South-Asian Fiction in English: Contemporary Transformations

by Alex Tickell (Editor)

Overview

This collection offers an essential, structured survey of contemporary fictions of South Asia in English, and includes specially commissioned chapters on each of the national traditions of the region. It covers less well known writings from Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh as well as the more firmly established canon of contemporary Indian literature, and features chapters on important new and emergent forms such as the graphic novel, genre fiction and the short story. It also contextualizes some key ‘transformative’ aspects of recent fiction such as border and diaspora identities; new middle-class narratives and popular genres; and literary response to terror and conflict. Edited and designed with researchers and students in mind, the book updates existing criticism and represents a readable guide to a dynamic, rapidly changing area of global literature.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781137403537
Publisher:	Palgrave Macmillan UK
Publication date:	05/01/2016
Edition description:	1st ed. 2016
Pages:	279
Product dimensions:	5.83(w) x 8.27(h) x (d)

About the Author

Alex Tickell is Senior Lecturer in English at The Open University, UK, and Director of the Postcolonial Literatures Research Group. He has published widely on contemporary South-Asian fiction and literary history and is the editor of The Oxford History of the Novel in English (Volume 10): The Novel in South and South-East Asia.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments.- Notes on Contributors.- Introduction; Alex Tickell.- PART I: REGIONAL FORMATIONS.- 1. Of Capitalism and Critique: ‘Af-Pak’ Fiction in the Wake of 9/11; Priyamvada Gopal.- 2. ‘An Idea whose Time has Come’: Indian Fiction in English after 1991; Alex Tickell.- 3. English-Language Fiction of Bangladesh; Cara Cilano.- 4. Sri Lankan Fiction in English 1994–2014; Ruvani Ranasinha.- PART II: CONTEMPORARY TRANSFORMATIONS.- 5. Writing the Margins (in English): Notes from some South-Asian Cities; Stuti Khanna.- 6. Occupying Literary and Urban Space: Adiga, Authenticity and the Politics of Socio-economic Critique; Dominic Davies.- 7. Contemporary Indian Commercial Fiction in English; Suman Gupta.- 8. Genre Fiction of New India: Post-millennial Configurations of Crick Lit, Chick Lit and Crime Writing; E. Dawson Varughese.- 9. Vignettes of Change: A Discussion of Two IndianGraphic Novels; Pooja Sinha.- 10. The New Pastoral: Environmentalism and Conflict in Contemporary Writing from Kashmir; Ananya Jahanara Kabir.- 11. Solidarity, Suffering and ‘Divine Violence’: Fictions of the Naxalite Insurgency; Pavan Kumar Malreddy.- 12. Writing South-Asian Diasporic Identity Anew; Maya Parmar.- 13. Minor Literature and the South-Asian Short Story; Neelam Srivastava.- Index.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

“This book kept me up late and continues to make me think. South-Asian Fiction in English’s emphasis on marginalized parts of the subcontinent, especially Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, is welcome and necessary. The strand on book history, commercial fiction, and neglected genres such as nonfiction and the short story offers a significant contribution to knowledge. Timely and urgent topics including the Naxalites, Kashmir, the rise of the middle class, globalization, and language debates are addressed with real insight. If you are interested in South Asia’s contemporary literary, cultural, and political scene, then you can’t do much better than reading Alex Tickell’s collection.” (Claire Chambers, University of York, UK)

Editorial Reviews

This volume eloquently delineates the polyvalent cultural imaginaries of South Asian fiction in English. Scrutinizing the multidimensional ramifications of the region’s contemporary transformations via an eclectic range of national, transregional and cross-border concerns, it crucially expands the disciplinary boundaries of postcolonial studies and world literature.” (Esha Sil, Journal of Postcolonial Writing, July, 2017)

“The volume offers genuinely new perspectives on writers, texts and regions that have tended to be overlooked in academic criticism. … This is a timely volume, in fact, which makes an important contribution to the field of South Asian literary studies.” (Wasafiri, Vol. 33 (3), September, 2018)

From the Publisher