UNTOUCHABLE - MULK RAJ ANAND
General Information:
- Mulk Raj Anand  Indian writer who wrote in English
- depicting the lives of the poorer castes in India
- Untouchable published 1935  life of Bakha
Characters:
Bakha
- strong
- Son of Lakha
- brother: Rakha
- sister: Sohini
- mother dead
- sweeper and latrine cleaner  lowest of the low caste  impurity
- treated by British with respect
- Bakha likes to dress like the British wants to be superior
- Bakha is intelligent, superior to his job
- wants to go to school  cannot because of caste
- rather naive view on society  has hope for a better future
Content:
- novel follows a day in the life of Bakha  narrator
- story is set in the outcastes' colony
- humiliation and discrimination
- woken early  clean the latrines
- father abuses and threatens Bakha
- Bakha begins to clean the toilets  Hindu man is thankful for Bakha's work
- proud when serving the higher castes
- Bakhas sister Sohini goes to a well to fetch water priest draws water for her
and asks her to clean the courtyard of the temple
- He touches a high caste Hindu  is slapped for having polluted him
- goes to a temple and looks inside (forbidden for Untouchables)
- the priest sees him  a crowd gathers and insult him
- a priest had made suggestions to Sohini when she was cleaning the lavatory of
his house  she screamed, priest denies it
- Bakha collects his hockey stick
- hockey match  fight arouses and a small boy is badly hit by stones Bakha
tries to save him
- He meets Colonel Hutchinson (Christian missionary) tries to convert Bakha
- Bakha is not interested  only part that interests him: idea that God sees
everyone as equal
- He listens to Gandhi's speech and is impressed
Colonialism:
Otherness:
- different traditions  colonizers/colonized
- some interested in clothing and tradition of colonizers (Bakha) but the most
are not  make fun of Bakha
- little mingling of cultures
Fragmentation:
- fragmented past  attempt to reclaim past via literature not mentioned
Hybridity:
- no integration or mingling of cultures
- clear distinguishable identities  no new, “hybrid” identity
 the untouchables are abused and discriminated against throughout the
novel
 however, some people trust them, ignoring caste