Does the Subaltern Speak? Narrative mediation and the politics of representation in Tagore’s ‘Kabuliwala’

Subaltern Studies has significantly shaped postcolonial literary and critical discourses; however, existing scholarship on ‘Kabuliwala’ has largely focused on its humanist concerns, particularly its portrayal of cross-cultural empathy and universal parental affection, while paying comparatively little attention to the ways in which the protagonist is represented in the narrative. As a result, the narrator’s role in mediating and regulating the conditions of the Kabuliwala’s visibility remains insufficiently examined. Drawing on Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak’s distinction between vertreten and darstellen, this study examines how the narrator mediates the Kabuliwala’s identity and subjectivity through acts of ‘speaking for’ and ‘re-presenting’ the represented Other. It argues that the protagonist is made intelligible primarily through the narrator’s representational authority rather than through sustained self-representation. The analysis reveals that the Kabuliwala’s voice, visibility, and intelligibility are shaped by an unequal distribution of narrative authority that determines the terms through which he is represented and understood. Although the protagonist is granted moments of speech and self-expression, these remain constrained and mediated by the narrative structure. By foregrounding narrative mediation as a site of representational power, the study revisits conventional humanist interpretations of ‘Kabuliwala’ and demonstrates how colonial narratives can render subaltern subjects visible through dominant representational frameworks while simultaneously limiting their opportunities for self-representation.