拉什迪《午夜的孩子》中被消费的印度

Consuming India in Midnight's Children

当代英国印裔小说家拉什迪的小说《午夜的孩子》以民族寓言的形式再现了印度独立前后的历史变迁,曾被学者们视为后殖民小说的经典之作。然而,除作品自身的艺术价值外,在日益商业化的英国文坛,小说中所呈现的印度无可避免地成为了西方读者的消费对象。小说的叙事手法和人物描摹中所蕴含的"异域情调",一方面满足了西方对东方长久以来的猎奇心理,另一方面小说的叙事也应和了英国社会在80年代流行的帝国怀旧风满足了英国大众市场上消费印度的欲望。

Salman Rushdie＇ s Midnight＇ s Children, with its allegorical historiog- raphy of Indian Independence has been regarded as a classic of postcolonial fiction. Under the influence of commercialization, however, even Indian resistance in postcolonial fiction has been turned into an object of consumption for mainstream British readers. The India portrayed in Midnight＇ s Children has been exoticized and fetishized in British mass cul- ture, echoing a feeling of nostalgia for the British Raj that was prevalent during the 1980s.