Pick one or two to issues, based on these questions, to address and include anything else you like in your post, especially responses to other posts, impulsive reactions to the reading, or links to outside materials. Posts can be informal - this is a chance to brainstorm about a splendid and subtle work. 1. Every first person literary work has a character who is not in the story: the implied author. And the character of the narrator, who is, of course, a part of the story. How does VSN create our impression of this character (the "I") in the beginning of the novel? Surely, it is not an aggressive or direct characterization. 2. The Nobel committee compared Naipaul to Conrad due to some similarity in their subject matter. And, indeed, VSN appreciates Joseph Conrad. But their writing styles are not similar at all. Look at a passage from Conrad and compare the style to Naipual's in the first chapters of this book. 3. Most readers, beginning the book, would tend to associate the main character with VSN. However, their origins are different. Can you tell us a bit about VSN and look for associations between author and the character of Salim? 4. Please sumarize the story so far. What happens? 5. Comment on Naipaul's approach as a storyteller. Surely, you'd expect a novel about a man relocating to a newly independent African state to be full of adventure. But the early chapters are a bit staid and quiet. Why do you suppose Naipual uses this approach? 6. Let's return to the idea that poor VSN is "self-hating." The early chapters contain many descriptions of Africa, not all of them wildly positive. What do you imagine is his intent in describing a post-colonial country this way? Specifically, how does VN use the words "African" and "European"? For instance, Zabeth's life was completely "African" - what does this mean? 7. Various characters undergo transformations in the way they are seen within this excerpt. Zabeth for one seems like a simple tradeswoman initially, but is later seen as a witch; Nazruddin is another; also, Ali or Metti: comment on the significance of these changes? 8. A related issue is the concept of exoticism: some characters are seen as exotic and a duality between the exotic and the familiar runs through the book. Who or what is exotic and has the glamour of exoticism? 9. The book begins with another duality: being "nothing" versus being "something." How does this duality play out as the book explores African identity versus European influences, particularly the issue of self-consciousness and memory and history? 10. Salim himself seems to embody this duality: nothingness versus identity. He is of the same age as Ali/Metti and Ferdinand, yet he is separate from both. Comment on his dealings with Nazruddin, Metti and Ferdinand. 11. One curious passage is Salim's conversations with Nazruddin, and Nazruddin's advice about business and math. What is the significance of this "math" thing? Also: are Nazruddin's intentions toward Salim honorable? 12. Few characters seem to be practicing Muslims. How does the spectre of religious belief hang over the story and influence events? Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Due 1/31: A BEND IN THE RIVER: choose from these questions
Pick one or two to issues, based on these questions, to address and include anything else you like in your post, especially responses to other posts, impulsive reactions to the reading, or links to outside materials. Posts can be informal - this is a chance to brainstorm about a splendid and subtle work. 1. Every first person literary work has a character who is not in the story: the implied author. And the character of the narrator, who is, of course, a part of the story. How does VSN create our impression of this character (the "I") in the beginning of the novel? Surely, it is not an aggressive or direct characterization. 2. The Nobel committee compared Naipaul to Conrad due to some similarity in their subject matter. And, indeed, VSN appreciates Joseph Conrad. But their writing styles are not similar at all. Look at a passage from Conrad and compare the style to Naipual's in the first chapters of this book. 3. Most readers, beginning the book, would tend to associate the main character with VSN. However, their origins are different. Can you tell us a bit about VSN and look for associations between author and the character of Salim? 4. Please sumarize the story so far. What happens? 5. Comment on Naipaul's approach as a storyteller. Surely, you'd expect a novel about a man relocating to a newly independent African state to be full of adventure. But the early chapters are a bit staid and quiet. Why do you suppose Naipual uses this approach? 6. Let's return to the idea that poor VSN is "self-hating." The early chapters contain many descriptions of Africa, not all of them wildly positive. What do you imagine is his intent in describing a post-colonial country this way? Specifically, how does VN use the words "African" and "European"? For instance, Zabeth's life was completely "African" - what does this mean? 7. Various characters undergo transformations in the way they are seen within this excerpt. Zabeth for one seems like a simple tradeswoman initially, but is later seen as a witch; Nazruddin is another; also, Ali or Metti: comment on the significance of these changes? 8. A related issue is the concept of exoticism: some characters are seen as exotic and a duality between the exotic and the familiar runs through the book. Who or what is exotic and has the glamour of exoticism? 9. The book begins with another duality: being "nothing" versus being "something." How does this duality play out as the book explores African identity versus European influences, particularly the issue of self-consciousness and memory and history? 10. Salim himself seems to embody this duality: nothingness versus identity. He is of the same age as Ali/Metti and Ferdinand, yet he is separate from both. Comment on his dealings with Nazruddin, Metti and Ferdinand. 11. One curious passage is Salim's conversations with Nazruddin, and Nazruddin's advice about business and math. What is the significance of this "math" thing? Also: are Nazruddin's intentions toward Salim honorable? 12. Few characters seem to be practicing Muslims. How does the spectre of religious belief hang over the story and influence events? 
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Okay...so, this being the first post, I'm not sure if I'm doing this right. While this is, in reality, Rachel (the blonde girl with the eyebrow piercing) I think my Google name is displaying as "Poe." Jeeeez.
ReplyDeleteThat was the title of my first book and its accompanying G-Mail newsletter...which is somehow weasling its way into my blog identity? Whaaat?
Oh well. Here goes!:
3.) Salim comes from a family of Muslim traders who moved to Africa, where they set up shop and became successful. (Yes? Yes, am I getting this right??) Salim is not ethnically African, just nationally.
To quote V.S. Naipaul's biography on the Nobel Prize site: "Born in Trinidad in 1932, the descendant of indentured labourers shipped from India, this dispossessed child of the Raj has come on a long and marvellous journey." They make it sound so inspiring...
9.) Being "nothing" = not incorporating YOURSELF into the idea of human history. Being "something" = a person like Father Huisman, who sees himself as part of a "historical river's flow"..he collects the relics of Africa to expand human knowledge. It's as though it were a big project he was helping complete.
Is that an ample post?? Waaaa, I hear Nicholas Birns in the back of my head, yelling: "Remember to be concise!"
Okay...so, this being the first post, I'm not sure if I'm doing this right. While this is, in reality, Rachel (the blonde girl with the eyebrow piercing) I think my Google name is displaying as "Poe." Jeeeez.
ReplyDeleteThat was the title of my first book and its accompanying G-Mail newsletter...which is somehow weasling its way into my blog identity? Whaaat?
Oh well. Here goes!:
3.) Salim comes from a family of Muslim traders who moved to Africa, where they set up shop and became successful. (Yes? Yes, am I getting this right??) Salim is not ethnically African, just nationally.
To quote V.S. Naipaul's biography on the Nobel Prize site: "Born in Trinidad in 1932, the descendant of indentured labourers shipped from India, this dispossessed child of the Raj has come on a long and marvellous journey." They make it sound so inspiring...
9.) Being "nothing" = not incorporating YOURSELF into the idea of human history. Being "something" = a person like Father Huisman, who sees himself as part of a "historical river's flow"..he collects the relics of Africa to expand human knowledge. It's as though it were a big project he was helping complete.
Is that an ample post?? Waaaa, I hear Nicholas Birns in the back of my head, yelling: "Remember to be concise!"
It's showing up as Poe because blogspot is part of google and you're probably signed onto a gmail address that lists your name as Poe. To post (rather than comment), log out on blogspot and sign in using the user name and password I gave you. Then you will have post-ability.
ReplyDeleteAbout the concision issue: good answers, but maybe a bit more reference to or quoting from the novel?
ReplyDeleteWill Simescu - Naipaul - 1/29/11
ReplyDelete12.
Religious belief is a powerful, yet inconsistent, force in the novel. Often in the story it takes hold of people in times of uncertainty and violence. The old Asian couple Salim dines with once a week lost their business and their family during the uprising, yet they console themselves with religion and tradition: “They had done all that their religion and family customs had required them to do; and they felt . . . that they had lived good and complete lives” (p. 70).
The night Metty tells Ferdinand about the violence in his coastal town, he describes the leader of the rebels who tore the town apart. When asked by Ferdinand why the man lead the rebels to kill the Arabs in the town, Metty replies: “He said he was obeying the god of Africans” (p.79). Religion is used to give meaning to bewildering violence.
The most devout follower of any faith in the story, Father Huismans, also meets the most horrific end. A white European, he has an interest in African religious beliefs and constructs a museum out of tribal masks collected on his numerous trips outside the town. Though apparently fond of Africa, his museum reflects the hegemonic Western view of Africa: a dark continent whose history will be subsumed within the larger narrative of stabilizing European progress. Within this worldview, it is not contradictory or idolatrous for a white Christian priest to take an interest in African religious masks. The masks are stripped of their context and rendered as bits of local color, remnants of an almost extinct indigenous African culture.
The narrator writes: "While he lived, Father Huismans, collecting the things of Africa, had been thought a friend of Africa." (p. 84) But Father Huismans’ efforts to “preserve” these objects fall into the “strategy of containment” discussed in “Intro to the Indo-European Novel.” His objectification of African belief contributed to the continued oppression of the African people. When he ends up with his head on a pike, he himself is objectified as a symbol of the white European oppressor.