INTRODUCTION
Amitav Ghosh undoubtedly occupied an undefeatable position in the galaxy of Indian writers in English. He has contributed immensely to make Indian writings acclaimed worldwide. Most of his writings involve the themes of exile, cultural displacement, revolution, emigration, dislocation, loss of identity, uprooting that characterizes into historical novels. He recuperates the irony, disillusionment, dilemma and ambiguity of human condition of a bygone era through his language. He masterfully connects the complex flow of time with his researched narrative. As a writer of historical fiction, he delves deeply in an introspective exploration of self and the society with much eloquence. Ghosh is laudable for handling his highly celebrated stories and exploring characters.
The Glass Palace, an international bestseller, won Ghosh the Grand Prize for Fiction at the Frankfurt International E-Book Awards. He declined the Commonwealth Writers Prize for Fiction for the book, objecting its classification as part of Commonwealth Literature. The Glass Palace opens in Mandalay in 1885 and the story moves between Burma, India and Malaya spread across several generations covering the histories of these countries. In this novel Ghosh weaves his narrative around the life of his protagonist in the manner of a Bildungsroman. The text narrates the story of an orphan, Raj Kumar Raha, an Indian migrant to Burma, his budding romance and marriage with the Burmese royal maid, Dolly and his rise and then fall as a successful businessman. His plight in the context of the Burmese history of the British invasion into Burma and its subsequent colonial rule, his temporary migration, dislocation and experience of loss, exile and a search for home and...
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...unciation, which is not possible at the present circumstances as she is deeply committed to her responsibilities. She proves her indomitable spirit and strength of convictions in the end of the novel by entering the monastery and withdrawing from the world. Ghosh presents here a woman of feminine virtues, obedience, dedication, patience
Works Cited
• Simon de Beauvoir,’ The Second Sex,’ Oxford Press, London, 1949.
• Khair, Tabish. Amitav Ghosh: A Critical Companion. Delhi: Permanent Black, 2003
• Rakhee Moral, “In Time of the Breaking of Nations The Glass Palace as Post-Colonial Narrative” Amitav Ghosh: Critical Perspectives ed. Brinda Bose (New Delhi: Pencraft International, 2003)152.
• R. Mokashi Punekar, “Repositioning Borders: A Reading of The Glass Palace ” Critical Practice. Vol. X, No.1, Jan.2003, 52-58.
• http://amitavghosh.com/blog/?p=3306
In the novel, The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls recounts her childhood as a tale of harsh struggle and of conflicting viewpoints. The set of ideals which she developed as an individual along with those instilled within her by her parents seemingly rival those purported by society and the developed world, creating an internal struggle greater than any of her physical conflicts. Examples of such conflicts involve the abstract areas of race, wealth versus poverty, and idealism versus realism.
Children these days have a variety of needs, often being surrounded by the ideas of freedom and security. While some people seek complete freedom from society’s rules, others seek the comforts of security that a normal life provides. Children’s preferences on freedom and security are reflected from their Mom and Dad’s parenting style. In The Glass Castle, by Jeannette Walls, the characters Brian, Lori, and Jeannette show that while growing they would rather have security over freedom because they repeatedly find themselves in a state of danger due to their parent’s lack of security. For example, if Jeannette’s parents were accountable while Jeanette was in proximity to fire she would not have been traumatized and severely burnt. Another reason the children want security is Rex is an excessive alcoholic who is very dangerous to be around while he is under the influence of hard liquor, they would rather a father that responsibly handled alcohol. Rex’s surplus of expenses on booze led the family into poverty because instead of using the family’s rare profit to pay off bills Rex uses it to buy alcohol and items that were not a necessity to their survival. Therefore, their parents struggled to give even the simplest things for them such as food and clothes.
On December 10, 1950, in Stockholm, Sweden, one of the greatest literary minds of the twentieth century, William Faulkner, presented his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize. If one reads in between the lines of this acceptance speech, they can detect a certain message – more of a cry or plead – aimed directly to adolescent authors and writers, and that message is to be the voice of your own generation; write about things with true importance. This also means that authors should include heart, soul, spirit, and raw, truthful emotion into their writing. “Love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice” (Faulkner) should all be frequently embraced – it is the duty of authors to do so. If these young and adolescent authors ignore this message and duty, the already endangered state of literature will continue to diminish until its unfortunate extinction.
Prose , Francine. "The New York Times > Books > Sunday Book Review > 'The Glass Castle':Outrageous Misfortune." The New York Times. The New York Times Company, 13 Mar 2005. Web. 31 Jan 2011. .
The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls is a memoir about Jeannette’s childhood experiencing many difficult situations. It is an excellent example of contemporary literature that reflects society. This story connects with social issues relevant to our time period, such as unstable home life, alcoholism, and poverty. Many of these issues, as well as others, are also themes of the story. One major theme of the story is overcoming obstacles, which is demonstrated by Jeannette, the Walls’ kids, and Rex and Mary Walls.
Hardships are a terrible, but normal part of everybody’s life. No matter the hardship, anybody can recover. After viewing the information, it give an idea of how bad each of them had it.When Jeannette from The Glass Castle escapes the depths of Welch and her parents, her life was smooth sailing afterwards. When you have a life as very upsetting as hers, It is expected for more struggles to happen later in life. Not everybody will be as fortunate as her and continue forward with no regression. When Lily from The Secret Life of Bees ran away from home with no clue where she was headed, other than a town written on a picture. Liz from Homeless to Harvard: The Liz Murray Story had drug addicted parents and no plans on continuing an education. She reached a life changing decision and started going to school again. This lead to her ultimate goal of going to college, and at one of the most profound ones in the United States. If these three girls can overcome the intense situations they endured, anybody can.
The book of "The Glass Castle" by Jeannette Wall’s a powerful and emotional memory. It was published in March 2005 in New York City. The novel is about the author's personal life. I'm very thankful for her willing to share her story. In this memoir, she told us the strength, sham and the growth of age she went through.
Green, Anna, and Kathleen Troup. The Houses of History. New York, NY: New York University Press, 1999.
What is the source of your success? My own definition of success is about overcoming my obstacles and hardships. If I can’t overcome the obstacles and hardships along the way, then I will try again so that I am more prepared and have the right knowledge. I want to meet obstacles and hardships because I want to feel the pleasure of success when I overcome them. In order for me to overcome and embrace hardships, I need to find the missing link, have the right knowledge, and practice effective time management.
James, Lawrence. Raj: The Making and Unmaking of British India. New York: St. Martin's, 1998. Print.
Levy, Eric P. "'Through Soundproof Glass': The Prison of Self Consciousness in The Glass Menagerie." Modern Drama, 36. December 1993. 529-537.
The famous French playwright Moliere once said, “The greater the obstacle, the more glory in overcoming it.” Throughout our lives, we often are faced with hardships that cause us to change ourselves, the people around us, and the situation itself. Because of this, it may reveal our true characteristics to show who we truly are. In the memoirs “The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls and “Warriors Don't Cry” by Melba Patillo, they vividly illustrate the story of how they faced their struggles. They both prevailed because of their tenacious mind sets, but handled the situations in both different and similar ways. The characteristics of the characters Jeannette and Melba show the similarities and differences between the characters.
This book was chosen to show that coming from a dysfunctional family does not have to hinder the success of a person’s future. Jeannette Walls is a journalist, writer, and former gossip columnist contributor to MSNBC.com. Despite living her childhood in the hands of neglectful parents, Jeannette Walls and her siblings have developed strength and achieved admirable success through their unconventional life of poverty.
Jeannette Walls’ memoir, The Glass Castle, encapsulates her childhood in poverty and trails her nomadic lifestyle with her irresponsible and arguably negligent parents. Although formidable and destructive when intoxicated, Walls’ father Rex was an intelligent, inventive man when sober. During the times when he was unemployed, Rex would design inventions to acquire wealth, such as “The Prospector”, a machine that would separate gold nuggets from other rocks based on weight. Moreover, he had formulated blueprints for an architecturally advanced and complex house, which had been named the Glass Castle. According to Walls’, “Once [Dad] finished the Prospector and we struck it rich, he’d start work on our Glass Castle” (Walls 25). This idea of
“The only people for whom we can even begin to imagine properly human, individual, existences are the literate and the consequential, the wazirs and the sultans, the chroniclers, and the priests—the people who had the power to inscribe themselves physically upon time” (Ghosh 17). History is written by the victorious, influential and powerful; however, history has forgotten the people whose voices were seized, those who were illiterate and ineloquent, and most importantly those who were oppressed by the institution of casted societies. Because history does not document those voices, it is the duty to the anthropologist, the historiographer, the philosopher as well as scholars in other fields of studies to dig for those lost people in the forgotten realm of time. In In An Antique Land, the footnotes of letters reveal critical information for the main character, which thematically expresses that under the surface of history is something more than the world can fathom.