Dismembered Dreams: A Diasporic Study of Benyamin Daniel’s Aadu Jeevitham (Goat Days)

Abstract

Benyamin Daniels’s Malayalam bestseller Aadu Jeevitham, (2008) translated to English by Joseph Koyippally as Goat Days was published in the year 2012. Benyamin’s novel surpasses many Indian diasporic writings in shedding light on the atrocities faced by labor migrants who journey from India to Gulf countries in search of better employment and monetary avenues. The graphic and insightful description of the life of these migrants in a remote Arabian desert is indeed heart wrenching. The mercenary ventures of the mega industries at work in the ‘oil kingdom’ offers Indian as well as migrants of other nations an attitude of belligerence that is inexplicable in terms of humanity.