English Extended Essay: Topic: An exploration of metaphors in “The White Tiger” by Arvind Adiga What I aim to investigate: Throughout the novel, Arvind Adiga uses a plethora of metaphors to describe the happenings of Balram Hawai, and his activities. In addition to this, the author repeatedly uses ironic, and sarcastic phrases to condemn the upper class Indian society, or “the light”. This brings several key themes in the novel, which include: • Globalization: The time in which the novel is written is essentially at the peak of Indian globalization, or “Americanization”. The theme is prominent, especially due to the technological and cultural advances that have taken places in Indian society. Balram, the protagonist’s employers decided to move to Gurgaon as a substitute for the USA. Furthermore, this globalization has led to sudden rise in the entrepreneurial culture in India that even resulted in Balram, formerly a driver, starting his own cab company. Although Balram’s transition from a driver to an entrepreneur took place under extraordinary circumstances, he does to keep up with the times. • Corruption in society: Throughout Balram’s life, he was exposed to corruption. Ranging from the domestic shopkeeper selling his employer’s votes …show more content…
The story exposes the poor-rich divide that surrounds India in the backdrop of economic activity and the wake of the technological revolution. The novel is a seven-part letter to the Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, from Balram alias Ashok Sharma, a self-styled “Thinking Man / and an entrepreneur”. Balram the murderer, transforms into his former master by taking up his identity after his atrocious crime. By crime and cunning, in the name of the social injustice due to existing rich-poor divide in India, Balram rules his entrepreneurial
In Annawadi, the slum setting of the book “Behind the Beautiful Forevers,” nearly everything falls under the law of the free market. Things that most countries deem “basic rights,” the Indian people of Annawadi have to pay for. Clean water, education, and medical attention from hospitals are just a few things that are exploited by police officers, gangs and slumlords. The liberalization of India caused the country to begin a process of economic reform. People from the countryside flocked to the cities to find work in the new booming economy that no longer depended on its agriculture. With the increase in population around the bustling cities, came competiveness for opportunity. This competiveness made poverty rates skyrocket, making corruption (and corrupt activities) in Annawadi the only clear way of making it out of the slums. “In the West, and among some in the Indian elite, this word, corruption, had purely negative connotations; it was seen as blocking India’s modern, global ambitions. But for the poor of the country where corruption thieved a great deal of opportunity, corrupti...
When dealing with corruption, first question to ask or to clarify is what corruption is. NSW Research (2002) describes corruption anything from gaining materialistically by virtue of position (for eg. getting a special discount at stores) to engaging in ‘direct criminal activities’ (eg. selling drugs). Newburn (1999) believes that there is a thin line between the definition of ‘corrupt’ and ‘non-corrupt’ activities as at the end, it is an ethical problem. For common people, however, bribery generalises corruption.
In The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga our protagonist struggles in his journey to adulthood. Born to a rickshaw puller who ends up dying of tuberculosis due to government corruption, Balram sets his sights to become somebody better than his father–– someone who wears the uniform–– as he’s a smart person and an entrepreneur. On his journey, he is confronted with many difficult decisions which help him discover the kind of person that he is; while also learning how corrupt the upper class is and how that has to do with the government. In the end he succeeds and goes from a rooster in the Rooster Coop, to somebody who 's broken out and made it–– out of the darkness, into the light. However, this doesn
Further explained by Boo, “the poor of a country where corruption thieved a great deal of opportunity, corruption was one of the genuine opportunities that remained” ( 566). Boos uses a female resident at Annawadi to allow readers to sympathize those who use corruption to advance. When readers encounter Annawadi inhabitants, one of the first citizens, Asha, is described as the slumlord’s wife who yearns to be in a position of power. In her pursuit to establish money and power, Asha creates false schools and nonprofit organizations for government funding. However, Boo turns a normally despicable situation into one of piteous pursuit. Asha yearns to become better than her previous life in a farming village, where laborious work brought death upon the population and gave fruitless results, and will do anything to improve herself. Similar to how others “prospered”, many impoverished residents in India turn to nefarious acts for money, power and a higher status, at the expense of others in similar circumstances. Boo describes this as “...Powerless individuals blamed other powerless individuals for what they lacked…[and] tr[y] to destroy each other” (3302). Boo allowed readers to identify with individuals who use fraud, bribery, and other elements of corruption to be liberated from the cycle of poverty. (226
The development of a country depends generally on the work and values of its society. The image of a country can be severely damaged by certain actions and behavior of their citizens, like bribery. When a country is known as a corrupt nation, not only will the facade of the country be affected, but also the economy. Establishing measures to eradicate corruption are urgently necessary. Corruption has been around since the begging of time, but currently is more common in business, more specifically, international business. Although some organizations have been formed, and conventions have been signed in order to end it, corruption is still one of the mayor problems around the world. An ethical view might bring more insight to why bribery and corruption is not a moral act and why more severe measures should be taken into consideration.
In the novel, The White Tiger, by Aravind Adiga the main character, is Balram, one of the children in the “darkness” of India. Adiga sheds a new light on the poor of India, by writing from the point of view of a man who was at one time in the “darkness” or the slums of India and came into the “light” or rich point of view in India. Balram’s job as a driver allows him to see both sides of the poverty line in India. He sees that the poor are used and thrown away, while the rich are well off and have no understanding of the problems the poor people must face. The servants are kept in a mental “Rooster Coop” by their masters. The government in India supposedly tries to help the poor, but if there is one thing Adiga proves in The White Tiger, it is that India’s government is corrupted. Despite the government promises in India designed to satisfy the poor, the extreme differences between the rich and the poor and the idea of the Rooster Coop cause the poor of India to remain in the slums.
For all Annawadians except Asha, corruption ingrained in society prevents the impoverished citizens of a Mumbai slum from being able to become successful in life. Despite working hard, saving money, and only wanting to better the life of their family, the Husains’s story is demonstrative of the fact that an unintentional entanglement in the “great web of corruption” “in which the most wretched tried to punish the slightly less wretched” could easily lead to near ruin (Boo 115). Over the course of her narrative, Boo shows that Annawadians recognize the issues of corruption present in their society, and the fact that they lack the power to change the system. For Annawadians, the courage and aspiration to become more successful in life meant taking a gamble, and Boo shows that their gamble could only be made in a system where the odds were forced against their
Known as a period of political scandal, many politicians engaged in bribes, lies, and abuse of power to further a political, social, and often personal agenda. The typical corrupt leader "will sell his vote for a dollar [...] turns with indifference from the voice of honesty and reason [...] his unalienable right may be valuable to him for the bribe he gets out of it" (166). Such politicians are an injustice to society because as they are elected by the people, they must act towards the betterment of the people, rather than for themselves. Furthermore, those who elect this politician to office merely underestimate their political and social responsibility because they "want the feeling that their own interests are connected with those of the community, and in the weakness or absence of moral and political duty" (167). Thus, under the control of the ruthless politician and the reckless voter, the true essence of democracy is
In order to raise awareness of the staggering injustices, oppression and mass poverty that plague many Indian informal settlements (referred to as slum), Katherine Boo’s novel, Behind the Beautiful Forevers, unveils stories of typical life in a Mumbai slum. Discussing topics surrounding gender relations, environmental issues, and corruption, religion and class hierarchies as well as demonstrating India’s level of socioeconomic development. Encompassing this, the following paper will argue that Boo’s novel successfully depicts the mass social inequality within India. With cities amongst the fastest growing economies in South Eastern Asia, it is difficult to see advances in the individual well-being of the vast majority of the nation. With high
The authors, Ronnberg and Martin, of The Book of Symbols present the colour white with the help of different approaches. They argue, “the milky, maternal ocean of Hindu myth is the source of all the fundamentals of the cosmos” (Ronnberg and Martin 660). Through the fact that the novel is based on Indian society and Indian culture, the white tiger can be referred to Indian cultures’ society and Hinduism belief.
As in representations of the other British colonies, India was used by colonial novelists as a tool of displacement of the individual and re-affirmation of the metropolitan whole. There are three methods by which this effect is achieved. The first method displays an unqualified reliance on a culture too remote to be approached except physically: a hero or protagonist in a pre-mutiny novel is at liberty to escape to India at a moment of crisis, rearrange his life to his advantage and return to a happy ending and the establishment of a newly defined metropolitan life. Dobbin of Thackeray's Vanity Fair (1848) and Peter Jenkins of Gaskell's Cranford (1853) exemplify this well. Even the child Bitherstone of Dickens' Dombey and Son (1848) regards India as his salvation.
This essay will attempt to explore the relationship between the two from the definitions, causes, consequences and the solutions. Corruption can be defined as the abuse of public power for private gain. (World Bank, 2004) Corruption is attracting a lot of attention around the world, and is a growing international and regional concern. According to Corruption Around the world (Tanzi, 1998), in its end-of-year editorial on December 31, 1995, The Financial Times characterized 1995 as the year of corruption.
In this way, Salman Rushdie presents the derogatory picture of India throughout the novel preferring the superiority of what is European and inferiority of what is not. By presenting the orientalist perception of India, Rushdie attempts to attract the western readership. In spite of the fact that he himself is an Indian, he could not avoid the attraction of western readership. For this reason, sometimes, his position becomes ambivalent.
Montesh, M. (n.d.). Conceptualizing Corruption: Forms, Causes, Types and Consequences. Retrieved May 4, 2014, from
This total idea of challenging and creating a new identity may seem quite a utopian concept but it is not so impossible. The present paper will illustrate the writings of Mridula Garg and Arundhati Roy. The characters in their work are not extraordinary and utopian but common people like us whom we can come across in our day today life. Here for the purpose of analysis Garg’s three short stories have been chosen. They are: Hari Bindi, Sath Saal Ki Aurat and Wo Dusri.