A Postcolonial Study Of The Grass Is Singing

Doris Lessing is"indisputably a major figure in English literature of the twentieth century."(Oates, 1972:38) She possesses a unique sensitivity, writing out of her own intense experience, her own subjectivity, but at the same time writing out of the spirit of the times.(Ibid: 40). Her works have been translated into many languages, have had a wide national influence. She was awarded Nobel Prize in 2007.The Grass Is Singing is Doris Lessing's first work. It was an immediate success when published in 1950 and acclaimed as one of the outstanding novels by a post-war English writer. It probes into the extraordinarily complex web of power of relationships of colonial Southern Rhodesial where relations are determined not just by race, class, and gender but also by location in country and city, colony and metropolis, agriculture and industryApart from the introduction and the conclusion, the thesis can be divided into three chapters.The first Chapter discusses multiple perplexes. In the colony, as a white woman, Mary's economic,psychological,racial and cultural perplexes are taken into consideration.The second Chapter is going to tackle the issue of the oppressed"other". The natives'loss of voice and the marginalization of the natives are discussed in detail. The natives were under oppression from the government, Charlie Slater, Dick Turner, the white male and Mary Turner the white female, live under the"orientalist gaze", in the state of loss of voice.The third Chapter is entitled"Gender Marginalization". The male chauvinist oppression and degradation of women are explored. The male's hegemony over the female and the latter ( Mary)'s acknowledgement of the male chauvinism are two issues relevant to the title. After a careful analysis of all the major characters in the novel, the thesis argues that despite their racial and gender identity, they are all made victims by colonization.