-
Essay / Critical review of postcolonial literature - 778
These literary works are not only colonialist narratives. Postcolonialism includes a wide range of writers and subjects. The different experience that each ex-colony faced gave rise to different geographical, historical, religious, social and economic concerns and these are depicted in each author's novels (Ivison). Some wrote inspiringly about the struggle for independence while others focused on the conflicting interests of natives under and after the colonialists. When we criticize literature from a postcolonial point of view, certain elements help us to characterize it as falling into this category of literature. The first characteristic of postcolonialism is the appropriation of colonial languages. This is when the language of their colonizer is used with bits of their own original language added. The second characteristic is that it is a metanarrative. This is when they show a different point of view on a story. Another aspect of this type of literature is colonialism and colonial discourse. The rewriting of history is also found in this type of literature. European colonizers often thought that the people they colonized had no history, culture, or tradition. To recover what was lost or misbelieved, these novels share the history of their country before the arrival of Europeans. And finally, all postcolonial literature shares the struggles of decolonization