The achievement of Ruth Prawer Jhabvala as a literary artist is distinctive, yet limited at the same time; distinctive, because she has cultivated and demonstrated the qualities of a literary artist which are her own and emerge naturally from a social and cultural milieu peculiar to herself. But her distinction is modified and narrowed by the rather limited quality of her literary achievement, which is partly the inevitable result of her choice, and partly the artistic outcome of her creativity. This peculiar paradox of her attainment as an artist is, in a way, rooted in the environs of her literary effort, and is also co-extensive with the range and quality of her fiction.
Ruth Prawer Jhabvala has been variously described as an 'inside-outsider' and an 'outside-insider'. These apparently contrary expressions are more meaningful than mere high-sounding literary labels since they impinge on her special personal and literary situation. She is essentially a European writer who has lived, and continues to live, in India and has given to her experience of life and society in India an artistic expression. From a European literary vantage point she may seem an 'outside-insider', while from the Indian artistic point of view she seems an 'inside-outsider'. Both these descriptions involve a basic change of perspective, though one of them is inherent in her literary situation.
This is a free excerpt of 219 words. There are 1,370 words (approx.
5 pages at 300 words per page) in the full critical essay.
Read the rest of this Criticism with our Jhabvala, Ruth Prawer 1927–: Critical Essay by Vasant A. Shahane Access Pass.
