ABSTRACT: This paper takes up the concept of memory that is a capacity basic to human selfhood, and seeks to describe a common attitude to narration in writers in English from countries that have liberated themselves from a colonial past. The author maintains that memory is a central element in post‐colonial narrative, and shows how it is associated with two important domains of cognition and imagination—recall of childhood and awareness of exile. Examining the work of writers like Thomas Wolfe, Christopher Koch, Raja Rao and Albert Wendt, the author seeks to explicate the complexities of self‐representation in post‐colonial literature in relation to memory, childhood and exile. Copyright © 1990, Wiley Blackwell. All rights reserved

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