Existential Crisis in Samrat Upadhyay’s Buddha’s Orphans

Abstract

As existent being, a man identifies with the word through his thoughts and perceptions. He is driven to seek meaning by the every complexities and contradictions of existence. The sense of lack of meaning or purpose is very apparent in twentieth century literature, philosophy and art. The thesis postulates’ critical question whether life is worth living or should be voluntarily terminated. Being brought face to face with the absurd world, a person longs for answers that will clarify his position and the purpose in this universe, but being unable to find satisfactory explanations he succumbs despair. The futile existence derives a person to the brink of despair and makes himself to contemplate suicide out of sheer despondency and hopelessness. It also stresses that each human being is thrown in to world in which pain, frustration, sickness, contempt, malaise and death predominately exists. This problem has been highlighted in Albert Camus's The Realization of Absurdity. This issue has been highlighted in the novel Buddha's Orphans. Through the analysis of major characters, the study aims to disclose how anxiety in general, occupies a major place in the existential spare of life in twentieth century. It also focuses that existential crisis revel in minor and major characters in Upadhyay's novel.