No language functions in vacuum. It substantially draws from and contributes to the complex of social, political, economic and cultural milieu. As linguists aver, it is not a mere “module of the mind” but ‘heteroglottic’. A dynamic, living language undergoes continual change to suit the changing societal needs. English, in particular, has undergone tremendous changes and registered magnificent growth, as a result of its global spread. Shedding its original insularity in the Anglo-Saxon period, it has borrowed liberally from languages like French, Greek, Latin, Italian, German and Sanskrit. Such uninhibited borrowing is the secret of its vitality and strength. Today, it is estimated that it is spoken by 337 million native speakers and by 1,357 million speakers as second or other language. India has the fourth largest English speaking population and the number is growing in view of the rising role of English in business, science and technology. The need of the hour is revitalize regional languages, too, by optimum borrowing to cater to the rising demands.

In the first paper , “English in Globalized Market,” Jyoti George adopts a micro-level approach to the role of language in society and analyzes the factors leading to the outstanding phenomenon of the spread of English language. One of the chief factors is ‘vehicular load,’ which helps English as a medium for scholarly discourse, commercial, technological and diplomatic communication as well confers on the users’ econo-technical supremacy in today’s world. But the author draws attention to the nativization of English and “geopolitical models of world Englishes.”

This issue offers three papers on a variety of areas related to Indian English Literature, which has been winning laurel after laurel in the international arena. In the second paper, “Midnight’s Children and the World of Imagi-nation”, Abraham P Abraham examines the need of post-colonial writers, like Salman Rushdie, to reclaim history and retain certain memories for using history as subject of their fiction. To Saleem Sinai he is important to India and Indian history. His version of India is really hi(story)! Blending artfully fiction, politics, magic and memory, the author shows, Rushdie demonstrates that there are no fixed identities and nations are merely imagined. Such an approach is symptomatic of the rootlessness of certain diasporic writers, who have shut the doors behind. The helpless predicament of an Indian woman, like Jaya, who is not allowed to express her views on the selection of her husband and the resulting sense of deep hatred for the patriarchal society are brought out by Daxa Thakor in the paper, “Root of Hatred for Patriarchal Dominion in That Long Silence”. In the fourth paper, “Image of Dark India: Social Criticism in Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger,” which was awarded the Man Booker Prize, Radika Chopra examines the dark side of India Shining, based on the transformation of Balaram Halwai, underdog Munna, into Ashok Saxena, rich, unscrupulous white tiger. With an excess of pessimism, though based on dismal realities of post-Independence India, Adiga presents a scathing critique of pervasive corruption, bureaucratic maladministration, affected by what Steinbeck once called “nerve gas of immorality.”

India and Bangladesh share not only the history dating back to hoary past but also the sufferings inflicted on women by exploitative society. The miserable plight of women in Bangladesh is compounded by grinding poverty and devastating starvation. In the paper, “Battered by Poverty: Women in Shaukat Osman’s Janani and The State Witness, Asha S examines the travails of women documented by the popular writer in the two novels chosen. The author shows that though women are superstitious, they are not orthodox. There is a hopeful feature in that we are witness to a celebration of motherhood amidst dismal social structures. In The State Witness, we are presented the hapless plight of Saburan, who is driven to prostitution by poverty and the government is partly guilty of her plight.

The pervasive predatory nature of man, who is essentially a wolf, is explored by P Suneetha in her paper, “Homo Homini Lupus: A Note on Hilary Mantells’s Wolf Hall,” based on the retelling of the murderous dealings of Cromwell, Cardinal Wolsey and king himself during the reign of Henry VIII. The degradation of the games children play to acts of savagery is studied by David Wilson in his paper, “A Study of Game Metaphor in Golding’s Lord of the Flies”. The author shows that the central theme of the novel is that man is basically evil and even kids exhibit that tendency, when they start the game of killing a pig for fun and during the action they descend into performing acts of cruelty, enjoying the agony of the afflicted.

The challenges faced by a translator, who must repress his personality and, as Venturi lays down, ought to remain invisible, are brought out by Greeshma Peethambaran, in the paper, “Invisibility of Translator in Mist,” based on her assessment of a competent and creative translation of M T Vasudevan Nair’s classic, Manhu, under the title, Mist, by V M Perimala, who has employed the techniques of literal translation, semantic re-creation and even re-creation of music. The exploitation of native aborigines by the colonizers in Australia is the central thematic concern of Kelvin Gilbert in his play, The Cherry Pickers. Edwin Singh Jeyachandra, in the paper, “The Conundrum of Aboriginality in Kelvin Gilbert’s The Cherry Pickers, shows how the playwright portrays the destruction of native culture by the invader, but at the end the natives choose to conform to alien culture. But the playwright succeeds in drawing attention to the pathos of the natives like Bubba, who face “nothin’ but starvin’, bleedin’ and cryin’.”

This issue also includes a perceptive review of a collection of articles and radio talks by a keen literary enthusiast with a wide range of interests, expressed in honest and convincing style.

This issue also offers a variety of evaluations of literature in English produced around the globe, keeping in view the increasing global positioning of English.

--S S Prabhakar Rao
Consulting Editor