Authors: Girisha D
Abstract: This paper attempts to explore how Upamanyu Chatterjee’s The Last Burden (1994) express most comprehensively the intimate social awareness of the society in which Indians are born and evolve with its problematic religious and cultural conditions. In this novel, he examines the negative aspects of kinship and familial bonds. It tells the narrative of a middle-class Hindu Brahmin family growing up in a seaside town. The family consists of the father, Shyamananda, the mother, Urmila, and their two sons, Burfi and Jamun. The most compelling feature of the novel is its examination of the emotional turmoil and interdependent relationships that exist among contemporary Indian households. In this novel, Chatterjee explores the enigmatic inner workings of the human mind and outlines the complicated issues of the modern Indian society. He demonstrates how multiculturalism and multilingualism benefit India. While blending the political, historical, and social upheavals with individual and cultural components, he has detachedly painted the socio-political and cultural struggle of the 1950s.
DOI: http://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.17733288
