Marginal Experience and the Aesthetics of Autobiography: An Analysis of K A Gunasekaran’s The Scar and Touch

Abstract

Autobiography is one of the prominent literary forms used by Dalit writers to express their resistance and document a history that does not surface in the dominant discourses. The emergence, development and diverse application of this genre are deeply intertwined with two fundamental dimensions of Dalit studies: politics and aesthetics. Raj Gowthaman in his text poi +Abhatham = Unmai has said that Dalit literature is a movement away from realist writing and towards postmodern writing. It is in this post-modern sense that the literariness of the form of
autobiography and the autobiographical nature of any literary production beg to be studied. This paper investigates the extent to which life narratives that have historical significance do have a role in contributing to the aesthetics of Dalit literature. Using SharankumarLimbale’s “Towards an Aesthetic of Dalit Literature”, this study investigates how one incident from K.A Gunasekaran’s autobiography The Scar, is transformed into the play Touch thereby bridging the gap between historical representation and aestheticization. Being a folk artist, Gunasekaran has used his art as a form of resistance attempting to have a dialogue with the mainstream. Additionally, it also addresses the question of how autobiography as a mode of writing can be understood and analysed in other literary forms like drama.