Anita and Me

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Anita and Me is Meera Syal's first novel , published by Flamingo in 1996. The novel won the Betty Trask Award in 1996 and was made into a film in 2002. A German translation is not yet available.

In 2004 and 2005, the novel became the subject of the UK General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) exam .

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In the novel, Meena Kumar, the daughter of Indian immigrants who was born in England, recounts her childhood in Tollington, a (fictional) former mining village near Wolverhampton in the West English Midlands, and her friendship with Anita, who is a few years her senior.

The action, which spans about two years from 1972, begins on the day that Anita Meena, whom Meena has long admired, and ends on the day that Meena's family moves away from Tollington and so that everyone breaks off contact with Anita. The development of the friendship between Meena and Anita thus forms a red thread that runs through the plot of the novel and marks important stages.

The actual main themes of the novel, however, besides the relationship between the girls, are on the one hand the learning process that Meena goes through and on the other hand the life of Indian immigrants in England in the 1970s. Meena, a very lively and imaginative girl (who doesn't take the truth too seriously), learns a lot over time about supposed and real friendships, about growing up and about her own identity.

In addition, the reader gets an insight into the world of an Indian family. Meena, who crosses the border between cultures, knows both the rituals of her own family and those of her white neighbors, has a keen eye for the differences and the misunderstandings that they cause. Some of the misunderstandings are harmless and give rise to comedy, but some of Meena's observations also have a strong political content - for example, when she sees some of the village youth transform into skinheads and before her eyes calling for a country free of foreigners.

literature

  • Rocío G. Davis: India in Britain: Myths of Childhood in Meera Syal's Anita and Me . 1999.