The Shock of Arrival: Reflections on Postcolonial ExperienceSouth End Press, 1996 - 223 pages In this book, acclaimed South Asian American poet and novelist Meena Alexander unleashes a fury of prose and poetry to confront the stereotypes and explore the challenges facing postcolonial immigrants in America. Commenting on the history of memory, language, shame, and exile, Alexander poignantly describes the wealth of experiences and imaginings that have shaped her life and writing. Her project: "to make space for what was crossed out in the decorum of femininity, in the high places of classical hierarchy, in the racism of a canonical knowledge, in the obliterations of a national memory ... all this is part of our task, part of the violent, fractured worlds that we must etch into beauty". |
From inside the book
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Page 172
Reflections on Postcolonial Experience Meena Alexander. In Search of Sarojini Naidu 1977 I started work at the University of Hyderabad , in the Igracious white building . The Golden Threshold " where the poet Sarojini Naidu had lived . I ...
Reflections on Postcolonial Experience Meena Alexander. In Search of Sarojini Naidu 1977 I started work at the University of Hyderabad , in the Igracious white building . The Golden Threshold " where the poet Sarojini Naidu had lived . I ...
Page 173
... Naidu first came to the public eye as a poet in English , the colonial language her father forced her to learn . Yet it was English that Naidu used in both her poetry and political speeches . In her public oratory , she was able to cut ...
... Naidu first came to the public eye as a poet in English , the colonial language her father forced her to learn . Yet it was English that Naidu used in both her poetry and political speeches . In her public oratory , she was able to cut ...
Page 179
... Naidu unable to break free of the choke hold of a lyricism that , while evoking female pain , could not free into the possibility of change ? Was it because the ideology she drew on through the mythologized past turned the suffering ...
... Naidu unable to break free of the choke hold of a lyricism that , while evoking female pain , could not free into the possibility of change ? Was it because the ideology she drew on through the mythologized past turned the suffering ...
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aesthetic America artist Ashtamudi Lake Asian Asian-American art Balamaniamma bits blood born breath British burning child cloth colonialism cried culture dance dark death decolonization Delhi dharma Draupadi dream earth edge English eyes face feminine fierce figure filled fire flesh forced Frantz Fanon Gandhi garden girl hair hands Hashmi head Hyderabad imagination India Kathakali Kerala Khartoum Lalithambika language light lines living Malayalam maternal Meena Alexander memory mother mouth Native American never painted Parasurama passion poem poet poetry political postcolonial published river rock Safdar Hashmi San Andreas Fault sari Sarojini Naidu sense sexual shock of arrival Sita skin Skin Song snow Song soul space speak speech stone street struggle tell Tethi Thankam things thought tion Tiruvella tongue torn trees turned Vasco da Gama violence voice walking wall window woman words writing young