R. K. Narayan's reputation as one of the founding figures of Indian writing in English is re-examined in this comprehensive study of his fiction. Arguing against views that have seen Narayan as a chronicler of authentic ‘Indianness’, the book locates his fiction in terms of specific South Indian contexts, cultural geography and non-Indian intertexts. It draws on recent thinking about the ways places are constructed to demonstrate that Malgudi is always a fractured and transitional site – an interface between older conceptions and contemporary views which stress the inescapability of change in ... More
Keywords: R. K. Narayan, Indian writing, Indianness, cultural geography, non-Indian intertexts, Malgudi, inescapability of change, modernity, founding figures, fiction
Print publication date: 2007 | Print ISBN-13: 9780719059261 |
Published to Manchester Scholarship Online: July 2012 | DOI:10.7228/manchester/9780719059261.001.0001 |