Naipaul's "Cultural Journey" —Naipaul's Cultural Identity On The Images Of His Works

The winner of 2001 Nobel Prize ,V.S .Naipaul has a complex cultural background. India is the state of his ancestors. Trinidad is the land of his birth but now he takes up residence in England. He wanders these countries, creating fruitful works.Based on theories of cultural identity, imagism, symbolism, post-colonialism and the co- mbination of Naipaul's life experience, this paper focuses on the major images, which fits h- is cultural ideas. After analysing his cultural Journey, it will reach the conclusion that conf- orms to his writing practice. Naipaul holds contradictory attitude in the choice of images, which reflects his contradictions of cultural ideas. He accepts the culture of India,Trinidad and England but at the same time he do not identify with them. It brings him into conflict of cultural ideas. This paper concluded that: the objective fact that Naipaul is an immigrant, the suzerain's influence on the colony in post-colonial era, the invasion of strong culture to wea- k culture and the experience of travel made Naipaul form a hybrid identity which is the main reason that he hold contradictory cultural position and cultural ideas.This paper is divided into three chapters. The main content of the first chapter is the definition of cultural identity, hybrid identity and image. The repeated images have symbolic meaning. These images are loaded the theme, structure, characters'meaning and author's ideas etc. Hybrid identity brings tension to post-colonial writers. The second chapter is divided into three sections which discuss Naipaul's ideas of India, Trinidad and England respectively. The choice of images reflects his contradictory attitude of India, Trinidad and England. It analyses Naipaul's correspondence, interviews and autobiographical works that proves his cultural ideas of the three countries. The third chapter selects the images of station, dock, airport and hotel for analysis. Naipaul became a wanderer in constant travel. The culture of India, Trinidad and England interacted on him which made him form a hybrid identity.