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Iconic migrant writers such as Michael Ondaatje, Salman Rushdie and Ben Okri use their fictional worlds to articulate the ways in which existential “nervous conditions,” caused by violent postcolonial history, drive individuals to rework the critical notions of freedom, authenticity and community. This existential thread in their works has been largely ignored or left undeveloped in criticism. Although Rushdie has argued that they primarily write back to the imperial centre(s), in their signature novels, The English Patient , Midnight’s Children and The Famished Road , they respond to their conflicting cultural and ethnic heritages by dramatizing characters in traumatic struggles with belonging and affiliation. As a way of coping with their identity crises, most characters succumb to the political rhetoric of communalism. The central characters, however, are driven by a powerful desire for self-sufficiency. Yet, since this individualism clashes with their need for communal sharing, they enact a form of creative destruction of their singular selfhood and communal identity. They experience a certain plurality of singular selfhood and participate in forms of “inoperative communities,” which elicit bonds without ties and coexistence without the necessity of a common work and essence.

Authenticity (Philosophy) in literature. --- Communities in literature. --- Liberty in literature. --- Freedom in literature --- Liberty as a theme in literature --- Community in literature --- Rushdie, Salman --- Ondaatje, Michael, --- Okri, Ben --- Okri, Ben. --- Rushdie, Salman. --- Anton, Joseph --- Raśdī, Salamāna --- Rüşdı̂, Salman --- Rushdī, Salmān --- Ruždi, Salman --- Salamāna Raśd --- Ondaatje, Philip Michael, --- Okri, Benjamin --- Ondaatje, Michael --- Ondaatje, Philip Michael --- Salamāna Raśdī --- Рушди, Салман --- רושדי, סלמאן --- רושדי, סלמן --- رشدى، سلمان --- Criticism and interpretation. --- Authenticity (Philosophy) --- Philosophy.

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"Storyworlds," mental models of context and environment within which characters function, is a concept used to describe what happens in narrative. Narratologists agree that the concept of storyworlds best captures the ecology of narrative interpretation by allowing a fuller appreciation of the organization of both space and time, by recognizing reading as a process that encourages readers to compare the world of a text to other possible worlds, and by highlighting the power of narrative to immerse readers in new and unfamiliar environments.Focusing on the work of writers from Trinidad and Nigeria, such as Sam Selvon and Ben Okri, The Storyworld Accord investigates and compares the storyworlds of nonrealist and postmodern postcolonial texts to show how such narratives grapple with the often-collapsed concerns of subjectivity, representation, and environment, bringing together these narratological and ecocritical concerns via a mode that Erin James calls econarratology. Arguing that postcolonial ecocriticism, like ecocritical studies, has tended to neglect imaginative representations of the environment in postcolonial literatures, James suggests that readings of storyworlds in postcolonial texts helps narrative theorists and ecocritics better consider the ways in which culture, ideologies, and social and environmental issues are articulated in narrative forms and structures, while also helping postcolonial scholars more fully consider the environment alongside issues of political subjectivity and sovereignty.

Caribbean literature (English) --- African literature (English) --- Postcolonialism in literature. --- Ecocriticism. --- Ecological literary criticism --- Environmental literary criticism --- Criticism --- History and criticism. --- Selvon, Samuel --- Saro-Wiwa, Ken, --- Naipaul, V. S. --- Okri, Ben --- Okri, Benjamin --- Selvon, Sam --- Criticism and interpretation. --- Postcolonialism in literature --- Ecocriticism --- History and criticism --- Criticism and interpretation --- African literature (English). --- Caribbean literature (English). --- Englisch. --- Erzähltechnik. --- Postkolonialismus. --- Roman. --- Okri, Ben. --- Selvon, Samuel. --- Nigeria. --- Trinidad. --- Caribbean literature (English) - History and criticism --- African literature (English) - History and criticism --- Selvon, Samuel - Criticism and interpretation --- Saro-Wiwa, Ken, - 1941-1995 - Criticism and interpretation --- Naipaul, V. S. - (Vidiadhar Surajprasad), - 1932-2018 - Criticism and interpretation --- Okri, Ben - Criticism and interpretation --- Saro-Wiwa, Ken, - 1941-1995 --- Naipaul, V. S. - (Vidiadhar Surajprasad), - 1932-2018 --- Saro-Wiwa, Ken, 1941-1995 --- Naipaul, V. S. - (Vidiadhar Surajprasad), 1932-2018