Interrogation of Gender Roles in Kamala Das' "Summer in Calcutta"
Anushree Joshi2020, Kitaab
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Abstract
This paper attempts to analyse the feminist tones in the poetry of Indian-English writer and poet, Kamala Das, particularly focusing on the expression and problematisation of gender roles in her 1965 poetry collection, Summer in Calcutta. It argues that her gendered identity manifests itself in her poetic style and aesthetic, wherein she questions the patriarchal expectations of gender - of women rooted in immanence and domesticity and of men rooted in transcendence and the public sphere. The custom of arranged marriage, domestic emotional abuse, confinement to the private sphere of domesticity, and daunting standards of feminine beauty, are some of the gendered expectations in the Indian woman's experience that Das' poetry interrogates. The confessional movement of poetry in the West, iconised in the poetry of women writers like Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath, also appears to influence Das' mode of expression, since she emphasises on the 'I' in her poems, while voicing the experience of not only her own self, but also of women as a community who have been disenfranchised socially, linguistically, politically, or culturally due to the gendered roles and expectations imposed upon them.
Key takeaways
- The definition and measure of a woman's aches and joys being subsumed in the association of herself with the masculine presence(s) in her life is ultimately rejected, as the poet-speaker seems to concretise her identity through her own parameters and markers.
- In several poems that grapple with issues of sexual awakening, feminine desire, struggles of romantic relationships and betrayals, aligning with the confessional mode of poetry, Kamala Das confronted and sometimes worked to subvert the female subservience and repression of female sexuality implicit in the domesticity expected from arranged marriage for women.
- Contrary to the slightly dejected tone of "An Introduction" when the poet-speaker says, "Don't play at schizophrenia or be a / Nympho" while referring to the socio-cultural stereotype 3 associating women with hysteria and witchcraft in expressing their liberty or agency, the following stanza from "Forest Fire" seems to portray the poet-speaker embracing the stereotype, thus delegitimizing its potency to vilify women:
- In Kamala, on the other hand, it is the confession that matters, and sometimes it seems that poetry is incidental.
- Introduction", the poet-speaker is discontented with the imposition of superficial ideals of clothing and appearance based on her femininity, so she turns to performative transcendence:
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