V. Naipaul - Collected Short Fiction

HISTORICAL EVENTS:India — Pakistan war.

1966

LITERARY CONTEXT:Rhys: Wide Sargasso Sea .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Mao launches Cultural Revolution in China. Indira Gandhi becomes Prime Minster of India.

1967

AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Flag on the Island: The Mimic Men.

LITERARY CONTEXT:Márquez: One Hundred Years of Solitude .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Arab — Israeli Six-Day War. Civil war in Nigeria (Biafra).

1968

LITERARY CONTEXT:Solzhenitsyn: Cancer Ward .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Student unrest in US and throughout Europe. Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia. Assassination of Martin Luther King. Nixon US President.

1969

AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Loss of El Dorado .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Resignation of de Gaulle in France. Americans land first man on the moon.

1970

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Black Power revolt in Trinidad.

1971

AUTHOR’S LIFE: In a Free State . (Wins Booker Prize.)

LITERARY CONTEXT:Updike: Rabbit Redux .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Formation of Bangladesh.

1972

AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Overcrowded Barracoon .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:President Amin expels Asians from Uganda. First Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty.

1973

LITERARY CONTEXT:Pynchon: Gravity’s Rainbow .

Greene: The Honorary Consul .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Arab — Israeli War.

1974

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Resignation of Nixon following Watergate scandal.

1975

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Guerrillas .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Levi: The Periodic Table .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:End of Vietnam War; exodus of the ‘Boat People’ begins. State of Emergency declared in India (to 1977). Guerrilla armies come to power in Angola and Mozambique. USSR and Western powers sign Helsinki Agreement.

1976

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Trinidad and Tobago become an independent republic.

1977

AUTHOR’S LIFE: India: A Wounded Civilization .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Morrison: Song of Solomon .

1979

AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Bend in the River .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Calvino: If on a winter’s night a traveler .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Margaret Thatcher first woman Prime Minister in UK.Carter and Brezhnev sign SALT-2 arms limitation treaty. Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. Iranian revolution; American hostage crisis.

1980

AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Return of Eva Péron (with The Killings in Trinidad ).

LITERARY CONTEXT:Burgess: Earthly Powers .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:An independent Zimbabwe formed.

1981

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Among the Believers .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Rushdie: Midnight’s Children .

1982

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Falklands War.

1983

AUTHOR’S LIFE:Honorary Fellow, University College, Oxford.

LITERARY CONTEXT:Narayan: A Tiger for Malgudi .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Reagan proposes ‘Star Wars’.

1984

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Finding the Centre .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Famine in Ethiopia. Indira Gandhi assassinated.

1985

LITERARY CONTEXT:Márquez: Love in the Time of Cholera .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Riots in South Africa. Gorbachev General Secretary in USSR.

1986

LITERARY CONTEXT:Walcott: Collected Poems .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Gorbachev — Reagan summit.

1987

AUTHOR’S LIFE: The Enigma of Arrival.

LITERARY CONTEXT:Morrison: Beloved .

Levi: The Drowned and the Saved .

1988

LITERARY CONTEXT:Rushdie: The Satanic Verses .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Gorbachev announces big troop reductions. Benazir Bhutto Prime Minister of Pakistan.

1989

AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Turn in the South .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Márquez: The General in his Labyrinth .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe. Fall of the Berlin Wall. Tiananmen Square massacre in China.

1990

AUTHOR’S LIFE: India: A Million Mutinies Now . Knighthood for Services to Literature.

LITERARY CONTEXT:Updike: Rabbit at Rest .

Walcott: Omeros .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Nelson Mandela released from jail after 27 years’ imprisonment. German reunification. John Major becomes Prime Minister in UK. Attempted coup by Islamic fundamentalists in Trinidad.

1991

LITERARY CONTEXT:M. Amis: Time’s Arrow .

Okri: The Famished Road .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Gulf War. Yeltsin President of Russia. USSR disbanded.

1992

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Bill Clinton elected US President. Civil war in former Yugoslavia.

1993

AUTHOR’S LIFE:Wins the first David Cohen Prize for Literature.

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Israel hands over West Bank and Jericho to Palestinians. Storming of White House, Moscow.

1994

AUTHOR’S LIFE: A Way in the World .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Heller: Closing Time .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Mandela and ANC sweep to victory in South African elections. Rwandan massacres. Russian military action against Chechen republic.

1996

AUTHOR’S LIFE:Wife Patricia Naipaul dies (3 February); marries Nadira Khannum Alvi (15 April).

LITERARY CONTEXT:Márquez: News of a Kidnapping .

1997

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Letters.

LITERARY CONTEXT:Bellow: The Actual .

Roth: American Pastoral .

Roy: The God of Small Things .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Tony Blair elected Prime Minister in UK (first Labour government since 1979). Princess Diana is killed in a car accident in Paris.

1998

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Beyond Belief .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Morrison: Paradise .

Pamuk: My Name is Red .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Northern Ireland Referendum accepts the Good Friday Agreement. Clinton orders air strikes against Iraq.

1999

AUTHOR’S LIFE: Between Father and Son: Family Letters .

LITERARY CONTEXT:Coetzee: Disgrace .

HISTORICAL EVENTS:Serbs attack ethnic Albanians in Kosovo; US leads NATO in bombing of Belgrade.