Indian Writing in English and the Global Literary Market

Some kinds of postcolonial writers and writing are not visible to it. If the Commonwealth permitted a largely apolitical conglomeration of readings, it nevertheless chose the texts-to-be-read from spaces of geographical and cultural otherness in relation to England; postcolonialism, on the other hand, increasingly focuses on British or American authors with a different name. This usually leaves out authors like Kiran Nagarkar, mostly based in the ex-colonies, from many discussions. It also, to be honest, leaves out an author like me, situated in the entirely liminal space of a village off Aarhus in Denmark. Moreover, the concerns and styles of some writers are less amenable to postcolonial criticism. For instance, if you draw on the colonial bridge, a horde of postcolonial critics will come and troop all over your texts; if you do not, well, you will need to be rescued by an anthology like this one. The booming industry of 'prizing' a certain kind of otherness that Graham Huggan critiques in The Postcolonial Exotic: Marketing the Margins is also part of this nexus of perception and occlusion, as is the overlap, not always justified, of the cosmopolitan with the metropolitan. All these elements favour the visibility of some kinds of Indian writing in English. However, there are some other, more specific factors too: for instance, the bias in favour of authors ensconced in metropolitan spaces, in India or abroad, or the continued dominance of British and American literary patronage. Many of these factors remain under-examined; some are totally obscured. This anthology of papers edited by Dwivedi and Lau attempts to excavate some of these factors. I can only hope that it will give rise to more work along these lines. Front Matter....Pages i-xiv Introduction: The Reception of Indian Writing in English (IWE) in the Global Literary Market....Pages 1-9 Front Matter....Pages 11-11 Writing India Right: Indian Writing and the Global Market....Pages 13-31 Indian Writing in English as Celebrity....Pages 32-47 How Does It Feel to Be the Solution? Indians and Indian Diaspora Fiction: Their Role in the Marketplace and the University....Pages 48-62 Commodifying Culture: Language and Exoticism in IWE....Pages 63-80 Indian Writing in the West: Imperialism, Exoticism and Visibility....Pages 81-96 Front Matter....Pages 97-97 Of Saris and Spices: Marketing Paratexts of Indian Women’s Fiction....Pages 99-118 Kiran Desai’s The Inheritance of Loss and the Troubled Symbolic Production of a Man Booker Prize Winner....Pages 119-139 Front Matter....Pages 141-141 Global Goondas? Money, Crime and Social Anxieties in Aravind Adiga’s Writings....Pages 143-163 In the Right Place at the Right Time: A Tale of Two Brothers, Rohinton and Cyrus Mistry....Pages 164-179 ‘(Not) readily available’: Kiran Nagarkar in the Global Market....Pages 180-197 Back Matter....Pages 198-216 Indian Writing in English and the Global Literary Market delves into the influences and pressures of the marketplace on this genre, which this volume contends has been both gatekeeper as well as a significant force in shaping the production and consumption of this literature. Indian Writing in English and the Global Literary Market delves into the influences and pressures of the marketplace on this genre, contending that it has been both a gatekeeper and a significant force in shaping the production and consumption of this literature. As well as providing case studies of selected contemporary Indian novels in English and comparing how diasporic authors fare compared to authors within India, this volume also provides theoretical insights into the postcolonial framework in which the global literary marketplace is embedded, and comments on the exoticization and marketing strategies adopted as a result "Indian Writing in English and the Global Literary Market delves into the influences and pressures of the marketplace on this genre, contending that it has been both a gatekeeper and a significant force in shaping the production and consumption of this literature. As well as providing case studies of selected contemporary Indian novels in English and comparing how diasporic authors fare compared to authors within India, this volume also provides theoretical insights into the postcolonial framework in which the global literary marketplace is embedded, and comments on the exoticization and marketing strategies adopted as a result"-- Provided by publisher "This is a necessary book that sets out to study and counter the institutionalisation of postcolonial criticism and the mainstream prizing of some fictions from South Asia."--Tabish Khair, author of The Thing About Thugs and How to Fight Islamist Terror from the Missionary Position