R.K. Narayan as a Regional Novelist

Abstract

RK Narayan was best story teller in Indian tradition of storytelling. His purpose always confined to entertaining his audience, by an interesting story. He never preaches or moralize anything in his works. He analysed human feelings, emotions, motives, but did not probed into the subconscious and the unconscious mind, as was the case with the modern novelists. RK Narayan took up Universal themes, with theme coinciding with its representation in specific region, immediately understandable and lived. This does not imply a deteritorialization or homogenization of local traditions. On the contrary, it suggests an immersion into known, local, native real space, thereby attaining the universal, only through local or regional. While focusing on one region, he stressed and created fictive regional spaces, preoccupied with the ordinary man and a system of life that belong to the local dimensions. In this way:
A) We get the Portrait of a Freeman in a condition that is captive in an extremely specific regional space.
B) The readers appreciate the literary value of his novels rather than focusing on collecting information about a certain culture.