Passion, Provocation and Delay of Desire in Mulk Raj Anand’s Coolie: a Psychoanalytic Probe

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Till date Anand’s Coolie had been hailed as a socialist realist masterpiece that champions the cause of the downtrodden multitudes who live from their hand to mouth. It is certainly acknowledged on all hands that Coolie is indeed an epic saga of the pain and sufferings meted out to the toiling unsung men and women who immigrate to the cities in search of fortune, and yet all they meet there range from untold misery to unspeakable self-denial. Munoo’s tale may apparently seem like some coming-of-age saga, but there looms a dreadful punctuation—his premature death. A child nipped in the bud, being smashed under the wheels of the cart of colonial capitalism—dreams fell shattering into the weary grounds, the walls of reality caving in. Coolie renders a heart-rending tale of a hill boy who undergoes a strenuous and abusive childhood (pick any typical victim of child labour even today!), and consumption snatches his life long before we might even see adulthood dawning on him—another precious life of a child of ambrosia into the depths of oblivion. Mulk Raj Anand’s assay is commendable and at the same time he uses Munoo as the mouthpiece of a larger-than-life issue of the poignancy of the child labourers in an “atmosphere charged with sharp abuse, unending complaints and incessant bullying” (Anand 46). India: then and now—the issue remained valid, across ages. Perhaps nothing is changed: say, the abusive households, the ill-treatment at factories, being a victim of communal riots, or say, even dying at an early age—eyes spilling dreams of a better tomorrow. Anand builds up an excruciating dystopic vista that besets the have-nots who pass their gruelling lives under the thumb of capitalism. May it be capitalism, may it be industrialization—what emerges out is misery, unmatched and irreparable. Among many a post-colonial, capitalist and communal quandaries, the tale also

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