도리스 레싱의 『마라왿� 댄』과 『댄장군과 마라의 딸, 그리오왿� 스노우 독 이야기』: 포스트콜로니얼 사변소설과 ‘유목적 주체’의 형상화 (Doris Lessing’s the Mara and Dann Series: Postcolonial Speculative Fiction and Figuration of “Nomadic Subjects”)

Doris Lessing criticizes British imperialism and colonialism by means of the genre of postcolonial speculative fiction in Mara and Dann and The Story of General Dann and Mara's Daughter, Griot and the Snow Dog. From the presumed African viewpoints of young Mara and her brother Dann living in Africa(Ifrik in these novels) after thousands of years, Lessing emphasizes the temporality and transience of Western civilization and technology. Mara, having arrived at ‘the Centre,’ her supposed destination, after her long journey, refuses her kinsmen’s suggestion that Mara and Dann should reconstruct a Mahondi dynasty, and settles down on a farm with her friends of various races and classes. This means Mara refuses her nationality and fixed homogeneous identity and instead chooses a trans-national identity and a subjectivity in transit. This invokes Rosi Braidotti’s concept of 'nomadic subjects.' In the latter work, Dann continues his trip to the Mediterranean Sea and finds all knowledge including geography, cartography, history etc. to be just fragmentary, situated, and local. He tries, in vain, to preserve literary works, the residual Western Civilization stored at the Centre, and finds reading, translation, and interpretation of the works neither complete nor perfect. Dann builds a hybrid society, that is, a trans-national community, with peoples of all kinds of ethnic, national, and tribal origins. Following The Golden Notebook, these two works by Lessing most fully embody postmodern concepts such as “denials of a center, originary sites, or perfection,” “incessant deferral of meanings,” and “deconstruction of dichotomies.”

Doris Lessing criticizes British imperialism and colonialism by means of the genre of postcolonial speculative fiction in Mara and Dann and The Story of General Dann and Mara's Daughter, Griot and the Snow Dog. From the presumed African viewpoints of young Mara and her brother Dann living in Africa(Ifrik in these novels) after thousands of years, Lessing emphasizes the temporality and transience of Western civilization and technology. Mara, having arrived at ‘the Centre,’ her supposed destination, after her long journey, refuses her kinsmen’s suggestion that Mara and Dann should reconstruct a Mahondi dynasty, and settles down on a farm with her friends of various races and classes. This means Mara refuses her nationality and fixed homogeneous identity and instead chooses a trans-national identity and a subjectivity in transit. This invokes Rosi Braidotti’s concept of 'nomadic subjects.' In the latter work, Dann continues his trip to the Mediterranean Sea and finds all knowledge including geography, cartography, history etc. to be just fragmentary, situated, and local. He tries, in vain, to preserve literary works, the residual Western Civilization stored at the Centre, and finds reading, translation, and interpretation of the works neither complete nor perfect. Dann builds a hybrid society, that is, a trans-national community, with peoples of all kinds of ethnic, national, and tribal origins. Following The Golden Notebook, these two works by Lessing most fully embody postmodern concepts such as “denials of a center, originary sites, or perfection,” “incessant deferral of meanings,” and “deconstruction of dichotomies.”