Heideggerian Out-of-Joint Situation and New Horizons in Postcolonial Literature: Interpreting the Zizekian ‘Extimacy’ in The Mimic Men by V.S. Naipaul

Abstract

Though Naipaul’s geo-spatial dislocation from periphery to centre generates an optical distance that helps observe postcolonial reality objectively, he simultaneously attaches to the reality that he initially left behind. This can be termed ‘ex-timated’ fictionalization, where the inner is intimately ex-centred with outer. This sense rises from Naipaul’s territorial dislocation that does not indicate a decisive ontological detachment from the postcolonial reality that he is alienated with. His de-territorialization is unable to fully embrace the new metropolitan reality and forget the former completely, as shown mainly in fictional characters i.e. Salim (A Bend in the River ) and Ralph Singh (The Mimic Men). This review considers The Mimic Mento explore this postcolonial situation, even though the symptom is visible even in his other novels, where major characters are positioned between tradition and modernity that emerged from post-colonial reality. While accepting the fact that his repetitive literary revisits to postcolonial Asia and Africa could provide the objective reality within the failed project of decolonization, a Zizekian analysis suggests that Naipaul could not effectively elevate himself from his Heidaggerian ‘out-of-joint’ situation and exploit his ‘homelessness’ to discover a better reality. Instead, he is ex-timately confined to an ‘ex-static’ (or ex-centric) postcolonial situation that leaves him in the deadlock of ‘de-personalized objective narrations’ and ‘situational consciousness’ of Third World Literature. On the basis of the said extimated alienation of Naipaul’s existential literary endeavor, this review suggests that to understand the postcolonial situation better, Zizek’s idea of extimacy is of substantial significance.