Interpellation of Individual as Subject in Malamud's The Fixer

Abstract

The present research attempts to analyze the novel The Fixer by Malamud from the perspective of Neo-Marxism. It brings into light the situation in which an individual gets interpellated by ideological and material condition of the society. Yakov Bok, the protagonist of the novel, becomes victim of different realms of ideology erected by the bourgeois class which kicks him off from the pillar to post by assigning him in multiple roles and thus dissolving his real existence as a normal human. The ideological state apparatuses, which work as a legitimized discrete body in sanctioning the views and interest of the ruling class people, i.e. Tsar, evaporate Bok’s plea for justice and freedom. His voice for a sound verdict is ignored and liquidated in the capitalist society. The dominant ideology in forms of family, religious, judicial and educational ISAs repress Bok’s advocacy for recognition and self-affirmation. The extreme tortures which Bok a bear at the hands of Tsars makes him revolutionary which is no different than the voice of protest emerging from the proletarians. Bok’s advocacy for equality, freedom, and justice signals the resistive force and new forms of awareness on the part of the hitherto marginalized people.