‘meta-modernism’.

IF4 - Intertextuality

Literary text may be created by cyclical processes. It means that it goes back to old one or origin. Intertextuality includes influences, references and sources. By using intertextuality the concept of escapism is present. The postmodern text, which has ‘intertextuality’, is innovative or creative with irregularity. That is why Tharoor has used ‘Intertextuality’.

The researcher has used hyphenated words such as: meta-modernism and meta-parody. While the readers are talking about ‘meta-modernism’ or ‘meta- parody’ the era of postmodernism or postmodern texts can be understood. That is why the researcher has found that, a reader of postmodernism can have the 172 epistemology of modernism, postmodern techniques and narrativity. This inter link can be called ‘pastiche’.

Further scope of the research can be in the following areas: New Historicism and Post-Theory can be applied to interpret the meanings and themes in The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel. This thesis deals with diasporic novels in comparison with an American postmodern novel. Other nation’s diasporic novels can be compared with these novels. This sort of comparison can bring different cultural aspects.

Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel deal with postmodern historical narration with politics. The Crying of Lot 49 deals with Californian culture.

Recent novels which deal with diasporic, social and historical criticism are:

The Submission written by Amy Waldman, an American novelist; Super Sad True

Love Story written by American-Russian novelist, Gary Shteyngart; and The Fat

Years written by a Chinese novelist Characterisation Koonchung.

This kind of comparative study of postmodern themes and techniques would produce multi-dimensional views and the development of cultural studies. This type of study can bring new humanity in the world.

______

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APPENDIX: AUTHOR’S PAPER PUBLICATION

Introduction

Postmodern Themes and Techniques in The Crying of Lot 49

Postmodern Themes and Techniques in Midnight’s Children

Postmodern Themes and Techniques in The Great Indian Novel

Comparative and Analytical Study of The Crying of Lot 49, Midnight’s Children and The Great Indian Novel

CONCLUSION

works cited