Cultural Hybridity In Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children

Salman Rushdie (1947-) is one of the most famous postcolonial writers in the 20th century. His multi-cultural background endows him with a unique feeling and understanding of the postcolonial context in which India situates itself. Midnight's Children won the Best of the Booker Prize in 1993, and became one of Salman Rushdie's most highly acclaimed novels. The novel presents to us the 62-year history of India before and after its independence and, by depicting the whole life of a man who is physically and psychologically a hybrid, shows us the repellent as well as synthesizing process of Indian and British heritage. In Midnight's Children, Rushdie explores the inevitable impact that Indian and British cultures leave on the nation and its people. The cultural hybridity is where his literary charm and success lie in. The thesis investigates the cultural hybridity presented in Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children from three aspects, namely language, identity and nation. The analysis is conducted in the framework of postcolonialism and focuses on Rushdie's particular emotion toward Indian and western cultures as a diasporic writer, as well as his special vision of a hybrid Indian in the coming years.The thesis has four chapters. Chapter one introduces the research topic. Chapter two discusses the research purpose and interpretative methodology. Chapter three is a close textual analysis of Midnight's Children, focusing on the language this novel adopts, the identities of the heroes as well as the connection between characters and their national consciousness. Chapter four concludes the thesis, stating that Rushdie cherishes his Indian and British identity and is full of hope for India's future, which, in his eyes, lies in its cultural hybridity.