Mahasweta Devi's The Breast Trilogy is a compilation of three short stories, 'Draupadi', 'Breast ... more Mahasweta Devi's The Breast Trilogy is a compilation of three short stories, 'Draupadi', 'Breast Giver' and 'Behind the Bodice', which were published under the title Breast Stories, translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Mahasweta finely weaves the stories with a common thread i.e. 'breast' but within each story this erotic object has multiple significances. Needless to mention, she never romanticizes the socio-libidinal theme in her writings. The present paper focuses various significances of this common erotic object underpinning a number of theoretical stances. In the story 'Draupadi', the protagonist is Draupadi, though she never uses this name with scriptural significance, rather she uses 'Dopdi'. She is a wanted criminal for the police as she leads a ferocious troop against the landlords, moneylenders , grain brokers, anonymous brothel keepers, ex-informants and so on. After being arrested by the police, she was gang raped by the police at night. In the morning when the guard comes to take her to the army chief, she tears her own clothes with her teeth and walking naked towards Senanayak, the leader of the operation, she asks " You can strip me, but how can you clothe me again? Are you a man? " At last, she pushes Senanayak with her two mangled breasts at which he becomes afraid to stand before an unarmed target. Thus, here 'breast' is a concept metaphor of state violence at the same time, a powerful weapon of revenge against the male atrocity and gender violence. In 'Brest Giver', Joshoda is a foster mother and breast giver to her Master's house and her breasts are the only means to manage food for her own family. In this story, Joshoda's reproduction turns to be labor which is the means to livelihood. In order to have milk all the time, she needs be giving birth to child, which in turn secures her job at the Master's house. The Marxist-Feminist idea that a woman's sexual reproduction cannot be fruitful labor in earning any value can thoroughly be critiqued through this story. Joshoda dies of mammal cancer and Mahasweta Devi looks her and her action of breast feeding as the myth of nation itself which will die of negligence. Thus, it turns to be an allegory of nationalism. In the story 'Behind the Bodice', Gangor's statuesque breasts become the object of an ace-photographer to be printed in the newspaper and consequently, Gangor is gang raped in the police custody. Thus, the supposed normality of sex i.e. 'breast' becomes the object of male violence.
Marginalized Sex in Mahesh Dattani’s Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai
Love, sexual desires, though related with instinctive behaviour, are controlled by the canons of morality. In the traditional Indian society, heterosexuality has been considered as the ‘norm’, an established gender related taboo and homosexuality has been shunned as ‘deviant, perversion and even criminal’ (Agarwal,2008, p. 46). Mahesh Dattani, the uncompromising dramatist in his two plays Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai boldly questions the homophobic Indian society and points out how the transgendered (though he retains the colloquial term, ‘hijra’) and the gay people are marginalized, victimized with social atrocities, and excluded into the periphery, though, no longer theirs is the subculture. The present paper focuses how the eunachs or the transgendered are stigmatized, treated as the ‘Other’ having no voice to speak for. As Subbu, the son of the Minister marries Kamala, an eunach, Mr. Sharma, the Minister connives with Salim, his bodyguard to murder Kamala and later on, he arranges a grand marriage ceremony for his son. The brutal murder was not reported in the newspapers, only Anarkali, another eunach who used to live with Kamala was arrested. All transgendered persons knew who was behind the murder but they can not speak as nobody will hear them. Thus, they are silenced. In another play, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai, Dattani shows how the traditional Indian societies through set behavioural patterns determine the established identity and the gay people like Kamlesh, Prakash (Ed), Bunny resort to hypocrisy and pretention. They frantically try to conform to the established sexual pattern in reorienting them but in turn highlights the insensitive Indian society which leads them to suffer from terrible identity crisis. Thus, the transgendered, the homosexuals are marginalized, even though their sexual inclination is a natural one.
Written in an epistolary form, Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger is an "autobiography of a halfbake... more Written in an epistolary form, Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger is an "autobiography of a halfbaked Indian", namely Balram Halwai who was born in Laxmangarh, a village of Gaya district. The novel is written in a seven parts letter by Balram himself to a Chinese premier, Wen Jiabao who is supposed to visit India. The novel unfolds Balram's past life in his native village as well as his successive journeys to various towns of India like Dhanbad, Delhi and finally to Bangalore experiencing India where corruption runs rampant, democracy is thwarted, election turns to be fraud and servitude and exploitation of semi-literate and illiterate people are confirmed. Embittered by various tortures, corruption and illegal actions of certain class of people, Balram Halwai, the white tiger of the novel murders his master Mr. Ashok in Delhi, grabs sevan hundred thousand money and comes to Bangalore, the hi-tech city of all prominence and becomes a successful entrepreneur. To him, India is not a homogeneous country. Rather, there are two Indias-one the rural sides with all bad and sad stories, the area of 'Darkness' and another is urban areas, a place of 'Light' with sky scrapers, shopping malls, palatial hotels. The present paper focuses that not only there is darkness in rural areas but also in the places of light and behind the ambitious, glimmering success myth of Balram there is much wickedness, immorality, heinous actions and faulty conceptions which can rip apart the overall social construction. Though neither the protagonist of the novel, nor the novelist himself seems to be aware of that and both are proud of such success myth, there remains a danger which will raise its obnoxious head by such successful twentieth century man like Balram Halwai.
In Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus, Victor Frankenstein, a young sc... more In Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus, Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist, assiduously accomplishes his animation project i.e. bestowing life to a human skeleton, the bones of which were collected from charnel houses and gives birth to a creature with gigantic stature, a 'monster' (the title Victor Frankenstein himself ascribes to it). Gradually, the creature performs one after another monstrous acts like killing William, Victor's brother; Justine Moritz, a cousin sister of Victor; Henry Clerval, the friend; Elizabeth, the newly married wife of Victor in her bridal chamber, and leaves Victor an eternal pursuer of him in the Polar Regions until his death. The paper seeks to study the alternating discourse within the narrative, which exposes the dichotomy between the monstrous nature of the 'creator' himself and the more humane instinctive drive of the 'creature', though traditionally, the latter is called a 'monster'. Engaging multiple points-of-view in the narrative, Mary Shelley problematizes the character of the creature, underpinning the steady progression of the creature to be more humane and the creator to be more inhuman.
Mahasweta Devi's After Kurukshetra is a collection of three stories, namely, The Five Women, Kunt... more Mahasweta Devi's After Kurukshetra is a collection of three stories, namely, The Five Women, Kunti and the Nishadin and Souvali. The ancient epic, Mahabharata as the source and the Kurukshetra war as the central motif, Mahasweta weaves the three stories critiquing the mainstream, patri-centred narrative. Conferring identities as well as voice to some women-folk-all marginalized, dispossessed and dalits, she offers some stories so long unheard, uncared, which highlight the sheer snobbery, illusion, destructive customs of the royal family, the rajavritta and its negligience for janavritta. The five peasant women folk in the story, The Five Women, having lost their husbands who were deployed in the Kurukshetra war as the foot-soldiers, sharply criticizes the glory and valorization of the 'dharmayuddha' which to them is a cold-blooded power game which claimed countless lives. Kunti is not a deified queen, rather bleeds within for her act of deserting her unacknowledged son, Karna in the story, Kunti and the Nishadin. She with her five Pandava sons is also accountable to kill a nishadin woman with her five sons for their own self-interest. The last story of the collection, Souvali, shows a vaisya dasi's anguish being deprieved of getting proper dignity of a wife, eventhough, she gives birth to Dhritarashtra's son. She flares up even to perform the last-rites for dead Dhritarashtra after the Kurukshetra war, who only used her youth and takes no responsibility. Instead of observing fast, she eats according to her will and does not care going to hell. She even remains nonchalant as to whether Krishna Dwaipayan Vyas would give her any place in his writing or not. Thus, the present paper focuses how Mahasweta reconstructs the popular Hindu epic to show, that even myth is politically controlled and motivated where the dominant class keeps the marginalized subservient, silenced.
The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they ... more The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they cannot love their own people nor are they loved in abroad. Thus, the sense of alienation, loss of identity, peace and homeliness crop up among the people of colonized land, who try to doff their own culture and don the colonizers' culture. Not only colonialism but also the global conflicts of religion, race and nationality also secure the same kind of experiences. The present paper focuses on the two novels, like V.S.Naipaul's The Mimic Men and Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss and throws some light upon this issue of depersonalization, alienation, loss of identity which thwarts the characters' dream of living in a better land than that of their own. Ralph Sing, born out of Indian heritage in the British dependent Caribbean island of Isabella leaves for London and experiences alienation, inferiority complex and discovers that his flight to London From Isabella was a flight to more disorder. After a temporary returning to his native Island and leading a politician's life, he once again comes to London and in a hotel room tries to write a diary about these disordered experiences only to give order. He spends a life of recluse and bears utter failure. In Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss, Jemubhai also leaves for London with a hatred for Indians and envies for the British. He experiences not only hatred for his skin color and distinct accent but also in returning he lives totally alone with his memory in Kalimpong. History repeats itself; for misconceived notion, false idealism people suffer from generation to generation. The sense of 'loss' which Jemubhai is suffering, goes to his descendent, his granddaughter Sai when the latter is jilted in love affair with her mathematics teacher, Gyan because of the Gorkha National Liberation Front. Almost all the characters suffer from this sense of 'loss'-it is loss of identity, peace, homeliness. The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they can love their own people nor are they loved in abroad. Thus, the sense of alienation, loss of identity, peace and homeliness crop up among the people of colonized land, who try to doff their own culture and don the colonizers' culture. Not only colonialism but also the global conflicts of religion, race and nationality also secure the same kind of experiences.
Mahasweta Devi's The Breast Trilogy is a compilation of three short stories, 'Draupadi', 'Breast ... more Mahasweta Devi's The Breast Trilogy is a compilation of three short stories, 'Draupadi', 'Breast Giver' and 'Behind the Bodice', which were published under the title Breast Stories, translated by Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Mahasweta finely weaves the stories with a common thread i.e. 'breast' but within each story this erotic object has multiple significances. Needless to mention, she never romanticizes the socio-libidinal theme in her writings. The present paper focuses various significances of this common erotic object underpinning a number of theoretical stances. In the story 'Draupadi', the protagonist is Draupadi, though she never uses this name with scriptural significance, rather she uses 'Dopdi'. She is a wanted criminal for the police as she leads a ferocious troop against the landlords, moneylenders , grain brokers, anonymous brothel keepers, ex-informants and so on. After being arrested by the police, she was gang raped by the police at night. In the morning when the guard comes to take her to the army chief, she tears her own clothes with her teeth and walking naked towards Senanayak, the leader of the operation, she asks " You can strip me, but how can you clothe me again? Are you a man? " At last, she pushes Senanayak with her two mangled breasts at which he becomes afraid to stand before an unarmed target. Thus, here 'breast' is a concept metaphor of state violence at the same time, a powerful weapon of revenge against the male atrocity and gender violence. In 'Brest Giver', Joshoda is a foster mother and breast giver to her Master's house and her breasts are the only means to manage food for her own family. In this story, Joshoda's reproduction turns to be labor which is the means to livelihood. In order to have milk all the time, she needs be giving birth to child, which in turn secures her job at the Master's house. The Marxist-Feminist idea that a woman's sexual reproduction cannot be fruitful labor in earning any value can thoroughly be critiqued through this story. Joshoda dies of mammal cancer and Mahasweta Devi looks her and her action of breast feeding as the myth of nation itself which will die of negligence. Thus, it turns to be an allegory of nationalism. In the story 'Behind the Bodice', Gangor's statuesque breasts become the object of an ace-photographer to be printed in the newspaper and consequently, Gangor is gang raped in the police custody. Thus, the supposed normality of sex i.e. 'breast' becomes the object of male violence.
Marginalized Sex in Mahesh Dattani’s Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai
Love, sexual desires, though related with instinctive behaviour, are controlled by the canons of morality. In the traditional Indian society, heterosexuality has been considered as the ‘norm’, an established gender related taboo and homosexuality has been shunned as ‘deviant, perversion and even criminal’ (Agarwal,2008, p. 46). Mahesh Dattani, the uncompromising dramatist in his two plays Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai boldly questions the homophobic Indian society and points out how the transgendered (though he retains the colloquial term, ‘hijra’) and the gay people are marginalized, victimized with social atrocities, and excluded into the periphery, though, no longer theirs is the subculture. The present paper focuses how the eunachs or the transgendered are stigmatized, treated as the ‘Other’ having no voice to speak for. As Subbu, the son of the Minister marries Kamala, an eunach, Mr. Sharma, the Minister connives with Salim, his bodyguard to murder Kamala and later on, he arranges a grand marriage ceremony for his son. The brutal murder was not reported in the newspapers, only Anarkali, another eunach who used to live with Kamala was arrested. All transgendered persons knew who was behind the murder but they can not speak as nobody will hear them. Thus, they are silenced. In another play, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai, Dattani shows how the traditional Indian societies through set behavioural patterns determine the established identity and the gay people like Kamlesh, Prakash (Ed), Bunny resort to hypocrisy and pretention. They frantically try to conform to the established sexual pattern in reorienting them but in turn highlights the insensitive Indian society which leads them to suffer from terrible identity crisis. Thus, the transgendered, the homosexuals are marginalized, even though their sexual inclination is a natural one.
Written in an epistolary form, Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger is an "autobiography of a halfbake... more Written in an epistolary form, Aravind Adiga's The White Tiger is an "autobiography of a halfbaked Indian", namely Balram Halwai who was born in Laxmangarh, a village of Gaya district. The novel is written in a seven parts letter by Balram himself to a Chinese premier, Wen Jiabao who is supposed to visit India. The novel unfolds Balram's past life in his native village as well as his successive journeys to various towns of India like Dhanbad, Delhi and finally to Bangalore experiencing India where corruption runs rampant, democracy is thwarted, election turns to be fraud and servitude and exploitation of semi-literate and illiterate people are confirmed. Embittered by various tortures, corruption and illegal actions of certain class of people, Balram Halwai, the white tiger of the novel murders his master Mr. Ashok in Delhi, grabs sevan hundred thousand money and comes to Bangalore, the hi-tech city of all prominence and becomes a successful entrepreneur. To him, India is not a homogeneous country. Rather, there are two Indias-one the rural sides with all bad and sad stories, the area of 'Darkness' and another is urban areas, a place of 'Light' with sky scrapers, shopping malls, palatial hotels. The present paper focuses that not only there is darkness in rural areas but also in the places of light and behind the ambitious, glimmering success myth of Balram there is much wickedness, immorality, heinous actions and faulty conceptions which can rip apart the overall social construction. Though neither the protagonist of the novel, nor the novelist himself seems to be aware of that and both are proud of such success myth, there remains a danger which will raise its obnoxious head by such successful twentieth century man like Balram Halwai.
In Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus, Victor Frankenstein, a young sc... more In Mary Shelley's novel, Frankenstein; Or, the Modern Prometheus, Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist, assiduously accomplishes his animation project i.e. bestowing life to a human skeleton, the bones of which were collected from charnel houses and gives birth to a creature with gigantic stature, a 'monster' (the title Victor Frankenstein himself ascribes to it). Gradually, the creature performs one after another monstrous acts like killing William, Victor's brother; Justine Moritz, a cousin sister of Victor; Henry Clerval, the friend; Elizabeth, the newly married wife of Victor in her bridal chamber, and leaves Victor an eternal pursuer of him in the Polar Regions until his death. The paper seeks to study the alternating discourse within the narrative, which exposes the dichotomy between the monstrous nature of the 'creator' himself and the more humane instinctive drive of the 'creature', though traditionally, the latter is called a 'monster'. Engaging multiple points-of-view in the narrative, Mary Shelley problematizes the character of the creature, underpinning the steady progression of the creature to be more humane and the creator to be more inhuman.
Mahasweta Devi's After Kurukshetra is a collection of three stories, namely, The Five Women, Kunt... more Mahasweta Devi's After Kurukshetra is a collection of three stories, namely, The Five Women, Kunti and the Nishadin and Souvali. The ancient epic, Mahabharata as the source and the Kurukshetra war as the central motif, Mahasweta weaves the three stories critiquing the mainstream, patri-centred narrative. Conferring identities as well as voice to some women-folk-all marginalized, dispossessed and dalits, she offers some stories so long unheard, uncared, which highlight the sheer snobbery, illusion, destructive customs of the royal family, the rajavritta and its negligience for janavritta. The five peasant women folk in the story, The Five Women, having lost their husbands who were deployed in the Kurukshetra war as the foot-soldiers, sharply criticizes the glory and valorization of the 'dharmayuddha' which to them is a cold-blooded power game which claimed countless lives. Kunti is not a deified queen, rather bleeds within for her act of deserting her unacknowledged son, Karna in the story, Kunti and the Nishadin. She with her five Pandava sons is also accountable to kill a nishadin woman with her five sons for their own self-interest. The last story of the collection, Souvali, shows a vaisya dasi's anguish being deprieved of getting proper dignity of a wife, eventhough, she gives birth to Dhritarashtra's son. She flares up even to perform the last-rites for dead Dhritarashtra after the Kurukshetra war, who only used her youth and takes no responsibility. Instead of observing fast, she eats according to her will and does not care going to hell. She even remains nonchalant as to whether Krishna Dwaipayan Vyas would give her any place in his writing or not. Thus, the present paper focuses how Mahasweta reconstructs the popular Hindu epic to show, that even myth is politically controlled and motivated where the dominant class keeps the marginalized subservient, silenced.
The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they ... more The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they cannot love their own people nor are they loved in abroad. Thus, the sense of alienation, loss of identity, peace and homeliness crop up among the people of colonized land, who try to doff their own culture and don the colonizers' culture. Not only colonialism but also the global conflicts of religion, race and nationality also secure the same kind of experiences. The present paper focuses on the two novels, like V.S.Naipaul's The Mimic Men and Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss and throws some light upon this issue of depersonalization, alienation, loss of identity which thwarts the characters' dream of living in a better land than that of their own. Ralph Sing, born out of Indian heritage in the British dependent Caribbean island of Isabella leaves for London and experiences alienation, inferiority complex and discovers that his flight to London From Isabella was a flight to more disorder. After a temporary returning to his native Island and leading a politician's life, he once again comes to London and in a hotel room tries to write a diary about these disordered experiences only to give order. He spends a life of recluse and bears utter failure. In Kiran Desai's The Inheritance of Loss, Jemubhai also leaves for London with a hatred for Indians and envies for the British. He experiences not only hatred for his skin color and distinct accent but also in returning he lives totally alone with his memory in Kalimpong. History repeats itself; for misconceived notion, false idealism people suffer from generation to generation. The sense of 'loss' which Jemubhai is suffering, goes to his descendent, his granddaughter Sai when the latter is jilted in love affair with her mathematics teacher, Gyan because of the Gorkha National Liberation Front. Almost all the characters suffer from this sense of 'loss'-it is loss of identity, peace, homeliness. The emptiness and hollowness of colonialism leaves people into an ambivalent stage. Neither they can love their own people nor are they loved in abroad. Thus, the sense of alienation, loss of identity, peace and homeliness crop up among the people of colonized land, who try to doff their own culture and don the colonizers' culture. Not only colonialism but also the global conflicts of religion, race and nationality also secure the same kind of experiences.
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Papers by SOVAN TRIPATHY
Marginalized Sex in Mahesh Dattani’s Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai
Love, sexual desires, though related with instinctive behaviour, are controlled by the canons of morality. In the traditional Indian society, heterosexuality has been considered as the ‘norm’, an established gender related taboo and homosexuality has been shunned as ‘deviant, perversion and even criminal’ (Agarwal,2008, p. 46). Mahesh Dattani, the uncompromising dramatist in his two plays Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai boldly questions the homophobic Indian society and points out how the transgendered (though he retains the colloquial term, ‘hijra’) and the gay people are marginalized, victimized with social atrocities, and excluded into the periphery, though, no longer theirs is the subculture. The present paper focuses how the eunachs or the transgendered are stigmatized, treated as the ‘Other’ having no voice to speak for. As Subbu, the son of the Minister marries Kamala, an eunach, Mr. Sharma, the Minister connives with Salim, his bodyguard to murder Kamala and later on, he arranges a grand marriage ceremony for his son. The brutal murder was not reported in the newspapers, only Anarkali, another eunach who used to live with Kamala was arrested. All transgendered persons knew who was behind the murder but they can not speak as nobody will hear them. Thus, they are silenced. In another play, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai, Dattani shows how the traditional Indian societies through set behavioural patterns determine the established identity and the gay people like Kamlesh, Prakash (Ed), Bunny resort to hypocrisy and pretention. They frantically try to conform to the established sexual pattern in reorienting them but in turn highlights the insensitive Indian society which leads them to suffer from terrible identity crisis. Thus, the transgendered, the homosexuals are marginalized, even though their sexual inclination is a natural one.
Keywords: Transgendered, Pervert, Homophobic, gay, identity crisis
Marginalized Sex in Mahesh Dattani’s Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai
Love, sexual desires, though related with instinctive behaviour, are controlled by the canons of morality. In the traditional Indian society, heterosexuality has been considered as the ‘norm’, an established gender related taboo and homosexuality has been shunned as ‘deviant, perversion and even criminal’ (Agarwal,2008, p. 46). Mahesh Dattani, the uncompromising dramatist in his two plays Seven Steps Around the Fire and On a Muggy Night in Mumbai boldly questions the homophobic Indian society and points out how the transgendered (though he retains the colloquial term, ‘hijra’) and the gay people are marginalized, victimized with social atrocities, and excluded into the periphery, though, no longer theirs is the subculture. The present paper focuses how the eunachs or the transgendered are stigmatized, treated as the ‘Other’ having no voice to speak for. As Subbu, the son of the Minister marries Kamala, an eunach, Mr. Sharma, the Minister connives with Salim, his bodyguard to murder Kamala and later on, he arranges a grand marriage ceremony for his son. The brutal murder was not reported in the newspapers, only Anarkali, another eunach who used to live with Kamala was arrested. All transgendered persons knew who was behind the murder but they can not speak as nobody will hear them. Thus, they are silenced. In another play, On a Muggy Night in Mumbai, Dattani shows how the traditional Indian societies through set behavioural patterns determine the established identity and the gay people like Kamlesh, Prakash (Ed), Bunny resort to hypocrisy and pretention. They frantically try to conform to the established sexual pattern in reorienting them but in turn highlights the insensitive Indian society which leads them to suffer from terrible identity crisis. Thus, the transgendered, the homosexuals are marginalized, even though their sexual inclination is a natural one.
Keywords: Transgendered, Pervert, Homophobic, gay, identity crisis