Hybridity and Identity Crisis: A Study of Place in V.S. Naipaul's Half a Life

Abstract

The aim of this study is to explore hybridity and identity crisis in V.S. Naipaul's Half a Life. The focus of the study is on the protagonist Wllie's who struggles to make his self-identity in a restrictive society where identity is constructed on the basis of culture, ethnicity, caste, nation, religion and sexual premises. He develops various identities in his life such as a respected writer, a husband of Ana, Ana's London man, a secret boyfriend of different women, etc. He has no single identity but has multiple identities built according to his travels and stays in different places and situations. Naipaul's novel revolves around Willie's migration and change of his identities according to his encounter with different places, cultures and circumstances. Therefore, this study tries to find out how places, cultures and circumstances play a key role to form and change a person's identity that ultimately leads him or her to dislocation, rootlessness and self exile. The concept of hybridity developed by Homi K. Bhabha and others has been adopted as an approach to analyse the the Naipaul’s novel.