Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided
The present paper is a New Historicist analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz's novel The Heart Divided (1957). Keeping in view the theoretical postulates of Stephen Greenblatt, the paper analyzes the literary text in conjunction with the author's life and time to evaluate how the different prevailing political discourses impacted the text. During the turbulent times of the Partition of the Subcontinent, the significance of the social and political forces that prompted the author to write the novel cannot be denied. Shahnawaz herself was a political activist during the Independence Movement so she closely witnessed the process of nation building and the emergence of the concept of Two Nation Theory so she incorporates these details in her fictional work. As a New Historicist study, this paper assumes that the selected fictional text has been shaped by the time and place in which it was produced and that it reflects the time and place it is set so the study explores the cultural forces surrounding the text and infusing meaning to it.
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New Historicism, Nation building, Fictionalization, Narrative, History
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(1) Amina Ghazanfar
Lecturer, Department of English UGS, National University of Modern Languages, Islamabad, Pakistan.
(2) Fayaz Ahmad Kumar
Lecturer, Department of ELT, National University of Modern Languages, Islamabad, Pakistan.
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- Gallagher, C., & Greenblatt, G. (2000). Practicing New Historicism. The University of Chicago.
- Gundur, N, S. (2008). Partition and Indian English Fiction. Adhyayan Publishers & Distributors.
- Rahman, T. (2015). A History of Pakistani Literature in English 1947-1988. Oxford University Press.
- Raychauduri, A. (2019). Narrating South Asian Partition: Oral History, Literature, Cinema. Oxford University Press.
- Shahnawaz, J. A. (2002). Father and Daughter. Oxford University Press.
- Shahnawaz, M. (1957). The Heart Divided. ASR Publications.
- Shamsie, M. (2017). Hybrid Tapestries: The Development of Pakistani Literature in English. Oxford University Press.
Cite this article
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APA : Ghazanfar, A., & Kumar, F. A. (2022). Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided. Global Social Sciences Review, VII(IV), 33-38. https://doi.org/10.31703/gssr.2022(VII-IV).04
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CHICAGO : Ghazanfar, Amina, and Fayaz Ahmad Kumar. 2022. "Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided." Global Social Sciences Review, VII (IV): 33-38 doi: 10.31703/gssr.2022(VII-IV).04
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HARVARD : GHAZANFAR, A. & KUMAR, F. A. 2022. Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided. Global Social Sciences Review, VII, 33-38.
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MHRA : Ghazanfar, Amina, and Fayaz Ahmad Kumar. 2022. "Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided." Global Social Sciences Review, VII: 33-38
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MLA : Ghazanfar, Amina, and Fayaz Ahmad Kumar. "Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided." Global Social Sciences Review, VII.IV (2022): 33-38 Print.
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OXFORD : Ghazanfar, Amina and Kumar, Fayaz Ahmad (2022), "Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided", Global Social Sciences Review, VII (IV), 33-38
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TURABIAN : Ghazanfar, Amina, and Fayaz Ahmad Kumar. "Allegorizing Nation Building in Fiction: An Analysis of Mumtaz Shahnawaz’s The Heart Divided." Global Social Sciences Review VII, no. IV (2022): 33-38. https://doi.org/10.31703/gssr.2022(VII-IV).04