" Feminine sensibility in the novels of Kamala Markandaya "

Feminist Literary criticism is broad and varied. It is a literary criticism based on feministic theory. It focuses on two thingswomen"s condition within literature and the exclusion of women from the literary canon. Lisa Tuttle has defined feminist theory as asking "new questions of old texts." She cites the goals of feminist criticism as:

Nothing is more constant than change. Life, being a dynamic subject, is consistently witness to changes, as old theories periodically tend to get discarded and new ideas incessantly pop up. We are living in very interesting times. The ‘new woman’ is inclined to renounce the old realism. She does not want to acknowledge the existing proclamations. Rather, she is striving after that underlying truth which is behind the veiled norms and traditions. In Indian society, where Sita has been accepted as an ideal ‘role-model’ since the days of her inception as she has suffered incarnate and yet never protested, the modern Indian woman looks towards the history of west for a realistic option. She observes that queen Elizabeth was an outstanding woman, both in rank and establishment and manifested significant intellectual curiosity and aptitude for knowledge from an early age. But Roger Ascham gave an extraordinary compliment about the queen while describing her ardent love for learning and aesthetics and the best kind of literature that “Elizabeth had a brilliant brain that was as good as a man’s” (qtd. in King 66), which corroborates that even a queen was not respected as a ‘woman’ and being a woman became a disability for Elizabeth “that had to be suffered as best it could” (qtd. in King 66). Such cultural, economic and educational discriminations within patriarchal society “hindered or prevented women from realizing their productive and creative possibilities” (24) remarked Virginia Woolf, an important precursor in feminist criticism. She protested while submitting this acrid truth about women, “imaginatively she is of the highest importance. Practically, she is completely insignificant. . . ” (Woolf 26). This profound thought which challenged the derogatory stereotypes of women in literary works and condemned the prevailing concepts of gender discrimination was propagated by quintessential modern feminist approaches to literary criticism

isara solutions, 2020

Kamala Das (1934), is an Indian poet, novelist, short story writer. Her popularity in Kerala is based chiefly on her short stories and autobiography, while her oeuvre in English, written under the name Kamala Das, is noted for the poems and explicit autobiography. She was also a widely read columnist and wrote on diverse topics including women's issues, child care, politics among others. Her open and honest treatment of female sexuality, free from any sense of guilt, infused her writing with power and she got hope after freedom, but also marked her as an iconoclast in her generation. As Kamala Das is known that feminism is the advocacy of woman’s rights on the ground of the equality of the sexes. The various feminisms, however, share certain assumptions and concepts that underlie the diverse ways that individual critics explore the factor of sexual difference and privilege in the production, the form and content, the reception and the critical analysis and evaluation of works of literature: The basic view is that Western civilization is pervasively patriarchal (ruled by the father)- that is, it is male centered and controlled and is organized and conducted in such a way as to subordinate women to men in all cultural domains : familial, religious, political, economic, social, legal and artistic. As Kamala Das is known for its extreme frankness in its nature of writing which encompasses all her sufferings and grievances, this present paper will traces out this feminine sensibility in her poetry with special references to her poems- An Introduction, Summer in Calcutta, My Story and The Sunshine Cat.

2012

Indian writing in English is a relatively-recent phenomena, as far as literature goes. Though one can trace such writers in India to a century back, Indian writing in English has come into force only in the last couple of decades or so. Some of these writers have achieved worldwide fame, some national, and others perhaps have to be content with a more constricted circle. The very definition of the adjective Indian here is hazy. Many of these writers neither live in India, nor are Indian citizens. To get around this haziness, I will cast my net as wide as possible and include all those writers who are related to India be it by origin, or the subject of their writings—whether they admit it or not, whether they like it or not!Indian women novelists have been portraying women in various manifestations. But recently, the remarkable range of India’s most accomplished women writers of post colonial strand has brought a tremendous change in the trend of depicting women characters. Women wri...

Ars Artium, 2014

For decades, women have been moulded, marginalised and victimised by the maledominated society in India. Termed as the 'Weaker Sex' they have been denied social, economic and political justice. However, the mid-twentieth century saw many changes in the history of India thus bringing about a change in the status of women in general. Literature being the reflection of society, this changing face of women has been portrayed by some of the women novelists. Kamala Markandaya is one such name that fully reflects this awakened feminine sensibility in the changing Indian traditional society. Her female characters though drawn from different rungs of society have a common thread prevailing in them. All her women characters refuse to lose hope. They are all bent to meet the challenges of life no matter how gloomy the economic, social and political scenario is. Nalini in A Handful of Rice (1966) and Rukmani in Nectar in a Sieve (1954), both represent the unprivileged women in rural India whereas Sarojini in A Silence of Desire (1960) is a typical middle-class Hindu housewife. Though these women belong to the different strata of society yet their stoicism in confronting problems brought about either by unjust social system or destiny is no different from each other. My paper will talk about the new face of these women through Kamala Markandaya's Rukmani and Ira in Nectar in a Sieve.

This paper attempts to explore the Portrayal of women in some of the works of Anita Desai, Shashi Deshpande and Nayantara Sahgal. The quest for identity and freedom has become dominant themes in literature. It unfolds the problems of women in the patriarchal society in a very positive way. These writers brings out the alienation, anxiety, insecurity, fear her marital familiar and social relation, sufferings and exploitation and struggle for new identity. These writers brings the familiar problems faced by women in the society and her own family. Their trauma over the situation of being dependent and suffering without expressing it to others. The inner strength of the women has been observed clearly. Most of the female novelists are known for their bold views that are reflected in their novels. They focus principally on the psychological searching of inner mind of women. These writers being women enter deep into the inner mind of the depressed women by virtue of their feminine sensibility and psychological insight and bring to light their issues, which are the outcome of Indian women's psychological and emotional imbalances of the society.

The family in India, during the last few decades, has been under a process of social change, thus substantially affecting the various relationships in a family unit. There is a conspicuous change in the spheres of roles and values. Due to growing enlightenment and movement for women's emancipation, socio economic conditions have changed and so have the patriarchal attitudes to gender. Literature plays an important role in raising the readers' consciousness by providing a glimpse into female psyche with the full range of female experience. Indian writers, in their works, present an image of women which is totally different from the image of the past. This paper aims at analyzing the self effacing nature of Kamala Markandaya's female character in her novel Nectar in a Sieve. The character though passive, teaches the divinity of womanhood to the modern women who are gripped under Western influence, totally neglecting their duties towards their families.

International Journal of Humanities in Technical Education, 2020

This paper attempts to examine the issues of feminism in India and the position of women in the Indian society in the light of Kamala Das’s poetry. Post-Independence, Indian women writers have exhibited a strong sense of freedom and self-dependence of thought and action in their works. Kamala Das’s poetry is a symbol of reliance, intellectual freedom and empowerment of Indian women. This is an endeavour to analyse how Kamala Das redefines womanhood in her poetry through the use of concrete imagery, symbols and her crisp and novel ideas about women, their position in a male-dominated Indian society and many other issues surrounding her and many other women of the country. Key-words: Feminism, Womanhood, Kamala Das, Poetry, Indian Writing in English.

If the twentieth century afforded great change due to wars and decolonization, a great deal of the twenty-first century’s upheaval comes from globalization and technology on one hand and a new kind of warfare labelled terrorism on the other. The purpose of the research is to examine against the backdrop of this development, to what extent the image or construct of a woman has changed in India for readers, particularly by studying the way it has been depicted in the writing of Indian women authors. The fact that recently these authors have received international acclaim in the form of awards makes it even more important to understand how readers all over the world and India perceive the image of an Indian woman. In short how are Indian women being positioned? The texts studied are: The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri, who is a second generation immigrant; The Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai, a first generation immigrant; Ladies Coupé by Anita Nair and Difficult Daughters by Manju Kapur, both of whom are Indian nationals residing in India with a certain amount of western education, the latter being a ‘traditional’ intellectual. The last chapter deals with the ‘organic’ intellectual focussing particularly on two contrasting short stories—“The Hunt” and “Statue” by Mahasweta Devi. However, to substantiate the hypothesis and for the purposes of comparison, the study also takes a brief look at other novels by Arundhati Roy, Sudha Murty, Lalithambika Antherjanam, Sharmila Rege, Baby Halder and P. Sivakami, keeping in mind that many of these works are translations. The approach adopted is a close reading of the texts focussing on the female characters, themes and attitudes. On this basis, the theoretical approach adopted is the writer’s interpretation of Hegel’s master-slave dialectics and Fanon’s reinterpretation of the same, Freud’s love-hate binaries, Gramsci’s differentiation between the ‘traditional’ intellectual and ‘organic’ intellectual and Spivak’s vision regarding the role of the humanities. According to Hegel, consciousness does not exist in isolation but is always dependent on another for a sense of selfhood. As there is injustice and an imbalance of power in this world, the two consciousnesses engaged with each other will assume the roles of master and slave with respect to each other. The injustice inevitably results in a struggle for selfhood on the part of the slave; one way this selfhood can be attained is through recognition of the slave’s labour. A defining emotion in this relationship is fear and it is only by overcoming fear that the slave can break free. The ultimate fear is that of death. In addition to the instinct for domination, Freud does not see the true self as one entity but as in Marx, it is a balance between contradictory forces and in this case the dialectic is between Eros—the love instinct, and Thanatos—the death one. For Antonio Gramsci, a solution or an instrument of change is the ‘organic’ intellectual. The purpose of an intellectual is not to be “specialised” but to become “directive” that is one who is political and driven to bring about change. However, in the face of globalization and the crisis that it brings with inequality, war and terrorism, according to Spivak, hope is available through education in the humanities, for it is through the humanities that one can bring about “the empowerment of an informed imagination” (Spivak, “Righting Wrongs” 2). The aim of the research is to try and understand whether western education helps to envision a new-age woman, whom this study defines as self-reliant, able to question roles and norms society has set for her, thinks independently and uses her own free will to choose to live life for herself rather than be subservient to the needs of her husband and family, or is this education an impediment. Thus in addition to intellectual and economic independence, she must be emotionally independent as well. It must be stressed that this concept of new-age is an ideal which is strived for but never actualized because it is dynamic and constantly changing over space and time. Also one must be wary of the tendency to generalize women who vary on the basis of geography, race, economics, caste and so on. The thesis statement explored is that although in some cases western educated Indian women may ostensibly live more liberated lives, the characters or images of women in the novels by the selected writers are more circumscribed as women. Another concern of the study is the difference between lived and written reality. A questionnaire based on the movie The Namesake taken by a community of informed readers in Pune indicated that in reality the image of the woman may have changed on the page but not in the minds of women and hence paradoxically in reality the concept of ‘new-age’ is a myth. The key women protagonists analysed are Ashima and Moushumi from The Namesake; Sai, her grandmother Nimi and her mother along with Noni and Lola in The Inheritance of Loss; Akhila and her companions in the coupé in the novel Ladies Coupé and Mary in ‘The Hunt’ and Dulali in ‘Statues’. The research hopes to indicate, that the most revolutionary change in the image is captured in the characters drawn by the Indian woman who is an ‘organic’ intellectual. By working intimately with the subaltern, she is aware of the urgency for change unlike a more privileged woman. She functions as a “permanent persuader” who is an instrument of change. Thus perhaps one answer to the conundrum could be that the writing of the ‘organic’ intellectual has the potential to capture one of the myriad images of a new-age Indian woman. As for a definite final one, perhaps it can never be found as it will always be dynamically changing and evolving and hopefully aspiring towards an ideal concept akin to the one defined by the study

International Science Community Association, 2023

This study examines the degree to which Shobha De infuses feminist consciousness into her female characters. Furthermore, it enhances understanding of urban Indian women's psychology, which demands equal rights for women in finding a meaningful place for themselves. In her novels, Shobha De explores the relationship between Indian women and their male counterparts. She has a wonderful gift for engagingly discussing delicate topics related to human relationships. The theme of her writings is standing up for women's rights and raising awareness of women's oppression. In Shobha De's stories, the female protagonists are charming, poised, and self-assured. She explores the feminine mind and diverse heterosexual, homosexual, and sexual practices in her works. The research project in this study, which is based on a qualitative research approach, uses both primary and secondary data. The major sources will be the selected novels of Shobha De, while the secondary sources will primarily draw from other authors' interpretive, analytical, and critical writings. This analysis and interpretation of the research have led to the conclusion that Shobha De's novels portray female protagonists as revolutionary social members. These social members are filled with a new sense of feminist consciousness.

Indian women writers have significant contribution in Indian English Writings. Indian literary scene has witnessed a tremendous change as far as women writers’ role. Women writings are concerned with the status of women in India. The ups and downs in these writers’ life have emphasized much upon the socio-cultural and psychological aspects. Women’s literature in Indian English Studies presents many women characters as role models or as silenced voices. This research paper takes into account the Indian women writers’ perspective of women’s world. For the study the following works have been selected - the novel Cry, the Peacock which explores the sociological state of the protagonist, Maya. She reflects internal conflicting realities of her psyche in de-motivational or subversive terms. The novel is concerned with a modern new woman’s rejection of her priorities and subsequently her failure on account of her meaninglessness in her thoughts, choices and deeds. The novel The God of Small Things portrays the politics of caste/gender and its effects on the marginalized, deprived woman in context of informalization and feminization of labour, her body and her ‘Self’. Manjula Padmanabhan’s play Harvest delves deep inside the pains, anguish of the poverty-stricken family that falls victim to the commoditization of the Third World body; while it also visualizes the futuristic approach of woman to counter the machines that may likely to govern human body in modern times. The Selected Poems of Kamala Das represent the wishes, aspirations, individuality, ambiguity and frustration. She is concerned with the women’s status in the men’s world. This research paper will attempt to find insights into the subjective experiences expressed in the writings, and same will be investigated as a source of self-discovery of these authors and their creative urge to find their space in public sphere. Other aspects such as - woman’s subjugated past, their voice breaking the silence, resisting the patriarchy and finding a female tradition and their imagined stereo- typed image will also be discussed. Keywords: Indian English Literary Studies, Women Writers, Gender-autonomy, Discriminatory doctrines

Boloji.com, 2023

The soul of this edition titled "India Unraveled-The Representation of Women in Literature and Society" lies in the enduring value, right nature of tongue perceptions, intellectual stature, rhetoric and the arresting diction of the contributors. The research essays open the inner frontier of selfdiscovery to overcome the lapse in mental health. This volume provides a platform to exhibit their ideas and creativity and discuss relevant subjects to get space to move ahead, feel enlightened and reach the unexplored realm of knowledge, practical wisdom and tranquility. The minds and spirits have unfolded to breathe life and purpose of art into the readers. Women from varied social standing have been segregated for the analytical criticism to serve the inspirational goals and obtain motivational force. A perfect understanding of this text reveals delight on the subjects of the inner world of women. The female heroism in Rani of Jhansi is highlighted through the transitional period

International Journal of English and Literature, 2013

Kamala Das belongs to the first generation of modern English poets who evolved a new poetics for themselves and made a new start both in theme and technique around the 1960s. The first phase of Indo-Anglican poetry ended in the 1950s. To the poets of this period the spirit of modernism was almost alien. Their main preoccupation was the spirit of nationalism and the war of independence, partition of country. It was only in the sixties that things began to take a new dimension where a new generation of young poets took control of the Indo-Anglican poetic realm. Kamala Das is one of the most powerful voices of this post-colonial era. In Kamala Das's poetry we find the best expression of feminine sensibility, its suppression in a male dominated society. So her poetry is confessional and autobiographical to a great extent, but at times she universalizes what is personal. The main themes of Dharker's poetry include home, freedom, journeys, communal conflict and gender politics. Purdah and other poems deal with the various aspects of a Muslim woman's life where she experiences injustice, oppression and violence engineered through the culture of purdah. This mixed heritage and itinerant lifestyle is at the heart of her writing: questioning, imagistic and richly textured poems that span geographical and cultural displacement, while also interrogating received ideas about home, freedom and faith. This research paper would unfold how both above mentioned poetesses rebel against the conventional restraints of society which are meant to exploit women in this man made world. "An Introduction" and "Stone Age" are two of Kamala Das's poems where she is intensely conscious of herself as woman, and by writing about the self she challenges the accepted notions of the female and redraft general opinion of the feminine mystique."Purdah" and "Living Space" are Imtiyaz Dharkar's poems which show the passion of an undaunted rebel, not to retreat and not to fail. The intensity and eloquence of her life and poetic accomplishment have dumbfounded the male-chauvinists and have left her female counterparts in soaring spirits not only inside the Islamic social, cultural and religious setup but also outside it. That is why her life and poetry make a fascinating study in the crushing indictment of the suppressive prescriptions against the freedom, dignity and respectful living of women, especially in the Muslim society. Imtiaz confirms our convictions that socio-cultural and socio-religious restrictions on women have robbed them of all their potentialities, leaving them not only physically and mentally handicapped but also psychological wrecks age after age. The lived experiences of Imtiaz have been honestly expressed in her poetry with the courage of conviction.

isara solutions, 2021

The modern age has shown abundant restlessness in the psyche of woman and this echo has been frequent not only in India but beyond the borders too. The art of living as a human being, understanding oneself truly is well defined in a number of books and scholarly treatises. But the pertinent question is-How does a woman see herself? Here comes the question of female subjectivity. For long, female characters, their aspirations, their experiences about body and mind have been looked through male lens. Literature, cinema, theatre, no medium of art is untouched of this factor. From Freud to Lacan, from Shakespeare to Shaw, female subjectivity has been dependent on male subjectivity for its definition. Significant figures like Simone the Beauvoir, Virginia Woolf, Betty Friedan, Kate Millett, and others challenged this perspective and brought noticeable changes in the scenario. We observe an existential form of female subjectivity in Beauvoir's The Second Sex. "'She is determined and differentiated with reference to man, and not he with reference to her; she is the incidental, the inessential as opposed to the essential. He is the Subject, he is the Absolute-she is the Other." (Beauvoir 16) Similar radical voices were perceived in the last century. We have come a long way since The Second Sex. The world is now living with the fourth wave of feminism. Literature, cinema, history and other social sciences are capturing this moment. Conventionally, female character/subject is seen or rather constructed through a relation to the other gender and male character/subject have been more open with the worldly concerns. There has been a long tradition in art to treat woman as an object or a subordinate. The postmodernist theory takes subjectivity as perspective of the individual self. It largely tends to ignore objective experiences. Women writers and additionally feminist theories no longer wish to accept history, philosophy, literature etc with male experiences as locus. Consequently, female subjectively looks at a women's perspective of herself or put it simply how does a woman looks herself as a subject. But this is a delicate arena. There are chances of extreme focus on a single subject or sometimes it poses the dangers of oversimplification. Spivak opines in this regard: "The position that only the subaltern can now the subaltern, only women can know women and so on, cannot be held as a theoretical presupposition either, for it predicates the possibility of knowledge on identity. Whatever the political necessity for holding the position, and whatever the advisability of attempting to identify (with) the other as subject in order to know her, knowledge is made possible and sustained by irreducible difference, not identity" (Spivak 9) Indian women writers of the twenty first century have shown an acumen of distinct variety. They have a language of their own. They try to penetrate deep into the layers of society where they finally find the balance between tradition and modernity. Manju Kapur is one such

THE LITERARY VISION, 2023

Woman is said to be the most beautiful creation of God on this planet. She is herself the origin of life and ultimate creator. She is the foundation of family who embraces everyone with her unconditional love and care as a grandmother, mother, daughter, sister and wife. She forms nearly half of the total population and thus has always been a centre of study and discussion in Indian literature. The Indian writers have continuously tried to present the complicated world of women from different perspectives and points of view. They have responsibly taken up the various issues and problems of women, their anxiety, pain and suffering. These writers have expressed their views and concerns through their work. Woman's condition and position in Indian society have undergone many changes from ancient times to the present. This article is an attempt to critically assess the depiction of woman in Indian literature since ancient times.