Description
Book SynopsisIn the wake of decolonization, colonialist narratives have systematically been rewritten from indigenous perspectives. This phenomenon is referred to as the Empire writes back to the centrea trend that asserted itself in late twentieth-century postcolonial criticism. The aim of such acts of writing back is to read colonialist texts in a Barthesian way inside-out or à l'envers, to deconstruct the Orientalist and colonialist dogmas, and eventually create a dialogue where there was only a monologue. Turning the colonial text inside-out and rereading it through the lens of a later code allows the postcolonial text to unlock the closures of its colonial precursor and change it from the inside. Under this critical scholarship, Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness (1899) has been a particularly influential text for Chinua Achebe and V. S. Naipaul. Their novels Things Fall Apart (1958) and A Bend in the River (1979) can be seen as a rewriting of Conrad's novella. Ho
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements – Introduction – A Centre and Its Margins: The Dilemma of a Manichean Dichotomy – ‘The Empire Writes Back to the Centre’: A Movement of Territorial, Moral, and Aesthetic Decolonization – A Dialogue Where There Was Only a Monologue: Chinua Achebe Fights Back the Canon – An African Condition in a European Tradition: Chinua Achebe and the English Language of Native Narratives – Things Fall Apart: Chinua Achebe’s Heart of Whiteness – V. S. Naipaul: The (Hi)Story of a Pro-Western Very Eastern Story-Teller – The Mimic Men: ‘Almost the Same but not Quite’ – A Bend in the River: A Heart-of-Darkness Rewrite – Conclusion – Index.
