LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 15:8 August 2015
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         S. M. Ravichandran, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.
         C. Subburaman, Ph.D. (Economics)
         N. Nadaraja Pillai, Ph.D.
Assistant Managing Editor: Swarna Thirumalai, M.A.

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Tracing the Voices of the Downtrodden:
A Reading of The God of Small Things

Prajna Manjari Badajena
M.A., P.G.D.T.E.
Ph.D. Scholar, Utkal University, Bhubaneswar


Abstract

Now-a-days globalization seems to have taken over every form of literature everywhere in the world, but there’s still a form of literature that thrives on being different in every country and every local community which moves away from the mainstream, called subaltern literature. The voice of the marginalized is mostly muted. It is socially, culturally, economically and legally deprived of one’s ‘right’ to voice their protest as a human being in every society. Voices from the subaltern: in the Indian English Novel it is located and explored in the works of eminent novelists like Raja Rao, Mulk Raj Anand, R.K. Narayan, Bhabani Bhattacharya, Arundhati Roy, Rohitton Mistry, Vikram Seth and David Davidar. Arundhati Roy as a Booker Prize winning novelist has shown keen awareness of the problems of many of her characters through her debut novel The God of Small Things. Therefore, my aim in writing this paper is to show how Roy rightly brings forth the characters who have become victims of violence, exploitation, alienation and exile as they are the ones on the margin of society.

Keywords: Globalization, Marxist literature, Subaltern literature, Voice of the marginalized, Indian English Novel.

Arundhati Roy and Her Writings

Indian novel after 1980’s witnessed a new wave of writers, who potentially handled diversity of issues. Their works are known for keen depiction of contemporary social and political issues. Majority of novelists realistically wrote about problems faced by women in a male dominated society. Arundhati Roy is one of them, who have been acclaimed as a leading interpreter of brutalities in a rapidly changing Indian society. Her writing is exclusively about current controversial issues like caste discrimination, gender discrimination, environmental protection and marginalization. She has used marginalization as a literary device to explore the sufferings of peripheral sections of society, especially women and subalterns. The novel The God of Small Things directly deals with the marginalization of three generations of women in an orthodox Syrian Christian family in Kerala and two Paravans both father and son. These three women are: Mammachi, who is representative of old generation of women; Ammu who is representative of the second generation; and Rahel is a daughter of Ammu, representative of the third generation of women in the same family. They are severely marginalized by the male dominated society. Velutha, son of an old Paravan, Vellya Pappen is the victim of caste diascrimination.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.


Prajna Manjari Badajena M.A., P.G.D.T.E.
Ph.D. Scholar, Utkal University, Bhubaneswar
Plot No.223/1755
Bomikhal
Rasulgarh 751010
Bhubaneswar
Odisha
India
prajnabadajena@gmail.com
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