Resistance and its Discontents in South Asian Women's Fiction

'Mirza's theorization of resistance is a substantive addition to feminist and postcolonial scholarship, and her rich readings of different literary texts make a valuable contribution to feminist literary studies.'
>'Resistance and its discontents in South Asian women's fiction is a rigorous and impassioned exploration of the concept of resistance in postcolonial literature. It is an essential contribution to the field of postcolonial studies and a compelling excavation of resistance in South Asian women's writing.'
>'Mirza's comprehensive take on what counts as "resistance" in Anglophone fiction by women writers from South Asia and its diaspora--not just its heroic manifestations but also its limits, its contradictions, its marginality and even its absence in the reality of women's lives--makes this a provocative theoretical inquiry into female agency. Resistance and its Discontents in South Asian Women's Fiction makes a major contribution to postcolonial criticism as well as feminist theory.'
>'Maryam Mirza's new book is sure to become a major work of reference in the field of South Asian literary studies and of literature by (and on) women. Its breadth, depth, and level of detail are astonishing, and it offers a thoroughly new reboot of the genre of "resistance literature", by enlarging and complexifying the semantic reach of the term "resistance" beyond its current remit within contemporary fictional narratives.'
>This book examines how English-language fiction by women writers from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka has grappled with the idea and practice of resistance. A valuable, original and timely contribution to the field of South Asian literary and cultural studies, the monograph extends and complicates existing debates about the meaning(s) of resistance and, by extension, 'the political'. It brings to the fore not only the emancipatory potential of resistance, but also the contradictions that it can encompass as well as the anxieties that it can generate, particularly for women.

Focusing on novels and short stories, the book explores fiction by Arundhati Roy, Kamila Shamsie, Tahmima Anam, Jhumpa Lahiri, Manju Kapur, and Ru Freeman, amongst others. Over six chapters, it engages with a range of manifestations as well as omissions of resistance including, but not limited to, public defiance against military dictatorships, imperial rule and patriarchal oppression sanctioned by the state, the fight for better working conditions, and the multiplicity of battles waged in the home, as well as the choice of expressing one's creative, linguistic, sexual or sexed identity.

The book will be an important resource for undergraduate and graduate students of postcolonial literature, South Asian cultural studies, and gender studies. It will also be of considerable interest to members of the general public who are fascinated by the literary and social landscape of the Indian subcontinent today.