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The unprecedented triumph of Barrack Obama in the US Presidential
elections is generally considered an eloquent evidence of the emergence of the
marginalized voices as a forceful participant in global politics, apart from
the obvious individual distinction of the victor. The triumph in the political
arena is indicative of the assertion of the OTHER VOICES in multiple areas of
human endeavor. The present issue, while congratulating the young and dynamic
President, who is called upon to meet the insuperable challenge of raising the
American economy and by extension, the world economy from the morass of recession,
focuses on the marginalized voices, which have found adequate literary expression,
the world over.
The first two papers appropriately look at the powerful and pained protest
in African-American writing. R M V Raghavendra Rao, in his paper "Constructs
of Blackness in Toni Morrison's Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary
Imagination", explores the new perceptions in African-American cosmology
through a close analysis of Toni Morrison's Playing in the Dark. The author
believes that Toni Morrison upholds the centrality and integrity of Africanness
in the US. In her paper, "Alice Childress' Wine in the Wilderness: A Harbinger
of the Golden Era of the 1970s African-American Feminist Epistemology",
Melissa Helen examines the rise of women, especially colored women, like Alice
Childress, Oprah Winphrey and Condoleeza Rice. Focusing closely on Alice Childress'
play Wine in Wilderness, the paper shows how the playwright could utilize the
inspiration from the Black Theater to re-vision and re-construct the history
and culture of their race.
This issue further offers two papers on the articulation of feminist voices, which
are, still, by and large, muffled by the male-dominated social structure. Adopting an
evolutionary stance, Anupama Chowdhury, in her paper "Historicizing, Theorizing, and
Contextualizing Feminism", tries to find a certain commonness of concerns in the largely
heterogeneous approach to feminism. Besides tracing the problems of interpreting terms like
`womanism' and `individual feminism', the author attempts to contextualize feminism in Indian
thought down the ages. Going to the specifics, in his paper "`Writing Women': A
Canadian Perspective", Suman Ray Malakar looks at the acts of `breaking the mold', through
the presentation of lesbianism in a short story by Jane Rule, and in Susan Swan's attempt
to topple the societal structure by giving women ultimate prerogatives over the other
gender, in her short story. The author also examines Aritha van Herk's questioning of
her insufficient `paltry (English) language', as well as her narrative technique, thus
providing multiple voices to her protagonists.
Aesthetic and critical responses to a work of art are largely determined by the
prevailing mores and ethos of the reader's geographical and racial context. But, a truly
integrated voice can rise above the restrictive specifics. S Asha, in her paper
"Reading Lolita in Tehran: Rehashing Orientalist Stereotypes", is critical about the perpetuation of
negatives about Middle Eastern Muslim women as hapless womenvictims of
Islamic fundamentalism. Focusing on Azar Nafisi's
Reading Lolita in Tehran, the author shows how
the new orientalist narratives misrepresent the position of women in Islamic
society, urging for a more balanced perspective. The announcement of the Nobel Prize in
Literature for 2008 for the nominally French novelist Le Clezio is a recognition of the intrinsic
worth of the voices outside the mainstream American-European hegemony. Although a
French national, Le Clezio rose above his racial specificity to live and write as a true
integrated visionary, having lived in Mauritius and among the tribes of North Africa. S S
Prabhakar Rao, in his paper "`Nomad Novelist' J M G Le Clézio: The Integrative Voice",
demonstrates how Le Clezio articulates an integrated voice.
As writing in English is vibrant in nations where English is not the first
language, the multiple voices emerging from the Indian diaspora in the US, the
sub-racial groups like Parsis in India, and the socially discriminated Dalits
in Andhra Pradesh, need to be critically considered. Three papers highlight
the concerns of these voices. Sonali Das, in her paper "Kiran Desai's The
Inheritance of Loss: Travails of Immigration", studies two kinds of diaspora
in the American contextthe old, who migrated in the colonial era as indented
labor, and the new, who migrated in the post-colonial era, looking for greener
pastures. Kiran Desai, in her novel, The Inheritance of Loss, deals with the
plight of illegal immigrants at the low economic level and simultaneously at
the Gorkha Resistance Movement in Kalimpong. The novelist has expressed the
anguished voice of `aliens' in the US as well as in India itself. The peculiar
predicament of the racial sub-group of Parsis in post-independence India is
examined by J G Duresh, in his paper "Anguish of Diasporic Experience in
Contemporary Parsi Fiction". The Parsis, who undertook a hazardous journey
and settled in India following the Arab invasion of Iran, flourished during
the British regime. However, in post-independence India, they feel a sense of
insecurity and rootlessness. The author studies this diasporic experience, as
voiced by Rohinton Mistry, Boman Desai and Farrukh Dhondy.
Discriminated socially and deprived economically, the Dalits, in India in general, and
in some states like Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh in particular, have attempted to
raise their voice, seeking redress and alleviation. Literature, in its social consciousness,
came in handy and turned into a spirited medium for expression. In Telugu, there has been
a counter-tradition of voice of protest, commencing with Unnava Lakshminarayana's
novel, Malapalli. The distinguished poet, Gurram Jashua, composed a poignant long
poem, Gabbilam (Bat), portraying the miserable plight of the depressed. In his paper "Critical Response to the Marginalized: Dalit Poetry in Telugu", V V B Rama Rao
traces the expression of this voice of protest in modern Telugu poetry, citing examples from
his translation of poems from poets like Salandra, Karri Vijayakumari and Pagadala
Nagender. Although the voice can turn occasionally raucous, the anger against injustice is clear and
loud.
Once again, we congratulate Obama on his historic election and wish him all
success in his endeavors to meet the challenges ahead.
-- S S Prabhakar Rao
Consulting Editor |
