Subaltern Perspective in Anita Desai’s Bye-Bye, Blackbird

Abstract

Anita Desai, has taken up Spivak’s concept and perception of subaltern and emphasized Spivak’s idea in her  novel Bye-Bye, Blackbird (1971) Spivak for example, objects to careless use of the term and its appropriation by marginalised groups who are not specifically subaltern. She asserts that subaltern is not just another word for the oppressed or marginalised, nor a general claim to disenfranchisement within a system of hegemonic discourse. Bye-Bye Blackbird, her third novel deals with subalternity in an alien land, the tensions between the white locale and immigrant black birds. Desai focuses on the disturbing aspect of loss of identity that immigration involves.