In the Beginning was Postmodernism An Analysis of the Inclusionary Vision in the Ancient Rajasthani Narratives

Abstract

The dissertation titled, In the Beginning was Postmodernism: An analysis of the newlineInclusionary Vision in the Ancient Rajasthani Narratives studies select tales from newlineVijaydan Detha s Chouboli and other stories from a postmodernist perspective. newlineEmploying four key concepts central to postmodernism, namely uncanny, magical newlinerealism, metafiction and intertextuality, the study demonstrates how postmodernist newlineelements play a crucial part in ancient Rajasthani narratives. This dissertation argues that the twentieth-century phenomenon of postmodernism, far from being a new-fangled contemporary philosophy, is in fact as old as humanity and can be illustrated as having a newlinesignificant bearing on ancient Rajasthani narratives. The identification of these newlinepostmodernist features in the ancient Rajasthani literature, will enable one to hazard the view that contemporary postmodernist literature is, as it were, redoubling of the ancient newlineoral literary tradition, both global and regional. The attempt here is to demonstrate how these textual strategies that are now associated with postmodernism have been an integral part of ancient Rajasthani narratives, and how they often provide both listeners and newlinenarrators of these tales with a liberating platform to interpret the narratives in numerous ways, thereby eschewing any charge of being at the mercy of the tyranny of monolithic signification and reality. newline