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The Middleman and Other Stories

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The Middleman and Other Stories
Front cover image
AuthorBharati Mukherjee
SubjectFiction, Immigrant experiences, Diasporas, Manners and customs
GenreIndo-Anglian fiction (short stories)
Set inVarious locales
Published1988
PublisherGrove Press
Publication placeUnited States, United Kingdom
Media typePrint, Audio, E-book
Pages190+
ISBN9780802110312 , 9780802136503, 9780449217184
OCLC17412386
WebsiteOfficial website

The Middleman and Other Stories (1988) is a collection of short stories written by Bharati Mukherjee.[1][2][3][4][5][6] This book won the 1988 National Book Critics Circle Award.[7][8]

Stories from this volume are frequently anthologized,[6] particularly Orbiting, A Wife's Story, and The Middleman[citation needed]. The short story Jasmine would later be developed into the 1989 novel Jasmine.

Synopsis

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According to Michiko Kakutani, of The New York Times, the characters populating these stories are "all exiles, expatriates, wanderers, people on the move, shucking off old lives as easily as a snake sheds its skin. They are third-world refugees, fleeing poverty and oppression; but they are also Americans moving from coast to coast, small towns to cities, exchanging one partner for another in search of a dream that always seems to elude them. Although they possess a seemingly infinite freedom - the possibility of becoming whatever they want to become — the price of that freedom is rootlessness and dislocation, a feeling of perpetual displacement."[9]

Contents

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Story Originally published in
"The Middleman"
"A Wife's Story"
"Loose Ends"
"Orbiting" [10]
"Fighting for the Rebound"
"The Tenant"
"Fathering"
"Jasmine"
"Danny's Girls"
"Buried Lives"
"The Management of Grief"

Reception

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See also

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References

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  1. ^ Alcorn, Alfred (1989). "Reviewed work: The Middleman and Other Stories, Bharati Mukherjee". Harvard Book Review (11/12): 8–9. JSTOR 27545352.
  2. ^ Raban, Johnathan (June 19, 1988). "Savage Boulevards, Easy Streets". The New York Times. Retrieved August 18, 2023. Full text also available here.
  3. ^ Maxey, Ruth (2019). "Immigration to the United States". Understanding Bharati Mukherjee. University of South Carolina Press. pp. 53–74. doi:10.2307/j.ctvgs0bhh.8. ISBN 9781643360003. JSTOR j.ctvgs0bhh.8. S2CID 159309198.
  4. ^ Siva, Nirmala (February 2019). "Social Struggle of the Protagonists of Bharathi Mukherjee in her Stories, "The Middleman and Other Stories"". Contemporary Literary Review India. 6 (1). Kurnool, Andhra Pradesh, India.
  5. ^ Parameswaran, Uma (1990). "Reviewed work: The Middleman and Other Stories, Bharati Mukherjee". World Literature Today. 64 (2): 363. doi:10.2307/40146601. JSTOR 40146601.
  6. ^ a b Maxey, Ruth (2019). "Bharati Mukherjee and the Politics of the Anthology". The Cambridge Quarterly. 48: 33–49. doi:10.1093/camqtly/bfy037.
  7. ^ "1988 National Book Critics Circle Award - Fiction Winner and Nominees". Awards Archive. 2020-03-28. Retrieved August 18, 2023.
  8. ^ Maxey, Ruth (2019). Understanding Bharati Mukherjee. University of South Carolina Press. pp. 1–8. doi:10.2307/j.ctvgs0bhh.5. ISBN 9781643360003. JSTOR j.ctvgs0bhh.5.
  9. ^ Kakutani, Michiko (September 19, 1989). "Third-World Refugees Rootless in the U.S." The New York Times. Retrieved August 21, 2023.
  10. ^ Carchidi, Victoria (1995). ""Orbiting": Bharati Mukherjee's Kaleidoscope Vision". MELUS. 20 (4): 91–101. doi:10.2307/467892. JSTOR 467892.

Further reading

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