TRAUMA AND/OR EMANCIPATION IN THE SELECT SHORT FICTIONS OF AKHTARUZZAMAN ELIAS

Abstract

Akhtaruzzaman Elias (1943–1997) is a critically acclaimed but comparatively less recognized literary figure from Bangladesh. Elias, whose literary genius spanned more than three decades, surprisingly has a very small number of books to his credit, including five short story collections and two novels. Following the political vicissitudes in the Indian subcontinent resulting in the two-time birth of Bangladesh, the first as a part of Pakistan in 1947 and the second in 1971, I aim to study the traumatization of the protagonists of Elias’s narratives. I shall examine the nature of their trauma caused by a plausibly failed emancipatory motive. I have selected those short fictions premiering the aporia of trauma and emancipation, apparently leading nowhere. Studying the aporetic solution thus sought by Elias will lend deeper insights into his oeuvre as well as his position in Bengali literature in particular and world literature at large.