Between Resistance and Conformity

This book examines the questions of conformity and resistance with respect to Premchand’s literary corpus. Mapping the various complexities, challenges, and contradictions of interwar India, it demonstrates how the passive peasant protagonists of the writer’s fictional works present a diametrically opposed definition of dharma as compared to their dissident nationalist counterparts. Through a relatively similar logic of comparative assessment, it further foregrounds the fundamental asymmetry that exists between Premchand’s literary representations of women as compliant domestic subjects and those that portray them as rebel patriots of colonial North India. Juxtaposing several genres, including novels, short stories, letters, and journalistic writings to offer a reconsideration of Premchand's work, this book will interest scholars of peasant narratives, nationalist fiction, and gender studies.

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