Afterword

The afterword situates the essays and arguments of the book within the broader field of Cold War Literary Studies. It notes that this collection of essays complicates the simplistic parcelling of Third World print culture into antagonistic, ready-made spheres of influence, with writers from the decolonizing regions pledging allegiance to one ideological bloc or expressing unequivocal preference for one aesthetic doctrine. Without denying or negating the real ideological pressures faced by Third World intellectuals, this volume suggests that intellectuals in the decolonizing world pursued their own agendas with more success than a straightforward conspiracy narrative would suggest. The Afterword also draws attention to non-state initiatives like Présence Africaine and, through the example of the Indonesian writer Pramoedya Ananta Toer, the pressure on Third World intellectuals by their own authoritarian states.