A Dynamic Modernity

This book compares selected Indian novels with their Western models to trace the differences appearing in them to the traditions of thought and understanding that had influenced the respective world-views. Beginning with a survey of the rise of modernity in India this book presents a comparative review of Western and Indian ontological interpretations of the major themes governing these novels. These novels in Bengali Hindi and English experiment with the form of the Western psychological novel to portray the individual’s private thoughts and experiences realistically. They represent that body of fiction which dwells on the different aspects of the rise of the modernist Indian temperament under British influence. The novels map nearly half a century of the individual’s struggle for meaning and freedom in a society trapped between history tradition and westernization. Using free translations this book illustrates the novelists’ methods of improvisation with Western themes styles and techniques to portray the Indian understanding of selfhood art and reality. The concluding comparative poetics discusses in a comparative perspective the poetic principles underlying the novelists’ assimilation comparison and parody of the Western texts. A mutual comparison of the Indian novels illustrates the diversity that characterizes the cross-cultural experience of Indian modernity.