Cannibal Himalayas? Jamaica Kincaid’s Among Flowers: A Walk in the Himalaya.

Abstract

This paper examines Jamaica Kincaid’s Among Flowers: A Walk in the Himalaya through the lens of cannibalism. It shows how Kincaid uses the cannibal scene or cannibal talk by using the discourse a la Hulme of the absolute foreignness of the locale and the threat that the locale poses to the traveler’s life. Using Arens’ study as a guide, it shows how blood-sucking is a crucial aspect of cannibal talk illustrated in Kincaid’s text by the author’s encounter with the leeches. Obeyeskere’s study is used to argue that Kincaid’s mission to replicate and reconstruct the Christian Garden of Eden through her seed hunting in the Himalayas, and her “socialization” with figures such as Columbus and Cook resurrect the colonial dichotomy of garden and wilderness, thereby giving a second life to the discourse of savage cannibal native which was so rampant in European narratives of explorations. There is a brief presence of cannibal counter-memory through which Kincaid seeks to address her self-alienation by braiding her identity with the women from the Himalayas.

Keywords

• jamaica kincaid
• himalayas
• cannibalism