Salman Rushdie's concept of wholeness in the context of the literature of India
The study explores the concept of wholeness in Salman Rushdie's works in the context of the literature of India. The first part outlines different theoretical approaches to the notion of wholeness such as role theory, C.G. Jung's ideas on identity, Hinduism's views and other sociological, psychological and philosophical approaches. The second part focuses more specifically on India, gives an overview of the country and its literature and of the importance certain aspects such as caste, gender or religion have by highlighting their role in the literary examples I give. The literary examples I use are taken from the time just before Independence until the beginning of the 21st century. By concentrating on texts from so many decades, I attempt to show how some aspects, such as those of nationalism and caste, have become somehow less prominent and how others, such as that of migration, have gained a more central position. In my third part, I take up these aspects again and also point out how the theoretical approaches introduced earlier become useful in the analysis of Rushdie's literature. I show how Salman Rushdie's texts are in many ways a climax in respect to complexity in form and content in comparison to the other works I analysed.
Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations