Contemporary Authors and the Past - Essay Example

? Contemporary and the Past Contemporary and the Past Introduction There are extremely few literary novelists coming up with ambitious, realist books about the present since few writers seem to consider there is nothing significant about the present (The Independent, n.d). When Graham Swift wrote his seminal essay, Waterland, in 1983, the points he brought out were so relevant that one would have anticipated a renaissance of Victorian storyline values. However, the criticism is that young individuals with severe literary ambitions are no longer concerned in the metropolis or big, as well as rich slice of up-to-date life. This is because such writings are normally met with harsh outrage from contemporary authors and other critics (The Independent, n.d). What is lacking from contemporary fiction is the kind of accounting, which prominent Victorian novelists such as Hoban (1980), Rushdie (1980) and Swift (1983) engaged in, and it was through this that they endeavoured to bring successful novels. Certainly, writing about current issues is one of the hardest things to do. People may think it simple since there are so numerous prominent writers on magazines and newspapers around, and, at its best, modern-day journalism approaches what creative writing can do to elucidate the human condition (The Independent, n.d). A good modern-day novel is an ideal time-capsule, which will take the person who read a century ago; to the tastes, preoccupations, beliefs and spirit of the period that it was composed (The Independent, n.d). However, such books, unless they are conveyed to the reader from the developing world, are extremely rare. What has remained constantly desirable and respectable are novels set in history. This paper will discuss three novels, Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban, Midnights children by Salman Rushdie and Waterland by Graham Swift and argue why contemporary novels are so concerned with the past. The findings of the paper will be discussed with regards to the three writings. Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban Set in post-apocalyptic United Kingdom, this novel narrates the tale of a 12-year-old boy and his expedition through the ruins of evolution (Hoban, 1980). Following the passing away of his father in an accident, Riddley is forced to become a man. However, his inquisitive mind and eccentric ways differentiated him from his peers (The Independent, n.d). Also, when he notices a remnant of the old time, he puts in motion a chain of events, which might well initiate the end of the world once more. Written in an outstanding and gratifying language, this is a novel that pays off rereading time and again. Hoban’s book was greatly and favourably evaluated when it was first published, with its language granted exceptional attention. This book is told in a language, which attempts the impractical and attains it (The Independent, n.d). The agreement, then, is that the writing is an extremely good mainstream book, which endeavours to attain marvelous things and it does this. The author writes in a kind of postmodern (contemporary) English, which entirely echoes the bow and spear culture of a primitive world (Hoban, 1980). The novel is a marvel of lexical creativity. Hoban (1980) utilises the resources of historical linguistics to develop a language, which no other author has used and yet each and every word contributes to the idea of vernacular corruption and degradation. The medium is, in essence, the author’s message for he keeps a vigour control of his language so that he can develop the societal layout of his prospective inland. Primitive punctuation, elementary spelling, folk etymologies, as well as a simple and frequently crude vocabulary shape the psychic background of the prospective individuals and they show the determination and truthfulness of that truth seeker (Hoban, 1980). Underlying the desire for historical novels is maybe a collective feeling, which literary imagination and fiction are not adequate in themselves to make a book worth reading and understanding - there should be an aspect of self-education, as well (The Independent, n.d). Therefore, in Hoban’s book, one is not losing him/herself in an imagined world, but they are learning about the world’s history in a fictitious way. If a writer writes a book about historical beliefs or a certain community of the past, then that becomes its justification for publicity, as well as publication. Hoban (1980) supposes history feels very safe because it is over. Therefore, an extremely good, historical book like Riddley Walker is not only better-researched and written than an average book, but also attached to the present, and; hence, has the perspective of time. This is why such a book opted to settle it findings on the historical war ages and romanticism times, a time that people of today are so much concerned with. People relate modern literary books with grime and grit maybe for the plain reason that when it is not, people get displeased. Novels that base their findings on the history, as conceived of by Hoban (1980), have both depth and breadth. They mix comedy with tragedy, satire with sympathy, character with archetype and narrative with realism. The richness of historical novels gives people a world in which to not only flee but, like the myths on which they drew so powerfully, but also confront the readers’ own problems. The world has lost its mass audience to other forms, such as the internet and TV, instead of engaging in contemporary literature. The only literatures that can substitute television and the internet today are historical novels. Contemporary life is no less comic, chaotic, fascinating and strange than it was during the times of Hoban (1980), yet ironically, while a number of novelists rely on the trimmings of the past for its succulent settings or real-life characters, few seem keen to wrestle with today’s Victorian forebears (The Independent, n.d). When some of our best writers do look at contemporary times, they seem to do so through the eyes of the past – by discussing the 1900s or earlier times. When Hoban came to write Riddley Walker, he acknowledged migration as being one of the elements of urban life, which persuaded it the most; its scale, ambition, acute eye and energy for the contemporary, was all highlighted by this apprehension (The Independent, n.d). Even though, America has its own unique problems and ideology, the most fascinating aspect of life in the United Kingdom is also its reliance on foreign labour, much of it illegal, living in our midst, but still disenfranchised and ignored (Hoban, 1980). Midnight’s Children by Salman Rushdie In the modern literary belief, a lack of universal truth substitutes prior ideas of one utter truth, in terms of history and notions such as the society and identity (The Independent, n.d). Just as modernism takes apart the concept of utter truth, Rushdie’s (1980) idea of “narcissistic narrative” typifies the postmodern discouragement of earlier traditions that beginning of the self-echoing structure, which governs a majority of modern-day novels may well lie in that parodic objective basic to the type as it started in historical novels, a goal or objective to uncover dead conventions through challenging and mirroring (The Independent, n.d). Saleem Sinai, in Midnight’s Children, is born just at the stroke of midnight on 15th August, 1947, the very day of India’s independence. Welcomed by cheering crowds, fireworks displays and the then Prime Minister of India, Nehru, Saleem grows up to learn the menacing effects of this concurrence (Santos, 2008). All of his acts are echoed and magnified in events, which sway the path of public affairs; his health and safety are inextricably limited to those of his country; Sinai’s life is undividable and, at times, impossible to tell apart, from the history of India (Rushdie, 1980). Maybe most significant are the psychic powers connecting him with India’s tens of thousands other “midnight’s children,” all conceived in that initial hour and gifted with magical powers (Santos, 2008). This book is, all in all, a charming family saga and a shocking suggestion of a vast land along with its citizens – a radiant personification of the worldwide human comedy. Over two decades after its initial publication, the book stands apart as both a dazzling work by one of the great literary novelists of today and an epochal work of fiction (Santos, 2008). Rushdie adapts the use of narcissistic narrative in undermining the idea of historical truth as recorded information (Santos, 2008). His ability to challenge the idea of utter historical truth as recorded information gains power from Saleem’s alertness of being a self-aware storyteller. Rushdie (1980) typifies this type of self-absorbed narration as obvious, as opposed to the unobvious form, in which insecure narration is more structural and internalised. Saleem’s unfolding in Midnight’s Children falls into the group of obvious, which Rushdie critics describe as stories through which the self reflection and self-consciousness are clearly evident, normally openly thematised or even symbolised in the ‘fiction’ (Rushdie, 1980). This narration sticks to this form of conscious narration as Saleem, the main narrator, frequently draws interest to writing (Rushdie, 1980). In reality, Saleem poorly tells the reader of his conscious narrative condition. Making use of Padma as a tool for communicating his awareness to the reader, the narrator argues on page 72 that Padma gets aggravated whenever his stories become uncomfortable (Santos, 2008). The narrator shows awareness of his narrative reticence and, in doing so, echoes the narcissism, which floods the narrative of Midnight’s Children. The battle between Shiva and Saleem echoes the ancient, mythological fight between the innovative and destructive forces of the universe (Rushdie, 1980). Contemporary authors seem not to have such stories that could help them relate well with today’s readers. The tension and enmity between the two starts at the time of their coincident births (Santos, 2008). The labeling of Shiva as the Hindu god of both procreation and destruction echoes not just the worry between creation and destruction but the inextricably restricted character of these two forces, as well. Saleem, as the main reporter of this novel, is charged with creating a world that we, as the main readers, are engaged in. Saleem represented Brahma, also known as the god of creation (Rushdie, 1980). What the narrator develops, nevertheless, is not life, but just a story; a story, which fascinates a lot of today’s readers. Through offering Saleem to the Widow, Shiva is liable for the obliteration of midnight’s children, and yet, through fathering Aadam and other children, he guarantees the extension of their legacy (Santos, 2008). The narrator cites his own recollection of events, such as Gandhi’s passing away in this case, as a true and legitimate description of his life in spite of that which is stored as fact and is regarded the one “correct” history (Santos, 2008). Therefore, Rushdie’s narcissistic narration invokes and enables new rules of writing to explain, while shunning away from prescription, a different way of approaching history: memory turns into a viable historical option to recorded facts. When Rushdie talks of ‘memory,’ he is talking, not of national memory or cultural consciousness, but of personal memory (Santos, 2008). The history of this novel is witnessed through the eyes of a person: it is not the main, official ‘History’ but a past, which is individualised and; hence, granted life, importance and meaning (Rushdie, 1980). Waterland by Graham Swift Contemporary novelist Graham Swift's Waterland is a meta-fictional, historiographic book that questions the difficult illustration in fiction and historiography through uniting both historical and fictive narration (Trans, n.d). The book not just comprises of remarks on historical and fictional representations, but it subverts and de-naturalises the conventions of traditional history writing and narrative, as well. This is not just a case of revealing fabulation and narrativity metafictionally, but narrative illustration, which is narrating a historical act in a novel. The narrator and protagonist, Tom Crick, has spent his almost his entire life trying to untangle the secrecy of the past and is now being sacked from his work as the school as a history teacher (Trans, n.d). Turning what he learnt into story-telling sessions, Crick begins telling his accounts about his forefathers. While narrating these stories, Crick questions storytelling, as well and its association with history and literature. Therefore, the novel ponders on storytelling, self-reflexively questions literature within a fiction, where history, as well, is regarded to be a type of storytelling. The clearest message of Waterland is that Grand Narratives of the past end more than once or instead is always previously ended (Trans, n.d). Crick, while narrating his life history to his learners, questions the significance of history, as well as its recording of major events. History of someone’s survival in public time is for Price ineffectual because he hopes for a "future" (Swift, 1983). This history that Price declines is Tom Crick's history, all together. In reality, Crick is narrating his life history as one reason that he is trying to comprehend what has occurred or what has failed in his life. While putting the memoirs into expressions, he redevelops his stories, as well as his personal history. With his own accounts, Crick falls into history and time. Crick emphasises that writing stories of one’s own life only comes after a fall, and it is the same with coming up with historical writings. History simply starts at a level where things go the wrong way. History is simply born with trouble, perplexity or regret, which is what people love to read about (Trans, n.d). A contemporary novel is considered vague as it does not incorporate such facts, but historical novels do. Without a doubt, the account of Crick's life, moving backward and forward, circles around a key question of what has failed in his life. The detection of Parr's dead body, in 1943, in water, is a disturbing event he recalls. Crick explains his aim of remembering proceedings from his past, which is all an attempt to make matters not seem worthless (Trans, n.d). Remembering proceedings from the past is all a fight against fear and Crick tries to unearth a reasonable reason for his steady story telling (Swift, 1983). This is the main basis that Swift (1983) gives as to why novelists do not on contemporary subjects because there is nothing significant to unearth about today, but the history is filled with numerous studies that people want to unearth and make sense of (Trans, n.d). History or autobiography, trying to share matters in a narrative way agitates that someone be both a writer and a historian. In Swift’s (1980) reasoning, history is that unfeasible matter: the effort to provide an account, with partial knowledge so that it educates people no short ways of salvation. Conclusion This paper has presented the fact as to why contemporary novels are so concerned with the past. The main reasons, as we have seen is to unravel and make sense of what took place, during historical times. It is vital to keep up with contemporary ages, but novelists argue that there is nothing much interesting about it as compared to old days. This paper has utilised Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban, Midnights children by Salman Rushdie and Waterland by Graham Swift plus other secondary sources to come up with its findings. However, the facts of this paper do not argue that contemporary writings are not significant as too as today, there are vital topics to novelists could write about just that the world has found better means of bringing out this topic such as the use of the internet and television. Novelists do not need to set fictions novels in the past in order to find insiders and outsiders, moral choice, violent conflict and reversals of fortune because it is right on their doorstep. Contemporary novelists have to carry out studies quite as much as the historical novelists, normally at more individual risk since what they seek cannot be found in newspapers or libraries. Therefore, more insight to such a topic is advised, as well as the significance of both contemporary and historical novelists. References Hoban, R 1980, Riddley Walker, Jonathan Cape, London. Rushdie, S 1980, Midnight's children: A novel, Jonathan Cape, London. Santos, J 2008, Historical truth in Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children: A question of perspective, Arizona State University, Phoenix, AZ. Swift, G 1983, Waterland, William Heinemann, London. The Independent n.d, Stuck in the past: Why is modern literature obsessed with history? Retrieved 14th November, 2013, from http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/features/stuck-in-the-past-why-is-modern-literature-obsessed-with-history-1667709.html Trans n.d, Narrativisation of history: Graham Swift's Waterland, Retrieved 14th November, 2013, from http://www.inst.at/trans/15Nr/05_12/attilla15.htm Read More