Seeking Fusion In Confusion

In 2006,Indian-American female writer Kiran Desai won the British Booker Prize for her novel The Inheritance ofL oss.Desai was born in India,then moved to the west with her mother at the age of 14.Having tasted the bitterness of new immigrants,she spent seven years in writing the experience into the novel,depicting a variety of Indian characters who were trapped by historical factors and colonial influence.From the colonial period to national liberation,The Inheritance of Loss concentrates history in India for nearly a century.Through the personal stories of the common people,the novel presents the "loss"of the two generations and reflects the changing times of India under the impact of colonialization and globalization.Pivoted around Kalimpong,India and New York,the United States,the novel shows the entanglements of Indian native people and the marginalization of Indian diaspora group.Born before India’s independence,the.judge Jemubhai and his cook,who have lived through British colonialism,are representatives of the first generation of Indians.They are dominated by colonial ideology and advocate“white supremacy”.The independence of India has completely overturns their cognition and destiny.As a result,they have become "the old generation" who refuse to adapt to the new era.Whereas the second generation of Indians,like Biju and Sai,born after independence,because of the awakening of the consciousness of equality and freedom,and a liberation movement of the Gorkha nation,not only falls into the same cultural and identity dilemma as their predecessors,but also suffers the double impacts of ethnic and class conflicts.From the perspective of postcolonialism,this thesis explores the Indians’ psychological confusion and contradictions with the definitions of“mimicry","ambivalence" and "hybridity"by Homi Bhabha.It begins with an introduction about the writer Kiran Desai and her novel The Inheritance of Loss,and a review about the current research on the novel.Chapter one analyzes the reasons behind the strange behaviors of imitating westerners of the four main characters—Jemubhai,the cook,Biju and Sai,combined with their personal experiences and the background of different eras,showing Indian individual confusion about eastern and western cultural values.Chapter two,by tracing the collective confusion of the Indian ethnic groups,exposes the living status of the Indian indigenous people and diaspora group,and reveals the crisis of "the Minority" as the marginalized others who have frequent conflicts with "the Majority".Chapter three focuses on the progress of the Indian people in resolving conflicts and questing for their self-location.The awakening of Jemubhai,the return of Biju,and the departure of Sai reflect Indian people’s recognition of the status quo,and the determination of getting out of colonial influence and eventually achieve ethnic fusion regardless of the crisis and challenges.The last part concludes the thesis,summarizing the Indian individual and collective confusion,and highlighting the sympathy and encouragement of writer Kiran Desai for her compatriots-expecting the Indian people to be out of the loss and move towards fusion.