Colonial and Post Colonial Short Stories in Term Paper

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Colonial and Post Colonial Short Stories

In the 19th and 20th centuries, much of the world was divided and compartmentalized. Empire nations colonized lands all over the world creating cultures which were based upon differentiation and racial inequality. In a colonized nation, the population would be comprised of the colonizers who were the ethnic and racial power and the colonized that would be considered ethnically inferior. In the short stories "Going to Exile" by author Liam O'Flaherty and "The Day They Burnt the Books" by Jean Rhys, the authors relate brief narratives which reflect the racial prejudices and conflicts that were bubbling beneath, and often times above, the surface of colonized countries.

In colonial literature, one of the dilemmas that come up most often is the question of identity. People who are colonized are forced to create for themselves a dual identity. At one they have their innate cultures, but at the same time, they are encouraged and often forced to identify with the culture of the colonizers. This happens in the Liam O'Flaherty story "Going to Exile." In the story, a young man named Michael is being forced to leave his home in Ireland for the United States where he believes that the will be able to better support himself and aid in taking care of his family. He will have to turn his back on his own culture in order to embrace and be embraced by the American identity.

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The father makes this idea clear when he says, "It's your own, the land, and over there…you'll be giving your sweat to some other man's land, or what's equal to it" (O'Flaherty). Although the young man feels some sadness at leaving his father, he does not at this point comprehend the greater meaning behind his leaving. To the father, it is as if there are two distinct groups: the Irish and the Americans and Michael's leaving is a form of treachery.

This idea of ethnic differentiation is repeated in the second story. In "The Day They Burnt the Books," Rhys begins the story describing a character named Mr. Sawyer. This man is married to a native Caribbean woman and mistreats her. However, the treatment does not affect the narrator so much as the fact that this white man has married a member of the colonized population. "They (the island population) never decided why he had chosen to settle in a place he didn't like and to marry a coloured woman" (Rhys). The author amends this statement by complimenting the woman, but the inequalities of the society which are determined by racial differences are still obvious.

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