Main Article Content
Abstract
From the ancient times, sacred books of literature in Sanskrit and regional languages reflect India as multilingual, multireligious and multicultural nation. In our myth and religion land has been represented as a place to inhabit. In modern context, with migration from one place to another, land has also become a source to describe dislocation, alienation and suffering. It is the life of multitudes of individuals and societies that collectively forms the dominant ethos of an era and finds due expression in various forms of art. The art of fiction lies in the way it savours of humanity in whatever age it is written. Indian English novel, a sibling of its western counterpart was in its early stages influenced by the western art form of the novel. In the later phase of the twentieth century a new term Post-Colonial Literature came into literary jargon. With the advent of the new millennium it has been witnessed that young authors are dabbling in commercial or popular fiction and setting new benchmarks for bestsellers. Chetan Bhagat is one of those new-age Indian novelists who have redefined the concept of bestsellers in India. There are several parameters of computing the bestseller quotient. Applying the theoretical paradigms of popular literature versus high art to the fiction of Chetan Bhagat reveals that the author is a highly successful story teller as all his novels in a row have far exceeded the benchmark of a bestseller.