Asian Studies Commons^™

The Fragmentation Of Self Within The Indian Novel, Michele Gibney

Michele Gibney

With the novel Midnight’s Children, Rushdie forged a new path for novel-writing. In his epic story the main character became split into two in order to show the many facets of Indian culture. Instead of gaining an understanding of just one way of life, the reader became privy to all the stories being lived in such places as the Methwold estates, the surreal Sundarbans, and the Magician’s Ghetto. The story of one, single individual was lost in the cacophony of voices that each had their own tale to tell in Rushdie’s novel. This new form of writing, which favored the …