Contents: Preface. 1. Re-interpretation of myth in Sri Aurobindo's Savitri/Ratri Roy. 2. A spirit for social change: a note on Mulk Raj Anand's Untouchable/S.D. Balaji Rao. 3. Tradition and modernity: an interpretation of Mulk Raj Anand's Untouchable/Kanupriya. 4. Novels of Malgudi (a tribute to R.K. Narayan)/R.S. Maurya. 5. Gandhian ideology and R.K. Narayan/Sudarashan Sharma. 6. Implications and interpretations of R.K. Narayan's feministic journey (from 'Savitri to Rosie and 'Daisy')/S.A. Mujumdar. 7. The hammer of God: a note on Raj Rao's Javni/S.G. Vaidya. 8. Dialectics of society and self in Ruth Prawer Jhabvala's Heat and Dust/Nagendra Kumar Singh. 9. Tensions and conflicts: a critical response to Kamala Markandaya's The Coffer Dams/S. John Peter Joseph. 10. Dialectics of society and self in Kamala Markandaya's The Golden Honeycomb/Negendra Kumar Singh. 11. Shashi Deshpande's Small Remedies: a woman's quest for refuge: a reappraisal/Ruby Malhotra. 12. Woman's voice in Shashi Deshpande's That Long Silence/Deepali Agravat. 13. An Equal Music--a critique/K.K. Gaur. 14. Gita Mehta's Raj: a study of woman's struggle for her identity and existence/M.B. Gaijan. 15. The style of Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things/S.K. Paul. 16. Art and activism: an analytical study of Arundhati Roy's fictional and non-fictional writings in the light of Gayatri Spivak's theory of subalternity/Shibu Simon and Sijo Varghese. 17. Facets of feminism in Sobha De's Starry Nights/Sheela Rani Khare. 18. The conflict between the roots and wings in Manju Kapur's A Married Woman--a critical perspective/Shalini R. Sinha. 19. Exploring the complexities of the diasporic life: a study of Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreter of Maladies and the Namesake/Pradip Kumar Patra. 20. The sense of history and tradition in Girish Karnad's Hayavadana/P.V. Ghorpade. 21. Vijay Tendulkar's Silence! The Court is in Session: a play of plight and plunder/Amar Nath Prasad. 22. Bengali literature and its panoramic views of genres: past and present/Anita Ghosh. Index.
"Critical Ruminations is our modest attempt to evaluate some poets, novelists and playwrights of Indian writing in English. It contains more than twenty scholarly articles contributed by great scholars and teachers of English who belong to the different universities in India. Most of the papers included here are research papers prepared for presentation in the national and international seminars and conferences. The writers discussed in this anthology are Sri Aurobindo, Mulk Raj Anand, R.K. Narayan, Raja Rao, Ruth Prawer Jhabvala, Kamala Markandaya, Shashi Deshpande, Vikram Seth, Gita Mehta, Arundhati Roy, Shobha De, Manju Kapur, Jhumpa Lahiri, Girish Karnad and Vijay Tendulkar.
The last paper discusses the panoramic views of genres of Bengali literature and its unforgettable contribution to Indian writing in English.
The book, it is hoped, will certainly prove to be a great asset to research scholars, students and teachers who want to be thoroughly acquainted with various critical aspects of Indian writing in English." (jacket)
