Adiga's White Tiger

[Here is the coursebook page for this title with links enabled]

Week 1. Introduction: Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger (2008)

‘It won’t win any prizes for subtlety. But it hasn’t been nominated for one of those’ – Peter Robins

Aravind Adiga was born in Chennai in 1974. He has worked as a journalist for the Financial Times and Time magazine. The White Tiger is his first novel.

Editions:

Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger, (London: Atlantic, 2008; London: Atlantic, 2008).

2008 Judges:
Michael Portillo (chair), Alex Clark, Louise Doughty, James Heneage, Hardeep Singh Kohli

2008 Shortlist:

Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger
Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture
Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies
Linda Grant, The Clothes on Their Backs
Philip Hensher, The Northern Clemency
Steve Toltz, A Fraction of the Whole

Topics:

· Introduction to Literary Prizes and Prize Culture.
· Media Hype and the Book Trade.
· The ‘Man’ Booker Prize: New Dawn or Hot Air?

Reviews:

Adam Lively, ‘The White Tiger’, The Sunday Times, (6 April 2008).
Sameer Rahim, ‘The Man on the Poster’, Times Literary Supplement, 5480 (11 April 2008).
David Mattin, ‘The White Tiger’, The Independent on Sunday, (11 May 2008).
Peter Robins, ‘Review: The White Tiger’, The Daily Telegraph, (9 August 2008).
Kevin Rushby, ‘Review: The White Tiger’, The Guardian, (15 October 2008).
Sanjay Subrahmanyam, ‘Diary’, London Review of Books, (6 November 2008).

A fuller round-up of reviews can be found here.

In the lecture I mention Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's celebrated essay, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ (1988) A version of this difficult but much-cited piece (abbreviated by the author) is available on Google Books.