Affirmation of Indian Culture in R.K. Narayan's Talkative Man

Abstract

This research paper attempts to focus on R. K. Naryan's novel Talkative Man as an affirmation of native Indian culture. The text has been analyzed as a cultural novel focusing on locale of the novel, Malgudi, a metaphor of Indian culture. The study provides an insight into the cultural milieu of Malgudi using Michel Foucault's notion of heterotopias. The study explores a significant conflict between native Indian culture and Western values. In the novel, Dr. Rann epitomizes the incursion of an outside force—western intrusion—into the Malgudi cultural values. The study ultimately employs the strategy of evoking the culture of humanity, an important characteristics of native Indian culture, so as to undermine the influence of Western culture on native culture. The significance of juxtaposing tradition and modernity as assessed as strategies for the affirmation of native India culture has been brought out in this brief research study.