Fractured Identities and Quest for Self in Suresh Chakravarty’s Short Stories

Abstract

The search for identity is the cornerstone of modern literature and it emerges as a major concern not only in the mainstream Indian literature but also in the Northeast literature. Another aspect of Northeast literature is the search for roots and it becomes an overriding concern in the Northeast literature of postcolonial India. Northeast, still suffering from colonial hangover and ethnicity crisis, has always been swamped by the mainstream Indian politics and governance. This political dominance has forced the Northeast writers to explore their distinctive identity and give shape in their writing.

Suresh Chakravarty delves deep into the hearts of Northeast people and digs out some of the most intensive crises of modern times and thus constructs each of his short stories depicting specific human sufferings and problems. He shows how the people of modern Northeast society are struggling with their dismantled identities fractured by the colonial legacy and mainstream political domination and how they are searching for their distinctive identities. The present essay discusses the above-mentioned concerns and explores how the writer successfully cultivates some of the most valid issues of modern Northeast people.

Keywords: identity, modern, political dominance, Northeast, colonial legacy.