The Bombay of Rohinton Mistry: Mapping the cityscape in A Fine Balance and Such A Long Journey

• Main Authors: Sarbani Mohapatra, Tirtha Pratim Deb
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Ratnabali Publisher 2017-04-01
• Series: Sanglap: Journal of Literary and Cultural Inquiry
• Online Access: http://sanglap-journal.in/index.php/sanglap/article/view/147

The metropolis of Bombay is rendered a sentient entity with its physical and mental existences in the entire oeuvre of Rohinton Mistry. This paper is aimed at studying the contours of this cityscape as undergoing constant frisson between the forces of change and the pro-status quo forces of resistance against the socio-economic and religious landscape of the city, as traversed by Mistry in Such a Long Journey and A Fine Balance. The implications of the authorial position of Mistry as a diasporic writer belonging to an ethnic minority community in India as well as the Parsi perspective on the depiction of Bombay will also be examined. Additionally, the paper will investigate the engagement of the city of Bombay as portrayed in the novels with the Derridean idea of 'new cosmopolitics',and “cities of refuge” and the concept of space and the State as analyzed by Henri Lefebvre.   Keywords: Bombay, Emergency, urban space, Parsi, cosmopolitics