Abstract

NAIPAUL'S QUEST FOR ROOTS, IDENTITY AND ORDER IN THE NOVELS WITH THE THIRD WORLD SETTING; A HOUSE FOR MR. BISWAS AND THE MYSTIC MASSEUR

Shashikant Bansal

Volume: 1 Issue: 1 2011

Abstract:

Literature is the chronicle of man’s attempts to make a sense of external reality ever since man came to imbibe the sensitivity to perceive in incompatibility between the forces within and without According to this perspective novel is the most obvious literary form. Here the individual is pitted inexorably against the large social reality at a particular juncture of history and the novel, in a way, becomes the saga of individual efforts to comprehend and adjust to the larger reality. The three cycles of historical romances social, and political realism, and psychological case studies are followed more or less uniformly in all literatures including Indian English literature. The Indian novelists in English have chosen themes and situations that have relevance all over the country or even the world. These themes are not many, since there is a variety of social structure, values, conventions and customs in different parts of India. The Indian English fiction of the post-independence era is free from social and political over tones and there is a shift of interest to the individual and self-identification. Literature is the product of a writer’s reaction of life, the writer himself belongs a production of the conditions of life around him consciously or unconsciously. All Literature articulates the spirit of the time which is an accretion of all the political, social, cultural and religious characteristics of a particular age. Intrigued by the existential question like Who am I? baffled by complex situations, the writer sets out to understands his roots.

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