The Oriental Cultural Images In Naipaul's Travel Writings

V.S.Naipaul,the winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize for Literature,is a celebrated but controversial Indian-English immigrant writer.He was born in Trinidad of Indian heritage and then immigrated to England and received western education.Therefore,he is influenced by three different cultural forces,the culture of Trinidad,Britain and his ancestral land India.Due to his multicultural background,he is trapped in a cultural identity crisis.Therefore,he makes three journeys to India to define his cultural identity and seek roots and creates his masterpiece India Trilogy including An Area of Darkness,India: A Wounded Civilization and India: A million Mutinies Now.Besides,Naipaul travels to different parts of the world,especially the Third World,and hence he creates quite a lot travel writings with the help of his acute observation and travel experiences.Thus,on his two trips to the four Islamic countries,i.e.Iran,Pakistan,Indonesia and Malaysia,he creates Among the Believers: An Islamic Journey and Beyond Belief.Based on post-colonial theory such as Orientalism,mimicry and cultural hybridity,this dissertation mainly makes an attempt to interpret the Oriental cultural images in Naipaul's representative travel writings India Trilogy,Beyond Belief and Among the Believers and meanwhile to analyze the reasons lying behind the writing of the images.Influenced by the western education he has received,Naipaul treats the Orient with a strong westernized way of thinking.Thus,the first time he sets foot in the far East,the Oriental images in An Area of Darkness are described as decayed,idle and ignorant mimic figures.Unlike his first visit to India,his second trip to this far East land is to examine the causes lying behind the decayed India.Nonetheless,this time the land described in India: A Wounded Civilization is still in chaos and darkness.Thus,in the first two journeys to India,he plays a role of an European traveler who treats the East from the perspective of Orientalism.However,he is always a “outsider” in the eyes of westerners though he has been living in England.As a result,influenced by his unique national complex and multicultural identity,he gradually achieves a sense of cultural identity in his motherland and the East in the third travelogue India: A million Mutinies Now turns into a modern and awakening one.Likewise,on his first trip to the four Islamic countries,he expresses his criticism and disrespect to Islam in Among the Believers and people in these eastern countries are described as fanatical Oriental figures.But the second time he returns to these Islamic countries,he tries to overcomehis bias and subjective judgment to this East land.Accordingly,the Oriental figures in Beyond Belief are depicted as modern ones who dare to fight against their destiny.Therefore,it can be concluded that Naipaul's depictions of the Oriental images in these travelogues are an ongoing process and his attitude towards India and the East also shifts from shocked and indignant to more tolerant and positive.Furthermore,on the basis of post-colonial theory and Naipaul's own personal experiences,it can be found that the reasons lying behind his different descriptions of the Oriental images may be concerned about his hybrid cultural identity,his Orientalism perspective and unique national complex.In brief,the dissertation primarily gives a brief introduction on Naipaul and his works,different valuations about him from Eastern and Western critics and theoretical foundation,i.e.post-colonial theory.It also makes a summary about the relevant researches about him and his books,especially the studies on his travel writings and the oriental images in his works.In the main parts,the dissertation gives a detailed analysis on the different Oriental images in Naipaul's travel writings.It points out that the descriptions of the Oriental images in the representative travelogues are a changing process.Furthermore,it also analyzes the reasons lying behind his writing based on post-colonial theory.In the conclusion part,the dissertation summarizes the main research findings and also points out the limitations of this dissertation as well as some suggestions for further research.