Reflecting on the “compelling presence” (2) of characters with disabilities in postcolonial literature, Christopher Krentz proclaims in Elusive Kinship: Disability and Human Rights in Postcolonial Literature that “disability is finally on the world’s agenda” (11). Despite there being over half a billion people with disabilities living in the Global South, they have been largely neglected when it comes to social, political, and scholarly awareness. Postcolonial literature provides a “corrective” (2) for this absence, argues Krentz, restoring the dignity of people with disabilities through depictions of “human, relatable, and exciting” (5) disabled characters in and from the Global South. Such literary works, he argues, both reflect and inform the progress that has been made in disability rights since the mid-twentieth century.
Recognizing the parallel growth of postcolonial literature and global human rights, Krentz traces how literary works published after the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights potentially informed future rights instruments,...