One night @ the call center

Hello reader,

This blog is my part of classroom activity on One night @ call center by Chetan Bhagat.

To show the worksheet of given task click here. 

 

 Que - 1:Comment on Narrative structure of the novel. Compare with that of Life of Pi.

Ans: In one night @ the call center we find that writer himself was travelling in train from Kanpur to Delhi. And then he meets a young girl, who tells him a story on condition of writing it as his second novel. He listens the story and story is told by Shyam – one of the characters of the novel. So here we find three layers of narration;

1) Entire story was author’s dream sequence

2) In train beautiful lady narrates the story of ‘one night @ the call center’ with her perspective.

3) Author maid narrator Shyam of his story, so third layer of the story was the perspective of the Shyam.

         chetan Bhagat makes very good use prologue and epilogue in his novel. In prologue, writer himself comes as character and talks with the reader. It looks like Bhagat is well aware bout the literary tradition of writing. Use of epilogue is also very interesting as much as prologue. Bhagat raise question that people cannot believe in this story so that lady gives alternative, element of God.

Competition with “Life of PI” by  Yann Martel.   

        There are many parallel/ similarities in Narrative technique of One Night @ The call center by Bhagat and "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel. For example, in beginning of both the novel we find the use of Prologue. Both the writer himself presents in the prologue how they got inspiration about writing their second novel. Both the writers meets person who tells them stories - a young lady in ON@tcc and an old man in Life of Pi. Both tell that you can meet the real people to collect more information.

Other parallel is Experience of God. There is not clarity about God, but rather it’s indicated and experienced. One can't say with surety that God is present or not.

        And one more point is First person Narration in both the novels- Shyam and Pi- narrator and protagonist in both the novels.

        And in the epilogue of both the novels alternative reading is given. When Japanese insurance agents listen the story of Pi, they are not ready to believe it. They say our company won’t believe this. So Pi tells another story replacing Animals with human beings. When Yann Martel asks what correct story is, Pi tells a story which I told you. But now it’s your story, you can write the way you wish. The same lines are also found in ON@tcc also. When Bhagat asks to that lady, people may not believe in story with the God's call. So the lady tells that you can replace the lines of God with Military uncle.So, this is the parallel in Narrative technique in both novels, which is quite interesting.  

 

Que – 2: What is popular literature? Is ON@tcc popular literature? Illustrate.

Ans. Popular Literature is literature that is enjoyed by a large mass of people.  Popular writing includes those writing intended for the mass and those that find favor with large audience. It can be distinguished from artistic literature in that it is designed primarily to entertain. Popular literature, unlike high literature, generally does not seek a high degree of formal beauty or subtlety and is not intended to endure. The growth of popular literature has paralleled the spread of literacy through education and has been facilitated by technological developments in printing. With the Industrial Revolution, works of literature, which were previously produced for consumption by small, well-educated elites, became accessible to large sections and even majorities of the members of a population.

One night at the call center as popular literature. 

ON@tcc can be considered as popular literature because it does not have proper plot structure, there is plot between love and break up-love of Shyam and Priyanka. It does not have that deep philosophy about life. And character blindly believing in god’s call. You do not require intellectual understanding after reading it. Plot follow simple story line like, love and breakup. All character has some kind of the problem with their family member. So it shows modern mind set of the people which Chetan Bhagat very well represented in his novel. So we can say that this novel is come in the category of popular literature.

Que – 3: What do you understand by self-help book. Is ON@tcc self-help book? Illustrate.

Ans: self-help book means that books who represent the realty of the time. Self-help book show the real image of the society and we also learn in the self-help book. With help of the self-help books readers solve their problem and also improve their self. Self-help book present the modern culture.

  

            In chetan Bhagat all book we see that he give one activity on one page, this page shows the self-help book most important Characteristics.

        In One Night @ the Call Center he gives activity like this:

        Before you begin this book, I have a small request. Right here, not down three things. Write down something that

1            1)You fear,

            2)Makes you angry and

                 3)You don’t like about yourself.

         

      Here we see that Chetan Bhagat gives one small exercise, in this exercise he asks some question, and that three questions about our personal thing. All three question about our own self. He ask like our fear, when we angry and do not like about our self. So these all things present that Chetan Bhagat saw that our self because we all have some dark side. Something we don’t like about ourselves, something that makes us angry and something we want to change about ourselves. The difference is how we choose to face it. Here Chetan Bhagat connects to us with all character, and say that how we handle this types of situation in our life, that depend on our self. So from this entire thing we can say that ON@TCC is self-help book.

Que – 4: How far can this novel be categorized as cyberpunk?

  

 Ans: This novel is known as cyberpunk novel because of we can find some technological elements in the work. And we can see it in the novel like use of mail, F.M., Bug, etc. So we can say it categorized as cyber punk novel. It is a postmodern science fiction genre noted for its focus on high tech and low life. In this novel we see that Vroom hacks Bakshi's email and writes email to Esah on his behalf and blackmail Bakshi and exhorted money from him to start new company with Shyam. So from this all element we can say that one night @ call center is a cyberpunk novel.