MEMORY AND THE SEA: OCEANIC METAPHOR IN STORIES OF MIGRATION .
‘So as soon as they left me, I went out, to see where I was and to see if I could find the sea’ (Gurnah,2001: 4)
Perhaps it is because immigrants so often arrive by boat, perhaps because their home lands are so often peninsulas in the ocean; One cannot be sure why it is, but it is certain that metaphors relating to the ocean, water and the sea are significant in the retelling of immigrant stories as well as in literature written by immigrant writers. This essay aims to explore the significance of the ocean through an analysis of narrative techniques and metaphors anchored by the sea in four stories of immigration and immigrant lives originating in the Indian Ocean and travelling through, specifically, Britain and the countries of the British Commonwealth. For the purpose of this essay comparisons have been drawn between By The Sea (by Abdulrazak Gurnah), The Year of the Runaways (by Sunjeev Sahota), Brick Lane (by Monica Ali) and In an Antique Land (by Amitav Ghosh). The question this essay hopes to answer is whether the sea can be said to be a common metaphor in describing shared experiences and the collective consciousness of immigrants, specifically those who come from a place close to a shore.
Within this tornado of grand designs and historical destinies,Khalaf ibn Ishaq’s letter seems to open a trapdoor into a vast network of foxholes where real life continues uninterrupted. Khalaf was probably well aware of the events taking place farther north: the city he lived in, Aden, served as one of the principal conduits in the flow of trade between the Mediterranean and the Indian ocean, Khalaf and his fellow merchants had a wide network of contacts all over North Africa, the Middle East and southern Europe. ( Ghosh,1994: 5)
Trade routes, globalisation and the Indian Ocean as a space of connectivity- these are the themes that emerge when the sea is considered a site of common experience (Bremner, 2013:29). The process of colonisation sees attempts at cultural- amalgamation by empirical forces through the implementation of colonial processes of discovery, specifically the claiming and naming of spaces as extensions of the colony. The Indian Ocean plays a major role in the development of trade routes connecting the Eastern and Western worlds for economic purposes both before and during the existence of Western economic supremacy (Desai, 2010:714). Traders, and people with a history of trade exchange within their oceanic culture so often have an in-depth knowledge of the oceans and the changing levels of hospitality towards traders and travellers found at sea. This common understanding of the nature of transnational practices of cultural globalisation forms a connection-point between legal and illegal immigrants within the trope of immigrant-life in colonial host countries (Helff, 2009:4)
They had been doing this every year for at 3least a thousand years. In the last months of the year, the winds blow steadily across the Indian Ocean towards the the coast of Africa, where the currents obligingly provide a channel to harbour. Then in the early months of the new year, the winds turn around and blow in the opposite direction, ready to speed the travellers home. (Gurnah,2001:14)
In By The Sea Abdulrazak Gurnah describes the monsoon winds that brought ships across the Indian Ocean and towards the coast of Africa, and also ushered them in the right direction when it was time to go home. The relationships between coastlines is symbolic of the exchange of knowledge that allowed this trade exchange to flourish and which highlights the heterogeneous climate of the Indian Ocean world, a world unto itself. Over generations of trade and immigration oral traditions of sharing information and guidance develop. This information ranges from the sharing of safe routes and passages to follow for trade or for arriving in Britain in order to work. These routes are often steeped in myths, both antiquated and contemporary, about parts of the oceans that are unknown and unfamiliar or the nature of travelling as an illegal stow-away and the risk this poses to personal health and safety. Essentially the stories and mythologies around seafaring develop over time in order to protect those who make the voyage. Those who share the common experience or history of connectivity through experiences of the Indian Ocean contribute to the narrative of transnationalism. This transnationalism is a key example of the development of globalisation as individuals move away from binaries between what is local and what is foreign, contributing to an archive of competing universalisms and the creation of new global narratives. The homogenous structures of the European north could not function as the prevailing ideologies of this oceanic space.(Hofmeyer, 2010:724) (Bremner, 2013:23)
Historically, the ocean was untameable although the nations that hugged the shorelines of the Indian Ocean were susceptible to colonisation, the ocean remained a space of neutrality, acting as buffer to nations that were very different in ideological beliefs, but still had something to offer each other in terms of trade, migration, culture and nautical knowledge. In times of intense mapping and ownership, this was a revolutionary occurrence- the ocean as a decontinentalised space where interactions took place and where cultures were encouraged to influence each other while providing sustenance and economic growth to various regions (Hofmeyer,2010,724).
The Indian Ocean has a rich history in trade and cultural exchange. During the colonial expansions there was an intense curiosity and a need to chart spaces, but most importantly, to be the first to do so. This kind of fixation on being the first, is what drives this intense exploration of the Indian Ocean and is essentially what promotes this rich cultural exchange of goods and trade. It is also this need to be the first that encourages families to send a child, or an individual to choose to go alone, to a foreign land in order to participate in global trade systems (Bremner,2013: 28). The trade of goods and humans that has been taking place throughout the Indian Ocean for centuries has resulted in this idea of globalisation which further emphasises the lack of ownership attributed to immigrants. The ocean as an open-ended space is unlike any other space, because it is not attributed to any particular nationality, it flourishes as a multi-cultural hub of trade and exchange. (Bremner,2013: 28)
‘The village was leaving her. Sometimes a picture would come. Vivid; so strong she could smell it. More often, she tired to see and could not. It was as if the village was caught up in a giant fisherman’s net and she was pulling at the fine mesh with bleeding fingers, squinting into the sun, vision mottled with netting and eyelashes. As the years passed the layers of netting multiplied and she began to rely on a different kind of memory. The memory of things she knew but no longer saw.’( Ali,2003: 217)
In Brick Lane Monica Ali uses the metaphor of coastal village life to describe the pain of forgetting home. The metaphor of the fishing net resonates with an experience of attempting to keep memory within reach and having no control the eventual loss of detail. The net is a symbol of a trap made up of strings and holes where the body remains contained by the ropes while memory, identity and cultural history fall through the gaps and become lost from new generations’ collective consciousness. The use of fishing metaphors is way of illustrating challenging situations from a coastal sea-farer’s perspective. These metaphors are used in a way that informs the reader that the history and origin of the immigrant characters are not easy nor uncomplicated. The metaphor of fishing appears to hold an underlying optimism of potential for bounty and success due to the nature of catching fish, whilst demonstrating an element of loss that is unique to immigrant life. These metaphors could symbolise that the process of assimilation into a foreign culture as a long and arduous one. The ship on the horizon could signal that there is distant and historical connection that the ocean has to the migration of people into colonial spaces. The ocean is acting as a temporal space where one can reflect on the past but also look into the future. At the same time the ocean is a realm that is vast, revealing a sense of isolation whilst on some level reaffirming the significance of the interconnectedness of those who share an oceanic origin. The physical body is trapped in a foreign space but the memories of the past are not static, they are fluid and can travel further than body and project into the future.
Those maps, how they transformed everything. And so it came to pass that in time those scattered little towns by the sea along the African coast found themselves part of huge territories stretching for hundreds of miles into the interior, teeming with people they had thought beneath them, and who when the time came promptly returned the favour.( Gurnah,2001:16)
Through the process of hydro-colonisation and oceanic mapping isolated spaces along coastlines became important port towns, new cities and important sites of trade and economic growth. Often this shift in the nature of the physical space caused a shift in the nature of the people occupying that space. A key principle of the colonial project is the mapping of spaces in order to claim ownership of said spaces, their people and their produce. This lead to rising tensions as a result of cultural globalisation and the emergence of capitalism. Colonisation lead to the subversion of indigenous class systems often through the insertion of a new group of people into a space who arrived as a part of an upper class trader community. This lead to indigenous coastal communities being defined as inferior and the idea of a stratified class system permeating through colonies and lingering in the collective consciousness of the colonised other for generations.
She was restless, like a castaway who imagines they’ve seen the prow of their ship coming over the horizon. ( Shahota,2015: 427)
As ships are one of the symbols closely associated with oceanic imagery, their presence or absence become symbolic of the potential for change, home or optimism. As many immigrants relocate by ship and as ships have been the vessels of trade and news for centuries their image has developed into a symbol of longing. In spaces of completely different cultural symbolism and currencies universal symbols such as ships, boats and other ocean faring vessels act as identifiers of change and travel for immigrants. Sahota’s metaphor of the ship coming over in the horizon in The Year of the Runaways acts as a description of the change the character is about to experience, because the ship is the vessel that brings immigrants to their new lives it is a metaphor for optimism and potential. The ship is a global oceanic metaphor that is symbolic of change and wealth.
The sea was calm, the sunset dingy. The ferry made its final crossing back from Vivekananda.( Sahota,2015:465)
The above passage is taken from the epilogue of The Year of the Runaways (by Sunjeev Sahota) and describes a moment when two characters happen to be upon what is previously described in the novel as a distant Indian coastline where the horizon is infinite. This space is a symbol of the expansiveness of home for those who have lived in isolation abroad. The coastal horizon is the opposite of the cityscapes, industrial landscapes and urban decay that surrounds immigrants when they move to places like London to find work and start new lives. The description of the calm sea acts as a metaphor for the lives of an immigrant who has returned to India, and a second generation immigrant who has travelled to India after years of a submissive and culturally abstract life in England. The notion that the ferry is making its final crossing describes a nautical knowledge and experience that transcends cultural references in a way that ethnicity can not.
‘I live in a small town by the sea, as I have all my life, though for the most of it it was by a warm green ocean a long way from here.’ (Gurnah, 2001: 2)
In conclusion, it can be argued that the sea in immigrant literature are important spaces that articulate the shared experiences of contemporary immigrant narratives. When a person leaves their home land the sea often becomes their mode of transportation as well as their new home. The ocean has become a symbol of home when immigrants find themselves in foreign lands. The imagery and experiences associated with oceanic migration have become symbols of both freedom and oppression and multiple experiences that fall between those polarities. The thematic patterns of oceanic imagery are symbolic of inherent mixed cultural spaces and speaks to the mixed influence of hydro-colonisation on people of coastal origins. It can be said that oceans and seas have for centuries acted as symbolic and environmental anchors for the cultural identities of those who have relocated in response to colonial forces.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Desai, G. (2010). Oceans Connect: The Indian Ocean and African Identities. PMLA, 125(3), pp713–720.
Gurnah, A. (2002). By the Sea. London: Bloomsbury.
Gosh, A. (1994) In an Antique Land. New York: Vintage Books.
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Sahota, S. (2015). The Year of the Runaways. London: Picador.
