The Rape of Sita - African Writers Author:Lindsey Collen Banned within hours of publication in her native Mauritius for enraging fundamentalists, Lindsey Collen's pathbreaking The Rape of Sita went on to win the prestigious Commonwealth Prize for Best Novel in Africa. A powerful and stylistically innovative work, Collen's novel exemplifies the brilliant creative possibilities of postcol... more »onial literature. Deftly blending oral and literary traditions, this masterpiece reveals the history, repression and resistance of an entire people through the story of one woman, and introduces to American readers a major literary voice.
Sita is a strong woman, champion of the repressed, inspiration to the weak, a living legend in Mauritian society. She has also buried a secret that threatens to overwhelm her very self.
Told in lyrical tones by Iqbal the Umpire, Sita's story echoes ancient myths, folk tales and religious prophesies. Yet in the modern landscape of the 1980's, Sita must struggle to remember her own history and her own rape -- which comes to symbolize all rapes, all violations, all colonizations.« less