161 research outputs found
Shyam Selvadurai's Funny Boy: a critical analysis
No full textIn this work, I will try to provide an insightful and accessible analysis of Funny Boy, a coming-of-age novel by Sri Lankan Canadian author Shyam Selvadurai. I will provide a brief biography of the author and a concise outline of the historical context. Subsequently, after discussing the novel's structure and its main characteristics, I will proceed to analyze the significance of the novel's title and the role played by ethnicity and sexuality as equivalent sources of alienation, both individually and through their combined agency. To that end, I will focus on what I consider to be the most salient episodes of the novel that, in my opinion, best exemplify the sense of alienation that any individual belonging to a minority group experiences at some point in their lives in mainstream society
Seksualumo reprezentacija Shyam Selvadurai romane „Funny Boy“.
No full textRepresentation of Sexuality in the Novel "Funny Boy" by Shyam Selvadurai A Canadian writer of Sri Lankan origin, Shyam Selvadurai is a representative of queer diasporic literature. In his first novel Funny Boy, Selvadurai scrutinizes issues of identity, ethnicity, marginalization and otherness. The author presents a psychological picture of a young character Arjie who searches for his identity in times of violent political upheaval in Sri Lanka and questions conventional binaries of sexuality, ethnicity and class. The aim of this paper is to discuss ways in which gender identity of protagonist Arjie is constructed and the ways his sexuality is represented in Selvadurai’s novel Funny Boy within the theoretical framework of queer theory. This paper will focus on gender performativity as means of establishing gender identity and will analyse the difficulties the queer subject has to undergo while creating his queer self. The results suggest that by telling his story and talking about himself openly, Arjie liberates himself from conventional understanding of identity and sexuality. In this way, he rejects the role the society expects him to take and turns into the real self, that is, a queer subject
Reading of "Funny Boy" & "Cinnamon Gardens"
No full textShyam Selvadurai, the Canada Council Writer-in-Residence for 2012 was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka. He came to Canada with his family at the age of nineteen, and has a BFA from York University in Toronto. Funny Boy, his first novel, was published to immediate acclaim in 1994, was a national bestseller, and won the Books in Canada First Novel Award, the Lambda Literary Award, and was named a Notable Book by the American Library Association. Cinnamon Gardens, his second novel, was shortlisted for the prestigious Trillium Award and has been published in the US, UK, India, and Europe. Selvadurai is also the author of an acclaimed novel for young adults, Swimming in the Monsoon Sea, which was shortlisted for the Governor General's Literary Award. Shyam will be reading from two of his novels and discussing his work as a diasporic writer.Graduate and Postdoctoral StudiesOther UBCUnreviewedOthe
Adaptation and epistemic redress : the 1857 indian uprising in Junoon
No full textOur interest – curiosity, even – in the Victorian Age has resulted in a continued investment in ventriloquising the Victorians themselves, as in the case of the various adaptations of Victorian novels and afterlives of Victorian literature in contemporary settings, as well as through neo-Victorian renditions. Towards an epistemic reading of adaptation, this chapter discusses the Hindi film Junoon (1979), directed by Shyam Benegal and produced by Shashi Kapoor, a screen adaptation of the neo-Victorian novella A Flight of Pigeons (1978) by Anglo-Indian author Ruskin Bond, set during the 1857 Indian uprising against British rule, as a creative exercise of epistemic redress whose locus of enunciation and adaptation is a former colony of the British empire.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Adaptation and epistemic redress : the 1857 indian uprising in Junoon
No full textOur interest – curiosity, even – in the Victorian Age has resulted in a continued investment in ventriloquising the Victorians themselves, as in the case of the various adaptations of Victorian novels and afterlives of Victorian literature in contemporary settings, as well as through neo-Victorian renditions. Towards an epistemic reading of adaptation, this chapter discusses the Hindi film Junoon (1979), directed by Shyam Benegal and produced by Shashi Kapoor, a screen adaptation of the neo-Victorian novella A Flight of Pigeons (1978) by Anglo-Indian author Ruskin Bond, set during the 1857 Indian uprising against British rule, as a creative exercise of epistemic redress whose locus of enunciation and adaptation is a former colony of the British empire.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio
Strong Urge for Racial and Gender Identity amid the Cultural Chaos in Shyam Selvaduarai’s Funny Boy
No full textThe Sri-Lankan author Shyam Selvadurai colours his imagination within the racial experiences, gender hierarchy and ethical society of the place to share the world unfolded social dichotomy of the place where the conflict between the Tamils and Singhalese is the key problem of the society which needs to be changed and flexible granting freedom and choice to people promoting the democratic values and the social values as well. The novel Funny Boy paints beautifully to the urge of a child for his choice and freedom on the sensitive issue of race and gender like. The violence between Buddhist Sinhala Majority people and Hindu Tamil Minority due to the issue of homosexuality is central cultural thread which affects the mindset of the youths in the country. The novel reveals the extended chaos, troubles and tensed environment involving consistent fights and clashes of the people in Sri-Lankan society happening frequently
Class, Gender, Race and the Construction of Masculinity in Shyam Selvadurai's Funny Boy
No full textEl propósito de este artículo es analizar los modos en que los aspectos de clase, género y raza
entran en relación con la construcción de la masculinidad en Funny Boy, la primera novela
del autor canadiense, nacido en Sri-Lanka, Shyam Selvadurai (1965-). Un entendimiento
particular de la idea de construcción sirve como herramienta para interpretar lo que significa
y lo que conlleva ser un hombre en la novela de Selvadurai. La tensión creada entre las
expectativas heterosexistas de padres y educadores y la realidad subversiva de los impulsos
homoeróticos del héroe se manifiesta en las representaciones narrativas de clase social, sistema
de género y, posiblemente, prejuicio racial. Nuestra intención será explorar la cuidada
representación que traza el autor sobre la resistencia de un niño a aceptar la identidad que
el poder normativo crea para él.The purpose of this article is to analyse the ways in which the issues of class, gender and
race intersect with the construction of masculinity in Funny Boy, the first novel by the Sri-
Lankan born, Canadian author Shyam Selvadurai (1965-). A particular understanding of
the idea of construction serves as a tool for the interpretation of what it means and what it
takes to be a man in Selvadurai’s novel. The tension created between the normative
heterosexist expectations of parents and educators and the subversive reality of the hero’s
homoerotic impulses manifests in the narrative representations of social class, gender system
and, possibly, racial prejudice. Our intention shall be to explore the author’s wellcrafted
portrayal of a boy’s resistance to comply with the identity that normative power
creates for him
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