Counterrealism and Indo-Anglian Fiction
What do R K Narayan, G V Desani, Anita Desai, Zulfikar Ghose, Suniti Namjoshi and Salman Rushdie have in common? They represent Indian writing in English over five decades. Vilified by many cultural nationalists for not writing in native languages, they nonetheless present a critique of the historical and cultural conditions that promoted and sustained writing in English. They also have in common a counter-realist aesthetic that asks its own social, political, and textual questions. Kanaganayakam analyzes the fiction of writers who work in this vibrant Indo-Anglian tradition and demonstrates patterns of continuity and change during the last five decades. Each chapter draws attention to what is distinctive about the artifice in each author while pointing to the features that connect them. The book concludes with a study of contemporary writing and its commitment to non-mimetic forms.
The meaning of contemporary realism
With a new introduction by Dr Gary Day, De Montfort University, Leicester, UK An argument for literary realism as opposed to modernism, contrasting Mann and Kafka. The book also argues for socialist as opposed to critical realism in literature.
The Politics of Economic Liberalization in India
Abstract Attempts at “liberalizing” India's import-substitution model of development have had a mixed record. Some success in changing the policy regime highlights the role of a new technocratic leadership that has received support from both Indian business groups and from external aid agencies. Conversely, “popular sectors” within India—including the rank and file of the ruling party, the organized workers in the public sector, and the numerically significant middle and lower peasantry — have registered their opposition. While the government remains committed to liberalizing the economy, the momentum has slowed down and, given the pressures of electoral politics, a populist economic program has been simultaneously readopted. It appears that the marriage of political and economic liberalism may not be an easy one in countries like India.