1

Introduction

The two main functions of literature are to give instruction and delight.

Resistance, perhaps, comes under the category of instruction raising the social

consciousness of the readers. The word resistance often means an overt

reaction or opposition to events or situations. The idea of resistance in literature

could convey a particular message or it may refer to an open action taken up by

social activists to bring out the required change in the social set up or to drive a

point home. The intention of the resistance is to promote different or counter-

thinking about the fabric of society itself. Thus the most important aspect of

resistance/protest literature is that it includes within itself an element of social

activism. Therefore, the idea of resistance in literature mostly revolves around a

cause or an issue. Resistance in literature can take the form of a symbolic sign of

delivering a social message, displeasure, or a banner of discontent with

something in particular or in general.

A study of theme of resistance is necessary because it not only raises

questions but sometimes suggests solution. Resistance is governed by the socio-

cultural constructs. To understand resistance in literature is to focus on the

economic and socio-political structure within which the action of the events

takes place. Of all the literary models, the novel is considered to be the most

suitable means for this purpose because it enables a writer to depict human

relationships in its varied aspects. To put it in simple words, the fictional form

may be considered a documentation of social criticism.

 2

People resist for many reasons: resist, what they dont understand; resist,

what they dont like; resist, because they tried and failed earlier; resist to change;

resist to preserve; resist to protect; resist to be loyal. There are different types of

resistance like political, social, cultural, psychological, emotional and silent

among the ways of protest. Resistance may take many forms, including active

or passive, overt or covert, individual or organized, aggressive or timid.

Resistance to change is the action taken by individuals and groups when they

perceive that a change is occurring as a threat to them. Perceive and threat are

the key words in understanding resistance to change.

From the last quarter of the twentieth century, the Indian women novelists

started articulating womens aspirations, their professional endeavors, their

newly formed relationship with man and the changed perceptions of

motherhood. Many writers like Anita Desai, Kamala Markandaya, Nayantara

Sahgal, Shashi Deshpande, Uma Vasudev, Githa Hariharan, Shobha De,

Arundhati Roy, Manju Kapoor, Gita Mehta, etc. have presented various forms of

women-resistance to patriarchal norms. These writers seem to be protesting

against the restrictions of womens lives, emphasizing on the theme of

resistance.

Fiction in the hands of these writers has come to locate the nature of the

individual acts of resistance in the society where the problems like economic

dependence of women, dressing, adolescent love etc. are seen as practices that

need change. Women are no longer presented as meek, passive, but energetic

with a sense of self-consciousness and self-assertiveness. These novelists made

 3

the process of social change look meaningful. Writers like Shobha De construct

their narration by going a step forward by allowing their protagonists to step out

of the patriarchal control.

A brief review of the criticism on a few writers reveals varied

perspectives on emancipation of women, quest for identity, feminism, gender

discrimination, man-woman relationship, cultural conflict etc. but very few

attempts have been made to analyze and understand the dialectic of resistance.

While Mrinalini Sebastian discusses Shashi Deshpandes novels from the

perspective of post colonialism, Sunita Reddy makes a full-length study of

Shashi Deshpandes novels from the feminist point of view. Suman Balas edited

book Women in the Novels of Shashi Deshpande focuses on husband-wife

relationships in all her novels till A Matter of Time. Chanchala K. Naiks edited

book, Writing Difference on the novels of Shashi Deshpande. Shalmalee Palekar

reads Shashi Deshpandes novels in terms of Gender, Feminism and

Postcoloniality. Guru Charan Behera examines the narrative pattern of That

Long Silence as the multi-coloured patchwork quilt. Very few critics like Usha

Bande discuss Deshpandes novels like A Matter of Time and Small Remedies

from the perspective of resistance and reconciliation. It is clear from the brief

survey of criticism that there are very few comparative studies of the recent

Indian English fiction in general and the works of Shashi Deshpande and Flora

Nwapa in particular from the perspective of the dialectic of resistance. There is a

need to examine the literature of resistance as projected by different women

novelists from a comparative perspective. Hence, the present study.

 4

The present study seeks to examine select novels of Indian and Nigerian

women novelists, namely Shashi Deshpandes That Long Silence (1988), The

Binding Vine (1993), Moving On(2004), and In the Country of Deceit (2008)

and Flora Nwapas Efuru (1966) and Idu (1970) from a comparative perspective

of resistance. As women writers, they portray women characters from a womans

sensibility, experience and perspective.

The present study is divided into four chapters. Chapter I focuses on the

dialectic of resistance in the Indian English and the Nigerian literature. It

attempts to throw light on various problems of women from the point of different

in class, culture, and race. It refers to the struggle of women for freedom,

development and individual identity. An attempt has been made to provide a

glimpse of women writers and their contribution to the society through their

writing.

Since the last quarter of the twentieth century, Indian English fiction has

attained greater heights and attracted the attention of the academics all over

world. R.S. Pathak rightly observes, In the growth and development of the

Indian novel in English the 1980s occupy the most significant position. It is

during the Eighties that Indian English novelists and novels earned unheard of

honours and distinctions in the Western academic world (14). With the

publication of Salman Rushdies Midnights Children (1981), Indian English

novel took the experimental form from psychological and realistic stages. The

post-independence Indian English fiction may be studied broadly under four

 5

categories-the political novel, the ethno-centric minority discourse, the expatriate

writing, and the womens writing or the feminist fiction.

Womens writing assumed a great deal of significance in the post-Eighties

with the emergence of new women writers who present their feminine

awareness. Womens literature seems to be focusing on womens emancipation,

equal rights to women on part with their male counterparts on their identity in

society. Writers like Kamala Markandaya, Anita Desai, Nayantara Sahgal, Shashi

Deshpande, Uma Vasudev, Githa Hariharan, Shobha De, Arundhati Roy, Manju

Kapoor, Gita Mehta, and others made an attempt to portray women characters

from the point of the feminine sensibility.

These writers present the picture of a woman, which is entirely different

from that of the past. Women characters from three different categories of the

society i.e., from aristocratic, middle-class and the rural poor women are

portrayed in their novels. For instance, the protagonists of Nayantara Sahgal and

Shobha De come from the upper-class. The protagonist Jaya of Shashi

Deshpandes That Long Silence represents the middle-class category and

Kamala Markandayas Rukmini in A Nectar in Sieve comes from the lower-

middle class rural background.

Women writers seem to study the human relationships and present their

understanding of daily problems and deal with various themes of conflict

protagonists, the East-West clash, womens struggle for independence, gender

inequalities etc. in the modern world. These women novelists make an attempt to
 6

set women characters free from the age-old male domination in their fictional

world. The women in their novels are well-educated and with their intellectual

capacity and financial freedom they attempt to resist the cultural and social

oppression. Their plot construction ability, depiction of characters, and use of

narrative techniques, awakening social consciousness make their novels

significant and draw the attention of the society. The characters in their novels

are drawn from the domestic sphere but portrayal in all its variety of ambitions,

good and bad, gender discrimination, caste and class inequalities etc. makes the

novels reflect the world at large.

A brief analysis of the women writers of the Indian English fiction is

necessary before a detailed study of the select writers and their novels for the

purpose of the present study. Kamala Markandayas characters are rural

peasants, city-dwellers, queens and concubines, English officials in India and

Indian emigrants in England. Her themes revolve around hunger, poverty,

despair, fear and death. Realistic picture of the Indian villagers, their customs

and cultures, rites and traditions are presented in her novels. Her novels focus on

the changing socio-economic scene during the Sixties.

The theme of her first novel Nectar in a Sieve (1954) is hunger. It

presents the picture of Indian villagers. The villagers work hard day and night in

their fields for their survival and for nectar out of the mother earth. But the

irony is that the nectar is bound to be poured in a sieve. The main protagonist

Rukmini encounters many losses in her life but overcomes them with endurance.

Though violent towards Kunit for blaming her, she grows in generosity and
 7

compassion. She gives up the strictures of caste when her sons go to work in the

tannery, and she gives up the tradition of shame when her daughter turns to

prostitution. Rukmini forgives her daughter-in-law for failing in her duty to help

them, and she learns to judge strangers not by their differences but by their deeds

and their hearts. Finally, she extends her love and care to Puli, a child even more

destitute than herself. By the end of the novel Rukmini has conquered the

hardships of her existence. In this connection it is relevant to quote what Rama

Jha thinks of Kamala Markandayas fictional concerns:

Her key novels undoubtedly establish Kamala Markandayas forte

in achieving a special insight into the female psyche. Her

characters range widely from the illiterate poor peasant women to

the educated, westernized city women as also the British women in

India. Although she shares her view of life with her contemporary,

Nayantara Sahgal, she does not allow politics directly to condition

her characters fate. Nor like Anita Desai does she deal with

hypersensitive characters almost bordering on the abnormal. At

times that makes her narratives a little flat despite her graceful,

luminous language but her characters, though slightly idealized,

will survive among the most memorable creations of Indian fiction

in English (172).

Anita Desai has been a pioneer in the field of Indian fiction with a style of

her own and brings forth the issues of identity and hybridity. Throughout her

novels and short stories, Anita Desai focuses on the struggles of a middle-class
 8

woman in contemporary India as they attempt to overcome the societal

limitations imposed by a tradition-bound patriarchal culture. Set amid the

cultural and social changes that have swept India since its Independence. Most

of her narratives validate the importance of familial bonds and explore the

tensions that exist between different generations.

In her first novel, Cry, the Peacock (1963), Anita Desai explores the

effectiveness of escapism as a coping mechanism of resistance. After a lifetime

of dutiful servitude to her family, Nanda Kaul purchases a house in the hill

station at Kasauli, and prefers to live a peaceful secluded life. Nandas

tranquility is disturbed, however, after her great-granddaughter Raka arrives on

her doorstep, having been forced out of her home by her parents martial

problems. The novel shows the clash of generations between Raka and Nanda,

the division of classes between Nandas isolated hill community and the nearby

village, and the conflict between the educational programmes sponsored by the

central government and the traditions of the local villagers. It explores the

alienation of Nanda Kaul and her great-grand daughter, Raka. The loneliness and

isolation of the two have been portrayed vividly. Nanda Kaul finds a way out of

her personal problem by selecting a secluded life which could be understood in

terms of dialectic of resistance.

Her Fasting, Feasting (1999) deals with the hardships of Uma who is

treated as a house servant by her parents. She has to stop going to school to look

after her baby brother Arun who grows and moves to America for studies. Anita

Desais description of Indians obsession with a son is very convincing. Hence,

 9

Anita Desais women are all reflective about their condition. Their resistance is

not for equality but for the right to be acknowledged as individuals. As they are

capable of intelligence and feeling, they do not look for freedom outside the

house but within it like that of Shashi Deshpandes protagonists.

Nayantara Sahgal, daughter of Vijayalakshmi Pandit, niece of Jawarharlal

Nehru, is the writer of both fiction and non-fiction and one of the foremost

socio-political novelists. She realistically presents the image of contemporary

political scene of India juxtaposed with the personal issues. Most of her novels

reflect the political issues. Besides politics, her novels deal with Indian womans

search for individual freedom and self-realization. The Day in Shadow (1971) is

preoccupied with the new Indian womans quest for sexual freedom and self-

realization. The novel presents the relationship between political and personal

dilemmas. A Situation in New Delhi (1977) deals with the political scene after

Nehrus death. Referring to the novels of Nayantara Sahgal, C. Vijayasree notes

that she shows a deep abiding faith in individual freedom and the single

unifying theme that runs through all her novels in mans growing awareness of

the implications of freedom. In novel after novel, she deals with the theme of

liberation of the individual and elaborates it against the background of nations

struggle to achieve independence and safeguard the same (21).

The character Sonali Ranade in Rich like us (1985) is distinct from the

stereotype of women characters. She is educated at Oxford and as a topper of the

civil service examination proves herself as an intellectual. Sahgal through her

character demonstrates the many obstructions that are to be encountered by a

 10

woman, however wealthy, beautiful, educated or powerful she may be, Sonali, as

a conscientious administrator, rejects a license to Mr. Neuman, the

representative of an American soft drink firm believing that Indian can do

without a company for the fizzy drink Happyola. Neuman succeeds in getting

permission by greasing the palm of the minister. Overruled by him, Sonali

resigns even as the emergency is declared. Sahgal here proves that democracy is

only artificial. She brings out the fact that women have always been ill-treated in

India.

Shashi Deshpande is another foremost Indian fiction writer in English.

She has written nine novels, six collections of short stories and four books for

children. She consistently deals with the problems of educated middles class

woman in the patriarchal Hindu society. Most of her novels are preoccupied with

the theme of gender injustice. Viney Kirpal rightly observes: Desphandes texts

provide the most detailed and competent record of gender injustice in

contemporary India (363).

Shashi Deshpande lets her women characters experience the confusing

and disturbing silence within, get a glimpse of their inner being and empower

them to confront power politics, comprehend the situation and come to grip with

the crisis. Thought she writes about the issues of women as a feminist in the true

sense of the word, she is not the strident and militant kind of feminist who sees

the male as the whole cause for all womens troubles. Though she disagrees,

Shashi Deshpande has been called a Feminist because her novels deal with the

description of middle class educated women, their inner conflict, their struggle
 11

for identity, parent-child relationship, marriage and exploitation. In this context,

she replies to Geetha Gangadharan:

Yes, I would, I am feminist in the sense that, I think we need to

have a world which we should recognize as a place for all of us

human beings. There is no superior and inferior. We are two halves

of one species. I fully agree with Simone de Beauvoir that the fact

that we are human, is much more important than our being men

and women. I think thats my idea of feminism (14).

Shashi Deshpandes strong resistance is shown in the following words:

It is a curious fact that serious writing by women is invariably

regarded as feminist writing. A woman who writes of womens

experience often brings in some aspects of those experiences that

have angered her, caused her strong feelings. I dont see why this

has to be labeled feminist fiction (33).

Her women character undergo a psychological turmoil within the

restricted domestic life. She does not make her women characters bolder than

they actually appear in their life. She portrays them as they take their own course

of life based on the circumstances. Almost all her novels portray a crisis in the

protagonists life. The narrative moves back and forth in time so that the narrator

can describe the incidents with the advantage of retrospection. Therefore, she

portrays in depth the meaning of woman in modern India. So, Shashi Deshpande
 12

is compelled to portray women concerns not by political ideology but by her

concern as a woman and as a human being more than anything else.

In an interview with T.Vijay Kumar about the original and exact

conception of all her novels, she quickly responds as follows: If anything, it

was The Dark Holds No Terrors. Except the ending, which gave me a lot of

trouble, it came out absolutely the way in which I saw it. When I see the final

picture-I think visually it has the colours, the shape of what I had seen.

Deshpandes first novel The Dark Holds No Terrors (1980) has been

translated into German and Russian languages. It presents the story of Sarita

who dares to resist the age-old traditions to marry a man outside of her caste.

Hindu tradition plays a big part in Saritas life. Hindus value a son over a

daughter. Saritas mother never accepts the fact that she lost her son by

drowning, while her daughter was spared. Sarita grieves for the death of her

brother. Her mother holds her responsible for the accident. Sarita disregards her

mother and joins medical college and marries a man she loves who is also

outside her caste. She succ eeds in her profession as a doctor but her success

leads to the breakup of her family life, as her husband cannot accept the fact that

she is the breadwinner. At the end of the novel, she realizes that she cannot go

away from her husband and decides to re-establish appropriate relationship with

him.

In her second novel If I Die Today (1982) Deshpande deconstructs the

traditional image of a woman as a socio-cultural construct and how that image

 13

gets destabilized because of her education, economic independence and

motherhood. The story of Manju and Vijay is an example in the novel, where

Vijay neither hits Manju nor says even a single angry word to her, but by his

actions and sly comments makes her feel guilty. Manjus married life is

burdened with silences and barriers. It is the middle-class mentality that

dissuades them from resisting against the tyranny. It appears to be a campus

fiction. The centre of action in the novel is the S.D.M. College and the hospital

established by Sethji and his father with a dream to make it the most famous in

the country. But it has been the site for murders. Guruji, the cousin of Dr. Ashok,

was suffering from cancer and his illness and attitude towards life made a lot of

impact on the lives of the medical doctors and their families but his murder

disturbed the atmosphere of the campus. Different characters in the novel have

different reading about Guruji. After a series of tragic deaths life sprouts again

through the narrator who gives birth to a baby girl, the day after that terrible

night. It is this assertion and celebration of life that distinguishes Deshpandes

work from other women writers.

Her third novel Come up and be Dead (1983) contains detective elements.

The protagonist Kshama, is quite different from the protagonists of the other

novels. Kshamas coming to the school marks the beginning of the novel. She is

the school principal and her housekeeper and cousin Devayani, are spinsters. As

Rama Gautam observes: They are typical examples of women caught between

the modern idea of freedom and the traditional need for a home of their own.

Kshama is an efficient administrator and possesses an ostensibly unruffled

 14

manner, but her thoughts reveal her agitation and complexes within her.

Devayani seems quite content with her role as her housekeeper but we find her

now and then musing about the uselessness of her life: What was left? A

twenty-seven-year-old spinster, insignificant, and underdeveloped, as Jane Eyre

would say (149-50). The novel brilliantly probes the universally relevant issue

of human relationships, and explores realities of womens lives. Like

Deshpandes other novels it too engages with womens silences and reveals the

truths that lie behind their silences-silences that speak a thousand words that

pave the way to search for ones own space and voice, to come to terms with

oneself, says Rama Gautam (151) In other words, it shows the silent resistance.

Her next novel Roots and Shadows (1983) presents the image of a new

woman who attempts to assert her individuality, realize her freedom and how it

brings her into conflict with family in a male-dominated society. The protagonist

Indu, a young teenaged girl leaves house to study in a big city and becomes a

journalist. She marries a man of her choice believing that she would be

independent. But soon she realizes that her independence turns out to be an

illusion. Her educated and progressive-minded husband Jayant, is not different

from any average Indian man. Marriage leads a woman to more subjugation.

Indu plays the role of an ideal housewife because she does not want to disturb

the peace of the family. Her role as a wife obstructs Indus development and her

artistic potential. Her attempts to articulate feminine voice through her creative

writing are suppressed by her husband because they need money. The meek and

humble Indu of the early days ultimately emerges as a bold, conscious and
 15

resistant woman. She resists the male authority, hierarchy and the mockery of

womens veiled existence. She overcomes her emotional disorder and determines

to lead a meaningful life with her husband. The home she once abandoned

becomes her place of safety and consolation. It is her Akkas house which

enables her to discover her roots as a free woman, a daughter and a commercial

writer.

Shashi Deshpande emerges as a major novelist in the Indian English

fiction with the publication of her fifth novel That Long Silence (1988), which

has honoured her with Sahitya Akademi Award. In this novel, the narrator Jaya, a

middle-class housewife in Bombay, seeks freedom from the conventional control

of patriarchy. Her resistance to patriarchal control and asser5tion to break the

silence is the theme of the novel. I will have to speak, to listen. I will have to

erase the silence between us (192). In the following chapter, a detailed analysis

of the novel is given.

Like her earlier novels like Roots and Shadows and That Long Silence,

Shashi Deshpandes sixth novel The Binding Vine (1993) also deals with the

theme of resistance to patriarchal ideology. Like most other protagonists,

Urmila, the narrator, is not dependent on men for survival but asserts her

economic as well as psychological independence. Urmilas is the voice of

resistance in the novel that register a protest against the patriarchal attitude

towards the issue of rape. Two forms of gender violence are juxtaposed in the

novel. In the case of Kalpana lying in an unconscious state represents the

silenced subaltern and in the case of Mira writing poems and diaries about her
 16

marital life itself becomes a mode of resistance. It is not a solution for her but a

warning to other women. Spivak in her essay Can the Subaltern Speak? (1985)

suggest that the subaltern cannot speak. By this phrase Spivak means that

those individuals in the most extreme positions of marginalization have no way

of having their voices heard, and of becoming visible through any process of

self-representation. Spivak suggests that literature can provide a different space

to articulate subaltern womens revolt and resistance in the social text of

postcolonial India. She also suggests specifically because the subaltern cannot

speak, it is the duty of postcolonial intellectuals to represent her. A detailed

analysis of the novel is provided in the following chapter.

A Matter of Time (1996) portrays the complex web of human

relationships in an intended family over three generations. The woman who

represents the first generation is Kalyani, the grandmother. The second

generation representative is Sumi, the mother and the third generation

representative is Arundhati, the daughter. The novel presents love, pain,

suffering, endurance, support and understanding extended to one another. Sumi

and Gopal had a love marriage and had three daughters Aru, Charu and Seema.

In spite of their love marriage, Gopal leaves the house and it does not upset Sumi

much. She resists asking him reasons for his decision and moves to her parents

house with her children. She learns to be independent, takes a job and writes a

play for children. With the quick decisions and execution of them Sumi frees

herself from the patriarchal control. Sumis act of creative writing is an

innovative way to prove her living. Thus, Shashi Deshpande does not oppose
 17

men, but their attitudes. She does not seem to believe in confrontation, rather she

seems to prefer coexistence, co-operation and mutual understanding.

In Small Remedies (2000) Deshpande deals with a range of people

belonging to diverse communities, professions and levels of society. Madhu

Saptarishi, the protagonist of the novel is subjected to the oppression

/suppression / marginality / domination in her married life like Indu, Sarita,

Urmi, and Sumi of Deshpandes earlier novels. She writes about a Goan

Christian family and also refers to a Muslim tabla player and gives a brief

account of his life and the people around him, especially his grand-daughter,

Hasina. She also touches upon classical music for the first time in this novel

which requires a deep understanding of Hindustani music on the part of the

author. Madhu is also an urban, middle-aged, educated woman. The main plot

moves around Madhus attempt to write a book. Madhu writes about the lives of

Savitribai and her own aunt Leela who seem to resist the caste and conventions

and marries a Christian and dedicates to the cause of the trade workers. Shashi

Deshpande portrays the growth of the protagonist Madhu who acquires strength

from recollecting and recreating the lives of other characters like Savitribai and

Leela. Hasina and Savitri are fond of music and the relationship between melody

and rhythm, between the singer and the tabla player represent the image of

human bonds.

In her novel Moving On (2004) Shashi Deshpande is once again

concerned with patriarchal resistance. Manjari is the new woman, who redefines

freedom and also relationships. She is a model practitioner of relational

 18

autonomy, situated in family and bound by relationship, yet subservient to none.

As an affectionate daughter, a loving sister, a caring mother and a good friend,

she is hardly imposing or demanding, and is not dependent on anyone. The novel

begins with Babas diary and in the following chapter Manjari is introduced.

Manjari is not only a narrator, but also a reader herself and she reads her fathers

diary and discovers the past life of their parents. Her independent disposition is

noticeable in the way she marries a man of her choice. She displays enormous

courage and steadfastness in her decision to give up medical studies. She prefers

to live on her own and declines financial assistance from her father after

Shyams suicide. She undergoes a painful period of struggle and strain, and turns

down Rajas repeated proposals to marry her just because Raja wants to unite

their two establishments. Manjari puts down the proposals of marriage without

the foundation of love and only as a means of social security for a single woman

as these are not acceptable to her.

She shocks Raja, the upholder of patriarchal norms by learning to drive

her car, and even run it as a taxi, by installing and operating a computer at home

and typing out manuscripts for others as a means of self-employment when she

fails to find a satisfying job. Manjair challenges the essentialized notion of

female identity as male fabrication and leaves the door open for social and

cultural change. Manjair is the new woman, who redefines freedom and also

family / social relationships. She is thus a model practitioner of relationships.

She is thus a model practitioner of relational autonomy, situated in family and

bound by relationship, yet subservient to none. An affectionate daughter, a

 19

loving sister, a caring mother and a good friend, she is hardly imposing or

demanding, and is not dependent on anyone. Thus, Manjari finds small remedies

to the day-to-day problems through her resistance. A detailed analysis of the

novel is done in the next chapter.

In the Country of Deceit (2008) is Shashi Deshpandes recent novel

dealing with the story of Devayani who chooses to live alone in the small town

of Rajnur after the death of her parents. Her family and friends gently disapprove

of her decision. Then she meets Ashok Chinappa, the new District

Superintendent of Police of Rajnur and they fall in love despite the fact that

Ashok is much older and married. This novel continues Deshpandes earlier

probing into womens experience, and the constraints of family life, and the

problematic of matrimonial relations. In the novel there is a house, a potent

metaphor of the space allotted /allowed to women. A well-to-do urban middle-

class celebrates the house with puja and champagne one of the many examples

in Deshpandes novels that her figures are not living in some in-between,

rather, tradition is an informing, modulating part of the ongoing process of

modernization. We meet relatives aplenty, with family history and heritage

hovering on the edge. Also, there is the well-known female narrator. And yet,

everything is different. The old house has been pulled down, the new one

designed by the architect-sister, its construction supervised so that it will give

most satisfaction to its new inhabitant, Devayani, the female protagonist. Both

her parents having died, the stage is set for a new beginning: I felt as if I was

waiting for the curtain to go up, waiting for something to happen (8). Very
 20

soon Devi would know what it is she so wants to happen. Satisfaction,

gratification of desire, fulfillment and not deferral, are the main lines of

movement in this novel. I want a needlepoint of extreme happiness, I want a

moment in my life which will make me feel I am touching the sky (25).

The novel as an extended discourse on desire, the discourse unfolding

itself on the one hand through Devis experiences of her body and on the other

through her aunt Sindhus letters in which she reveals her own life and, thought

at first unintentionally, comments on or complements Devis experiences: Life

is lived through the body (41) writes Sindhu, and she continues, the body is

important, and so are the demands of the body your natural desires will be

with you for many more years (42).

If desire is one line of movement of this novel, the second is betrayal or

deceit as the title proves it. Ashok is a married man, and again it is Sindhu,

writing from her daughters home in the US, who points out: Our country does

not allow women to fulfil these desires without marriage (42-43). The last

paragraph of Small Remedies (2000), another of Deshpandes novels about love

and despair, closes on memory as a life-giver: how could I ever have longed for

amnesia? Memory, capricious and unreliable though it is, ultimately carries its

own truth within it. As long as there is memory, theres always the possibility of

retrieval, as long as there is memory, loss is never total (324).

In the Country of Deceit (2008) ends on a question mark: Is this what

my life is going to be like from now a constant struggle between trying to forget
 21

and wanting to remember? deceit, that is, fraud. Like Jiji in Moving On, Devi

comes under threat from the property mafia, though with less nasty

consequences. On the contrary, not only does the sub-plot, just like the one

around Rani, serve to situate the main plot in a wider, socio-economic context, it

also provides a glimpse of hope for Devi, of future fulfilment at least through

professional activity. This glimpse of hope, however, does not make for a tired

ending. Deshpande has never had pat solutions, no facile evasions for her female

figures. Her early novel Roots and Shadows (1983) is open-ended: Maybe

Jayant would understand. Maybe he wouldnt. But even so. (205), just as

more than twenty years later Moving On (2004) underlines: The search is

doomed to failure. Yes, Baba, youre right, we will never find what we are

looking for, we will never get what were seeking for in other humans. We will

continue to be incomplete, all of us, each one of us. Yet, the search is what its all

about, dont you see, Baba, the search is the thing (343).

Like its forerunners, In The Country of Deceit is a carefully constructed

and calibrated novel, its first-person narrators voice and limited view finding

their counterpoint in a series of letters, first and foremost those of her clear-

sighted and frankly outspoken, admirable aunt Sindhu. It is mainly through these

letters that Devi is forced to consider and reconsider her own position and come

to her own decisions, and it is these two voices, Devis and Sindhus that

contribute to the charm of the novel.

Love, more often out of than in wedlock, has been a topic in Deshpandes

writing from the very beginning, though it has not been scrutinized to the extent
 22

that In the Country of Deceit does. Love in all its exciting as well as sordid

aspects, has been in the foreground of so many Indian novels for so many years.

In Deshpande it is part of a quest. Devi is one of Deshpandes modern women

trying to come to terms with themselves and their place in family and society;

trying to reconcile their individual freedom to that of their given, which is not

simply culture or society or class/caste, but also the freedom of others. All her

figures reach their moment of sudden realization that sets them on their difficult

track towards crisis and resolution. The novel is discussed in detail in a separate

chapter.

In an interview with The Hindu, about the significance of the title In the

Country of Deceit, Shashi Deshpande says,

Yes. Seems odd, doesnt it? But when you think of what love does to people and

the things love makes them do My novel explores the slippery, treacherous

terrain that love takes people into. Actually, except for one or two early attempts,

I had never written a love story, in the sense in which these words are usually

used. It amuses me that I had to get to this age to be able to write one. Once I

began, I realized the difficulties of writing about love. Its so easy to slip into

clichd language, clichd situations, to become banal and maudlin. But the truth

is that love is a strong emotion; there is nothing banal or clichd about it

some time during the writing of this novel, I realized that I have been exploring

the idea of love in all my novels. Different kinds of love, the different faces of

love. I also find myself increasingly interested in the idea of goodness in human

beings. The emphasis today, perhaps because of the times, is on violence, on

 23

evil. Goodness, when it is written about, is made to seem like weakness. In fact,

we shy away from the very word. We speak of values instead. Nevertheless,

goodness is real, it exists-not only in people like Bapu or Mother Teresa, but in

ordinary people. It is these people who make life worth living. So, whether it is

Joe in Small Remedies, Kalyani in A Matter of Time, Akka in The Binding Vine,

or Gayatri in Moving On, they make life possible for others. While Shashi

Deshpande deals with destabilizing long social formulas, without breaking away

from family and giving respect to the value system of the traditional family,

seems to be welcoming new ideas, progress modernization; Shobha Des women

do not care for any moral or traditional values. Women in Shobyha Des novels

try to identify themselves outside the family life and they feel they are equal to

men. They want their a existence to be felt and recognized by all those they

come in contact with. These women refuse to bow to tradition and convention

and oppression. They are far from the conservative stronghold of Indian society.

They have their own social circle. They do not care for anyone except

themselves. They believe that the world is at their feet and sky is the limit for

their progress and development. These are the modern women groups that are

emerging stealthily in a very striking Indian aristocratic society which Shobha

De presents in her novels with enthusiasm and creative energy. The erotic

description of her novels has become somewhat controversial. She explores the

subtle and inner depths of human psyche. She tries her best in bringing out the

moral and spiritual degradation of modern society. She stands first among the

writers who attempt to explore the world of urban women in India.

 24

Shobha Des first novel Socialite Evenings (1988) deals with a new

woman of modern era. It is about a young middle-class girl who develops a

passion for the world of films and modeling. Karuna, the protagonist of the

novel, moves from a dusty clinic in Satara to the mega city of Bombay, from a

middle-class family to the big world of fashion designing and advertising. Her

Starry Nights (1991) deals with the story of a film star Aasha Rani, who comes

from a small town to the film world of Bombay. The glittering world of cinema

is in reality so miserable that it can shatter the moral values of any human being.

Shobha De criticizes severely the hypocrisy of the people of the film world who

are from higher stratum of the society who try to conceal their real personalities

with their money and power. She also discusses love and sex frankly, besides the

modern womans quest for identity in the male-dominated society.

Sisters (1992) is a realistic novel which brings forth serious issues about

urban women in the fast-growing business society. It is the story of an urban

Indian woman confronted with degenerated underworld culture, which is

involved in conspiracies and betrayals. It is the world where women are treated

as objects of pleasures. In her Strange Obsession (1992) Shobha De deals with

lesbianism. It revolves around the life and lustful relationship of two young

women-Amrita Pritam and Meenakshi. Her other novels are: Uncertain Liaisons

(1993), Small Betrayals, Shooting from the Hip (1994), Sultry Days (1994),

Snapshots (1995), Second Thoughts (1996), Selective Memory: Stories from My

Life (1998). L. Sonia Nngthoujam rightly examines Shobha Des women thus:
 25

They are all daring women and have lots of stamina to face the

stress and strain of the high society they live in. they are not afraid

of facing every brick thrown in their way in their endeavour to lead

lives on their own terms. Power, money and fame are the three

biggest aspirations of the new women. They are ready to take up

every challenge which lies before them to get what they want.

Nothing matters to them as long they can enjoy life. They refuse to

look on man as their superior. They are daring lionesses on the

prowl, out to attack everything that comes to hinder them from

catching their prey. This is the new image of the modern woman

which De daringly brings out in all novels (45).

Uma Vasudev has become one of the leading novelists of Indian English

fiction and a renowned columnist on political issues. She has also written,

produced and directed several documentaries and television serials. She deals

with fictional and non-fictional approach while writing. For instance, this

novelist feels that her biographies of Indian Gandhi were actually an attempt to

identify the countrys history through a woman who governed it. She

investigates the inner struggle of her characters in her novels. The Song of

Anasuya (1978) looks deeply into man-woman relationship. In her second novel,

Shreya of Sonagarh (1993) she is more concerned with the upliftment of women

and their liberation. It also portrays the character of a local woman politician of

Madhya Pradesh and her strong perceptions. It features the transformation of

Shreya into a national political figure. The story is about Shreya who used to be
 26

lazy, unambitious and unattractive but her personality changes after her

marriage. In order to fulfil her mother-in-laws dreams, she attended political

meetings and involved herself in socializing. For keeping the promise made to

her mother-in-law, she contests elections and that is how her political career

begins. With time, she realizes the wasteful living of the upper begins. With

time, she realizes the wasteful living of the upper class people and the sufferings

of the poor people and develops a genuine concern for them and completely

involves herself into a political career.

Arundhati Roy came into limelight with the publication of her first novel

The God of Small Things in 1997. The novel has been translated into more than

40 languages of the world. It is autobiorgraphical in nature. Like the writer

herself, the narrator of the novel has a Bengali father and mother who belong to

the Syrian Christian family of Kerala. It is about the memories of her with caste

prejudices and changing political scene, their rites, customs and traditions, the

manipulation of police power by politicians in Kerala. It is a kind of resistance

novel which brings forth the atrocities against the powerless children, women

and untouchables. She is a social activist and her book An Ordinary Persons

Guide to Empire (2005) covers such subjects as Narmada Bachao Andolan,

Americas War on Terrorism, The Growing Threat of Corporate Power and the

Role of NGOs.

Suniti Namjoshi was born in Bombay, has become a citizen of Canada

and resides in England. She worked as a I.A.S. officer for some years and

moved to Canada in 1972 where she taught at the Department of English of the
 27

University of Toronto. She is an outstanding fiction writer and her feministic

concerns are well presented through fables and allegories. Her work reflects

several cultural traditions by touching upon autobiographical elements such as

gender, sexual orientation, politics and her Hindu background. Her first novel,

The Conversations of Cow (1985) presents the story of Suniti, the protagonist,

who is a lecturer of Indian origin. Her Guru appears in the form of a cow and the

story leads into the world of fantasy with the cow of a cow and the story leads

into the world of fantasy with the cow and Suniti moving around Canada. Her

other works are: The Donkey Fables (1988), The Mothers of Maya Diip (1989),

St. Suniti and the Dragon (1994), and Building Babel (1997).

Manju Kapur was a Professor of English at Miranda House in Delhi. Her

first novel, Difficult Daughters (1998), received the Commonwealth Award for

the Eurasian region. The novel portrays the image of a new woman struggling

between family duty, the desire for education, and illicit love. The novel talks

about the Second World War, partition and Indias independence struggle. The

women of three generations are presented. The novelist presents realistically

Kasturi, the first generation women, Virmati, the second generation women and

Ida, the third generation daughter who does not want to be like her mother

Virmati, during her lifetime and after her mothers death this realization

overwhelms her with guilt. Ida starts probing into her mother and grandmothers

past by bringing together the fragments of memory in search of the woman she

could know and understand. She resists arranged marriage because she falls in

love with her professor, a married man, her neighour. She does not married man,
 28

her neighbor. She does get married to the professor but cannot escape the anger

of her family or the trauma caused by the Partition and by her struggle for her

own freedom. Manju Kapurs second novel A Married Woman (2003) is a

seductive story of love. The lives women live and struggle under the oppressive

mechanism of a closed society are reflected in the writings of Manju Kapur.

Thus, Indian English women fiction writers of independence era

successfully present the urges, dreams and desires of Indian women, especially

the middle-class women who resist the male domination and their surroundings.

These writers are preoccupied with inner life and the interpersonal relationships.

They describe women in the context of the contemporary world, as an individual

with the freedom of their choice. They present the image of women who resist

the traditional boundaries, the cultural obstacles, the problems and sufferings,

joys and worries of women which have universal significance.

For a long time African women writers and their work remained

unnoticed in literary debate, including academic research. Literature and literary

criticism was dominated for a long time by the male writers and critics, who

naturally focus only on the male-oriented modes of literary experience. The

anthologies, journals and critical work in African literature until the Seventies

reveal the relative non-seriousness and negligence of African women writers.

This non-serious attitude of academics and critics continued until the Seventies

except one reference to a woman writer from Africa i.e., Flora Nwapa, labeling

her as an inferior novelist in An Introduction to African Novel by Eustace

Palmer. The writings about African women and their efforts to find a place for a
 29

female tradition and its unique place in the African womens fiction saw an

unprecedented rise in the Eighties.

Women were always an integral part of the oral tradition of narration in

pre-colonial Africa as they covered all aspects of social life including

governments and even military forces. A large number of pre-colonial societies

were quite democratic and granted more or less equal rights to both women and

men. In fact it was only with the coming of colonialism in the continent, first

through the Arabs and then the Europeans that the condition of women in Africa

really deteriorated. The impact of colonialism on the women of Africa is

therefore a significant subject of investigation because it foregrounds the strong

note to protest in the voice of many women writers.

Historically speaking, women in Africa had always played a significant

role in several political movements and participated along with men in the

Anzanwan struggle, Kenyas Mau Mau freedom movement, the Namibian

liberation movement, South Africas anti-apartheid movement and the Biafran

Civil War. They had legal and social security that enabled them to become

effective heads of state and military strategists. Participation in political life

including community decision-making; public affairs such as economic

activities, memberships in numerous associations; active involvement in

religious and social life; economic independence despite the existing patriarchal

structures etc. lasted only till the colonial interference.

 30

The drastic reduction in the status of women in Africa, both at the

economic and social level, was a direct outcome of colonization. It was

especially after the European colonial intrusion that women were deprived of

their traditional initiative and status in society. Prior to colonization, both men

and women were engaged in the production of some kind of socially necessary

goods and this gave women access to and control over the products of their

labour. But when the colonizers introduced cash crop cultivation, women

became displaced from a position of centrality to margins. It is not that after

colonization, people in Africa, particularly women, accepted their fate and

degradation silently. There were voices of protest.

Both men and women writers of Africa have depicted this deplorable

condition of women in their writings. For the female writer in Africa, the main

dilemma has been to articulate her silence and make her voice heard. Due to lack

of opportunity, most African women did not reach the University. Hence, African

literature became a male-dominated, male-controlled and male-oriented field.

The pain of the colonial experience and the trivialization of her role in society

added to her disability as a writer struggling to make her voice heard.

African womans perception, experience and awareness are most explicit

in the works of protest writers. The major women writers who think that the

womans experience revolves around her own identity rather than around mans

needs are: Buchi Emecheta, Efua Sutherland, Ama Ata Aidoo, Flora Nwapa and

Bessie Head.
 31

Generally, the protest of all these writers is directed at sexual inequality in

traditional as well as modern Africa. This protest is usually interwoven with a

frank emphasis on the womans own need to develop and assert her own strength

of will. In this connection Lloyd W.Brown says:

It is not enough to complain about ones sexual victimization: one

needs to do something about it Buchi Emecheta started out

primarily as a protest writer whose early scathing indictment of

male chauvinism in England and Nigeria is passionate and direct,

but often marred by sloppiness and long-winded preacheniess that

leaves little room for complex and credible characterization her

fiction has become more complex, blending the continuing notes

of protest with interesting, often arresting characterization and with

a more interesting narrative style (39).

Women writers like Flora Nwapa and Buchi Emecheta portray women

who function within the traditional African society. But they challenge the

unchanging, submissive rural women who accept the male-oriented societal

norms without questioning it. These writers give expression to the dilemmas in

the lives of the protagonists whose difficulties are instigated by the conflict

between desired personal aspirations and authorized societal norms deeply

ingrained in the system and in their own psyche. At the same time, these writers

also accept the importance of wifehood and motherhood.

 32

The lives of middle class Nigerian women differ greatly from those of

most western women. From pre-colonial days women retained certain economic

opportunities within the social system. In fact, before the middle of the twentieth

century, Nigerian women traditionally played a more significant role in society

than the western women. Traditional or tribal society in Nigeria expected women

to be significant wage earners in the family. They labored in farming, fishing,

herding, and commerce. For instance, they work along with Nigerian men in

pottery, cloth-making, and craft work. In fact, women traditionally had the right

to profit from their work, although the money usually served as a contribution to

the family income. This economic freedom was much different from many

western societies, where women had to fight for the right to work. These

traditions still survive in modern Nigeria.

However, Nigerian men do not value the economic contributions of their

wives. They do not view the womans job and household work as especially

strenuous. For the most part, Nigerian men consistently take their wives for

granted. Moreover, even with economic opportunities, Nigerian women lack

certain rights. As a rule, men do not have any legal responsibility for their

offspring, and they often abandon women, expecting them to carry the financial

burden of the family.

The Nigerian institution of marriage is unconventional by western

standards. The traditional and an systems of polygamy flourish within every

social class. Women expect very little from men in terms of companionship,

personal care, and fidelity. Their relationships exist without the emotional
 33

elements. Polygamy is a crucial component of many womens lives. Women

depend on the other wives of their husbands. The younger co-wives take on

many of the household and financial responsibilities. As women get older they

have the comfort of knowing that the burden of their marriage does not fall

solely on their shoulders.

A womans position in society changes vastly once they marry since she

becomes a possession, with relatively no rights in her husbands family. In fact,

the husbands mother and sisters have much more of an influence over him than

his own wife. The wife resents this lack of control or even respect within their

marriage. The Nigerian system of inheritance reflects the lack of male

responsibility to his wife and children. If a husband dies, the woman usually

receives nothing, although the law entitles her to a share. If she has no children,

the treatment is worse. Since property can only pass between the same sexes,

women can never inherit from their fathers. Within marriage, women have an

obligation to have children. Traditionally, society blames the woman for a

marriage without children. Society condemns not only women who cannot have

children, but also unmarried and divorced women.

Buchi Emecheta in The Joys of Motherhood (1979) challenges the myth

that motherhood is synonymous with self-fulfillment. Nnu Ego labours

throughout her life to bring up her numerous children who in turn desert her in

her old age and she dies alone on the roadside. Emecheta establishes the need for

her traditional protagonist to fight against oppressive social and sexual codes

within the society.

 34

Buchi Emecheta is perhaps the first African writer to address the issues of

women overtly. Although, she travelled widely, she resides in London with her

five children. Being a student of oppression in a white society, man-woman

relationships in African society and tradition versus modernity. Her fiction is

structured by her ideological position that moves between her identity as an

African woman and as a writer living in England. Living as she does between

two societies, her dilemma is how to present an authentic picture of Africa to the

Western readers. Even though Emecheta lives and writes from London, her

women never forget their African roots. They are very often torn between

African tradition and western modernity and display a wounded psyche but they

refuse to conform and invariably voice their protest. They look for a change and

try to make their independent choices. In this, they generally survive and often

triumph, (65) says Neerja Chand.

As a feminist writer, she rejects the clichd images of women as self-

effacing, docile and silent. Her heroines are practical individuals defining their

own self and contributing to the progress of their society. But as an African she

feels committed to highlight the positive aspects of her rich heritage. In one of

her articles, she says: Being a woman, and an African born, I see things through

an African womans eyes. I chronicle the little happenings in the lives of African

women I know. I did not know that by doing so I was going to be called a

feminist. But it I am now a feminist then I am an African feminist with a small

f (175). Her novel, Second Class Citizen 91974) traces the trials and

tribulations of Adah, from childhood to maturity. Adah makes education a

 35

weapon that she must acquire to liberate herself and fulfil her dream of going to

U.K. More than any other writer, Emecheta focuses on education as the most

important tool for female empowerment.

Bessie Head, South African writer in exile who made the neighbouring

country Botswana her home, wrote fiction that deals with the larger issues of

race, class and gender while making a passionate cry for an end of oppression in

its many forms, economic, racial and sexual. Head deals with the innermost

chaos and alienation of her fragmented women. Her women characters depend

on each other for nurturing guidance and emotional and psychological support in

a gesture of the female bonding like that of female characters in Shashi

Deshpandes The Binding Vine.

Bessie Head shifts her focus almost entirely to the inner world of women

from the outer world and this makes her different from any other African woman

writer. She focuses on women who are on the verge of disintegration in their

struggle against patriarchy, racial discrimination and gender oppression, women

who suffer and revolt, get destroyed in the process but sometimes survive. This

innermost portrayal of the female psyche makes her a distinguished writer. In

this connection Twinkle Suri rightly observes:

Heads experience of apartheid and racial dispossession aligns her

with the Black people but unlike them, she has no sense of ethnic

loyalties. Other West African women writers like Flora Nwapa and

Ama Ata Aidoo not only highlight the inequalities and

 36

shortcomings of traditional African society but their works convey

a sense of complete identification and belonging to their African

roots. Buchi Emecheta, who is comparatively ill at ease with her

Igbo roots, manages to fill up this vacuum by identifying with her

adopted culture in the West. Even Black American women writers

like Toni Morrison, Paule Marshall, Zora Hurston land Alice

Walker seek to end their isolation in a white Euro-centered world

by returning to their African roots. Buchi Emecheta, who is

comparatively ill at ease with her Igbo roots, manages to fill up

this vacuum by identifying wither adopted culture in the West.

Even Black American women writers like Toni Morrison. Paule

Marshall, Zora Hurston and Alice Walker seek to end their

isolation in a white Euro-centered world by returning to their

African heritage. Bessie Head remains the only African woman

writer who is isolated from Black Africa as well as the Christian

West (18).

Maru (1971) is a novel of growth and focuses on the theme of racial

prejudice. Margaret Cadmore, the female protagonist belonged to a despised

tribe of Bushmen who were contemptuously called Masarwa which means low

and filthy. Margarets offence was that she was born to a poor undernourished

Masarwa woman who died after giving birth to a girl child on the road. Her

smelly dress, hard calloused feet and expression of peace and joy on her dead

face speak of the miserable life she had been living. It was only when Margaret
 37

started going to the mission school that she became aware of how different she

was from other children. Margarets alienation from society finds its echo in the

situation of Heads birth. Margaret started her first teaching assignment in the

village of Dilepe after returning from England and her friends were Moleka and

Maru and his sister Dikeledi who were members of the ruling elite. All three are

drawn to Margaret because of her unusual personality and all three of them were

very progressive and liberal in their outlook. Moleka shows courtesy to Margaret

by providing her with adequate lodging and taking care of her comforts. Her

relationships with Dikeledi is a striking example of female bonding.

Marus marriage to Margaret is allegorically significant in the plot. The

two dimensional portrayed of Maru is visible in the novel. On one side he is a

man with God-like proportions, whose word was law in the village of Dilepe,

who liberated Masarwa clan and did the unthinkable by marrying a Masarwa

girl. The other side of his character is a manipulator who trapped Moleka, who

also loved Margaret, into marrying his sister Dikeledi. Margarets momentary

passive acceptance of his benevolent scheming highlights the role of the male as

the dominant agent in the womans quest for self-hood. While Dikeledis limited

individuality invites male protective domination, Margarets independence

protects her equally from Marus protective domination. Margarets

uncompromising individuality suggests that woman has to tackle the structures

of male power not only as they are embodied in man himself but as they exist in

her own psyche, which is conditioned by male-oriented society. Margarets

growth as an individual is closely associated to her creativity as an artist. Her

 38

sketches mirror life. Margaret had a recurrent dream in which she saw a couple

standing together in the driveway of a house lined with bright yellow daisies.

The sketch she painted of the dream becomes a reality with her marriage to

Maru.

Bessie Heads A Question of Power (1974) is a very subjective novel and

traces the story of Elizabeth, the main protagonist as a coloured in Botswana,

which was very much under the shadow of apartheid South-Africa during the

time of Bessie Head. It is almost an autobiographical work because the entire

narrative is filtered through the disturbed consciousness of Elizabeth and the

relationship between the internal events and outside world is analyzed. The

novel portrays not only an external political issue but also a moral and

psychological crisis in each individual. The solution to social problems therefore

rests on the individuals personal strength, as well as on institutional reforms. On

this basis, Bessie head is one of the most profoundly representative of the artists.

Her social vision is focused on matters of immediate and concrete African

significance. At the same time, she raises questions about the nature of female

self-awareness, about the need for female self-help and inner strength that are

fraught with implications for women everywhere. Like the other women writers

she explicitly speaks on behalf of and about the African woman in particular but

compels our attention as a voice for all women.

The other influential African women novelists whose works are

accessible in English and form the corpus of African Female Discourse from

western coast are Flora Nwapa, Ama Ata Aidoo, Buchi Emecheta, Adaora Lily
 39

Ulasi, Funmilayo Fakunle Zaynab Alkali, Ifeoma Okeoye, Simi Bedford, Enu

Obong, Mariamma Ba and Aminata Snowfall; from the restive and diverse East

Africa, Grace Ogot, Muthoni Likimani, Asenath Bole Odaga, Miriam Khamadi

were and Rebeka Njau; from Apartheid ridden Southern, Africa, Bessie Head,

Miriam Tlali, Lauretta Ngcocono, Tsitsi Himunyangaphiri and Tsitsi

Dangarembga; from the Islamic northern Africa, Nawal El Saadwi and Assia

Djebar.

Ama Ata Aidoos works as Ghanas Minister of Culture and Education in

the early 1980s highlight her social vision, her commitment to write oral

literature and her desire to create a more integrated African society. She has also

promoted her cultures traditions through her writing. The piteous condition of

the women in the Ghanaian society is well illustrated by Aidoo as an African

feminist. Gyamfuaa Fofie rightly says: In spite of Ghanas renowned status as a

matrilineal society, men have been the main architects and beneficiaries of

family and inheritance laws. The matrilineal system merely guarantees that

nephews will inherit from their uncles through the female line. Wealth continues

to be confined to males (40).

Like Flora Nwapa, Aidoo also utilizes her cultures oral tradition in her

writings and emphasizes the way in which women pass on and maintain the

traditional values and customs of their society. In her novel Our Sister Killjoy

(1983), Aidoo has made Sissie, the main protagonist, a universal character,

whose journey could be viewed as a transit between Africa and Europe. Like

Flora Nwapas heroines, Idu and Efuru, Sissie dominates the novel not just as an
 40

individual woman but as a symbol of African womanhood. Sissie believes that

she was very lucky to be chosen for the trip to Europe with a group of young

Africans. She travels first to Germany and then to England. In London, she

encounters young Africans who had come to the West for a good education, but

trapped by the glitter of the western materialism and have decided not to return

to Africa. Sissie tries to convince them of the need to return home but her

outspoken political ideological beliefs make her alienate them. She eventually

decides to go back to Africa. Sissie was overwhelmed by the very glimpse of her

continent. Her return to Africa nourished her and made her more alive.

Zaynab Alkali is one of the leading writers from Islamic Nigerian society

who has effectively broken the silence on the plight of women. She has widely

explored the manner in which women are overburdened by discriminatory

social, economic and religious structures and has suggested possible remedies to

these constraints. According to her, a change of attitude in society is most

essential to liberate women from patriarchy. Female education, empowerment,

female bonding and virtue occupy an important place in her novels. The

Stillborn (1984) is about the shattered hopes of three adolescent girls who

struggle to seek a meaningful survival for themselves. Li, the main protagonist,

her sister Awa, and her friend Faku restructure their lives which have been

broken by patriarchal oppression. Li represents the latest generation, she is not

against tradition, but rebels against the restrictive and strict behavior of her

father, Baba, whose uncompromising Christian principles create tension between

him and his children. The various conflicts in Nigerian society are portrayed
 41

through the life of Li and her family and the intergenerational conflict between

Li and Baba are highlighted. Li wants to escape the suffocating atmosphere for

the greater freedom of the city and become financially independent. In order to

fulfil her dream she married Habu Adams, who betrayed her love and married a

city wife. Abandoned by her husband, Li followed him to the city where she was

mentally and physically abused by Habu.

Awa, her sister, was just like her mother and believed that man is the

substance and the woman is his shadow. She bore a child every other year,

including a set of twins. Her husband turned alcoholic and she was forced to

seek her mothers help to feed her large family.

Faku lost her father at a tender age, her brothers were drowned in a flood

and her poor mother was branded a witch by the villagers. Though she was

prepared to share her husband Garba with other women, she was shocked to find

that he was already married and had a wife andnine children in the city. Garba

and his wife made Fakus life miserable because she had only one child. In order

to survive, she was forced into prostitution. Both Li and Faku suffered because

of the marital infidelity of their husbands who were insensitive to their feelings.

The title is very appropriate for the word Stillborn symbolizes the aborted

dreams of Li, Awa and Faku and how young girls are not given the freedom to

lead self-fulfilling lives.

Zaynab Alkali condemns a social order which prompts young women like

Li and Faku to escape oppressive environments by contracting hopeless and

 42

hasty marriages. Alkali overtly denounces polygamy as it undermines the

happiness of women and seeks to treat them like commodities. Li protests

against the static existence by demanding change in status. She depicts that

woman is culturally indoctrinated to her subordinate status from childhood and

needs a support in the form of a father, husband or son. And therefore, Li rejects

that status in this novel. Habu repents for his infidelity and begs for Lis

forgiveness. At the end of the novel, Li has a dream where she advises her great-

granddaughter that even if some dreams are stillborn, she should continue to

dream and realize her aspirations.

Ifeoma Okoye, a writer from eastern Nigeria, writes about the middles

class Africans who benefited from the opportunities afforded by western

education in the postcolonial era. Behind the Clouds (1982) is an emotional story

of human situation. The first half of the novel is a journey of love and trust

whereas the second half is about infidelity and distrust. The novel concludes on a

note of penitence and restoration of harmony. The plot centres on the love story

of Ije and her husband Dozie Apia. The young Nigerian couple represents the

educated middle class which is influenced by western values and education. The

title of the novel symbolizes the life of Ije which is clouded by her childless

state. Okoye has made the struggle of Ije a universal struggle for all women to

sustain life amidst the atrocities meted out to them by the patriarchal world.

Mrs. Apia, Ijes mother-in-law, is a narrow-minded woman who disliked

Ije from the beginning because Dozie married against her wishes and believed

that educated girls are headstrong and disrespectful. Moreover, she blames Ije
 43

for her barrenness and welcomes a loose woman Virginia to fulfil her desire for a

grandchild. Okoye has drawn a contrast between Mrs. Apias blind acceptance of

tradition and Ijes modern outlook which refuses to accept the notion of female

inferiority. Motherhood is the central theme of the novel. In the African culture,

motherhood defines womanhood. Unlike Shashi Deshpandes Jaya, Okoys Ije

walks out of her marriage. By doing so, she not only asserts her selfhood, but

also helps Dozie to realize the anguish at being separated from her which gives

him the strength to throw Virginia out of his house. He pleads with Ije to pardon

him. Okoye stresses that it is Dozies realization of his mistake, his grief at

losing Ije and his desire to overcome his weakness that make him worthy of

forgiveness. Dozie overcomes his male egoism to take full responsibility for

their childless state and decides to go abroad and undergo treatment for both

their sakes and succeeds in bringing back joy into their clouded marriage.

Twinkle Suri rightly observes:

The three novelists, Ama Ata Aidoo, Zaynab Alkali and Ifeoma

Okoye are separated by geographical boundaries and cultural and

religious barriers but they speak with one voice about the

discriminatory social, religious and economic structures that have

given rise to the stereotyped and controlled images of the African

woman. In their fiction they have portrayed women in their

multifaceted dimensions. She is no longer voiceless; they have

given her a voice that rings out loudly, clearly and boldly

throughout the diaspora. Their brand of femalism is not

 44

antagonistic towards the opposite sex but they strive to show that

character traits are not gender specific and female aspirations are

not simply limited to sexual roles (86).

Flora Nwapa is considered to be the first significant woman writer in

Nigera and through her well known novels Efuru and Idu, encapsulates Nwapas

belief in the need for the African woman to be versatile for her own survival.

The credit goes to Nwapa for recreating the Igbo culture in her work. Her novel

is not an import from the west but evolves from ritual drama and oral tales

leading to the creation of an Igbo womens literary tradition. For instance, Efuru,

centres on the protagonist and is narrated in seventeen sections, each section

enumerates one particular virtue of Efuru. She has grown from early innocence

to a conventional acceptance of the role of wife and mother, and finally fulfills

an alternative woman-centred function in society through her association with

Uhamiri, the lake deity. This beautiful and talented daughter of a village

headman, Nwashike Ogene met her first husband Adizua after the festival in

which the young people selected their sexual partners. She violated the

convention by living with him without formal betrothal and without payment of

bride price. Her assertiveness prepares her to grow into a self-sufficient woman.

Every detail of her action is revealed in the novel through her interaction

with friends, market women, farmers or relatives. Ossai, her mother-in-law, and

her strong-willed sister Ajanapu represent two choices open to Efuru, i.e., to

submit or to rebel. Ossai admires her daughter-in-law and firmly supports her

when Adizua deserts Efuru. Being a tradition-bound woman, she teaches Efuru
 45

the lesson of tolerating injustice and oppression. Ajanapu is an ideal role model

for Efuru because while fulfilling the traditional role as wife and mother she

comes across as a firmly independent woman. She stands as a loyal friend and

advises her on her marital problems and questions Gilberts judgement of

accusing Efuru of adultery at a time when she was seriously ill. The strong bond

of friendship between Efuru and Ajanapu is an illustration of female bonding.

Efurus misfortune as a wife and mother draws the symbpathy of the whole

community towards her. Her personal grief is turned into a communal loss. The

solidarity of the village women is also seen when they come to console her and

give her the strength to look forward to a better future when she returns to her

fathers house after a futile search for Adizua, her first husband. Nwapa focuses

on the mutual concern women have for each other as they all share the common

burden of womanhood. Men are totally marginalized in such a matriarchal

society. Unlike Shashi Deshpandes Jaya, Efuru walks out of her marriage

because she refuses to accept any further exploitation and becomes the

worshipper of Uhamiri, the river goddess.

The symbolic presence of Uhamiri in the novel corresponds to the

direction of Efurus growth. She seeks emancipation within her community, not

outside it. She has rebelled against the traditional role of wife and mother and

her individualism is recognized religiously in the form of Uhamiri by the

community. She finds fulfillment in an alternative woman-centred role in the

Igbo society.
 46

Flora Nwapas second novel Idu (1970) is a sequel to Efuru. It is written

in twenty-two sections and looks like continuing the narration of the first novel.

Like Efuru, Idu is basically a novel about the question of choice. In the earlier

novel Efuru chooses a possible alternative because she has failed as a wife and

mother while Idu who is fulfilled as a wife and mother, chooses an alternative

which satisfies her personal aspirations as a woman. Lloyd W. Brown in Women

Writers in Black Africa says: Nwapas protagonist arrives at her crucial

decision as individual in a social context that is heavily influenced by that sense

of order which flows from strong social institutions and established moral norms

especially the conventions governing the womans role as part of the family

unit (151).

Unlike Efuru, Idu was a happy wife and mother. The novel explores the

marital experiences of three couples Idu and Adiewere, his brother Ishiodu and

his wife Ogbenyanu and Idus childhood friend, Ojiugo and her husband

Amarjeme. Among them, Idu and Adiewere represent the ideal couple. Against

the backdrop of marital strife, Nwapa challenges and rewrites the stereotypes

and myths that have surrounded women. Idu becomes the symbol of the strong

Black woman firmly rooted in the traditional Igbo community. Her involvement

and concern in encouraging communal development, her economic

independence and assertiveness are the source of community based power. Idu

resists the social conventions that crown parenthood and prefers to die for her

departed husband. The sudden death of her beloved husband shocks Idu as she

cannot imagine life without him. Idus choice of death in preference to the
 47

motherhood is a vindication of her personal feelings. The community offers stiff

resistance to Idus assertive personal choice but she prevails. Her fight against

the system was tougher than that of Efuru. Nwapas protagonists in both Efuru

and Idu traverse different paths to reach the same conclusion; a woman is an

individual not just a wife and mother (51) says Twinkle Suri.

The structure of Nwapas fiction is a series of dialogues, all designed to

dramatize the main concerns of the novel. Talk more specifically, the talk of

women, establishes the milieu within which Nwapa examines the communitys

expectations of its women as well as the womans response to both the

community and her own needs. The oral form has been consciously incorporated

within her themes and narrative designs. The structure of her fiction depends

mainly on a continuous series of dialogues to dramatize the main concerns of the

novel. The oral technique which is in the dialogue structure is more fully

developed in her second novel Idu. The titles of Efuru and Idu outwardly reflect

the personal experience of the individuals within the community; internally they

throw light on the communitys collective perception. The communitys attention

and its relationship with the protagonist are defined and communicated by a

dialogue form which bears all the signs of the novelists careful attention to oral

forms that reinforce her communal themes.

To examines the nature of resistance in the two novels, we observe that

Efuru was unlucky in her choice of husbands and the death of her only child.

The community accepts her new role of her association with Uhamiri and her

benevolent work in the village though she rebels against the accepted role of
 48

wife and mother. In Idus case, the emotional pressures are greater because she is

a happy wife and mother but refers death to motherhood. Hence Nwapa observes

that motherhood is not the only justification for a womans life.

The African writer has a dual commitment to tell the story of being a

woman and also the story of being an African. Female friendships form the core

of female empowerment in the work of women novelists. The women novelists

do not offer utopian or idealistic solutions to the problems of women. They

believe that the female empowerment begins and ends with the self. In the

novels selected for the study, each protagonist learns to make a way out for

herself. Western feminism is an individualistic egoistic doctrine which demands

equal rights only for women. African womanism on the contrary is humanistic

and communal in nature as it not only talks about rights of the individual but of

all groups, races and nations. It is not an ideology of egoism but humanism. It

does not only talk about the rights of the individual but also his responsibilities

in constructing a new world order. According to Twinkle Suir:

Womanism emphasizes the value of women as they are; it believes

they are already as valuable as men. By asserting the value of

women as women, and not as sexless clones of men, womanism

effectively counters the systematic devaluation of men under

patriarchy In fact an African woman makes her children the

cornerstone of her life and in a system of generational continuity

offers herself as a role model of responsible and empowered

womanhood The devaluation of the family, lack of moral values,

 49

delinquency in children and teenagers, drugs, sexual abuse and a

utilitarian society in the West are the direct result of individualistic

feminism which is a separatist creed and seeks to replace the

tyranny of man with the tyranny of woman. Womanism offers a

positivist, holistic approach to life, a step towards sanity in human

relationships, and is perhaps, the only mode for preservation of

human existence on this planet (116).

The word womanism was first used by the Pulitzer Prize winning author,

Alice Walker. She used the term in her book In Search of Our Mothers Gardens:

Womanist Prose 91983). In this book, Walker uses the word to describe the

perspective and experiences of women of colour.

Although most Womanist scholarship centres on the African American

womans experience, other non-white theorists also identify themselves with this

term.

The roots of theological womanism grew out of the theology of Jacquelyn

Grant, Delores Williams, and James Hal Cone.

Womanist theology is a prophetic voice concerned about the well-

being of the entire African American community, male and female,

adults and children. Womanist theology attempts to help black

women see, affirm, and have confidence in the importance of their

experience and faith for determining the character of the Christian

religion in the African American community. Womanist theology

 50

challenges all oppressive forces impeding black womens struggle

for survival and for the development of a positive, productive

quality of life conductive to womens and the familys freedom and

well-being. Womanist theology opposes all oppression based on

race, sex, class, sexual preference, physical ability, and caste. Thus

womanism is not only a theoretical concept, but is also live

experience.

Womanism is a term commonly used in the context of academic

theological studies. Some authors use womanism and black feminism almost

interchangeably, as they have much overlap and share heroines and foremothers.

Other experts make a distinction based on the prioritization of men. Both black

and white feminists are primarily concerned with women, in contrast to womens

roles in what they consider as male-centred society.

The term womanist, according to Alice Walkers In Search of Our

Mothers Gardens: Womanist Prose (1983), attributed the words origin to the

black folk expression of mothers to female children, You acting womanish,

i.e. like a woman usually referring to outrageous, audacious, courageous, or

willful behavior. Wanting to know more and in greater depth than is considered

food for one (A womanist is also) a woman who loves other women sexually

and/or non-sexually. Appreciates and prefers womens culture. and womens

strength committed to survival and wholeness of entire people, male and

female. Not a separatist. Womanist is to feminist as purple is to lavender.

 51

Although Walker states that a womanist is a black feminist or feminist of

colour, she insists that a black feminist as womanist talks back to feminism,

brings new demands and different perspectives to feminism, and compels the

expansion of feminist horizons in theory and practice.

The introduction of womanism in the feminist lexicon in the early

1980s marks a historic moment in feminist engagement in the United States. The

late 1970s and the 1980s witnessed an internal insurgency in feminist led by

women of colour who participated in fighting vigorously against sexual politics

of the previous decade only to be confronted by the feminist politics of exclusion

a decade later. Excluded from and alienated by feminist theorizing and thinking,

women of colour insisted that feminism must account for different subjectivities

and locations in its analysis of women, thus bringing into focus the issue of

difference, particularly with regard to race and class.

As feminism was unable to fully account for the experiences of black

women, Alice Walkers womanism intervened to make an important

contribution to carry the weight of experiences of black women. As Walker

noted in the New York Times Magazine in 1984, I dont choose womanism

because it is better than feminism I choose it because I prefer the sound, the

feel, the fit of it; because I cherish the spirit of the women (like Sojourner) the

word calls to mind, and because I share the old ethnic-American habit of

offering society a new word when the old word it is using fails to describe

behavior and change that only a new word can help it more fully see. In other

words, feminism needed a new word that would capture its complexity and
 52

fullness. Despite Walkers claims to the contrary, she suggests in her definitions

of womanism (e.g., womanist is to feminism as purple is to lavender) that the

womanist /black woman is stronger and superior to the feminist/white woman.

Black feminism takes off on the dual issue of racial and sexual

discrimination and proposes a different attitude with which one could approach

and appreciate womans experience in Black or Third World communities,

especially Africa. The need to formulate such an approach arises from the fact

that the historical and social realities surrounding African women are essentially

different from those of western white women. Even though the experience of

womens oppression as womens experience is universal, obvious major

inherent contradictions like dominant patriarchy and traumas of a colonial

experience lend a different dimension to their experience as African women.

Therefore, the most decisive factor that distinguishes black feminist

perspective from the ideological basis of white feminism is the specific historical

experience of the black woman. While the white woman is oppressed as a

woman only, a black woman is oppressed by the same white patriarchy as a non-

white and very often by the white women as well.

African Womanism is an ideology created and designed for all women of

African descent. It is grounded in African culture that contributes to Afro-

centrism / Afrocentric discourse, focusing on the experiences, struggles, needs,

and desires of African women of the African disapora. It is not a type of

feminism, or Alice Walkers womanism.

 53

Womanists are black women who are, in a traditional communal sense,

concerned very much with both black women and black men. Men, and their

welfare, are sometimes claimed to be a higher priority to womanists than to

feminists. White feminism (as it is sometimes referred to by Womanist) is also

called upon to remember that black women (and all women of minority

race/ethnicity and /or low socio-economic status) were ignored and silenced by

white feminism through its second wave.

The following are the eighteen culturally derived African Womanist

characteristics:

1) The African Womanist canbe self-naming accessing herself, naming

herself and her movement.

2) The African Womanist is a self-definer; she defines her reality and

community in terms of their African cultural experiences.

3) The African Womanist is family-centred, as she is more concerned with

her entire family rather than with just herself and her sisters.

4) The African Womanist is in concert with males in the broader struggle for

humanity and the liberation of all African people. The idea of the

intertwined destiny of African men, women, and children is directly

related to the notion of the dependency upon the male sector in the

participation of the African Womanists struggle for herself and her

family.
 54

5) The African Womanist is flexible in role-playing. This is a controversial

topic today due to the predicament of the Afircan man and woman, which

dates back to American slavery, when neither partner was free to act out

the defined roles of men and women as set forth by the dominant culture.

6) The African Womanist believes in genuine sisterhood. This sisterly bond

is a reciprocal one, one in which each gives and receives equally.

7) The African Womanist comes from a long tradition of psychological as

well as physical strength. She/he has persevered centuries of struggle for

her/himself and family.

8) The African Womanist desires positive male companionship, a

relationship in which each individual is mutually supportive, an important

part of positive African family.

9) The African Womanist commands respect for herself in order to acquire

true self-esteem and self-worth, which in turn enables her, among other

things, to have complete and positive relationship with all people.

10)The African Womanist must insist upon recognition of her humane nature

so that she may more effectively fulfil her role as a positive and

responsible co-partner in the overall African struggle.

11) The African Womanist seeks wholeness (completeness).

12) The African Womanist desires authenticity (cultural connection) in her

life.
 55

13)The African Womanist demonstrates a sense of spirituality, a belief in a

higher power that transcends rational ideals, which is an ever-present part

of African culture.

14)The African Womanist respects and appreciates elders, insisting that her

young do likewise. This respect and appreciation for elders is another

continuum of African culture.

15) The African Womanist is adaptable, and demands no separate space for

nourishing her individual needs and goals, while in the twentieth-century

feminist movement, there is the white feminists insistence upon personal

space.

16)The African Womanists ambition and responsibility are highly important

in the life of the African womanist, for her/his family, too, depends on

these qualities in her.

17) The African Womanist is committed to the art of mothering her own

children in particular and humankind in general. This collective role is

supreme in African culture, for the African woman comes from a legacy

of fulfilling the role of supreme Mother Nature nurturer, provider, and

protector.

18)The African Womanist is a nurtuer and consistent in doing what must be

done for the survival of the family, a commitment grounded in and

realized through a positive sense of history, family-hood, and security.

 56

As mentioned in the ninth point of the African Womanism, Shashi

Deshpandes Jaya and Urmila also command respect for themselves in That

Long Silence and The Binding Vine. Both the writers selected for the study, i.e.,

Shashi Deshpande and Flora Nwapa, call themselves womanist and not Feminist.

Gender relations in Nigeria are characterized by a lot of imbalance to the

disadvantage of women. This is the twenty first century, yet tradition, culture,

religion and other factors have continued to widen the disparity between

Nigerian men and women, by keeping women in a subordinated position to men.

The larger society and the male subculture still see women and their aspirations

as subordinate, resulting in a situation in which the marginalization, trivialization

and stereotyping of women are glaring aspects of Nigerian life. In spite of being

disadvantaged by gender, a number of Nigerian women particularly from the

Igbo and Yoruba ethnic groups have made their marks in different fields.

Nevertheless, a majority of them are afflicted by poverty. One major cause of

poverty among women is their low access to credit and income-earning

opportunities as well as their marginalization from major economic activities.

Secondly, most Nigerian women are also afflicted with illiteracy as poverty and

illiteracy often go together.

The Nigerian woman is also characterized by low self-esteem because the

society has continued to regard her as unimportant and inferior to her male

counterparts. All through her growing up years, the girl child is trained to accept

her subordinate position even when it is well known that Liberal Feminist
 57

Theory is correct in its argument that boys and girls are born with equal potential

that can be fully realized, given the proper and conducive environment.

In the area of politics, the plight of Nigerian women is equally pathetic.

Their presence in policy/decision-making positions is very low. Factors for their

lack of participation have their roots in womens subordinate position in society,

illiteracy, poverty, low self-esteem, ignorance, lack of confidence, violent and

unconducive political environment, cultural stereotypes, religious barriers, high

registration fees and harmful traditional practices. Above all, the chauvinistic

tendencies of the male rulers of the land have over the years denied women any

meaningful participation in politics.

For the whites, black symbolized evil, sin, wretchedness, death, war and

famine. The black women have to carry the burden of these negative aspects

appended to their image and have to suffer greater degradation. The realization

of this degradation and neglect, infuriated the black women who in the Seventies

preferred to describe their struggle for equality as womanism.

Hence, Flora Nwapa, a novelist, publisher, and a short-story writer, is best

known as the first female novelist in Nigeria and the first African woman to

write and publish a novel Efuru (1966) in English.

Although early critics of African literature did not recognize the

significance of her work, Nwapa has been widely praised for her ability to adapt

the English language to capture the flavor of the Igbo idiom. Nwapa offers to

readers a fresh perspective on traditional West African culture and modern

 58

Nigeria by exploring a womans point of view; furthermore, her use of the oral

tradition and the folk language of village women reflect a commitment to create

literature from those sources.

All Nwapas fiction for adults centres on the role of women in Nigerian

society, whether urban or rural. She tries to prove that women are first and

foremost human beings. Nwapa views women dialectically in both traditional

and modern society. On the one hand they are powerful figures in traditional

culture, economically secure and socially vibrant; yet, on the other they are

bound to a system of male dominance that limits their choices.

Nwapas attention to womens lives, particularly in the villages, gave

her writing an oral quality in which the voices of women define the

pattern and structure of her novels and short stories. Nwapa, like many of

her male counterparts, relied heavily on African oral tradition in the form

of proverbs, parables, songs, and tales. Nwapas style is rarely

descriptive; information is passed on by dialogue. As in oral culture, the

characters in her novels and short stories find important news through

contacts at the market place, at the farm, in town, or around the family

compound.

Efuru, Nwapas first novel, is set in the village community of Oguta,

where Nwapa was raised. Efuru, the protagonist, is a remarkable woman:

beautiful, intelligent, and successful as a trader. Yet she has one severe flaw of

not bearing a child. Although she respects her village traditions, she does not
 59

always follow them. She chooses her husbands without familial approval, and

both marriages end disastrously. Yet, even though she cannot, as wife and

mother, meet the conventional requirements of the society, Efuru is given

another option to serve her community, as the worshipper of the lake deity,

Uhamiri. As a child Nwapa was fascinated with the stories of Uhamiri, and

through this powerful female god, Efuru takes her place as a full citizen of her

society. Throughout the novel Efuru wrestles with her situation and, by the end,

finds a path different from the conventional one for women. Moreover, even

though the ending seems a positive one for Efuru, readers are left with a

question: Efuru slept soundly that night. She dreamt of the woman of the lake,

her beauty, her long hair and her riches She gave women beauty and wealth

but she had no child. She had never experienced the joy of motherhood. Why

then did the women worship her? (221).

In Efuru, Nwapa examines the relationship of the individual: in particular

the individual woman to the community, an important motif in contemporary

African literature. Furthermore, she explores the theme of womens central roles

in the society, as mothers and educators of children, as well as the painful theme

of childlessness. The childless Efuru can neither be what society expects of her

nor can she fulfil herself within that context, though she is wealthy, beautiful,

generous, and kind. But at various instances in the novel, Efuru stands boldly to

maintain her identity by being a successful trader. To quote one instance she

responds to the long passive suffering of her mother-in-laws words: Perhaps

self-imposed suffering appeals to her. It does not appeal to me. I know I am

 60

capable of suffering for greater things. But to suffer for a truant husband, an

irresponsible husband like Adizua is to debase suffering. My own suffering will

be noble (62).

The above-mentioned instance proves that Efuru is strongly averse to the

idea of being ruled by her husband like her mother-in-law, but learns to be

independent and takes up the challenge of taking care of her child; helps her

neighbours and continues with her trade. She also insists that her suffering

should not go in vain and if at all she has to suffer, that suffering must be for

something which is noble and not a debase suffering for an irresponsible

husband like Adizua. The passage also shows her resistance to the self-imposed

suffering and self-realization.

Flora Nwapas second novel Idu (1970) is a sequel to Efuru. It is written in

twenty-two sections and looks like continuing the narration of the first novel.

Like Efuru, Idu is basically a novel about the question of choice. In the earlier

novel Efuru chooses a possible alternative because she has failed as a wife and

mother while Idu who is fulfilled as a wife and mother, chooses an alternative

which satisfies her personal aspirations as a woman.

Unlike Efuru, Idu was a happy wife and mother. The novel explores the

marital experiences of three couples Idu and Adiewere, his brother Ishiodu and

hiw wife Ogbenyanu and Idus childhood friend, Ojiugo and her husband

Amarjeme. Among them, Idu and Adiewere represent the ideal couple. Against

the backdrop of marital strife, Nwapa challenges and rewrites the stereotypes
 61

and myths that have surrounded women. Idu becomes the symbol of the strong

Black woman firmly rooted in the traditional Igbo community. Her involvement

and concern in encouraging communal development, her economic

independence and her personal assertiveness are the source of community based

power. Idu resists the social conventions that crown parenthood and prefers to

die for her departed husband. The sudden death of her beloved husband shocks

Idu as she cannot imagine life without him. Idus choice of death in preference to

the motherhood is a vindication of her personal feelings. The community offers

stiff resistance to Idus assertive personal choice but she prevails.

Literary theory is the body of ideas and methods we use in the practical

reading of literature. By literary theory we refer not to the meaning of a work of

literature but to the theories that reveal what literature can mean. Literary theory

is a description of the underlying principles, one might say the tools, by which

we attempt to understand literature. All literary interpretation draws on a basis in

theory but can serve as a justification for very different kinds of critical activity.

It is literary theory that formulates the relationship between author and work;

literary theory develops the significance of race, class, and gender for literary

study, both from the standpoint of the biography of the author and an analysis of

their thematic presence within texts. Literary theory offers varying approaches

for understanding the role of historical context in interpretation as well as the

relevance of linguistic and unconscious elements of the text. Literary theorists

trace the history and evolution of the different genres narrative, dramatic, lyric in

addition to the more recent emergence of the novel and the short story, while
 62

also investigating the importance of formal elements of literary structure. Lastly,

literary theory in recent years has sought to explain the degree to which the text

is more the product of a culture than an individual author and in turn how those

texts help to create the culture.

Feminist criticism is one of the latest literary trends in modern literary

criticism. Womens liberation movement of the late 1960s is one of the

motivating forces behind it. Feminist criticism is concerned with the

interpretation and reinterpretation of texts of women writers. According to

Elaine Showalter, Feminist criticism must be women experience centred,

independent and intellectually coherent. She expresses it in two modes. One is

concerned with feminist as reader and it offers feminist readings of text which

consider the images and stereotypes of women in literature and the

misconceptions about women. The other is concerned with women as writers

and its subjects are history, styles, themes, genres and structures of writing by

women. Showalter sums up this specialized critical discourse in one word as

Gynocritics which she herself invented.

Feminist criticism in each country has a different centre which is related

with one or the other aspect of womanhood: i) English feminist criticism,

essentially Marxist, stresses oppression, ii) French feminist criticism, essentially

psychoanalyst, stresses repression and iii) American feminist criticism,

essentially textual, stresses Expression. It is also concerned with womens

language. Women writers cultivate linguistic and stylistic devices which

spontaneously express feminine sensibility and individuality.

 63

From the point of feminist perspective, the idea is to read Shashi

Deshpande having in mind the arguments of the three major critics: Juliet

Mitchell, Torill Moi and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak. Reader response theory

from a feminist perspective finds literature as a subtle device to weaken women.

In the context of women novelists writing about womens domesticity and

seclusion within home, Juliet Mitchell believes that there is no such thing as

female writing or a womans voice. She joins Julia Kristeva to call such

writing as the hysteric voice which is the womans masculine language talking

about feminine experience. It is both simultaneously the woman novelists

refusal of the womans world she is, after all, a novelist and her construction

from within a masculine world of that womans world. Juliet Mitchells

statement is disproved by Shashi Deshpande whose The Binding Vine is a sane

post-mortem of several tragedies in the life of different women. Her writing

furnishes mirrors of authentic female experience and she examines lives of half

a dozen women to drive home the point what drives women to become hysteric,

escapist, sacrificial goats, and also discusses the compulsions which compel

them to silence, suicide or death while delivering a child. Feminists have tried to

convince that women are misunderstood/ marginalized because of the power

amassed by men, and that the language developed by patriarchy becomes

instrumental in forcing women to silence. Deshpande demonstrates that often

women too become the cause of female subjugation and suffering (161) says

A.G.Khan.
 64

Mitchall expresses her views on the psychoanalytical theories behind the

position of women novelists. At the point in which the phallus is found to be

missing in the mother, masculinity is set up as the norm and femininity is set up

as what masculinity is not. What is not there in the mother is what is relevant

here, that is what provides the context for the language. The expression which

fills the gap is phallocentric (80).

For instance in That Long Silence, Shashi Deshpande writes about the

internalized patriarchy by depicting the minor character like Venu. Venu, the

well-known writer advises Mira: Why do you need to write poetry? It is enough

for a young woman like you to give birth to children. That is your poetry. Leave

the other poetry to us men (127). This recognition of difference of works is the

mode of resistance towards the patriarchal ideology.

Shashi Deshpande born in Dharwad, a smaller city of Karnataka, moved

to Bombay later for her graduation and lives in Bangalore at present. This

movement between city and smaller hometowns is seen in her novels too and

these movements give shape to her metaphor of home-the parental home and the

home after marriage. For instance in That Long Silence, Jayas gender

discrimination is clearly reflected in the episode of Ramukakas sketch of their

family tree:

Look Jaya, this is our branch. This is our grandfather your great

grandfather and heres father, and then us Laxman, Vasu and me.

And here are the boys Shridhar, Jannu, Dinkar, Ravi. But,
 65

Ramukaka, Id exclaimed, I m not here! You! He had looked

up, irritated by the interruption, impatient at my stupidity. How

can you be here? You dont belong to this family! Youre married,

youre now part of Mohans family. You have no place here (143).

At this remark, she could not retort; only silence prevails. As she comes

out she thinks of her life as without any identity of her own. Jaya comes from the

privileged class of the society but this does not mean that she is free from the

limitation imposed by the gender. So also with the poet, Mira in The Binding

Vine, who marries a man impulsive to her and dies after giving birth to a son. It

doesnt mean the inability of Jaya and Mira to speak about their gendered

discrimination. Shashi Deshpandes women characters positive movement

towards speech could be linked to Gayatri Chakravorty Spivaks term gendered

subaltern. The narrator, Urmila in The Binding Vine takes upon herself the act

of introspection of speaking for Mira and Kalpana who are women who cannot

speak.

With Kalpana and her mother, we enter a completely different world,

where the term gendered subaltern is discussed. The issue of rape becomes an

issue of concern for Urmila. The fear of Shakutai that the girl would not be

married if a case is registered reveals the control that a traditionally patriarchal

society has on the women in India. As Mrinalini Sebastian observes: It is a

statement which combines many issues and reveals the frightening importance

given to chastity of the woman and to the necessity of marriage in order to fulfil

the life of a woman It is this fear of society and the expectations of this society
 66

which dominate the lives almost impossible for them, thus giving them the status

of the subaltern (160).

Shashi Deshpande makes the position of women quite clear in her novels

through portrayal of her protagonists inner and outer journeys. In the place of

Western feminism, what Deshpande focuses is a kind of gendered humanism. A

strongly developed class consciousness figures repeatedly in her novels. It is

often through the servant women, the subaltern class that the middle class

protagonists become aware of the relatively privileged position, and their

economic background and education confer upon them. The issue of gender and

class to oppress working class women is mapped out in The Binding Vine by

interweaving the tragedies of three women of different backgrounds. Urmi, the

middle-class woman, grieves the death of her daughter, Anu. Shakutai, a

working class woman, struggles to make out a living raising three children alone.

Her daughter Kalpana has been raped and is in coma. And the third woman is

Urmis mother-in-law Mira. Urmi increasingly gets drawn into Shakutais life, as

she realizes that her own mother-in-law, Mira too had been subjected to rape in

her marriage.

Though initially Urmi is able to ignore Shakutais replication of

Kalpanas shame on the ground that she is illiterate and working class, she soon

begins to see the connection in Kalapan and Miras tragedies and her own grief.

In the end, through her persistence and support, she is able to make Shakutai see

that it is not her daughters fault for being raped, while gaining insight into what

she sees as the cruelty of human nature. Why do I imagine that love absolves us
 67

from being cruel? Theres Shakutai she says she loves her daughter; but I know,

and she does too, that she was cruel to her. Perhaps it is this, the divide in

ourselves thats hardest to bridge, the hardest to accept, to live with (201). The

common suffering of the different classes as mentioned above, suggests

strategies of resistance.

If we examine the binary of tradition / modernity, Jaya in That Long

Silence re-examines her life as a wife and mother and finds a new formulation of

her responsibility to her husband and children. She thinks that she has played

only the biological role of a wife and the socially prescribed role of a woman as

a mother. She isolates herself from wife and mother and therefore resistance.

Feminists argue that the phallocentric culture alienates a woman from

her body. From the late 1960s to about mid 1980s works that dealt with

internalization of patriarchal norms by women have drawn heavily upon the

concept of alienation. Radical feminism does not accept the alienation theory

as it considers womens experience central to any theorization of selfhood and

body.

The radical feminists argue that womans body is the cause of her

oppression and the condition of her difference and hence it is a site of

interpretation of historical wrongs and social violence as well as of power and

strength.

Feminism like postcolonial theory attempts to invert the prevailing

hierarchies of gender, culture and race. Both share the mutual goal of
 68

challenging forms of oppression. Gender inequalities exist in both the

indigenous and the colonial culture both often simultaneously oppress women

during colonialism and in its wake, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, the Indian-

American critic identifies women as a subaltern with no history and therefore

cannot speak and therefore everyone else speaks for her and hence she is

rewritten continuously as the object of patriarchy or of imperialism. Vijaya

Guttal rightly says:

The postcolonial discourse has been described as an act of

rereading and an approach that offers us different perspectives on

issues related to colonialism. As a critical concept, it recovers

resistance of various kinds and attempts to explain the presence of

the silenced voice in any dominant discourse and makes it possible

to tease out various readings of a textual narrative. Postcolonial

criticism draws attention to issues of cultural difference in literary

texts and focuses on issues of gender, class and caste

Deshpandes work may be seen as a search for an authentic

feminine discourse in which the community of women with a

common heritage of oppression tries to understand themselves

and also work towards a positive social change. Although Shashi

Deshpande is never a doctrinaire feminist and has been wary of

the label feminist, many feminist critics turn to her work in order

to develop discussions in feminist criticism. Her novels featuring

female protagonists reconstruct aspects of womens experience and

 69

attempt to give voice to muted ideologies, registering

resistance Her attempt to echo the loneliness of the gendered

subaltern and give voice to the silenced voices constitutes part of

the decolonizing feminist project (169-170).

For instance The Binding Vine projects two central issues of female

bonding and resistance to patriarchy. In the female bonding, Urmilas pain for

the death of her baby daughter Anusha makes her reach out to other suffering

women like Shakutai and her young daughter Kalpana, and her mother-in-law

Mira. These women coming together and sharing their life reinforces the idea of

the binding vine.

Another theme that is equally powerful is that of resistance to patriarchy.

Urmilas is the voice of resistance that registers a protest against the patriarchal

attitude to the issue of rape and she is not dependent upon men for survival and

asserts both her economic as well as psychological independence.

Much research work has been done on the novels of Shashi Deshpande

with regard to the feminist point of view whereas not much has not been done

from the point of view of womanism. Unlike political and economic movement

of equal rights and opportunities for women, increasing consciousness and

awareness about womens issues is the concept of womanism. Their fight is not

for equality as such but for the right to be acknowledged as individuals capable

of intelligence, insight and feeling. Deshpandes protagonists have a great desire

in them for a particular way of living a life full of love, respect and dignity. This
 70

is again a characteristic feature of Womanism. This study is to see women

characters of both the novelists with reference to the concept of womanism.

Shashi Deshpandes protagonists do not seek freedom outside the household but

they desire it within the family structure the freedom to be what they are,

without a mask in their behavior and attitude. Their protest/resistance is not for

equality but for the right to be acknowledge as individuals.

The concept of Womanism in the hands of novelists like Shashi

Deshpande and Flora Nwapa will be an additional critical too to understand and

appreciate the fictional characters like Jaya, Urmila, Efuru, Idu etc. Therefore, an

attempt has been made in the present study to interpret and understand women

characters and their concern from the point of view of humanism and

womanism.
 71

Shashi Deshpande

Shashi Deshpande was born in Dharwad, in Karnataka, India. she is the

daughter of the renowned Kannada writer and Sanskrit scholar Sriranga, a

cerebral man who wrote plays of ideas. From her father, Shashi Deshpande

acquired an intellectual bent of mind and love for reading and scholarship. She

obtained degrees in Economics, Law and English and a diploma in Journalism.

She is a widely-read person.

Till date Shashi Deshpande has published ten novels The Dark Holds No

Terrors (1980), If I Die Today (1982), Come Up and Be Dead (1983), Roots and

Shadows (1983), That Long Silence (1988), The Binding Vine (1993), A Matter

of Time (1996), Small Remedies (2000), Moving on (2004), and In the Country

of Deceit (2008); eight collections of short stories; one collection of essays, two

short crime novels and four books for children. Deshpandes reputation,

however, rests on her mature novels like The Dark Holds No Terrors and That

Long Silence for which she was honoured with the Sahitya Akademi Award in

1991.

Her novels generally centre on family relationships particularly the

relationship between husband and wife and the latters dilemmas and conflicts.

For her portrayal of the predicament of middle-class educated Indian women,

their inner conflict and quest for identity, issues pertaining to parent-child

relationship, marriage and sex, and their exploitation and disillusionment,

Deshpande has been called a feminist. The publication of That Long Silence by
 72

the Virago press made its own contribution to this belief. But Shashi Deshpande

made it absolutely clear that she had nothing to do with feminism in the narrow

sense. Being a woman herself, she sympathizes with women. Deshpande has

portrayed the new Indian woman and her dilemmas, her efforts to understand

herself and to preserve her identity as wife, mother, and above all, as a human

being in the tradition-bound, male-dominated Indian society. The Indian

womans plight is a part of the general human predicament, though her

experience is significantly more intense. Her pro9tagonists are women struggling

to find their own voice and are continuously in search of their identities.

Memory plays a significant role in Deshpandes novels. The narrative

keeps on moving back and forth in time. The novelist also uses some devices

like flashback, light of memory, interior monologue and so on to probe into

the psyche of her characters.

Memories dominate the narrative structure and pattern of the novel. There

is a constant reference to the past being in the present. The novel That Long

Silence begins with Jayas memory of her childhood days, when film music

which Jaya loved so much was banned in her parents house as the disgusting

mush (3) by her father. Similarly, Mohan, her husband also ridicules her liking

for advertisement visuals in movies as a poor taste (3).

Shashi Deshpande told her interviewer Geetha Gangadharan that That

Long Silence is more meaningful than any other of her works, for it deals

with a much larger issue the long silence of women (2).

 73

At the beginning of the novel itself, Jaya, the protagonist feels that she is

losing control over her body which she resents. It is only a memory, a memory

of fear. She is reminded of the process of childbirth. As in other novels memory

plays an important role in the novels of Shashi Deshpande. Jaya remembers the

process of childbirth: The only memory of it that remains with me is that of fear

that I was losing control over my own body. And so I resisted (1). When we

look at our face in a mirror, it gives us our exact image but when different people

look at our face in different circumstances, they give different meanings to the

same face. The mirror is always a treacherous one. It shows only what we want

from it. And others also see what they want from the face. Jaya starts her

narration by giving her own details of being Mohans wife and mother of two

children.

Once again she recollects her childhood days and resents the way her

father remarked on the taste of music she has: What poor taste you have, Jaya

(3) Perhaps Jaya had her own taste of music but her fathers statement makes

her realize how her habits are controlled and influenced by others.

She reflects on her life in the Dadar flat as an illusion of happiness. When

they came to the Dadar flat in Bombay, Jaya compares themselves to a pair of

the bullocks yoked together (7). This is a recurring image in the novel and it is

used to described their married life for seventeen years with two children but the

reality was that they were only two persons a man and a woman.
 74

Mohan blames the family, i.e., Jaya and the children for the scam. Jaya

remains silent at the beginning of the novel when Mohan accuses her of his fault.

At this point Jaya is reminded of the mythical figures of Sita, Savitir and

Draupati, sharing their husbands travails. Like these mythical figures who

followed their husbands into exile, Jaya also follows Mohan to Dadar flat and

learns to reject silently her submissive nature: No, what have to do with these

mythical women? I cant fool myself. The truth is simpler. Two bullocks yoked

together it is more comfortable for them to move in the same direction. To go

in different directions would be painful; and what animal would voluntarily

choose pain? (11-12). Jayas name was also changed after marriage. She was

now Suhasini, distinct from Jaya, a soft, smiling, placid, motherly woman who

lovingly nurtured her family.

At Dadar flat, Jaya feels free, after years, of all those monsters that had

ruled my life, gadgets that had to be kept in order, the glassware that had to

sparkle, the furniture and curios that had to be kept spotless and dust-free, and

those clothes, God, all those never-ending piles of clothes that had to be washed

and ironed, so that they could be worn and washed and ironed once again (25).

She was pleased with the bareness, the ugliness of the place at Dadar flat than

her own carefully-furnished home in Churchgate.

It is not only the women from the middle class society who suffer from

the egoistic nature of men but also women from the lower class society who

crave for the birth of sons. For instance, Nayana, a character from the labour

class is introduced to project that even she gives importance to a male child:this
 75

time it is going to be a boy passing her hand tenderly over her swollen

abdomen (27). When Jaya questions her craving for a male child, Nayana

responds quickly: why give birth to a girl, behniji; wholl only suffer because of

men all her life? (28).

Jaya remembers the childhood game of keeping house which seems to

hold a very strong inner meaning for womens life. Jaya stares at Mohans

restlessness and remarks that he hardly knows what waiting was. he had always

moved steadily from one moment to the next: But for women the waiting game

starts early in childhood. Wait until you get married. Wait until your husband

comes. Wait until you go to your in-laws home. Wait until youhave kids. Yes,

ever since I got married, I had done nothing but wait. Waiting for Mohan to

come home, waiting for the children to be born, for them to start school, waiting

for them to come home, waiting for the milk, the servant, the lunch-carrier man

(30. Therefore, the whole life of woman is like a waiting game.

Jaya remembers the words of her Vanitamami: a husband is like a

sheltering tree (32). This image of a sheltering tree is repeated in the novel. At

this juncture, she remembers how Mohans father reacted at his mother. She

cooks fresh food for him, doesnt serve any reminders. One night when there is

no fresh chutney, he behaves rudely towards her:

Why is there no fresh chutney today? he asked, not looking at

her. She mumbled something. The next moment he picked up his

heavy brass plate and three it not at her, but deliberately at the
 76

wall, which it hit with a dull clang. He stood up, and jerking his

shirt off the peg walked out of the house. .. Silently, watched by

the children, she picked up the plate, cleaned the floor and the wall

of all the spattered food, and wiped it the baby woke up and

began to cry. The hushed it and gave it her breast. When the boy

finally drifted off to sleep, she was still sitting there in front of the

fire, silent, motionless (35-36).

This episode was narrated by Mohan to Jaya. Jaya was filled with pity by

this painful story of Mohans mother. But she feels strange at Mohans comment

at this incident: She was tough. Women in those days were tough (36).

There was a lot of different in the understanding of a man and a woman.

Mohan observes strength in the woman sitting silently in front of the fire but

Jaya observes despair. Jaya remarks, I saw struggle so bitter that silence was the

only weapon. Silence and surrender. Im a woman and I can understand her

better; hes a man and he cant (36-37). This incident proves that women have

been suffering since the times immemorial.

Vimala, Mohans sister, dies of ovarian tumour with mistoses in the lungs

but she dies in silence, without sharing her problem with any of their family

members. Jaya reads the similarity between her mother-in-law and sister-in-law

and observes silence as a powerful weapon is common in their lives: I can see

something in common between them, something that links the destinies of the

two the silence in which they died (39).

 77

The first part of the novel gives a glimpse of the suffering of different

generations of women like that of Jayas mother-in-law to that of Nayana, a

domestic servant from the lower strata of the society.

In the second part of the novel, the ownership of Bombay flat is

transferred from Ai to Dada and from Dada to Jaya. While living in this flat she

comes to know of the sufferings of various women from the lower group who

lead their life as domestic servants. One such woman is Jeeja. Jeeja was

basically a realist. She badly needed the money she earned; she knew her value

as a good worker, she knew it was her reputation for reliability that enabled her

to earn more than the other servants did. Endurance was part of her life. There

were days when she used to come to work bruised and hurt. Sometimes she

never came to work. But what surprises is that she never seemed to be angry

with her husband: What had surprised me then, what still surprised me, was that

there seemed to be no anger behind her silence? (51). Therefore, deliberate

silence is a powerful weapon of resistance as in the case of Jeeja when she told

Jaya not to give any money to her husband.

Jayas anger over inequalities in the society is shown in her reaction to

Mandas (eldest daughter of Jeeja) narration about her drunken father beating her

mother because she could not provide him with money to drinki. Jaya begins to

wonder: Where was it I read an account of how baby girls were done to death a

century or so back? They were, I had read in horror, buried alive, crushed to

death in the room they were born in; and immediately after that, a fire was lit on

the spot to purify the place, they said. Perhaps it was to endure death. All those
 78

agonies for days I had been unable to get it out of my mind. But now I

wondered whether it wasnt more merciful, that swift ending of the agony once

and for all, than this prolonging of it for years and years (53).

Jaya speaks ironically to explain her familial comfort. For instance, she

never questions Mohan when he gets job of his choice. She follows her husband

like the mythical figure Gandhari:

If Gandhari, who bandaged her eyes to become blind like her

husband, could be called an ideal wife, I was an ideal wife too. I

bandaged my eyes tightly. I didnt want to know anything. It was

enough for me that we moved to Bombay, that we could send

Rahul and Rati to good schools, that I could have the things we

needed. Decent clothes, a fridge, a gas connection, travelling

first class. And, there was enough for Mohan to send home to his

father for Sudhas fees, Vasants clothes and Sudhas marriage (61-

62).

She compromises her life of being a good wife to Mohan following him

wherever he moves. But, later she realizes it was treasure to be in solitude. To

justify the statement from the text, Jaya looks at her achievements in life and

remarks:

Im not afraid any more. The panic has gone. Im Mohans wife, I

had thought, and cut off the bits of me that had refused to be

Mohans wife. Now I know that kind of fragmentation is not

 79

possible Two bullocks yoked together that was how I saw the

two of us the day we came here, Mohan and I. Now I reject that

image. If I think of us in that way, I condemn myself to a lifetime

of disbelief in ourselves. I have always thought theres only one

life, no chance of a reprieve, no second chances. But in this life

itself there are so many crossroads, so many choices. Yathecchasi

tatha kuru. Do as you desire! If I have to plug that hole in the

heart, I will have to erase the silence between us We dont

change overnight. Its possible that we may not change even over

long periods of time. But we can always hope. Without that, life

would be impossible. And if there is anything I know now it is this:

life has always to be made possible (191-93).

She sits down to write something. Jaya goes through the pages of her old

diaries to see what stages she had passed through and what changes have come

over her. She finds that she had meticulously recorded what she had bought, how

much she had paid for it, the dates on which the childrens schools had reopened,

the servants absences, the advance payments they had taken, the dates of

insurance payments. She notices in a special way what she was to prepare for

breakfast, lunch, tea or dinner. That had been her life motif in those days. It was

so dull. She observes herself nowhere in her diaries but being identified as

Mohans wife or Rahul and Ratis mother. Deshpandes protagonists are women

struggling to find their own voice and are continuously in search to define
 80

themselves says R.S. Pathak (21). Jayas personal identity is lost. Perhaps she

was searching for that identity.

But for me, now that I had abandoned Seeta, there was nothing;

or, if there was, I had to search for it. Wa that the reason why I was

sitting here with the diaries of so many years about me? Looking

through these diaries, I realized, was like going backwards. As I

burrowed through the facts, what I found was the woman who had

once lived here. Mohans wife, Rahul and Ratis mother. Not

myself (69).

The biggest question that confronts her by looking at diaries: Is this all?

The biggest question facing the woman of these diaries had obviously been:

what shall I make for breakfast / lunch/ tea/dinner? That had been the leit motif

of my life (70). Jaya once tells Mohan: I know you better than you know you

yourself. And I had meant it; wasnt he my profession, my career, my means of

livelihood? Not to know him was to admit that I had failed at my job. But why

then did the idea of his anxiety not occur to me this time? Was I slipping, losing

the clue to him? Or was it that, not caring, I was not as finely tuned to his moods

as I had been? (75). She herself feels guilty that she was not caring for Mohan

properly as she did in her earlier days.

As a child, Jaya used to get anger very soon. But after her marriage she

learnt to control her anger. Mohan has crushed the woman and the writer in Jaya

as he neither loved nor encouraged her. Jaya has every reason to be bitter about
 81

him for he has been responsible for her misery. With a straightforward language,

gentle irony, Jaya recalls their relationship as wife and husband:

Sensual memories are the coldest. They stir up nothing in you.

Love? Yes, what else could I call it but love when I thought of

the agony it had been to be without him, when his desires, his

approval, his love, had seemed to be the most important thing in

my life? It seems to me now that we had, both of us, rehearsed the

roles of husband and wife so well that when the time came we

could play them flawlessly, word-perfect (95).

Jaya tells that they were yet to live as husband and wife even after

seventeen years of their married life. It was frustrating and depressing to live like

husband and wife in futility without love.

In the third part of the novel, Jaya is extremely angry at all the charges

made against her by Mohan for his own fault. But here also Jaya remains silent

with her inner anger and confusion. Jayas confusion and silent anger are

revealed in these words:

I was full of a sense of angry confusion. What was he charging me

with? And, oh, God, why couldnt I speak, why couldnt I say

something? I felt foolishly inadequate, having nothing to offer him

in exchange for all these charges he was pouring on to me (119).

Jaya wants to burst out in anger but fails to break her silence. Expression

of anger in silence is best evident in this incident when Mohan accuses her: But
 82

as if Id been struck dumb, I could say nothing. I sat in my place, pinned to it by

his anger, a monstrously huge spear that went through me, excruciatingly

painful, yet leaving me cruelly conscious (121). To become conscious of her

own self is what makes Jaya different from other women. In an interview with

Gita Viswanath about womens silence, Shashi Deshpande says:

I did know any theories when I started writing. But I have seen

women and their silence. Women do talk a lot and there is a lot of

communication but I would say that there are certain aspects they

would rather keep to themselves. These unsaid aspects are what

matter to me. You know, I have seen girls being paraded, I mean

being shown to boys for marriage. I remember when I was with

my mothers family in Poona, there was a girl in the family who

was rejected. I was younger than her and was not consciously

thinking about it. Later it came back to me, how much pain that

girl must have felt. For example widows, there were many widows

in my family. There was a lot of unthinking cruelty towards them,

in the way they had to dress, the way they were at everybodys

service, as if they had not a life of their own. I remember a grand

aunt of mine, a loving woman, who would rise early in the

morning, and begin work in the house. She just took it for granted

that it was her lot as she was widowed at the age twelve. So I

thought of all these things which impelled me to write. Its not that

I began writing and then thought of silences. In fact these were the
 83

things that forced me into writing; it sort of piled up in me and

poured out in all the novels (231).

Memory is always selective. Some incidents in her life are rooted firmly

which are difficult to be erased from her memory. One such incident was about

girls identity. She is neither identified in her parents house nor in her in-laws

house. To substantiate, an instance is displayed through the family tree sketched

by Ramukaka:

Look Jaya, this is our branch. This is our grandfather your great

grandfather and heres father, and then us Laxman, Vasu and me.

And here are the boys Shridhar, Jannu, Dinakar, Ravi But,

Ramukaka, Id exclaimed. I m not here! You! He had looked

up, irritated by the interruption, impatient at my stupidity. How

can you be here? You dont belong to this family! Youre married,

youre now part of Mohans family. You have no place here (143).

At this remark, she could not retort; only silence prevails. As she comes

out she thinks that her life was without any identity of her own. To Mohan, she is

not a writer but only an exhibitionist. This proves the male dominance and the

colonial attitude of Mohan. She continues to write with the help of Kamat.

Kamat encourages her to write about the travails of a middle-class housewife

pouring out her experience of life which are deeply ingrained in her married life.

Kamat encourages Jaya to spew out her anger in her writing and not to hold it

within herself. At this comment Jaya reacts:

 84

Why? Because no woman can be angry. Have you ever heard of an

angry young woman?.... A woman can never be angry; she can

only be neurotic, hysterical, frustrated. Theres no room for anger

in my life, no room for despair, either. Theres only order and

routine today, I have to change the sheets; tomorrow, scrub the

bathrooms; the day after, clean the fridge (147-48).

Even at this stage Jaya was scared of breaking her silence at Kamats

advice and returns to her house. But it makes her to think. An apt image of a

worm crowling into a hole to describe the state of Jaya, a budding writer

dwindling into a stereotypical Indian housewife, is expressed in these lines:

Middleclass. Bourgeoisie. Upper-caste. Distanced from life. Scared of failing.

Oh God, I had thought, I cant take any more. Even a worm has a hole it can

crawl into. I had mine as Mohans wife, as Rahul and Ratis mother. And so I

had crawled back into my hole (148).

This part ends with a comment on relationship between man and woman.

The relation of man to woman is the most natural of one person to another.

Natural? Theres only treachery, only deceit, only betrayal (158). A close study

at these incidents highlights the gross injustice towards women. The most

notable example as mentioned above is the tree episode which illustrates the lack

of importance for women in the Indian social set up. But Jayas resistance is not

a violent resistance but to become conscious of her own self as part of her silent

resistance makes her different from other women.

 85

The image that a husband is like a sheltering tree is repeated in the

fourth part of the novel when the doctor asks Jaya to come with her husband.

Jayas anger increases at this statement: With your husband, of course what did

he mean by that? Was it impossible for me to relate to the world without Moha?

A husband is like a sheltering tree Vanitamami, did you, without knowing it,

speak the most profound truth Im destined to hear in my life (167). Her parents

at Saptagiri also told her that you become a mother, and everything follows

naturally and inevitably love, wisdom, understanding and nobility (173).

Therefore for Jaya, her husband and children are her entire life and she thinks

that it was a warm and safe hole to crawl in. In spite of all these sacrifices in her

married life, Jaya complains bitterly of her failure; a loveless married life which

caused the wife and husband to drift away from each other. Ill tell you whats

wrong. Ive failed him. He expected something from me, from his wife, and Ive

failed him. All these years I thought I was Mohans wife; now he tells me I was

never that, not really. What am I going to do? What shall I do if he doesnt come

back? I dont know, I dont know what I am (195).

When Kamat dies, Jaya was scared to pay her last respects because of her

marital bonds. When Mukta informs her, Stumbling over the words, I suddenly

realized it was not Mohan but marriage that had made me circumspect(187).

Introspective study of the protagonist undergoes a kind of transformation

through self-recognition in this passage: What have I achieved by this writing?

The thought occurs to me again as I look at the neat pile of papers. Well, Ive

achieved this. Im not afraid any more. The panic has gone. Im Mohans wife. I
 86

had thought, and cut off the bits of me that had refused to be Mohans wife. Now

I know that kind of a fragmentation is not possible (191).

After her realization, Jaya would not accept the earlier image of a pair of

bullocks yoked together imitating, a couple without love: Two bullocks yoked

together that was how I saw the two of us the day we came here, Mohan and I.

Now I reject that image. Its wrong. If I think of us in that way, I condemn

myself to a lifetime of disbelief in ourselves. Ive always thought theres only

one life, no chance of a reprieve, no second chances. But in this life itself there

are so many crossroads, so many choices (192).

For seventeen long years, Jaya manages to suppress her feelings, thinking

that it is more important to be a good wife than a writer. In the early years of her

marriage, Jaya was acquiring a name as a creative writer. One of her short stories

was published in a magazine and Mohan thinks that the story portrays their own

personal life of a man who cannot reach out to his wife except through her body.

Then she begins to write under an assumed name with the help of Kamat. She

starts writing light, humorous pieces on the travails of a middle-class housewife

in a column titled Seeta. This receives a good response from the editors and

readers. Therefore, she rejects her earlier image.

In her famous soliloquy, Jaya doesnt want to listen to the edited versions

of Mohans story when he returns:

Mohan will be back. All well his telegram says. Does he mean

that, now that Mohan has sorted out his problem, and no longer
 87

fears prosecution, joblessness and disgrace, we can go back to our

original positions? Does it mean that hell come back and give me

a carefully edited version of what has happened-as he has done so

often till now and then ask me, What do you say, Jaya? But it

is no longer possible for me. If I have to plug that hole in the

heart, I will have to speak, to listen, I will have to erase the silence

between us (192).

After suffering a lot due to her failure to speak in defence, she decides not

to remain a silent victim anymore. She gets the message from Mohan that all had

turned out well and he would come back. Jaya reviews the whole situation and

thinks whether they would go back to their original position and he would give

the answers he wanted. It was not acceptable to Jaya and she doesnt want

Mohan to become her master. Therefore, she says to herself, I will have to

speak, to listen, to erase silence between us (192).

At the end of the novel, Jaya breaks silence and builds herself to speak

with Mohan, giving voice to her unidentified life throughout the novel in the

preceding three parts. However, Shashi Deshpandes Jaya doesnt break away

from her familial bonds but maintains the sacredness of the Indian marital vows

and makes life possible in contrast to that of Shoba Des protagonists. The

concludes: we can always hope. Without that, life would be impossible. And if

there is anything I know now it is this: life has always to be made possible

(193). This conviction of hope shows the positive attitude to life. R.S. Pathak

examines: Deshpandes protagonists finally try their best to conform to their

 88

roles, and the novels end with an optimistic note with the possibility of some

positive action in future. The novelist emerges in them as a bridge-builder

between the old and the new, between tradition and modernity. For this and for

portraying the basic reality of Indian society and the place of women in it in a

sensitive and authentic manner her novels are of immense value (25).

At the beginning of the novel Jaya remains a silent bride, silent wife,

a silent accused, and a silent woman but at the end of the novel she breaks

the silence.

Imagery is frequently used in the novel. Shashi Deshpande uses a

beautiful image to describe Jayas married life:

A pair of bullocks yoked together a clever phrase, but can it

substitute for reality? A man and a woman married for seventeen

years. A couple with two children. A family somewhat like the one

caught and preserved for posterity by the advertising visuals I so

loved. But the reality was only this. We were two persons. A man.

A woman (8).

To an Indian reader the image of a pair of bullocks yoked together

suggests a world of meanings. It means that the bullocks so yoked share the

burden between themselves but no one knows whether they love each other or

not. The image of the beasts performing the duty mechanically undermines the

husband-wife relationship, who are supposed to be united in the bond of

 89

marriage with love and not for leading a mechanical life terminating in mutual

hatred and distrust.

The image employed by Deshpande is appropriate to the theme of the

novel. Two recurrent images in the novel are: a pair of bullocks yoked together

and a sheltering tree, and these images explain the meaning of the novel in a

subtle way. The protagonist of the novel rejects the image of mythical women

characters like Sita, Savitri and Draupadi and says: No. what have I to do with

these mythical women? I cant fool myself. The truth is simpler. Two bullocks

yoked together it is more comfortable for them to move in the same direction

(11-12).

This disgust of living with a man who does not love the woman the way

she expects of him is a burning problem that educated women face in our

contemporary society. But the thought of desertion by the husband unnerves Jaya

for she has not yet cast off the role of a traditional Indian woman. Through

Jayas character Deshpande expresses an ambivalent attitude of contemporary

educated independent-minded Indian women who can neither reconcile

themselves to a new situation when their husbands ignore them and crush their

ambition in life nor can they cast off their husbands, for the husband is like a

sheltering tree which they cannot afford to live without.

The novel, aptly called That Long Silence, depicts the plight of an

educated Indian woman of our time. The significance of the novel depends on
 90

how far the reader is able to realize the situation and go long with the author in

deciphering its meaning.

In a way, the protagonist, Jaya is any modern woman of our times, who

resents the husbands callousness and becomes the victim of circumstances. By

implication her character represents modern womans ambivalent attitude to

married life. Deshpande hints at the modern womans refusal to comply with the

wishes of the husband. The reader is free to interpret the heroine as a woman

who failed her husband or otherwise. Alternatively, a reader may also take her as

a representative woman of the contemporary society who is all set to resist the

husband. Jaya is both an individual and a dependent. Frequent reference to

Indian epics and allusions to archetypal characters like Dasarath, Rama, Sita,

Draupadi and Gandhari make the role of the reader difficult, for they demand his

familiarity, insight and sympathy.

Folk tales and fables are also made use of occasionally: Tell lies now and

youll be a lizard in your next life, steal things and youll be a dog, cheat people

and youll be a snake (128). Only a reader with an insight into Indian ethos and

familiarity with classics can appreciate the following discourse on sin and

retribution: An act and retribution they followed each other naturally and

inevitably. Dasarath killed an innocent youth boy whose parents died crying out

for their son. And, years, later, Dasarath died too, calling out for his son, Rama,

Rama. Yes, escape was never possible (128).

 91

That Long Silence shows progression as the protagonist undergoes a kind

of transformation through self-recognition. She makes an introspective study and

asks a question at the end: What have I achieved by this writing? She gets an

easy answer to her question: Well, Ive achieve this. I am not afraid any more.

The panic has gone. Im Mohans wife, I had thought, and cut off the bits of me

that had refused to be Mohans wife. Now I know that kind of fragmentation is

not possible (191).

Thus, That Long Silence is symbolic of womens resistance in general

through the story of a single woman in patriarchal society. Shashi Deshpande is

against suppression of women. Her presentation of the woman character like

Jaya is convincing as she never deviates herself from hard realities of life. She

presents the picture of womens life in a middle-class society as they are the

majority.

Shashi Deshpande examines various ideologically encoded binaries such

as: dominant/resistant; modernity/ tradition; speech / silence; male / female ;

oppressor / victim; central/ marginal; majority / minority etc. To substantiate the

first binary of the dominant/ resistant ideology most of the female protagonists

of Shashi Deshpande reject their mothers as role models, because they represent

a patriarchal outlook on life. Mira in The Binding Vine says in one of her poems:

To make myself in your image / was never the goal I sought (124).

The narrator, Urmila, in The Binding Vine is a clever, educated woman

working as a lecturer in a college. Against the wishes of her parents, she has
 92

married a man of her choice but is desperate of her married life. As she has

confidence in herself, she takes up the job as a journalist and becomes

financially independent. She never submits herself to her husband, Kishore. She

cannot bear the submission of Vanaa, her friend and sister-in-law, to her spouse.

She says:

You let him get away too much. I tell her.

What do you want me to do?

Assert yourself. You dont have to crawl before him, to you?

I dont crawl, I do what I want.

No, you dont. Youre scared of him, yes, you are, Ive seen you. You

dont even dare to call your daughters anything but Mandira and Pallavi, no, not

even when you pet them, because Harish doesnt like baby talk (80).

The denial of submission lies in the fact that Urmila wants to assert

herself. She has to reject Kishore and this can be done only by escaping the

tailored role of a woman. Thought she succeeds in escaping her culture-bound

role by not using the money Kishore sends her to run the family, she cannot go

away from her nature-bound role especially the role of a life-partner. Ultimately,

their relationship crumbles because of the lack of communication between the

husband and wife.

Since the beginning of married life Urmila finds that the bond between

her and her husband is not that of love, though she first believes that the anchor

to attach oneself to this strange world is to love each other. From the very first
 93

night of their wedding she feels the distance from Kishore. Marriage, which was

considered to be a spiritual bond in the olden times, has now become only a

sexual, legal bond. Each time when she tries to reveal her emotional insecurity

whenever Kishore goes away from her, he asserts himself sexually. Kishore, the

archetypal Indian husband, never understands the depth of her feeling. She tells

him a couple of times that each time parting with him is like death and Kishore

tries to find a solution in the physical relationship. But to her, sex is only a

temporary answer. I came out of it to find that the lights had come back. Go

to sleep, he said. He was kneeling by me, his face close to mine, but the

closeness was only physical. His voice was cold. I could see the goose bumps on

his shoulders, his chest. I did not look into his face. I was afraid of what I would

see, I turned round and fell asleep (139-40).

This incompatibility to understand each other ends in alienation. She

thinks: Yes, here it is, the knowledge I spared myself then. Kishore will never

remove his armour. There is something in him I will never reach. I have lived

with the hope that, some day I will. Each relationship, always imperfect,

survives on hope. Am I to give up this hope? (141).

Thus, a marriage that suppresses Urmilas human demands, a marriage

that denies her fullness of experience, forces her to take refuge in Dr. Bhaskar

Jains friendship. She tries to find herself in her relation with Bhaskar because he

is a patient hearer to her talks, gives her right response, cares for her emotions

and makes her feel comfortable.

 94

The married life of these women i.e. Urmila and Vanaa, whether working

or not, ends in discontentment. Shakutai tells about her sister Sulus life: After

marriage she changed. She was frightened, always frightened. What if he doesnt

like this, what if he wants that, what if he is angry with me, what if he throws me

out? What kind of life it is? (195). Marriage in male-oriented societies turns out

to be both physically and spiritually dissatisfying for the female partner. It

creates confusion in her whether to take the path of submission or rejection

because both end in discontentment. As a result, marriage becomes meaningless

and physical relation alone seems to sustain the man-woman relationship.

The second angle of physical relationship can be seen in the case of

Urmilas mother-in-law, Mira. Miras story raises the question of rape with

marriage. Mira was married at the age of eighteen to a man who loves her

passionately, but did not find solace in physical relationship. Urmila finds in the

writings of her mother-in-law a clear thread of an intense dislike of the physical

relationship with her husband. She writes: I have learnt to say no at last, but it

makes no difference, no difference at all. What is it he wants from me? I look at

myself in the mirror and wonder what is there in me? Why does it have to be

me? Why cant he leave me alone? (67).

Many years after her marriage, Urmila is given an old trunk full of books

and other odds and ends belonging to her dead mother-in-law, Mira, by her

husbands step-mother, who is referred to as Akka. Akka is also the mother of

her friend, Vanaa. The trunk was full of school notebooks which Mira had used

as diaries, scribbling pads, untidy bundles of paper, a file and an envelope full of
 95

photographs. Reading through the mysterious poems and entries in her diary,

Urmila is able to reconstruct the tragic tale of a girl who was condemned to

suffer in an unsuitable marriage. Her innermost feelings find expression in her

poems written in the vernacular, Kannada.

Mira, perhaps, symbolizes the plight of countless women who face the

same situation but are unable to voice their suffering. The attack on ones body

even though sanctified by marriage, can be as traumatic as rape. It is no wonder,

then, that Urmilas mother-in-law, Mira, had to put up in silence with the

violation of her body. Her thoughts however, are recorded as poems for posterity.

Urmilas careful translation of the Kannada poems into English reveals the

pathetic condition of Mira. One poem particularly brings home her tragic

despair: But tell me friend, did Laxmi too twist brocade tassels round her finger

and tremble, fearing the coming of the dark-clouded engulfing night (66).

Going through Miras diary, Urmila is convinced that she had written

from her personal experience. She observes: It runs through all her writing a

strong, clear thread of an intense dislike of the sexual act with her husband, a

physical repulsion from the man she married (63). To prove her point, Urmila

narrates a passage where Mira had clearly put down on paper, the relationship

she shared with her husband and her lack of feelings for him:

Talk, he says to me, why dont you say something, why dont you

speak to me? What shall I talk about, I ask him stupidly. What did

you do today, where did you go, what have you been thinking
 96

about all evening? and so he goes on, dragging my day, my whole

self out of me. But I have my defences; I give him the facts,

nothing more, never my feelings. He knows what Im doing and

gets angry with me. I dont mind his anger, it makes him leave me

to myself, it is a bliss when he does that. But he comes back, he is

remorseful, repentant, he holds me close, he begins to babble. And

so it begins. Please, he says, please, I love you. And over and

over again until he had done. I love you. Love! How I hate the

world. If this is love it is a terrible thing. I have learnt to say no

at last, but it makes no difference, no difference at all. What is it he

wants from me? I look at myself in the mirror and wonder, what is

there is me? Why does it have to be me? Why cant he leave me

alone? (66-67).

Urmila is able to feel her pain and anguish years later and connects her

sorrows to that of Shakutais who also has the same thing to say, Why does this

have to happen to me? (67).

Urmila alleviates her grief by discovering and empathizing with the

sorrow of these women. Usha Bande says: It is dignity in suffering that elevates

an individual and redeems the novels from becoming grim sagas of suffering

(192). Since the beginning of time, it had always been taken for granted that

marriage provided a means for man to satisfy his sexual urge and to help in the

task of procreation, and the woman was only a tool to be used towards that

marriage provided a means for man to satisfy his sexual urge and to help in the
 97

task of procreation, and the woman was only a tool to be used towards that end.

Deshpandes Mira represents women who are victims of marital rape. Thanks to

the feminist movement initiated in the west, shattered this myth and proclaimed

that woman had every right to find fulfillment in the act of sex. But Indian

women bound by the culture however, could not even dream of asserting

themselves in this aspect.

While reading Miras diaries Urmila compares her to Kalpana, a victim of

rape, hanging between life and death in a hospital ward. Urmi meets Shakutai,

the mother of a rape-victim, Kalpana on her visit to a hospital where Vanaa, her

sister-in-law works. Earlier the mother assumes that her daughter, who is now

lying unconscious, was injured in a car accident. On examination, the doctor

informs her that she has been raped and in the process she had been badly

injured. Shakutai gets a hint of the conversation between Vanaa and Dr. Bhaskar,

the doctor in-charge, she recoils in fear against the word, report. She cries:

No, no, no, Tell him, Tai, its not true, dont tell anyone. Ill never

be able to hold up my head again, wholl marry the girl, were

decent people, doctor, she turns to him, dont tell the police

(58).

The narrator highlights her immediate concern here which is that the rape

should remain a secret. In writing about rape, Deshpande has not attempted

anything new but the way she has portrayed this sordid drama is very realistic.
 98

The characters spring to life; the anger, frustration, helplessness and

despair of the victims family are brought out evocatively. The narrator, Urmila,

escorts the sobbing Shakutai to her house on Vanaas request and from here

begins their association. Urmila visits her regularly to inquire after her daughter

and through their conversation we get a picture of Kalpanas life. While speaking

of her daughter, Shakutai is full of paradoxes. On one hand she says: She is

very smart, thats how she got the job in the shop. Kalapana even learnt how to

speak English. People in our chawl used to laugh at her but she didnt care.

When she wants something, she goes after it, nothing can stop her. Shes

stubborn, you cant imagine how stubborn she is (192). A little later, she

continues, however, pride gives way to bitterness: And shes secretive. She

never tells me anything. She didnt even tell me how much her pay was, can you

imagine that? Me, her own mother. As if I was going to take her money away

from her. I dont want anything. All I ask is that she helps me out (92). On

another occasion, Shakutai bursts out: Shes very pretty, my Kalpana Shes

not like me at all. When she was born, she was so delicate and fair, just like a

doll, I wondered how a woman like me could have a daughter like that (93).

The same Shakutai, however, condemns her for the very things for which

she had praised her earlier:

And I have to listen to such words because of this girl. Shes

shamed us, we can never wipe off this blot. And Prakash blames

me what could I do? She was so self-willed. Cover yourself

decently, I kept telling her, men are like animals. But she went her
 99

way. You should have seen her walking out, head in the air caring

for nobody. Its all her fault, Urmila, all her fault (147).

Urmila, however, is unable to see the point in blaming Kalpana and wants

to punish the rapist by registering a case. She tries to reason with Shakutai: She

was hurt, she was injured, wronged by a man; she didnt do anything wrong.

Why cant you see that? Are you blind? Its is not her fault, no, not her fault at

all (147 But she is unable to convince Shakutai.

The mothers reaction, no doubt, is a reflection of the society we live in,

governed by age-old patriarchal norms. There is a strict code of conduct to be

followed by girls regarding their dress, speech and behavior in order not to

attract the attention of men. A girl is advised at every step to avoid behaving like

a male and to establish her feminine identity. A lot of importance stands, talks

and interacts with others: Talking long strides denotes masculinity, and so a girl

is told to walk with soft steps, so soft that they are barely audible to the others. It

is considered sacrilege for a girl to dress or move in such a way so as to attract

peoples attention.

If a girl is raped, then, according to the rules laid down by society, she is

considered to be as much at fault as the rapist, if not more. Perhaps, there can be

no greater injustice heaped on women than this. It is still more painful when the

police officer prefers to record the case as an accident as he tells Dr.Bhaskar:

Shes going to die anyway, so what difference does it make

whether on paper, she dies the victim of an accident or a rape? We

 100

dont like rape cases theyre messy and troublesome, never

straightforward. But forget that and think of the girl and her family.

Do you think it will do them any good to have it known the girl

was raped? Shes unmarried, people are bound to talk, her name

would be smeared (88).

The police officers argument, no doubt, aptly sums up the Indian psyche

nurtured as it is in a culture which, in general, depicts women as grossly

sensuous. So much so that in a crime as brutal as rape, it is the victim more than

the accused who desires to remain anonymous.

Dr.Bhaskar, the doctor in charge of the case, protests in outrage at the

case being reported as an accident. Pointing out to the obvious signs of rape on

the badly mauled Kalpana, he tells Urmi:

What about the injuries. I asked him? Id examined the girl damn

it, Bhaskar says angrily. You could see the marks of his fingers

on her arms where he had held her down. And there were huge

contusions on her thighs he must have pinned her down with his

knees. And her lips bitten and chewed. Surely, I

asked, no vehicle could have passed over her lips leaving teeth

marks? (88).

Dr. Bhaskar finds it strange that women like Shakutai who have got

nothing out of marriage except children, still live in fear of their children

remaining unmarried. He is informed by Vanaa that Shakutais husband had

 101

deserted her long ago for another woman and left her alone to work for herself

and the children. Hence he thinks it is a mystery that Shakutai should hanker

after the marriage of her children when it had given her little comfort or

happiness herself. He tells Urmila: Women are astonishing; I think it takes a

hell of a lot of courage for a woman like that to even think of marriage (87).

Urmi replies that women marry in spite of everything because it provides her

social security. She makes a valid point here and emphasizes the vulnerability of

single women in a social set up as ours where men and women are expected to

follow a rigid code of conduct keeping natural, biological feelings under control.

In spite of all her sympathies, Urmila is unable to do anything for

Kalpana. She remains a mute spectator until the hospital authorities decide to

shift her to a suburban hospital as beds are in much demand in the crowded

hospital. Urmila then decides to take the matter to the press so that Kalpana may

get justice. Urmilas crusade for Kalpana does not receive the approval of either

Vanaa or Urmilas mother. Nevertheless, Urmila pursues the case. Eventually,

the case if reopened and the identity of the tragedy cannot be avoided as the case

draws to a close. The rapist is discovered to be Shakutais sister Sulus husband

who, it is later revealed, had always lusted for Kalpana. This revelation shatters

Sulu, who kills herself in a feeling of guilt and despair, leaving behind her grief-

stricken sister, Shakutai, who had adored her.

The Binding Vine not only revolves around the individual tragedies of

Urmila, Mira and Kalpana but also depicts the raw deal faced by most women at

different levels, whether it is women from chawls like Shakutai and Sulu, or the
 102

urban, educated women like Urmilas mother, Inni, her friend, Vanaa and her

mother-in-law, Akka.

Urmila, perhaps, is the most rebellious of Deshpandes women characters.

Unlike the protagonists in the other novels, who are aware of the inequalities in

society but do not attempt to set right anything. Urmila takes up to defend on

behalf of the rape victim, Kalpana. She is instrumental in publicizing the case

and getting the police to investigate the matter and find the culprit. She

encourages her friend, Vanaa to assert and stop behaving like a door mat. She

also sets herself to the task of translating the poems written by her mother-in-law

in Kannada into English and intends to publish them.

Along with Juliet Mitchell, Toril Moi rationally defines feminist literary

criticism and clearly distinguishes between the key words feminist, female

and feminine and defines them to signify important categories in feminist

theory. According to her Feminist means a person who supports the belief,

that women should have the same rights and opportunities. It suggests political

connotations. Female connotes biological category and it means affecting

women. Feminine is connected with women and it denotes cultural aspect.

In The Binding Vine, the central issue of resistance through female bonding is

reflected in the pain of the death of Urmilas baby daughter Anusha, and it seems

to motivate her to reach out to other women around her who have their own tales

of suffering to tell. Feminine solidarity or female bonding runs as a strong hint in

the novel. In spite of the differences of the mothers and daughters, sharing of

experience and supporting are essential parts of bonding in The Binding Vine. In
 103

the feeling of sorrow and sympathy, a sense of identity is struck. Urmila

remembers Miras cry of despair and says, How clear it comes to me across the

years her cry of rage and anguish. Why does this have to happen to me? Why

did it have to happen to my daughter? Shakutai asked. Why? My own question

comes back to me why? (67).

The Binding Vine is divided into four harmonious parts of about fifty

pages each. Each part is preceded by short poetical epigraphs as extracts from

the poems of Mira, who worked all along her short life in search of selfhood and

personal identity.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak in her famous essay Feminism and Critical

Theory reveals her views on feminist criticism as a source of cultural revival.

She questions the cultural structures of patriarchal or male-dominated society,

now called phallicentred society. In this essay the clearly expresses her views

about the relationship among feminism, Marxism, psychoanalysis and

deconstruction. Feminism and Critical Theory is divided into four parts. The

first part is a version of one of Spikaks talks. She restricts herself to feminism

with reference to literary criticism.

According to Spivak, a language is woven into text. So text is of utmost

importance in any discourse, especially in cultural discourse. Marxist text is read

as a theory of the world (history and society), a text of the forces of labour and

production, circulation and distribution. Marx should be judged in terms of use

value, exchange value and surplus value: use value pertains to a thing, which is
 104

directly consumed by an agent. Exchange value is assessed in terms of what can

be exchanged for in either labour power or money. The worker, who has to work

harder and longer, suffers much in this exchange. He works more and gets less in

wages (in exchange of his loabour). The employer saves more money, which is,

in fact, the surplus value.

This value system can allegorically be applied to a woman. In the

traditional social-situation, the woman produces more and gets little in terms of

subsistence. She is thus the producer of surpluses for the man who owns her, or

by the man for the capitalists who own his labour power. It is unfortunate that

the unremunerated womans work for her husband or her family is not

considered value-producing work. Thus in the capitalist order woman has no

place. The child is the womans best product. Womb is the place of production;

therefore, the woman being the producer is entitled to the benefits of her

production. Spivak observes that in both matrilineal and patrilineal societies, the

man, who is deemed to produce the child has inalienable property right over

the child, Theman retains legal property rights over the product of womans

boydy. Marxist feminism works on an analogy with use value, exchange value

and surplus value relationships.

The Binding Vine has a multiplicity of complex themes. But the

predominant theme is that of agony caused by the death of Urmilas daughter

Anu, with which the novel opens, runs through two parts in the middle and is

concluded in the fourth section of the book. But the death of her daughter

dominates the consciousness of the narrator. The novelist gives a deep study of
 105

inner self by presenting characters who collectively share Urmilas personal

agony. This was done to reduce the personal agony of Urmila by collective

sharing. this agony is again compared with the agony of Mira, the mother of

Urmilas husband Kishore, who died in her second delivery. She could not adjust

with the possessiveness and egoistical nature of her husband. In this context

A.G. Khan rightly says:

Her writing furnishes mirrors of authentic female experience and

she examines lives of half of dozen women to drive home the point

what drives women to become hysteric, escapist, sacrificial goats,

and also discusses the compulsions which compel them to silence,

suicide or death while delivering a child. Feminists have tried to

convince that women are misunderstood/marginalized because the

power amassed by men, and the language developed by patriarchy

becomes instrumental in forcing women to

silence (162).

Miras tragedy is not individual but could be related to the upper-middle

class families. The novel ends with the meditation on the mixture of love and

hate in man. Inni reveals why Urmila was sent to Baiajji for education as Inni

left her with a servant alone, thus shocking her father who never excused Inni for

this lapse. With all threads of the plot suitably resolved, the novel ends with

confirmation of belief in the human struggle and affections. A closer look at the

novel reveals that it deals more with human relationships, affections and love.
 106

Shashi Deshpande uses the first person autobiographical tone as the

narrative technique. Urmila, the protagonist, plays an important role in the novel.

She weaves the stories of Mira, Shakutai, Kalpana, Vanaa and Harish, Kishore,

Amrut, Inni and Akka, Aju and Baijji, and the obscure figure of Miras husband

and Bhaskar. It is Urmilas agony at the death of Anu which weaves all emotions

and themes into one. The intensity of her emotions and experiences is powerfully

projected by the novelist. The image of a tender plant is used in the opening

epigraph:

The fragrance of the night-queen

Crosses the hedge of thorns

Touches the pinnacle of the shrine

And is no longer mine (7).

The fragrance of the night queen is the departed Anu, her daughter.

The central theme of the novel is the binding vine of feelings and

emotions between parent and child and between husband and wife. The symbolic

importance of the title of the novel is displayed in the following lines from

Miras poetry:

Desire, says the Buddha, is cause of grief,

But how to escape this cord

This binding vine of love? (140).

 107

It is the love which is the binding vine of life: The most important need

is to love. From the moment of our births, we struggle to find something which

we can anchor ourselves to this strange world we find ourselves in. Only when

we love do we find this anchor. But love makes you vulnerable (137). Urmila

finally realizes that relationships bind one another and that Each relationship,

always imperfect, survives on hope (141).

The central theme of the novel is seen in the opening line of the epigraph

in part Four:

Standing still I searched,

Stretching out my arms,

Sinking deep into the earth,

Like the banyan roots

Seeking the spring of life (151).

Mutual love, affections and anxieties of wife, husband, child mother,

father and others from the spring of life. Urmila says:

But, what terrible things we do in the process of surviving. And

yet, I think of Vanaa, heavily pregnant, sitting by me, holding my

hand during the pains before Kartik was born, I remember

Kishores face when he first saw Anu, I think of Akka crying for

Mira, of Innis grief when Papa told her about his illness, of Papas

anguished face watching her, of the touch of grace there was in

Shakutais hand when she covered me gently at night while slept,

of the love with which she speaks of her sister, of Sandhya (203).
 108

In connection with the significance of the title, A.G. Khan rightly

observes:

The title of the novel The Binding Vine is significant since mother

and child are bound by the binding vine of love, though sometimes

it takes a heavy toll. That is how relationships are built, vine

grows in all direction having intricate network that would not

allow anything to disengage from its tentacles. In this narrative, the

stories of Mira, Akka, Vanaa, Inni, Shakutai Suumavshi and

Kalpana touch Urmi as ripples or waves and disturb her poise for

some time. However, beyond their anguish, pain and suffering, in

their nameless moments of intimacy and bonding, she discovers

the overwhelming binding vine of love, the spring of life, the

glimmering of hope; to overcome her own sense of loss and

despair and to rise above all shades of misunderstanding (167).

The novelist represents the true Indian cultural ethos regarding the

expression of the vision of life in the novel through Urmilas acknowledgement:

And after everything passes grief, shock, anger, bitterness, Ive known all of

them this remains: that life is worth-living. Or else, why would death be so

terrible? This is nothing but a positive faith in life.

That Long Silence and The Binding Vine end with the conviction of a

positive faith in life. But still we observe resistance in the main protagonists of

the novels. Mrinalini Sebastian says Urmila takes upon herself the act of
 109

introspection of speaking for Mira and Kalpana who are women who cannot

speak (157).

Unlike Jaya in That Long Silence, Urmila is a rebellious character who

resists outspokenly for the suffering of her own self and other women characters

like Kalpana, Shakutai, Mira and also encourages her friend, Vanaa to assert

herself and stop behaving like a door mat. Vijaya Guttal observes Her novels,

featuring female protagonists, reconstruct aspects of womens expeience and

attempt to give voice to muted ideologies, registering resistance (170).

Moving On (2004) is a family fiction of intimate spaces of emotional

wounds and intrusions. Everything begins in this domestic institution reflecting

the universal at large. Anything that happens outside the family is the reflection

of what happens within the matrix of family. It is also considered a harmonious

and sanctified unit. When one probes into the internal sight of each member of

the family unit so called sanctified by the societal norms, it is often filled with

dissention, domination and violation. This dialectic of family relation proves to

be of a complex nature covering human relationships within a family or in the

broader social space.

The narrator of the novel Moving On is Manjari. She has the double

function of reading and narrating. She narrates her own story and also reads the

narration of her father in the diaries. It is the process of participation she comes

to identify herself as an individual a daughter and a woman. She thinks she

knows about her parents. But gradually discovers in the process of reading the
 110

diaries of her father that her knowledge and understanding about her parents is

inadequate:

I thought I knew them. Baba and Mai were a book Id read a

million times, I knew every word of it, I could visualize each page

clearly. And now Baba is bringing them back, offering me

another picture. The truth. The truth remains, Baba says. But can

there be any one truth about people? People are complex,

undecipherable, protean there is no absolute about them. How can

there be the truth about Baba and Mai? Baba is only giving me his

picture (21).

She discovers a disparity between appearance and reality. She was not in

a position to accept the truth revealed in the diaries of her father that (Mai) her

mother did not live upto the expectations of her father, especially his physical

passion. What was revealed to her through these diaries has been expressed in

her fathers words as follows: She valued most was freedom, freedom to be

herself, to be on her own, freedom from our constant demands on her (125).

In probing into the complex relationship within the family, Deshpande

brings her narration of Moving On bringing forth the following binaries:

self/other; man/woman; bone/body; physical/emotional and individual /social.

The narrator of the novel is a woman. Hence the above binaries are interrogated

from a womans perspective. It is also in the form of self-analysis manner of her

position in a society. In her search for self, she discovers the secret lives of
 111

others i.e., her parents. This revising and rediscovery of the other is the process

of deconstruction and reconstruction.

The narrator was reluctant at first to read her fathers diaries. Gradually,

through her fathers diary, Manjari comes to know the secret lives of her parents.

As a scientist, her father rejects the idea of death of his wife. He says: Matter

does not cease to exist, it changes form (111). And then he meditates on the idea

of reincarnation of the belief of a Christian meeting in heaven. He admits that

without Vasu, he was incomplete. After Vasus death, Gayatris goodness was

part of the healing process for him. Later, Raja and then writing. He was also

happy that Manjari was coming. Vasu shows her resistance to Babas idea of the

importance of the body. Manjari identifies her parents

bed, which had been a place of comfort and love, is suddenly the

arena in which a man and woman fought their battles. Hes drawn

me into the most private world of human, the most intimate and

secret world of man and woman. Im amazed that he could write of

himself so clinically, so objectively. I see it as part of his plan to

shed everything his past and his inner world. Unburdening himself.

There is a kind of naivety in Baba that fills me with compassion

Mai knew the dangers of this. Which is why she wrote the kind of

stories she did, covering the bare bones with ornate clothes, with

frills and brocades, with jewels which glittered so much that you

noticed nothing else. Yes, Mai knew what writing could do: once

you wrote a thing down, it became final, it was there forever, you
 112

could no longer ignore what had happened, you were pinned down

to it, changed forever (116-17).

To look at the binary of man/woman, it is clearly visible in the novel how

Babas profession as a doctor, was a loud fact in the lives of the members of the

family and the narrator. Manjari says: Babas profession was a loud fact in our

lives; it was stamped on every aspect of our living (122). Therefore it was an

attitudinal problem. Baba through his profession was recognized as a doctor but

the same attitude is not extended to her mother. Perhaps Mai allowed him to

become great by hiding some of her greatness. Hence everybody recognized him

as a doctor but her mothers greatness is scarcely known. Mais work was never

visible (122).

Manjari also knows her inner self by showing the differences in the

writing of Babas diary and Mais writing for magazine. She says: Mai knew

the dangers of this. Which is why she wrote the kind of stories she did, covering

the bare bones with ornate clothes, with frills and brocades, with jewels which

glittered so much that you noticed nothing else. Yes, Mai knew what writing

could do; once you wrote a thing down, it became finale final, it was there

forever, you could no longer ignore what had happened, you were pinned down

to it, changed forever (117). The difference in the two writing modes of Badri

Narayan, the doctor of bones and his wife Vasu inhabit two different worlds:

Babas was more of physical world and Vasus was of emotional.

 113

Manjari plays the role of narrating and participating in the novel. She tells

her own story by narrating the writing of her parents. What is significant in the

novel is the narrative voice and its location and identity as an individual, a

daughter and a woman.

The novel begins with Babas diary and in the following chapter Manjari

is introduced, remembering her old home, her dead parents. She reads her

fathers diary, resists her parents past and discovers their hidden life. By reading

her fathers diary, Manjary discovers the true nature of her parents relationship.

She confesses of her inadequate knowledge about their lives. She says:

I thought I knew them. Baba and Mai were a book Id read a

million times, I knew very word of it, I could visualize each page

clearly And now Baba is bringing them back, offering me

another picture. The truth. The truth remains, Baba says. But can

there be any one truth about people? People are complex,

undecipherable, protean-there is no absolute about them. How can

there be the truth about Baba and Mai? Baba is only giving me his

picture (21).

Whatever appeared in her sight was not the same when she read the diary.

Therefore there is a disconnection between the apparent and the real. The real

and the imaginary get mixed up and challenge the very notion of freedom. How

free one is becomes problematic in the case of Manjari, who as a rebellious

daughter has tried to be on her own by living alone, running a car for taxi and
 114

installing a computer to type manuscripts for others. Manjari is a complex

character and her entire struggle is to come out of her patriarchal values.

Manjaur shows great courage in her decision to give up her medical study,

despite her fathers desire to be a doctor. Chanchala Naik rightly says:

The novel amply demonstrates our perception of the other, not in the outside

social space of gender and caste hierarchies, but within the limited space of the

family where the drama of domination and subordination is played out daily

(221).

Raja represents the patriarchal structure. Manjaris relationship with her

tenant makes her feel guilty. Her struggle to come out of the thoughts that she

has committed a mistake constantly haunts her. She wonders if Raja comes to

know about it, what would be his reaction towards her. This is her internalized

patriarchal mind set up even in her fears of getting accused though she has done

it out of her own will. Raja accuses.

In this context Naik examines Manjaris character and says, We can put

Manjari in the same kind of a voyage: from resistance, trying to be her own, she

becomes part of and lives through the other. The novel amply demonstrates our

perception of the other, not in the outside social space of gender and caste

hierarchies, but within the limited space of the family where the drama of

domination and subordination is played out daily (221).

Manjaris decision to give up studying medicine, her fathers desire to see

her as a doctor and to marry Shyam, a photographer, displays her enormous

 115

courage. After Shyams death, she encounters many difficulties to take care of

her son Anand and Malus daughter Sachi. In spite of the innumerable

difficulties Manjari prefers to live on her own and refuses to take any financial

assistance from her cousin Raja or her father Baba. She was firm in whatever she

did and not scared about the threatening calls from Mafia to sell her ancestral

house.

She learns to live independently by learning car driving and even trying to

run it as a taxi and by installing and operating a computer at home and typing out

manuscripts for others at home as means of self-employment. These independent

thoughts of living shock Raja, the upholder of patriarchal norms. She also

disapproves Rajas role of protecting male in her life: I want the brakes under

my feet, not someone elses I dont want a dual control,. The control should be

mine, mine alone (88) She was not even scared to live alone when she gets

repeated calls from strangers to sell her ancestral home. She was even physically

assaulted. Though the calls come as a threat to her life, she refuses to sell her

ancestral property and says: This is what they want, theyre trying to reduced

me to this shivering cowardly mass of fear. I wont be scared of death (167).

She doesnt like to be dictated by anybody. The novel ends symbolically when

both of them (Raja and Manjari) part ways at the end of a long journey and she

starts her car and is back on the road again to be free.

Unlike Feminism which is of political and societal orientation, womanism

doesnt instigate a radical change. In terms of the concept of freedom, it is more

of the emotional freedom than that of the material freedom. It does not come
 116

from any supportive systems like Government to ensure economic freedom etc.

It cuts across caste/class boundaries. It gives an ability to see. Freedom of

thinking or feeling comes from cultivation and need to be cultivated. It is more

of empathy and not sympathy. It is towards self and individual awareness as in

the case of Manjari in Moving On and Devayani in In the Country of Deceit.

The truth is that love is a strong emotion; there is nothing banal or

clichd about it. Different kinds of love, the different faces of

love. I also find myself increasingly interested in the idea of

goodness in human beings. The emphasis today, perhaps because

of the times, is on violence, on evil. Goodness, when it is written

about, is made to seem like weakness. In fact, we shy away from

the very word. We speak of values instead. Nevertheless, goodness

is real, it exists not only in people like Bapu or Mother Teresa, but

in ordinary people.

Devayani, the protagonist of the novel is an ordinary human being. She is

not like Mahatma Gandhi and Mother Teresa to be recognized by the entire

humanity. But she wants to remain like a saintly figure of love trying to

remember all the good moments in her life and forget the painful situations. Her

love is a selfless love expecting nothing in return from her parents, sister Savi,

aunt Sindhu, cousin Kshama, film actress Rani and from Ashok the SP of Rajnur

around whom the novel revolves.

 117

When Devi is back in her house the next day, thoughts flow in her mind

and make her guilty:

I knew it was wrong; nothing could make it not wrong. And yet, I

had rushed into it. Why had I gone it? I knew the answer. I did it

because Relationship? What relationship? Mistress? The other

woman? The kept woman? I pushed the words away; I thought

instead of love. Words I had never heard spoken, words I had

only read in books, words which had now become real (142).

From then onwards, she has to hid certain things from her sister Savi and

her aunt Sindhu which was not in her character and thus forced her to entre the

country of deceit. She speaks to herself:

I had entered the country of deceit. I could no longer be open and

honest with people I loved; I had to deceive them. I was glad they

were far away, these two women who loved me. If they were here,

they would have known something had happened to me.

Transparent as a clean piece of glass, my mother used to say

about me. You cant hide anything from me (147).

Their relationship continues without marriage and many thoughts haunt

Devayani, one hard truth we would never be able to live together. he had his

life, his work, his wife, his daughter. All that I had was guilt I would learn I

would even learn to live with guilt. You get used to everything you learn how to
 118

live with suffering, pain, death. Why not with guilt the? Yes, I would learn to

cope with guilt as well (152).

Her love for Ashok was genuine but the relationship outside marriage was

unacceptable in a society like India. Deshpande tries to explore into a new area

of relationship which seems to be prophetic or saintly for her character Devayani

who doesnt expect anything in return. In spite of the advice given to her by her

aunt Sindhu, sister Savi and brother-in-law Shree, she was unable to break up her

relationship with Ashok. She was unable to come out of the country of deceit.

With all these reflections in her life, when Ashok brings a gold chain on her

birthday, she refuses and says: I feel as it Im being paid (209).

The above quoted lines throw enough light on her relationship of choice.

The refusal of gift hurts Ashoks ego and he leaves the place in anger. When he

leaves, Devi speaks to herself: He walked out. Maybe its for the best, may

be its best of end it this way. Theres no future for us, both of us know that. We

know we have to give this up, sometimes some day. Why not now? (210).

And later he returns and says sorry for hurting her and assures that there

was only love in what I did, only my love (210). Devi knows it clearly that he

loves her very much and at the same time he has his own ambitions and

commitments. Devi reflects: He loved me, but he also had his ambition, his

work, his dreams of a future life. And, threaded through the design of his life

was the strong strand of his love for his daughter, a thread that linked him,
 119

whether he liked it or not, to his wife. Love was not enough, no, it was never

enough (210).

Gathering all her thoughts one day she speaks, Ashok, I cant go on like

this any more. I feel, I feel cheap (232). After a brief silence, Ashok

responds:

Nothing between us can be cheap. Believe me, Divya, you are

precious to me. Its not only that I love you, I respect you. I respect

you deeply. I would never do anything that would make you feel

cheap. Believe me, Divya, believe me. The first time I saw you

was your face, I may sound like a fool, but I felt I had found

something I had been looking for all my life. Youre my Divya,

youre my love. Ive had other women, yes, I admit it, but

believe me, Divya, believe me, youre precious to me. I cant

speak like you. I dont have words like you, but believe me, Im

speaking the truth (234).

For the first time Rani invites Devi to her house to watch her movies.

Devi matches Ranis films in a chronological order. All of them were generally

about young lovers, who had to overcome many obstacles to finally come

together, except one which was a triangle love story between her husband and

her lover. That night, Devi realizes from Ranis comments that she likes to go

back to the film world she had left behind. Her experiences, memories, prove

that she had left behind. Her experiences, memories, prove that she was
 120

nostalgic about her working life: She was missing not being a star but the active

working life, the companionship, the comaraderie (33).

All the conversations with Rani are in the form of memory bringing back

all the incidents. Perhaps the recollection has started after everything had

happened, i.e., at the end of the novel. The first part of the novel Ground Zero

is nothing but recollection of the narrators memories. The past tense used in this

part tells that the narration is only a recollection of her memories.

To analyze the relationship between Rani and Devayani i.e., between a

woman and a woman is to differentiate between the real and the illusory. They

belong to two different works, have contrasting natures but still become friends.

The former is from the world of films and the latter from the world of ordinary

women. But the relationship which binds them together is the human

relationship. Marriage as an institution was security for Rani when she married

KN, a wealthy man in Rajnur. Hence there is give and take formulae in her

relationship with her husband, i.e., only for convenience and therefore selfish.

Unlike Rani, Devayanis is a different kind of love story. She doesnt

expect anything from anybody but only gives. Hence her love/life outside

marriage is taken as a weakness and therefore people take advantage of it. Ashok

being one in such category prefers his daughter over Devayani when he is

transferred from Rajnur. But the greatness lies in Devayani when she tries to

give her genuine love, never expecting anything even in her relationship with

Ashok, outside marriage.

 121

In a country like India, such relationship is not acceptable. But

Deshpandes Devayani proves to be a modern woman resisting the given

freedom to woman and exploring into the new areas of freedom. It doesnt mean

that she is breaking the traditional values. It also shows different strand from her

earlier novels. She doesnt give in to the demands of her blood relatives like her

sister Savi or the society by being tied up in the institution of marriage. Earlier it

was in marriage, the women characters found security and freedom. But now, the

conscious decision of getting out of the family is done in this novel. This shows

the change of perception in the novels of Shashi Deshpande from the 1980s to

the recent novel in 2008. The novelists early concept of revolt was only internal

in her novels except one or two characters like Urmi. In this novel, Devayani

makes others change their perception. Minor characters like Shakutai in The

Binding Vine resist changing while Devi in The Country of Deceit is making

others to change. She is willing to face the future: the future of ambition; the

future of changing the minds of her sister, Savi and her aunt, Sindhu who look

fulfillment only in marriage; the future of analyzing the failures of her father

with his patriarchal mind-set and coming out of such hurdles.

Perhaps from the few hints given in the novel, Devayanis father must

have influenced her a lot. The following passage shows the failures of all the

jobs taken up by her father:

The mangoes he was going to export cost more to grow than the

price he could get from them. The friend with whom hed started a

printing press cheated him and the literary magazine he was

 122

editing died after just two or three issues. He wrote a little, but

nothing that made anyone note him as a writer. He tried being an

insurance agent, but except for one he sold to Keshav, he never

sold a single policy in all the years. Bit by bit he sold the land. The

fence came closer with each sale, a visible symbol of his failures,

until finally we had a normal sized backyard like most people. And

with each successive failure, he retreated more and more into

himself (600-61).

His patriarchal mindset is revealed in one of the episodes after her sisters

marriage. Devayanis fathers planned suicide makes her believe the rigid

patriarchal nature he possessed in himself all his life. The world thinks that he

died in a train accident but Devayani alone knows that it was a suicide when he

left his ring and watch in his table drawer before he went out. Devi reflects his

fathers mindset in the following words: After my fathers death, we found out

that there was enough money in my mothers bank account to pay for the

wedding. Why didnt you use this? I asked her in astonishment. My father

would not let her; he would not permit his daughters wedding to be paid for

with his wifes money (63). Devayanis father takes it as an insult to use his

wifes money for their daughters wedding and hence ends up in debt. The same

mindset is seen in most of the men and hence Devyanis fathers death is an

example in the novel.

This episode influences Devayani to resist such rigid patriarchal beliefs

and try to live in freedom. Her choice of spinsterhood is an example. Devis

 123

decision to remain to spinster is an eye-opener to all men and women. The novel

is an extended discourse on desire. On one hand it is Devis experiences of her

body and on the other it is her aunt Sindhus letters. In her letters she reveals her

own life at first and later unintentionally, comments on Devis experiences: Life

is lived through the body (41) writes Sindhu, and she continues, the body is

important, and so are the demands of the body your natural desires will be

with you for many more years (42). If desire is one line of movement of this

novel, the second is betrayal or deceit as the title proves it. Ashok is a married

man, and again it is Sindhu, writing from her daughters home in the US, who

points out: Our country does not allow women to fulfil these desires without

marriage (42-43). The last paragraph of Small Remedies (2000(, another of

Deshpandes novels about love and despair, closes on memory as a life giver:

How could I ever have longed for amnesia? Memory, caprivious and unreliable

though it is, ultimately carries its own truth within it. As long as there is memory,

theres always the possibility of retrieval, as long as there is memory, loss is

never total (324).

In the Country of Deceit (2008) ends with a question mark: Is thiswhat

my life is going to be like from now a constant struggle between trying to forget

and wanting to remember? (259). One of the sub-plots revolves around another

kind of deceit, i.e., fraud. Like Jiji in Moving On, Devi comes under threat from

the property mafia, though with less horrible consequences. Her early novel

Roots and Shadows (1983) is open-ended: Maybe Jayant would understand.

 124

Maybe he wouldnt. But even so (205), just as more than twenty years later

Moving On (2004) underlines:

The search is doomed to failure. Yes, Baba, youre right, we will

never find what we are looking for, we will never get what were

seeking for in other humans. We will continue to be incomplete,

ampersands all of us, each one of us. Yet, the search is what its all

about, dont you see, Babam the search is the

thing (343).

Like its forerunners, In the Country of Deceit (2008) is a carefully constructed

and calibrated novel, its first-person narrators voice and limited view finding

their counterpoint in a series of letters, first and foremost those of her clear-

sighted and frankly outspoken, admirable aunt Sindhu. It is mainly through these

letters that Devi is forced to consider and reconsider her own position and come

to her own decisions, and it is these two voices, Devis and Sindhus, that

contribute to the charm of the novel.

Love, more often out of than in wedlock, has been a topic in Deshpandes

writing from its very beginning, though it has not been scrutinized to the extent

In the Country of Deceit does. Love in all its exciting as well as its sordid

aspects has been in the foreground of so many Indian novels for so many years.

In Deshpande it is part of a quest. Devi is one of Deshpandes modern women

trying to come to terms with themselves and their place in family and society;
 125

trying to reconcile their individual freedom to that of their given which is not

simply culture or society or class/caste, but also the freedom of others.

In the Country of Deceit is a subtle, many-layered exploration of the

consequences of betrayal on peoples lives and relationships. The novel is

divided into four parts with suitable titles. It starts with Ground Zero words

spoken by the narrator Devayani implying the demolition and the construction of

the house. It probes into the endless cycle of creation and destruction. The house

stands as a metaphor. It was a deliberate reversal of the old house from the

dingy, dark small rooms to the large rooms, the light that come from huge

windows and the broad sills to sit. There are a series of letters in this part which

also reflects the epistolary style of the novel.

The second part of the novel is entitled Epiphany. The sudden

manifestation/realization of their lifes meaning in various characters. They

include: (i) Sindhu, who thinks that her daughter Tara who lives in USA loves

her a lot but it is the other way round. In one of the conversations regarding her

son Gundu and daughter-in-law Asha about having their baby, Tara suddenly

gets upset with Sindhu for saying that she doesnt like to interfere in their

personal lives for both of them are adults and doctors. To her surprise Tara

suddenly bursts out in anger and says, Dont make a big virtue of it. You dont

interfere, as you call it, because you dont care about us (117). This statement

of her daughter hurts Sindhu and one shares her sorror with Devayani. It shows

only the materialistic and not genuine love. Every parent expects to be loved. It

is a clash between parents and children in modern times. The clash of ideas
 126

arises leading to conflict. This type of parental conflict is also visible in Ashok

who prefers his daughter for Devayani.

(ii) The second manifestation is Ranis sudden realization of her love with

Maheshji in her past professional world. She reveals this secret to Devayani

when they go to visit to temple. Devayani says: After a few minutes silence,

she started speaking, telling me for the first time about the man who had been

her lover. Maheshji, she called him, and she spoke of him as if theirs had been

only a professional relationship (71).

(iii) The third manifestation is sudden discovery of the land gifted to

Devis mother by her grandfather. It was in this part that Devayani, Savi, and

Kshama come to know about their hidden land through Iqbal, the Vakil. This part

also throws light on the forgery of Devayanis mother.

(iv) The fourth manifestation is Ashoks sudden realization of his liking

for Devayani and the consequences of their relationship. In other terms the

deceit of Ashok as the title of the novel reflects.

The third part of the novel is entitled. The Country of Deceit. Devayani

enters into the relationship with Ashok outside marriage, i.e., the country of

deceit. Rani enters into the life of KN for convenience in the bond of marriage.

Hence this is another type of entering into the country of deceit with false

appearances:

KN and Rani as two people come together for mutual

convenience. For her, an easy life with a wealthy man and for
 127

him, a beautiful wife, one more possession he could be proud of

they occupied separate bedrooms. Yet they had two children

perhaps, like royalty, he visited her occasionally after giving her

advance notice when they were together they were polite with

each other, never intimate (158-59).

Therefore, a loveless marriage for convenience to lead a so called happy

worldly life is only deceiving each other and this happens in the life of Rani and

KN. Roshini, daughter of Rani, was angry for this life of pretence of the film

people. She says, these film people who live their lives among pretences and

falseness how will they know the truth when they see it?.... Im overstating it,

Im overreacting But. I have every right to (172). Roshini doesnt like her

mothers desire to work in another movie and feels happy to meet Devayani and

shares her thoughts. She likes the way Devayani looks and lives. Roshini writes

to Devayani:

I am very glad I met you. Youre so different from most people, at

least those I get to meet. You say little, but give me a feeling of

having much inside you. Its like youre living a secret, a

mysterious life of your own inside; what you show is only what

you choose to show. Youre like your garden. Hidden surprising

and beautiful (172).

 128

At the end of this part Devayani questions herself: Something is wrong

with our relationship, Ashoks and mine I have to ask myself: if love is so

wonderful, why should love make me do what is wrong (202).

The last part of the novel is entitled Unspooling. Devayani realizes that

she has been cheated and refuses the gift of Ashok on her birthday. She says, I

feel as if Im being paid (209). She also says Ashok, I cant go on like this any

more just go away and leave me alone (232-33). Hence, the unwinding or the

unspooling of her past is a path of realization in Devis life. She doesnt want to

brood over her past and remain in darkness; she continues her life by taking a

job as a junior lawyer under Iqbal Vakil: Is this what my life is going to be like

from now a constant struggle between trying to forget and wanting to

remember? (259). It provides a glimpse of hope for Devi, of future fulfillment

through professional activity and a sign of hope to live on her own trying to

forget the painful situation in her life. The cover design of the novel: flowers

sprouting out of the rock also symbolize this hope.

In her relationship with Ashok, she was able to bring about a change in

him. Ashok openly admits his change saying, Ive had other women, yes, I

admit it, but I have never felt this way, there has never been anything like this

What I feel for you is love. Believe me, Divya, believe me youre precious

to me I cant speak like you, I don have words like you, but believe me, Im

speaking the truth (234).

 129

Devi is one of Deshpandes modern women trying to come to terms with

themselves and their place in family and society; trying to reconcile their

individual freedom with that of their given, which is not simply culture of

society or class/caste, but also the freedom of others in their own personal

feelings and responsibilities. For instance Devayani allows Ashok to be on his

own and does not pester him to marry her for the sake of society. Secondly, Savi,

her sister, does not worry about Devis future as she was busy in her family

responsibilities and Devi understands her problem without complaining. Thirdly,

Sindhu, Devayanis aunt, asks her to forget everything and live a new and fresh

life that shows concern in her future. Lastly, Iqbal Vakil offers her a job to work

as a junior lawyer.

It was a part of confession on Ranis part to take her daughter Roshinis

words seriously about not going back to the film world and take care of her

children Rohan and Neha. For the first time, Rani acknowledges that Mahesh

was her lover and how he cheated her. For him Rani abandoned Roshini and her

husband but she was cheated. This realization is done in the last part of the

novel. She not only realizes but tries to resist the idea of being cheated.

Flora Nwapa

Postcolonial literature is a true storehouse of different cultures and

perspectives. African literature in English added to new face to the postcolonial

literature. The spread of imperialism in English, French and other European

languages has become a part of African linguistic reality; literature of the

 130

western world has provided models for African writers. In spite of these factors,

experience and response retained its identity.

Africa was heavily exploited by the colonial powers. African people had

to live under the laws imposed by the colonialists and had to face the crisis of

values that was generated by the colonial politics. The traditional value structure

of the African societies was shaken with entry of colonial powers into the

African continent. Africans were judged on the basis of European norms and

values by the colonial powers. As the colonialists had too many inbuilt notions

about the African people, they spread all sorts of wrong notions. But the spread

of European system of education opened new routes for the expression of

African inner self to the contemporary world.

The emergence of African literature has added a new dimension to the

postcolonial literature. In 1962 a conference of African writers in English failed

to produce a satisfactory definition of African Literature. At another

conference African literature was defined as creative writing in which an

African setting is authentically handled or to which experiences originating in

Africa are integral. According to this definition works produced by white

writers like Nadine Gordimer, Doris Lessing and Alan Paton were included as

part of African writing, while those by Conrad and Greene were excluded. A few

years later Chinua Achebe attempted a definition: I do not see African literature

as one unit but as a group of associated units in fact the sum total of all national

and ethnic literatures of Africa (5). By national literature Achebe means

literature written in the national language of the nation, and by ethnic literature
 131

he means the literature written in one of the indigenous languages spoken by one

group within the nation.

Analyzing the role of the western critics in the criticism of African

literature, Achebe in his essay Where Angels Fear to Tread points out three

kinds of critics disliked by Africans: first, hostile critics; second; those critics

who say that African writers should be judged by the same standards as

European writers and then arrive at the logical conclusion that African writing is

inferior to European writing. Achebe is at pains to point out that Europeans and

Americans claim to know too much about Africa, when in actual fact they do not

understand the African world view and cannot speak African languages (2).

The African writers had to depend only an oral tradition as there was no

written literary tradition. Their myths and legends are in no way inferior to those

of other countries. Their folk songs also mirror the wisdom and insight of the

African people. Oral cultures are relatively more homogenous than literate

cultures because oral transmission depends on face-to-face contact and ensures

common customs, beliefs, techniques, sentiments and general outlook.

Individuals tend to share moral attitudes and concepts of the good life and the

rights and obligations of individuals to the community and vice versa. Family

ties and social solidarity are closer and stronger.

Where the oral tradition ensured relative stability in the living conditions

and customs of non-literate people, the introduction of literacy has brought new

cultural elements, new beliefs and moral values, new attitudes, new
 132

technological skills, new aspirations, new ideologies and new outlooks, which

upset the equilibrium of the old indigenous cultures. The oral tradition relies

largely on human memory for preservation and transmission of the cultural

repertoire and so develops elaborate mechanisms for helping the human

memory. The literate tradition, because it relies on written records, is more

elaborative, exploratory and experimental than the oral tradition and leads to

greater skepticism than the oral tradition and is the basis of modern scientific

progress.

West African literature therefore reflects features which pertain to the oral

tradition and to the literary tradition. The blending of impulses from the oral and

literary traditions gives the West African novel its distinctive local colour. The

novel is the only major literary genre which has no strict equivalent in the oral

tradition of West Africa, partly because it is a product of literacy, but also

because the social factors which determine its rise and define it as a distinct

literary form are also the factors which marked the change in the West itself from

the oral traditional culture to the modern industrial culture. according to

Emmanuel Obiechina, West African novel has five distinguishing features:

1. Obviously enough, the West African novel is a novel written in West

Africa about West African people.

2. More specifically it is genuinely regional novel. The novelists draw

largely from the local environment to give local colour to their stories.

They represent local speech habits, beliefs, customs and mores in order to
 133

give a distinct quality to life and action which reflects West African

realities.

3. It has an essentially sociological emphasis. Because the West African

novel has risen at a time when large-scale social and economic changes

are taking place, the writers show an almost obsessive preoccupation with

the influence of these conditions. This is the condition of life; these are

the ways in which people feel its pressure; these pressures demand

expression.

4. It is explicitly or implicitly didactic, even propagandist. The West African

novelist functions, among other things, as teacher and social reformer. He

uses his writings to explore the problems of society and to indicate,

through the aspects of contemporary West African life he is criticizing,

the society which he wishes to see. The West African novel is a true

example of la literature engage.

5. Finally, the West African novel reflects the peculiar cultural situation of

West Africa, where elements of the oral-kinship-oriented culture of old

Africa exist side by side with elements of the world technological

contact-oriented culture. This generate tensions, conflicts, contradictions

and ambivalences in the lives of individuals. Moreover, and this is an

important distinction, the West African novel tends to show individual

characters not through their private psychological experiences, but

through community or social life, and activities of a collective or general

 134

nature, with individual sentiments and actions deriving force and logic

from those of the community (36).

Nigerian literature written in English is closer to Kenyan literature than

British literature. Firstly, the two nations share the common features of

Africanness. Secondly, they went through the same colonial experience.

Third and the most important factor is that the different nations have the

same sense of oneness. In spite of its tribalism, the idea of one Africa is there

in the minds of the people. There is a common core of culture, political

aspirations, history and world-view which binds the African people as one

people.

In spite of the influence of the West, Nigerians still retain many

traditional ceremonies such as those for marriages, funerals, naming children

and community festivals, as well as their music, songs and dancing in which

they take pride.

Among the Yoruba of Western Nigeria, three stages are usually observed

in the process of marriage i) an early intimation, ii) a formal betrothal and

(iii) the formal marriage. It is usually the duty of the female members of the

family to look for wives for their male relatives. The middleman usually

plays an important part as a mediator for both the families and establishes the

group connection between them. He is paid for his job which terminates on

the day of the marriage. No girl marries without the consent of her parents,

and it is rare for a girl to refuse the choice of her parents. But this process of
 135

an early intimation was violated by the main protagonist Efuru, in Flora

Nwapas first novel Efuru. For instance:

On Nkwo day when everybody had gone to the market Efuru

prepared herself. She had her bath very early in the stream. She

took great care that morning over her appearance. Her father was

now not at home. She took a few of her belongings and went to her

lovers house. The mother of the young man went to market; when

she returned she was surprised to see Efurus clothes and a few

other possessions in her sons room. The young man was quick to

explain. He told his mother that Efuru was his wife. I have mo

money for the dowry yet. Efuru herself understands this. We have

agreed to be husband and wife and that is all that matters. The

young mans mother was excited for her son had indeed made a

good choice (8).

This episode shows her resistance towards the traditional role of a woman

to go by the choice of the parents in selecting their life partners. Efuru was

successful in making her choice of marriage without fulfilling the first stage of

the marriage ceremony, i.e., an early intimation.

The ceremony of betrothal is usually performed at night, and all the

important members of the family on both sides as well as their intimate friends

are expected to be present. After this comes the giving of the bride price. The

would-be bridegroom presents to the parents of his intended bride choice kola
 136

nuts, some alligator pepper, bitter kolas and anything else demanded as the bride

price. This bride price legitimizes marriage; no marriage contract is valid

without it. It is a form of compensation to the family of the bride for her services

which they will soon lose. In recent years there has been a tendency to raise the

bride price according to the education and social level of the girl. The ceremony

of betrothal is usually an occasion for rejoicing, feasting and offering of

sacrifices.

This ceremony of betrothal is rejected by Efuru. When her father sends

some young men to the mans house whom Efuru married to bring back their

daughter who had brought so much disgrace to them by marrying a person of her

choice without dowry, Efuru comes out of her house and greets them warmly.

She fulfills the responsibility of her husband in his absence by treating the

people who came from her fathers house. This incident again is the resistance to

the formal ceremony of betrothal:

Efuru brought two big kola-nuts. They were fit only for kings. She

put them before the men, with some alligator pepper. The

spokesman took one kola nut and blessed it. Then he broke it and

gave the men. Meanwhile, Efuru brought out a bottle of home-

made gin a very good one that had been in a kerosene tin for nearly

six months The men enjoyed the drink very much. They finished

the bottle and some of them were even tipsy We shall go, our

daughter, the spokesman said. You seem to be happy here and we

wonder why your father wants us to bring you back. We shall tell
 137

him what we have seen. But your husband must fulfil the customs

of our people. It is very important. Our enemies will laugh at us.

Tell your husband, he must see your father. Let him not be afraid

(9).

This quote doesnt mean that Nwapa is trying to give up the traditional

customs of the Nigerian society through her female character but trying to prove

that even in the circumstances of being away from the support of the society and

parents, women life Efuru can make a difference and stand firmly on her

decision of selecting a husband of her choice.

The third and the last stage observed in the process of marriage is the

formal marriage or solemnization. Marriages may be solemnized at any time of

the year except during the season of harvest or soon after any important

community festival. The bride in her best costume is conducted to her new home

at night, attended by many girls dressed in their finery, and with drums and

singing and dancing. The bridal party is met at the entrance of the bridegrooms

compound by a female band from the house especially selected for the purpose.

the ceremony of washing the brides feet is performed by these women after

which the bride is lifted and carried into the bridegrooms house. She is then

conducted into the bathroom where she is washed, dried, perfumed, dressed up

afresh and then conducted into the apartment of the head lady of the house. She

now becomes the inmate of that house for life. If she is acceptable to her

husband and his friends, presents are sent on the next day to her parents and the

festivities continue for at least three days. But a bride who is found to have been
 138

unchaste is treated harshly and may be sent home in disgrace. This is generally

regarded as a social setback not only for the girl but for all the members of her

family.

Now, the above-mentioned things did not happen in the case of Efuru. No

young girls dressed in their finest clothes welcome Efuru by singing and dancing

and no washing of the brides feet is performed to make Efuru an inmate of

Adizuas house. But rather her mother-in-law alone welcomed Efuru by saying:

You are welcome, my daughter (8).

Efurus mother-in-law is a bit worried of the reputation of Efurus father

and questions Efuru: But your father, what will you say to him? To which

Efuru suddenly answers: Leave that to me, I shall settle it myself (8). This

shows the strong will power of Efuru to take care of herself in spite of the

obstacles in her life for going against their customs and traditions.

It is perhaps significant to note that the most fertile centre of Africans

writing is Nigeria, with its concentration of intellectually adult tribes like the

Ibos and the Yorubas. While there is a long and still undocumented tradition of

Nigerian writers in English, it was only in the early 1950s that authors who are

worthy of serious literary attention emerged.

The Palm-Wine Drinkard (1952) by Amos Tutuola was one of the first

novels written in English by a Nigerian. Nigeria was on the map of world

literature as this novel quickly gained the international reputation. The reasons
 139

for its international reputation are its imaginative use of tribal myths, its fresh

use of English, its free mixture of the spiritual and the human worlds.

The second major significance of Nigerian literature in English was the

publication of Cyprian Ekwensis People of the City (1954). Tutuolas books are

romances and allegories, which utilize traditional Yoruba myths and recognize

no barrier between the living and the dead. Ekwensi works within the recognized

conventions of the English novel and belongs to a tradition of realistic writers

who find their subject-matter in the instability of modern urban life. His writings

are concerned exclusively with the living, and he sees traditional customs and

rituals as an anthropologist might, carefully noticing the interesting and the

sensational. Tutuolas style is appropriate for his uneducated narrators, so

Ekwensis use of pidgin English is appropriate to his characters, the semi-

literate, semi-educated who make up the greater part of metropolitan life.

It could be said that the real tradition of Nigerian literature in English

begins with Chinua Achehes Things Fall Apart (1958), Achebe was the first

Nigerian writer to have successfully transformed the conventions of the novel, a

European art form, into African literature. He freely used the Ibo idioms

translated into English. European economy of form is replaced by the rhythms

of traditional tribal life of Africa/Nigeria. Achebes themes reflect the cultural

traits of the Ibos, the impact of European civilization upon traditional African

society, and the role of tribal values in modern urban life. Achebe has a sense of

irony and is especially good at social satire. With Wole Soyinka, Nigerian

literature in English entered another new phase. The sophistication of Soyinkas

 140

work is the reflection of a lively mind, skeptical, witty, alert, ironic, articulate

and home in the realm of ideas. Gabriel Okara and Okigbo are other important

writers in Nigerian English literature.

In this sudden blossoming of the African literary activity, however, few

women seem to have come to the forefront. The African woman in her tribal past

has had a career more active than that of man. There was no need for the African

woman to reach out for liberation. In the 19 th and 20th centuries, African woman

became powerless. Increasing urbanization deprived the African woman of her

power in the family circle. In recent decades, however, there has been an

increase in the number of educated women in employment and they are now

found everywhere facing the lures and hazards of the complex modern society.

So also the African woman has entered the field of fiction with the publications

of Flora Nwapas Efuru (1966). Nwapa retrospects:

As a high school teacher, I began to write about my childhood in

the boarding school. Then, one day, the story of Efuru struck me in

a most dramatic way as I was driving at speed of 80 miles per hour

along Enugu-Onitsha Road. I got my destination, borrowed an

exercise book and began to write Efurus story. I wrote Chapter

one (They Saw Each Other) and I did not stop until I finished the

entire novel. I gave it to Chinua Achebe, who kindly read it and

sent it to his publishers, Heinemann Educational Books, London,

that published it in 1966. I have become a writer. I asked myself:

Do you want to be a writer? I was not sure. Before I could find

 141

answers, the critics had taken over: What was Nwapa trying to do

in Efuru? Did she succeed? The deed had already been done. I

have become a writer. I racked my brain trying to figure out what

exactly I was trying to do apart from writing the story of Efuru. All

Africa is crucial for the survival and progress of the race. This is,

of course, true of all women across the globe, be they black or

white. In my work, I try to project a more balanced image of

African womanhood (527).

Flora Nwapa was born in 1931 and brought up at Uguta in Eastern

Nigeria. She had her schooling in Lagos and collegiate education in Ibadan

where she received an Arts Degree. She took her Diploma in Education in 1958

from the University of Edinburgh. She first worked as a Woman Education

Officer in Calabar, and later taught English and Geography in Queens School,

Enugu. At the time when Efuru was published, she was Assistant Registrar

(Public Relations) at the University of Lagos. Nigerian writer, teacher, and

administrator, a forerunner of a whole generation of African women writers,

Flora Nwapa is best-known for re-creating Igbo (Ibo) life and traditions from a

womans viewpoint. With Efuru (1966) Nwapa became black Africas first

internationally published female novelist in the English language. She has been

rightly called the mother of modern African literature. Talking about Women

and Creative Writing in Africa, Nwapa rightly says:

I am asserting that a woman is also a flesh and blood. She has a

heart and soul and she is capable of human feelings. She can stand
 142

on her own two feet just as a man can. But I think that women

should have an open mind about relationships with men. I also

think that women writers should not only have an open mind but

create avenues for this openness of mind. Our task should be to

exploit elements of our indigenous traditions-such as democracy,

tolerance, sharing and mutual support in order to achieve our goal.

The fact that one man betrays and brutalizes you does not mean

that another will do the same. There should be interdependence

and some measure of understanding which blossoms to mutual

respect and equality. Did I say equality? Yes, because the lives of a

man and a woman are interdependent, there must be mutual

understanding and respect. The African woman writer has a great

responsibility now and in the future, but can she alone champion

the cause? A man can portray a powerful heroine as well as a

woman can if he sets his mind to it and if he does

not feel that portraying a strong heroine makes him less of a

man (532).

Besides writing books, Nwapa established Tana Press, which published

adult fiction. It was the first indigenous publishing house owned by a black

African woman in West Africa. Recollecting the cause for the establishment of

Tana Press by Flora Nwapa, Marie Umeh says, she decried the multiple

marginality she experienced with the western publisher who regarded her as a

minor writer. Regarded as a Third World Writer, her London publisher did not
 143

bother to print and distribute her books locally and internationally when they

were in demand as they would have if she came from so-called first-world

country. According to Nwapa, Heinemanns placing her in the literary

backwaters resulted in the piracy of her books in Africa and the death of her

voice globally. Recognizing her books herself and established Tana Press

Limited in 1977 for this purpose. It is my contention that Nwapas resistance to

the canonical politics of her erasure is behind her distancing herself from the

term feminist to describe her ideological position in global letters Hence, she

preferred to identify with Alice Walkers term womanist, which reflected the

African reality of effacement based on racial difference.

Between 1979 and 1981 she produced eight volumes of adult fiction.

Nwapa also set up another publishing company, Flora Nwapa and Co., which

specialized in children fiction. In these books she combined Nigerian elements

with general moral and ethical teachings. As a business woman, she also

encouraged many women folk to break the traditional female roles of

wife/mother and strive for equality in society. However, like Shashi Deshpande,

Nwapa did not call herself a feminist but a womanist.

The word womanism was adapted from Pulitzer. Prize winning author,

Alice Walkers use of the term in her book In Search of Our Mothers Gardens:

Womanist Prose (1983). In her book, Walker used the word to describe the

perspective and experiences of women of colour. Although most Womanist

scholarship centres on the African American womans experience, other non-

white theorists identify themselves with this term.

 144

The roots of theological womanism grew out of the theology of Jacquelyn

Grant, Delores Williams and James Hal Cone. Womanist theology is a

prophetic voice concerned about the well-being of the entire African American

community, male and female, adults and children. Womanist theology attempts

to help black women see, affirm, and have confidence in the importance of their

experience and faith for determining the character of the Christian religion in the

African American community. Womanist theology challenges all oppressive

forces impeding black womens struggle for survival and for the development of

a positive, productive quality of life conducive to womens and the familys

oppression based on race, sex, class, se3xual preference, physical ability, and

caste. Womanism is not only a theoretical concept, but also live experience.

Womanists are black women who are, in a traditional communal sense,

concerned very much with both black women and black men. White feminism

(as it is sometimes referred to by Womanists) is also called upon to remember

that black women (and all women of minority race/ethnicity and/or low socio-

economic status) were ignored and silenced by white feminism through its

second wave.

Womanists have argued that the gains of second wave feminism and

beyond were largely built around the lifestyles and options of highly educated,

upper-middle class white women. Some womanists have also argued that

negative unintended consequences resulting from feminist reforms have fallen

heavily upon women of colour specifically in regard to the structure of the black

family unit.
 145

As a novelist, Nwapa made her debut with Efuru, based on an old folktale

of a woman chosen by gods, but challenged the traditional portrayal of women.

Efuru, which Nwapa started to write in 1962, was the first novel published by a

Nigerian woman.

Nigerian literature expresses the sruggles of a country that has survived

the exploitation of colonialism and capitalism as well as the devastation of civil

war and authoritarianism. Given the turmoil in Nigerian history, it is inevitable

that the postcolonial Nigerian artist would fulfil the traditional role of artist as

the voice of the people. The manifestation of protest in the novels, plays and

poetry of Nigerian authors in the last 40 years attests to the role of artist as the

cry of protest.

Since the publication of Flora Nwapas Efuru in 1966, Nigerian women

have been prolific publishers. Although by Western definitions, these writers are

not likely to as feminists, their works offer realistic pictures of gender issues in a

patriarchal society. The cries of protest from the Nigerian women authors expose

the hegemonic order in a society wrapped in a history of colonialism and

patriarchy.

Nwapas fictional universe is a world of women and this is visible in

focusing every minor character in her novel Efuru. Efuru, a remarkable woman,

comes from a distinguished family and distinguished herself from many other

women in her community, married Adizua, a poor man from Igbo community.

Her married life was very happy in the first year but soon people started looking
 146

at her life as a cursed one for not bearing a child. Ajanupu and other women in

the community appear perplexed at this and say: Efuru was a man since she

would not produce (23). Efurus sorrow may have been exclusively personal at

this level as Adizua was not worried about her barrenness. Adizua, though poor,

not known to people and unable to give dowry, loves her very much and

consoles: You know I cannot exchange you with a wife who would give me

twenty sons (26).

In Ibo communities, not to have children was considered a curse. The

same fact of barrenness is also seen in another novel of Flora Nwapa. Idu, the

protagonist of the novel, displays no emotion in public when accused of

barrenness but moves to tears during private moments with her husband,

Adiewere.

In African traditional community, there was no other event as joyous as

the birth of a child. For any married woman of the community, the role of

mother was considered superior to the role of a wife. The novel presents a few

dramatic changes in Efurus fate when she becomes pregnant and bears a baby

daughter.

When Efuru was at home to take care of the baby, Adizua lost his

business as he was not good at trading. Efuru, like Nnu Ego in Buchi Emechetas

Joys Motherhood is a business woman. She is able to bring in the highest prices,

and pay the lowest. At the same time she remains a respectable woman in her

villages society. She aids the sick and poor.

 147

Later, Adizua behaves indifferently towards Efurus every aspect of

serving including, food etc. at this stage, Efuru was sad but did not protest rather

shared with her mother-in-law. One night Adizua demands I want my food

tonight (60). She did not cook for him as she has wasted a lot for the previous

weeks. She remembers all her past days and weeps: she thinks that Adizua was

with another woman but compromises: I dont object to his marrying a second

wife. I dont object to it at all (63). This shows the polygamy system prevailed

in the African society. Efuru remains passive, leaving everything in the hands of

God. Here, at this juncture, Nwapa tries to link the suffering of Efurus mother-

in-law to accept Efurus suffering and strengthens her by narrating an incident.

Efurus mother-in-law recollects her past days. :My daughter, I can only solicit

patience. Have patience. You may not wait as long as I did. I gained nothing

from my long suffering, so the world would think, but I am proud that I was still

true to the only man I loved (61). Efurus response to her mother-in-laws

words is revealed in her famour soliloquy:

Perhaps self-imposed suffering appeals to her. It does not appeal to

me. I know I am capable of suffering for greater things. But to

suffer for a truant husband, an irresponsible husband like Adizua is

to debase suffering. My own suffering will be noble. When Adizua

comes back, I shall leave him. and what about my daughter? She

asked herself. I can leave a man, but I cannot leave my daughter.

Of course, I shall take my daughter with me. I shall go back to my

 148

fathers house. Thank God he is still

alive (62).

The above passage of her self-realization could be seen in terms of

Efurus resistance to her self-imposed suffering. She likes to remain faithful with

her only child ogonim blessed by her ancestors and receive the advice of her

father, mother-in-law and Ajanupu. She does not want to disobey these people

for they had been important in her life. Here, we can perceive the similarity of

the Nigerian and the Indian culture. Bonds of family relationship and blessings

from ancestors are similar in both the cultures. Her impulse of resistance grows

stronger in the following words: Our ancestors forbid that I should wait for a

man to drive me out of his house. This is done to women who cannot stand by

themselves, women who have no good homes, and not to me the daughter of

Nwashike Ogene. And besides, my face is not burnt, I am still a beautiful

woman (64).

The same sort of self-realization is also visible in Shashi Deshpandes

That Long Silence selected for the study. In her famous soliloquy, Jaya, the

protagonist, doesnt want to listen to the edited versions of Mohans story when

he returns:

Mohan will be back. All well his telegram says. Does he mean

that, now that Mohan has sorted out his problem, and no longer

fears prosecution, joblessness and disgrace, we can go back to our

original positions? Does it mean that hell come back and give me
 149

a carefully edited version of what has happened as he has done so

often till now and then ask me, What do you say, Jaya? But it

is no longer possible for me. If I have to plug that hole in the

heart, I will have to speak, to listen, I will have to erase the silence

between us (192).

After suffering a lot due to her failure to speak in defence, she decides not

to remain a silent victim any more. She gets the message from Mohan that all

had turned out well and he would come back. Jaya reviews the whole situation

and thinks whether they would go back to their original position and he would

give the answers he wanted. It was not acceptable to Jaya and she doesnt want

Mohan to become her master. Therefore, she says to herself, I will have to

speak, to listen, to erase silence between us (192). Though the suffering seems

to be common in both the protagonists, the bonds of culture and system of

marriage differ. For instance, Efuru was free to marry again as the system of

polygamy was prevalent in Nigeria but in the Indian system of marriage, Jaya

doesnt break away from her family but wants to stand for herself by breaking

the silence between Mohan, her husband and herself. Shashi Deshpande rightly

observes this sacredness of marriage in the Indian system in her novels.

Before she decided to leave Adizua, her only daughter Ogonum dies of

convulsion: She had another attack of convulsion and before Ajanupu arrived,

she was dead (68). Efuru goes in search of her husband but no use. A week after

her return from Agbor, she tells her mother-in-law:

 150

Mother, I cannot stay any more I cannot wait indefinitely for

Adizua, you can bear witness that I have tried my best. I am still

young and would wish to marry again. It will be unfair both to you

and your son if I begin to encourage men who would like to marry

me while still in this house (88).

For the above statement, her mother-in-law remains silent but Ajanupu,

her mother-in-laws sister, interferes and requests Efuru:

You know that I am proud of you. You are a good woman. There is

no woman like you. Your mother-in-law knows this very well

though she does not show it. It is a pity that this had befallen you.

But dont worry, it will be all right. By the power of God it will be

all right. Adizua has wronged you. You have been rough-handled,

but dont worry. Give Adizua one year, just a year and if he does

not come back to you and you have an offer of marriage from

another man, with a good background and wealth, leave him and

marry the man. Wait for a year, just a year. After a year and you

marry again, nobody in this world will raise an accusing finger at

you and say you have not done well (93).

Even after her one year of waiting, Adizua doesnt return and Ajanupu

continues to persuade Efuru to stay back to which Efuru disagrees:

No. I will not stay. Efuru said. I am sorry but I haver to

disappoint you. Adizua does not want me any more. It is so

 151

obvious. Do you want me to stay until he comes home and tells me

to pack? That will be very shameful. You dont want this to happen

to your daughter. For once in her life, Ajanupa had nothing to say

(88).

The next day, Efuru packs up all her things and leaves Adizuas house for

her fathers house. This reflects her self-respect. But Efuru continues to help the

people who are in need of her helping hand. Observing the goodness of Efuru,

Ogea, the maid-girl starts loving her mistress and calls her mother. She vaguely

goes to see her parents at the farm when Efuru persuades her. Efuru helps

Ogeas parents financially and for medical surgery of her father Nwosu for his

boils. She forgives them for their debts and continues to help for the harvest. We

also come across another old woman Nnona helped by Efuru for her leg

operation. Efuru always remains charitable to all those who seek her help. She

earns respect from younger and older ones in the entire community and is loved

by most of the people.

In the later part of her life, Efuru accepts the proposal of Gilbert, her

school friend, to marry her after a long time of thinking and understanding.

Gilbert takes her in marriage by paying a dowry of 12 pounds and 10 shillings.

The first year of Efurus second marriage was a happy one as Gilbert loved and

respected her. The mother-in-law, though strict, started liking her and treated her

as her own daughter.

 152

Gilberts family was prospering and Gilbert was very happy with Efuru.

Even after two years of their married life, Efuru did not conceive. One of the

women poisons the ears of Efurus mother-in-law and she asks Efuru to see the

dibia. Meanwhile Efuru dreams about the lake and the woman of the lake and

reveals it to her father:

I dream several nights of the lake and the woman of the lake. Two

nights agon, the dream was very vivid. I was swimming in the

lake, when a fish raised its head and asked me to follow it.

Foolishly I swam out to follow it. It dived and I dived too. I got to

the bottom of the lake and to my surprise, I saw an elegant woman,

very beautiful, combing her long black hair with a golden comb.

When she saw me, she stopped combing her hair and smiled at me

and asked me to come in. I went in. she offered me kola, I refused

to take, she laughed and did not persuade me. She beckoned to me

to follow her. I followed her like a woman possessed. We went to

the place she called her kitchen. She used different kinds of fish as

firewood, big fish like asa echim, aja and ifuru. Then she showed

me all her riches. As I was about to leave her house under the

water, I goot up from my sleep What I have noticed so far each

time I dreamt about the woman of the lake was that in the

mornings when I went to the market I sold all the things I took to

the market, Debtors came of their own accord to pay their debts

(146-47).
 153

When her father listens to the dream, he laughs softly and says: Your

dream is good. The woman of the lake, our Unhamiri, has chosen you to be one

of her worshippers (147) and directs her to see a dibia on Afo day as her mother

used to have similar dreams.

Dibia arrives at her fathers house, greets him. listens to the dream and

asks to keep her taboos on the Orie day, the great day of the woman of the lake.

He says:

You are not to fish this day. I know you dont fish, but you should

persuade others not to fish. You arenot to eat yams on this day. You

are not to sleep with your husband. You have to boil, roast, or fry

plantains on Orie days. Uhamiri likes plantains very much. You

can even pound it if you like. When you go to bed, you must be in

hite on Orie nights. You can sacrifice a white fowl to Uhamiri on

this day. When you feel particularly happy, or grateful, you should

sacrifice a white sheep to her. Above all, you will keep yourself

holy. When you do all these, then you will see for yourself what

the woman of the lake would do for you You are to buy an

earthware pot. Fill it with water from the lake, and put it at one

corner of your room. Cover it with a white piece of cloth. Thats all

you have to do (153-54).

As Efuru remains barren in her second marriage, the mother-in-law and

Efuru herself look for another wife for Gilbert to bear a child in the family.
 154

During this period Gilbert meets his childhood friend, Mr.Sunday and recollects

all his past days of elementary school. During the discussion of their personal

life, Gilbert reveals that he had a bounching baby boy with a girl at Ndhoni, but

it remains a secret from his mother and Efuru. Without knowing this Efuru and

her mother-in-law arrange a marriage with Nikoyeni. When Nikoyeni is

pregnant, the son of Gilbert from Ndhoni comes to his house with his undle but

returns to his mother as Nikoyeni doesnt like him. Efuru was happy to see the

boy but Nkoyeni was furious and viewed the whole thing with disgust. She also

argued that the boy was not Gilberts son though Efuru saw a clear resemblance

of Gilbert and treated the boy and his uncle very kindly. At this point we can

analyse the difference in character of Efuru and Nkoyeni.

Efurus father dies and when she is in that pain of loss, Nkoyeni gives

birth to a bounching baby boy. Gilbert comes home only two months after the

delivery of Nkoyenis son. Efuru asks him about the delay and expresses her

unhappiness of not being present for her fathers burial. Gilbert remains silent.

Later on, Ajanupu reveals to her the secret of Gilbert being jailed at Onicha for

three months. Efuru is angry because after six years of their married life, Gilbert

hid something and again loved him in vain. She was filled with hate and

resentment, qualities that were foreign to her nature (209). Soon afterwards,

Gilbert confesses that he was in jail but not for stealing. Efuru was at peace and

did not question him further. But Nkoyeni threatened to leave and did not believe

Gilberts words.
 155

Just after this heated argument between Nkoyeni and Gilbert, Ogea, maid

girl at Efurus house, starts sweeping the house at night. Ajanupu hears the sound

of sweeping, scolds her for doing it during late night and tells her not to throw

the dust as it would be a loss of property to the house. Again in this act of

sweeping, we see the similarly of Nigerian and Indian custom in sweeping

during the night time. In their discussion of Ogeas behavior and innocent nature,

Efuru and Ajanupu decide to get Gilbert marry Ogea when Nkoyeni threatened

to leave. But a sad thing happens before the final arrangement of the marriage.

Efuru suddenly fails ill. Many dibias come to her rescue but she doesnt recover

from her sickness. She is blamed of adultery for not being cured and her

sickness. She is blamed of adultery for not being cured and her husband Gilbert

tells her to confess her sins to be alive with him. Gilbert speaks to his wife:

Efuru, my adultery, and unless you confess, you will die. So you should confess

to me and live. I wont ostracize you, you will still be my wife, and I wont

allow anybody to molest you. So confess and live (216).

Efuru has no energy to reply and calls for Ajanupu. Ajanupu is angry with

the accusation and there are blows between Ajanupu and Gilbert. Efuru leaves

Gilbert and walks with her age-group members to the shrine of Goddess Utuosu

and swears by her name to kill her if she has committed adultery. She remains

alive, Gilbert regrets the accusation but Efuru refuses to go back and comes to

her fathers house. That night she dreams about the woman of the lake:

Efuru slept soundly that night. She dreamt of the woman of the

lake, her beauty, her long hair and her riches. She had lived for
 156

ages at the bottom of the lake. She was as old as the lake itself. She

was happy, she was wealthy. She was beautiful. She gave women

beauty and wealth but she had no child. She had never experienced

the joy of motherhood (221).

Efuru is the detailed study of a womans calamity and success. Flora

Nwapa has succeeded in conveying an idea of the African woman at her best:

respectful, hard-working, patient, loving, helpful, uncomplaining and beautiful.

Efurus character evokes the live figure of the African woman. Efuru

distinguished herself fills the entire picture of the novel. Having determined

her life with Adizua she does not complain about his ways. It is she who engages

herself in trade and saves the money necessary for her dowry to be given to her

father. By doing so she saves the honour of both her husband and her father. In a

short time she becomes popular with her husbands people.

But in spite of her inherent capabilities and outward success, Efuru is a

sorrowful figure. She is like a bird with beautiful feathers, but killed within. The

first years of married lifed with Adizua are stained by her childlessness, which is

a curse to African womanhood. A visit to the dibia, prayers and offerings to the

ancestors, bring her the fulfillment of motherhood. Ogonim is born, but Adizua

is lost. However, even in the midst of her sorrows, Efuru turns to Ogonim for

comfort, but this too is soon denied to her. Ogonim dies suddenly, and Efuru

goes back to her fathers house and engages herself in trade and charity.
 157

Having gone through a life of pain and sorror, Efuru becomes at last, in

the years of her maturity, the chosen worshipper of Uhamiri. A new life begins

for her, she is dedicated to the goddess Uhamiri and to the good of the people.

There are two most important strains in Nwapas characterization of Efuru.

Firstly, Efuru is presented to us as a woman full of enthusiasm for life who on

the other hand is also a woman of sorrows. Secondly, she is portrayed as a

woman capable of a great unselfish love towards fellow human beings. Even in

her darkest moments Efuru can make her life purposive by simply and

unselfishly caring for humanity.s he does not lose her faith in humanity though

Adizua has deserted her and Gilbert has blamed her. Efuru is no doubt a realistic

portrayal of everyday Africa. The protagonist, Efuru, who becomes the chosen

worshipper of Uhamiri, is also a symbolic figure. The local myth of Uhamiri, the

woman of lake, has skillfully been exploited by Flora Nwapa.

The myth speaks of Uhamiri being married to Okita, the God of the river.

Their marriage is fruitless and people say they have quarreled and live alienated

from each other, each ruling over a separate domain. At the union of the river

and the lake, the waters are always troubled and muddy. And yet, the blue waters

of the lake are always peaceful and calm. Uhamiri, the deity presiding over the

lake, helps trade and fishing, lends life-giving waters to the farms around and

generously helps the people to grow prosperous and rich if they but pay her due

reverence by keeping her day with devotion. She is particularly benevolent to

her women-worshippers. She is rich and lvies a content and happy life
 158

independent of her husband and she blesses her devotees with riches,

contentment and happiness.

Efuru is Uhamiri in flesh and blood. She has the golden touch of Uhamiri.

She is large-hearted and is benevolent to innumerable people in her community.

She has married and yet circumstances compel her to live single and all by

herself. Like Uhamiri she is all equanimity and like her patron deity she chooses

to live a life that is independent of menfolk. She withdraws herself voluntarily

from the narrow bounds of family only to take into her loving embrace the whole

humanity.

Thus, it is very clear that the local Uhamiri myth has helped Nwapa to

project a truly heroic African woman who by her exemplary life proved to be a

new African woman in the male-dominated African tribal society. Efuru, in her

meager way, is the independent African woman constricting tribal norms which

have for ages consigned woman to an inferior position in her society.

Efurus village is a polygamous village. However, Efuru, as a woman, has

more rights than other women. When Efurus husbands are unfaituful to her, she

also, unlike in other polygamous villages, is able to leave her husbands. Efuru is

independent and thinks of herself as well as her husbands. Though she loves

both men she marries, Efuru does not forget about her own rights. Efuru thinks

of her husbands and although she is not able to bear more than one child, she is

willing to bring a second wife into her home in order to give her husband more
 159

children. However, she keeps her dignity and leaves her husbands when they

abandon her illustrating her strength to take care of herself.

Efuru, not able to depend on her husbands, turns her faithfulness to the

goddess of the lake, Uhamiri, Efuru begins by dreaming about this elegant

woman, very beautiful, combing her long black hair with a golden comb. This

dream signifies the beginning of her worship of Uhamiri. Efuru is chosen to be

one of Uhamiris worshippers. Rather than give women children, Uhamiri grants

beauty, riches and wealth. Uhamiri is rather a symbol of hope for all women so

that her devotees such as Efuru can taste of her kind of freedom and happiness

with or without children. To Uhamiri, her independence becomes desirable and

blessed.

Efuru sets not only a feminist example through her independence, but she

is also a symbol of survival and independence from a colonial empire. Efuru is

successful, happy, and free from her oppressive and abusive first husband,

Adizua, and from her equally disappointing second husband Gilbert. Both men

symbolize colonial power, Adizua by his abuse after having profited by marrying

Efuru without having paid a dowry, and Gilbert, by his Christian name and

ideals after having attended a colonial school.

Discussing Gender relations in Efuru Flora Nwapa put a lot of

emphasis in marriage and procreation. Both these aspects are indispensable in

creating new family units and in increasing the population of the family or

lineage. Nwapa is reflecting, in Efuru, the situation, as it exists in her society.

 160

Children are greatly valued in Efuru. Each marriage is expected to produce many

sibilings, both male and female (with preference for a male).

In Igbo culture, the most important reason for marriage is procreation.

Even in marriages where love is the main attraction that brings couples together,

the desire to have children is always the ultimate goal. This is the reason why

most marriages, including those that are built on affection, crumble or are

seriously threatened when they are not blessed with children. Why do everyday

Igbo woman, whether married or unmarried, have a strong desire to have a

child?

The concern with procreation is not limited to the married couple. It is

their relatives, friends, and neighbours who first express these concerns when the

woman has not become pregnant. A year after their first marriage, Efuru and

Adizua (in her first marriage) and she and Eneberi (in her second marriage) are

still enjoying new and fresh marital life when gossip spreads about Efurus

barrenness, among her female neighbours, as anxious gossips are made over the

fact that she has not had any children.

An important role that women play in the family is the upbringing and

nurturing of children. This role limits, confines, and domesticates women. It also

distracts women from achieving higher goals or roles for themselves. In Efuru,

Flora Nwapa constantly refers to the proper upbringing of children; especially

girls who are expected to become wives and mothers.

 161

If motherhood is so vital to the mental health of the African woman, why

does Flora Nwapa punish the heroine, Efuru, with the malignant trauma of

childlessness? The pain of infertility is inflicted in Efuru, Idu, Amaka in One is

Enough and Rose in Women Are Different. When these women eventually

conceive a child, it brings about a lot of difficulty to them and doesnt bring

about total satisfaction. Perhaps the Lake Goddess is responsible for the fact that

these women do not have children, the state that they eventually find themselves

in. I say this because it is strange that the women who either worship her or

share her attributes long hair, beauty, wealth, and independent spirit are the

women that do not have children or are not capable of being mothers.

Efurus mother only had Efuru, and Efuru losses Ogonim, her only child.

Uhamiri, The Lake Goddess, is barren and her state justifies the others. The fact

that she does not have any children and is very wealthy, have a structural and

thematic relevance to the lives and experiences on Efuru.

The concern shown by mothers and elders in Igbo society underscrores

how seriously they take the socialization of young people to proper behavior.

Women always express these concerns and they also enforce the code. This

means that women are the custodians of tradition.

What Flora Nwapa is trying to convey in Efuru is that children alone do

not bring about happiness or self-fulfillment to women. In Efuru, Uhamiri is said

to be happy even though she doesnt have a child. She is probably consoling

those women in Igbo society that cannot have children and are barren, by
 162

relating how happy the Lake Goddess is even though she cannot have children. It

is as if Flora Nwapa is saying that there are other factors to happiness.

Companiionship and love in marriage are as important as motherhood, if not

even more. Originally, a marriage fails or succeeds depending on the

circumstances that affect it. Childlessness, in Igbo society and in Efuru, is one

aspect to a marriage that fails but there are other aspects to consider, like neglect,

incompatibility, lack of trust, and unfaithfulness. Efurus marriages fail because

her husbands are unfailthful, ungrateful, and irresponsible where she is

concerned. Efuru survives her failed marriages. After her marriages end she

gains strength and an increase in her stature.

She eventually finds fulfillment in her worship of Uhamiri. As well, her

business expertise and strength of her character enable her to leave her husbands

and continue with her life. Her marriages to both her husbands were her choice

and she doesnt blame anyone but herself. She offers a life of service to her

community; an example would be when she helps those that have felt ill by

calling on the doctor for them, and her worship of the Lake Goddess.

Throughout all her trial and tribulations Efuru has the support of those in her age

group. Throughout her ordeal those of her age group advise her to have patience

with Adizua. She feels like it is up to her to terminate her marriage when it

becomes burdensome as well as destructive to her. She remains self-reliant and

independent in her action.

In Efuru, Flora Nwapa illustrates to us the traditional Igbo woman and

their relentless capacity to survive despite all the odds that are against them and
 163

their determination to achieve economic independence and a measure of

fulfillment as human beings in their communities. The Lake Goddess is used to

criticize the tradition that values women as only being useful for the sake of

procreation rather than as human beings with aspirations to attain self-fulfillment

and independence. The image of the goddess symbolizes the potential of Igbo

womanhood. They can aspire and achieve great things in life; they are not here

on this earth for the sake of procreation only. It also represents the glory and

beauty of womanhood. The Lake Goddess gives women the power to aspire,

whether its economic, political or social aspirations.

Flora Nwapas second novel Idu (1970) opens with the conversation

between Uzoechi and Nwasobi talking about Idu and her husband Adiewere after

reflecting for a while about their own family relationship especially when

Nwasobi remembers her past days: how her even after becoming a mother of six

children and how she resisted to open the door when he came fully drunk.

Suddenly they switch to their dialogue towards Idu and her marital life.

Nwasobi, an elderly woman, reflects about IduL They are comfortably off. Idu

is a child of yesterday. She married a man whose hands make money. Things

will be good for them. By our standard, they are well-to-do. But what worries

me now is that they still have no child (3). Hence, like Efuru, the question of

barrenness poses a problem to a woman like Idu. Though it is her personal

problem, it becomes a talk of the community as in the conversation between

Nwasobi and Uzoechi.

 164

These two characters are immersed to a remarkable degree in a ceaseless

flow of talk throughout the novel. This is a kind of technique Nwapa employs in

her novels, especially, the talk of women. The noverl is divided into twenty-

two sections. In each section of the novel, there is dialogue between two people

and sometimes a commentary in-between. In the first section of novel, Idu and

Adiewere represent the ideal couple and they become the talk of the community

through Nwasobi and Uzoechi:

Have you ever seen two people so happy before?

No, I never have. God created them as good people and God gave

them to each other. You never see them quarrel. Dont they ever

quarrel? (2).

The sickness of Adiewere is revealed in the first section of the novel

when a commentary about Idu tells that she avoids giving M & B medicine.

While preparing soup for her husband, Idu calls her sister Anamadi. She shouts

but there is no answer and to her wonder a girl runs towards her and gives her a

piece of information about Anamadi and her fight in the market. Anamadi is

quite opposite in terms of her character when compared to Idu. As a matter of

fact a group of womengather around her watching her fight in the market and

tell: it is Anamadi, the sister of Idu. Nobody would think that they are born of

the same mother and father. This thing is bad. The girl has no sense. And Idu is

full of sense and understanding (5). The first section ends with the coming of

Nwasobi and Uzoechi to Idus house to know about Adieweres health.

 165

In the second section of the novel, the two business friends of Idu, Okeke

and Okorie, are introduced. Like Efuru, Idu is also a business-woman but unlike

Adizua, Adiewere, husband of Idu helps her in trading. Idus friends were very

happy with her hospitality. Besides her domestic virtues, Idu displays remarkable

business acumen as a trader and brings financial prosperity to her home as well

as her village. Her business partner Okeke was so impressed by her

industriousness and fair dealing that he refused to sell oil to anyone but to her.

While eating supper, these men chat about swimming and Adiewere narrates an

incident to them how he escaped a danger because he could swim. After listening

to the episode Idus love for her husband is revealed when she speaks to her

business friends.

It is true, Idu said. He swam out with the bags of money and the

money was in coins, coins mind you. I wept that day. I said, you

know how we women behave, I said, Why didnt you leave the

bags of money? Can I eat money? (11).

This section also explores the marital experience of another couple-

Ishiodu brother of Adiewere and his wife Ogbenyanu. Contrary to the marital

life of Idu and Adiewere, the marriage of Ogbenyanu and Ishiodu was unhappy

because Ishiodu was an irresponsible man who failed to fulfil his family

obligations. Obgenyanu wanted to walk out of her marriage but was unable to do

so because of her financial dependence on her husband. And her husband in turn

used to depend on his elder brother Adiewere and his wife Idu. Fortunately

Ogbenyanu has three children and she was in her fourth pregnancy. When she
 166

comes to know about her fourth pregnancy, Idu, being dignified, displays no

emotion in public but during private moments with her husband, cries: Idu

started weeping softly. It was the third year of their marriage and nothing had

happened. She was not pregnant, she had not even miscarried. It had worried her

husband in the first year, but he was in love with his wife and he did not want to

marry another wife. Many people had advised him to marry another, but he had

refused. He was not at heart a polygamist (16).

Idus care for her co-sister is noticeable in the miscarriage of the fourth

child of Ogbeyanu when she puts her total trust in Idu. Idu says to Ogbenyanu

Dontyou see your children? What will happen to them if anything happens to

you? I have my mother, Idu and my father, Adiewere, they will look after

them Ogbenyanu replied (22). Uzoechi and Nwasobi discuss the laziness of

Ishiodu and the hard work at farm of Ogbenyanu and later they pray to God for

Idu to be a mother. In Ibo communities, it was a curse not to have children. It

was regarded as a failure to be a woman without being a mother. This type of

humiliation is also seen in the life of Efuru, when there was a gossip in the

community and sarcastic comments like Efuru was man for not producing a

child in spite of all her good work she does to the community. L. Sasi Bala

rightly observes: Barrenness is a curse, a slur on feminity, and a flaw in

womanhood. To become a wife and mother of a number of children is the

highest ideal and aspiration of every African woman. Marriage and consequent

motherhood being the focal centre in a womans traditional role in African

society, an African woman feels herself fulfilled and content only in the
 167

attainment of these twin goals. A barren woman is a contemptible creature, an

affront to her community and an offence in the eye of God for the tribal ethos

cast the woman in the role of creative and protective force in life. These

restrictive norms militated against the full flowering of African womanhood and

the barren wifes life was miserable (266).

Idu though barren engages herself in extending a helping hand to those,

who are in need. And hence she enjoys the goodwill of the people in her

community and many people pray for her to be blessed with a child as Nwasobi,

an elderly friend of Idu says to Uzoechi, Nwapas inveterate talker: What I am

saying is that Idu should be pregnant. I am praying to God and all our ancestors

to give her a child. A good woman like that should have a child (28).

Nevertheless there are certain shadowy characters like Onyemuru who poison

the ears of Nwasobi, an elderly friend of Idu to instruct Adiewere to take a

second wife as Idu showed no sign of conceiving:

If Idu cant have a child, let her allow her husband to marry

another wife. Thats what our people do. There are many girls

around You remember Uberife. When she saw that she was

barren, she quickly arranged other wives for her husband, and now

their house is full of children You know Nwoji of Umuenu

village. When she could not have a child, her husband married

other wives, and now they have many children. How can a man

live without children? Wasnt it a woman who bore him in her

 168

womb? No, you must tell Idu to find another wife for her husband

(33-34).

Soon, we come across another couple Ojiugo and Amargajeme in the

fourth section of the novel. Every section of the novel opens in dialogue format

and so in this section we observe the conversation of Idu and her childhood

friend, Ojiugo. Ojiugo had been unfortunate the first time she married. Her

husband had died of cough, and for a long time afterwards she had no suitors.

She was prosperous, had a lot of will-power and was very generous, but men

were afraid to come near her because of her late husbands disease. She knew

this herself, and it made her miserable, although she was by nature cheerful.

Then, just before the planting season Amarjeme returned from the Great River.

He had been there for years, Ojiugo knew him only by name. he was always

referred to as a prodigal son, who squandered all his fathers wealth and took

refuge in the Great River.

At the Great River Amarjeme had continued with his bad ways. He lived

an immoral life and nobody was quite sure from where his income came. So

when he returned to his town everyone was curious, and even more curious

when they heard rumours that he wanted to marry Ojiugo. People who knew him

before he left the town remarked that he was sober, but others did not want to

jump to conclusions. They wanted to wait and see. But as time went on, these

people began to change their minds about Amarjeme. He had returned home

with some property. He had called his age-group men and given them wine to

drink. He had plans to settle the age-long quarrel between himself and his young
 169

brother. These were the outward signs of his changed heart. People around him

thought that this change might be because he wanted to marry Ojiugo. When he

returned home after the death of his first wife in a storm in the Great River, he

met Ojiugo and wanted to marry her. Ojiugo was happy with Amarjeme and they

lived happily. Gradually Amarajeme began to settle down. People began to see

how lucky Ojiugo was and Ojiugo in turn loved him more and more.

When Ojiugo hears that Onyemurus canoe was taken by Idus sister,

Anamadi, she comes to Idu to find about Onyemuru and the canoe, for she was

the only person who knew how to handle Onyemuru who has an evil tongue.

When she met Idu, they talked for long hours on their trade, their husbands, and

the gossip in the town. They had plenty of things in common as both had

devoted husbands, but neither had borne their husbands children, and they were

both getting older. But neither had a husband who worried unduly, at least

outwardly. But their husbands were not friends in the sense in which Idu and

Ojiugu were friends. Their wives occasionally brought them together and there it

ended (37). These are the common features we observe in Idu and Ojiugo, the

childhood friends.

Besides sharing their own family matters they also talk about various

women in the community especially women who have gone astray and are

leading the wives of prostitutes. Some among them change their lives and

become mothers and lead a good family life while few among them remain

prostitutes and go mad. Idu says that prostitution is bad for their women and the
 170

Woman of Lake frowns at it and she also says that it is foreign to our women. It

should be left to women of other lands, not our women (41).

The recurring dialogues between Nwasobi and her friend Uzoechi make

everybodys business the communitys business. In the fifth section of the novel

they talk about the pregnancy of Idu and they are happy about it. Idu was

conceived when Adiewere married a girl about three months ago. The petty mind

of the second wife of Adiewere can be noted when Nwasobi (Adiewere, Idu and

the second wife) were returning from the beach: They had plenty of bags of

Kernel in the canoe, and it was going to rain. Idu and Adiewere paddled with all

their might, but the second wife just sat down and folded her hands although a

paddle was beside her. She refused to paddle?... I was there but coming from

the opposite direction. I said to them, Idu, Adiewere and the small wife, are you

returning? Idu and Adiewere answered me, but not that small girl. She did not

say a word (44).

Nwasobi continues to observe the arrogant nature of the small wife when

she visits Idu at her house. On the contrary Idu was full of patience doing her

best to make the second wife comfortable in her new surroundings. Adiewere

was happy that Idu conceived and took good care of her. Ojiugo was happy to

know the news. The small wife leaves the house for another man. Idus business

friends Okeke and Okorie, hearing that she was expecting a baby, had brought

her food stuffs found in their town.

 171

One evening when Anamadi and Idu were sitting outside, Ogbenyan

arrives and tells Idu that she fought with her husband. Idu was unhappy to hear

Ogbenyanu fighting with her husband and counsels her which is disliked by her;

she takes her belongings, three children and goes to her mothers house. Mother

being very poor asks her to go to Idu. The irresponsibility of Ishiodu and his

laziness plunge Idu and her husband into debts. They had supported him and his

family all his life. But there seems to be no change in his life. After speaking to

Ishiodu, peace prevails in his family and the wife agrees to return with her

children.

In the eighth section of the novel, Idu continues to think of the baby in her

womb. She plans in her mind that there must be somebody to look after her

husband when she goes for delivery to the hospital and Anamadi should go with

her to help in the hospital. While going to the market she remembers the dream

she had the previous night. In the dream she gives birth to a baby boy who is

very dark and she is afraid to touch him. But the nurses take him for bathing,

scrub him with the sponge and the baby becomes fair. As she is musing on this

dream, she reaches the market. But Idu likes to have a girl child because girls as

first children give luck to their parents. A girl is very useful to a mother when

she goes to market and she looks after her sisters and brothers. She would be an

asset according to Idu.

After buying things from the market, she notices that there is an unusual

brightness. She thinks that she can go to the hospital in a good weather but then

as she is about to step into the compound there is a sudden darkenss. She
 172

staggers and falls. She remains where she is unable to get up. She hears noises.

There is a stampede. Children shout, and mothers collect their children. One

woman says that this is the end of the world. Idu sits where she is, unable to get

up and is even unable to shout. She hears the voice of the old Esther, the only

Christian in the compound saying, God, receive all in thy kingdom. Christians

believe that it is the coming of the Christ as darkness covers everything in the

middle of the day. Idu is just there perplexed with a baby in her womb. She

contemplates on her own religion that after her death she would go to the other

world, much better than the present one and it is not the one Esther is talking

about. What frightenes Idu is not only the darkness, but her solitary voice in the

darkness. She calls Adiewere and they embrace each other, and as theydo so the

darkness begins to give way to the light. It seems as if the light has now

overcome the forces of the darkness. By the time Idu and Adiewere reach their

door, the light reappears fully. Nobody could explain what had happened. Not

even the old men of the town.

Idu gets delivery pains and asks her husband to send for Nwasobi and

Uzoechi as Ojiugo is not at home; By the time they arrive, Adiewere has gone to

dibia who lives nearby. Dibia tells Adiewere:

Your wife will give birth to a baby boy. But today is a bad day to

give birth. The day that we had night in the afternoon. It is a bad

day. Pray that the baby does not come today. No, you cant lstop

that now. Your wife will soon have the baby. Are the women

looking after her experienced? They should be, because the child is
 173

going to be a greater person. Dont be afraid. She will be all right.

Sacrifice to the gods and your ancestors, and all will be well.

Again, your chi needs a fowl. Sacrifice a fowl to it and all will be

well (84-85).

Adiewere thanked dibia and rushed home and heard the cry of the baby

boy. In African tradition there was no other event as joyous as the birth of a child

for a couple. He was happy and forgot everything about the bad day. The childs

name was Ijoma. He quickly grew into a handsome boy. His parents were proud

of him. He was not a year old when he started walking, and before he was two,

he was able to speak. Ijoma was a good child and in his first two years he never

gave his parents any anxious moment. Anamadi had improved after the birth of

Ijoma. She was not as stupid as before. She liked her nephew very much.

Adiewere and Idu were very happy with their son. Their boy was the centre of

their life. Adiewere went to the big towns and bought beautiful clothes for him.

he takes him to the stream, to the beach, everywhere. Adiewhere was very

pleased with Idu and in one casual conversation he reveals his love: And you,

Idu, what man will marry another woman after marrying you. You know you are

different (91).

In the eleventh section of the novel, Ojiugo deserted her husband

Amarjeme because he was sterile and went to live with his friend Obukodi

because she desperately needed to become a mother. Her pregnancy brought into

the open the fact that Amarjeme was sterile, so he killed himself by hanging. The

readers come to know this fact again in the conversation between Nwasobi and
 174

Uzoechi: Come, come, do you know? Do you know that Ojiugo has left her

husband? Nwasobi asked her friend Uzoechi. Who said so? It is a lie. It cannot

happen. Ojiugo cant have left her husband. I am telling you it is true Who

has she gone to To Obukodi., I dont know what Ojiugo wants in

Obukodis house. What does she want? Is it because she has no child by

Amarageme? asked Uzoechi. Of course, what else? said Nwasobi (105).

Throughout the town Onyemuru had reputation as a bringer of bad news

and this woman brings the mysterious news to Amarjeme of his wifes departure,

pregnancy and birth of a baby boy. Slowly he comes to realize that he was

impotent and hangs himself. He was unaware of this fact before marriage

because his wife was drowned in the storm in the early days of his first marriage.

This he tells Idu when she comes to visit him:

Welcome, Idu, have you come to see me today? Is all well that

you have come? Our Amarjeme, I said I must come for I have

not seen you for a long time. Last time I asked about you, you

were in the Great River. Yes, I went to my second home. You

know that one is always hungry for the place where one was

brought up. It is true. Were they well when you left them? It

was a long time ago. My father-in-law and mother-in-law were

well when I left them. Your father and mother-inlaw? yes,

didnt you know that I was married before I married your friend?

Is it true? You know, Idu, you know. Truly, I didnt know.

your friend didnt tell you? She didnt tell me. What happened to
 175

your first wife? She died before my manhood could be tested.

Idu stopped. She did not say anything. She wondered whether

somebody had broken the news to him You are quiet, observed

Amarajeme. Why? How is market? Market is going on well

(130-31).

These dialogues are fairly representative of Nwapas skill in developing

oral forms into effective narrative devices. They suggest a careful attention on

the novelists part to dramatic development and suspense, to a sense of moral

and social order and to a sense of design in both society and art. They are also a

means of integrating the social and moral significance of talk in the community

with the novels structure as a whole which symbolizes the social relationships

and individual experience that her themes describe. The communitys perception

of the womans personality and womans response to the community are all

presented through oral experiences especially dialogue and story-telling.

In the fourteenth section of the novel, Adieweres illness becomes severe

and she starts vomiting blood. Anamadi runs to the beach to inform Idu and she

almost faints to see her husband prostrate on the floor. He looked like a pice of

rag agater a heavy rain. She tried to lift him, but she was unable to. Anamadi was

crying and Ijoma was bewildered. Idu tried to lift him up saying, Adiewere,

Adiewere answer me. It is me, Idu, your wife. It is me. It is me the beautiful

woman you married. It is me. It is me, thats better, get up. You have heard my

voice. I knew that when you heard my voice you would answer. Thats what we

agreed. Thats what we decided(135). This is the first time Adiewere becomes
 176

so sick that he cannot carry himself. Meanwhile Nwasobi arrives. Ishiodu goes

for the dibia in Umuosuma village. The two women change his clothes and lay

him on the bed. Idu takes the broom and water and cleans the floor. She gives

him some palm oil to drink which makes the poisons impotent.

Eventually dibia arrives with his bag on his shoulder. He murmurs

something to himself and sits down on the floor. He says it is alright. Nothing

will happen to him. In two days he will be alright. Dibia goes to Adieweres

room and asks him if his heart was strong. Adiewere nodded. Dibia leaves him

by asking Idu to give him something to eat. Idu reflects about that morning, how

active Adiewere was and suddenly he starts vomiting blood. Idu says to

Nwasobi: I have only two people in this world: my husband and my child are

all. What will I do if anything happens to either of them? (138).

Before Ishiodu leaves Adiewere, Nwasobi warns him not to tell anybody

for there are many witches around. But Ishiodu told nearly everybody he met on

his way home and he met more than a dozen people. Many people came to

Adiewere, and Idu knew of course that it was Ishiodu who had told them.

Ishiodu kept nothing in secret. So, after two days, Idu decided to take Adiewere

to Nwasobis house so nobody would know where they were. While they were

there, Idu and Nwasohi decided to send Ishiodu to up-country to consult a dibia

of great reputation.

Ushiodu left with Uzoka his kinsman one day before the cock crew. Ten

days passed before they were back. That nioght everybody assembled to hear
 177

their news. Adeiwere was now much better. He could walk round the compound

without anybodys aid but looked thin. After travelling for seven days and seven

nights they met the great dibia Ogwagara. He was a terrible man. His beard

touched the floor. It is said that he does not know the number of children he has.

All he knows is that he has only ten girls and three are married. The boys he

does not know. He has about fifteen wives, but he does not eat what a woman

cooks. After a great difficulty Ishiodu and Uzoka, his kinsman met him and told

about Adiewere. After listening attentively to them Ogwagara said: Go home,

your brother will get well. Before you reach home he will be well. But what is

wrong is in his stomach. It is there. There is something in there, like a snake

eating him away stage by stage. Unless the snake is located and killed, he will

continue to suffer. Another thing is this, there is someone, a woman who does

not like him either. But dont worry. I am going to tell you what you must do

when you reach home he will be well. But what is wrong is in his stomach. It is

there. There is something in there, like a snake eating him away stage by stage.

Unless the snake is located and killed, he will continue to suffer. Another thing is

this, there is someone, a woman who does not like him either. But dont worry. I

am going to tell you hat you must do when you reach home. You much sacrifice

to the ancestors and to the Woman of the Lake on the day that she is worshipped

(141).

Later they paid the fees and left him. as they finished narrating the

encounter with the great dibia, Ojiugo comes to check about Adieweres health.

It is only two days after her discharge from hospital she comes to see her
 178

childhood friends husband. Her baby was only twenty eight days old. After

knowing that Adieweres health was recovered a little, Ojiugo says, When ones

time has not come, nothing can happen. Even if a poisonous snake bites

Adiewere, even if he swallows poison, nothing would harm him if his time has

not come. And that is true (42). And they all pray for Adieweres recovery. As

they were talking there was a shout from Anamadi, not a shout of joy but of

sorrow and fear. She breaks the terrible truth of Amarajemes death. Ojiugo gives

a shout and throws herself on the floor weeping. She gets up afrter a while

putting her hands on her head, runs towards Amarajemes house but Uzoka stops

her as she had only few days old baby. She wails loudly saying, Its true, Idu

it is true. I have killed him. I am a murderer. I have killed him. He hanged

himself because I left him (144). Then she tells them the real truth hidden

behind her leaving Amaragemes house. She says that even after six years of

their married life she did not conceive and hence they went to Ogwagara who

revealed to her that her husband was not a man and she would not have a child if

she stays with him. this she tells Amarajeme and he quarreled about it; went to

another dibia and said that Ogwagara was wrong. Even after taking treatment, it

was a futile effort. Hence, she left with her friend of youth, Obukodi. As the

news of Amargajemes death spread, Obukodis first wife comes to Idus house

and takes Ojiugo and treats her as her daughter.

After the death of Okeke, Idus business friend who was shot by the

thieves, adopts his son and educates him. Idu loved his only son Ijoma so much

that one night, in her absence, Ishido takes him to his house and the boy sleeps
 179

with his children. Not knowing where he went, Idu sobs: He is the only thing I

have, Ijoma is the only thing I have in this world. Idu broke down and began to

weep convulsively (186).

In the penultimate section of the novel, both Idu and Adiewere went to the

beach. They bought and sold as usual. Before the end of the day Adiewere

complained of dizziness, and went home. When he reached home, he could not

help going to the stream to wash himself. He was still dizzy and to his surprise,

he realized that he was so weak and he asked Anamadi to fetch water for him so

that he could wash himself at the back of their house. Anamadi fetched the water

and Adiewere awent to have his bath.

A short time later, it seemed to Anamadi that she heard a cry, but she was

reluctant to interfere. So she waited. But when Adiewere had been long time in

the bathroom, she went boldly and opened the door slightly. It was very hard to

relate what she saw; Adiewere was vomiting and passing out blood. Anamadi

gave a shout and ran to the beach to call Idu. Idu was shocked to see Anamadi

breathlessly running towards her and her first thought went towards her son

Ijoma. But after knowing the truth, she ran as fast as her legs could carry and

went straight to the backyard. Her husband was lying face downwards on the

floor. She turned him over, called his name many times, but she could not reach

him. he was already dead.

She left him there in the blood and filth and went to Nwasobis house and

said I have come to tell you that Adiewere is dead (209). The calmness of Idu
 180

made Nwasobis blood run cold. They arrive at Idus house. Idu sat down on the

mud bench and asked Nwasobi to go and see him at the back of the house.

Nwasobi gives a shout when she sees Adiewere who was now a corpse. She

shook him several times, and gave way to uncontrollable tears. As for Anamadi,

she was rolling on the floor. People gathered in to time and said that it was not a

natural death. Burial could not take place because it was already dark. It would

be on the following day. But there were no tears in Idus eyes. Nwasobi would

go to her and implore her to weep to which Idu reacts:

Weep for what? she asked. Weep for Adiewere? That is not

what we agreed on. He cheated me. We did not agree on what to do

if this sort of thing happened. We did not thing of it. Why do you

want me to weep. I am going with him. leave me alone, I am going

with him (210).

Friends, relatives and neighbours filled the sitting-room, weeping and

consoling Idu. But Idu did not shed a drop of tear for his death. Many

sympathizers implored her to weep but there was no change in her attitude. My

daughter. A Woman addressed her: Please weep, weep so that you will be able

to bear the loss. Weep, my daughter, the whole world mourns with you for this

tragedy. What kind of thing is this? Weep, my daughter, weep (210). Idu resists

to weep and recollects the previous night, how both of then were planning their

life:
 181

Idu laughed a dry laugh. Mother, I will not weep. Thats not what

we agreed. Adiewere and I planned things together. we did not plan

this. We did not plan that he would leave me today and go to the

land of the dead. Who will I live with? Who will talk to me at

night? What are you telling me? Asking me to weep? To weep for

my husband? I was with him only yesterday. We did not sleep

early. We talkied making plans and today he is dead, he is a corpse

lying there, a corpse, and you tell me to weep for him Mother,

thank you for your advice, I will not weep. I am going with my

husband. Both of us will go there to the land of the dead. So,

Adiewere, my husband, wait for me after you have crossed the

stream. I am coming to meet you there, and we shall continue our

lives there. It will even be better there (210).

Idu starts singing in praise of her husband and his people. Everybody

gathered there is filled with pity. With the help of men, Nwasobi washed the

corpse and dressed it. Idu continues talking more and more but does not weep

for her husband. People who saw her talking continuously thought that

something was going to happen.

In the last section of the novel, Idu refused to scrape her hair as was the

custom of her people when they mourned. Nwasobi spoke to her but she

deliberately refused. No amount of words could make her change her mind. She

told her husbands people that she was going soon to the land of the dead and

Adiewere would not like to see her hair scraped. She not only refused to scrape
 182

her but also refused to wear black for her mourning. In spite of many words of

consolation, she behaved strangely. She also resisted to be a wife of Ishiodu for

he is the only brother of Adiewere and the custom of community to marry him

after his brothers death. Idu says, Ishiodu came to put the thread round my

neck this morning. Did you hear? I just looked at him, he put the thread on and

left. He was not sure of himself. He is the only brother of Adiewere. He should

marry me, and she laughed again (216).

People also encouraged her to think of her only son, Ijoma and live for

him. But Idu says that he will stay with Ishiodu. He will look after him very well

and Okekes son will go back to his people. She also recollects how Ojiugo, her

childhood friend was dead in soul with the death news of Amarajeme. Now she

lives like a living dead body. People come and sympathize with her.

After eight days of Adieweres death, she calls her sister Amarajeme and

asks her to cook soup with some fish. Anamadi was happy to cook for her sister.

It was ready very quickly. Nwasobi goes home. Idu washed her hands as if she

was cleansing them for a ritual. She took a morsel of the food, threw it outside

and said it was for Adiewere, the ancestors and the gods and then she began to

eat. This was the first time she had done like this, although her mother and

grandmother never ate without throwing a morsel of food to the gods and the

ancestors. In Indian culture, it is generally man who throws a morsel of food to

the dead as a ritual but here a woman does it. After doing so, Idu ate as she had

never eaten before.

 183

After her supper, she enquires about Ijoma. Anamadi replies that he hwas

gone to play with Ishiodus children. She tells her sister to ask Nwasobi to come

inside when she comes and goes to bed. When Nwasobi came, she went into the

room, fanned, herself with her head tie and called Idu. But Idu did not stir:

Ewuv, Idu this kind of sleep, and as she said this, she went nearer

the bed and touched her Her hand awas on Idus feet when

Anamadi came in. Is she not up yet? Wake her, she said you

should wake her when you come. Nwasobi did not say a word.

Her hand was still on Idus feet. She did not even look at Anamadi

who rushed to Idus feet. She did not even look at Anamadi who

rushed to Idus bed saying, No, no, it cant be, its not so. What

have I done? Idu, Idu. Anamadi called and shook her sister as if

by doing so she would bring her back to life (218).

idus choice of death over motherhood is a vindication of her personal

feelings (57) observes Twinkle Suri. The sudden death of her beloved husband

shocks Idu as she cannot imagine life without him. Though is to be with her

husband in death, Adiewere, my husband, wait for me after you have crossed

the stream. I am coming to meet you there, and we shall continue our lives

there (210).

Amarjeme the husband of Ojiugo, a childhood friend of Idu, also grieves

in the same way when his wife deserts him and commits suicide. He commits

suicide not for her but because he has failed to fulfil his responsibility of
 184

fatherhood in the community. Twinkle Suri rightly observes, Idu, like Alcestis

and Savitri, is the embodiment of the faithful wife who is willing to die for her

husband, because she loves him. Amarajemes suicide is due to community

pressure (57).

Death of Idu in the novel is not a submissive failure but a powerful

justification of her personal feelings over motherhood, the custom of the

community. There are other incidents in the novel which prove that the main

protagonist refuse/resists to perform certain rituals followed by the community.

For instance, she refuses to marry her husbands brother as a convention. Not

only that, she also protests to scrape her hair as a widow is supposed to do after

the death of her husband. She also resists openly weaing black clothes as a sign

for mourning. Instead, she asks her sister to cook a meal for her and eats it as she

has never eaten before. It shows as if she was preparing for the final ritual of the

cycle of life. She takes death as a celebration of life without mourning, the

accepted customs of the community rather than a negation of life. The life she

shared with her husband makes her realize death as an insignificant event in

human life.

As the Chrisitans believe in the philosophy of life after death, Idu though

unaware of the huge doctrines of Christianity observes death as a transformation

of life for the better. She chooses death but she does not commit suicide like that

of Amarajeme. She sees death as a transformation of life within which their love

will continue. In this context Lloyd W. Brown rightly says: Idus choice of

death can be seen positively, as an affirmation of love and a commitment to her

 185

husband that transcends death itself. On a more negative, rather covert level, it is

clear that choice also amounts to an escape from the insistent voice of the

community (which would have had her remarry and have children in this case)

and from the potential or actual restrictiveness that this voice implies for her

sense of individuality (157). To look at the novel from a womans point of view,

Twinkle Suri rightly observes:

As in the first novel, in Idu too Nwapa makies a startling feminist

statement that motherhood is not the only justification for a

womans life. Idus choice can be interpreted in two ways, firstly

as an affirmation of self-definition over communal pressure,

secondly as an escape from the insistent voice of the community

which wants her to remarry and have children. In both cases, the

individual will prevails not by rejecting the system but by

circumventing it (58).

Flora Nwapas woman-centred world countries a static and stereotyped

definition of woman and creates a more problematic awareness of women. N.

Wilson Tagoe rightly justifies the statement saying, Her text is subversive

because on the surface it speaks of womens powerlessness, yet celebrates their

power Nwapas rhetoric of realism therefore conceals certain ironies and is a

strategy of narration which presents women in shifting, changeable positions as a

way of countering their static definition in patriarchal society (15).

 186

As Z.Susan Andrade says, Nwapa locates her ideal representation of

Igbo female power and independence at the turn of the century. The narrative

strategy is especially telling when historically contextualized; at the time Nwapa

was writing, Europe and the United States were witnessing the birth of second

wave of European feminism. That (her protagonists) have no contact with

Europe, certainly none with European style feminism, means that the narratives

prototype of female power is Igbo-a powerful statement in the face of a post-

second world war feminism that implied the global liberation of women would

begin in the West (98). Therefore, Nwapa stands as a pioneer in appropriating a

tradition of African femalism.

 187

Conclusion

This study of Shashi Deshpande and Flora Nwapa broadens our

understanding of women characters in their novels. What stands out logically is

the sharp contrast/similarity between Shashi Deshpande and Flora Nwapas

women. The contrast is evidently the result of the difference in the cultural ethos.

However, their aim is identical. They inherit two different socio-cultural and

religious traditions and hence their approach to the problem of women in their

relationship to the contemporary world is often similar and rarely divergent in

terms of monogamy and polygamy. Both novelists mainly deal with women in

the family and their subordinate position.

The point that women had been passive is always debatable because the

struggle for an independent, dignified life is not a new phenomenon. It has its

own history. All the codes about womens conduct, behavior and existence were

given by men. The traditional woman was thus the product of mans needs.

Many philosophers and critics like Mary Wollstonecraft and Simone de Beauvoir

raised their voice against the male-dominated society bringing forth little result

or improvement in the condition of women.

Today the extreme commitment to traditional values and the passive

courage which has marked the life of Indian womanhood is slowly crumbling

down. Women today no longer feel morally depraved to protest against man-

made injustices. Woman has realized that her primary duty is not merely to

please and obey man but also to lead a life of dignity and equality. This is
 188

nothing but an awareness of her position in family and society. It is this

englightment which made her get rid of the elements of passivity and meekness

ingrained in her since centuries. The approach of Shashi Deshpande and Flora

Nwapa to the male domination, the steps and measures taken to surpass it are

completely different. The common factor in them is the deplorable condition of

woman and hence each writer posits the problem from her own cultural

perspective.

In Shashi Deshpandes fiction, beginning with Sarita of The Dark Holds

No Terrors to Devayani of The Country of Deceit, women characters seem to

undergo a slow transformation. The transformation includes innocent and

ignorant women as well as awakened and reasoning women and not to fall a prey

to the victimization of man. Deshpandes fiction unravels the unhappy situation

of the Indian women. She depicts the strong reactions of silent, sensitive and

intelligent Indian women married mostly to self-satisfied, insensitive and

uncaring men. Their lives turn into a dull matrimonial relationship with mostly

no emotion and love on the part of the husband.

Deshpandes women protagonists find it difficult to come to terms with

the loveless living conditions. The awareness and the attitude of constant

questioning and rejecting the present state of life in Jaya in That Long Silence is

in itself a kind of protest. This shows courage in the Indian women to challenge

and reject the norms of society where a woman is brought up to be passive,

meem and obedient.

 189

Unlike political and economic movement of equal rights and

opportunities for women, increasing, consciousness and awareness about

womens issues is the concept of womanism. Their fight is not for equality as

such but for the right to be acknowledged as individuals capable of intelligence,

insight and feeling. Deshpandes protagonists have a great desire in them for a

particular way of living a life full of love, respect and dignity. This is again a

characteristic feature of womanism. There are many research works done in the

feminist perspective of women characters in the novels of Shashi Deshpande.

But this study is to see women characters of both the novelists with reference to

the concept of womanism. Shashi Deshpandes protagonists do not seek freedom

outside the household but they desire it within the family structure the freedom

to be what they are, without a mask in their behavior and attitude. Their

protest/resistance is not for equality but for the right to be acknowledged as

individuals.

Nwapas fiction evolved from ritual folk drama and oral tales leading to

the creation of an Igbo womens literary tradition. It also reveals womens place

in Igbo culture and their role in passing on cultural values to future generations.

She was inspired by Chinua Achebe to speak in a distinctively African idiom.

Her Engish is mixed with a lot of local oratory. Her fiction is full of proverbs,

folktales, superstitions and myths. Gay Wilentz rightly says that Flora Nwapas

narrative style is an incorporation of folk culture, oral traditional in particular,

into written texts.

 190

Like Shashi Deshpandes Jaya and Mira, Nwapas Efuru and Idu seek

personal selfhood not by cutting themselves off from their community but by

making themselves obligatory in village affairs and illustrating their importance

in community life. Her two novels selected for the study illustrate women as

powerful figures, economically secure and socially alive even in their limited

social atmosphere. Nwapas characters oscillate between conformity and

tradition and a deep sense of rebellion against unjust treatment. For instance

Efuru is left with no option within her two marriages but to walk out of her

marriage because she refuses to accept any further exploitation. This is in

contrast to Deshpandes characters who remain in the family and resist. But

Efuru seeks liberation within her community, not outside it: She has rebelled

against the traditional role of wife and mother; her individualism is sanctioned

religiously (Uhamiri) by the community (50). She is a role model for women to

escape dehumanizing marriages and seek personal aspirations in alternative and

fulfilling roles.

Her woman-centred role in the society brings her under the concept of

womanism. As discussed earlier in the introduction part, the African womanist

desires authenticity in her life and demonstrates a sense of spirituality, a belief in

a higher power that transcends rational ideals, which is an ever-present part of

African culture. in this connection Twinkle Suri rightly says:

Efuru chooses her future role in the community according to her

needs. Her prosperity as a trader brings wealth to her community

which is like her own family. As a priestess, she interprets Uhamiri

 191

to the community and as a communal mother she passes on her

goodness to the children in her village. She finds and fulfils herself

in an alternative, woman centred role in Igbo society (50).

Like Efuru, Idu is basically a novel about the question of choice. Besides

her domestic virtues, Idu displays remarkable business intelligence as a trader

and brings financial prosperity to her home as well as her village. Nwapa gives a

message through Idu that financial independence makes a woman confident and

responsible but dependence on others cripples her. Under Idus guidance,

Ogbenyanu also learns to stand up for herself by working in a vegetable farm to

supplement her income. At the end of the novel, Idus choice of self-awareness

over communal pressure prevails not by rejecting the system but by

circumventing it.

Flora Nwapas woman-centred world counters a fixed and stereotyped

definition of woman and creates an awareness for women. Wilson Tagoe says:

her text is subversive because on the surface it speaks of womens

powerlessness, yet celebrates their power Nwapas rhetoric of realism

therefore conceals certain shifting, changeable positions as a way of countering

their static definitions in patriarchal society (15).

Hence the protagonists of both the novelists are identitical as they refuse

to be victims and try to sensitize us about womans issues. This types of

increasing consciousness and awareness goes a longer way than any political or

economic movement for equal rights.

 192

Bibliography

Achebe, Chinua. Morning Yet on Creation Day.

Bala, Sasi L. Heroines of Flora Nwapa. Commonwealth Fiction, ed. R.K.

Dhawan, New Dehli: Classical, 1988.

Bala, Suman. ed., Women in the Novels of Shashi Deshpande. New Delhi:
Khosla, 2000.

Bande, Usha. Resistance and Reconciliation. Shashi Deshpandes A Matter of

Time and Small Remedies, Writing Difference, ed. Chanchala K.Naik.
New Delhi: Pencraft International, 2005.

Barchi, C.D. Facets of Feminism in Indian English Fiction, Indian Women

Novelists, ed., R.K.Dhawan, Set III: Vol.I.

Beauvoir, Simone de. Women and Creativity. French Feminist Though: A

Reader, ed. Toril Moi, New York: Basil Blackwell, 1987.

Bill, Ashcroft, Gareth Griffith and Helen Tiffin. The Empire Writes Back:
Theory and Practice in Postcolonial Literatures, London: Routledge,
1989.

Boehemer, Elleke. Postcolonialism, Colonial and Postcolonial Literature. New

York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

Brown, Lloud W. Women Feminism: Gender Perspectives on Buchi Emecheta.

New Delhi: Book Plus, 2005.

Chand, Neerja. Beyond Feminsm: Gender Perspectives on Buchi Emecheta.

New Delhi: Book Plus, 2005.
 193

Chandra, Subhash. Silent No More: A Study of That Long Silence, Indian

Women Novelists, ed. R.K. Dhawan, Set I: Vol.V.

Cook, Mercer & E. Stephen Henderson, The Militant Black Writer in America.
London: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1969.

Dada, Pius Olusegun. The Tradition of the African Novel. Studies in the
African Novel, ed. Samuel Omo Asein & Albert Olu Ashaolu, Ibadan
University Press.

Deshpande, Shashi. The Dilemma of the Writer, The Literary Criterion, 20:4,
1985.

---. Roots and Shadows. Bombay: Sangam, 1983.

Mphahlele, Ezekiel. African Literature and Universities,Transition. Vol. 4:10.

Naik. Chanchala K. Moving On: Individual Autonomy and Self-Realization.

Writing Difference, ed. Chanchala K.Naik.

---. ed. Writing Difference. New Delhi: Pencraft International, 2005.

Naik, M.K. The Achievement of Indian Fiction in English, Perspectives on

Indian Fiction in English, ed. M.K.Naik, New Delhi: Abhinav, 1985.

Nandakumar, Prema. Sombre the Shadows and Sudden the Lights: A Study of
Anita Desais Novels, Perspectives on Indian Fiction in English, ed.
M.K.Naik, New Delhi: Abhinav, 1985.

Ngara, Emmanuel. Stylistic Criticism and the African Novel. London:

Heinemann, 1982.

Nwapa, Flora. Women and Creative Writing in Africa, African Literature. An

Anthology of Criticism and Theory, ed. Tejumola Olaniyan and Quayson.
Australia: Blackwell, 2007.

---. Efuru. South Africa: Heinemann: 1966.

 194

---. Edu. London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1970.

Obiechina, Emmanuel. Culture, Tradition and Society in the West African

Novel. London: Cambridge University Press.

Ojo-Ade, Femi. Female Writers, Male Critics. African Literature Today: 13

Recent Trends in the Novel, ed. Elderd Durosimi Jones & Eustace
Palmer. London: Heinemann Educational Books, 1983.

Okoye, Chukwuma. Soyinka: Text, Embodied Practice and Criticism, ed.

Anjali Gera Roy. Delhi: Pencraft International, 2006.

Pandurang, Mala. Introduction: Ngugi wa Thiongo: A Bio-literary

Perspective, Ngugi wa Thiongs: An Anthology of Recent Criticism.
New Delhi: Pencraft International, 2007.

Pathak, R.S. Introduction, Recent Indian Fiction. New Delhi: Prestige, 1994.

---. The Making of the Novelist, ed. The Fiction of Shashi Deshpande. New
Delhi: Creative, 1998.

Prasad, Madhusudan. Some Post-Independence Indian English Novelists: An

Overview. Perspectives on Indian Fiction in English, ed. M.K. Naik,
New Delhi: Abhinav, 1985.

Ramchand, Kenneth. The West Indian Novel and its Background. London: Faber

and Faber, 1970.

Sebastian, Mrinalini. The Novels of Shashi Deshpande. New Delhi: Prestige,

2000.

Shirwadkar, Meena. Indian English Women Novelists. Perspectives on Indian

Fiction in English, ed. M.K. Naik.
 195

Sonia, Ningthoujam, L.Image of the New Woman in the Novels of Shoba De.
New Delhi: Prestige, 2006.

Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. In Other Worlds: Essays in Cultural Politics. New

York: Methuen, 1987.

Suneel, Seema. Man-Woman Relationship in Indian Fiction. New Delhi:

Prestige, 1995.

Suri, Twinkle. A Room of Their Own: Womens Voices in Africa. New Delhi:
Book Plus, 2006.

Tagoe, N.Wilson. Reading towards a theorization of African Womens writing

within feminist gynocriticsm, Stephanie newell, ed. Writing African
Women: Gender, Popular Culture and Literature in West Africa. London:
Zed, 1997.

The Hindu, Saturday, July 26, 2008.

Vijayasree, C. Towards Freedom, from Fear: A Discussion of Rich like Us.

Indian Women Novelists, ed. Set II. Vol. 5, Ed. R.K. Dhawan. New
Delhi: Prestige, 1993.

Vijay Kumar, T. Shashi Deshpande-In Conversation with T.Vijay Kumar,

Muse India. The literary e journal, Jan.-Feb. 2007.

Viswanath, Gita. In Conversation with Shashi Deshpande (3 June 2003).

Writing Difference, ed. Chanchala K. Naik.

Wake, Clive. Nigeria, Africa and the Caribbean: A Birds Eye View,
Introduction to Nigerian Literature, ed. Bruce King. University of Lagos:
Evans, 1971.

Wilentz, Gay. Binding Cultures: Black Women Writers in Africa and the
Diaspora, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1992.
 196

Wisker, Gina. Locating and Celebrating Difference: Writing by South African

and Aboriginal Women Writers, Postcolonial Literatures, ed. Deborah L.
Madsen, London: Pluto Press, 1999.