I.Boldea, C. Sigmirean, D.-M.Buda THE CHALLENGES OF COMMUNICATION. Contexts and Strategies in the World of Globalism NAIPAUL – COLONIAL AND POST COLONIAL ALIKE Adina-Maria Paicu Lecturer, PhD, ”Constantin Brâncuși” University of Târgu-Jiu Abstract:This paper deals with Naipaul‟s position in the context of post-colonial theory, considering him as a member of the Indian diaspora Ŕ two approaches leading to a discussion of his Indianness. After a bio-biographical introduction to Naipaul (the man and his work) a first step would be to determine those elements in Naipaul‟s writings which allow us to consider him from the point of view of his belonging to the post-colonial literature in general, and to the Indian diasporic writing, in particular. A second step would be to establish the relationship between the biographical and autobiographical elements in Naipaul‟s travelogues, with a special stress on his Indian heritage: to what extent does Naipaul‟s Indianness inform his fiction and non-fiction? What triggers the numerous adverse reactions to some of his writings (such as his comments on Islam and the Muslim world, or even on India? What justifies an unfavourable response such as Derek Walkott‟s? Is Naipaul‟s decision to stop writing fully motivated and acceptable? Keywords:VS Naipaul, Indianness, Post-Colonial Literature, Biography and Autobiography, Indian Heritage Date: 2001, December 7. Location: Stockholm, Sweden. Event: Nobel Award ceremony. Awardee: Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (See Fig, 1). It was on this date and at this particular location that Naipaul delivered Two Worlds Ŕ his now famous Nobel acceptance speech Ŕ to the distinguished guests of the Swedish Academy. Naipaul began his lecture by citing Proust, according to whom Ŗa book is the product of a different selfŗ from the daily self of the person who wrote it. In order to understand it, we should search deep in our souls, try Ŗto reconstruct it thereŗ and then we would probably reach it. It is in the light of this statement that we should approach the biography, or even autobiography, of all those who depend on inspiration: ŖAll the details of the life and the quirks and the friendships can be laid out for us, but the mystery of the writing will remain. No amount of documentation, however fascinating, can take us there. The biography of a writer Ŕ or even the autobiography Ŕ will always have this incompleteness.ŗ (Naipaul, Two Worlds) He then continues with a concise presentation of the history of his native Trinidad, the adoptive home of his parents and the other indentured Indian workers in the West Indies. It is like an incursion into the colonial past and postcolonial present, an attempt at self-discovery and self-understanding, an invitation to the two worlds of his childhood Ŕ his grandmotherřs house and the world outside which, by its excluding attitude allowed the new the new arrivals to live their own private lives in their own ways, in their own Ŗfading Indiaŗ. In the world outside young Naipaul learned the rudiments of his Indian heritage Ŕ language, traditions, religion Ŕ and by meeting his Indian Muslim neighbours he became aware of the existence of the other. But the world outside was much more powerful. Even if the his elders were observing the ancient customs and religion, organizing ceremonies and readings of sacred Sanskrit texts, their Ŗancestral faith recededŗ, with a sense of not belonging to the present, and all possible links with India were severed. We are witnessing the colonizing process in a nutshell. Naipaulřs Trinidad is a cosmopolitan world, where the Hindu meets the Muslim, the 130 Section: LITERATURE I.Boldea, C. Sigmirean, D.-M.Buda THE CHALLENGES OF COMMUNICATION. Contexts and Strategies in the World of Globalism Africans or other people of African descent meet the whites and the non-whites Ŕ English, Portuguese, Chinese Ŕ all surrounded by areas of darkness. Fig.1 Sir V. S. Naipaul receiving his Nobel Prize from His Majesty King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden at the Stockholm Concert Hall, 10 December 2001. And here we come to another connection we have been looking for: the writerřs motivation of his subsequent trips to India, the source of his Indian travelogues, the essence of the present study. Naipaul testifies to his indebtedness to Nehru and Mahatma Gandhi, to Rudyard Kipling and John Mastersř books on India and the British Raj, even the romances written by women writers. (Un-)willingly we have touched upon a few of the concepts we will develop upon: biography and autobiography, the travelogue as literary genre, colonial/post-colonial literature, Orientalism, the backlash of the Empire Ŕ all meant to draw a portrait of Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul, the Indian who shocked the Indians in his attempt to find his roots in the areas of darkness surrounding him and his world. Date: May, 2008. Location: Jamaica. Event: the Calabash Literary Festival. Nobel Prize Laureate Derek Walcott launches an unexpected attack upon his fellow Nobel laureate, Sir Vidia Naipaul. The unprecedented attack was dutifully mentioned in The Observer as follows: ŖA wickedly humorous poem by a Nobel prize winner has drawn more blood in a vitriolic feud between literary lions.ŗ As surprising as it may seem, Derek Walcottřs attack on his Nobel fellow triggers questions that only find answers in Naipaulřs writings. Walcott Ŕ better known for his narrative poem Omeros,deeply indebted to Homerřs Odyssey Ŕ and Naipaul Ŕ a similarly fêted novelist and travel writer Ŕ fit into the same picture of postcolonial, diasporic writers. What is, then, the reason(s) of such a fierce and apparently unjustified attack? I navigated the net with the declared purpose to find an answer to this question. After having visiting thirty Internet sites at least, I gave up, and decided to stay on the safe side, and not interfere between two giants of world literature. Nevertheless, The Mongoose, is a highly humorous, surprising attack on Naipaul, the man and the writer. It was first read at the Calabash Literary Festival in Jamaica. Walcott attacks Naipaulřs writing technique (Řeach stabbing phrase is poisonř), directly addressing two of his novels, Half a Life and Magic Seeds: ŘThe plots are forced, the prose sedate and silly / The anti-hero is a prick named Willie.ř Such a violent attack by a fellow writer invites to an investigation into the biographical elements in Naipaulřs life which could (un)justify it. Who is, then, Naipaul? A biographical account may sound rather dry: eighty years ago, on August 17, 1932, Naipaul was born in Chaguanas, Trinidad, into a Hindu family, belonging to the approximately 145,000 Indians who came to Trinidad between 1845 and 1917. About 85% of them were 131 Section: LITERATURE I.Boldea, C. Sigmirean, D.-M.Buda THE CHALLENGES OF COMMUNICATION. Contexts and Strategies in the World of Globalism Hindus, and only 15% were Brahmins. Writing about the unfriendly reception of the Indians by the local population of Trinidad, Bridget Brereton stresses the humble social position assigned to the new-comers by theŖplanters, officials, upper-class whites, educated colored and black Creoles and the black working classŗ once they became aware that the Indians were there to stay. (Brereton, 110) It is in this tropical Trinidadian space with its multi-ethnic population and multicultural atmosphere that we find the explanation of a certain degree of preoccupation with, or obsession of the marginality detected when reading his books, the writerřs feeling that his native island, or the other countries visited, and their inhabitants Ŕ Christian, Muslim, or Hindu Ŕ are totally irrelevant to the (post-) colonial centre. During his boyhood on the island, Naipaul resolved to get away in five yearsř time. He was only twelve then, and he kept his promise. At eighteen, he travelled to England to read literature at Oxford on a government scholarship, never to return. A Knight of the British Empire, Naipaul was conferred the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2001. In Indians Abroad: A Story from Trinidad, Namit Arora provides additional information about the Naipauls. Obviously, Naipaul was not a poor Trinidadian of Indian origin. In spite of his documented extraction from the former indentured workers who had crossed the seas for a better, well-paid for job in the colonies of the British Empire, Naipaulřs father was a journalist and a writer. His marriage into the Trinidad based influential family of politicians and writers of Capildeo. Even today, situated about eleven miles away from Port of Spain, the little town of Chaguanas boasts the so-called Lion House Ŕ Naipaulřs birthplace. Namit Arora lists at least three recurrent themes in Naipaulřs writings: (1) “post-colonial identity and nationalism”; (2) “the fiction of history and the history of fiction” and, (3) “home and belonging in a world characterized by flux, movement and cultural contact.” Arora wonders at the extent to which Trinidad informed Naipaulřs view that all those countries he had visited and written about are Ŗhalf-made Ŕ full of rage, hysteria, or mimic men Ŕ trapped in narrow identities, short on self-awareness,ŗ and questions the Ŗdysfunctionŗ of Trinidadian society which either Ŗhas constrained his way of seeing,ŗ or expanded Ŗhis powers of observation and analysis.ŗ The impact of native Trinidad on Naipaulřs achievement as a writer cannot be denied. It is an impact that awoke in him Ŗthe curiosity… for the larger world, the idea of civilization, and the idea of antiquity. It is the island which gave him to the world as a writer, which Ŗhad given me the themes that in the second half of the twentieth century had become important; had made me metropolitan in a way quite different from my first understanding of the word.ŗ (EA, 153) On the other hand, Naipaul discusses the intimate relationship between India and England, an India he equals to an Ŗun-English fantasyŗ, which the Indians of India could not possibly comprehend.