The Man-eater of Malgudi:

A Post-colonial Study

Presented By:Ashraf Ahmed

ID No. 1203030301Leading University, Sylhet

Prepared For:Dr. Hossain Al-MamunAssociate Professor, Department of EnglishSUST

Course Title: Indian Literature in English Course Code: ENG-507

❏ From Edwards Said’s Orientalism, we can get an idea of the term post-colonialism as the “use of the prefix ‘post’ suggests not so much the sense of going beyond but rather”, as Ella Shohat comments in a seminal article that postcolonialism is “continuities and discontinuities; but its emphasis is on the new modes and forms of the old colonialist practices, not on a ‘beyond’”. (Said, p. 350)

❏ So, postcolonial studies deal with the fatal and unavoidable impacts of colonialism during the colonialist regime and after the introduction of independent ruling in colonized countries.

What is Postcolonialism and Postcolonial Study?

Some texts reflecting postcolonial studies

Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'oPetals of Blood

(1977)

Chinua AchebeThings Fall Apart(1958)

E. M. ForsterA Passage to India(1924)

● In The Man-eater of Malgudi, we find two opposite forces functioning mainly through the characters of Vasu and Nataraj. Vasu stands for the colonizers who dominated the natives being an outsider. On the other hand, an almost innocent person like Nataraj suffers because of his simple texture and inferior attitude. In addition, Nataraj is sometimes appreciative of Vasu’s activities and attitudes as the colonized people were addicted to the lifestyle of the colonizers during colonialism.

The Man-eater of Malgudi as a postcolonial Text

Vasu’s Role as a Colonizer• Initial friendly attitude• Hypocrisy • Begins to dominate Nataraj once settled in the

attic of Nataraj’s shop (takes shelter in Nataraj’s attic almost forcefully and later files a case against Nataraj)

• Acts like a person of borrowed culture• Tries to dominate the locals• Goes against established customs

(Peers through the blue curtain)

Vasu’s Difference with Locals• Started taxidermy which is an unusual

practice for that locality (like the British colonizers who started machine-based industries using modern technology)

• Not respectful to religion even (intend to kill Kumar, the elephant of the temple)

• Represents forces associated with Western modernity such as individualism, industrialism and commercialism. (Ashok Berry)

The symbol of the rakshasa in The Man-eater of Malgudi as a symbol of colonialism imposed upon India. A rakshasa is a “demonic creature who possessed enormous strength, strange powers, and genius, but recognized no sort of restraints of man or God. Every rakshasa gets swollen with his ego. He thinks he is invincible, beyond every law” (Narayan 72). Like the rakshasa, Vasu feels no restraint in the town of Malgudi. He makes Nataraj’s home his own and shows little respect for what he is given. He disturbs the harmony of the local practices and dies on his own at the end.

Rakshasa: Symbol of Colonialism

• Nataraj “is at times attracted by aspects of the outsider’s [Vasu] personality, which is very different from that of himself and his townspeople” (Fakrul Alam)

Nataraj’s Attraction to Vasu’s Personality

This is a common phenomenon in other texts like Mulk Raj Anand’s:● Bakha, in Untouchable,

shows deep interest in Western clothing of foreign officers and always wears old clothes bought from secondhand shops.

● In Coolie, Munoo dreams of material gain enchanted by the different and comfortable lifestyle of the English officials of Imperial Bank and the textile factory of Mumbai.

To Conclude

● R. K. Narayan sharply delineates ‘the conflicting minds of his characters caught between the spiritual and the baser instincts, material gains and religious fervour, cultural values of the East and the West, age-old unscientific beliefs and refining influences of modern civilization. (Jahangir Bin Sarwar, The Chittagong University Journal of Arts and Humanities)

● Narayan also believes in the universality of his Malgudi characters: “If I explain that Malgudi is a small town in South India I shall only be expressing a half-truth, for the characters of Malgudi seem to me universal.”

● To sum up, we can deduce that The Man-eater of Malgudi is a classic example of postcolonial text.

Email: ahmashraf@gmail.comWebsite: http://www.ashrafonline.com/

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