Senior Library Books
Resource Key
LEVEL 1
brief, basic information laid out in an easy-to-read format. May use informal language. (Includes most news articles)
LEVEL 2
provides additional background information and further reading. Introduces some subject-specific language.
LEVEL 3
lengthy, detailed information. Frequently uses technical/subject-specific language. (Includes most analytical articles)
Linked Databases
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JSTOR This link opens in a new window
Scholarly resources on JSTOR include Archival and Current Journals, Books, and Primary Sources.
Introduction
"Set in Kerala in the 1960s, The God of Small Things is about two children, Estha and Rahel, and the shocking consequences of a pivotal event in their young lives, the accidental death-by-drowning of a visiting English cousin. In magical and poetic language, the novel paints a vivid picture of life in a small rural Indian town, the thoughts and feelings of the two small children, and the complexity and hypocrisy of the adults in their world. It is also a poignant lesson in the destructive power of the caste system and moral and political bigotry in general." (The Man Booker Prizes, 1997)
Analysis
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Sadaf, S. (2008). Colour Play in Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. Ariel, 39(3), 73-84.
For all its seemingly erratic stylistic devices, The God of Small Things emerges as a perfectly harmonious work because of an underlying threadwork of connecting ideas. One such connecting mesh is the use of colour-codes within the novel, which gives it direction and coherence. Colours are used as a suggestive device to help invoke the required feelings in the readers. -
Bobby, C.S. (2012, October 10). Resisting Patriarchy: A Study of the Women in the God of Small Things. Language in India, 12, 490-496.
The God of Small Things depicts the social reality in the last few decades where organized movements to raise the consciousness of women began. The women in TGST are depicted as victims by forces of history, dead convention, false pride, the tyranny of the state and the politics of opportunism and andocentric order.
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Bose, B. (1998, April). In Desire and in Death: Eroticism as Politics in Arundhati Roy's The God of Small Things. Ariel, 29(2), 59-72.
In the following essay, Bose discusses the viability of the erotic themes developed in The God of Small Things, noting that the sexual politics explored in the novel reflect real-life choices faced by Roy's characters in their socio-political milieu.
Podcasts
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Naughtie, J. (2011, October 6). Arundhati Roy - The God of Small Things [Audio podcast]. Retrieved June 6, 2015, from BBC Radio 4: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b015brn8
Arundhati Roy talks to James Naughtie and readers about her Booker prize winning novel The God of Small Things. It's Arundhati Roy's first and so far only book of fiction and it took the literary world by storm, winning the Booker Prize in 1997. -
L'Estrange, S. (Producer). (2015, February 17). Subcontinent Book Club: The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy [Audio podcast]. ABC Radio National.https://www.abc.net.au/listen/radionational/archived/booksandarts/books-and-arts-27-february-2015/6253834
The God of Small Things was the debut novel of Indian author Arundhati Roy. It’s also her only novel. The novel takes a microscope to the happenings of this family of Syrian Christians and the members who don’t or won’t conform to the family’s expectations.
