LITR 5734: Colonial & Postcolonial Literature

Sample Student Final Exams 2008

Essay 2: Compose a dialogue between our four novels since the midterm. (Objectives 1, 2, and 3 + others)

C. Vanessa Olivier

The Sameness of Otherness

In all of the colonial and postcolonial texts read this semester, religion and its broad influence on individual relationships and cultural norms kept reemerging as a dominant and multifaceted theme in our studies.  Perhaps more importantly, however, is the distinct patterns and roles of religious divergence present in colonial literature as opposed to postcolonial novels.  E.M. Forster’s Passage to India and Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe illustrate the colonial era’s emphasis on religious conformity and sanctity, which directly influence the relationships and decisions in these works.  In stark contrast, Khushwant Singh’s Train to Pakistan and Jamaica Kincaid’s Lucy present characters uninhibited by the confines of religious authority or the implications of their actions. 

Colonial texts often use the colonized country for the sole purpose of providing a scenic backdrop for their story as seen in Passage to India and Robinson Crusoe.  In many ways this insensitive technique also influences the treatment of native religions and their importance.  The colonizer’s religious background, on the other hand, is covered extensively and is usually at the forefront of the main storyline.  Read in present times, these texts often translate as biased portrayals of history but as true depictions of religious oppression, characteristic of colonial times. As noted in Michael Russo’s 2005 final exam, “little effort is given to look much beyond the exterior of foreign cultures, or to find enlightenment or knowledge from the philosophies of the colonized peoples who occupy these novels.” In postcolonial works, including Train to Pakistan and Lucy, religion does not hold the same power over the lives of its characters and is not portrayed as a pure and absolute source of knowledge and instruction.   Not surprisingly, the individuals emerging from this backdrop are much more complex and possess nonconformist tendencies, resulting in powerful stories of resistance and transformation in the face of adversity.

In general, Passage to India and Robinson Crusoe present religion in a positive light.  In both cases, the characters rely on religion to carry them through difficult times.  For example, descriptions of Aziz’s faith are profound:  “here was Islam,…more than a Faith, …where his body and his thoughts found home.” (16).  Crusoe is an extreme example of religious dedication.  In fact, Defoe’s work reads at times more like a “spiritual autobiography” than an adventure novel, for Crusoe seems to be on a lifelong pilgrimage, determined to overcome his “original sin” in order to find favor with god.  Another similarity between these works concerning religion rests on the use of religion in defining “the other”.  Passages such as, “God has created all races to be different” and Crusoe’s comparison of the natives as “hellish Wretches.. [like] the Devil himself” indicate colonial feelings of superiority (Forester 100).  Lucy and Train to Pakistan reveal a different interpretation of religion - a much darker one. In these postcolonial texts, life is not easily defined and explained in simple religious terms.  Lucy is our best example of resistance to religious conformity.  “I had been a girl of whom certain things were expected: for example, a sense of duty to my parents, obedience to the law and worship of convention.  But in one year of being from home, that girl had gone out of existence” (Lucy 133).  Examples of religious indifference in Train to Pakistan are expressed through Hukum Chand’s inner thoughts in solitude.  He claims, “there is no faith or religion” and justifies his wrongdoings based on his conclusion that “…there does not seem to be a code either of man or of God on which one can pattern one’s conduct.  Wrong triumphs over right as much as right over wrong…what can you do but cultivate an inner indifference to all values?  Nothing matters” (Train 172).  On the other hand, although our postcolonial texts minimize religious supremacy, they offer a spiritual alternative, a philosophy of inclusion and path towards acceptance and possible healing.  Mano Majra experiences peace despite its diverse religious and ethnic composition, a fact represented symbolically and physically in a shared veneration for their local deity (2).  Lucy demonstrates this new ideology, admitting, “It wasn’t her fault.  It wasn’t my fault.  But nothing could change the fact that where she saw beautiful flowers, I saw sorrow and bitterness” (Lucy 30).  In a way this represents a postcolonial step towards absolution and thus freedom from the past.

Parent-child relationships often parallel the relationship between god and man. Therefore, any refusal to follow a parent’s guidance naturally translates into an act of defiance towards.  Furthermore, the questioning of authority in postcolonial texts generally serves to emphasize the colonized person’s right to reject colonial conceptions of god as the sole path to enlightenment.  Lucy and Crusoe provide solid examples to support these ideas.  Both characters assert their individuality and resistance to authority through their travels to foreign lands, ignoring their parent’s wishes and therefore god’s will in the process.  The characters differ in their symbolic parent-child relationships, though, taking on roles representative of their life experiences and cultural heritage.  Crusoe and Friday share a father-son relationship, which in actuality is simply a civil master and slave arrangement.  Although Crusoe cherishes Friday’s companionship, he is unable to see him as his equal.  Crusoe controls all aspects of the union, consciously directing the dialogue to suit his needs.  In contrast, Lucy’s mother-daughter relationship with Mariah represents a contemporary response to colonialism.  Despite her subservient role, Lucy never withholds her opinions, intent on asserting her individuality and embracing her “otherness.” Through Lucy, Jamaica Kincaid offers a new role model to combat the oppressive propaganda left in the aftermath of colonialism.  “The postcolonial present individuals whose identities are not determined or threatened by differing religious viewpoints, but individuals who completely reject a master narrative of creation and faith as an indicator of their personal identities” (Kayla Logan 2003).

Studying colonial and postcolonial texts in dialogue presents endless “persistent oppositional themes” in the form of “modernity vs. tradition, first world vs. third world, and national or ethnic “purity” vs. “hybridity” (objective 1b), which can prove discouraging in the search for solutions.  However, my final thoughts on this range of topics rest on the continuous cycle of history and its people.  We are complex human beings comprising even more complex societies, that when examined closely through intertextuality, especially within colonial-postcolonial context reveal in the most basic sense a world more similar than not.

“Everything remains the same, and yet nothing is the same.” (Lucy 78)

SOURCES

Bakhtin, M. M. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Ed. Michael Holquist. Trans. Caryl Emerson and Holquist. Austin: U of Texas P, 1981.