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Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul (born August 17, 1932), better known as V. S. Naipaul, is a British novelist of Hindu heritage from Trinidad and
Tobago.
In 2001, two of his books, A House for Mr
Biswas and A Bend in the River were included on the list of the 100 best English-language novels of the 20th
century by the editorial board of the American Modern
Library. He is married to Lady Nadira.
Both his fiction and his travel writing have been criticised
for their unsympathetic portrayal of the third world. Most notably, Edward
Said has argued that he "allowed himself quite consciously to be turned into a witness for the Western prosecution",
promoting "colonial mythologies about wogs and darkies" (p. 53).
Awards:
Fiction
- The Mystic
Masseur - (1957)
- The
Suffrage of Elvira - (1958)
- Miguel Street -
(1959)
- A House for
Mr Biswas - (1961)
- Mr. Stone and the Knight's Companion - (1963)
- A Flag on the
Island - (1967)
- The Mimic Men -
(1967)
- The Loss of
Eldorado - (1969)
- In a Free
State - (1971)
- Guerillas - (1975)
- A Bend in the
River - (1979)
- Finding the
Centre - (1984)
- The Enigma
of Arrival - (1987)
- A Way in the
World - (1994)
- Half a Life -
(2001)
Non-fiction
- The Middle Passage: Impressions of Five Societies - British, French and Dutch in the West Indies and South America (1962)
- And Area of Darkness (1964)
- The Overcrowded Barracoon and Other Articles (1972)
- India: A Wounded Civilization (1977)
- A Congo Diary (1980)
- The Return of Eva Perón (1980)
- Among the Believers: An Islamic Journey (1981)
- Finding the Centre (1984)
- A Turn in the South (1989)
- India: A Million Mutinies Now (1990)
- Homeless by Choice (1992, with R. Jhabvala and S. Rushdie)
- Bombay (1994, with Raghubir Singh)
- Beyond Belief: Islamic Excursions among the Converted Peoples (1998)
- Between Father and Son: Family Letters (1999, edited by Gillon Aitken)
Further reading
- Said, Edward (1986). "Intellectuals in the Post-Colonial World." Salmagundi 70-71. 44-64.
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