Diasporic writing is an essential part of postcolonial literature. Though Diaspora bridges cultures through widening of experience,it always involves loss and unhappiness. The role of the colonial regime in displacing the colonised people is widely studied. These communities are uprooted from their social settings and eventually move to strange territories. One of the key components of diasporic writing is the search for cultural roots and the realisation that the country of their origin is an illusion they can never get access to. Naipaul himself has articulated this disappointment in this futile attempt to trace the roots of his own past “our own past was, like our idea of India, a dream”(Finding the Centre). The alienation one suffers in a strange place is intensified by the realisation that the country of one's origin is also erased. This hyphenated identity is well articulated in the diasporic literature.
Critical Readings of the Novel
i) Diasporic Novel
One of the striking features of Naipaul’s fictional narrative of the indian diasporic community of Trinidad is his engagement with the descendants of indentured labourers. The indian immigrants in the Caribbean are unskilled labourers and they were displaced by the colonial administration in India.The famine and scarcity of resources force these groups of people to flee from the country and studies have shown that famine was also a result of colonial mismanagement of Indian food grains. The establishment of plantations in the caribbeans is also a colonial enterprise. These groups of people were displaced from their homeland and later employed in the colonial plantations. Thus, it is clear that these diasporic communities are created by the colonial process.
The cultural alienation and the impossibility of returning to home make the life of the diaspora often hard to bear. The first generation of indentured labourers desired to return home as they undertook the voyage as an escape from misery. In the novel Pundit Tulsi, the patriarch of the Tulsi family fails to return home and gradually this is forgotten. It is also significant that there is displacement within a country, for example Mr. Biswas’ journey from Arwacas to Port of Spain brings a change in his fortune. The novel also portrays the migration of second generation Indian Trinidadians like Owad to European countries for higher studies. The epilogue testifies that Anand spends his time in England and refuses to return even when he is informed of his father's illness. Biswas’ journey from Pagotes to Port of Spain marks the impact of the alien environment on the lives of the migrants.
It is a common feature of diasporic writing that those communities upheld the cultural values of the communities they were part of. Most of the labourers compared their exile from home to that of Rama’ s exile from Ayodhya and believed that they would return home triumphantly as Rama reclaimed his kingdom. In the novel, people and houses are given names from Indian puranas; for example the Tulsi household is known as Hanuman House, -Hanuman was a close aide of Rama- Mr. Biswas’ father as Raghu andTara’s husband as Ajodha. In this novel, most of the indian characters attempt to reproduce indian cultural values and rituals in Trinidad. The Tulsi family observes most of the rituals in their everyday life. It is also worth noting that the local community is involved in a ceremony of mounting sticks which is a desperate attempt to cling on certain regional celebrations of north indian villages.
ii) Home as a Motif
The novel records the search and failure of Biswas to create a house of his own expectations. Various factors contribute to this failure; In the first case he is unable to live in the ancestral house of the Tulsis because of the power struggle within the family and number of inhabitants in the family. It is also important that the house reconciles with him and often helps to recover from illness. The novel also narrates the rise and fall of the ancestral home. In more than one way, this house resembles the brahmanic ancestral houses in India and Biswas desire for privacy and recognition is ignored. The house may represent India as such with its crowded streets and power imbalance in the patriarchal household.
The house at The Chase depresses with loneliness and his inability to cope with the people around. He had to deal with thugs like Mungroo and work with raw men like Seth. His refined tastes meet with the aggressive manners of the local people. In Green Vale, his house was broken by the alien climate of the region. Here again, the strange land he lives makes it difficult to survive. His life at Port of Spain was the best he ever had, though he was thrown out of the house whenever Mrs. Tusi was in need of the house. The house he buys in Sikkim Street is defective but he gradually makes it customised to his requirements.
Biswas’ search and failure mark the helplessness of the diasporic communities to feel at home in countries they were forced to live.
iii) Root and Route
In his analysis of the diaspora, Paul Gilroy introduces these terms. The first one “root” refers to attempts made by migrants to reconstruct from memory a pristine, pure, uncontaminated homeland to which the first generation of immigrants dreamt of returning. In the novel the other term “route” refers to the journey and the historical interactions between masters and indentured immigrants which have forever contaminated the diasporic ethos and meaning, His analysis throws light into the complexity of migration and how their cultural roots are contaminated by the colonial regime
Critics have also studied the impact of long ship voyages on the migrants. The existing social relations were subject to negotiations and many rigid social practices such as caste related rituals were violated. This also led to forming new social organizations such as brotherhood among the immigrants. Unlike many other diasporic communities, the Caribbeans have invented new myths and also have reinvented old ones to suit their present condition.
iv) Struggle over Place
The title itself implies the spatial concern in the novel. A house is a social construct and his engagement with the alien geography of Trinidad leads to his discontentment.It is commonplace that Biswas notion of a home is modelled after colonial notions. His dissatisfaction with Hanuman House is partly because of its joint family system in which individuals are nonentity and everything is shared among the inhabitants. He also resists the collective way of bringing up children in the Tulsi household, and wishes to bring them up with taste which the Tulsis did not permit.
Biswas is also very critical of the inequality of spatial distribution. For example, in the house no one gets enough space except the dominant people in the house such as Mrs. Tulsi, Seth, Owad and Shekhar. They enjoy absolute control over the house and the premise and sons-in-law and widows in the family are denied domestic space. The episode in which a doll’s house gifted by Biswas was broken down by Shama to please the Tulsis indicates the domination of the Tulsis in imagining and distributing spaces.
Critical Analysis of A House for Mr Biswas by V S Naipaul - Part 1
Critical Analysis of A House for Mr Biswas by V S Naipaul - Part 1
No comments:
Post a Comment