T 1290.pdf - Pondicherry University DSpace Portal

America transformed her. The letting-go of India might havebeen traumatic, but aha did not want to insulate herself byhanging-on to an outdated image of the country. Bharatl~ukherjee writes about a kind of new pioneer. The deslre for%more, more, more....' marks her characters as dlstlnctlyAmerican. Her characters are brash and spunky and have a senseof adventure. They may transgress and come to bad ends but theydo not glve-up. Mukherjee arms to expose Americans to theenergetic voices of these new settlers In the Unlted States.The new changing America is the theme of the storles InThe Middleman. The lmmigrants lr! her storles go through extremetransformation In Amerlca and at the same trme they alter thecountry's appearance and psychological make-up. Mukherjee'scharacters have to assume different ldentitles. These people donot ask for our sympathy nor are they going to remaln plungedln doom, gloom and antiquated memory. They Intend to go outthere, cur some deals and carve out a plece of the Amerlcan piefor themselves. These lmmlgrants assume ldentltles of a newconerlaseekerla traveller; a naturallsed cltlzen; ahousewlfe/a householder; a studentla scho1ar;a loverlaseducer,a bankerla bus~nessman. They turn up as a sufferer oraggrlebed person. They find themselves as law-breakers orlllegal aliens.Success in the Unlted States came at a tlme when she