An even later reflection...

The “Seepersad & Sons: Naipaulian Creative Synergies” conference was held at the UWI St. Augustine’s Open Campus from October 28^th to 30^th, 2015 and although my plan was to attend the opening sessions on the 28^th and all those scheduled for the 29^th, this was not to be. I made it to the final session on the 30^th and caught the following three presentations in Session 6: “The Naipauls’ Karma” by Ms. Fariza Mohammed, “Spaces Created by A Way in the World” by Mr. Varistha Persad, and “Sex and the Naipaul Brothers” by Ms. Meghorn Cleghorn.

It was something of a relief to discover that a number of the presenters had explicitly articulated their topics around various theoretical frameworks that were familiar to me. In the paper “Spaces Created by A Way in the World”, Mr. Persad applies techniques of postmodern criticism to his examination of the V. S. Naipaul novel, and goes to on explore Naipaul’s treatment of real, imagined and re-imagined spaces in the novel through the lens of geocriticism, a term/theory that was new to me. In “On Literary Cartography: Narrative as a Spatially Symbolic Act”, Robert T. Tally defines geocriticism thus:

An approach to narrative as a spatially symbolic act [that] enables us to navigate literature and the world in interesting new ways, by asking different questions, exploring different territories, and discovering different effects. As writers map their worlds, so readers or critics may engage with these narrative maps in order to orient ourselves and make sense of things in a changing world (Tally).

In “Sex and the Naipaul Brothers”, Meghorn Cleghorn finds in the works of V.S. and Shiva Naipaul a critique of the postcolonial Caribbean with regard to the existence of perverse sexuality in the Hindu community, with a focus on sado-masochism and incest, while “The Naipauls’ Karma” by Fariza Mohammed examines the concept of karma as represented in V. S. Naipaul’s A House for Mr. Biswas and Shiva Naipaul’s Fireflies. Mohammed touches upon a number of significant issues in postcolonial criticism. The paper explores the tensions between karma which may be interpreted as simply fate, and which cripples many in the postcolonial Hindu community with passive resignation and lack of responsibility for one’s life, versus karma that encompasses responsibility for one’s fate in the sense that good actions will bring rewards and negative actions will be punished—the emphasis being on taking intentional action. According to this presenter, the main characters' rejection of metanarratives and focus on the “mininarratives” of agency within the contexts of the novels is an apparent embrace of a postmodern ethos on the part of the Naipauls.

I have been deeply suspicious of “theory” with respect to literary works, but found the exploration of cultural and critical theory in the LITS 6007 course and in the conference presentations  I attended to be surprisingly enjoyable and stimulating. Theory addresses the pressing concerns of thinking humanity as we seek to make sense of ourselves and the world, and I look forward to furthering my knowledge in this field, moreso since I am in the process of discovering new (to me) and intriguing approaches to literary criticism such as ecocriticism, ecofeminism and geocriticism, approaches which appear to merge the things about which I am passionate—literature, philosophy, ecology and women’s issues.

A rather late observation

The conference “Seepersad and Sons” offered critical insight into the world of the Naipaul’s. However, there were challenges in understanding the content of the presentation due to the difficulties in transmission. The microphones were having issues for the first two days; this blurred any kind of signification. Therefore, despite the scholarly presentations given at the Naipaul conference, it would be remiss of me to speak on which I did not hear properly. Although, I did hear properly for the creative panel at the Mayor’s office in Chaguanas, I would like to point my attention to the third day.

On the Third Day, I Heard Better: I make my very short observation here.

The presentation done by Dr Hwyel Dix of Bournemouth University was particularly interesting. His paper was entitled: "From tonka beans to magic seeds: V.S. Naipaul’s Late Career Fiction of Self-Retrospect". Dr Dix consults Edward Said's book On Late Fiction to define this concept of lateness but he comes up short. Dr Dix asserts that Said doesn't tell us what lateness is but he tells us what it feels like. He went on to say that Said posits that later works are stylistically resistant to their audiences; they possess the negation of conformity, and art not in favor of reality. Dr Dix then moved on to speak about how he framed his research. He said that he accidentally read the work of Career Counseling by Mark Savickas and the career construction theories of practitioners such as, Kobus Maree, Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot and Larry Cochran. He tries to propose a new theory of authorship through which Naipaul can be read. I place Dr Dix's reading of Naipaul into the New Historicist school of criticism, who according to Peter Barry, "juxtapose literary and non-literary texts , reading the former in light of the latter".

What struck me was not necessarily Dr Dix's presentation but the discussion that revolved around it. The definition of lateness was thought of by Professor Barbara Lalla as biological lateness, a kind of tiredness associated with old age, where the writer really doesn't care about the kind of critique he gets (which was not true about Naipaul since Professor Ramchand noted that he (Naipaul) would not have appreciated harsh criticism). Dr Dix then stated that a late work can be done by someone in their 30's as well, so he doesn't believe that one can really describe lateness. If, however, a work is being described with terms that are ambiguous, how can one come to terms with what is being described? Here we witness the "warring of signification” as Barbara Johnson described in her book The Critical Difference.

 Personally, what I can take away from the conference was the passion and curiosity with which the work of the Naipaul's were discussed (the presentations I heard of course). I believe such useful dialogue is necessary to create a robust  forum for emerging and established academics and scholars.

The conference proved to be a bitter sweet experience for me because  I was

unable due to the previous commitments, to attend on Thursday 29^th, which from the feedback I

received from my colleagues, was very interesting and controversial, and also on the morning of

Friday 30^th. I would have particularly liked to hear the contributions of Dr Raymond Ramcharitar and

Mr Shastri Maharaj. On the positive side I enjoyed the presentations of Prof Aaron Eastley

on the writings of Seepersad Naipaul, and the presentations of the afternoon of Friday 30^th  by Ms

Megahan Cleghorn, Ms Fariza Mohammed and Mr. Varistha Persad. I also enjoyed the closing

ceremony at the Naipaul House in St. James, where Akal, the sister of the writer, read the preface to

the latest edition of the novel ‘A Bend in the River’, which was written by V.S himself, and which Mrs

Naipaul-Akal said she had never read before her very recent purchase this edition. This preface was

very interesting because it spoke about the process that led to the writing of this particular novel. A

process that mystified Mr Naipaul himself, because it was a bit haphazard, and a lot of

the inspiration came for his dreams.

Good morning classmates,

Owing to work constraints, I was only able to attend the conference on Friday 30th October. I truly looked forward to attending as it was my first conference of this nature. Quite anticlimatically however, I noticed that the audio in the amphitheatre was truly going to upset my listening experience and possibly hamper my ability to produce any valuable commentary on the conference. Fortunately, just at the time when the main panels were about to present, and almost as if the audio system itself felt the value of what was going to be said, the problem was swiftly resolved and I was then able to hear clearly and take notes. Thankfully, it happened in this timely manner because I definitely enjoyed listening to the seasoned as well as the blossoming scholars and their analyses of the works of Naipaul.
One of the things that stood out to me was the dynamic and seemingly multifaceted personality of V.S Naipaul as was highlighted throughout, by the presenters and the members of the audience alike. Without any concrete prior evidence of who he was as a person, I had him simply reduced in my mind to an unlikeable cultural icon when it came down to personality. It was therefore quite interesting to learn things such as the fact that he did not initially appreciate or value the work of his father Seepersad Naipaul and stalled in publishing his book although eventually he admitted that it was his father who provided inspiration for his own works. I learned that his relationship with his own brother Shiva was also quite volatile with words such as love, anger, remorse, intolerance and hate being used to describe the feelings between them. Shiva complained that Naipaul never raised a hand to help him as an upcoming artist and in reference to Naipaul stated that: "No one lives up to the demands of an asshole." Nevertheless, it was mentioned that V.S Naipaul was severely affected by his  brother Shiva's death. It was interesting to learn that Naipaul was more driven by artistic ambition rather than love and stated once: "I am the sum of my books."
What I learned about V.S Naipaul at Friday's conference, clarified my preconceived notions of him as a person and offered me concrete evidence to support those feelings. Needless to say, the value and superior quality of many of his works cannot be easily refuted or nullified.

A MARXIST ANALYSIS OF V.S. NAIPAUL IN THE READING OF DR. JIM HANNAN

In his close reading from Dr. Jim Hannan's excerpt, “‘My Sense of Distance and Time was Shaken’: Globalization before It’s Time in the Work of V.S. Naipaul”, Dr. Hannan comments that the theoretical framework of Postcolonialism is not best suited to Naipaul's work. He posits that Naipaul does not see himself as being part of the local and as such does not comment or analyze or respond to the cultural legacies of colonialism. For Naipaul, who considers himself a more globalized writer, the theoretical framework of Marxism is more appropriate in analyzing his works. 

Marxism "Analyzes class relations and societal conflict using a materialist interpretation of historical development and a dialectical view of social transformation". As such, Naipaul's globalized perspective and his idea of distant proximities foregrounds the notion of "commoditizing". Naipaul commoditizes the local and everything else as a means whereby any person, regardless of space, can belong and benefit on a global scale, so that regardless of if you are from Trinidad, Argentina, or any other part of the world, you will be able to benefit and belong. In this context, he does not view himself as a Trinidadian, or ascribing to the local alone but as a global writer. 

Marxism is the primary theoretical framework which under-girds Dr. Hannan's reading of Naipaul.

Seepersad Naipaul's contribution to the society

Hello everyone,

I especially appreciated the presentation on Friday by Professor Brinsley Samaroo. The most salient point for me was that Seepersad Naipaul was against the repatriation of East Indians because of the hostile reception that they received from friends and family. Instead, he worked to improve the lives of East Indians here in Trinidad. Education was especially dear to his heart, and due to his efforts, Muslim and Hindu schools were erected. In this way, he contributed to the development of Trinidadian society as a whole. In addition, he was one of the first writers to use ‘Trini’ dialect in his works. He really seemed to be committed to ‘Mother Trinidad’  and we could all take a page from his book.  

Great conference

     Hello everyone. I attended the Thursday and Friday conference days and found them all to be incredibly informative and interesting. I really enjoyed Nicholas Laughlin's presentation about his edition of the book of letters between VS and Seepersad Naipaul. It gave an interesting exploration into the history and family dynamic of VS Naipaul. What really struck me was that in one letter, Laughlin describes it as VS beginning to see his father as a character. Another interesting note on the presentation was his question on the consequences of having let VS' sister Kamla write and encouraging her career as an author. What would that mean for the literary community in Trinidad? Dr. Dix's presentation on the development of late career fiction using the career theory further developed on this presentation for me. The evolution of a writer throughout his lifetime and the continuum of identity that is established between works as well as the change in narrative techniques such as a conclusive ending in House for Mr. Biswas and an open one in Magic Seeds.


     Jim Hannon's presentation on the inefficiency of postcolonial theory to Naipaul due to his distancing himself from any one particular location was of great interest. He showed Naipaul as being a 'global citizen' not limiting himself to one particular cultural identity. Another panel I particularly enjoyed was Sharon Millar's feminist reinterpretation of Guerillas and especially her statement that coming to a country and not understanding the culture can be very dangerous.


     All the panels were quite good in spite of the bad audio and interruptions by people about this problem. I thoroughly enjoyed visiting Anand Bhavan as well as it helps to set the scene for House for Mr. Biswas.

Good night classmates,

I attended both sessions on Thursday 29^th October where the sessions incorporated “Being and Becoming: Naipaulian Men of Letters” and “Creative Writers on Naipaulian Influences” respectively. I was extremely excited because it was my first academic conference. The poor audio of the first session neglected me the opportunity to grasp what was being said. However, the second session was fascinating and interesting. To listen to readings from the panel of Dr. Raymond Ramcharitar, Ms. Sharon Millar and Mr. Shastri Maharaj was inspirational. I liked that Mr. Shastri Maharaj used his paintings to tell a story and those paintings was so colourful and full of meaning. I must mention our site seeing adventure to the Lion House where I went up to the top, that was quite an experience and not forgetting our walk. 

Feminist theory: Sex and the Naipaul Brothers, presented by Ms. Meghorn Cleghorn

I loved how Ms. Cleghorn tied feminist theory into her presentation. She highlighted why Savory Fido is against V.S Naipaul's image of the character of women in his writings. Fido believes that Naipaul is punishing the woman by using sadomasochism and masochism. However, Ms. Cleghorn disputes this theory by arguing that Naipaul is giving the woman power by reversing the roles between the man and the woman. The woman is the one who is in control of her sexuality and therefore she decides what she wants to do sexually. The power of choice is what gives her the control over the male character. 

Spaces Created by A Way in the World

I thought it was quite interesting the way in which Mr Persad did a postmodern reading of Naipaul. Just goes to show you that postmodernism really is about reading it new!

C News covers the SEEPERSAD AND SONS - NAIPAULIAN CREATIVE SYNERGIES

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDdOS9r6XEM

Hi everyone,
I was able to attend the conference on the Thursday and Friday, and for me, those two days were really fulfilling and gave me such inspiration and encouragement to push forward with my research. I was particularly moved by Mr. Varisth Persad's presentation entitled, "Spaces Created by A Way in the World". He made mention of the fact that the past, present and future all shared the same space in Naipaul's work. This is testimony to a very post-modernist approach by the author, in which there is a sort of liminality and the absence of a clear separation between distance, space and time. What was also interesting about his presentation was the multiplicity in identities of the characters in Naipaul's novel, which also translated into the multiple identities of the author himself.  With this being said, Naipaul was then able to create a new space, whether fictional or non-fictional, for himself through literature.

Reflection on theories in Conference

My favourite panel was the panel that consisted of Dr. Raymond Ramcharitar, Ms. Sharon Miller and Mr. Shastri Maharaj. I thought that their presentations were wonderful. Also, I could understand what they were saying unlike in Open Campus where the acoustics were a hindrance. 

I thought of stylistics when they mentioned the Naipaulian point of view and voice which could be heard in Dr. Ramcharitar's poetry. That seemed important to me as it was a style or voice that impacted Dr. Ramcharitar's work. 

Also, I think that a postmodern approach can be seen when Dr. Ramcharitar and Ms. Miller were talking about how Naipaul affected the way they write. Dr. Ramcharitar, I think said that his work was inspired by Naipaul and Walcott. Also, Ms. Miller said that her book would not have been possible without Naipaul's Guerillas (1975). That book seemed to have an impact on her writing. So it seemed to me that they were building on the ideas and legacy of Naipaul's literature. It had a positive impact on them and their writing. 

Also, the feminist aspect of Mr. Maharaj's presentation stood out to me. He gave a lot of significance to the woman in the Hindu family who is generally marginalized because of patriarchy. It reminded me of Mrs. Tulsi who was the matriarch of the Tulsi family even though Hindu families tend to be patriarchal. His use of yellow also stood out to me. But I thought of Meditation on Yellow by Olive Senior instead of curry. 

Dr. Hannan's presentaion, “'My Sense of Distance and Time was Shaken': Globalization Before Its Time in the Work of V.S. Naipaul” was also interesting. However, the acoustics were not good and I didn't catch everything that he was saying. But from what I understood, he spoke about how postcolonial theory can be applied to Naipaul. I thought of how Naipaul captures different cultures and places in his literature like Trinidad, India and Africa when he said that. But I think he said that post colonial theory when dealing with Naipaul is limited because of his aim to take his work global. Naipaul is not just a regional writer and he is not just a Caribbean writer. He wants his work to be for England and the rest of the world.

I liked the conference. I thought it was really interesting and informative. It is amazing how much the Naipauls' legacy has affected literature. Maybe they will be like Shakespeare and be taught in schools centuries later.

Hi everyone

For those who did not have the opportunity to attend on Wednesday, I reached just in time to listen to the two last addresses of the second session  'Feminist and Phenomenological Readings'.

These two addresses were titled 'Struggling with Constructions of Masculinity in House for Mr Biswas' and Naipaulian Mothers and Motherlands given by Dr. Elizabeth Jackson and Dr. Paula Morgan respectively.

Dr. Jackson talked about the insistence of maintaining patriarchy in a household and how masculinity is seen as an assumption of power. She also mentioned that the production of masculinity reproduces patterns of oppression.  I found it very interesting  when she said that men seek approval from other men in the exercise of their masculinity, and a good example of this is the 'trophy' of the ideal girlfriend or wife.

As for Dr. Morgan she gave insights on the women functioning in strong patriarchal families in the Naipaulian writings.

Even though I struggled to understand the speakers due to the fact that it was my first time participating in this type of conference spoken in English, I enjoyed being part of this event and I describe it as a great experience.

Currently listening to the presentation of Ms. Fariza Mohammed on "The Naipaul's Karma." One thing that has stood out for me thus far is the fact that poverty does not only exist on a financial level; there is also poverty of the mind and spirit. While I may have thought of this in a different way, I found that the way in which she put the point across was quite deep.

Ok everyone,

The third session of the day is about to start, with our very own Dr. Maharaj chairing the 

panel. Can't wait to hear what this panel has to say and to ask Dr. Maharaj some very 

difficult questions :) 

Family Love, Artistic Ambitions

Hi everyone,

Due to work commitments, I was unable to attend Wednesday and Thursday of 

the conference. However after hearing everyone's comments and Dr. Tewarie's  

presentation, I am even more disappointed than before that I could not be there. Dr. 

Tewarie's presentation, entitled Family Love, Artistic Ambitions, gave insight into the 

personal life of V.S. Naipaul and his relationship with his family, and even more so, the 

relationship between V.S. Naipaul, his father, Seepersad and his brother Shiva. This 

keynote address was the first of the day and provoked a lively discussion afterward. I am 

looking forward to the rest of the conference today and will try to post more during the 

course of the day.

Wow. Today's panels were overwhelmingly informative and brilliant. 

I've taken as many notes as my hands would allow; the most being from the first speaker - Dr. Jim Hannon, whose address was systematically structured both in terms of chronology and theory. 

He even went as far as listing out some of the theoretical schools within his paper - which of course was of great help to us who were there today. 

Naipaul indeed is a global commodity - not merely limited to a national or even a regional scale - and as Prof Ramchand stated (he speaks in such awe of Sir Naipaul), he is a creative and performance artist who focuses not on being a writer, but on the act and process writing itself. 

This ties in with Mr. Shastri Maharaj's address, in that the artist (whether painter such as Mr Maharaj, or writer such as Sir Naipaul) has the task of "visual literacy," through the social commentary of their narratives. The writing then becomes a documentation of what is occurring around the artist. 

Looking forward even more to tomorrow's panels, after the wonderful time I had today. 

I can finally join in on the excitement got my official approval for time off so I will be there on Wednesday and Friday. I am really looking forward to seeing how they look explore Naipaul's treatment of post colonial trauma.

Two Worlds, V.S Naipual. This link shows how he feels about all of his writings

http://www.nobelprize.ohamletsobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2001/naipaul-lecture-e.html

One more week. I'm very excited to learn more about this family.

Bringing the Naipaul legacy home

Found this in today's Newsday.

http://www.newsday.co.tt/editorial/0,218702.html

Seepersad & Sons: Naipaulian Creative Synergies

The Friends of Mr Biswas in conjunction with the Department of Literary, Cultural and Communication Studies will be hosting “Seepersad & Sons: Naipaulian Creative Synergies,” from October 28-30, 2015. This conference seeks to uncover the layers of ideas across the works of Seepersad Naipaul, Shiva Naipaul and V.S. Naipaul, which in effect will produce a vivid moving documentary of critical issues in Caribbean life.

Further Reading: "Seepersad & Sons: Conference to explore the role of the Naipaul family" (UWI Today)