The Inheritance of Loss
Encyclopedia
The Inheritance of Loss is the second novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

 by India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

n author Kiran Desai
Kiran Desai
Kiran Desai is an Indian author who is a citizen of India and a permanent resident of the United States. Her novel The Inheritance of Loss won the 2006 Man Booker Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Fiction Award...

. It was first published in 2006
2006 in literature
The year 2006 in literature involved some significant events and new books.-Literature:*Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie - Half of a Yellow Sun*Chris Adrian - The Children's Hospital *Martin Amis - House of Meetings...

. It won a number of awards, including the Man Booker Prize
Man Booker Prize
The Man Booker Prize for Fiction is a literary prize awarded each year for the best original full-length novel, written in the English language, by a citizen of the Commonwealth of Nations, Ireland, or Zimbabwe. The winner of the Man Booker Prize is generally assured of international renown and...

 for that year, the National Book Critics Circle
National Book Critics Circle
The National Book Critics Circle is an American tax-exempt organization for active book reviewers. Its flagship is the National Book Critics Circle Award....

 Fiction Award in 2007, and the 2006 Vodafone Crossword Book Award
Vodafone Crossword Book Award
Vodafone Crossword Book Award is an Indian book award sponsored by Vodafone and Crossword Bookstores. It is India's biggest private sector award. The Award was instituted in 1998 with the intention of competing with The Booker Prize, Commonwealth Writers' Prize or The Pulitzer Prize.The award...

.

It was written over a period of seven years after her first book, the critically acclaimed Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard
Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard
Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard is a novel by Kiran Desai published in 1998. It is her first book and won the top prize for the Betty Trask Awards in 1998. It is set in the Indian village of Shahkot and follows the exploits of a young man, Sampath Chawala, trying to avoid the responsibilities of...

. Among its main themes are migration, living between two worlds, and between past and present.

Summary

The story is centered on two main characters: Biju and Sai. Biju is an illegal Indian immigrant living in the United States. Sai is a girl living in Darjeeling. Desai switches the narration between both points of view.

The novel follows the journey of Biju, an illegal immigrant in the US who is trying to make a new life; and Sai, an Anglicised Indian girl living with her grandfather in India. The novel shows the internal conflict in India between Muslim groups, and Buddhist groups, whilst showing a conflict between past and present. There is the rejection and yet awe of the English way of life, the opportunities for money in the US, and the squalor of living in India. Many leading Indians were considered to be becoming too English and having forgotten the traditional ways of Indian life, shown through the character of the grandfather, The Judge. The major theme running throughout is one closely related to colonialism and the effects of post-colonialism: the loss of identity and the way it travels through generations as a sense of loss. Individuals within the text show snobbery at those who embody the Indian way of life and vice versa, with characters displaying an anger at the English Indians who have lost their traditions.

Jemubhai Patel in this novel and Anita Desai's Nanda Kaul in Fire on the Mountain have some similarities. Both of them want to lead a secluded life. They don't want to be disturbed by others. Their grandchild is the first one who disturbs their aloneness. At first, they feel the presence of their grandchild embarrassing. But, they gradually understand that there are certain similarities between them and their grandchildren. In the portrayal of Jemubhai Patel, Kiran must have been inspired by the character, Nanda Kaul of her mother.

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