Assignment 202 - Indian English Literature - Post Independence

 Name : Anjali M. Rathod

Enrollment no. : 4069206420220024

Roll no. : 02

Batch : M.A. Sem. 3 (2022-24)

Paper no. : 202 - Indian English Literature - Post Independence 

Email Address: rathodanjali20022002ui@gmail.com

Submitted to : Smt. S.B. Gardi, Department of English, Maharaja Krishnakumarsinhji Bhavnagar University, Bhavnagar - 364002

           Midnight’s Children as a Postcolonial novel

Introduction of Salman Rushdie : 

Salman Rushdie is an acclaimed British-Indian author born on June 19, 1947, in Bombay, India. His full name is Ahmed Salman Rushdie. He gained international fame and notoriety with the publication of his novel "Midnight's Children" in 1981, which won the Booker Prize and the Booker of Bookers as the best novel to have won the Booker Prize in its first 25 years. 

 The novel is considered a landmark work in postcolonial literature and magical realism. Rushdie's writing is characterized by its imaginative richness, linguistic flair, and exploration of complex themes such as identity, migration, cultural clash, and the impact of historical events on individuals. His works often blur the lines between reality and fantasy, incorporating elements of magical realism and drawing on a wide range of literary traditions.

One of Rushdie's most controversial and well-known works is "The Satanic Verses" (1988), which led to a fatwa a religious edict issued against him by the Iranian government. The novel explores themes of religion, faith, and the nature of belief, and its publication sparked widespread protests and condemnation from the Muslim world. Rushdie lived under police protection for many years due to the threat to his life.

Apart from his novels, Rushdie has written essays, short stories, and non-fiction works. His other notable works include "Shame" (1983), "The Moor's Last Sigh" (1995), "The Ground Beneath Her Feet" (1999), and "Shalimar the Clown" (2005).

Salman Rushdie's literary contributions have earned him numerous awards and honors, and he remains an influential figure in contemporary literature. His ability to weave together intricate narratives, explore cultural and political themes, and challenge conventional storytelling has left an indelible mark on the literary landscape. Beyond his literary achievements, Rushdie has also been an outspoken advocate for free speech, human rights, and secularism.

    Rushdie has served as a professor and lecturer at various universities, contributing to discussions on literature, politics, and culture. His life and work continue to be subjects of academic study and public interest, reflecting the enduring impact of his contributions to the world of literature.

About the Novel : 

        Midnight’s Children, allegorical novel by Salman Rushdie, published in 1981. It is a historical chronicle of modern India centering on the inextricably linked fates of two children who were born within the first hour of independence from Great Britain.

Exactly at midnight on Aug. 15, 1947, two boys are born in a Bombay (now Mumbai) hospital, where they are switched by a nurse. Saleem Sinai, who will be raised by a well-to-do Muslim couple, is actually the illegitimate son of a low-caste Hindu woman and a departing British colonist. Shiva, the son of the Muslim couple, is given to a poor Hindu street performer whose unfaithful wife has died.

   Saleem represents modern India. When he was 30, he wrote his memoir, Midnight’s Children. Shiva is destined to be Saleem’s enemy as well as India’s most honored war hero. 

      This multilayered novel places Saleem at every significant event that occurred on the Indian subcontinent in the 30 years after independence. Midnight’s Children was awarded the Booker McConnell Prize for fiction in 1981. In 1993 it was chosen as the best Booker Prize novel in 25 years.

    The novel's title,  Midnight's Children  is a nod to the extraordinary circumstances surrounding the birth of its protagonist, Saleem Sinai, who was born at the exact moment of India's independence from British rule on August 15, 1947. As Saleem grapples with the challenges of growing up in a newly liberated nation, he discovers that he shares a telepathic connection with other children born in the first hour of India's independence. These children, like Saleem, possess unique and supernatural abilities, a metaphorical manifestation of the tumultuous changes and challenges faced by the nation in its early years.

The narrative unfolds against the backdrop of a rapidly evolving postcolonial India, capturing the political, social, and cultural transformations that shape the destiny of Saleem and his fellow Midnight's Children.

    Rushdie skillfully weaves historical events into the fabric of his storytelling, seamlessly blending reality with elements of magical realism. The result is a rich and multi-layered narrative that not only chronicles the personal struggles of Saleem but also serves as a metaphor for the collective journey of a nation finding its identity in the aftermath of colonial rule.

As a postcolonial novel : 

 

      Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children is a key text in postcolonial literature describing an allegory of events since India’s independence. The novel depicts the historic events which shaped the life of Postcolonial India that we know today through the portrayal of personal history of Sinai family. Midnight’s Children follows Saleem Sinai, the novel’s narrator, as he self-consciously explains his family history to the reader and to his listener, Padma. 

    While describing his grandfather and grandmother’s personal history, Saleem intertwines Indian history within his narrative. This combination of his own familial history and Indian history culminates in the moment of his birth. Born at precisely midnight, August 15, 1947, Saleem echoes the birth of an independent India, which gained its independence from Great Britain at the same exact moment as Saleem’s birth. In this moment, Saleem gains the ability to communicate with the other “midnight children,” those also born on the same day as Indian independence.

 

The novel aligns Saleem’s narrative to the narrative of a newly independent India, creating an allegorical reading of his character. Post-colonial identity is the way a person or group of people affected by colonization. Characteristics of post-colonial

identity include being dehumanized, marginalised, voiceless, hybrid, and being classed as ‘other’ or ‘subaltern’. Rushdie tries to show how the colonised people were inhumanly dehumanised by the colonizers in the text with the extensive use of metaphors. In one instance Salim said he was “mysteriously handcuffed to history”. (Rushdie 210). This infers that Salim experienced a feeling that he was a slave to his life and his decisions were not his to make, his interests were forced, and he had no control whatsoever over his life. 

   This signifies dehumanization, as the colonizers brainwashed the indigenous inhabitants of the subject country, convincing them that their native culture and standards were inferior and animal-like. Salim also talks about the insults that he had

to endure throughout his life. He was called Piece-of-the-moon’ which is a metaphor that originates from Arabic, where it directly translates to ‘baby gazelle’. This is an example of dehumanization, as the people using this to insult Salim because of his skin colour, comparing him to an exotic and wild animal, showing that they believe he does not qualify to be a human. 

     Secondly, Rushdie presents the colonized people as ‘voiceless. An example of this is when Salim reveals that he doesn’t have the power to open up about his experiences as he had been a ‘swallower of lives’. This signifies that he has bottled up all of his and other people’s experiences and their inevitable destiny and purpose inside because he had no power and his opinion would not matter even if he had voiced his thoughts. Another example of this is when he expresses that his destinies were ‘indissolubly chained to those of my country’. This can imply that he was psychologically as well as physically being forced to follow the crowd and to not be out of the ordinary.

           The protagonist of the novel Saleem Sinai also becomes a face of Postcolonial India. The novel is narrated through the first personis the history of an individual, who identifies himself with the history of the nation. The hero, Saleem Sinai, the child of the midnight, is born at a time when the past and the future join hands in respectful greetings on 15 August, 1947 when the nation he was born in , India gains Independence. Consciously and unconsciously, he becomes mysteriously hand-cuffed to the happenings of the nation and his destiny is indissolubly chained to his nation. It so happens that on the same night between 12 p.m. and 1am with a slight difference in time, 1001 children are born throughout India. Of the 1001 children born, 420 children die and the remaining 581 children survive. These children are gifted with an extraordinary skill of telepathy. This gift enables them to organise a Midnight's Children's Conference, which is a platform for the children to meet and discuss their personal and political problems through their minds. The 581 number of children and the Midnight's Children's Conference is somewhat parallel to the Indian Parliament and its members.

       The protagonist’s life’s major events are found parallel to many political and historical events in the country. Saleem says “Such historical coincidences have littered, and perhaps befouled, my family's existence in the world". (Rushdie 1). The major historical events described in the novel are: The Jallianwala Bagh Massacre, the Quit India Movement, the role of Muslim League in the Partition, the partition of India, the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi in 1948, reorganization of States on linguistic basis in 1956, the language riots, the Chinese aggression, Prime minister Nehru's death in 1964, the Indo-Pak war of 1965, the birth of Bangladesh in 1971, the declaration of Emergency in 1975, and the General Election of 1977. Thus, the protagonist of the novel and his narration becomes a face of Postcolonial India.

 Conclusion 

      It can thus be said that, both V.S Naipaul’s A House for Mr. Biswas and Salman Rushdie’s Midnights Children draws the reader’s attention to various traits of Postcolonial literature. Naipaul focuses on East Indian’s Struggle for an identity in

Trinidad through the protagonist Mr. Biswas around whom the whole story runs. On the other hand, the protagonist of the novel Saleem Sinai also becomes a face of Postcolonial India. The novel depicts the historic events which shaped the life of Postcolonial India that we know today through the portrayal of personal history of Sinai family. The novel illustrates the problems of postcolonial the difficulties in assigning an origin point, determining one’s own history, and finding an authentic identity. While Naipaul in his A House for Mr. Biswas portrays the life of people of other nations immigrating to a creole society. In this novel by Naipaul, the writer draws our attention to the characters who are immigrant Indian people spending their lives in the creole society of Trinidad under the dominance of colonial power.

References : 

 Britannica, The Editors of Encyclopaedia. "Midnight’s Children". Encyclopedia Britannica, 27 Oct. 2023, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Midnights-Children. Accessed 8 December 2023.

Chetia, Janardan. A Postcolonial Analysis of Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and V.S. Naipaul’s A House for Mr Biswas. vol. o8, March 2021, https://www.jetir.org/papers/JETIR2103242.pdf. Accessed 8 12 2023.

Image : 1

Words : 1830