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World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth recovers a genealogy
of anticolonial thought that advocated collective inexpertise,
unknowing, and unrecognizability. Early-twentieth-century
anticolonial thinkers endeavored to imagine a world emancipated
from colonial rule, but it was a world they knew they would likely
not live to see. Written in exile, in abjection, or in the face of
death, anticolonial thought could not afford to base its politics
on the hope of eventual success, mastery, or national sovereignty.
J. Daniel Elam shows how anticolonial thinkers theorized
inconsequential practices of egalitarianism in the service of an
impossibility: a world without colonialism. Framed by a suggestive
reading of the surprising affinities between Frantz Fanon's
political writings and Erich Auerbach's philological project, World
Literature for the Wretched of the Earth foregrounds anticolonial
theories of reading and critique in the writing of Lala Har Dayal,
B. R. Ambedkar, M. K. Gandhi, and Bhagat Singh. These anticolonial
activists theorized reading not as a way to cultivate mastery and
expertise but as a way, rather, to disavow mastery altogether. To
become or remain an inexpert reader, divesting oneself of authorial
claims, was to fundamentally challenge the logic of the British
Empire and European fascism, which prized self-mastery, authority,
and national sovereignty. Bringing together the histories of
comparative literature and anticolonial thought, Elam demonstrates
how these early-twentieth-century theories of reading force us to
reconsider the commitments of humanistic critique and egalitarian
politics in the still-colonial present.
This comprehensive volume examines the relationship between
revolutionary politics and the act of writing in modern South Asia.
Its pages feature a diverse cast of characters: rebel poets and
anxious legislators, party theoreticians and industrious
archivists, nostalgic novelists, enterprising journalists and more.
The authors interrogate the multiple forms and effects of
revolutionary storytelling in politics and public life, questioning
the easy distinction between 'words' and 'deeds' and considering
the distinct consequences of writing itself. While acknowledging
that the promise, fervour or threat of revolution is never
reducible to the written word, this collection explores how
manifestos, lyrics, legal documents, hagiographies and other
constellations of words and sentences articulate, contest and enact
revolutionary political practice in both colonial and post-colonial
South Asia. Emphasising the potential of writing to incite, contain
or reorient the present, this volume promises to provoke new
conversations at the intersection of historiography, politics and
literature in South Asia, urging scholars and activists to
interrogate their own storytelling practices and the relationship
of the contemporary moment to violent and contested pasts. This
book was originally published as a special issue of South Asia:
Journal of South Asian Studies.
This comprehensive volume examines the relationship between
revolutionary politics and the act of writing in modern South Asia.
Its pages feature a diverse cast of characters: rebel poets and
anxious legislators, party theoreticians and industrious
archivists, nostalgic novelists, enterprising journalists and more.
The authors interrogate the multiple forms and effects of
revolutionary storytelling in politics and public life, questioning
the easy distinction between 'words' and 'deeds' and considering
the distinct consequences of writing itself. While acknowledging
that the promise, fervour or threat of revolution is never
reducible to the written word, this collection explores how
manifestos, lyrics, legal documents, hagiographies and other
constellations of words and sentences articulate, contest and enact
revolutionary political practice in both colonial and post-colonial
South Asia. Emphasising the potential of writing to incite, contain
or reorient the present, this volume promises to provoke new
conversations at the intersection of historiography, politics and
literature in South Asia, urging scholars and activists to
interrogate their own storytelling practices and the relationship
of the contemporary moment to violent and contested pasts. This
book was originally published as a special issue of South Asia:
Journal of South Asian Studies.
World Literature for the Wretched of the Earth recovers a genealogy
of anticolonial thought that advocated collective inexpertise,
unknowing, and unrecognizability. Early-twentieth-century
anticolonial thinkers endeavored to imagine a world emancipated
from colonial rule, but it was a world they knew they would likely
not live to see. Written in exile, in abjection, or in the face of
death, anticolonial thought could not afford to base its politics
on the hope of eventual success, mastery, or national sovereignty.
J. Daniel Elam shows how anticolonial thinkers theorized
inconsequential practices of egalitarianism in the service of an
impossibility: a world without colonialism. Framed by a suggestive
reading of the surprising affinities between Frantz Fanon's
political writings and Erich Auerbach's philological project, World
Literature for the Wretched of the Earth foregrounds anticolonial
theories of reading and critique in the writing of Lala Har Dayal,
B. R. Ambedkar, M. K. Gandhi, and Bhagat Singh. These anticolonial
activists theorized reading not as a way to cultivate mastery and
expertise but as a way, rather, to disavow mastery altogether. To
become or remain an inexpert reader, divesting oneself of authorial
claims, was to fundamentally challenge the logic of the British
Empire and European fascism, which prized self-mastery, authority,
and national sovereignty. Bringing together the histories of
comparative literature and anticolonial thought, Elam demonstrates
how these early-twentieth-century theories of reading force us to
reconsider the commitments of humanistic critique and egalitarian
politics in the still-colonial present.
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