A Study Guide for V.S. Naipaul's "Bend in the River"

By Gale and Cengage

A Study Guide for V.S. Naipaul's "Bend in the River," excerpted from Gale's acclaimed Novels for Students. This concise study guide includes plot summary; character analysis; author biography; study questions; historical context; suggestions for further reading; and much more. For any literature project, trust Novels for Students for all of your research needs.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cengage Learning - Gale
• Release date: Jun 27, 2016
• ISBN: 9781535819312

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11

A Bend in the River

V. S. Naipaul

1979

Introduction

After winning the Booker Prize in 1971 for In a Free State, V. S. Naipaul was considered an important international author with valuable insights on third-world countries. As a Hindu Indian growing up in Trinidad, Naipaul experienced both colonialism and its end, to note that it was sometimes difficult to say which was worse. In 1975, Naipaul wrote a scathing article on the African dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, titled A New King for the Congo, which he used as a basis for his 1979 novel A Bend in the River. The novel was short-listed for the Booker Prize in Fiction. His ambivalence about postcolonial conditions for former colonies is apparent in A Bend in the River, in which independence from Europe has led not to freedom but to tyranny in the rule of the Big Man.

The first-person narrator, Salim, is a Muslim Indian who opens a shop in the European ruins of Stanleyville (now Kisangani), Congo, after independence is gained in the 1960s, only to get embroiled in the African violence there. Salim considers whether he can find his place in Africa, as his family has for centuries, or whether he must leave Africa for the West. Naipaul's dark vision of Africans being unable to join the modern world has led many critics to call him a neocolonialist, or supporter of European colonialism. A Bend in the River remains valuable for its brilliant evocation of postcolonial contradictions. A 1989 edition is available from Vintage Press.

Author Biography

Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul—known as Sir Vidia Naipaul or V. S. Naipaul—was born on August 17, 1932, as the oldest son to an Indian Brahmin family in Chaguanas, Trinidad and Tobago, a former colony of Great Britain. He was descended from indentured laborers from East India who were cheap labor for the sugar plantations. His father, Seepersad, was a journalist for the Trinidad Guardian and wrote short stories that influenced his son's desire to be a writer. Naipaul's father was poor but married into the rich Capildeo family and was often dependent on his wife's family for income. Vidia's brother Shiva Naipaul, his uncle, and a cousin all became published authors.

V. S. Naipaul attended Queen's Royal College, in Trinidad, and then won a scholarship to Oxford, leaving Trinidad in 1950. England became his permanent home. After broadcasting for the BBC Caribbean Voices program, in 1955 he married Patricia Hale, an Englishwoman who became a lifelong literary partner. His first novels were satirical and comical portraits of Trinidad. The Mystic Masseur (1957) won the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize in 1958 and was adapted as a film. Miguel Street (1959), a collection of short stories, won the 1961 Somerset Maugham Award. A House for Mr Biswas (1961) is based on Naipaul's father and his problems with poverty. Mr Stone and the Knight's Companion (1963) was set in England