Histographic Metafiction and Political Pastiche in Muhammad Hanif’s “A Case of Exploding Mangoes”: Rewriting National History through Satire s

Abstract

This study investigates the relationship of historiographic metafiction and political pastiche in Mohammed Hanif’s A Case of Exploding Mangoes (2008), examining how the novel reconstructs historical memory, interrogates authoritarian power, and destabilizes official narratives of Pakistani history. Situated within postmodern literary discourse, the research employs a qualitative interpretive methodology grounded in textual analysis, thematic coding, and content analysis. Drawing primarily on Linda Hutcheon’s concept of historiographic metafiction and Fredric Jameson’s theorization of pastiche, the study analyzes selected narrative episodes, stylistic patterns, and discursive structures to explore the relationship between fiction, history, and political representation. The findings reveal that Hanif systematically blurs the boundaries between historical fact and imaginative reconstruction through self-reflexive narration, narrative fragmentation, competing versions of truth, and the strategic use of irony. Metafictional techniques expose the constructed nature of both literary narratives and official historical records, encouraging readers to question the authority of state-sponsored histories. Simultaneously, political pastiche operates through the hybridization of military discourse, bureaucratic documentation, intelligence reports, political rhetoric, religious language, detective fiction, satire, and popular culture, producing a multilayered critique of dictatorship, ideological manipulation, and geopolitical power structures. The novel transforms the historical event of General Zia-ul-Haq’s death into a contested narrative space where truth remains unstable and subject to competing interpretations. The study further demonstrates that the convergence of metafiction and pastiche functions as a postcolonial strategy of resistance, enabling the recovery of marginalized voices and alternative historical memories suppressed by authoritarian regimes. Rather than merely parodying historical events, Hanif reconstructs cultural memory through narrative disruption, exposing the mechanisms through which power manufactures legitimacy, controls public discourse, and shapes collective consciousness. The research contributes to contemporary scholarship by integrating historiographic metafiction and political pastiche within a single analytical framework, revealing how postmodern narrative techniques can serve as powerful instruments for historical revision, political critique, and cultural resistance. Ultimately, A Case of Exploding Mangoes emerges as a significant postcolonial text that re-imagines history not as a fixed record of the past but as a dynamic site of ideological contestation and narrative negotiation.

Keywords: Historiographic Metafiction; Political Pastiche; Postmodernism; Mohammed Hanif; A Case of Exploding Mangoes; Historical Reconstruction; Political Satire; Narrative Fragmentation; Postcolonial Literature; Cultural Memory.