Table Of ContentPostcolonial Traumas
This page intentionally left blank
Postcolonial Traumas
Memory, Narrative, Resistance
Edited by
Abigail Ward
Assistant Professor in English Literature, University of Nottingham, UK
Introduction, selection and editorial content © Abigail Ward 2015
Individual chapters © Contributors 2015
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-52642-7
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this
publication may be made without written permission.
No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted
save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence
permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency,
Saffron House, 6 –1 0 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication
may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this
work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2015 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke,
Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC,
175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.
Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
and has companies and representatives throughout the world.
Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-349-56934-2 ISBN 978-1-137-52643-4 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137526434
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing
processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the
country of origin.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Postcolonial traumas: memory, narrative, resistance / edited by Abigail Ward.
pages cm
1. Postcolonialism in literature. 2. Psychic trauma in literature.
3. Collective memory in literature. 4. Postcolonialism in motion pictures.
I. Ward, Abigail Lara.
PN56.P555P6775 2015
809'.93358—dc23 2015020289
Typeset by MPS Limited, Chennai, India.
For Kate Clark
This page intentionally left blank
Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Notes on Contributors x
Introduction 1
Abigail Ward
1 Chronic Trauma, (Post)Colonial Chronotopes and
Palestinian Lives: Omar Robert Hamilton’s Though
I Know the River is Dry/Ma‘a Anni A‘rif Anna
al- Nahr Qad Jaf 14
Lindsey Moore and Ahmad Qabaha
2 From Mary Prince to Joan Riley: Women Writers and the
‘Casual Cruelty’ of a West Indian Childhood 30
Sandra Courtman
3 Harlem Tricksters: Cheating the Cycle of Trauma in the
Fiction of Ralph Ellison and Nella Larsen 48
Emily Zobel Marshall
4 Trauma and Testimony: Autobiographical Writing in
Post- Apartheid South Africa 65
Paulina Grze˛da
5 The Postcolonial Graphic Novel and Trauma:
From Maus to Malta 83
Sam Knowles
6 Trauma Theory, Melancholia and the Postcolonial Novel:
Assia Djebar’s Algerian White/Le Blanc de l’Algérie 97
Lucy Brisley
7 From Colonial to Postcolonial Trauma: Rushdie, Forster and
the Problem of Indian Communalism in Midnight’s Children
and The Moor’s Last Sigh 112
Alberto Fernández Carbajal
8 Indian- C aribbean Trauma: Indian Indenture and its Legacies
in Harold Sonny Ladoo’s No Pain Like This Body 127
Abigail Ward
vii
viii Contents
9 The Writing of Breyten Breytenbach, The Writing of Breyten
Breytenbach: Dog Heart 143
Christopher Davis
10 Discrepant Traumas: Colonial Legacies in Jindabyne 159
Gillian Roberts
11 Rape, Representation and Metamorphosis in
Shani Mootoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night 173
Marie Josephine Diamond
12 Haunted Stages: The Trauma of New Slaveries in
Contemporary British Theatre and Television Drama 190
Pietro Deandrea
Bibliography 208
Index 228
Acknowledgements
Thanks first of all to the contributors to this collection, without whom,
of course, there would be no book. On that note, thanks also to Ben
Doyle, Tomas René and the team at Palgrave Macmillan.
As editor, I am grateful to friends and former colleagues at Nottingham
Trent University, whose enthusiasm for the project at its early stages
was very welcome, particularly Anna Ball, Natalie Braber, David
Coleman, Daniel Cordle, Claire Jowitt, Philip Leonard, Sharon Ouditt,
Clare Newstead, Mahendra Solanki, Carl Thompson, Patrick Williams,
Gregory Woods and Nahem Yousaf. I am also fortunate to have had
the support and advice of current colleagues at the University of
Nottingham, including Celeste- Marie Bernier, Sarah Davison, Joseph
Jackson, Peter Kirwan, Lynda Pratt, Lydia Wallman, Matthew Welton
and Mel Wraight. Thanks are also due to other friends in academia
whom I don’t see nearly often enough, including Clare Barker, Stef
Craps, Pilar Cuder- Domínguez, Sam Durrant, Lucy Evans, David Farrier,
Corinne Fowler, Dave Gunning, Caroline Herbert, Graham Huggan,
Gail Low, John McLeod, James Procter, Emma Smith and John Thieme.
Finally, I am thankful for the friendship, love and support of
Danyarna Buchanan, Kate Clark, Mandy Pepper, Angela Tawn, Adrian
Ward, Joy Ward and Lisa White.
ix
