Spaces, Places, Dwellings, and Beings. A Contribution to a Topoanalysis of Rahul Sankrityayan’s Bāisvīṃ Sadī

  • Alessandra Consolaro University of Torino
Keywords: Hindi literature, Rahul Sankrityayan, space and place, topoanalysis, Utopia

Abstract

Pandit Rahul Sankrityayan’s creative writing Bāisvīṃ sadī (Twenty–second century) is an imaginary journey in time and space. Mobility is a crucial element in this story: it implies changes of space, but also physical and mental challenges. In light of topoanalysis – the term coined by French philosopher Gaston Bachelard to describe the detailing of intimate spaces – a better understanding of the self can be attained through a research of the places in which the subject has lived on account of the close link between self and place. Place attachment is in direct proportion to the integrity of identity. This paper aims to contribute to a revised topoanalysis of Bāisvīṃ sadī.

Author Biography

Alessandra Consolaro, University of Torino

Alessand ra Consola ro is Associate Professor of Hindi Language and Literature at the University of Torino (Italy). She completed her MA in Sanskrit (University of Milan 1986) and Hindi (University of Torino 2000). She obtained her PhD in History, Institutions and International Relationships at the University of Pisa, Italy (1997). She was a visiting researcher at the University of Uppsala (Sweden) in 2010, and a visiting professor in Kolhapur University (India) in 2015. Her field of interest and research is marked by interdisciplinarity and is based on feminist and gender critique. She has published on South Asian history, the history of the Hindi language, colonial and postcolonial theory, contemporary Hindi literature, critical study, and translation.

Published
2019-12-16
How to Cite
Consolaro, A. (2019). Spaces, Places, Dwellings, and Beings. A Contribution to a Topoanalysis of Rahul Sankrityayan’s Bāisvīṃ Sadī. Archiv orientální, 87(3), 483–507. Retrieved from https://aror.orient.cas.cz/index.php/ArOr/article/view/23
Issue
Vol. 87 No. 3 (2019)
Section
Research Article

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