Rama Mehta 's Inside The Haveli Essay

Mahasweta Devi’s short story, “Giribala,” is about the life of Giribala, a girl of Talsana village located in India. Born into a caste in a time when it was still customary to pay a bride-price, Giri is sold to Aulchand by her father. From this point on, we see a series of unfortunate, tragic events that take place in Giri’s life as a result of the circumstances surrounding Giri’s life. There are many issues in Giri’s life in India that Devi highlights to readers. First, the economic instability of the village leads to an extremely poor quality of life for the lower, working classes. Next, the cruel role of women determined by men in society is to either satisfy the sexual desires of men or to reproduce offspring who can work or be sold off to marriages. There are also other social norms and beliefs which discriminate against women that will be discussed.

Women in India were unaware of their miserable condition. It is in the post independence period the women’s quest for identity of her own commenced. The 20th century saw the shift from outer to inner sensibilities and no one can better understand a man or woman better a feminine writer. In modern English fiction a number of women novelists have arrived on the literary scene, they have set out making new forays in to the world of women. Nayantara Sahgal being a feminist writer has emphasized in her novels on freedom and a new definition of the New Women. Sahgal’s heroines are well aware of the injustice done to them in their marriage and they come out of this traditional bond.

The Ramayana is an Ancient Indian epic poem that follows the story of a young prince named Rama who is a mortal incarnation of the Hindu god Vishnu. The plot follows a narrative that starts from his first time outside the royal palace, through his banishment from the kingdom and his quest to save his beloved wife Sita from Ravana, the evil King of Lanka, all the way to his coronation as King of Ayodhya, the kingdom from which he was originally banished. Throughout the whole narrative, there is one factor that remains constant, the role of women in the culture. The acceptance, or rejection of these cultural values by the women directly corresponds with how their character is perceived by the reader and how their role directly influences the

This paper attempts to examine the fictional projections of Indian girls, to see how they emerge in ideological terms. Their journeys from self-alienation to self-adjustment, their childhood struggles against the hypocrisies and monstrosities of the grown-up world, eventually demolishing the unjust male constructed citadels of power that hinder their progress- are the highlighted issues. The point of comparison between the two novels focused on here is the journey of Rahel in The God of Small Things and Sai in The Inheritance from a lonely childhood to a tragic adulthood passing through a struggle with the complex forces of patriarchal society. Both the novels portray the imaginativeness, inventiveness, independence, rebelliousness, wide-eyed wonder and innocence associated with these young girls.

Most of Ambai’s women characters exhibit a strong desire for independence and space- both personal and professional. They discard all the outward symbols of matrimony and wifehood such as the ‘Thali’ and assert their individuality and single status, as is the case in “Journey1”. Most of Ambai’s women characters exhibit positive traits such as courage, self confidence, optimism and zeal to live life on their own

“Please don’t play your games with a helpless poor girl” declared Dhowli. The Misra boy leaned in closer to her replying, “I’m not playing games.” Dhowli then shouted back “ You’ll leave after you tire of the game, and what will become of me? Am I to be like Jhale? No, deota, not that.” (238). I’m hesitate to keep reading after this line thinking to myself how I feel sorry for Dhowli and who she is going to become since getting pregnant with a Misra boy who is dominant in the caste system. Dhowli creates an ambitious, courageous, and philosophical figure in the short story “Dhowli” by Mashasweta Devi. In the short story the caste system is well defined showing of social stratification of two opposite levels of the social chain in India. To an American reader the foreignness of how India treats single mothers is how this short story stands out.

Ismat Chughtai, the Urdu writer of fierce feminist sentiments, has never got the accolades that have been bestowed upon her contemporaries- especially male contemporaries. She is remembered as a controversial writer who did not hide anything in her narratives; and hence irked her contemporary society in all possible manners. I am of the opinion that it is high time to re-evaluate the works of Ismat Chughtai by foregrounding her unflinching anti-hegemonic sentiments. Chughtai was a Feminist who challenged the status-quos and prudery of the Indian culture shaped up during the Victorian era. Her collection of short stories raised such a storm all across the country that she even had to face the court of law. The primary charge labelled against

In this novel, what the reader learns about the culture of the society is that men are the most important in the family. From an early age, little girls are taught to be submissive to men. Arranged marriages are common, as in Lakshmi’s case, she was promised to marry a boy whom she has never met before, whom she refers to as “the boy with the sleepy cat eyes”. The uncertainty of Lakshmi’s future is common for many girls as poverty often drives the mother or father of the young Nepali girls to sell them to wealthy families as a last resort. The girls are sold to wealthy families in urban India work as “maids,” but the actuality is that the young girls are sold unwittingly into prostitution. The girls are told they will work until they pay

Anita Desai presents to reader her opinion about complexity of human relationships as a big contemporary problem and human condition. At the level of inner consciousness words are not mere meanings recorded in a dictionary but are symbolic which trigger feelings and meanings that an individual draws out of one’s subconscious storehouse. Her women characters make a reader look at them with awe with their relationship to their surroundings, their society, their men, their children, their families, their psychological make-ups and themselves. Though not admittedly a feminist, Anita Desai is well aware of the predicament of the Indian women and their relationship with men. Running inward her fiction grapples with the intangible realities of life. Man-woman relationship in the urban society is her concern and in novel after novel she delves deeper and deeper in this dilemma. D.H. Lawrence rightly points out that "The great relationship for humanity will

Before the independent colonization of India, the roots of tradition were so thick that being anything other than what was expected from your gender, class, and education level, was odd. Scary, even. In a time and place where women aren’t considered useful for much other than birthing children and feeding said children, Rukmani, a child bride with a good education, a strong will, and a modernized mentality, is struggling to find happiness in a world where she is being thrown curveball after curveball. In this tale of odd in an even world, Kamala Markandaya writes to show how breaking from cultural norms can create a better life for Rukmani and her family.

The political and social events of the sixties and the seventies along with growing opportunities of education and employment for women encourage women belonging to the urban middle class to engage in literary activities. The thematic concerns of these women writers have been cantering around women related issues. The social setting for most of these writings is the urban middle class and the protagonist is, more often than not, a woman. Indian Culture treats women with utmost reverence. Women are identified with Adi Shakti or the primordial energy. Woman’s avatar as mother treated as highest manifestation of human relationship; It is the mother who gets precedence over all other principles of life including father and god in importance. She

Love in these texts is quite superficial, as the driving force behind these feelings of love is physical appearance. In each of the four stories, for example, the characters fall in love within seconds of simply seeing a person. They become instantaneously attached, and they start thinking about how to turn their feelings into marriage. In the Ramayana, Rama and Sita see each other in the same moment, Rama from the street and Sita from her balcony. Narayan describes a tension-filled scene where they stare at each other and revel in each other’s beauty (Narayan 23). Sita’s wishes for marriage to Rama are then made clear when she hears that someone met her father’s condition and, in turn, won her hand in marriage. She expresses her hopes that Rama is the one who did this, asking her maid “Do you know if this is the same man who struck me down with a look as he passed along the street? If it is someone else, I will end my life” (Narayan 28). Similarly, in The Recognition of Śakuntalā, King Dusyanata sees Śakuntalā and is so intrigued by her beauty that he automatically expresses his resentment for her difference in class because it would be a hindrance to their marriage. He does not let this stop him, though, as he says: “Indeed if only she could be the child of the bramin holy man and a woman of a different class. But why should I worry? Truly, if my noble heart desires her, that makes her fit to be a prince’s wife, for the wise man trusts his heart to lead

This essay focuses on the theme of forbidden love, The God of Small Things written by Arundhati Roy. This novel explores love and how love can’t be ignored when confronted with social boundaries. The novel examines how conventional society seeks to destroy true love as this novel is constantly connected to loss, death and sadness. This essay will explore the theme of forbidden love, by discussing and analysing Ammu and Velutha's love that is forbidden because of the ‘Love Laws’ in relation to the caste system which results in Velutha’s death. It is evident that forbidden love negatively impacts and influences other characters, such as Estha and Rahel, which results in Estha and Rahel’s incestuous encounter.

There are many aspects of Indian life: the people, the technology, the culture. The list is forever evolving and increasing. In the stories “They Are Staring At Me” and “My Aunt Gold Teeth”, Vidia Naipaul introduces similar aspects of Indian life through first-person and third-person viewpoints while revolving around religious themes and ideas. In “They Are Staring At Me”, the reader is engaged by the viewpoint of the protagonist when he encounters a Sikh who displays immense amounts of anger and criticism towards Indians and other Sikhs. In “My Aunt Gold Teeth”, the reader experiences Gold Teeth's religious inspirations and conflicts through the viewpoint of her nephew. Considering these similarities, Naipaul contrasts the third-person viewpoint, the meaning of religion, and the characteristics of wealth between the stories to express different aspects of Indian life.

Coming to the impact that feminism had on literary theory then, we might be able to suggest that Feminist Literary Theory looks to rewrite, as it were, the `literary canon' in order to identify neglected texts by female writers. Texts by male writers are also examined so that the depiction of women can be re-interpreted. Feminist critic, Elaine Showalter, identifies the `woman as reader' analysis as `feminist critique', and the `woman as writer' idea, she calls `gynocritics' .