Monday 16 April 2012


                                               Midnight’s children : an indian narrative                      

 Introduction-

The book is about Saleem,who is nararator and protogonist but it’s also about India because for some magical reason, Saleem and India’s destiny are related with each other.Saleem's birth coincided with a aparticular day of indian history. They both suffer the battering and bruising that comes with being newly independent.
  Alongside the turmoil of this incredible family, is the brutal yet ever hopeful history of India during those times – from the Independence struggle, to Nehru’s early hopeful rule, the wars with China and Pakistan, the creation of Bangladesh, and the Emergency of 1975. Rushdie manages to pack all these events of a long duration quite well in the book.

Why an Indian narrative-

In Midnight's Children, the narrative comprises and compresses Indian cultural history.
Midnight’s Children is a text that recreates the postcolonial history of India.
In the pages of Midnight’s Children, we are able to see the psychological effects of colonial domination on a nation and its people.
Instead of mirroring the colonial ideologies of India’s past to retell the story of her Independence, Rushdie recreates the history of his homeland from the subjective and fragmented memory of his narrator.
       By paralleling  Saleem’s life with the events following India’s           independence, Rushdie ties the identity of the postcolonial country directly to the individuals that are products of it. The result is a text that vividly represents the plural identities of a country and its people who are seeking to define themselves in the wake of colonialism

Intertwining the Indian history in the life of characters -

Born at the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, the day of India’s independence from British rule, Saleem’s life is a microcosm of post-Independent India.
The multiplicity and plurality of India is a dominant theme within Midnight’s Children and is what Saleem refers to when he says that “[t]here are as many versions of India as Indians” (323). This plural national identity mirrors itself in Saleem’s life; his story becomes the story of a new nation.
 His attempt to reconcile his various multiple identities reflects India’s struggle to reunite its multiple nationhoods  after colonial rule.

Postcolonial discourse in the novel-

Western colonial empires during the nineteenth and early twentieth century.
PostPostcolonial discourse was born in response to the imperial expansion of colonial writers like Rushdie, therefore, emerged out of the experience of colonization and asserted themselves by writing in response to the authority wielded by the imperial powers.
The desire to reclaim the India of his past was the driving force behind Rushdie’s decision to write Midnight’s Children and the use of this writing technique.
The novel was born when Rushdie realized how much he wanted to restore his past identity to himself.

Use of language to make the book an Indian novel-

The English of Rushdie is decidedly postcolonial and postmodern. It gives us glimpses into his conscious craftsmanship, which aims at decentring and hybridity.Rushdie very innovatively makes the use of English as a language to represent the past and the history of India.
The innovativeness of Rushdie’s English is prompted by a desire to capture the spirit of Indian culture with all its multiplicity and diversity.
The most inviting feature of Salman Rushdie’s language is the sprinkling of English with Hindi and Urdu words throughout Midnight’s Children, and this provides a certain amount of oriental flavour to the novel.
Such words, phrases and expressions form a long list, including ‘ekdum’ (at once), ‘angrez’ (Englishman), ‘phut-aphut’ (in no time), ‘nasbandi’ (sterlization), ‘dhoban’ (washerwoman), ‘feringee’ (the same as ‘angrez’), ‘baba’ (grandfather), ‘garam masala’ (hot spices), ‘rakshasas’ (demons), ‘fauz’ (army), ‘badmaas’ (badmen), ‘jailkhana’ (prison),.
Reasons for the use of such phrases and expressions-
This is probably done for two specific reasons: firstly, to situate the novel in its geographical location in the various cities of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh; and secondly, to subvert a language associated with colonial powers.
The use of such expressions provides an amount of authenticity and credibility to the novel. It also enhances the quantum of reality which is so much needed in an historical novel like Midnight’s Children.

References-

1.    Linguistic Experiments in Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children
       O.P. Dwivedi
2.     Cathy C. Miller“Salman Rushdie’s ‘Stereoscopic Vision     postcolonial Environments in Midnight’s Children

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