EStrangement of Dog

Textual Deconstuctional Reading On Chinua Achebe's work 'How the Leopard Got His Claws'

Abstract

                                                                                                            Abstract

                                 Estrangement of Dog: Textual Deconstructive Reading on Chinua Achebe’s ‘How the Leopard Got His Claws’

       Deconstruction is a critical approach or strategy of reading that seeks to dismantle, destroy and subvert any not in that a text. The present paper aims at a deconstructive reading of the children book ‘’how the Leopard Got His Claws’ in order to highlight the contradictions and the conflicts in the subtext that are concealed by the surface text. The paper targets to bring out the sufferings faced by the Dog due to his appearance which is different from other animals and his refusal for the capitalized plan of the king of the forest. It aims to ignite the light on the readers’ notion from the exterior view of doing good and doing harm to the interior level not enquiring why they are doing so. In addition, it is to encounter the positive state of mind in the apparent villain and the negative state of the apparent hero of this postcolonial work of Chinua Achebe. Following Derrida’s concept of deconstruction, “to make the not seen accessible to sight”. This paper brings to light the unperceived and hidden concepts in the subtext of the children book.

Key words: Deconstruction, Postcolonial work, capitalized attitude, interior level, state of mind, hidden concepts.