Marginality Shatters Existence: An Existential Reading on Tahar Ben Jelloun’s The Pleasure Marriage

Abstract

The marginalisation of people based on caste, creed, gender, and race has been rooted in the past and continues in various forms. The realisation of the self and the true purpose of human existence compel individuals to transcend man-made divisions and assert their identity. The article analyses how questions of existence push racially discriminated black people to forge their path by revealing their inhibited existential freedom within the framework of existentialism. The article draws on characters from the novel The Pleasure Marriage by the famous Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun to reveal how the mind and consciousness function as tools through which humans search for the reason for their existence.