Can a subject be sovereign in a hegemony? Can creativity be reined in by forces of empire? Studying closely the oral narrations and writings of four Indian authors in colonial India, The Audacious Raconteur argues that even the most hegemonic circumstances cannot suppress audacious raconteurs, skilled narrators who fashion narrative spaces that allow them to remain sovereign and beyond subjugation.

By drawing attention to the vigorous orality, the maverick use of photography, literary ventriloquism, and bilingualism in the narratives of these raconteurs, Leela Prasad shows how the ideological bulwark of colonialism formed by concepts of colonial modernity, history, science, and native knowledge is dismantled. Audacious raconteurs wrested back meanings of religion, culture and history that were closer to their lived understandings. The figure of the audacious raconteur does not only hover in an archive but suffuses everyday life. Underlying it all, the personal interactions with the descendants of narrators that Prasad tracked down give weight to her innovative argument that the audacious raconteur is a necessary ethical and artistic figure in human experience.

Thanks to generous funding from Duke University, the ebook editions of this book are available as Open Access volumes from Cornell Open (cornellopen.org) and other repositories.