Diasporas writings
Literature produced in reign of colonies and anti-colonies literature might have arrested the attention of the readers but post-colonial literature proved to be more interesting to read. Literature of the colonized is termed as postcolonial literature. Salman Rushadie, V.S.Naipaul, Bapsi Sidhwa, Anita Desai and now her daughter Kiran Desai are the Indo-Anglian writers who write about the colonized experiences. Though they are anglophile, history is evident to witness the Diasporas who are born in India but live in abroad and write about their born country. What makes their contribution in literature a valuable one? Other writers may write about what they think and imagine but the diasporas write about what they feel, feel about the root country and its problems. It’s their own longing, feeling of rootlessness, suppressed intentions, quest for identity that contribute to the works of art. For instance: Bapsi Sidhwa, a Pakistan’s leading diasporic writer, writes about her own cultural and political difference in her novel Cracking India. They write about the perverted historical views inherited from the colonialism.
Some common things that diasporas share are the ambivalent characters, being fictitious, disregard with their nature, are found either searching for their identity or establishing their given identity, suffering cultural and/or political difference, their psychological dilemmas, cultural politics etc.
Kiran Desai’s, the Man Booker Prize winning book ‘The Inheritance of Loss’ is one such example in the recent times. It is a must read for the Commonwealth Literature lovers. What made the judges to lay their hands on the book to award it? The book depicts themes like English versus indigenous languages, Center and Margin, Nation and Nationalism, Inter culture translations, which are fit to be a postcolonial product. Born in India and brought up in USA, Kiran Desai like any other diasporic writer writes back. Her novel ‘The Inheritance of Loss’ depicts Indian part of Himalayan characters for which she personally lodged in Himalaya for several days.
Some doubt the writers’ self part in their products. And some question if it is possible to write, as T.S.Eliot says, to be catalytic? But it is evidential that though fiction it is realistic fiction. For instance, Kiran Desai herself felt a call back sort as her character Biju does in her novel. Salman Rushadie, who moved from India to England with his family moving to Pakistan, finds political problem in himself like his most of the characters do. Edward Said’s characters resemble him in cultural problems. This feature adds to the interest while reading. You get to know the writer himself when you read their works of art. The only challenge remains is to identify the character which resembles to the writer. In fact, if one wants to know about the writer the only source remains before them is the product of the writer because biographies are often, as some critics claim, half true. Biographies give only the physical details of the writer and his life, whereas their products reveal their hidden self.
In the years time has produced many such diasporas with classics ever written in the world of literature. But such popularity has its own price to pay and some writers have paid it. Many such immigrant writers are often in problems. Recently a renowned Bangladeshi writer, Taslima Nazreen and now Pakistani writer Bapsi Sidwa mentioning their ever immigrant problems in either publishing their novels or the themes that they depict. With the postmodern era at the hands of literature it seems that taboo has a little role to play in writing. Whatsoever they are bound to be in the controversies either in publicity or in anti-taboo activities.
