The East-West encounter literary genre is an axiomatic creative manifestation of our colonial/post-colonial inheritance. Both Indian English and Anglo Indian literary historiography is indelibly etched with the contours of this encounter. Hard to exorcise, the pulls and pressures of this tradition continue to enthrall Indian literary sensibility. Given her intellectual-academic location it is not surprising that Sharmistha Mohanty in her New Life too draws her inspiration from this lore. The novel manipulates various ingredients of this genre – the mystic east oozing with its humid summers, spiritual depths (loftiness?), temples, faith and restrictive customs; the rational west superficially ensconced in its materialistic individualism and physical progress.
February 2007, volume 31, No 2