Tabish Khair Is a Versatile Genius of Indian Origin Who Later Settled in Denmark, Where

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CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

Tabish Khair is a versatile genius of Indian origin who later settled in Denmark, where he is working as an Associate Professor in the Department of English at Aarhus University Denmark. He is enjoying immense popularity in English studies on account of his critical works like Babu Fictions: Alienation in the Contemporary Indian English Novels, and The Gothic, Postcolonialism and Otherness: Ghosts from Elsewhere, creative novels such as The Bus Stopped and The Thing About Thugs, How to Fight Islamist Terror from Missionary Position and Filming: A Love Story, poetic collection such as Where Parallel Lines Meet as well. His first poetic collection is My World published in 1994, which has been reviewed by eminent poets of Indian English Literature like Shiv K. Kumar, Keki N. Daruwalla, Adil Jassawalla, and Vilas Sarang.

His first novel An Angel in Pyjamas was published in 1995. Later on he got published his research work entitled Babu Fictions: Alienation in the Contemporary Indian English Novels in 2001, which was followed by his second novel The Bus Stopped (2004). This novel is written in the form of a travelogue. His third novel The Thing About Thugs focused upon the stereotypes and the racist attitude of the British towards the orients. Further we found his second collection of poems Where Parallel Line Meet published in the year 2000. His poetic collection Man of Glass: Poems published in 2010.

Tabish Khair won immense popularity on the basis of his two major works The Gothic, Postcolonialism and Otherness: Ghosts from Elsewhere and How to Fight Islamist Terror from Missionary Position. In the first book Khair evaluated and referred great writers like Rudyard Kipling, Emily Bronte, Joseph Conrad, Erna Brodber Mcville and Jean Rhys etc. All these works were based upon the observations and experiences of the writer. His next novel Filming: A Love Story was marked by Khushwant Singh as one of the best twenty English novels by Indians or writers from Indian origin. The novel was a portrayal of the early lost world of Indian cinema. However his last and the most powerful work How to Fight Islamist Terror from Missionary Position is the story of love, friendship, betrayal and pain.

Being an Indian by birth and Denmarkian by profession, we find Anti-Colonial Discourse in the writings of Tabish Khair. This chapter also highlights diversifying changes from Colonial to Postcolonial and from Postcolonial to Anti-Colonial Discourse.

In his works we find the element of anti-colonial discourse in the respect as he carries the cultural baggage of India and in his works he also tries to assimilate the cultural conflicts prevailing in between his root nation and adopted nation. Certain features of anti-colonial discourse such as identity, quest for identity, search for roots, nostalgia, sense of loss, homelessness, alienation, became the reasons behind his leaving India and deflations of colonial mind-set which still exists in post-independence Indian scenario can also be observed in his works. When we go through the concept of anti- colonial discourse we have to study and understand the colonial and postcolonial literature.

According to Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the word colonialism comes from the Roman ‘colonia’ which means ‘farm’ or ‘settlement’, and it refers to the Romans who settled other lands but still retain their citizenship. It is defined by Ania Loomba in her book Colonialism/ Postcolonialism as:

“A settlement in a new country a body of people who settle in a new locality, forming a community subject to or connected with their parent state; the community so formed, consisting of the original settlers and their descendants and successors, as long as the connection with the parent state it kept up” (2005, 7).

Colonialism is not an identical process in different parts of world. The process may be defined as the control and conquest of the land and goods of other people. It is not only an expansion of European powers into Asia, America and Africa from the sixteen century onwards but also it is a widespread and recurrent feature of world human history. Colonialism is the establishment, maintenance, accomplishment and expansion of colonies by people from one territory to another territory. Krishnaswami Nagarajan in Contemporary Literary Theory further defines, “According to etymological dictionaries the word ‘colony’ in English was borrowed from Latin and used in the 16th century to mean ‘Farm settlement, landed estate, etc.’ (2012, 90).

It is a process through which the metropole claims sovereignty over the colony, the social structure, the government, and the economy. The colonialism where the sovereignty of the coloniser is based upon the colonised in different forms specially in order to attack upon the colonised’s culture in order to ascertain their grandeur. Depankar Roy in his “Representation of the ‘National Self—Novelistic portrayal of a New Cultural identity in Gora” has written about the perception of colonial attitude in a general sense. To quote:

“Any colonial rule involves a systematic and ruthless attack on the culture and heritage of the colonized race. This often results in a total loss or at least maiming of the sense of 'self' for the colonized people. The masculinist self of the colonizer labels the self of the colonized as 'effeminate'. In reaction to this, the nationalist consciousness of the colonized people often tries to replicate the macho virility of the colonial masters in an act of fashioning a nationalist self” (2010, 385).

Generally the Colonial period has been referred to the late fifteenth century to twentieth century. Colonialism began in the fifteenth century and reached its climax in the late nineteenth century, when European states established colonies in other continents. At the height of European colonialism, more than three quarters of the earth belonged to the European nations of Britain, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Italy and Germany. During this period, the justifications for colonialism included various factors such as the emplacement Christian missionary work, in their own interests, for the expansion of the power of the British Government.

However the renaissance period played vital role in English literature and has been called as the golden period of English literature on account of certain traits like centrality of man, thirst for knowledge, love for beauty and revival of the classical art and literature. In the period we also find wide range of dispersal, displacement and dislocation of academicians, philosophers, and scholars who went abroad on account of atrocities and the political authorities. In this way they brought new genres and perspective to the English literature. Subsequently colonies were established by the British government all over the world and the words like colony, colonial, coloniser, colonisation, colonialist, colonised, postcolonial, and anti-colonialism got immense popularity and became matter of discussion and research work in the post second world war English literature. Postcolonialism indicates resistance of the third world countries against the British who had projected them as only civilised and powerful.

Colonialism is also referred as the expansion of a nation’s sovereignty from one territory to other territory through forcible occupation. The colonial countries were interested in increasing their own political power and they explored the wealth, power and resources of native country. The primary aim of the colonial countries was to use their resources for their own interests. Most of the native people of colonial territory were oppressed and enslaved by the colonising power. At the same time the native people were forced to give up their cultural heritage and to assimilate to the coloniser’s culture. This type of working strategy is also known as ‘cultural colonisation,’ and this type of colonisation was supposed to manipulate the colonised people’s mind. According to George J. Sefa Dei colonialism can also be seen as, “a signifying territorial ownership’ of a place/space by an imperial power while imperialism on other hand is the governing ideology of such occupation” (2006, 3).

The colonial power believes that a colonised nation which adopted and admired western culture would no longer resist the coloniser’s occupation. For example, in the British colonies, the colonised population had to convert to Christianity. The colonial power always argued that ‘third world countries’ were inferior and needed western help and assistance in order to gain moral integrity and economic wealth. Albert Memmi points out that, “the privilege of the coloniser is always at the expense of the colonised, putting to the rest the notion of merit where there are the relations of domination” (1969, 8-9).

The key point of the process of colonialism was that the European colonialism involved a variety of techniques, patterns and tools to dominate the colonised country. All of them produced the economic imbalance that was necessary for the growth of European industry and capitalism. In the sixteenth century, when European powers began to occupy small parts of Indian coast line, like Portugal, the Netherlands and France ruled different regions in before the British East India Company was founded in 1756 in India. Some parts were ruled by British colonialist and the key cities were Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras. However some regions were left like Kashmir, whose ruler was loyal to British Empire. In the Year 1857, the big rebellion took place in the north region of India, which is known as ‘First war of Indian Independence’. But the rebellion failed and British colonialist continued to rule in India.

The foundation of Indian National Congress made a new way so that the rebellions moved in a new direction. British colonies were divided into two nations: The secular Indian Union and the smaller Muslim state of Pakistan. The non-violent movement against colonial rule, mainly initiated and organised by Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru, finally lead to independence in 1947.

During the late nineteenth century, when Indians were already in a full scale debate about their relationship with Great Britain, and at that time some countries were demanding independence for the first time. Nationalism swept through the Indian population, and despite their many differences in religion, education, and caste states, millions of Indians came to agree that Great Britain should ‘quit India’ and allow India self- rule. The British responded with minor concessions but mostly delaying tactics and armed repression. India became a member of the British Commonwealth after 1947.

The reasons for the broad upsurge of Anti- European sentiment included religious revivals of Hinduism in India, Buddhism in Burma, and Islam in South East Asia, all of which heightened people’s awareness of differences from the west. Second World War was the catalyst for the nations throughout the region in the late 1940s and 1950s. But events and leaders provided the foundation for the achievement of independence.

Colonialism can also be understood as: Former colonies have experienced three types of evolution in relation to their former mother countries. Michel Cahen in his “Anti Colonialism and Nationalism: Deconstructing Synonymy, investigating historical Processes” defines the three different and related types of the process of colonisation. “(1) Independence without decolonisation (2) decolonisation without Independence (3) Independence with decolonisation” (2012, 6).

Colonial discourse represent the language in which the coloniser express their superiority over colonised. The natives were not civilized, and European wants to educate them to make them educated and civilised. The one more reason behind this practice was that they want to use their talent and resources for their own purposes or interests and they also can use the people as slaves. The coloniser were at the centre ‘Self’ and colonised were at the margins ‘Other’. This is a practice, which also known as ‘Othering’.

M S Nagarajan in his English Literary Criticism and Theory also writes the working or dominating attitude of western countries. It defines,

“This attitude of raising the European culture as the ultimate standard by which to measure the other culture, is designated Eurocentrism which employs what is called the philosophy of ‘Universalism’. European ideas and experiences were universal, the standard to follow. Eurocentric discourse is seen even in the division of the world: First World refers to Britain, Europe and USA; Second World to the white population of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Southern Africa, and the former Soviet Russia; Third World, the developing Countries, such as India, and countries in Africa, central and South America, and Southeast Asia; Fourth World, the native populations subjugated by white settlers, and governed by the majority culture that surrounds them”. (2012, 186)

Colonialism is a set of unequal relationships between the metro pole and the colony and between the colonists and the indigenous population. Colonialism can also be understood as a product of imperialism and it has engendered diverse effects around the world. Colonialism and Imperialism are different systems. Colonialism is only one form of practice which results from the ideology of imperialism. Therefore there are certain prominent thinking/definitions of colonialism such as Ellacke Boehmer has defined, colonialism as the settlement of one dominant territory, over less powerful country and the exploitation or development of the resources they also attempts to govern the indigenous inhabitants of colonised land.

Pramod Kumar Nayar in his book Contemporary Literary and Cultural Theory: From Structuralism to Ecocriticism defines colonialism as a violent process. He writes, “colonialism as a violent conjugation where the sense of self develops through a negotiation rather than a separation, a relation rather than a disjunction, with the other” (2010, 157).