Uprootedness: Hanif Kureishi's Works and Postcolonial (Dis)Order

The book discusses Hanif Kureishi's early works in the context of postcolonial studies. The situation of the United Kingdom is analysed through the prism of colonial heritage. Hanif Kureishi, the son of a Pakistani father and an English mother, represents both ethnic groups and their views which is reflected in his works. The problems faced by Kureishi's protagonists concern numerous issues: tradition, homeland, religion and heritage. In their every-day struggle for identity the characters experience inferiority, hybridity, racism and depression evoked by the feeling of being constantly "in-between". Additionally, the postcolonial subjects living currently in the United Kingdom encounter typical problems of our civilization: endangered masculinity, emancipated, strong women, loneliness and marginalization.