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Crossing Borders: Post 1980 Subcontinental Writing in English ORIGINATING as an anthology of some papers presented at a seminar by a galaxy of well-known authors and scholars, the book discourses upon some crucial issues—inevitability and utility of crossing borders, exile/ homelessness, problem of identity, violence and power struggle. Drawing on facts, theories and the treatment, the issues find in the post-1980 subcontinental writing in English make a thought-provoking study.
Examining the flow of cultures, histories and memories across borders, the brief Introduction is followed by a host of scholarly, enlightening and stimulating papers. "Rejecting extinction", the iconoclast writer Nayantara Shagal speaks of crossing borders in terms of her personal experiences as an Indian woman and a woman writer. As a matter of fact, she flouted the established pattern choosing politics as subject for fiction. And again, she transgressed the bounds of middle class conventions of her times revealing a personal relationship outside marriage in Relationship (1994). Hence her bohemian arguments and experiments make a strong impact in the first paper. The second paper explains the process of crossing linguistic borders. A ready reference work to many critics and critical work, it brings to focus the attempts made by different agencies (Sahitya Akademi, Katha and National Book Trust) and individual critics (M. K. Naik, Meenakshi Mukherjee and Jasbir Jain) to evaluate the Indian English literature in the context of the Indian literature and role of good translations in transcending linguistic barriers. The grave issue of violence recurs several times throughout the book. Charu Mathur in reference to Pakistan writer Gauhar’s novel, No Space Further Burials (2007), a saga of the tragedy of Afganistan, critiques forcefully the American way of combating terrorism through terror, while Nidhi Singh writes on The Shadow of Violence inherent in the post-Partition India. Using newspapers and news magazines reports, decoding Freudian conception of violence, exploring a couple of contemporary fictional texts, infused with various facets of violence, Jasbir Jain reflects on the impact of alarmingly rising violence in the subcontinent. A disturbing study. In her feminist study, The Politics of Honour/Horror, Usha Bande describes heinous violence against woman, widespread across boundaries of cultures. Penetrating into Mukhtaran Bibi’s In the Name of Honour, a feminist text of resistance to rape, a document of the effectiveness the subaltern voice, she critiques the patriarchal hegemonic system which makes a woman an upholder of a community’s honour. The heart-rending agonies of the irregular migrants from the Doaba region of Punjab are fully illustrated in the disturbing paper, One Crossing Many Journeys. Sounding a note of warning, it has a special relevance to those who are crazy about abroad. Jean Arsayangam’s title poem Crossing Borders touches us deeply rendering poetically the plight of an alienated, nostalgic, refugee compelled to cross border to reach a safer place of refuge. And her deeply moving short story, journey describing the travails of an escape journey braved by 16 nameless (reduced to numbers) refugees, asylum seekers, looking to reach Berlin, works around the issue of identity that "separates and divides". To sum up, this
stimulating discourse makes a minute exploration of the vital subject
of crossing boards, exhibiting the various borders and human
initiative and endeavour in transgressing them.
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The bottom line is that
transcending borders, though never without a sting of nostalgia and
anxiety, leads to growth, self-evolution and reaching out to the ‘other’.
Hegemonies, hierarchies and violence are the ‘fault borders’,
which block the way of equal relationships.