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Revamping History

Appropriating the Residues of the Past in William Dalrymple’s

Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan.

Suma Alexander,

Assistant Professor of English,

Bishop Moore College, Mavelikara.

Every apprehension of the past as history is dependent upon a prior understanding of

the reality from the perspective of the narrator. Organising the contents of the past can be

conceived only as a storied narrative act, and by doing justice to the past, its reality always

lies beyond our reach. The history is a simulacrum of the past as invented by the historian,

based on the residues of the past left behind in archives and other historical records which

themselves have the status of discursive entities. Historical truth cannot be equated with fact.

Imagination and reason have key roles to play in the composition of a historical discourse for

an adequate representation of reality, and this necessitates employment of fiction making

techniques by the historian. Nevertheless, in the words of W G Gallie, the narrative possesses

“referentiality”. Hayden White rightly observes:

… no given set of casually recorded historical events can in itself constitute a story;

the most it might offer to the historian are story elements. The events are made into a

story by the suppression and subordination of certain of them and highlighting of

others by characterization, motific repetition, variation of tone and point of view,

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alternative descriptive strategies and the like – in short all the techniques that we will

normally expect to find in the emplotment of a novel or a play. (White 84)

William Dalrymple, the Scottish born writer and historian has proved his ingenuity in

his chosen field with the publication of the masterful retelling of the great Indian mutiny The

Last Mughal: The Fall of a Dynasty, Delhi, 1857(2006). He started his career as a travel

writer with a handful of acclaimed travel narratives to his credit. His recent work Return of a

King: The Battle for Afghanistan (2013) tells the history of the First Afghan War as an

abortive experiment in the British imperial scene that slowly descended into what is arguably

the greatest military humiliation ever suffered by the West in the Middle East; an entire army

of what was then the most powerful military nation in the world utterly routed and destroyed

by poorly equipped Afghan tribesmen. The retreat of the imperial army after the humiliating

defeat yet again left Afghanistan in tribal chaos and ruled by the same government that the

war was launched to overthrow.

Historians deliberately inculcate narrativity into their works to demonstrate processes

and causality in representing an “extra-textual real”, as Alun Munslow puts it, which makes

up the discourse. All such narratives explain why the events happened as such, overlaid by

assumptions held by the historian about the forces influencing the nature of causality- factors

like race, class, culture, geography, region, coincidence and so on and so forth. Thus the

narrative emerges as a complex interpretative exercise which can conclusively be termed

neither true nor false. The First Anglo-Afghan War (1839-42) and the reinstallation of the

puppet king Shah Shuja in 1839 are part of a doomed imperialist design to control an unruly

population in an inhospitable terrain. The English realized that Afghanistan was not an easy

place to rule as there was no central control as in the case of Mughal Hindustan. The shifting

patterns of tribal alliances were a decisive factor in Afghan politics.

“To write a history meant to place an event within a context, by relating it as a part to

some conceivable whole” (White 94). Dalrymple places the British intervention within the

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context of the “Great Game” rivalry with the Russian Empire over influence in central Asia.

The British feared the existence of a Russian move on Afghanistan supported by Dost

Mohammad via Persia. Shah Shuja’s deposition and exile were viewed by the British as a

visible sign of Russian influence in Afghanistan and they were bent upon bringing him back

to power overlooking the popularity and stronghold of Dost Mohammad Khan Barakzai in

Afghan politics. On the other hand an alliance with the British provided Shah Shuja with a

powerful ally which could provide him resources to unite his fracturing empire.

Afghanistan had been an in-between-place, “the fractured and disputed stretch of

mountains, flood plains and deserts separating its more orderly neighbours.” “There were

the different tribal, ethnic and linguistic fissures fragmenting the Afghan society”, coupled

with “the endemic factionalism within clans and tribes, and especially the blood feuds within

closely related lineages” (3) - symbolizing the impotence of central stronghold. The contest

between the two leading clans, the Sadozais headed by Shah Shuja and the Barakzais led by

Dost Mohammad had gained the status of a civil war in Afghanistan.

Hayden White’s view that the narrative does not pre-exist as such, but is invented as

much as found by the constructive historian holds true in the case of Dalrymple’s works. We

come across multiple voices within the narrative which work against each other and aid the

production of the desired sense. Though Dalrymple employs these techniques to provide

objectivity to his work, the counter discourses can be identified with the post-modern trend

where “historians are less interested in explaining the real lives of the people, but instead,

they stress the way people experienced and interpreted their own world giving them a

cultural autonomy for dealing with their own world in their own specific way” (Rusen 139).

Dalrymple has dealt with a wide range of previously untranslated full-length

contemporary accounts of the Anglo-Afghan conflict, including the autobiography of Shah

Shuja, thereby enabling a retelling of the events from the vantage point of the Afghans and

Shah Shuja himself. Historians cannot work without a prior knowledge of the previous


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emplotments and interpretations of the archives dealt with. In Alun Munslow’s words, “there

is a substantial degree of reciprocity between the mental prefigurative process and the

evidence, in as much as each narrativised piece of evidence is already an intertext that has

previously been interpreted and textualised by other historians working within the archive

and their episteme” (188-89). The brutal picture of the war is also unveiled from the letters,

diaries and accounts of the western counterparts.

Dalrymple extensively uses the previously untranslated Afghan sources like the epic

poems, Akbarnama ,the history of Wazir Akbar Khan, the war like son of Dost Mohammad

who took the reins of the “jihadis” against “kafirs” in 1841, and Jangnama , the history of

the war, for the Afghan versions where “…the caricature of Akbar Khan as a ‘treacherous

Muslim’ of the British sources gradually transforms before our eyes…”(500). While the

British sources portrayed the Afghan leaders as treacherous bigots and fanatics, the anti-

imperial gaze of the historian probes into the Afghan sources which reveal them as rounded

figures with essential human virtues and motivations. At the same time it holds a mirror as to

how the Afghans saw the British. The British army remarkable for its heartlessness is

described thus by Dost Mohammad in Akbarnama :

For such is how they show their strength

Terrorising those who dare to resist them

As it is their custom, they will subjugate the people

So that no one makes a claim to equality. (500)

The Afghan sources reveal that Shuja had many loyal supporters who turned alien to

him due to his continued patronage of the British infidels. Mirza Ata who narrates the story

of the war as a loyal supporter of Shuja later becomes disillusioned by his undue reliance on

the British patrons and his later writings express his increasing sympathy with the resistance.

As Mirza Ata remarks, “It was clear to all that those English men who had boasted off their


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shrewdness in policy and bravery in battle, were worth nothing compared to the Sardars of

Khursan. They were in fact mere mules stuck in the mud!”(354). The retreat of the British in

1842 ended in chaos out of adverse climatic conditions and frequent attacks from tribals

across the mountain passes. It was “an extra ordinary defeat for the British and an almost

miraculous victory for Afghan resistance” (388). Shah Shuja who finally decided to join the

“jihadis” was murdered shortly afterwards by his godson.

Historical events are “value-neutral”, when considered as potential story elements

(White 84). This accounts for the different narrative emplotments possible for the same set of

events, inorder to figure forth different meanings within different fictional matrices. The

victorious Barakzai propaganda portrays Shah Shuja as a cruel tyrant. He lies buried in an

unmarked and unfrequented grave while Dost Mohammad found his place in a grand

mausoleum beside Sufi saints. Dalrymple vindicates Shah Shuja describing him as “unusual

for his honourable loyalty to his allies and his faithfulness to his agreements, in a region not

known for either” (422). Shuja emerges through his own writings and those of his supporters

as an enigmatic figure. He was resolute and unbreakable and had a fund of optimism.

Dalrymple maintains that though Shuja does not possess a tragic stature in the conventional

sense, his “turbulent life ended as so much of it had been lived, in failure” (424), often for

reasons quite outside his control- aptly attributed to ill luck. “Shuja’s reign was brought

down not by his own faults but by the catastrophic mishandling of the invasion and

occupation of Afghanistan as managed by Auckland and Macnaghten, and as lost by General

Elphinstone” (423).

As a symbolic structure, “the historical narrative does not reproduce the events it

describes; it tells us in what direction to think about the events and charges our thoughts

about the events with different emotional valences” (White 91). The British defeat of 1842

serves as a symbol of the determination of the Afghans and their refusal to succumb to the

norms and principles of a foreign power. The title Return of a King could signify the return

of Shah Shuja to his dream throne. It could be equally applicable to Dost Mohammad, the


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only man who clearly gained from the Anglo-Afghan war and regained his throne, so also to

Akbar Khan who spearheaded the Afghan resistance leading to their glorious victory.

The historian, through his narrative act attempts to engage meaningfully with the

past- present continuum. Though history never repeats itself exactly, Dalrymple traces

striking parallels between the First Anglo-Afghan War and the neo-colonial adventures of

the NATO in Afghanistan. He observes:

There is a real continuity in the impact of political geography on the evolution

of both conflicts. The significance of Kabul’s location is one issue- adjacent to

both the Tajik population of Kohistan, on one side, and the eastern Ghilzais on

the other. Then there is a tribal issue, as another Popalzai ruler lacking a real

power base, Hamid Karzai- astonishingly, from the same sub-tribe as Shah

Shuja- faces the brunt of concerted guerrilla attacks led by the eastern Ghilzai

who today make up the foot soldiers of the Taliban. They are directed by

another Ghilzai tribal leader from the Hotak ruling clan, in this case Mullah

Omar. (482)

The anti-colonial gaze of the writer endows the story space with agencies, structures and

events that validate his arguments and thereby holds true Ankersmit’s observation that

history is a narrative, while the past is not.

Works Cited

Dalrymple, William. Return of a King: The Battle for Afghanistan. London:

Bloomsbury, 2013. Print.

Munslow, Alun. Deconstructing History. London: Routledge, 1997. Print.

Rusen, Jorn. History: Narration- Interpretation- Orientation. USA: Berghahn Books,

2005. Print.


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White, Hayden. Tropics of Discourse: Essays in Cultural Criticism. London: The

Johns Hopkins Press Ltd., 1978. Print.


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History on the Anvil: Recalibrating The Ramayana in Anand Neelakantan's

Asura - The Tale of the Vanquished

Ranjith Krishnan K.R. Rajalekshmi K.L.Assistant Professor of English, & Assistant Professor of English,

N.S.S. College, Pandalam Govt. College, Kariavattom,

Trivandrum.

India is a mosaic of multifarious cultures, patterns and even climates. But there are a

few things that have kept this country united for ages. Especially the various art forms

including the rich literature that existed in this land has been a major amalgamating factor.

The two great epics The Mahabharata and The Ramayana underscore this actuality as they

have shaped, nurtured and influenced the Indian society, culture and value systems for a long

period. These epics form the backbone of Indian storytelling and numerous writers have got

inspired from these. They have found ample material from these texts to form their own

ideas and create novel texts. Many of them have even tried emulating the style of the epics

while others have tried to foreground the characters of it. Authors, fascinated by the aura of

the epics have even attempted to retell these epics.

The modern literary firmament is lit up with certain novel narrative as well as

thematic techniques. Critiquing many such texts unleashes multiple layers of signification.

Shaking down the linear historical narratives offer a place/space for revamping the age-old

legends and myths thus, providing the readers with fresh perspectives. The Ramayana

ascribed to the sage Valmiki depicts the offices of relationships, portraying ideal characters

and presenting anti-heroes. The epic The Ramayana, which means ‘Rama's journey', narrates

the story of Rama, believed to be an incarnation of Lord Vishnu whose wife Sita Devi is

abducted by the demon-king Ravana. The pundits look upon the text as an allegory, which

explores human values and the concept of dharma. The protagonist Rama kills Ravana at the

end thus saving Sita and establishing virtue. The characters of the epic are fundamental to the


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cultural consciousness of the nation and have other versions of the same in many parts of the

world. As A.K. Ramanujan in his essay ‘Three Hundred Ramayanas’ says:

This story is usually told to suggest that for every such Rama there is a

Ramayana. The number of Ramayanas and the range of their influence in

South and Southeast Asia over the past twenty-five hundred years or more are

astonishing. Just a list of languages in which the Rama story is found makes

one gasp: Assamese, Balinese, Bengali, Cambodian, Chinese, Gujrati,

Japanese, Kannada, Kashmiri, Khotanese, Laotian, Malayasian, Marathi,

Oriya, Prakrit, Sanskrit, Santali, Sinhalese, Tamil, Telugu, Thai, Tibetan--to

say nothing of Western languages. (24)

Legendary stories abound in praise of the victorious - glorification of all their deeds even if

they are inhuman, comes into the fore with the blue pencil of history that sweeps under the

carpet the story of the downtrodden. Most of the epics were transmitted through the oral

medium thus giving space for additions and deletions of actual or fictitious events. One such

tale is that of the Ramayana. Throughout Indian history, many authors have produced diverse

tellings of the Ramayana in numerous media. The televised Ramayana by Ramanand Sagar

too had a huge impact on the mainstream national culture. The whole world is familiar with

the heroic Rama and the anti-heroic Ravana. Whether it be a human or God, nobody sticks

on to the linear character. They can be flat and round. But as it depicts things from the

human side, flawless persons are a nullity. Even the glorious Rama commits such errors. All

the inter-textual readings fail to connect the humanitarian concern with Ravana - ‘the other'

in the epic.

Contemplation of the victorious finds space in history. Those who are left in oblivion,

continues to stay in the clutches of memory as the ‘unwanted'. The racial and caste

dominated society has always tried to brand the rebellious as the ‘asura'. Such deconstructive

apathies can be cited out of the text, Asura - Tale of the Vanquished: The Story of Ravana


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and His People (2012) penned by Anand Neelakantan. The novel is the Ramayana told

through Ravana's perspective. In this novel, every character including Rama and Ravana is

human, only differentiated from the other by their caste and love of power. The study

analyses the novel from the perspective of an unsung hero, Ravana. Rendering him into the

postmodern context, with a voice of his own, the novelist creates a ‘metanarrative’ that

dissects the age-old concept of the powerful antagonist. Juxtaposing the Ramayana and

Asura, one finds the churning out of certain versions, which will theoretically support the

creation of centre - margin, the superior race and the other in the ‘historicisation' of epics and

folk-tales. While one imbibes knowledge, it is better to rethink and analyse that awareness in

order to be flawless in the proper understanding of history.

Anand Neelakantan's Asura opens with Ravana dying on the battlefield, felled by

Rama's arrows. His life flashes before his eyes, which unfolds the secret history of the

‘other', the ‘vanquished' as the author would prefer, from the Ramayana. The antagonist of

the original hogs the limelight in this newer version with the positive side of Ravana under

foucs. He is a devotee of Shiva, a great scholar, a talented musician and astrologer. He

reminds the readers that apart from that one act of self-destructive madness when he

abducted Sita, Ravana was a great and noble king, beloved of his people until Rama and his

allies unleashed the genocidal war. According to the author’s observation, asuras were highly

democratic people with a casteless society. With Lord Siva being their deity, their lineage

can be historicised to the Dravidians rather than to the Aryans. Ravana, thus, is devoid of the

features of an archetypal villain. The physical rendering of the ten heads gave Ravana

demonic look but the author corrects it as nine emotions or deeds and the intellect that are

purely human. He wanted to live as an earthly being. He says, “I didn't want the seat Rama

has reserved for me in his heaven. I only wanted my beautiful earth” (14). When Mahabali

advises Ravana to shed all the base emotions and to promote the intellect, he retorts by

saying that without all these emotions he cannot be a complete man. Jealousy and pride


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kindles his desire to excel in every field, even the ruling system of a country is decided by

these. Ravana turns out to be a perfect ruler and scholar whom even Rama admires.

The present paper opens up the possibility of various readings from a postmodern

perspective, where both Rama and Ravana are depicted as representatives of two different

clans. In the Ramayana, Rama occupied the centre, marginalizing Ravana as the ‘other’. But

in the novel, the centre-margin has been thrashed in order to replace it with a humanistic

perspective. In the Ramayana, one can trace the birth and upbringing of Rama in such a

detail that nobody gets bothered to count on the legacy of Ravana. Here the author, clearly

states the heritage of the Asura clan. Ravana, being the son of the great sage Vishrava and

the Daitya princess Kaikesi, spent his childhood in poverty. While watching the luxurious

kingdom of his stepbrother, Kubera, he also became ambitious. That ambition ignited a

passion in him leading to the thoughts of reclaiming the glorious past of Asura rule. Ravana,

according to the novelist, is not a demon but a king who was insistent upon implementing a

casteless society thus ousting the money minded Brahmanical system of knowledge

perpetuation. About the destiny, Ravana says, “[...] I had been born to fulfil someone else's

destiny. To allow someone else to become God” (15).

Being the tale of the Asuras, the novelist brings out the opinion of not only the

overpowering Ravana, but the point of view of Bhadra, the common man. Bhadra identifies

himself as ‘nobody'. But the efforts and decisions of Bhadra was inextricably linked with the

fate of the Asura clan. He made the entry of Ravana easier into the kingdom of Kubera, by

poisoning the food of Kubera's army. It was he who got entrusted with the duty of murdering

Vedavati, the Brahmin woman to whom Ravana got attracted during his Indian expedition,

and Sita, the daughter of Ravana. History was entangled with him as he decided not to kill

Sita, thus to rewrite the fate of the Asura clan. Later, the same Bhadra influenced the

thoughts of Rama, when he migrated to Ayodhya after the fall of the Asura kingdom. While

living in Ayodhya as a dhobi, Bhadra quarrelled with his wife and said that he was not ready


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to accept a woman who spent some days in the abode of another man. He asserted his

statement by saying that he was not like King Rama who accepted Sita even after she spent

some days in Lanka. In Ayodhya, Bhadra became part of the untouchable because of the

prevalent caste system of the Devas. Making Bhadra voice out his opinions, Anand

Neelakantan provides a novel reading of the original epic from the perspective of a Dalit – a

man who changed the destiny of the upper class.

The Mahabharata and the Ramayana are two such epics, which have shaped, nurtured

and influenced society, culture and value systems in this country for ages. Literature being

the most sensitive reflection of the sensibility of a society and its cultural system, this

discrimination is much evident in Indian literature also. Men forms the power structure

where women are always subdued. In the novel, both Sita and Soorpanakha are presented as

the two sides of life. Ravana and Sita are portrayed as fair coloured while Soorpanakha is

more dark and negative. It was the attitude of Rama and Lakshmana towards Soorpanakha

that infuriated Ravana, which resulted in the abduction of Sita. The mutilation of

Soorpanakha provoked Ravana to ensure the safety of his daughter. He never wanted his

daughter to spend the fourteen years in the forest. If the cruelty of Rama and Lakshmana are

up to mutilating a woman, then how can Sita be safe in their hands? This thought triggered

an anxiety in the mind of Ravana ultimately leading to the breakout of the lethal war.

There is the possibility of diverse narratives in the novel. Both Ravana and Bhadra

depict almost the same incidents in their own ways and according to their thinking, which

shows the difference between perspectives of the rich and the poor. Ravana describes his

feelings and his ambitions initially from a teenager's point of view and then describes the

problems of handling an entire empire from a ruler's point of view. While Bhadra describes

everything from a common person's point of view or rather from a poor person's perspective.

Through this, the writer brings in diverse reflections of the two sections of the society

making the text more relevant unfolding the concerns of a ‘class-oriented’ society.


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The ‘Shaiva – Vaishnava’ rift too comes as a major concern in the text. Lord Siva was the

real God and he was the saviour of the Asuras while Vishnu was just the commander-in chief

of the Devas. Later, he assumed the status of a God thus to relegate Siva from being the sole

protector of the world. The story of Mahabali achieves relevance in this context. The king

Mahabali, at that time, was all set to conduct the great ‘Rajasooya’ trying to claim the

position of an all-empowering emperor. Ravana reflects:

Kings, chieftains, rajas and maharajas belonging to all the tribes and kingdoms

in India assembled at the Asura capital of Muzuris to pay homage to the king

of kings, Mahabali. As part of the ritual, the Emperor promised a boon to

anyone who asked for it. (28)

It was to subvert the ‘Shaiva’ domination that, a Brahmin boy named Vamana Vishnu came

pleading to the King Mahabali, to grant him three feet of land to start a Brahminical school.

Later, the very same school achieved a cult status thus instilling in the people brahminical

ideology as a way to belittle the Asura rule sending Mahabali in exile.

The novelist has also highlighted the commercial aspect of ruling that the readers fail

to associate with the Ramayana when read as a religious text. It was Kubera’s trade with

different nations, the author argues, that made Lanka a much sought-after kingdom. The

‘Godly’ status of Kubera and even Varuna, normally regarded as the God of Ocean has be

demystified in the text. Varuna simply turns out to be a pirate and not a God making

manipulations and thus looting and controlling the trade activities in that sphere. Kubera

hoards numerous possessions with his diligent business mindset.

The final section of the novel deals with the death of Ravana. The author creates a

contrast between the lives of Rama and Ravana. Bhadra, the commentator says:

Rama had sacrificed the two people who he loved the most, for the sake of his

dharma. He became more and more depressed and withdrawn and finally found


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eternal solace in the dark waters of the Sarayu. […] He led an unhappy life and

sacrificed everything – his wife, his brother and his conscience, for that dharma.

[…] / Ravana was a man who lived life on his own terms, doing what he thought was

right and caring nothing for what was written by holy men; a man who lived life fully

and died a warrior’s death. Like their lives, believes, values and definitions of

dharma, the manner of their deaths were also contradictory. However, the final truth

remains that both were actors in a grand farce and it is only the small detail of who

won, that decided the hero and the villain, in their epic life stories. (493 – 94)

Rama who wanted to uphold dharma never succeeded in it. The author thus sums up

the novel by saying that still the people of the God’ own country yearns to re-establish the

golden times of emperor Mahabali where everyone is treated as equal. As Paul O’Flinn says,

“[...] history demonstrates clearly the futility of a search for the ‘real', ‘true' meaning of a

work” (19). It is here that people should think of reproducing the text in consonance with the

needs of another cultural background. The religious sensibility of the times of The Ramayana

is being unearthed and restructured in accordance with the construct of a class/caste oriented

society. The reflex of India as a ‘chathurvarnya' society inculcate the thought of the revered

as a construct. Thus, Rama and Ravana are two social products to assert the dominance of a

particular group. When the writer unpacks the ancient product, the need to reconstruct the

same is being hunted upon. The novel Asura, turns out in every sense an attempt to recreate

the past as well as the epic giving voice to the muted making it appealing for every reader.

Works Cited

O’Flinn, Paul. “Production and Reproduction: The Case of Frankenstein”. Reading Popular

Narrative: A Source Book. Ed. Bob Ashley. London: Leicester University Press,

1997. 18 – 32. Print.

Neelakantan, Anand. Asura: Tale of the Vanquished. The Story of Ravana and His People.

Mumbai: Platinum Press, 2012. Print.


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Ramanujan A.K. “Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five Examples and Three Thoughts on

Translation”. The Collected Essays of A.K. Ramanujan. Ed. Vinay Dharwadker. New

York: OUP, 2004. 22 – 49. Print.

Entity as an Enigma: A Study of Manohar Malgonkar’s Cactus Country.

Sreekala B.

Assistant Professor of English.

N.S.S. College, Pandalam

Manohar Malgonkar has taken up the most crucial moments in the life of a nation and has

portrayed them in terms of human situation in Cactus Country. The central character, Aslam

Chisti had begun as an immature character, but eventually developed into a fully developed

one through his self realization. This realization is the shattering of all his ideals and beliefs

about himself. Aslam’s picture at the end of the novel is that of a betrayer of his own people-

a traitor-even in the eyes of his own father, Major General Tarik Chisti who would have

become the president of the undivided Pakistan if things had developed according to his plan.

Aslam is forced not only to leave his country, but he has to accept a new faith as well.

In fact he was not sure of his identity earlier. He is the son of a Muslim military

officer and a university educated Sikh woman. His parents had a broad outlook and he had

never experienced the problem of a mixed parentage. The trauma faced by him is not to

migrate from his native place so much so that he has no sense of belonging to that either. His

mother is a Sikh woman from India. He is born and brought up in that part of the Punjab

which belongs to Pakistan.

Himself a military man, Malgonkar revealed his great interest in the portrayal of

military actions and situations in the novel. Aslam Chisti , the young officer in the Pakistani

army is caught between the struggle of East Bengal and West Punjab in Pakistan. The


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western part of Pakistan treated East Bengal as their colony. “After twenty-one years of

independence, the gulf that divided Pakistan’s east from its west wing had only widened, the

cultural differences deepening within time. East Pakistan remained economically under

developed and sustaining over 55%of Pakistan’s 120 million people on 15% of its total land

area”.(320)West Punjab and East Bengal are two separate nations that cannot stand together

geographically or linguistically. The only criterion of their grouping together is that both of

them are Muslim majority areas. But history proves that nations cannot hold together solely

on the basis of religion. In Pakistan regional nationalism triumphed over religious

nationalism. The East Bengal, administered mostly by bureaucrats from Punjab, who spoke

and thought in Urdu rather than Bengali, and kept them under martial control by army and air

force, cannot remain loyal to the western authorities. They find themselves exploited by their

rulers as they were once exploited by the British rulers. Hence on December15, 1971, East

Bengal emerged as a free nation -Bangladesh.

The opinion that East Bengal and West Punjab are two separate nations which

would have never held together is voiced by most of the political and military leaders of the

time. Even Lord Moundbatten who had presided over the dismemberment was quite sure that

these two pieces held together will not last long. But the union lasted beyond their

expectations. Even the senior military officers who had fought for the integrity of Pakistan

had such a suspicion. They were also sure about the division of the two parts.

Sheikh Mujib epitomizes the hopes and aspirations of a large mass of people-the

East Bengalis. Cactus Country portrays the events that followed Sheikh Mujib’s achieving an

electoral majority and the struggle leading to the independence of Bangladesh with the

intervention of India on a wide canvas.

The tribes of the West including the Balochis, the Pathans, the Sindhis and the

Punjabis were stunned at the verdict of democracy which entitled Sheikh Mujib with a great

victory. They could not even tolerate the thought of allowing themselves to be ruled by the


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‘despised Bengalis’. Though the major interest in the novel is the depiction of the military

codes and conduct through the experiences of Aslam Chisti, the political events that form

part of the history are also revealed through the same.

While East-Bengal was burning in the fire of political turmoil, Sheikh Mujib was

arrested and escorted by tanks from his home at midnight. The military authorities had done

it with all fanfare. They gave the arrest of Sheikh Mujib the effect of the capture of a mighty

a terrorist after braving all the obstacles. The military action that captured Bengal’s most

admired leader of those days was in a manner shameful to a soldier. It was simply the taking

of ‘an unarmed man who had been asleep in his house’ (138) after frightening his family

which includes women and children, with tanks and bayonets. Aslam who was brought up

and trained in cultured and refined society felt ashamed of the manner of this arrest. It was

unbecoming of a soldier who has some elevated ideas about his duty. It was not “something

to recount to one’s children with pride and a thump of the chest saying “I was there”.

Because this was not something a soldier could take pride in”. (138)Here the novelist

portrays the inhuman and unjust aspects of the liberation struggle.

Through the novel he reveals that the separation of Bangladesh was a historical

necessity. Aslam Chisti can never visualize West Punjab as part of India. He could not

comprehend how his father and mother who believed in different faiths and belonged to

either sides of the line of separation can marry without causing any irreparable estrangement

in their respective families. He can never comprehend a nation without any division on the

basis of religion. His doubts are relevant in the case of all persons who belonged to his

generation. To them, these differences have strong and strict basis as they began to

experience it from their early life onwards.

The intellectuals of the Dacca University who had given expression to the unjust

actions of the Punjabi rulers raised a serious threat to the military regime. The consequence


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of it was many innocent victims who ransacked the University and its premises. Only for the

young educated persons like Aslam Chisti , who could not blindly follow the stringent codes

of a military dictatorship had a moral scruple for such an action. The military leaders acted

consciously that they are destroying innocent students. Nothing had prevented the military

rulers from destroying an educational and cultural centre. Their only aim is to subjugate a

nation that has turned against their authority. They used tanks and bayonets profusely to

bring under command a whole nation, the unity of which provides strength to their struggle.

The separating forces are numerous. In some cases it is religion and in some cases it is

language or any such regional concern.

Aslam’s prison life among the East Bengalis changed his outlook towards them. He

no longer considered them as ‘bloody Bingoes’. Noor Pirzada showed love and mercy to

Aslam that transcended all regional considerations. An element of human relationship that

transcends all other considerations is evident in all these connections. The relationship

between Aslam’s mother, Amar and Noor’s wife, Begum Sahiba is another example. Amar

considered Mrs. Pirzada as her ‘music sister’. She was trained in music by Begum Sahiba’s

mother, Begum Akhtar. Aslam , a prisoner in the hands of East Bengalis was keen on the

developments in the country.. He cursed his stars as he cannot participate in the great events

happening in the country. While in India, what Indira Gandhi was waited for is a propitious

day to start the war. Aslam could not control himself the thought of wasting away his

soldier’s life in enemy’s captivity at a time when he has to prove his heroism.

Sentimentalism has no place in war and it is not proper for a soldier to become

sentimental. But Aslam could not control himself as he left the soil of Bengal. He had his

experiences of life in Bengal. It was where he had learnt the lessons of life and the value of

human relationships more than the importance he gained in West-Pakistan army, because of

the powerful presence of his father, Tarik Chisti.


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Disloyalty to his own country and army is not to be tolerated by General Tarik Chisti, even if

that sin is committed by his own son. The only option for him is to immigrate to India which

he did with the assistance of Major Pirzada. He has to find his identity in India. The only

option for him to find this identity is to accept his mother’s faith. His mother’s family who

had no opposition to her marriage is now reluctant to accept him because, his mother ‘had

renounced her family, her faith’…. (404). Up to this time Aslam had no belief in any faith.

But now he has to accept a new religion, his mother’s in order to find a place in their family.

But even while offering his readiness to accept their faith, he was quite sure that he

was not entering an asylum, but a trap. The hatred in the mind of the people has reached to

such an extent that each person has to find his acceptance in the society only on the basis of

his faith, his language and the land where he inhabits. This attribute is one of the tendencies

developed in the mind of the people who belong to the post -independence generation in

India. Aslam’s final return to his mother’s place to be anchored is a symbolic representation

of every man’s search for a sense of belonging.

Works Cited

Collingwood,R.G. The Idea of History. Rev.ed. New York:Oxford UP,1994.

Malgonkar,Manohar. Cactus Country. India: Penguin,1992.


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Narrativising History: An Altered Image of America’s Past in Philip Roth’s

The Plot Against America

Jayalekshmi.B.

Assistant Professor of English.

M S M College,Kayamkulam.

History is generally taken as a record of past events or a record of facts. Several

aspects of history link it with fiction. The fictive elements of history link the historian and

the fiction writer. Thus we have the genres like historical fiction, alternate histories etc.

Alternate history differs fundamentally from historical fiction although they have

similarities. Historical novel, peopled with characters of the past attempts to recreate as

realistically as possible the past milieu. In oher words, either the characters or the setting will

be historical in historical fiction. Historical novels prove that history is not a mere record of

past events; it can be given life and breath through creative imagination.

Alternate history alters or revamps the historical events to suit fictional goals. If

historical novels uphold the “true version of history,” alternate history dismantles it.

Alternate historians embellish what is already constituted “with new characters” and also

include the “changed” event that provides the essential conflict in the story. Alternate

histories dovetail a historian’s strategies with a fiction writer’s strategies often so

successfully, that readers find themselves hard pressed to tell where one ends and where

other begins.

This paper is about the narrativising of history since the role of narrative in history

has been the subject of much debate among historiographers. The word “narrative” is used to

denote the representation of an event or story in art; the telling of the story that can be linked

to a system of cause and effect. Many critics argue that narrative is a way to structure reality.

Others argue that narrative constitute reality.

In alternate history and historical fiction history is narrated with imagination. The

writers enliven the dead events of the past with a free play of imagination. We know the


ISBN 978-81-927671-0-9

events in history as it is recorded. Nobody could change such recorded events, its causes and

effects. Alternate history is a way to reconstruct history through narrative thereby blurring

the borders between history and fiction. Narrativising history is accomplished by

reconstructing history to the will and imagination of the writer.

Philip Roth’s The Plot against America is such a novel where history is reconstructed.

Philip Roth gained attention with the 1959 novella “Good Bye Columbus” – a humorous

portrait of American Jewish life for which he received the US National Book Award for

fiction.

In The Plot against America, Roth tries to find out the answers of certain questions-

“What if America had taken an isolationist stance during the Second World War? And what

if American president had openly supported Adolph Hitler and signed the pact of agreement

with the Nazis declaring that America would not enter the wars? What would America have

looked like if the greatest generation had never existed?

Roth addresses these issues in this novel and thereby gives the altered image of

America. He imagined the presidential election of 1940 as one in which Franklin

Roosevelt is defeated by Charles Lindbergh, the aviator famous for being the first to traverse

the Atlantic on a solo flight and also known as an open supporter of Hitler and the Nazi

party. The nations decline into Fascism is slow but constant under Lindbergh’s “Just Folk

Program”

The story is about Roth family, but it is a family in the truly broader sense of the word

including friends and neighbours, even strangers brought together by circumstances. The

novel follows the fortune of Roth’s family during the Lindbergh presidency as anti-Semitism

becomes more accepted in American life and Jewish American families like the Roths are

presented on various levels. The narrator and the central characters of the novel is an eight

year old boy Roth who is growing up in New Jeresy in 1940s. The plot against America is

the plot against every Jewish family in America. Philip Roth’s fiction discloses the burden of

Jewish tradition. The novel dramatizes the prevalence of anti-Semitism and racism during the

war years.


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The story is unfolded through the narration of a small boy Philip. The fear and anxiety

expressed in his narration captivates the readers to the pathetic situation of the Jews in

America. The novel wins the attention of the readers to the problem faced by the Jews. The

very beginning of the novel: “Fear presides over these memories, a perpetual fear” takes the

readers to an alterd world of America.

He says:

we were a happy family in 1940. My parents were outgoing , hospitable people,

their friends culled from among my father’s associates at the office and from the

women who along with my mother had helped to organize the Parent –Teacher

Association at newly built Chancellor Avenue School, where my brother and I were

pupils. All were Jews (2)

This shows how happily and peacefully they lived. Their hard working is revealed when the

boy says “the men worked fifty, sixty, even seventy or more hours a week”. It was their work

that identified and distinguished their neighbours not their religion and he believed that his

home land was America. But “everything changed” when the Republicans nominated

Lindbergh.

Lindbergh as a social force was distinguished not solely by his isolationism but by his

racist attitude towards Jews- an attitude that is reflected through his speeches, diaries and

letters. He was at heart a white supremacist leaving aside his individual friendship with Jews.

He did not consider them as equals or desirable American citizen other than very small

members.Here the novel attains political hue which creates an alternate universe where

America shifts to Fascism and makes the ordinary people suffermore. When Hitler’s allies

rule the White House, anti-Semitic mob roam the street.

That year, the Republicans nominated at the actual convention, a lawyer named

Wondelt Wilkie to run against Franklin Roosevelt. Roth’s narrator recalls a different

outcome. The Republicans go 20 ballots and cannot settle anybody at all. Instead the name of

Charles Lindbergh, the aviator is entered into nomination. Lindbergh in real life as also in the

novel, admired Hitler and even accepted a medal from Hitler’s government. He looked on the


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American Jews as a suspicious group all in all. Even so millions of other Americans admired

him. In the Republican party, some politicians even thought of running him for president.

In the beginning the readers feel the fear, the perpetual fear of the Jews at Fascism

and anti- Semitism. Then we feel the anger of this class towards the same objects. But this

anger gave way to anxieties of a little boy overwhelmed by childhood fears trying to make

sense of the events with a knowledge of the world that comes from his stamp collection and

from bedtime whisperings with his brother, Sandy and cousin Alvin.

Roth shows us how swiftly the rights and democratic customs of American life are

lost under the authoritarian guidance of president Lindbergh and his cloyingly named “just

folk program” which sets out to break up Jewish families and neighbourhood by scattering

Jewish children into the Christian heartland. The narrator’s brother spends a while in

Kentucky through this programme and comes home with a sympathy for Lindbergh which

was a chilling development.

Alvin his cousin, a frustrated youth who is keenly aware of the political and social

changes in their life joins the Canadian army to fight Hitler and comes home with his teeth

rotting, missing a leg, embittered furious, and rocked by wild emotions. The young narrator

as a boy can hardly cope with these calamities, “I wanted to scream, No! Alvin can’t stay

here- he has only one leg”. And the adult narrator exudes a pathos of his own, the tone of a

man forever reeling, even in his older years at the memory of that most amazing and

alarming of childhood discoveries – the recognition that his own father- the all powerful is

not so powerful at all.

Historical facts end with Lindberg’s election as president, where historical

imagination begins. What is altered is the way history is represented, sometimes it is history,

sometimes it looks like history but it is not. “We cannot allow the natural passions and

prejudices of other people to lead our country to destruction” (13). By having the fictional

characters speak the words of the historical figure; Roth blurs the frontiers between fiction

and history or between the historical fact and the historical imagination.


ISBN 978-81-927671-0-9

Works Cited

Roth, Philip. The Plot Against America (2004). New York: Vintage Books, 2005.

Car, David. Time, Narrative, and History. Bloomington: Indiana U P, 1986.

Cobley, Paul. Narrative. London and New York: Routledge, 2001.

Ferguson, Niall. Virtual History: Alternatives and Counterfactuals.London:

Penguin, 1997

Hellekson, Karen. The Alternate History: Refiguring Historical Time. Kent: Kent

State U P, 2001.


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