Critical Essay | Critical Essay by Ramlal Agarwal

SOURCE: "A Critical Study of Heat and Dust," in Studies in Indian Fiction in English, edited by G. S. Balarama Gupta, Jiwe Publications, 1987, pp. 53-60.

In the following essay, Agarwal discusses the stories of Olivia and her granddaughter in Heat and Dust, proposing that their tragic fates in India are due to their "liberalism and sensitivity."

When the Booker Prize for 1975 was given to Heat and Dust the literati in India refused to be impressed. They thought that Jhabvala was awarded the prize for her ruthless damning of India, the country in which she had lived for over a quarter of a century. Naturally they hit back by damning the book. In an article called "Cross-cultural Encounter in Literature," published in The Indian P.E.N. [November-December, 1977] Nissim Ezekiel observed:

I found Heat and Dust worthless as literature, contrived in its narrative structure, obtrusive in its authorial point...
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