Saleem's historical discourse in 'Midnight's Children'

• Autores: Luis de Juan Hatchard
• Localización: Miscelánea: A journal of english and american studies, ISSN 1137-6368, Nº 15, 1994, págs. 331-346
• Idioma: español
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• Resumen

  • It has been the aim of this paper to analyze Midnight's Children with regard to the evolution undergone by history writing, and specially with the position it actually holds. This has been done with a view to discovering that much of postmodernist fiction, among which we must include Rushdie's novel, is dealing with similar issues to those which have become the subject of the New Historicism. The first half of the paper deals with the narrator's ambivalent position: his oscillation between internal and external narrator serves to underline the uncertainty and relativity of the task he has undertaken. By underlining the discursive nature of history, and by consciously choosing an impossible task--the struggle towards objectivity and reliability--Saleem manages further to blur the frontier that differentiates fiction from history. The second half deals with Saleem's position both as a character and narrator. Saleem's fascination with the unknown allows him to write from new angles, and therefore to offer different perspectives, and points of view. this concern with history (writing) must be understood as an attempt to suggest multiplicity, heterogeneity, and plurality. This task is carried out by continually stressing Saleem's position as a self-conscious writer, and by commenting on the linguistic nature of his discourse.