Toba Tek Singh by Sadat Hasan Manto

By King Meera -
TOBA TEK SINGH

NOV 10, 2014

Evolving understanding of Partition
Identity crisis:
1. Existential crisis
2. Loyalties - Indian or Pakistani - not just territorial or political but also highly personal, an individual choice
3. identity itself fluid and contextual

about madness in and of Partition
Madness because of the cost of separation

Madness incomprehensible, but meant to be so:
1. no outsider can comprehend the reality of the Partition
2. the Partition SHOULD NOT make sense to us, because it is not our tragedy to understand
3. trauma narrative

--------------

NOV 14, 2014

Components of a short story:
  • plot (twist) (message)
  • characters
  • time
  • point of view - but better to call it focalization
  • setting 
  • mood
  • fact or fiction
  • style of writing
"When you learn how to read a text, it 'disables' you from merely summarizing it in the exam"

Paratexts (outside elements)
  • title
  • preface
  • prologue
  • epilogue
  • foreword
  • introduction
  • blurb
in a third-person narrative (POV) we must look for indications that the narrator is reliable or otherwise
a reliable narrator will never express personal opinions - is objective, distanced

zat is all.

In a trauma narrative of this sort, nothing makes sense to us because it is not our experience to understand. The madness and political absurdity of the partition is beautifully portrayed in this short story. Nobody knows what's going on, everybody's busy with their own problems to deal with, and Toba Tek Singh (Bishan Singh) still doesn't know where Toba Tek Singh is.

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