Inscribing Indian Indentureship in the Creolised Caribbean: The Homing Desire in V.S. Naipaul’s A House For Mr. Biswas

Abstract

This article argues that the novel A House for Mr. Biswas (1961), by Nobel-prize winner V.S. Naipaul reflects, through the metaphor of the house, characteristically Caribbean concerns regarding the meanings of home. Therefore, is it argued that the Indo-Caribbean community should be accounted for in theories of creolisation which, until recently, have ignored this community in favour of a unified Afro-creole identity that was to support the struggle for independence and other rights. The aim of this article is to understand creolisation by taking into account the interactions between the diverse diasporas that have created the contemporary Caribbean. As such, the novel unveils the conflicts that arise when there is a neglect of such negotiation. With its ending, even if not openly, A House for Mr. Biswas emphasises the immanence of lived experience in the perception of identity. The home in the novel eventually transitions into Avtar Brah’s homing desire, a concept that challenges essentialism in the apprehension of diasporic identities. Reading the novel through this lens reconsiders the meanings of home in the context of the Caribbean in general and the Indo-Caribbean community in particular.