THE LANGUAGE OF POSTCOLONIAL LITERATURES: 
An Introduction

by Ismail S Talib

"This is the most comprehensive introduction to post-colonial language use to date. A wide-ranging survey of the issues and conflicts involved in this very contested field makes this book a very useful resource for students and general readers." -- Bill Ashcroft, University of New South Wales

"I read this book right through at one sitting, with great pleasure. Wonderful range of reading across every continent, jargon-free, clear and persuasive prose, sensible organization, tidy brevity, and heaps of fascinating material." -- Benedict Anderson, Cornell University

"The book's great success is to address the political issues around postcolonial literatures in a way that promotes understanding of the complexity. The wide coverage, geographically and chronologically, allows the book to function as an overview of or introduction to postcolonial literatures. It should be essential reading on all postcolonial literature courses." -- A. F. Gupta, Leeds University

"Trying to make the highly complex notion of the postcolonial accessible to the undergraduate is a worthy exercise and in this respect Ismail S. Talib’s book The Language of Postcolonial Literatures: An Introduction is worth reading. … This book is important in that it gives the student a fine overview of many of the issues raised within the post-colonial debate. It is important because it leaves room for that debate, as the many quotes and references illustrate." -- Peter Flynn, Gent University

"Ismail Talib, in The Language of Postcolonial Literatures: An Introduction, provides a collection of stimulating thoughts about the complex relation between language and literature in the postcolonial condition. ...this is a very useful study of the relationship between literature and language in a postcolonial world that will be of interest not only to those specializing in non-English varieties of literature in English but to anyone who is aware of the importance of language variation (whether geographical, social, historical, or ethnic) for a full understanding of any literary text." -- Clara Calvo, University of Murcia

Links

Of related interest: Archive of the Online Postcolonial Conference (1997).