The Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under Colonialism Book

To most of the finest critical minds of West, Colonialism was a necessary evil, the first portal towards a more even homogenized world. But for the Colonized, the psychological after effects and the trauma of subjugation, in all its postulated merits, have not yet let them embrace the egalitarian world the apologists conveniently then envisioned. Author here argues that Colonialism has not only colonized the geographical material entity but also the mind; by compelling colonized societies to modify, if not alter, their cultural priorities towards the concepts of modern West. In this book, Nandy consciously connives to uncover what Western colonialism has done to its subjects unconsciously, and the alternative language of discourse colonized Indians might have created in the process.

I know the intro sounds like the first snooze button in a long boring lecture, but I find myself ill equipped to articulate the things that I enjoyed and found enlightening during this read. Even a reproduction in Nandy's own language, which is academically tharoorized like Khilnani's, isn't enough to vocalise my thoughts and disagreements, or even appreciation towards the things I couldn't repudiate even though I wanted to.

"Even in opposition, the dissent remains predictable and controlled. It is possible today to opt for a non-West which in itself is a construction of the West. One can then choose between being the Orientaist's despot, to combine Karl Wittfogel with Edward Said, and the revolutionary's loving subject, to combine Camus with George Orwell. And for those who do not lik the choice, there is, of course, Cecil Rhodes' and Rudyard Kiplings' noble, half-savage half-child, compared to whom the much-hated Brown Sahib seems more Brown than sahib."
The book is comprises of two long essays, first one of psychology of colonialism where Author examines the nature of sex, age and ideology in British India, and latter about post-colonial view of West and India. And they both speak of victims than victors, and when victors are addressed they are considered as camouflaged victims in their earlier stage of psychological decay. According to Nandy, one must choose the non-modern slave over the modern master coz slave represents a higher cognition for regarding his master 'human', whereas master's cognition perforce reduces the salve to a 'thing'. Modern oppression, he argues, as opposed to traditional oppression is not a battle between the self and the enemy, or the oppressor and the revolutionaries, or the god and the demons. Though I think a detailed look into the traditional oppression, can render them less monochromatic, I found his take very appealing and well in line with book's title.

Side lining economic and political borders, Nandy tries to show the state of mind as the primary differentia between colonizers and the colonized, where a shared culture might not find its commencement with alien rule or closure in its departure. Towards later years, British began to ascribe salvatory meanings to Colonial domination and Indians began to see their progress in becoming more like the British, in friendship or enmity. In this 'identification with the aggressor', western view of hyper masculinity began to permeate into the socio-religious-literature-art movements of India, with 'Kshatriyahood' (the martial portion of Indian caste system) becoming the indicator of authentic indianhood. Indian concepts of purusatva(masculinity), naritva(feminity) and klibatva(hermaphroditism) were polarized against one another and the existence of later two or any forms of androgyny were now perceived as negation of man's unalloyed political identity. This reader was able to identify, to some extent, the suggested transition in depiction of Gods, who are getting increasingly martial, or masculine or feminine, every day against earlier androgynous 'ardhanarishwaran' (half man half woman God).

In the second essay, author takes his psychoanalysis to the post-colonial view, of both India and the West. It gets into the nitty gritty details of Kipling's life in relation with his literary view, and the materialistic obfuscations of internal critiques like Nirad C Chaudhuri and V.S.Naipaul, who in their loss, wanted to identify India as a martial opponent to the West. Nandy's polar opposite is Aurobindo Ghose, who denounced his western middle name and western education to embrace India as India, not the non-West. To the former Orient should defeat the Occident in its own game by embracing 'this-worldiness' of 'Kshatriyahood', and to the latter the already superior 'Spiritual India' was the real India. Though pluralities of ideologies are always accommodated, this split is in present continuous tense and when everything material fails people retracts to the spiritual self for answers. The major western worldview separates both philosophies, with conspicuous hierarchy and exclusivity. And this is where Gandhi stands as an original critique to modernity. He attacked the moral statement and civilizing mission of colonialism based on cultural superiority in their home ground-by declaring it evil through judgement via Christian values. And he further disproved the historical conception of colonisation as an instrument of progress using western conception of 'history' itself.

"there are many kinds of failures, some of which succeed."

A Passage to India, EM Foster
Idea of India has always been compromising, fluidic and in a way ahistoric, with tolerance and willingness to learn the ways of outsider or civilized, provided it's profitable. It would be more correct to put this aspect as something out of necessity than intrinsic trait, a survival strategy that keeps somewhat dynamic boundary conditions, to preserve one's self-image. Here the 'Spiritual India' maintains pragmatism even with its weak grasp on reality and provides ductility over brittleness of egoistic identity. I can't say I have grokked this unfathomable unheroic Indian response, and to the occident in me and you, these questions may offer more clarity than the answers author provides for them.

"But the question remains why every imperial observer of the Indian society has loved India's martial races and hated and felt threatened by the rest of the India's 'effeminate' men willing to compromise with the victors?

What is it in the latter that has aroused such antipathy?

Why should they matter so much to the conquerors of India if they were so trivial?

Why could they so effortlessly become the antonymous of their rulers?

Why have many modern Indians shared this imperialist estimation?

Why have they felt proud of those who fought out and lost, and not of those who lost out and fought?"