MEG-13

WOMEN’S WRITING IN ENGLISH

Tamil Nadu Open University

School of Humanities
Chennai

June 2021
 Name of Programme : M.A. English (1st Year – Non Semester)

Course Code with Title : MEGN-13 (Women’s Writing in English)

Curriculum Design : Dr. R. Mahendran

Assistant Professor of English
School of Humanities
Tamil Nadu Open University

Course Writer : Dr. U. Aruna

Assistant Professor of English
KCS Kasi Nadar College of Arts and Science
R.K. Nagar, Chennai-600 021

Content Editor : Dr. R. Mahendran

Assistant Professor of English
School of Humanities
Tamil Nadu Open University

Course Coordinator : Dr. R. Mahendran

Assistant Professor of English
School of Humanities
Tamil Nadu Open University

Total No. of Pages : 350

First Edition : 2004
Revised Edition : June 2021
ISBN No : 978-93-5706-217-6
@ TNOU, 2021, “Women’s Writing in English” is made available under
a Creative Commons Attribution -Share Alike 4.0 License (International)

http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0

All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any form, by mimeograph or any
other means, without permission in writing from the Tamil Nadu Open University. Course Writer
is the responsible person for the contents presented in the Course Materials.

Further information on the Tamil Nadu Open University Academic Programmes may be
obtained from the University Office at 577, Anna Salai, Saidapet, Chennai-600 015 [or]
www.tnou.ac.in

Printed by: R.K. 11, Virudhunagar Dist Co-op Printing Press, Virudhunagar – 626 003.
Course Title : Women’s Writing in English
Course Code : MEGN-13
Course Credit :6

Course Objectives:

 CO1: Discuss the beginnings of women’s writing and introduce the learners to works
of select women’s writers in English
 CO2: Explain the developments, themes, and narrative strategies of feminist poets.
 CO3: Sensitise the students about the problems women face in the patriarchal
cultural milieu through a reading of select critical texts.
 CO4: Employ literature to analyse issues and questions relating to women’s
experience and empowerment
 CO5: Develop empathy towards women through an understanding of women’s
literary history, women’s studies and feminist criticism

Syllabus

Block-1 Women’s writing: An Exposition

Women’s Writing: The Beginnings – Social Status of Women Family and motherhood Women
and education Role of Women: Contemporary Views

Block-2 Poetry
Adrienne Rich- Necessities of Life and Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger - Gwendolyn Brooks Sadie and
Maud Mrs. Small- Sylvia Plath-Lady Lazarus- Yasmin Goonaratne- Big Match 1983- Mamta
Kalia- Tribute to Papa

Block 3 Prose/Criticism
Elaine Showalter -Towards a Feminist Poetics - Kate Millett - Sexual Politics- Rassundari Debi-
Amar Jiban- Gilbert and Gubar -The Mad Woman in the Attic- Radway- Reading the romance
Block 4 Play
Mahesweta Devi– Rudali- Marsha Norman –Night, Mother

Block 5 Fiction
Charlotte Bronte– Jane Eyre- Jane Austen- Sense and Sensibility- Virginia Woolf- Mrs. Dallowy-
Margaret Atwood- The Edible Women- Toni Morrison- The Bluest Eyes- Kamala Markandaya-
Nectar in the Sieve

Course Learning Outcomes:

On successful completion of the Course, the learners will be able to:
 Examine the historical development of women’s writing
 Recognize the importance of gender specificity in literature
 Recommend ways to find solution to the problems faced by women
 Evaluate canonical texts written by Women writers across different ages
 Validate the experiences of women
References:

1. Rich, Adrienne. Necessities of Life.Norton, 1966.

2. Kalia,Mamta. Tribute to Papa and Other Poems. University of Michigan, 1970.
3. Showalter, Elaine. ‘Toward a Feminist Poetics’. The New Feminist Criticism: Essays on
Women, Literature and Theory. Ed. Elaine Showalter. London: Virago, 1986. 125- 143
4. Millett, Kate. The Sexual Politics. Columbia University Press, 2016.
5. Debi, Rasundari. Amar Jiban. Translated by Enakshi Chatterjee. Calcutta: Writers
Workshop, 1999.
6. Gilbert, Sandra & Gubar, Susan. The Mad Woman in the Attic- The Woman Writer & the
Nineteenth–Century Literary Imagination 2e. London: Yale University Press, 2000.
7. Radway, Janice. Reading the Romance: Woman, Patriarchy & Popular Literature. United
States: The University of North Carolina Press, 1991.
8. Devi, Mahasweta. Rudali. India: Seagull Books, 1993.
9. Norman, Marsha. Night Mother. New York: Hill and Wang, 1983.
10. Bronte, Charlotte.Jane Eyre. India: Amazing Reads, 2017.
11. Austen, Jane. Sense and Sensibility. Oxford University Press, 2019.
12. Woolf, Virginia. Mrs Dalloway. Cambridge University Press, 2014.
13. Atwood, Margaret. The Edible Woman. United Kingdom: Virago, 2009.
 14. Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eyes. RHUK Publisher, 1999.
15. Markandaya, Kamala. Nectar in the Sieve. India: Penguin, 2009.

Web Resources:
1. http://writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88v/rich-jennifer-tiger.html
2. https://genius.com/Gwendolyn-brooks-sadie-and-maud-annotated
3. https://docs.google.com/document/d/1kWFjtn4TWZg1cSXYtENam9hrxI9l9kCvqrh6PQu3
Yd8/edit
4. https://poets.org/poem/lady-lazarus
5. https://thedreamerlit.wordpress.com/big-match-1983/
6. https://historiacultural.mpbnet.com.br/feminismo/Toward_a_Feminist_Poetics.htm
Contents

Block - 1

Unit 1: Women’s writing: An Exposition

Overview 1
Learning Objectives 2

1.1 Women’s Writing: The Beginnings 3

1.2 Social Status of Women 9
1.2.1 Family and motherhood 12
1.2.2 Women and education 17
1.3 Role of Women: Contemporary Views 20

Summary 24

Reference 24
Video link 24

Block - 2

Unit 2: Rich, Brooks and Plath

Overview 25
Learning Objectives 26
2.1 Adrienne Rich and Her Poems 26
2.1.1 Early Life 28
2.1.2 Necessities of Life 34
2.1.3 Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger 38
2.2 Gwendolyn Brooks and Her Poems 44
2.2.1 Early Life 45
2.2.2 Sadie and Maud 51
2.2.3 Mrs. Small 53
2.3 Sylvia Plath and Her Poems 56
2.3.1 Early Life 47
 2.3.2 Lady Lazarus 65

Summary 70

Reference 70
Video link 71

Unit 3: Yasmin Goonaratne and Mamta Kalia

Overview 72
Learning Objectives 72
3.1 Sri Lankan English Literature 73
3.2 Yasmin Goonaratne 77
3.2.1 Early Life and Work 78
3.2.2 The poem: Big Match 1983 81
3.3 Mamta Kalia 86
3.3.1 Indian Women Poets in English 86
3.3.2 The poem: Tribute to Papa 91
Summary 95

Reference 95
Video link 95
Block – 3

Unit 4: Elaine Showalter and Kate Millett

Overview 96
Learning Objectives 96

4.1 Feminist Criticism: An Introduction 97

4.2 Elaine Showalter 101
4.2.1 Early life and work 102
4.2.2 Towards a Feminist Poetics: The Essay 104
4.3 Kate Millett 108
4.3.1 A biography 109
 4.3.2 A critique of Sexual Politics 111

Summary 121

Reference 121
Video link 122

Unit 5: Debi, Gilbert & Gubar and Radway

Overview 123
Learning Objectives 123

5.1 Debi and Amar Jiban 124

5.1.1 Early life and her work 124
5.1.2 Amar Jiban: The story 127

5.2 The Mad Woman in the Attic: An analysis 135

5.2.1 Introducing Gilbert and Gubar 135
5.2.2 The Mad Woman in the Attic: A critique 139
5.3 Romance Fiction and Radway 151
5.3.1 Romance fiction 151
5.3.2 Reading the romance: An analysis 154

Summary 158

Reference 158
Video link 158

Block- 4
Unit 6: Mahesweta Devi and Marsha Norman

Overview 159
Learning Objectives 160
6.1 Devi and Rudali 160
6.1.1 Mahesweta Devi: A biography 160
6.1.2 Rudali: An analysis 165
6.2 Norman and ’Night Mother 172
6.2.1 Marsha Norman: A biography 172
6.2.2 ’Night, Mother: The play 177
6.2.3 ’Night, Mother: A critique 178

Summary 190

Reference 190
Video link 190
Block- 5
Unit 7: Charlotte Bronte and Jane Eyre

Overview 191
Learning Objectives 192

7.1 Charlotte Bronte: A Biography 192

7.2 Jane Eyre: The Story 196
7.3 Jane Eyre: A Critique 200
7.4 Themes 207
7.4.1 Romance 208
7.4.2 Religion 209
7.4.3 Female independence 212
7.4.4 Class system 213
7.5 Character Sketch 214
7.5.1 Jane Eyre 215
7.5.2 Rochester 216

Summary 221

Reference 222

Video link 222

Unit 8: Jane Austen: Sense and Sensibility

Overview 223
Learning Objectives 223

8.1 Jane Austen 224

8.2 Sense and Sensibility: The Story 234
8.3 Sense and Sensibility: A Critique 242
8.3.1 Social comedy 242
8.3.2 The novel as a burlesque 244
8.3.3 The element of surprise 245

Summary 252

Reference 252
Video link 252

Unit 9: Virginia Woolf and Margaret Atwood

Overview 253
Learning Objectives 254

9.1 Virginia Woolf: The Author 254

9.1.1 Early Life and Work 255

9.1.2 Woolf as an essayist 256
9.1.3 Woolf as a literary critic 257
9.1.4 Woolf as a novelist 259
9.2 Mrs. Dallowy: The Novel 261
9.2.1 The story 262
9.2.2 A critique 266
9.2.3 Themes 267
9.3 Margaret Atwood: The Author 277
9.4 The Edible Woman: The Novel 283
 9.4.1 The story 284
9.4.2 A critique 285

Summary 296

Reference 296
Video link 296

Unit10: Toni Morrison and Kamala Markandaya

Overview 297
Learning Objectives 298
10.1 Toni Morrison: A Biography 298
10.2 The Bluest Eyes: The Novel 302
10.2.1 The story 302
10.2.2 A critique 303
10.3 Kamala Markandaya: The Author 316
10.3.1 Nectar in the Sieve: The Novel 319
10.3.2 The story 319
10.3.3 An analysis 322
10.3.4 A character sketch 328
Summary 330

Reference 331
Video link 331

Model Spot Assignment Question Paper 332

Model Term End Examination Question Paper 333

Plagiarism Check Certificate 335

 BLOCK - 1

UNIT-1 WOMEN’S WRITING: AN EXPOSITION

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

1.1 Women’s Writing: The Beginnings

1.2 Social Status of Women
1.2.1 Family and motherhood
1.2.2 Women and education
1.3 Role of Women: Contemporary Views

Summary

OVERVIEW

In this Course, Women’s Writing in English, we will discuss the

contribution of women writers to English literature with the help of
samples from poetry, prose, play and fiction. Drawing inferences from
these works, the Course intends to inform that there were aspirated
women in the field of literature who have contributed everlasting quality
of literary art through their writings. They were born to showcase the
potentiality of women amidst other women who are confined to
household activities.

Till the 1970s, the study of English literature across the world had, in its
syllabus, a few women novelists like Jane Austen, George Eliot,
Charlotte Bronte, Virginia Woolf, Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, etc.
These writers were taught as part of the main stream British/American
Literature. Their works proved that gender did not matter much and that
the visionaries were alike when it came to teaching Universal Truths.

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Women's literature has often been defined as a category of writing done
by women. What makes the history of women's writing so interesting is
that in many ways it is a new area of study. The tradition of women
writing has been much ignored due to the inferior position women have
held in male-dominated societies. The onus of women's literature, then,
is to categorize and create an area of study for a group of people
marginalized by history and to explore through their writing their lives as
they were while occupying such a unique socio-political space within
their culture.

Since then, a great change has come over the academia and the
awareness about women’s writing and the specific problems related to
such writings has been brought forth. Women’s writing has become a
distinctly different area and theorists from all over the world and in India
have been attempting insightful readings. The reconstruction of
women’s history has been a central concern of contemporary feminism.
Literature written by women has been reread and analysed in order to
understand it from the perspective of a woman reader and woman writer
and texts have been subverted.

The debate on women as the sinners or the sinned will continue.

However, as students of literature, we should aim at a balanced view.

It is against this background that we will introduce you to women’s

writing in English in this first Unit of the Course. We will first give you the
amorphous beginnings of feminism. We will then discuss the status of
women in the society and its manifestation in the literature. We will wrap
the Unit up with a discussion on the encouraging contemporary views on
women.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you will be able to:

 trace women’s writing in English;

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 sketch the status of women in the society;
 discuss the contemporary views on women.

1.1 WOMEN’S WRITING: THE BEGINNINGS

In her A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Mary Wollstonecraft (1792)

charged that women were “immured in their families, groping in the
dark”. Writers like Mary Wollstonecraft had sporadically raised their
voices and registered their protest against male chauvinism in vain.
Wollstonecraft’s work constitutes a major advance in feminist thought.
Other writers before her had pointed out the conflict between the
claimed equality of all individuals and the social subordination-, of
women. Wollstonecraft’s arguments had vigour and originality.

A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Mary Wollstonecraft

The second wave feminists repeated her analogy of “woman groping in

the dark” in their households, as unpaid servants, reading and
understanding only from a man’s point of view.

However, it is Virginia Woolf who serves as the touchstone for many

later day writers. It was she who pointed out first a need for identifying
the women writers and to create a female canon of writing. In her A
Room of One’s Own (1929), Woolf speculated about women of genius
who did not express their gift for writing because of societal restrictions.
She observed:

3
“When….one reads of a woman possessed by devils, of a wise woman
selling herbs, or even of a very remarkable man who had a mother, then
I think we are on the track of a lost novelist, a suppressed poet, of some
mute and inglorious Jane Austen, some Emily Bronte, who dashed her
brains out on the moor, … crazed with the torture that the gift has put
her to.. ..”

“Had there been a female Shakespeare, Woolf continued, she would

certainly have gone crazed, shot herself or ended her days in some
lonely cottage outside the village, half witch, half wizard, feared and
mocked at. For it needs little skill in psychology to be sure that a highly
gifted girl who had tried to use her gift for poetry would have so thwarted
and hindered by other people, so tortured and pulled asunder by her
own contrary instincts, that she must have lost her health and sanity to a
certainty.” They in fact shared a lack of education, lack of opportunity
and lack of freedom.

She proves that women, “will make a fuller and subtler use of the
instruments of writing” that led to many revolutionary changes in law,
and constitution.

Adrienne Rich, an American poet, in her essay When We Dead Awaken:

Writing on Revision wrote in connection with the writings of two excellent
and promising women poets, Diana Wakoski and Sylvia Plath:

“Man appears as if not a dream a fascination and terror, and that the
source of the fascination and the terror, is simply, man’s power to
dominate, tyrannize, choose or reject the woman…And, in the work of
both of these poets, it is finally the woman’s sense of herself –
embattled, possessed, that gives the poetry its dynamic charge, its
rhythms of struggle, need, will and female energy.”

While the earlier women did not express their resentment towards the
power that men held over their lives, the later writers like Wakoski and
Plath wrote about it. Talking about male judgement of her work, Ann
Bradstreet had in one of her poems written: For such despite they cast

4
on female wits/If what I do prove well, it won’t advance,/ They’ll say its
stolen, or else it was by chance.

Women writers had to free themselves not only from the power men
exert over the bodies and their psyches, but also from the sense of
inadequacies they suffered in their relationship with their editors,
publishers, reviewers, directors, actors and critics. For instance, while
most male critics writing about Gillian Clarke, a British poet, asserted her
indebtedness to Ted Hughes and Seamus Heaney, Anne Sexton alone
wrote that she is “presenting a woman’s view of what matters – private,
personal and domestic.” Women writers, until recently, have had no
female models to follow and thereby had no chance of affirming and
confirming their own experiences and had no way of modelling
themselves as writers, after other great writers who were also women.
They had to adopt the images, myths and symbols of male writers. It is
only after the 1970s that we find women writers talking about their
private experiences and also using a language and rhetorical devices,
which are woman-specific. For example, in her Letter from a far country
Gillian Clarke asks:

Where” they call “are your great works”

They ship their fetters and fly up to laugh at land-locked women.

Their cries are cruel as greedy babies our milky tenderness dry
to crisp lists; immaculate linen; jars labelled and glossy without
perfect preserves.
Spiced oranges; green tomato chutney; Seville orange
marmalade annually staining gold the snows of January.
If we launch the boat and sail away who will rock the cradle?
Who will stay?
If women wander over the sea who’ll be home when you come in
for tea.

Not only Clarke, but also the women writers all over the world have
grown conscious of the power that is specifically woman. They
celebrate motherhood and homemaking. Writers like Doris Lessing,
Jean Rhys, Moriel Spark, Iris Murdoch, Carol Reumens, Fleur Adcock,
Adrienne Rich, Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Bell Hooks, Sashi

5
Deshponde, Amy Tan are a few writers who have not succumbed to
male bashing but have contributed to the creation of a feminist canon.

That said, it is important to note what women have faced throughout

their writing careers, which they have not as yet got over, is the timidity
and fear they feel over creating male characters. The general attention
therefore is on women and their problems and we find women writing
about women with women’s sensibilities. In a way, this sharing of
experiences, visions, sensibilities, sensitivities and anger confirms and
affirms woman-ness and human-ness. Forms like autobiography and
epistolary novels have given scope for better understanding of women
by women. However, it is a bitter truth that in the male writers’ circle, the
women who write are dismissed with Hawthorne’s scathing epithet
“damned scribbling women”.

The feminist critics, who have been tirelessly building a specifically

feminist approach to the reading and writing of literature, have been
relentlessly working alongside the creative writers. Concerned with
sexuality as well as the subject, the first group of questions raised in
such attempts are at once political and epistemological: What is woman?
Where is writing? What and where are women and writing? and When
women are writing about women?

Polemical discussions concerning such questions have been kept up by

many writers, some of whom are listed below:

 Simon De Beauvoir (1949): Second Sex

 Mary Ellman (1968): Thinking of Women

 Sandra Gilbert and Susan Guber (1979): The Mad Woman in the
Attic
 Ellen Moers (1976): Literary Woman
 Toril Moi (1985): Textual and Sexual Politics

 Germaine Greer (1970): The Female Eunuch

 Betty Frieden (1963): Feminine Mystique

 Alice Walker: In Search of our Mother’s Gardens

 Gayathri Chakravorthy Spivak (1987): In Other Worlds

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 Kate Millet (1969): Sexual Politics
 Eva Figes (1970): Patriarchal Attitudes

 Dale Spender (1980): Man Made Language

Note that the list above is only a representative list and not an
exhaustive one.

While some writers are concerned in their discussions with the way in
which patriarchy victimises women, a few others are concerned with
evidence that the victims of Patriarchy are in a position to strike back.
All of them however agree that writing is a mode of resistance. Elaine
Showalter a British critic, in her essay Towards a Feminist Poetics
(1979) has coined the term “Gynocriticism” to categorise women’s
reading and women’s writing.

Showalter’s excellently researched work A Literature of their Own is

perhaps the most influential of the accounts of women’s writing in its
difference from men’s. She identifies a female subculture in which
fiction by women makes a record of their experience. She defines the
separate but overlapping terms ‘feminine’, ‘feminist’ and ‘female’ and
points out that in the first phase (1840 – 1880), women wrote mainly
initiating the masculine model but with feminine concerns.

In the second phase (1880 – 1920), which extended from women writers
formulated well-defined protests and demands. The third phase since
1920 to the present, women’s writing has concentrated upon self-
discovery, exploration of minor space through distinctly female
experiences. “Gynocriticism” also challenges the conventional critical
value judgments. The critics so far have carried on with a twin purpose –
the denunciation of patriarchy on the one hand, and the study of
women’s writing on the other; the rewriting and subverting of patriarchal
writing while welcoming newer visions from women writers. Radical
changes in feminist thinking have been effected and feminist struggle is
in short, undertaken by women on behalf of women.

The place of the woman writer in the new millennium has a distinct
social and political identity in the literary history. It is quite a task to

7
wend one’s way through the thicket of contemporary feminist writing
without some sort of help. While some feminists see women as
universal victims, others view them as oppressed “nature”. A minority
urge women to keep away from the male-dominated society. Some
insist on recognising motherhood, its essential role and integration into
society. Women who are both critics and accomplished creative writers
are however skeptical of gender specific responses to literature by
women, despite the fact that an essentially female subculture has been
firmly established.

In trying to establish this specifically female tradition in writing, many

milestones have been crossed, many landmarks have been identified
and many signposts have been created. Any one, who questions the
validity of woman’s place in society, belongs to the tradition of women’s
writing. They may be blacks, aboriginals, Marxists, lesbians, liberal
pluralists, radical humanists or simply any one conscious of the
hierarchical nature of the mainstream canon.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 1.1

How is women’s writing different from men’s, according to feminists?

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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1.2 SOCIAL STATUS OF WOMEN

In her Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution, Rich

Adrienne (1977) remarks, “Patriarchy is … a familiar social ideological,
political system in which men, by force, direct pressure or through ritual,
law and language, customs, etiquette, education and the division of
labour, determine what part women shall or shall not play and in which
the female is everywhere subsumed under the male. It does not
necessarily imply that no woman has power, or that all women in a given
culture may not have certain powers.”

In A Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Mary Astell (1695) argued that

female seminaries must be created to allow women to choose a
contemplative life – to pursue advanced studies and at the same time
train younger women for their duties in the family. During the next two
centuries the prime topic of discussion and of women’s writings was
woman’s proper role in society. In Britain, as elsewhere in the West,
women were mainly homemakers and they begot children to keep the
family tree.

Mary Astell
In India, true womanhood has always rested on fulfilling the role of
motherhood. Society granted status only to married women all over the
world. However, the right to property, ownership, abortion, marriage and
many other issues were denied to women uniformly. If this was the
condition of women of the well to do and middle classes, the
marginalised women had the additional burden of being the property of

9
their landowners. Feminist historians such as Barbara Welter maintain
that a cult of true womanhood existed well into the nineteenth century
from time immemorial. This ideal upper/middle class womanhood had
four cardinal virtues namely piety, purity, submissiveness and
domesticity. Hazel Carby, the literary scholar has analysed this ideal as
a societal formula that contrasted the mainstream woman with the
marginalised.

The guiding principles of the concept of true womanhood being piety and
purity, i.e., the qualities to which the marginalised could never aspire
since the marginalised were objectified as sexual objects. Their woman-
ness was considered an open sexual invitation to men who owned the
land in which they worked. The female labourer’s economic productivity
was also measured in terms of reproduction as much as labour output.
Sensuality, sexuality, passion and lust, which were detested by
patriarchy in women belonging to the middle and well-to-do classes,
were encouraged and exploited in the deprived classes.

As Carby points out, this dichotomy kept the males in control of two
female spheres. Labourers inherited the status of their mothers and
“gave birth to property”. Upper class and middle class women
reproduced and “strengthened patriarchal order and inherited its power”.
Even at present, perceptions of upper class women’s piety and purity
verses marginalised women’s immorality and promiscuity legitimises a
double standard. And for the upper and middle class women, the
marginalised women cannot possess “true womanhood”. And since not
a “true woman” she could have no emotional pangs regarding personal
shame. They could be ignored, laughed at and they are not really
mothers, daughters, sisters, wives or women.

Questions regarding the double standards allotted by patriarchy and the

anger of the upper and middle class women against the men for their
immoral behaviour and supercilious attitude towards themselves gave
rise to a rising.

While activists in Britain and America had a progressive social vision

and demanded voting rights and legal rights for ensuring the welfare
rights of women, the black slave women asked to be lifted and

10
presented before the world as human beings with strong morals. While
the white women asked for rights for women, black women asked for
liberty for themselves and their men. The First wave feminism created a
new political identity for women and won for women legal concessions
and public emancipation. During 1848 – 1875, the pursuit of women’s
rights had been intermittent. There have been periods of high activity,
when need for reforms have been keen.

Since the mid-1880s, feminists drew closer to the labour movement,

joined socialist societies and campaigned for legislation to shorten
women’s hours of work and improve their wages. They worked hard to
bring women’s movement and the labour movement together and tried
to bridge the gap between gender and class. The suffrage movement
covered the years 1890–1925. The struggle for the vote and the later
battles for family allowances, contraception, abortion rights, welfare
rights, women’s domestic labour, protective legislation and women’s
legal status were achieved during these years.

Writers and activists like Olive Schreiner, Vera Brittain, Rebecca West
and Winifred Holtby are among the many other feminists who
consistently argued that legal and political changes depended on major
changes in thinking and in consciousness. All those who were
conscious of the exploitation of women attended to the sexual division of
labour, to gender roles and inequalities and also paid attention to
women’s radical possibilities. Equipped with full welfare, economic,
political and legal rights, women believed they could have a better status
in society and could transform the world.

The years 1925 – 1960 concentrated on the issues of the previous

decades, namely equal rights for legal, educational and political status
for women. They also continued the strain of thought regarding
women’s status in society being tied to her sexuality. Causes of rape
and murder were discussed upon and this led to the development of
awareness regarding gender identity and gender power. Much work has
been done during this period to establish women in their individual
identity and to claim a social status based on this identity as potential
homemakers.

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Since 1960, women’s movements have been concentrating on creating
a subculture where revisions and reconsideration of earlier thought
patterns have been undertaken. The status of women still remains a
question as women are venerated and attacked still only through their
sexuality. The status of women as subordinate to men hasn’t changed
despite equal educational opportunities. Women haven’t had good
representation in power sectors, in politics and policymaking sectors.

Dowry deaths, purdhas and Muslim divorce laws, wage discrimination,

harassments at home and at workplaces, etc., still continue. If one were
to go through the milestones women have crossed in their journey since
centuries ago, one would notice that in reality women have moved very
little ahead. A movement forward, however small it may be, is indeed a
welcome move.

1.2.1 Family and motherhood

No one who understands the feminist movement, or who knows the soul
of a real new woman would make the mistake of supposing that the
modern woman is fighting for the vote, for education and for economic
freedom, because she wants to be a man. That idea is the invention of
masculine intelligence. Woman is fighting today, as she has all the way
up through the ages for the freedom to be a woman (Ann B. Hamman,
1914).

The most remarkable nature of the revival of ‘Feminism’ in the recent

years lies in women’s rediscovery of the female power principle. A keen
attention has been given to reviewing the patriarchal attitudes towards
women and their stereotyped roles in society.

Patriarchal society all over the world has laid down the following
parameters for feminine attributes: The sexual division of labour reflects
natural differences between men and women. For example, women’s
identity comes through their relationship with men. She is daughter,
sister, wife and mother. Women are childlike and therefore they need
paternal protection. Women, who remain alone by choice or by
circumstance, are considered deviant. Women achieve their highest
fulfilment only as wives and mothers and women are apolitical.

12
This model can be used as a standard to measure attitudes towards
women in any society, be it East or West. These patriarchal views about
women are so very deep rooted, that it is reflected everywhere a woman
steps in.

The justification of the patriarchal assumption of male superiority is

manifold.

The first of these is grounded well in the biological superiority that man is
stronger than woman physically and therefore psychologically too.
Woman’s natural superiority based on the ability to give birth has given
way to male supremacy based on this mere physical strength. The
second justification arises out of cultural and anthropological studies of
ancient and pre-modern society after the rise of the ‘phallus’. Woman
was assigned second place or no place at all, since she was considered
to be impure and devilish. The third argument asserted the fact the
female existed only to reproduce and her role was to perpetuate a male
line. Women were kept under tight social controls and this in turn kept
them in economic dependence, which helped the male population to
claim sole property rights. This also made men economically superior to
women.

The last and most important source of justification is religion and the
taboos glorified worldwide on the basis of religious sentiments. The
Christian view of woman being responsible for the fall of man, the
Muslims’ espousal of the purdah, the Confucius’s hobbling of women’s
feet, and the Hindu Law of Manu, also reflect patriarchal notions of the
inferiority and dependence of women.

Women have been fighting against such notions and have come a long
way. The first wave, second wave and third wave of the feminist
movement have had as their agenda, the need for equality, identity and
individuality, respectively. The voting rights, legal rights, education and
employment have established women as potential threats to the
masculine waywardness.

13
However, there can be no doubt that the majority of women still regard
marriage and motherhood as the occupation of choice; it is a great
mistake, to think that the value of marriage and children is enhanced in
the eyes of either men or women by excluding women from other
professions or occupations. The policy to allow men and women
admission to all careers equally and so eliminate any feeling of jealousy
or frustration is rather a sound one. There would then be one thing,
which women alone can do, namely bearing children and making a
home and that is a great privilege. When the home is given this status,
women who wish to marry will take care to equip themselves for
marriage, as they would do for any other profession.

Women are seen as inseparable from the family, and most functions
assigned to family are indirectly assigned to women. Women in addition
to being caretakers, nurturers, educators and source of strength are
increasingly major earners too. Women meet the challenge and
responsibilities within the system with generosity, self-sacrifice and
unstinting labour. The family affects every aspect of women’s lives: their
socialization and education, their sexuality, the way in which they are
expected to behave as women, wives, mothers and care takers. The
family places immense obligations on women’s shoulders, and shapes
their place and rewards in the labour market, their roles in local, national
and international affairs. The positioning of women primarily within the
privacy of the family has profound implications.

Traditional family structures are changing due to economic

developments and migration to urban areas. However, the family in one
form or another is the basic unit of all societies. It exists not only
objectively as the recognized basic social unit but, subjectively in the
minds and imagination of all people and individuals. It is widely
regarded as a useful and a positive institution essential for the emotional
care and development of children.

The family is eulogised by all major world religions and most

governments. The family, however, has contradictions. It can be a
shelter, offering its members security and protection from the hardships
of the outside world and a place of nurturing and personality building –
“the center for culture, learning and especially economic and affective

14
solidarity”. It can be restrictive and a hindrance to emotional
development. It can, in certain cases, destroy individuality.

The family’s paradoxical nature has attracted much criticism and has in
recent years been regarded as an inherent flaw. The hierarchical and
patriarchal structure of most family types, the area of women’s
subordination and discrimination have been targeted by many writers.
Julian Mitchell, a conscious writer comments: women are offered a
universe of their own: the family. Like woman herself, the family
appears as a natural object, but it is actually a cultured creation. There
is nothing inevitable about the form or role of the family, any more than
there is about the character or role of a woman (J. Mitchell).

There are numerous questions asked regarding the structure and

meaning of family, but the answers are few. For instance, questions like
why cannot the family prevent such problems as alcoholism, drug abuse,
rape, violence against women and children, suicides and mental
disorders, have practically no clear cut answers but only surmises.

The rapid changes, which have taken place recently in family formation,
for example, the rise in single-parent family have become subjects for
research and debate. The changes have been regarded as a sign that
the family no longer performs well. There is also a tendency to lay the
blame for many of the new trends, such as divorce and vandalism at the
door of women’s growing independence. However, for any study of the
family, it becomes imperative not to lose sight of women.

The family will continue to be the basic unit of society even if it takes
many forms. The institution is constantly evolving and has always
readjusted itself to the changing parameters. It is now facing a
challenge unlike in the past, from within – from its women members. To
date, many men have not understood and reacted well. The lack of
understanding on one end and the newly acquired awareness on the
other have heightened tensions within the family. If family has to acquire
a new egalitarian and democratic form, men will have to fully accept
women’s equality.

15
Feminist historians have identified three essential steps to achieving
equality for women. The first would promote equal educational
opportunity and effective job training, so women would not be reduced to
dependency on a man. The second and the most difficult to implement
would encourage men to share the joys, responsibilities worries of
women and to share the tedium of raising children to adulthood. The
third step would set up quality day care centres available from infancy as
children in any ideal society would not be just women’s priorities but are
human priorities. Equality is an amorphous word and to many women,
despite the concrete definitions of the term, it means one thing firmly
“Respect” and many women equate it with motherhood and the status of
being a wife.

Becoming a mother is an astonishing event and something which

women regard as a fulfilling one in their lives. The uniqueness of the
mother-child relationship and the ideal of the perfect mother are strong
in every culture. It is a status celebrated in literature and religion. The
special status of a woman in immediate society is decided by her ability
to become a mother. The continuity of a family line is kept up through
women who nurture young lives with great care and love. It is rather
necessary for any society to come to terms with the fact that women
have a destiny higher than that of the wife. Equally so, they have a
destiny higher than that of the mother.

Motherhood brings enhanced authority within the home. A mother is

responsible for taking day-to-day decisions about a child’s mental and
physical well-being. Fathers play very little role in it. Women also derive
their emotional support from children. Mothering is not an ordinary,
uneventful task. On the contrary, if done by a morally, and intellectually
strengthened woman, it can make Family an ideal institution. Women
need three things urgently to carry out the job.

Value must be attached to the work that they do inside the home by way
of caring, specialising in the individual home, parenting and carrying out
the day-to-day human maintenance of the home. Equality is being
recognised at home. Fathering is as essential as mothering. Women
must be allowed to work and live unimpaired by sexual harassment and
violence and should be empowered to choose their way of life as freely
as men. They need the support from society and from men in particular.

16
They need the right kind of emotional and intellectual support to carry
out their work, at home and outside, effectively and efficiently.

In summation, it would be just the right thing to recall the interesting

evolutional speculation of Tennyson:

Yet in the long years likes must they grow:

The man be more of woman, she of man

He gains in sweetness and in moral height,

Nor lose the wrestling thews that throw the world;

She mental breadth, nor fall in childward care,

Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind.

1.2.2 Women and education

When girls are educated, their countries become stronger and
more prosperous.
– Michelle Obama

The intimate relation between education and women’s emancipation is

an important factor, which is often ignored, by any study on women’s
empowerment. A quick survey through the ages would help us
understand as to why in spite of the Feminist movement for equality
being successful in earning rights for women, their general condition has
not changed.

The UNESCO declared the year 1975 as the International Year for
Women and expressed its belief that in the long run, education will prove
to be a most effective channel for achieving equality between men and
women and for ensuring full participation in women’s development. This
declaration was a necessity of the time, since despite achieving too
many legal rights women were far from emancipation and economic
independence.

17
An assessment of the condition of women in developed and developing
countries will reveal much to our dismay that even three decades after
the declaration by UNESCO, women are not making much headway
where equality is concerned. The percentage of women in high posts is
still very small and atrocities committed against women are increasing
by the day. Neither in the apparently emancipated west nor in the
changing culture of the east has the issue been won. The reasons for
the failure to achieve equality and individuality are many, and women’s
education is one of it.

The general pattern throughout the world regarding education for women
seems to be a high percentage in Arts, Humanities and subjects leading
to low paid jobs and a very low percentage in hard sciences.
Subsequently, the economic independence of women is very limited.
Stereotyped educational qualification and wage discrimination all over
the world have rendered women economically still dependent. The high
divorce rate has also led to the increase in the number of female-headed
households. Poor education, low paid jobs and single parenting which
restricts one’s free time has given rise to an increase in poverty rate
which in turn has led to the coinage with the term “feminization of
poverty”. A considerable percentage of women are illiterate all over the
world. And along with the woman, the fact remains that a good
percentage of men are also illiterates.

The curriculum, syllabi and the environment in the schools and colleges
have undergone changes to include, gender awareness. Girl children
have been made to become aware of sexual stereotypes and have been
offered alternative vision of a gender free society. Girls have been made
to speak their own minds and not be intimidated by boys. Keeping in
view the goal of the Indian Constitution, the National Educational Policy
of India (1986) has implemented compulsory elementary education to
children (male and female) up to the age of 14 years. “Operation Black
Board” and “Education for all” have been launched to improve the basic
infrastructure of schools.

State governments periodically announce privileges to girl students.

Curricula are the same for boys and girls. Vocational training programs
are introduced at the Junior colleges and though the Education
department maintains its policy of no sex discrimination in courses

18
offered, women are enrolled only in courses such as designing, office
assistance, etc., which prepare them for sex stereotyped employment
opportunities. Education and employment are used only as
steppingstones to marriage and reproductive status. Very often, it is the
education and employment status that secures a fairly educated
husband for women. Development plans for women in a way also has
an adverse effect as it increases the dowry. Education and employment
also have been looked at as a means to set up homes and to get
married. This notion has prevented women from widening their
knowledge and achieving individuality.

Quite curiously, men prefer educated wives, who can keep the home for
them, entertain their guests, be educated companions and tutor the
children, etc. In addition to these unpaid services, women are also
valuable economic commodities as they bring dowry with them. The
gain that women get in return is a married status and children. The
marital status very often prevents them from improving their career.
They pick up jobs wherever their husbands move and it affects their pay,
pension and other benefits. A well-educated, independent and
intelligent woman is never tolerated by her male colleagues, and
therefore, they remain non-assertive even in their professional capacity.
While on the one hand, one has to pay attention to the fact that all
women are not educated, and most women are poorly educated, on the
other hand, one should study the existing picture to know if education
actually has empowered women.
Empowerment through education helps an individual to achieve an
understanding of one’s circumstances and capacity to take decisions
accordingly. It also gives a feeling of self-worth and independence, the
realisation that one need not be a raging beauty to be feminine, the
capacity to accept oneself, as a woman, and to feel gender proud.
Further, it gives an awareness of inequalities and hence the ability to
equalise, the recognition of one’s ability and need to be economically
independent. The challenge of contemporary higher education is in
creating this awareness among women. Care should be taken to enable
them to become active and competent. Education, in all, should aim at
making women recognise the uniqueness of the individual, of self-worth
and of dignity.

19
 LEARNING ACTIVITY 1.2
Describe how social status is reflected in women’s writing.

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

1.3 ROLE OF WOMEN: CONTEMPORARY VIEWS

“Women have a much better time than men in this world; there are
far more things forbidden to them.”

― Oscar Wilde

“Thinking again?” the Duchess asked, with another dig of her sharp little
chin.
“I’ve got a right to think”, said Alice sharply, for she was beginning to feel
a little worried.

“Just about as much right”, said the Duchess, “as pigs have to fly”
(Alice in Wonderland)

20
Like Alice, while women know that they have a right to think about
equality, identity and individuality and to demand them, society like the
Duchess asks them repeatedly to curb their thinking and keep it within
limits – a man-made limit. The traditional values about a woman’s place,
being a home, is reinstated carefully through the media and at home
through the manipulated ignorance of women by men. The glorification
of the housewife, the stress on femininity, the emphasis on romantic
relationships, the warnings about careerism are projected by the mass
media even while women are still struggling hard to break the web
around them and confirm their ability to rise to new challenges.

Models of womanhood are of course produced in systems largely

controlled by men. Masses of women consume the media. Though for
some women they are just a form of escape and as lacking relevance to
their own lives, many succumb to the charm and popular appeal of the
media. Popular culture thus created by the media while reassures
women who resumed their traditional role its messages discourage
those with aspirations and are not in conformity with the traditional
gender notions.

The society puts the blame for its many ailments on women. For
instance, if marriages are hurting and breaking, it is because women
have become too independent. Women should continue to hold their
tongues, especially when family is the object. Otherwise, man will start
staying away from home. It is not uncommon to be often told that
women do not know how to use power. If they are given power and
allowed inside politics, they want to behave like men and try to rule with
an iron hand. Women are forever in a state of confusion. The more
educated a woman is, the more confused she becomes about the
choices she has before her. She does not do justice to her career as
well as home and children suffer because of women.

While on the one hand, the male section of the society views women as
ignorant, arrogant and self-willed because of their education and
employment, the feminine half of society is aware after nearly a few
decades of living in a culture of changing gender roles, that women’s
dependence on men and matrimony has lessened.

21
During the last thirty years or so, despite societal forces attempting to
keep women “in their place”, women have punctured huge holes in the
mythology and have move beyond their place. The stereotypical portrait
of women, as dependent and submissive, capable of only care taking
has been broken, and a broader definition has been established.
Husbands who might have opposed married women holding jobs as a
matter of principle are able to rationalise employment by their own wives
as a necessary device to get more money for family needs.

The patriarchal society thinks women work in order to give their children
a better life and a healthier environment. It would never brook a woman
taking up a career to pursue and fulfil her personal ambitions. A woman
trying to fulfil the role of a helpmate in a newer way, by being employed
is looked at generously by men and by the traditionalist women. The
society does not believe that a woman’s right to her job is more
important than her duty to the home. As women’s earnings are
controlled by men, economic equality clearly remains a distant goal,
despite women’s lives having undergone a remarkable change.

Society continues to describe a woman even at present, as either a

“housewife” or a “career woman”. But women do not see themselves
that way. They operate with three sets of possibilities at the moment:
being a housewife, having a job and having a career. They put various
combinations of their choices together depending on their family
circumstances, knowing fully well that over a period of time, they may
weave in and out among all three. Women do not want to be trapped by
employment the way men are, that is, forced to live with work as a
predominant priority.

Most women do not consider men’s long time goals interesting. As a

result, even those with vital and rewarding careers strike a balance
between career and family. Most contemporary women, including the
feminists, make their choices around the welfare of their children and
would never lose sight of this, however interesting they are. Women are
aware at the same time, of their rights.

Men are no longer the sole income providers and hence have been seen
shifting within the family. The shift and the demands of a working wife

22
who is aware of her rights, has both allowed and forced fathers to
participate in the raising of their children. Men have become
participating parents, besides being sperm donors, bread-winners, etc.
As a result, women are more than convinced that given a chance, men
can raise children and of course, only if they choose to. And, at the
same time, women have not and will not give up the status of a primary
parent. As men gradually have started accepting responsibility for
childcare, women have begun to feel more relaxed and free to pursue
their career aspirations.

In the last few decades, the press has regularly reported on tensions
between women at home and women in workplace. It is commonly
believed that homemakers are envious of the career women and resent
being looked down upon as “mere housewives”. Some of these feelings
still linger, but as times have been changing, and as more housewives
are finding ways to move into the work force, a healthy understanding of
problems on either side has taken place and women have established a
bonding. As one feminist historian observes, caring is as important as
doing, caring indeed is doing, and care givers, both paid and unpaid are
the foundation of a humane society and must be treasured and
honoured.

If society is really at a loss to know what women really want, the answer
is simple. It is “respect” that women want. It is “respect” in the form of
help in raising the children they cherish. It is “respect” in the form of
recognition of the contribution they make to world economy. It is
“respect” for their freedom to act on their desires.

23
 LEARNING ACTIVITY 1.3
Describe the contemporary views on women.

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

SUMMARY
We began the Unit with a discussion on the beginnings of women’s
writing in English and implied that it did not have a structured beginning.
We then took up discussion the status of women in the society and its
manifestation in the works of women writers. We closed the Unit by
touching upon the contemporary views on women, which are quite
positive.

REFERENCE

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women%27s_writing_(literary_categ
ory)

2. http://plaza.ufl.edu/jess16/MultiplePerspectives
3. https://scholarworks.uni.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1002&co
ntext=grp

VIDEO LINK

https://www.britannica.com/video/185972/women-introduction-literature-
Englis

24
BLOCK - 2

UNIT -2 RICH, BROOKS AND PLATH

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

2.1 Adrienne Rich and Her Poems

2.1.1 Early Life
2.1.2 Necessities of Life
2.1.3 Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger
2.2 Gwendolyn Brooks and Her Poems
2.2.1 Early Life

2.2.2 Sadie and Maud

2.2.3 Mrs. Small

2.3 Sylvia Plath and Her Poems

2.3.1 Early Life
2.3.2 Lady Lazarus

Summary

OVERVIEW

Units 2 and 3 will give you a glimpse of the nature and tenor of the
poems of women authors. Unit 2 will discuss Adrienne Rich, Gwendolyn
Brooks and Sylvia Plath and Unit 3 will discuss Yasmin Goonaratne and
Mamtha Kalia. The present Unit, i.e., Unit 3, begins with a biographical
sketch of Rich followed by a succinct critique of some of her poems. It
then focuses on Brooks and examines how her childhood has found
expressions in her poems. Subsequently, the Unit considers Plath and
her poems.

25
LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 Can understand the poems of Rich, Brooks and Plath;

 Can analyse the common traits with reference to feminist views in
these poems.

2.1 ADRIENNE RICH AND HER POEMS

There are many great poets, but not all of them alter the ways in of world
we live in and not all of them will suggest that words can be held
responsible. It is Adrienne Rich who did this, and continued doing this,
for generations of readers.

Rich’s has made a transformation through her writing and invented new
ways and brought them to the literary world. After reading this block,
you’ll get a clear insight of Adrienne Rich, her life, legacy and
achievements. You’ll also be able to know and analyse her poems
Necessities of Life and Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger.

Adrienne Rich

26
Adrienne Cecile Rich was an American poet, essayist and feminist.
Her works were widely read in the second half of the 20th century". She
takes the credit in bringing "the oppression of women to the forefront of
poetic discourse”. Rich criticized rigid forms of feminist identities.
Her first collection of poetry, A Change of World, was selected by the
renowned poet W. H. Auden for the Yale Series of Younger Poets
Award. Auden went on to write the introduction to the published volume.
She famously declined the National Medal of Arts, protesting the vote
by House Speaker Newt Gingrich to end funding for the National
Endowment for the Arts.
Rich writes highly crafted lyrics, which explore socially relevant topics
including feminism and criticised patriarchal societies and institutions.
She is an influential essayist whose prose works have advanced
theories of feminist criticism. As an early proponent of societal changes
that reflect the values and goals of women, Rich articulates one of the
most profound poetic statements of the feminist movement in the United
States. Many critics see her development of a relaxed form of free verse
combined with formal diction as revolutionary and distinctive in American
poetry.

Rich also wrote several books on criticism. Of Woman Born: Motherhood

as Experience and Institution (1976) combines scholarly research with
where one can see personal reflections on being a mother, while On
Lies, Secrets, and Silence (1979) traces history through musings on
Rich’s own various incarnations. In Blood, Bread, and
Poetry (1986), What Is Found There: Notebooks on Poetry and
Politics (1993), Arts of the Possible: Essays and Conversations (2001),
and A Human Eye: Essays on Art in Society, 1997–2008 (2009).

According to Alice Templeton, “Adrienne Rich’s poetry had always

raised important, difficult questions about the cultural uses of poetry and
ideology of poetic and critical tradition. For over forty years her work has
provided the occasion for critics to comment on the art of poetry, its
political significance, the character of poetic tradition, and the value of
poetry as a critical and creative cultural activity.”

27
2.1.1 Early Life

Adrienne Rich was born in Baltimore, Maryland on May 16, 1929. Born
in May 16 1929, in Baltimore, Maryland, Rich was home-schooled until
fourth grade, but she showed an early interest in writing and availed
herself to her father’s extensive Victorian literature collection. She
attended Radcliffe College, graduating in 1951, and was selected by W.
H. Auden for the Yale Series of Younger Poets prize for A Change of
World (Yale University Press, 1951) that same year.
The daughter of Arnold Rich, a professor of medicine, and Helen, a
trained composer and pianist, Adrienne Rich described her early
upbringing as "white and middle-class … full of books, with a father who
encouraged me to read and write." From her father's library she was
reading writers like Rossetti, Swinburne, Tennyson, Keats, and Blake
before officially attending grade school. In fact, since both her parents
believed that they could educate their children better than a public
school; neither she nor her sister was sent to class until fourth grade.
However, by the time Rich graduated from high school she was writing
concise and carefully constructed poetry.
In 1951, the year Rich turned 22 and graduated from Radcliffe
College, A Change of World was published. Chosen by W. H. Auden for
the Yale Younger Poets Award, it was praised for "its competent
craftsman-ship, elegance and simple and precise phrasing." Rich herself
stated years later that being praised for meeting traditional standards
gave her the courage to break the rules in her more mature work.
Rich won a Guggenheim fellowship in 1952 and began studying in
Europe and England. In 1953 she married Alfred H. Conrad, a Harvard
economist, and moved to Cambridge, Massachusetts. Two years later
she gave birth to her first child, David, and saw the publication of her
second volume, The Diamond Cutters and Other Poems, which received
the Ridgely Torrence Memorial Award.
In 1957 and 1959 two more sons, Paul and Jacob, were born, and Rich,
burdened already under the demands of motherhood, grew even more
frightened by the sense that she was losing her grip on her art and
herself. Those early years of motherhood are described with unflinching
honesty and vivid detail in "When We Dead Awaken: Writing as
Revision," an essay in which she chronicles her anger, fatigue, and
frustration as a young mother who feared she had failed both as a
woman and as a poet.

28
Her Works

Upon the birth of her first son in 1955, Rich published her second poetry
collection, The Diamond Cutters, but by 1959, Rich was the mother of
three sons and had little time for writing. However, the publication of
Snapshots of a Daughter-in-law in 1963 marked her poetic breakthrough
to national prominence, particularly because of its overt delineation of
female themes. In 1966, Rich moved with her family to New York City,
where she became active in the rights and anti-war movements.

During that time, she produced the poetry collections Necessities of Life
(1966), Leaflets (1969), and The Will to Change (1971). By 1969, she
was estranged from her husband, who committed suicide the following
year. During the early 1970s Rich devoted much time to the women’s
liberation movement and gradually identified herself as a radical
feminist. She won the National Book Award in 1974 for Diving into the
Wreck (1973), but she refused it as an individual and instead accepted it
on behalf of women whose voices were silenced.

She advocated a female separatist philosophy in her subsequent poetry

collections Twenty-one Love Poems (1977), The Dream of a Common
Language (1978), and A Wild Patience Had Taken Me This Far (1981).
She displayed a similar philosophy in The Fact of a Doorframe (1984),
as well as in the essays collected in Of Woman Born (1976) and On
Lies, Secrets, and Silence (1979). During the 1980s Rich broadened her
audience by addressing such diverse issues as poverty, violence, and
racism in Your Native Land, Your Life (1986), Blood, Bread and Poetry
(1986), and Time’s Power (1988).

29
Throughout her writing career, Rich had honed her feminist attitudes by
lecturing at American universities, most notably as professor of English
and Feminist Studies at Stanford University from 1986 to 1992. Since
then Rich has received numerous accolades, including the Robert Frost
Silver Medal for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry. Following her award-
winning poetry collections An Atlas of the Difficult World (1991) and Dark
Fields of the Republic (1995), Rich also earned a 1997 National Medal
of the Arts, but declined the award stating that “the very meaning of art is
incompatible with the cynical politics of [President Clinton’s]
Administration.”

Rich’s poetry is often divided into discrete phases that reflect the
evolutionary nature of her art as well as the changing consciousness of
women in general during the latter half of the twentieth century. The
formal lyric structures and representations of alienation and loss in A
Change of World and The Diamond Cutters evince Rich’s early affinities
with modernist poets.

The poetry of Snapshots of a Daughter-in-law, considered her first

transitional work, departs from the formalism of her previous art by using
free verse and speaking to women’s themes. The title poem, for
instance, expresses a young woman’s anger and frustration at her
banal, limited existence in a male-dominated society. Diving into the
Wreck, Rich’s second major transitional work – considered by many as
her finest collection – stands as a radical feminist critique of
contemporary society.

30
Necessities of Life, Leaflets, and The Will to Change comprise the
second phase of Rich’s career. Confrontational in tone, these works
focus on the relationship between private and public life; openly reject
patriarchal culture and language, and reflect her growing dissatisfaction
with contemporary society and her increasingly complex personal and
political beliefs. These works also feature Rich’s experiments with
various means of communication as alternatives to traditional poetic
methods. For example, Images for Godard and Shooting Script
incorporate such techniques of New Wave filmmakers as rapid
successions of images, freeze frames, and jump cuts.

The poems of The Dream of a Common Language, A Wild Patience Has

Taken Me This Far, and The Fact of a Doorframe lend historical
perspective to the idea of “woman” and celebrate the accomplishments
of women both individually and collectively. They represent, for instance,
the achievements and hardships of such historical figures as Emily
Dickinson, Susan B. Anthony, Marie Curie, and Ethel Rosenberg as well
as Rich’s own grandmothers. Other poems, such as For Julia in
Newbraska, The Spirit of Place and the sequence Twenty-one Love
Poems, emphasise the value of a distinct community of women.

Although subsequent works expand Rich’s feminist ideals, they also

address new issues. The long sequence Sources in Your Native Land,
Your Life, for example, confronts the poet’s Jewish heritage and the
effect of the Holocaust on her life and work. Living Memory from Time’s
Power focuses on the consequences of time and aging and also
meditates on the poet’s bond to the American landscape. Through first-
person narratives and dogmatic language, the poems in An Atlas of the
Difficult World concern such themes as poverty, the Persian Gulf War
and the exploitation of minorities and women in terms of Rich’s own
personal experiences. Dark Fields of the Republic continues to broaden
the poet’s themes, focussing on the promise and failure of the American
dream, class and gender struggles, and racial inequality.

In her poem Toward the Solstice Adrienne Rich has written, “I am trying
to hold in one steady glance all the parts of my life”. Her life has been so
varied and complex that it has been quite difficult to comprehend it in a
single encompassing vision. An articulate proponent of the need for

31
social, economic and political equality for both women and men, Rich
has dedicated herself to “the struggle for self-determination of all
women, of every colour, identification or derived class….” During her
career, Adrienne Rich’s poetic vision has become increasingly women-
centred. Her poems assert the importance of reinventing cultural
standards in feminist terms and point to women’s need for self-
determination.

Rich’s prose work explores similar feminist concerns. Of Woman Born

studies the contemporary concept of motherhood, while On Lies,
Secrets, and Silence furthers Rich’s feminist aesthetic, most notably in
“When We Dead Awaken,” which clarifies Rich’s call for female self-
determination. Blood, Bread, and Poetry examines racial identity and
racism. The essays of What I Found There (1993) contain meditations
on politics, poetry, and poets in relation to large themes of social,
ecological, and political crises of the United States.

A critique
Rich’s self-reflexive poetry and prose exhibit themes that can be traced
across the timeline of her life’s work. While her earlier works like A
Change of World (1951) were formally regular, sharing thematic
concerns as well as meter and rhyme scheme with the kind of
modernism championed by male writers like W.H. Auden, her later
works established her as a radical feminist, progressive, and anti-war
artist. She shifted to a predominantly free verse style with heavy
enjambment. Rich stated that she was “interested in the possibilities of
the ‘plainest statement’," and used plainspoken language to advance her
progressive ideals.

Rich's poetry is extremely accessible and readable. However, there are

a few allusions that cannot be understood and, from time to time, there
will be references to events or literary works that will not be immediately
recognized by students. This material or these references are glossed in
the text so the student can understand the historical or literary context.
Other problems occur when there is fundamental hostility to the poet
over feminism. The instructor will have to explain that feminism simply
means a belief in the social, political, and economic equality of women
and men. Explain, also, that Rich is not a man-hater or in any way
unwilling to consider men as human beings. Rather, her priority is to
establish the fundamental concerns of her women readers.

32
As a young poet, Adrienne Rich was praised for her artifice. W.H. Auden
observed in his Forward to A Chance of World, her first volume of
poems in1951, “Miss Rich, who is, I, understand twenty-one years old …
(has) a love for the medium, a determination to ensure that whatever
she writes shall, at least, at last not be shoddily made”. Rich’s poetry has
not always been described as “feminist,” especially her early poems. W.
H. Auden, for instance, in his Foreword found that her poems “are neatly
and modestly dressed, speak directly but do not mumble, respect their
elders and are not cowed by them, and do not tell fibs.”

Despite her early success, it was only with the publication of Snapshots
of a Daughter-in-law (1963) that Rich developed a style and subject
matter, which were deeply personal. In this collection she wrote for the
first time from a female perspective.

Since the publication of Diving into the Wreck, however, most critics
have analysed Rich’s writings as artistic expressions of feminist politics.
Although many reviewers have admired her formal versatility, others
have complained about the didactic tone of her work or have perceived
an anti-male bias. Critical commentary has reflected the polemics of her
poetry: critics who adhere to Rich’s politics often commend her work
unconditionally, while those who dissent from her radical feminism
usually disavow her writings.

A conclusive appraisal of Rich’s canon has remained elusive, despite

several attempts since the early 1990s – a testament perhaps of the
poet’s continuous revision of her views and approaches to contemporary
issues. Nonetheless, the general consensus among critics recognises
Rich’s intelligent, imaginative and innovative portrayals of women in her
poetry as significant contributions to the feminist movement.

“There is no one whose poetry has spoken more eloquently for the
oppressed and marginalized in America, no one who has more
compassionately charted the course of individual suffering across the
horrifying and impersonal growth of recent history,” David St. John has
said, adding that Rich’s works “continue to be essential writings”.

33
Randall Jarrell admires Rich’s deft metrics and says that “her
scansion…. is easy and limped, close to water, close to air”.

Awards and Recognition

One of her generation’s most distinguished and accomplished poets,

Adrienne Rich was an extremely influential and important voice in the
field of feminist and lesbian studies. She authored more than twenty
volumes of poetry and prose, including several volumes of essays and a
groundbreaking, book-length study of motherhood entitled Of Woman.

Rich first achieved recognition in 1951 with the publication of A Change

of World, which was chosen by W.H. Auden for the Yale Younger Poets
Award. In his preface to the volume, Auden praised Rich’s poetry for its
formalism, restraint, elegance, and precision.

Her 1978 volume, The Dream of a Common Language, is recognized as

a seminal text for any discussion of lesbian feminist poetry and was
nominated for a National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry.

Rich’s numerous awards and grants include two Guggenheim

fellowships, a National Institute of Arts and Letters Award for Poetry, a
Fund for Human Dignity Award from the National Gay Task Force, a
National Poetry Association Award, the first Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, a
Robert Frost Silver Medal from the Poetry Society of America and a
MacArthur Foundation Fellowship. She also received the National Book
Award in 1974 for Diving into the Wreck: Poems, 1971-1972, which she
accepted together with Alice Walker and Audre Lorde in the name of all
women who have been silenced in literary culture. Rich was awarded
the Bollingen Prize in February 2003.
In Subsections 2.1.2 and 2.1.3, we will learn about two of her poems.

2.1.2 Necessities of Life

Necessities of Life (1966) reveal the poet’s deepening conviction that the
culture in which she lives is destructive. In several of the poems in this
volume, she expresses the need to separate herself from what she
perceives to be the landscape of death.

34
 I used myself, let nothing use me.

Like being on a private dole,

Sometimes more like kneading bricks in Egypt,

What life was there, was mine,

Now and again to lay

One hand on a warm brick

And touch the sun’s ghost

With economical joy,

Now and again to name

Over the bare necessities.

Like Emily Dickinson, who is portrayed in the poem I am in Danger-Sir,
Adrienne Rich decides to:

Dare inhibit the world

Trenchant in motion as an eel, solid

As a cabbage head.

Dickinson separated herself from the world around her in order to write
poetry. Unlike Dickinson, Rich does not cut herself off from public life:

I have invitations:

a curl of mist streams upward

from a field, visible as my breath
houses along a road stand waiting

like old woman knitting, breathless to tell their stories.

She shares Emily Dickinson’s determination to survive as an

independent and creative person, translate the stories world has to tell
her, for the benefit of humankind.

35
Rich’s Necessities of Life talks of the poet’s capacity to distinguish
between fate and destiny. Finding her destiny to be in her hands, she
wastes no time to build it. One finds the continuity and unity of thought
from the associations and images playing back and forth among the
couplets. This free flowing technique makes her work evocative of
feelings experienced.

She herself has chosen from the things that crowded her the changes
that would make her what she is. She escapes the slavery of life first
through identifying her life’s journey:

Piece by piece I seem

To re-enter the world: I first began

A small, fixed dot, still see

That old myself, a dark blue thumbstalk

from the pointillists’ buzz and bloom.

After a time the dot

Begin to ooze. Certain heats melt it.

She begins her life on a dot, the dot that the pointillists (one who uses
dots of pure colour that can be optically mixed into a resulting colour by
the viewer) would arrange to create and present a particular picture. But
somewhere, the necessities of life make the dot lose its shapes, melt
under its heat and harshness, and she finds herself caught in an
existential agony, while:

Whole biographies swam up and

Swallowed me like Jonah.
Jonah! I was Wittgenstein

Mary Wollstonecraft, the soul

Of Louis Jouver, dead

In a blown-up photograph.

Sucked up by the polemical ideas of Jonah, Wollstonecraft, Wittgenstein

and Jouver, she melts till she becomes unidentifiable. “Wolfed almost to

36
shreds”, she says, “I learnt to make myself”. Emerging like a phoenix
from the ashes of her own burnt up individuality, she considers it is
enough of these agonies and decides to practise to become “middling-
perfect”.

Commenting on the structure of the poem, Henry Vendler remarks on

the beauty of the first passage, contrasts it with the second and says
that the girl who earlier had “dreamed of being Wittgenstein should join
the garrulous crones”, to tell the story of the world. But Rich, convinced
about what she wrote in 1951 reiterates it in her The Will to Change
(1971), I am an instrument in the shape of a woman trying to translate
pulsations into images for the relief of the body and the reconstruction of
the mind.
“This famous poem by Adrienne Rich comments upon the theme of
resurrection and re-engagement with life. The persona of the poem
describes how "piece by piece" she re-enters the world that she had left
before. If we examine the persona, we can see that this poem is centred
around the central theme of struggle with the world in relation to role and
identity. The persona is clearly confused and is now re-entering the
world, having left it, with the desire to have a second chance at living.”
“One of the ways in which this theme is presented is through the
structure of the poem, that, in places, mirror the development of the
persona. Consider the way in which the only stanza in the poem that
both initiates and concludes a sentence in the poem is the following line:
"So much for those days." This indicates the way in which the persona is
deliberately moving on from how she formerly considered her
necessities of life, and has now changed her perspective and is ready to
re-enter the world with a different mind set.”

The poem therefore narrates one woman's courageous decision to

reverse an earlier choice made in her life and to try and engage in the
risky and hazardous enterprise of living in the world rather than sitting
out in the game of life.

“Piece by piece” the persona in Adrienne Rich’s Necessities of Life re-

enters the world. This conclusion is reached through the poem’s plot,
which deals with the struggle of a young person in relation to their role in
the world. It is no great mystery that the persona is confused, has left the
world, and is currently returning with hopes of gaining a successful
second chance at life. What is most interesting about this poem is its

37
structure. The poem’s form parallels the changing perspectives and
revelations of the persona.

A primary example of this technique is that the only stanza, which begins
and ends a vital sentence throughout the entire poem is the line, which
reads “So much for those days.” This line demonstrates the
transformation from how the persons had viewed her life and its
necessities to how those past days and over and now she is ready to re-
enter the world with a new perspective. Much of the rest of the poem
contains lines that flow, not necessarily smoothly, from one stanza to
another. This effect reflects the life of the persona: ever-flowing, ever-
continuing even though it wasn’t “smooth” all the time.

These necessities reflect Rich's awareness of her growing strength as a

poet and the conflict it stirs up with her self-concept as a woman. To be
a poet, to alienate herself "in the woods" or anywhere else is against the
traditional role of a woman. The paradoxes, that she, a poet, is finding
truths that are away from the reach of the common knowledge and is yet
different from most poets as she is a woman and again different from
most women because she is a poet, create her identity.
Rich’s method proved to be most effective in that it concretely proves the
mood and confused/uncertain state of the persona. Like the plot, the
structure does not guarantee any closure or resolution thus the poet
provides the audience with not only what to read but how to read it as
well.

2.1.3 Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger

Rich wrote, “Poems are like dreams: in them you put what you don't
know you know. Looking back at poems I wrote before I was twenty-one,
I’m startled because beneath the conscious craft are glimpses of the
split I even then experienced between the girl who wrote the poems,
who defined herself in writing poems, and the girl who was to define
herself by her relationships with men.”

Aunt Jennifer creates a needlepoint that shows tigers leaping across the
canvas. Bright and vibrant, like topaz gems, the tigers live within the
green world of the canvas. They are not afraid of the men standing

38
underneath the tree, who are also depicted in the image. The tigers walk
with certainty, shining and courageous.
Aunt Jennifer's fingers swiftly and delicately work the yarn, yet she finds
it physically difficult to pull even a small needle made of ivory through
the canvas. Her husband's wedding band feels huge, and weighs down
heavily on her hand.
When Aunt Jennifer dies one day, her frightened hands will finally be
still. Yet they will still be marked by the difficulties that ruled over her
while she was alive. Meanwhile, the tigers she created will continue to
leap across her needlepoint without shame or fear.

An example of this split between a conscious craft and these glimpses

predicting some characteristic of her future poetry can be identified in a
poem like Aunt Jennifer's Tigers.

Aunt Jennifer's tigers prance across a screen,

Bright topaz denizens of a world of green.
They do not fear the men beneath the tree;
They pace in sleek chivalric certainty.

Aunt Jennifer's fingers fluttering through her wool

Find even the ivory needle hard to pull.

39
 The massive weight of Uncle's wedding band
Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer's hand.
When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie
Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by.
The tigers in the panel that she made
Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid.

Composed in three carefully rhymed stanzas, the poem can firstly seem
an homage to the speaker’s aunt’s skills in stitching a panel with tigers.
However, a detailed reading reveals images and symbols that suggest a
relation of oppression concerning Aunt Jennifer and her husband.

She produces her tigers under his control, represented by "The massive
weight of Uncle's wedding band [that]/Sits heavily upon [her] hand."
Physically, a wedding ring is light, but this one has a "massive weight"
heavily sitting on her hand. These images construct an opposition
between the couple: as a woman she has a creative force, but her
husband, represented by the wedding ring, seems to control her
initiative. In spite of his dominance, she embroiders tigers that "do not
fear men."
Tigers are both admired and feared by their force. It is said that even
demons would runaway from them, a belief that explains the placement
of tiger statues in front of buildings or for grave decoration. Through this
symbol, her creation assumes a form of power. It is worth noting that this
idea is ironically interlaced with the use of a regular meter and a craft
obedient to traditional patterns of poetry. Such formal structure can be
read as a correlative of Aunt Jennifer’s household confinement.

Furthermore, Aunt Jennifer is paralysed in the poem; her only action is

to stitch the tigers, her stillness contributing to compose her submission.
In the last stanza, suddenly the speaker foresees Aunt Jennifer’s death,
however with no significant emotional change in her (personae’s) mood.
Jennifer’s death seems only to confirm the paralysis of her life. Her
remaining art, however, concedes her a sense of immortality and a
freedom from the dominance she experienced while married.

The vehement tigers she embroiders represent Aunt Jennifer’s

imaginative life. Her tigers:

40
 prance across a screen,

bright to pay denizens of a world of green .

In her imagination, Aunt Jennifer, like the tigers, lives in a free world, in
an Arcadian environment, untouched, untroubled and not insulted and
like them:

not fear the men beneath the tree;

they pace in sleek chivalric certainty.

Aunt Jennifer is happy to create her tigers who enjoy freedom as her
fingers flutter through the wool, but the hard, heavy wedding band gifted
to her by uncle make the movement of the fingers difficult and slow. Aunt
Jennifer’s imaginative life is contrasted with her actual circumstance in
the lines:

The massive weight of uncle’s wedding band

Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer’s hand.

The heartless wielding of patriarchal power over women is brought out

effectively with the lines “ringed with ordeals they were mastered by”. So
massive is the weight, so harsh had been patriarchal arrogance, so used
to has been her submissive nature that even after Aunt Jennifer dies,
her terrified hands will be still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by,
while the tigers in the panel that she made will go on prancing, proud
and unafraid.

When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie

Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by.
The tigers in the panel that she made
Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid.

Aunt Jennifer’s Tiger, as Rich points out, embodies deep themes –

themes she would teach herself to deal with immediately and personally.
Rich meets life on the most honest term she can. The burden of the

41
poem is in the making, and hence the discovery of herself. She
convincingly portrays her sense of who she is and what terms of living
are possible to her. Rich’s energy and anguish are complimented by the
metrical form. Rich explores the patriarchal role in the poem. At the heart
of the poem is her conviction that women have the energy to transform
the world, provided it is not snapped up by the heavy hands of
patriarchy. For presenting art as an alternative to perpetuate women
historically and as a medium for women's liberation, Aunt Jennifer’s
Tigers is considered one of the first feminist poems of Adrienne Rich.

Some critics describe the poem as a contest between the individual and
the social, between imagination and gender roles and expectation,
between the oppressed and the oppressor. Reading the poem through
oppositions, these critics search for the poem's resolution. The question
for these critics seems to be, who wins - imagination or gender roles, the
oppressed or the oppressor? For some, the answer is an evasive and for
others it is unforgiving. Ultimately, as these critics argue, Aunt Jennifer's
Tigers fails to resolve the conflict between the individual and the social.

Some critics observe that the poem resists those oppositions upon
others. To the former, Aunt Jennifer's Tigers does not stage a contest
between the individual and the social, but rather characterises them by
their interdependence. In the central symbols of the poem, i.e., the
tapestry tigers and the Uncle's wedding band, the individual and social,
the personal and the political meet. The tapestry tigers are not just
individual artistic expressions. They are politically inflected, engaged in
patriarchal chivalry myths and, as icons of colonialism, are suggestive of
capitalist regimes of power. The personal and the political again meet in
the intimacy of "Uncle's wedding band" (line 7). By the physical intimacy
of a wedding band and by the familial presence conferred by "Uncle's
wedding band", Aunt Jennifer's Tigers personalises the presence of
patriarchal politics.

To condemn Aunt Jennifer's Tiger's then, as some critics do, for its
rebellion's indebtedness to patriarchal culture, to say the least is, to miss
the point. What makes the poem interesting, I think, is the very interplay
between rebellion and repression, between the individual and the social,
between the personal and the political. To demand a resolution wherein
individual expression wholly escapes the social/political, magically rising

42
above patriarchal discourse seems a little naive and largely dismissive of
the poem's more sophisticated conceptualisation of power. Aunt
Jennifer's Tigers is a clear statement of conflict in women, specifically
between the impulse to freedom and imagination (her tapestry of
prancing tigers) and the "massive weight" of gender roles and
expectations, signified by "Uncle's wedding band."

The poet expresses the inner feelings of a woman - Aunt Jennifer. This
pattern of the free and fearless tigers reflects her inner desire to live a
free and fearless life. Her desire of freedom and fearlessness will live on
through her tigers.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 2.1

Describe Adrienne Rich and her poems

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

43
2.2 GWENDOLYN BROOKS AND HER WORKS

Themes of Gwendolen include black pride, black identity and solidarity,

black humanism, and caritas, a maternal vision. Historically, racial
discrimination; the civil rights movement of the fifties; black rebellion of
the sixties; a concern with complacency in the seventies; black
leadership are revealed through her life and works. After reading this
block, you’ll get a clear insight of Gwendolyn Brooks, her life, legacy and
achievements. You’ll also be able to know and analyse her poems,
Sadie and Maud and Mrs. Small.

GWENDOLYN BROOKS

Gwendolyn Brooks is one of the most highly regarded, influential, and

widely read poets of 20th-century American poetry. She was a much-
honored poet, even in her lifetime, with the distinction of being the first
Black author to win the Pulitzer Prize. She also was poetry consultant to
the Library of Congress, the first Black woman to hold that position, and
poet laureate of the State of Illinois. Many of Brooks’s works display a

44
political consciousness, especially those from the 1960s and later, with
several of her poems reflecting the civil rights activism of that period. Her
body of work gave her, according to critic George E. Kent, “a unique
position in American letters. Not only has she combined a strong
commitment to racial identity and equality with a mastery of poetic
techniques, but she has also managed to bridge the gap between the
academic poets of her generation in the 1940s and the young Black
militant writers of the 1960s.”

A powerful voice of Black consciousness and social protest in mid-20th

century America, Gwendolyn Brooks is among the most distinguished
African-American poets of the twentieth century. With the publication of
her second volume of poetry, Annie Allen (1949), she became the first
Black American writer to win a Pulitzer Prize. Noted for her mastery of
traditional forms and poignant evocation of urban Black experience,
Brooks emerged as a leading Black literary figure during the 1950s and
1960s.

Drawing upon both European models and African-American folk

tradition, her lyrical poetry addresses racial injustice, poverty and the
private struggles of young Black women with exceptional precision,
psychological depth and authenticity. In addition to Annie Allen, Brooks
is best known for A Street in Bronzeville (1945), The Bean Eaters
(1960), In the Mecca (1968), and her only novel, Maud Martha (1953).
During the late 1960s, Brooks embraced the Black power and Black arts
movements, marking a dramatic shift in her poetry towards increasingly
polemical declarations of Black pride and African cultural nationalism.

2.2.1 Early Life

Brooks was born on June 7, 1917, in Topeka, Kansas. When Brooks

was six weeks old, her family moved to Chicago as part of the Great
Migration. She was known as "Gwendie" to close friends and family
during her childhood.
Her mother abandoned teaching for marriage and motherhood and her
father, the son of a runaway slave who fought in the Civil War, gave up
his ambition to attend medical school to work as a janitor. Out of the
loving security of her home, Brooks early experienced racial prejudice in

45
grade school, where other Black students ridiculed her dark skin and
lack of social or athletic abilities.

Brooks attended three high schools: the prestigious, integrated Hyde

Park High School; the all-Black Wendell Phillips Academy High School;
and the integrated Englewood High School. The racial prejudice that she
encountered at some of these institutions would shape her
understanding of social dynamics in the United States and influence her
writing. In 1936, Brooks graduated from Wilson Junior College, having
already begun to write and publish her work.

Brooks found solace in reading and writing, which her parents

enthusiastically encouraged. After reading her seven-year-old daughter’s
precocious poetry, Brooks’ mother proclaimed to her, “You are going to
be a poet.” Books published her first poem at the age of thirteen in
American Childhood magazine. At age sixteen, she met Langston
Hughes, who read her poems and offered encouragement after a poetry
reading.

After graduating from Wilson Junior College in 1936, she briefly worked
as a maid and as a secretary for a spiritual charlatan who managed a
massive slum tenement known as the Mecca. Brooks later recalled both
of these painfully degrading job experiences in her poetry. In 1938,
Brooks joined the NAACP Youth Council, where she met her husband
Henry Lowington Blakely II, whom she married the next year; their son
was born in 1940 and daughter in 1951.

Gwendolyn Brooks Poems

Brooks began writing at an early age. She published her first poem in a
children's magazine at age 13. By 16, she had published approximately
75 poems. She began submitting her work to the Chicago Defender, a
leading African American newspaper. Her work included ballads,
sonnets and free verse, drawing on musical rhythms and the content of
inner-city Chicago. She would later say of this time in her life, "I felt that I
had to write. Even if I had never been published, I knew that I would go
on writing, enjoying it and experiencing the challenge."
Brooks’ early poetry reflects her interest in William Wordsworth, John
Keats, Emily Dickinson, William Cullen Bryant, and Percy Shelly. After
graduating from an integrated high school in 1934, Brooks continued to

46
devote herself to writing and even corresponded with Harlem
Renaissance poet James Weldon Johnson, who commented favourably
on her poetry and suggested that she read modern poets.
Her poems in A Street in Bronzeville and the Pulitzer Prize-
winning Annie Allen (1949) were “devoted to small, carefully cerebrated,
terse portraits of the Black urban poor,” commented Richard K.
Barksdale in Modern Black Poets: A Collection of Critical
Essays. Brooks once described her style as “folksy narrative,” but she
varied her forms, using free verse, sonnets, and other models. Several
critics welcomed Brooks as a new voice in poetry; fellow poet Rolfe
Humphries wrote in the New York Times Book Review that “we have,
in A Street in Bronzeville, a good book and a real poet,” while Saturday
Review of Literature contributor Starr Nelson called that volume “a work
of art and a poignant social document.” In Annie Allen, she explains the
experiences of a Black girl as she grows into adulthood.

Bronzeville
In the 1950s Brooks published her first and only novel, Maud
Martha (1953), which details its title character’s life in short vignettes.
Maud suffers prejudice not only from white people but also from lighter-
skinned African Americans, something that mirrored Brooks’ experience.

Her third volume of poetry, The Beam Eaters, heralded Brook’s growing
social and racial consciousness at the height of the civil rights
movement. Her Selected Poems (1963) received a Robert F Ferguson
Memorial Award and Thormod Monsen Literature Award in 1964. In
1967, Brooks attended the Second Fisk Writers Conference, where she
was captivated by younger Black writers such as Leroy Jones (Amiri
Baraka) and Don. L. Jones (Haki Madhubuti), whose message of Black
Solidarity Brooks embraced as her own, marking a decisive turning point
in her career.

47
Brooks hosted poetry workshops for members of the Chicago Gang and
Blackstone Rangers, travelled to Africa twice in the early 1970s, and
supported Black publishing ventures by having her subsequent work
published by Broadside press in Detroit and Third World Press in
Chicago.

During the 1970s and 1980s, Brooks published additional small volumes
of poetry, her autobiography Report from Part One (1972), children’s
verse in The Tiger Who Wore White Gloves (1974), and the writing
manuals Young Poet’s Primer (1980), A Capsule Course in Black Poetry
Writing (1975), and Very Young Poets (1983). A noted teacher and
mentor for young poets, Brooks has sponsored numerous poetry
contests and workshops, often financed at her own expense, and taught
at many colleges and universities since the early 1960s.

According to Cheryl Clarke, “Brooks’ entire oeuvre has been studies of

Black subjectivity, of African-American oral and written traditions,
sources of knowledge and faith systems; of the psychic and physical
effects of racism on the lives of black and white people; and of the
richness of the lyric. “Critical analysis of Brooks’ work is focused
primarily upon her poetry in A Street in Bronzeville, Annie Allen, The
Bean Eaters, In The Mecca and her novel Maud Martha, together
considered her most accomplished works.

Brooks’ poetry after the 1967 racial awakening has received mixed
reaction. While some critics disapprove of the ideology and polemical
tone of her poetry from In The Mecca forward, others continue to
appreciate the impressive force and universal appeal of her work.
Brooks has also received both praise and criticism for the complexity
and ambitious themes of her work. Despite her identity as a “New Black”
poet, during the late 1960s and 1970s, Brooks is recognised as a
prescient commentator on race and female oppression for her work that
predates the civil rights, Black Power, and women’s movements.

As Kathryne V. Lindberg writes, “Brooks has always addressed and

continues to address difficult issues, including those often decorously
silent intimate traumas of abortion, colour caste, domestic abuse,

48
alienation and motherhood in poverty. Defiant in the face of a painful
history of racist lies and false consciousness that refuses to yield a
‘useable past,’ she has actively fashioned models of personal and
communal dignity as poetic blueprints for ‘cultural survival.”’

Brooks’ poetry in A Street in Bronzeville reveals the formal

accomplishment, colloquial rhythms, and social concerns that
characterise most of her work. The first section of the volume presents a
realistic montage of everyday episodes and scenes in Bronzeville, the
poor Chicago neighbourhood of her childhood and early marriage.
Drawing upon a variety of poetic styles, including the sonnet, ballad,
blank verse, and blues, Brooks relates the frustrated hopes, economic
deprivation, violence, and racial prejudice experienced by ordinary
Bronzeville men, women, and children.

In The Ballad of Chocolate Mabbie, the title character is jilted by her

boyfriend for a light-skinned girl. The Sundays of Latin Legs Smith
depicts one man’s futile effort to escape poverty and racism through
flamboyant dress and sex. The second section of the volume, consisting
of the sonnet series Gay Chaps at the Bar deals with unsung heroism of
Black soldiers during World War II. Brooks continued these social
themes in Annie Allen, which focuses upon the maturation of its young,
Black female protagonist.

Divided into different sections, including Notes from the Childhood and
Girlhood, The Anniad, Appendix to the Anniad and The Womanhood,
Brooks chronicles Annie’s home life, youthful innocence, growing self-
awareness and romantic relationships amid the same grim, poverty-
stricken setting of A Street in Bronzeville.

Awards and recognitions

Brooks is highly regarded as a major contemporary American poet and

pre-eminent African-American literary figure. Consistently praised for her
technical skill and intimate portraits of Black personalities and urban life,
she has won both critical and popular admiration among her readers. As
many critics note, Brooks possesses an uncanny ability to transmute
commonplace subjects into extraordinary, especially those seemingly

49
insignificant events in the lives of the poor and dispossessed in her
native Chicago.

Brooks worked as a secretary to support herself while she developed as

a poet. She took part in poetry workshops, including one organized by
Inez Cunningham Stark, an affluent woman with a literary background.
While Stark was white, all of the participants in her workshop were
African American. Brooks made great strides during this period,
garnering official recognition. In 1943, her work received an award from
the Midwestern Writers' Conference.

Brooks at Wisconsin

Brooks was named one of the ten most outstanding women of the year
by Mademoiselle Magazine in 1945 and received several prestigious
honours, including a National Institute of Arts and Letters grant in 1946,
an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award in 1946, and
Guggenheim fellowships in 1946 and 1947. Brooks’ next volume of
poetry, Annie Allen, won a Eunice Tietjens Memorial Prize from Poetry
magazine in1949 and a Pulitzer Prize in 1950.

She also served as editor of several Broadside Press anthologies. In

1968, Brooks received a National Book Award nomination for In the
Mecca and succeeded Carl Sandburg as poet laureate of Illinois. In
1971, she received the Black Academy of Arts and Letters Award.
In 1985, Brooks was appointed poetry consultant for the Library of
Congress. She has received numerous additional honours, including the
Frost Medal from the Poetry Society of America and a Lifetime

50
Achievement Award from the national Endowment for the Arts in 1989,
and a National Book Foundation medal for lifetime achievement in 1994.

Brooks was a regular poetry contributor to the

Chicago Defender beginning in 1934.

During 1941 – 1942, Brooks attended a poetry workshop

with Inez Cunningham Stark, who helped hone her
technical skills. Brooks won the Midwestern Writer’s
Conference prize in 1944 with the “Gay Chaps at the Bar”,
and again in 1945 with “the progress”. Both poems
appeared in her first volume of poetry A Street in
Bronzeville.

2.2.2 Sadie and Maud

Sadie and Maud, one of the poems in the collection A Street in
Bronzeville presents a humanistic answer to the maladies of the 20 th
century society. A verbally spare ballad, it advances the theme of “a
song in the front yard”. Brooks goes beyond the mere imitation of ballad
themes and techniques to create more varied and complex structures.
The result is that while on one level, her ballads are simple and direct,
on the other level, they are deeply ironic and complex, both in theme
and techniques.

Brooks reinvigorates the ballad tradition by infusing it with new themes

and variations; and she critiques the tradition by using periodic
techniques. The overall effect, however, is the revelation of
contemporary, often unpleasant truths about Afro-American and
American Society. Brooks continues in the tradition of the European folk

51
ballads, by using additional folk elements from the Afro-American
spirituals and blues traditions.

The original popular ballad is anonymous, transmitted by oral tradition

and tells a story, often about events well known to the audience.
Whatever affects the thoughts and emotions of a community may
become the subject of a ballad, but the most frequent themes are
unfaithful lovers, shocking murderers, mysterious happenings and
political oppressions (e.g., Robin Hood Ballads).

The language of folk ballads is usually simple in diction and meter.

Brooks uses the folk ballad tradition, with a few innovations. Sadie and
Maud is a typical Brooks poem. Reworking on items of common life, she
reminds us that creative experience can be mined from this vast store of
unshaped material. The poem speaks directly to situations for which
black women need names, but this specificity may be broadened to
define situations that speak for other women as well. As she succinctly
puts it, she is fascinated to write about the ghetto people.

The ballad form chosen for Sadie and Maud suits Sadie’s involved
spontaneity against Maud’s conventional respectability. “Maud went to
college/Sadie stayed at home/Sadie scraped life/with a fine-tooth comb.”
“Sadie” recalls Sadie Thompson, the prostitute in Somerset Maugham’s
classic Rain. Maud’s name derives from “Magadaline”, the reformed
adulteress in the New Testament and recalls Tennyson’s romantic
heroine in the poem Maud so that for the reader – exceeding the poet’s
intention – there is further irony.

Sadie’s parents react strongly to her out-of-wedlock child bearing. When

52
 Sadie bore two babies
Under her maiden name.

Maud and Ma and Papa

Nearly died of shame.

Sadie leaves her two daughters the expensive heritage of “fine-tooth

comb” with which she “scraped life”. Maud goes to college, as the other
girls in her other poems in this collection do and remains unmarried and

Is a thin brown mouse

She is living all alone

In this old house

Having fun.

Sadie’s life, financially and socially restricted, holds a spiritual vigour not
accessible to Maud or even perhaps to “the mother”. The speaker’s
colloquial tone and the lean toughness of the verse refine an implicit
message: “Live”.

2.2.3 Mrs. Small

In Mrs. Small from the collection The Bean Eaters, Brooks’ “indirect
libre” style projects the sensibility of a middle-aged woman trapped in
daily domestic chores:
Mrs. Small went to the kitchen for her pocketbook

And came back to the living room with a peculiar look

And the coffee pot

Pocket book. Pot

Pot. Pocketbook

Mrs. Small is caught between the economic pressures of white culture,

symbolised by the insurance salesman who often figures as a predator
among Black people and male chauvinism of her husband along with the

53
demands of her ten children. She has to deal with the insurance man
and meet the payments and her submerged rage is expressed in the
repetition of “Pocketbook. Pot/Pot. Pocketbook.”

The insurance man was waiting there with superb and cared for hair. His
face showed impatience as it “did not have much time” nor was he
interested in showing any courtesy to the little plump tan woman with
half-open mouth and half-mad eyes.

Standing in the middle of the floor wondering about the demands of the
day, she does not forget the common courtesy of offering coffee to the
insurance man though he does not even smile at her and consider her
as a human being worth recognising. But the “very best coffee in town”
as her husband used to term it spurts and leaves a pair of brown dots on
the “whiter than white shirt” of the insurance man.

The dandier Jim Small’s compliment is recollected with pride along with
the fact that Jim Small was likely to give you a good swat when he was
not pleased.

Amidst a mountain of things, she does not forget to pay him and
apologises for the delay and at the background, the six daughters yell
and scramble in the hall and the four sons, horrors as she calls them are
not to be seen. The insurance man glares at the receding figure
idiotically from the doorway stupefied by the woman’s energy,
individuality or what not, we do not know. The poet says that the idiotic
stare matches the “sterile stare” of Mrs. Small. He departs. Mrs. Small
takes a moment to rest herself and then attends to her work.

And silence the six

And mix

Her spices and core

And slice her apples and find her four

Continuing her part

Of the world’s business

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The last line “Continuing her part of the world’s business” reminds one of
the Elegy in the churchyard. So casually and sincerely made, the
statement brings out the reality regarding the wastefulness of squabbles
between men. Her colour “tan” stands between black and white, and
she represents the section of people who are politically awakened
enough to know that they too have their little business in the world.

Brooks’ poem emphasises two points very clearly: it talks about the
centrality of Mrs. Small’s inner life, for the poem is a revelation of her
thoughts, feelings, personality, and reflections on her limited world. In
illuminating Mrs. Small’s specific individuality, the poet also shows her in
relation to the other people in her physical environment. The other idea,
which she emphasises, is through the word “Small”. How, the
indomitable personality of Mrs. Small, makes her go on with her small
business in the world and contribute to the progress of the world is
stressed on to transcend the ordinariness of the chores described in the
poem.

Brooks’ poem let us have a peep into the world of the underprivileged –
the blacks – to know what it is to be a black. Brooks’ portrayal of a black
woman whose life is not characterised as “tragic” is perhaps due partly
because of the overlapping trends in Afro-American life and thought of
the 1950s. One finds on the one hand protest against racism and on the
other celebration of the Blacks’ indomitable will. The poems of Brooks
establish the Blacks in their legitimate place in the world.

55
 LEARNING ACTIVITY 2.2
Describe Gwendolyn Brooks and her poems.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

2.3 SYLVIA PLATH AND HER WORKS

Sylvia Plath was an American writer whose best-known works,

including the poems “Daddy” and “Lady Lazarus” and the novel The Bell
Jar, starkly express a sense of alienation and self-destruction that has
resonated with many readers since the mid-20th century. This unit will
help you to get an insight on Sylvia, her life and works.

56
 Sylvia Plath

Considered as one of the most powerful poets of the World War II era,
Plath became a cult figure following her suicide in 1963 and the
posthumous publication of Ariel, a collection which contains her most
startling and acclaimed verse. Plath is best known for her vivid, intense
poems that explore such topics as personal and feminine identity,
individual suffering and oppression, and the inevitability of death.
Through bold metaphors and stark, often violent and unsettling imagery,
her works evoke mythic qualities in nature and humanity.

In addition to citing her command of poetic craft, critics often identify two
other reasons for widespread interest in Plath’s work: the
autobiographical elements in her writings poignantly reflect her struggle
with despair and mental illness and her efforts to assert a strong female
identity and to balance familial, marital, and career aspirations have
established her as a representative voice for feminist concerns.

While Plath is frequently linked with confessional poets Robert Lowell,

Anne Sexton and John Berryman, all of whom directly express personal
torments and anguish in their work, critics have noted that many of her
poems are dramatic monologues voiced by a character, which is not
necessarily autobiographical. Although sometimes faulted as indulgent
and preoccupied with death and physiological suffering, Plath’s work
continues to be read widely and has generated numerous scholarly
exercises.

2.3.1 Early Life

Sylvia Plath was born in Boston, Massachusetts, on October 27, 1932,

to Otto and Aurelia Plath. Her father, a professor of biology (the study of

57
plant and animal life) at Boston University and a well-respected authority
on bees, died when she was eight years old. She was left with feelings
of grief, guilt, and anger that would haunt her for life and led her to
create most of her poetry. The sudden death of her father from diabetes
mellitus in 1940 devastated the eight-year-old Plath, and many critics
note the significance of this traumatic experience in interpreting her
poetry, which frequently contains both brutal and reverential images of
her father as well as sea imagery and allusions to bees.

Sylvia Plath with her Parents

Plath gave the appearance of being a socially well-adjusted child. She

was also an excellent student who dazzled her teachers in the Winthrop,
Massachusetts, public school system and earned straight A's and praise
for her writing abilities. She was just eight and a half when her first poem
was published in the Boston Herald.

Plath lived in Winthrop with her mother and younger brother, Warren,
until 1942. These early years gave her a powerful awareness of the
beauty and terror of nature and a strong love and fear of the ocean. In
1942 her mother found a job as a teacher and purchased a house in
Wellesley, Massachusetts, a respectable, middle-class, educational
community that also influenced Plath's life and values. Her first story,
"And Summer Will Not Come Again," was published
in Seventeen magazine in August 1950. In September

1950 Plath entered Smith College in Northhampton, Massachusetts, on

a scholarship (money given to a gifted student to attend college). There

58
she once again excelled in her studies academically and socially.
Referred to as "the golden girl" by teachers and peers, she planned her
writing career in detail. She filled notebooks with stories and poems,
shaping her words carefully and winning many awards.

Her works

Plath began publishing poetry at an early age in such periodicals as

Seventeen and the Christian Science Monitor, and in 1950 she earned a
scholarship to Smith College. After spending a month during the summer
of her junior year in New York City as a guest editor for Mademoiselle
magazine, Plath suffered a mental collapse, which resulted in a suicide
attempt and her subsequent institutionalisation. Plath later chronicled the
circumstances and consequences of this breakdown in her best-selling
novel, The Bell Jar. Following her recovery, Plath returned to Smith and
graduated summa cum laude. After winning a Fulbright fellowship to
study at Cambridge University, Plath met and soon married Ted Hughes,
an English poet. The eventual failure of their marriage during the early
1960s and their ensuing struggles with severe depression that led to her
suicide are considered crucial elements of Plath’s most critically
acclaimed poetry.

Plath’s verse is represented in several volumes. For example, The

Colossus (1960), the only compilation of poems during her lifetime,
collects pieces dating from the mid- to late 1950s. Ariel (1965) contains
poems selected by Hughes from among the many works Plath
composed during the months before her death and had intended to
publish as a unified volume. Winter Trees (1971) contains several more
of Ariel poems and reflects Hughes’ plan to publish Plaths’ later works in
intervals. Crossing the Water: Transitional Poems (1971) has most of
her post-Colossus and pre-Ariel verses. The Collected Poems (1981),
which won a Pulitzer Prize, features all of her verse, including several
previously unpublished pieces, in the order of composition.

Critics often maintain that during her brief career, Plath’s verse evolved
from a somewhat derivative early style to that of unique and
accomplished poetic voice. Katha Pollitt commented: “Plath’s was one of
those rare poetic careers – Keats’s was another – that moved
consistently and with gathering rapidity and assurance to an ever greater
daring and individuality.”

59
Plath’s early verse reflects various poetic influences, evoking the mythic
qualities of the works of William Butler Yeats and Ted Hughes, the
diverse experiments with form and language of Gerard Manley Hopkins
and W.H. Auden, and the focus on personal concerns, which dominate
the verse of Robert Lowell and Theodore Roethke. Most of her early
poems are formal, meticulously crafted, and feature elaborate syntax
and well-developed metaphors, as Plath employed such forms as the
ode, the villanelle and the pastoral lyric to examine art, love, nature, and
personal themes. These pieces are more subdued than the later work
for which she would become renowned.

Critics generally believe that some of the later poems in The Colossus
herald a new phase in Plath’s career. Marjorie Perloff commented: “
[When], in the last two years of her life, [Plath] finally came into her own,
the adopted voices merely evaporated, and a new harsh, demonic,
devastating self, only partially prefigured in such poems as the The Thin
People (1957) and The Stones (1959), came into being.”

Plath’s later work evidences the increasing frustration of her desires. Her
ambitions of finding happiness through work, marriage, and family were
thwarted by such events as hospital stays for miscarriage and an
appendectomy, the break-up of her marriage, and fluctuating moods in
which she felt vulnerable to male domination and threatening natural
forces, particularly death. Jon Rosenblatt noted: “Life and death operate
in Plath’s poetic world as tangible powers: they appear as dramatic
agents embodied in people, trees, houses, colours, and animals. And
they proceed to control the self’s actions and desires, its present and its
future.”

Following the dissolution of her marriage, Plath moved with her two
children from the Devon countryside to a London apartment and wrote
feverishly from the summer of 1962 until her death in February of the
following year. Many of her best-known poems, including Daddy, Lady
Lazarus, Lesbos, Purdah and Edge, were composed during this period
and form the nucleus of the Ariel poems. These pieces, which reflect her
increasing anger, bitterness and despair towards life, feature intense,
rhythmic language that blends terse statements, sing-song passages,

60
repetitive phrasing, and sudden violent images, metaphors, and
declarations.

For Example, in Daddy, perhaps her most frequently discussed work,

Plath denounces her father’s dominance over her life and, among her
allusions, associates him with Nazism and herself with Jewish victims of
the Holocaust. Plath explained: “The poem is spoken by a girl with an
Electra complex. Her father died when she thought he was God.”
Response to this poem reflects the general opinion of much of her later
work. Some critics contend that Plath’s jarring effects are extravagant,
and many object to her equation of personal sufferings with such horrors
as those experienced by victims of Nazi genocide. Others, however,
praise the passion and formal structure of her late poems, through which
she confronts her tensions and conflicts. Robert Lowell observed that in
the Ariel poems, “Sylvia Plath becomes herself, becomes something
imaginary, newly, wildly, and subtly created – hardly a person at all, or a
woman, certainly not a ‘poetess’, but one of those super-real, hypnotic,
great classical heroines.”

Plath published The Bell Jar (1963), which appeared shortly before her
death, under the pseudonym of Victoria Lucas. She was unsure of the
quality of the work and feared that it might offend those people,
particularly her mother, on whom the characters are based. This novel
details a college student’s disappointing adventures during a summer
month in New York City as a guest editor for fashion magazine, her
despair upon returning home, her attempted suicide, and the
electroshock treatments and institutionalisation she undergoes to “cure”
her of depression and lethargy.

The narrator of The Bell Jar encounters many pressures and problems
Plath examined in her verse; her attempts to establish her identity are
consistently undermined, she projects an ambivalent attitude toward
men, society remains indifferent to her sensitivity, vulnerability and
artistic ambitions, and she is haunted by events from her past,
particularly the death of her father. Although critical reception to The Bell
Jar was mixed, reviewers praised the novel’s satiric portrait of American
society and its poignant study of the growing disillusionment of a
talented young woman.

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The posthumous publication of Plath’s writings in other genres, many of
which were edited by Ted Hughes, reflects the continuing interest in her
work. Three Women: A Monologue for Three Voices (1968) is a verse
play originally presented on British Radio in 1962 in which three women
discuss pregnancy. Letters Home: Correspondence, 1950-1963 (1975)
reveals Plath’s reactions to pivotal events in her adult life through the
publication of letters she exchanged with her mother. Johnny Panic and
the Bible of Dreams and Other Prose Writings (1977) collects short
stories and excerpts from her diaries in which Plath reworked the
personal experiences, themes, and topics she frequently explored in her
verse. The Journals of Sylvia Plath (1982), which includes most of the
extensive diary entries Plath compiled during her lifetime, received
substantial critical attention.

Katha Pollitt described this collection as “a storehouse of ideas for

stories, novels, and poems; of stray phrases and incidents that would
turn up, sometimes years later, in her finished work. They are the place,
too, where she chronicled an almost unbroken parade of depressions,
blocks, and visits of the ‘Panic Bird,’ and where urged herself, over and
over, year after dragging year, to throw herself into writing.”

The serious, gifted, withdrawn distinguished poet, Sylvia Plath

committed suicide in 1963. She succeeded after several useless
attempts at it. A. Alvarez, the well-noted literary critic, took up Sylvia
Plath as the prologue to her volume Savage God (1971) a study in
suicide from the perspective of literature. He attempted to see how it has
coloured the imaginative world of the creative artist, a black thread,
which leads him from Dante, Donne, Cowper, Chalterton and the
romantic agony of Dada. He traces the presence of suicide, the Savage
God, at the heart of modern literature.

Alvarez had only heard about Sylvia Plath, when her first volume of
poems was sent to him for review, by the weekly observer. He recalls
the time in his memoir of her in Savage God, “It seemed to fit the image I
had of her: serious, gifted, withheld, and still partly under the massive
shadow of her husband.”

62
There were poems that had been influenced by Alvarez and others,
which echoed Theodore Roethke or Wallace Stevens. Clearly, she was
casting about for her own style. Yet the technical ability was great, and
beneath most of the poems was a sense of resources and disturbances
not yet tapped. Alvarez was convinced that a huge shadow lingered on
her always. The book describes their friendship and how Plath would
often drop in at his home to read her poems to him. It was on one such
occasion that Alvarez recollects that the poem Lady Lazarus (see
Subsection 2.3.2), which Plath termed as “light verse” was read to him.
In Alvarez’s own words, “Her voice, as she read them was hot, and full
of venom I was appalled. At first hearing, the things seemed not so
much poetry as assault and battery.”

Between the years 1960 and 1963, Plath and Alvarez met each other
often, Plath reading her poems to him and Alvarez offering his
comments and corrections where necessary. Alvarez had talked to her
the night before she committed suicide and he records his thoughts thus
after nearly 10 years. “Even now I find it hard to believe. There was so
much life in her long, flat, strongly boned body, and her longish face with
its brown eyes, shrewd and full of feeling.

She was practical and candid, passionate and compassionate. I believe

she was a genius. I sometimes catch myself childishly thinking I’ll run
into her walking on Primrose Hill or the Heath, and we’ll pick up the
conversation where we left off. But, perhaps, that is because her poems
still speak so distinctly in her accents; quick, sardonic, unpredictable,
effortlessly inventive, a bit angry, and always utterly her own.”

A brilliant and compelling lyricist, Sylvia Plath’s dramatic end, makes

everyone of her readers search for an answer for her suicide in her
poems. This is made easy because of the subjective tone of her poems.
The posthumously published Ariel poems have been much researched
upon by readers all over the world, and the result has remained as
enigmatic as the author herself.

The Ariel poems often termed as the “dialectic of death” were written
mainly in the last year of her life and carry a speed unusual even for
Plath. Alvarez wrote: “She was systematically probing that narrow,

63
violent area between the viable and the impossible between experience,
which can be transmuted into poetry and that which is overwhelming.”

The heart of Ariel poems is lifeblood itself. Death dominates this volume.
We peer into not the darkness of man’s mortality but into the very state
of the Poets’ private dark angel, suicide. Death remains an active agent,
and appears in all forms: “a heaven starless and fatherless, a dark
water” (Sheep in Fog), “Black and stiff, but not a bad fit” (The Applicant),
“Dying is an art” (Lady Lazarus), or the inevitability of death, “from the
bottom of the pool fixed stars / Govern a life” (All the Dead Dears).

Ariel poems create a highly personal world where the routes seem to
lead only to death. Of course two routes seem to emerge clear. The first
one found in poems concerned with the poet’s sense of identity and her
relationship with the rest of the world. The second group of poems has a
shared sense of the closeness of death itself and of a strange belief in it
as a kind of possible rebirth.

The first group of poems, dealing with identity, talk of loss of identity,
alienation and fear of relationship. The poem Tulips, written in 1961, is
an excellent example:

The tulips are too excitable, it is winter here.

I am learning peacefulness, lying by myself quietly.

I am nobody; I have nothing to do with explosions.

I have let things slip, a thirty- year old cargo boat.

They have swabbed me clear of my loving association.
And I have no face, I have wanted to efface myself.

The poem is not about a calm peace but a withdrawal and rejection of
the outside world as she finds difficult to find herself.

In Fever 103, illness is used to convey the experience of purification of

identity by the abandoning of the external world. So also the other
poems in the group like The Bee, The Arrival of the Bee Box, Morning

64
Song, Night Dancers, talk about meaninglessness and her inability to put
up with it.
Awards and Recognition
The Collected Poems, which includes many previously unpublished
poems, appeared in 1981 and received the 1982 Pulitzer
Prize for poetry, making Plath the first to receive the honour
posthumously. A book for children that she had written in 1959, The It-
Doesn’t-Matter Suit, was published in 1996.
She had kept a journal for much of her life, and in 2000 The Unabridged
Journals of Sylvia Plath, covering the years from 1950 to 1962, was
published. A biographical film of Plath starring Gwyneth Paltrow (Sylvia)
appeared in 2003. In 2009 Plath’s radio play Three Women (1962) was
staged professionally for the first time. A volume of Plath’s letters, written
in 1940–56, was published in 2017. A second collection—which
contained her later letters, including a number of candid notes to her
psychiatrist—appeared the following year. In 2019 the story Mary
Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom, written in 1952, was published for the
first time.
Many of Plath’s posthumous publications were compiled by Hughes,
who became the executor of her estate. However, controversy
surrounded both the estate’s management of her work’s copyright and
his editing practices, especially when he revealed that he had destroyed
the last journals written prior to her suicide.

2.3.2 Lady Lazarus

The most famous poems in the Ariel volume are Lady Lazarus and
Daddy and both the poems are about the move towards death and the
embracing of suicide as a kind of rebirth of identity. While Daddy is a
very powerful poem Lady Lazarus has always been considered as
Plath’s most original conception. As P.R. King suggests, “It is these two
poems in particular, with the public display of deeply private obsessions;
that has led some critics to speak of Sylvia Plath as being a confessional
poet (Nine Contemporary Poets).

65
Of course, Plath shares the label with Robert Lowell, Anne Sexton and
W.D. Snod Grass. The poems are attempts made to widen the private
world through the use of imagery drawn from the extermination camps of
the Second World War and they make the reader understand the poet’s
private suffering strongly.

Lady Lazarus is about the suicidal tendencies of the poet; she has made
previous unsuccessful attempts to kill herself but is convinced that:

Like a cat I have nine times to die

I have done it again

One year in every ten

I manage it.
It is casual but disarming opening and it allows the reader to take part in
a juicy bit of gossip. The naturalness with which she talks about the
attempts she had made every ten years lends a great charm to the poet.
The naturalness is born, as any perceptive reader would know out of
perfectionism as a poet, her great skill at poetry writing and sincerity
about her work in addition to her obsession with self-destruction. She
believes:

Dying
Is an art, like everything else,

I do it exceptionally well.
I do it so it feels like hell.

66
 I do it so it feels real
. I guess you could say I’ve a call.

The deliberate ambiguity in the lines about the seriousness of the notion
leaves the reader go on without sensing any menace, nevertheless
uneasy. The seriousness of the notion is rendered flippant by the slangy
diction and simple syntax. However, the poet does not continue like that.
The shock tactic is used in the fusion of the poets’ personal past with the
history of the Nazi concentration camp.

… … my skin

Bright as a Nazi lampshade,

My right foot
A paperweight,

My face a featureless, fine Jew linen.

A repulsive reminder of the Nazi barbarity is repeated in the poem. A link

is established thus between all private and public victimisation. She sees
the mass murder in the recent history as an assault on identity. The
Nazis wish to destroy the identity of an entire race is reflected in the
poet’s wish to do away with herself, in order to give herself a new
identity which would confer meaning to her existence. The reference to
the objects of the concentration camp, namely, lampshade, paperweight
and Jewish linen, makes the poet look at herself as another object
looked at with excitement and amusement by the Nazi guards.

The peanut-crunching crowd

Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand and foot.

The big strip tease.

Gentlemen, ladies

These are my hands

my knees.
I may be skin and bone,

67
 Nevertheless I am the same, identical woman.

Plath’s confession of her personal hell naturally finds no room for feeling
apologetic about suicide. Of course, there is a slight suggestion against
such an act: “What a trash/To annihilate each decade”. But as the poem
swings through moods, no room is left to consider the suggestion
seriously. She goes on to talk of the after effects of the suicide.

They had to call and call

And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek

Her attack on the spectators of suffering and the bitter realisation of her
position as a doomed victim ends on an angry and revengeful cry in the
final stanza:

Herr God, Herr Lucifer.

Beware

Beware.

Out of the ash

I rise with my red hair

And I eat men like air.

The sudden change of tone in the lines reveals the underlying tension of
the poem. The surging anger, hatred and wish to avenge along with
helplessness to do so are so powerfully brought out in the poem. The
style at first is light verse; diction is colloquial; there are slangs too; and
the stanza structure is simple with frequent repetition of words. This form
contrasts with the dark, complex emotions, which are the subject of the
poem and the effect seems to be a kind of a grotesque joke.

The reader who would mistake anguish for a grotesque joke is berated
as “peanut crunching crowd”. The crowd of people who would not allow

68
someone to die and find neither revenge thus nor will take the meaning
seriously but would dismiss it as a sardonic humour, is attacked. The
suffering of the Jew, the world listened to as a good story but no one
other than the sufferer knew how terrible it was. The poem makes an
indictment of the callous spectator.

Lady Lazarus has undoubted force, and works with a kind of black
aesthetic. The emotional landscape of the poem is one of deep personal
crisis, and the existence of others or the nature of an outer reality is
coloured entirely by the poet’s sense of her own fragile identity. Like the
dead Lazarus resurrected by Jesus in the Bible, the poet hopes to
resurrect and become a different identity altogether and “eat men like
air”.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 2.3

Describe Sylvia Plath and Her Poems.

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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SUMMARY

In Unit 3, we discussed the central theme in some of the poems of

Adrienne Rich, Gwendolyn Brooks and Sylvia Plath. We began the Unit
by giving a biography of Rich and an overview of her poems. We then
briefly discussed two of her poems, Necessities of Life and Aunt
Jennifer’s Tiger. We then gave a biography of Brooks and analysed how
her childhood had its reflection in her poems with particular reference to
Saddie and Maud and Mrs. Small. Finally, we discussed Plath by
sketching her biography along discussing Lady Lazarus. The theme in
all these poems concerns with women liberation.

REFERENCES

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/adrienne-
https://poets.org/poet/adrienne-rich

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Adrienne-Rich
https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/adrienne-richs-poetic-
transformations

https://biography.yourdictionary.com/adrienne-rich

https://bollingen.yale.edu/poet/adrienne-rich
https://www.enotes.com/homework-help/please-interpret-adrienne-richs-
poem-necessities-306370

https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/adrienne-rich/aunt-jennifer-s-tigers
https://www.successcds.net/cce-cbse/class-xii/english/aunt-jennifers-
tigers-ncert-explanation-summary.html
https://faculty.georgetown.edu/bassr/heath/syllabuild/iguide/brooks.html
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/gwendolyn-brooks

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwendolyn_Brooks

https://www.biography.com/writer/gwendolyn-brooks#
https://www.biography.com/writer/gwendolyn-brooks

https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sylvia-Plath
https://www.inkbottlepress.com/useful/most-famous-sylvia-plath-
poetry.html

70
https://www.notablebiographies.com/Pe-Pu/Plath-Sylvia.html
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Sylvia-Plath

VIDEO LINK:

https://edumantra.net/learn-english/aunt-jennifers-tigers-theme-
message/
https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/sadie-and-maud/

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UNIT - 3 YASMIN GOONARATNE AND MAMTA KALIA

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

3.1 Sri Lankan English Literature

3.2 Yasmin Goonaratne

3.2.1 Early Life and Work
3.2.2 The poem: Big Match 1983
3.3 Mamta Kalia
3.3.1 Indian Women Poets in English
3.3.2 The poem: Tribute to Papa

Summary

OVERVIEW

In this Unit, we will give you a brief account of the emergence of Sri
Lankan and Indian writing in English in order to provide a context for the
discussion that follows concerning women poets in English in both these
contexts. We will begin the Unit by chronicling the genesis of Sri Lankan
writing in English in general. Following this discussion, we will analyse
Jasmin Goonaratne’s poem Big Match 1983, which using the cricket
metaphor delineates the sufferings of people in the wake of the ethnic
riots in Sri Lanka. We will then give you a glimpse of Indian women
poets writing in English and make a critique of Mamta Kalia’s poem,
Tribute to Papa, which denounces patriarchy.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

72
 analyse Big Match 1983 in the context of ethic riots in Sri Lanka

 review the author’s anguish about patriarchy with reference to

Tribute to Papa.

3.1 SRI LANKAN ENGLISH LITERATURE

In Subsections 3.1. and 3.2, we will respectively deal with the Sri Lankan
English literature in general and Yasmin Goonaratne’s poem Big Match
1983, the former providing a context for the discussion of the latter, while
in section 3.2 we will give you a brief biography of the author herself.

By its growing vitality and popularity in the last three decades, Sri
Lankan literature in English has put an end to the many debates about
its talented writers. Ashley Halpe (1964), a noted critic, observed in The
Ceylon Observer “Now, after more than a hundred years of Ceylonese
writing in English, we can at last see the approach of the end. For those
who have kept a finger on the pulse, the realization must barely be
accompanied by relief. Nothing of major significance has been
achieved, nor is such an achievement likely in the short future that
remains.”

Ashley Halpe

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In 1971, T. Kandiah, in his review-article New Ceylon English observed,
“There is no distinctively Ceylonese style for creative writing in English.
If a distinctively Ceylonese style of writing had ever had a moment when
it would have come into being the creative writers had missed it.”

In her Introduction to An Anthology of Modern Writing from Sri Lanka,

Rajini Oveysekere (1981) commented: “For the most part, the prognosis
for creative writing in English in Sri Lanka is gloomy. As has been the
case with the English Theatre in Sri Lanka, creative writing in English is
unlikely to have the chance for survival that its counterpart in India has.
However, Sri Lankan poetry in particular has achieved a quality in
English that is noteworthy.”

The colonial period of Sri Lanka, despite intermittent flashes, has been
generally a period of low achievement as far as writing in English is
concerned. Leonard Woolf’s The Village in the Jungle (1913) about Sri
Lanka remains still the best literature of the period in English. Forest Life
in Ceylon (1954), also by another Englishman, William Knighton, adds to
the list during the colonial period. But the creativity of the natives
themselves took to wings only after Independence in 1948 and Sri
Lankan writing in English, a sporadic but strong performance, emerged.

As part of the consequences of the Indian freedom struggle, Sri Lanka

also received its liberation. Hence a strong national consciousness has
not been forged by the Sri Lankans, as it had been done by the rest of
the Colonies. Frantz Fanon is of the opinion that violence is necessary
in the process of decolonisation to unify and truly liberate the natives.
But, in the case of Sri Lanka, a strong national current surfaced in the
early 1950s without any kind of violence, smoothly and gracefully. The
year 1956 has been considered a watershed in Sri Lankan history in
many ways. The Sri Lankan native dress replaced the western outfit,
and English itself was replaced by Sinhalese as the official language.
And precisely it is this move to oust English from its official status, which
made creative writers in English take off.

Sri Lankan writers in English have fared better in the genre of poetry
than in any other. The beginnings of their achievement lie in the 1930s
and 1940s; it has been claimed that George Keyt, well known as a
painter of extraordinary talent and author of three volumes of poetry –

74
Poems (1936), The Darkness Disrobed (1937) and Image in Absence
(1937) – is Sri Lanka’s “first modern poet”.
The Reverend W. S. Senior, a British missionary in Ceylon, published a
volume of poetry Vita Magistra in 1937. Senior does not share the
liberate ideas of fellow Englishman, Leonard Woolf, but he is colonial in
his feelings. He sees British imperialism as ‘tutelage’ and although he
thinks Ceylon’s progress is slow; he looks ahead to independence and
common wealth of nations and senses change in Ceylonese Society
during his own stay. His poetry is in the Tennysonian tradition and his
craftsmanship, though, obviously not of the order of Tennyson’s,
represents a level of competence. Perhaps, his poetry is best
summarised by George Orwell’s phrase “good bad Poetry”.

In the mid-1930s and early 1940s, poetry was written by the contributors
to the ‘Blue’ page, a magazine page of the Ceylon Daily News, and by
the Kandy Lake poets. These poets were influenced by the Romantics
and especially by Tennyson, the poets to whom their literary education
at school was then restricted. They were also inspired by Indian poets
such as Rabindranath Tagore and Sarojini Naidu and especially by W.
S. Senior’s effort to be a “band of Lanka”.

It is a curious coincidence that, like the great Romantic poets who died
young, most of the Kandy Lake poets (Sunetha Wickremasinghe, Helen
D’Alwis, Hector D’ Alwis and Earle Mendis) suffered a similar fate. They
were interested like the Georgian poets in nature and human emotions.
The keynote of their poems is “Dreaming”, and their poems tend to
reflect their well-to-do alienated though well-meaning existence
(alienated, that is, from the mass of the people, their traditions and their
problems).

Harrison Peiris, a writer of romantic verse, was more prolific – his works
are long out of print – but Earle Mendis was better endowed than most
of his school. Mendis’ poems have been collected in Kandyan Lotus
(1985). His language though is consciously poetic is simple and lively,
at times, going beyond description of feelings to convey his love for his
country and its ancient culture. His poems evoke the splendour and
calm of the untroubled Sri Lanka. It is almost during this period that
E.F.C. Ludowyk, the first Sri Lankan professor of English at the
University of Ceylon (1936) introduced ‘close reading’ and ‘practical

75
criticism’ in the place of Victorian criticism. He helped create awareness
of language and literature. Soon, Sri Lanka witnessed the first major
collection of poems by Patrick Fernando. His The Return of the Ulysses
(1955) turned away from the Romantic-Victorian tradition and thus
became a major achievement.

The Sri Lankan poets began to feel the strong nationalist currents after
1956. Their problems were similar to that faced by the rest of the
colonies – namely, on the one hand, the reconciliation of their own
sensibilities, indigenous traditions and realities and, on the other, the
western literary traditions and their influences. In the 1960s, the poet
Gamini Seneviratne wrote about this predicament and conflict in Two
Songs of Myself in Twenty-Five Poems (1974).

Sri Lankan critics have adopted the position of the West with regard to
the language of poetry. The critic Kandiah argues that the language of
the Sri Lankan writer should reflect, “in an ideal form the actual rhythms
and idiom of a living Ceylon.” Further, he says that the language of the
Sri Lankan writer in English gains vitality if “derived from Sinhala”, the
vernacular. The same idea has been reflected in Quadri Ismail’s
comment: “no Lankan poet, seeking to evolve through his work a Lankan
identity, can hope to do so without an equal commitment to the Lankan
language”. But, to pay special attention to language and to be
conscious of it is like separating language from experience and in the
poems of true poets their experiences find the language.

Lakdasa Wickramasinha is often eulogised for using Lankan English in

his poetry and his usage in original, incorporating expressions derived
from a variety of experiences. As Wole Soyinka observes: “We are now
beyond the “Prospero Caliban” syndrome of the complexities, which
attend the adoption of a language of colonial imposition: the “Prospero
Caliban” syndrome is dead.”

The years after independence also witnessed the prolific growth of

popular verse. Serious poetry, however, remained a minority art as
elsewhere in Sri Lanka. Talented poets like Yasmine Goonaratne and
Patrick Fernando, kept it going through their writing, globally. They
resemble each other in their tone and quality. Satire is their forte and

76
they combined it with concern. Goonaratne possesses a rare command
over language and form. She is orthodox in form and her poetry is
markedly different from that of her counterparts in Britain. She
incorporates in her poems distinctively Sri Lankan elements. Another
major poet is Anne Ranasinghe, a poet with a different cast of mind. Her
Jewishness and her awareness of Nazi atrocities are central to her
mature work, though she keeps close to the indigenous tradition.
Lyrical, her poems have a rare tragic vision.

Reggie Siriwardena is yet another important poet, who has a distinctive

style. He has published two collections, which have received critical
acclaim. Michael Ondaatje, a Canadian Sri Lankan, is a much-
acclaimed writer. The current ethnic crisis has proved a traumatic
experience to Sri Lankan poets. It has impelled Jean Arasanayagam to
depart from ornate poetry and concentrate on the “sorrow” in her land in
a straightforward manner. Like her and Goonaratne, many
contemporary writers have broken away from western traditions.

3.2 YASMIN GOONARATNE

Gooneratne’s writing engages with various themes. One theme that

continually appears in her works is a reflection upon how the past affects
the future. She relays many of her own experiences to make her points
more personal and more real to the reader. In this section, you will learn
about YASMIN GOONARATNE and her work Big Match 1983.

YASMIN GOONARATNE

77
A member of the well-known Sri Lankan Bandaranaike family, Yasmine
Gooneratne was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka. She obtained a Bachelor
of Arts (Hons) degree from the University of Ceylon and a Doctor of
Philosophy degree from Cambridge University, both in English
Literature. In 1953, she won the Senkadagala Memorial Prize for
Original Verse. Her professional activities include university professor,
literary critic, editor, biographer, bibliographer, novelist, essayist, short
story writer and poet. Yasmine Gooneratne is an acclaimed South Asian
writer for she has authentically portrayed political and social reality that
exists in Sri Lanka.

3.2.1 Early Life and Work

Yasmine Goonaratne immigrated to Australia in 1972 and her Six

Thousand Foot Death Dive (1981) records her difficulty in writing poetry
as an emigrant. Diasporic, her poems have a rare quality of pathos and
reminiscences.

Born in Colombo, Sri Lanka, she attended Bishop’s College, Colombo,

graduated in English from the University of Ceylon and earned a Ph.D.
from the University of Cambridge, England. She was a lecturer in
English at the University of Ceylon from 1959 until 1972, when she
immigrated to Australia. She has since been in the School of English
and Linguistics, Macquarie University, where she is a professor of
English and the founding director of its Post-Colonial Literatures and
Language Research Centre. In 1981, the Macquarie University
conferred on her its first Doctor of Letters degree.

In her doctoral dissertation, published as English Literature in Ceylon

1815 – 1878 (1968), Gooneratne, like the older generation of critics in
Sri Lanka and elsewhere, extended the application of ‘Cambridge
English’ to the new field of Commonwealth literature. She was the
pioneer critic of Sri Lankan literature in English and performed a
valuable service in launching a journal, New Ceylon Writing, in 1970, to
replace the last in the line of Sri Lankan journals in English, Community,
which has ceased publication in 1963. Her critical studies Jane Austen
(1970) and Alexander Pope (1976) continue to hold the interest of both
general reader and scholar. The most sophisticated of her studies of

78
individual writers is Silence, Exile and Cunning: The Fiction of Ruth
Prawer Jhabvala (1983). Diverse Inheritance: A Personal Perspective on
Commonwealth Literature (1980) is a collection of essays.

Gooneratne is probably best known, especially outside Sri Lanka, for her
work as a critic, but her first two collections of poetry, Word Bird Motif
(1971) and The Lizard’s Cry and Other Poems (1972) are equally
valuable. A member of the upper class, she is at times rather aristocratic
in her poetry, like W. B. Yeats in his Coole Park poems. But, she is able
to transcend the limitations imposed by her origins to become a critic of
her class. In Post-office Queue her affluent but apologetic persona
addresses a ‘sister’ of lower class. Aware of the problems of crossing
class barriers, she still makes an attempt; the poem’s irony is targeted at
upper-class attitudes.

In Peace Game, while Gooneratne satirically and allegorically

contemplates class conflict, the tension of the poem suggests another
dimension – international power politics. Satire and wit, befitting her
familiarity with the Augustans, are her strengths. Gooneratne, however,
is capable of combining these elements with deep feeling, as in The
Second Chance; she also writes effective love poetry as in Rocks in
Marine Drive and White Cranes. In her poetry, Gooneratne had
mastered an alien language and alien forms, moulding them with ease to
the experiences she wishes to express. Critics such as M. C. Bradbrook
judge the fifty-three poems of Word Bird Motif to be ‘mastery in their
range and ease.’

In The Lizard’s Cry, her most ambitious and longest poem, Goonaratne
attempts to combine the convention of the sandesaya or message poem
of Sanskrit and Sinhala traditions with an eighteenth-century ‘imitation’ of
Pope’s Dunciad, replacing Pope’s content with local material while
retaining the form and spirit of the original. Gooneratne’s poem works
only in patches; her satire, which is not sufficiently objective or positive,
deteriorates into vituperation.

Although alienation prevented Gooneratne from relating to the concerns

of the mass of the people and has limited her range, it did not stall her
creativity, while she remained in Sri Lanka. Immigrated to Australia,

79
partly because of the ‘solemn dons and grave administrators’ she
satirises in Masks in the University Senate Room, she experienced
alienation. Six Thousand Foot Death Dive (1981) contains poems
written in Australia, Honolulu, USA, and Sri Lanka between 1972 and
1981.

Nine years is a long interval to precede a slim volume of twenty-nine

short poems, and it is a disappointing performance for a poet who had
been so prolific, though explicable in the light of what she says about her
immigration in the poems themselves. Australia has diminished her
satiric fire and has wrought changes. Her technique has altered; while
she had earlier exploited clarity and precision of style, ‘she is now
exploring the resources of resonance, the depths and echoes that rim
the edges of a poet’s line,’ according to critic Lakshmi de Silva. More
significant, however, is her preoccupation with exile, especially the
difficulty of writing poetry in Australia. Like Coleridge in Dejection: An
Ode, Goonaratne expresses her inability to communicate. Her
alienation in a foreign country is responsible for the poetry in this volume
failing to achieve the quality of her earlier verse.

Her work entitled Reflecting Merits: A Personal Memoir of the

Bandaranaike Family of Sri Lanka (1986) could be considered a
substitute for the poetry Goonaratne did not or could not write after
1983. In it she chronicles the history of her family. While expatriate Sri
Lankan Michael Ondaatje in Running in the Family (1982) selects a
semi-factual, semi-imaginative mode, Goonaratne is wholly factual.
Both authors surrender partially to the blandishments of their community
– the Burghers (people of mixed Sri Lankan and Dutch or Portuguese
ancestry) and the Sri Lankan upper class, respectively – while being
critical of it. Both write well and offer a personal odyssey as well as a
history of a segment of Sri Lankan society.

Awards and Recognition

Goonaratne’s achievement is many-faceted: she is a critic, poet,

memoirist, and university teacher. For her distinguished contribution to
Sri Lankan and Australian literature and education she was awarded the

80
Order of Australia in 1990. In 1991 Goonaratne published a novel, A
Change of Skies, about South Asian immigrants in Australia.

Gooneratne has around 20 published books that include critical studies

of Jane Austen, Alexander Pope, and contemporary novelist and screen
writer Ruth Prawer Jhabvala. She has also written volumes of literary
essays as well as poems, short stories, a family memoir, and
two novels. In 1991, she was awarded a Writer’s Fellowship at Varuna
Writer’s Centre where she edited the final draft of one of her novels, A
Change of Skies. This novel later won the Marjorie Barnard Literary
Award for Fiction in 1992 and was shortlisted for the 1991
Commonwealth Writers Prize. Her second novel, Pleasures of
Conquest, was shortlisted for the 1996 Commonwealth Writers
Prize. She has also contributed various articles, poetry, short stories,
and other writings to many different anthologies and journals. Her work
has been presented on television, radio, and at public readings around
Australia and many other parts of the world. Her achievements are
recorded in Who’s Who of Australia 1997 and in The Oxford Companion
to Australian Literature.

3.2.2 The poem: Big Match 1983

The racial fire that rages in Sri Lanka is described as ‘big match’ – the
match between the ethnic Tamils and the Sinhalese and the scores of
people dead on either side, the amount of destruction caused by the
factions seem to raise the tension and this is compared to the frenzy felt
by the cricket fans at England’s Oval Stadium.
In the poem Big Match, 1983;Yasmine Gooneratne has registered her
sorrow over the violent communal clashes which completely disrupted
the diligently built cultural poetics of the multiracial and multicultural
country. The violence of July 1983 was a moment of ignominy in the
history of Sri Lanka for the ruling Sinhalese majority conducted an
officially sanctioned pogrom against the Tamil minority. Even after the
harrowing effects of the aftermath of the Second World War, humanity
has failed to learn the importance of compassion and humanism.
Though Sri Lanka had a rich cultural heritage, the discrepancy prevailing
in society has ransacked the edifice of the cultural mosaic of a multi
racial community.

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To reiterate, the poem Big Match 1983 discusses the ethnic issue and
the continuous bloodshed in the beautiful land of trees. Contextualising
the poem around the cricket match of 1983, she mentions that the “racial
pot boils over” and, as a result of which, the tourists who had come to
see the world cup cricket match “glimpsing the headlines in the
newspapers”,

Scuttle for cover, cancel their options

On rooms with views of temple and holy mountains

‘Flash point in paradise’. Racial pot boils over.

The fight had broken. The otherwise beautiful palm fringed Jaffna
reverberates with gunshots. People who had, at last, returned to the
mother country wanting to get back to their roots like the “gone away
boy”.

Who had hoped to find lost roots, lost lovers,

lost talent even, out among the palms,
makes timely return giving thanks

that Toronto is quite romantic enough

for his purposes

return to their land of immigration.

The poet carefully constructs the emotional value of the situation, by

using words and phrases like “gone away boy”, “lost talent even”,
“purposes”, etc. She captures effectively the reason for which people left
Sri Lanka. In other words, the ability to live a normal life and to continue
living has forced many to discontinue the pursuits in their land and settle
in an alien land and culture. They had to forget their natural talents,
develop newer ones for survival and they have gone away for good.

The headlines announce the ethnic war and the people of Sri Lanka
distanced from their land not caught in the midst of the war and forced to
take sides by sharing and sheltering, objectively analyse the situation.
Whatever had caused the ethnic issue to take to such a proportion is a

82
question that is uppermost in the minds of those involved and interested
in preserving Sri Lanka. They try

…to trace

the match that lit this sacrificial fire,

the steps by which we reached this ravaged place.
We talk of ‘Forty Eight’ and ‘Fifty Six’

of freedom, and the treacherous politics

of language.

Using the cricket match analogy, the poem goes on to explore how
independence in 1948 and the subsequent assumption of power by the
nationalist government headed by Bandaranaike in 1956, paved the way
for ethnic riots. The issue of official language – the poet calls it
“treacherous language”, since it has robbed one section of the land to be
part of it. The language matchstick, which lit the national campfire, has
not been put off by the government. The poet also is able to see that the
spark that has been set off by language issue has developed into a
racial issue and is beyond control. It is in “other hands” – in the hands of
the passionate on either side, and the fires set by the passions:

…ring factory, the house, and hovel,

and Big Match fever, flaming high and fast,

has both sides in its grip and promises

dizzier scores than any at the Oval.

Nothing escapes the rage. Anything that is the ‘others’ is consumed by

fire and ravaged. Even national treasures and what belongs to future
are not preserved. The poet narrates the story (a true story) of a man of
letters holding on to his books and in agony drinking heavily to prepare
to save his book, if they were to be destroyed. He keeps giving report of
home front over phone to those abroad:

In a tall house dim with old books and pictures

83
 calm hands quiet the clamouring telephone.
It’s strange life, we’re leading here just now,

not a dull moment. No one can complain

of boredom, that’s for sure. Up all night keeping watch,

and then as curfew ends and your brave lads

dash out at dawn to start another day

of fun, and games and general jollity

I send Padmini and the girls to a neighbour’s house.

It is rather puzzling to know under such grim situation, what “fun, games
and general jollity” the author can be talking about. But life goes on
even in the ‘war ravaged’ Jaffna. Youth find ways for fun and women
and girls are taken care of. The sensitive drink a little more though he
“always was a drinking man,”

…I always was

a drinking man, you know, and nowadays

I’m stepping up my intake quite a bit,
the general idea being that when those torches

came within fifty feet of this house, don’t you see,

it won’t be my books that go up first, but me.

The sensitive intellectual, supports himself with liquor to face
reality, and the poet once again successfully brings out the
underlying anguish when he rings off by saying:
…Thanks, by the way, for ringing.

There’s nothing you can do to help us, but

its’ good to know some lines haven’t yet been cut.

The rest of the poem captures the burning of familiar places, the fear
and agony of losing close ones and the heartlessness of those in power.

Shopfronts in the Pettah, landmarks of our childhood

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 Curl like old photographs in the flames…
at the corner of Duplication Road a child lies dead

and two policemen look the other way.

and Sri Lanka, a land of fine culture and beauty burns and along
with it,
The joys of childhood, friendship of our youth
ravaged by pieties and politics

screaming across our screens, her agony.

at last exposed.

“Sri Lanka burns alive”, losing herself, her values and whatever remains
of the big match set on in 1956 are nothing but carcasses of values.

Using the match of 1983 as the controlling metaphor, the poet talks
about the match of minds, might, language, faith and race. The telling
images and the moving diction depicts the scenic reality, effectively. The
fine mosaic of culture built over the centuries in the country is laid waste
and rendered useless by the racial clash. Goonaratne’s is an insightful
commentary of the land’s predicament. Big Match 1983, while reflecting
her concern for ethnic harmony, suggests an awareness that the Sri
Lankan milieu, from which her poetry had taken value and strength, has
been irrevocably changed by civil war and is, in fact, no more.
Gross human rights violation, radical power politics, legitimized terrorism
ravaged the nation to shreds. The agony and anguish of the nation was
exposed to the world through the poignant literary works. In spite of
international involvement, peaceful co-existence remains a farfetched
dream. With the expectation that her poetry might act as a panacea for
the troubles insinuated by separatist mentality and would bring peace to
the war ravaged country.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 2.2
Describe the metaphor used in the poem Big Match 1983.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

3.3 MAMTA KALIA

In Subsection 3.3, we will give you a reasonable background about

Indian women poets (poetess). This will set the background for the
discussion of Mamta Kalia’s poem Tribute to Papa in Subsection 3.3

3.3.1 Indian women poets in English

Indian women poets writing in English have always correlated the inner
realms of women’s experiences with the outside world of physical reality.
The poetry of the colonial period is characterised by romantic vision.
Toru Dutt, the earliest of Indian women writer in English, revived

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legendary tales and chose such characters as Sita and Savitri to portray
Indian womanhood in her collection Ancient Ballads and Legends of
Hindustan (1882). Many of Sarojini Naidu’s poems are melodious,
sensuous excursions into familiar landscapes studded with clear-cut
images of Indian village girls and princesses. Her anthologies The
Golden Threshold (1905) and The Broken Wing (1917), among others,
are greatly influenced by the romantic tradition. Like all colonial writings,
these early writings are an imitation of western form and native themes.

The women writers, who belonged to the next phase, soon after
independence though still conventional, attempted to lend voice to
female confinement and suffocation. Kamala Das and Monica Varma,
who started writing after independence, emphasise the need for creating
an inner space undivorced from the patriarchal order, a balance that
they see as integral to the concept of the Indian family.

Varma’s collections include Dragonfly Draw Flame (1962), Greenleaves

and Gold (1970) Past Imperative (1972). Kamala Das wrote Summer in
Calcutta: A Collection of Poems (1965), Descendents (1967) and The
Old Playhouse and other poems (1973). Das created a drama of
selfhood that seeks to confront unveiled feelings and dormant
experiences. The complaint and longing found in earlier Indian women’s
poetry is replaced in Das’s work by sexual traumas and journeys.

The poetry of Gauri Deshponde continues the tradition of Varma.

Deshponde’s first collection of poems, Between Births (1968) was
followed by Last Love (1970) and Beyond the Slaughterhouse (1972).
Her poetry is rooted in reality and deals with the minutiae of everyday
life, such as the coming of a lover, the ingratitude of children, or the
death of a puppy. Though a sense of sadness, loss, barrenness and
loneliness is found in her poems, Deshponde explores the possibility of
healthy and positive relationships among individuals. Her love poems
are sublime and are not daringly overt like Das’s and Varma’s poems.

Women poets in India have also concentrated on mainstream thoughts

regarding social consciousness and personal relationships. They are
interwoven in the poems of writers like Eunice De Souza. Her poems in
Fix (1979) revive memories of Catholic Goan life in Poona, with its

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repressions, idiosyncrasies, social prejudices and familial relationships.
De Souza explores personal relationships with precision, to avoid
emotional over-clouding. The subjects of her satire are the church,
marriage, motherhood, and hypocrisy, Goan vulgarity, and the isolation
of the Goan Catholic in India. Her later poetry is confessional in tone
and creates a mosaic of guilt, desire and revelations which are part of
her cultural heritage. The poems are studies in female subjugation,
which in turn prevents women from being part of socially creative
activities.

Melanie Silgardo, like De Souza, concentrates on issues related to

women. She uses a direct colloquial style and evokes ironic images of
social traditions. Silgardo’s collection The Earthworm Story (1978) is
charged with emotional content. The poem The Earthworm Story is a
projection of the humiliation and insecurity that women feel in a
masculine society. Woman’s world becomes a cycle of self-hate,
horrifying fears, insecurities, failed relationships and overburdened-self.
Her collection Skies of Design (1985) also talks about women but this
time about their newfound spaces. The confessional tone blends with
the familial and social concerns. Memories of family life as in For Father
on the Shelf (concerning her dead father), are often self-explorations
through encounters between the private self and society. While most
women writers in India have tried to portray humiliations, contradictions
and defeats that confront women, they also show how not to succumb to
it. Many of the poets have sought to clear a space for women and map
women’s language.

Leela Dharmaraj’s Slum Silhoute and other poems (1966), S. Santhi’s

Lamplight in the Sun (1967), Lakshmi Kannan’s Draupadi and She,
Anuradha Potdar’s Motherhood and Sa. Usha’s To Mother are
explorations of womanhood, motherhood and the female psyche set
against the backdrop of changing conventional attitudes and traditions.

The most notable India woman poet of the 1980s is Meena Alexander,
whose first volume of poems, The Bird’s Bright Ring (1976) took the
world by surprise. Her concern about the continually violated humanism
broke the tedium of feminist poems. Her collections including Without
Place (1977), I Root my Name (1977), Stone Roots (1980) and House of

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a Thousand Doors (1988) explore the pain associated with one’s
heritage and the violated potentials of women.

An immigrant writer settled in U S A, Alexander’s is an Asian American’s

diasporic longing. Most autobiographical in tone, her poem ranges from
reminiscences of Bala Maniamma, a Malayalam poet, to the gruesome
report of a woman gang-raped by the police. Her poems reflect a rich
inter-textuality that seeks to unify and enrich her understanding of life.
Experiences of despair, suicide and death are frequently analysed in her
poems.

The 1980s and the decades after have seen a growth in the thoughts of
women writers in India. Writers like Suniti Namjoshi, who lives in
Canada, and has brought out two collections Cyclone in Pakistan
(1972), The Jackass and the Lady (1980) reflect an expatriate’s sense of
separate identity. Her deep social awareness is seen in poems such as
E. P. Declaration of Independence in which the poet talks of the nuclear
age which has sparked off hatred and ill-will.

Recent writings in India by women tend to be self-reflexive in form. A

more expansive vision of self and reality has replaced the confessional
tone.

Mamta Kalia

Mamta Kalia

Mamta Kalia is a prominent Indian writer known for her invaluable

contribution towards literature in form of short stories, plays, novels,
essays and poetry. In this section, you will learn about Mamta Kalia and
her work Tribute to Papa.

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Introduction

As an Indian woman poet, she is conscious of her identity in the

traditional Indian society and raises her voice against the oppression of
women with a great sense of vigour and involvement. Her poetry like
Kamala Das‟s poetry is highly autobiographical in content as her early
life with a dominant father, a loveless relationship with her husband and
his family and humiliation in her professional life develop her anger and
a sense of revolt against the repressive patriarchy under which she is
victimized and defeated. So her poetry accordingly depicts the agonies
of women in the Indian patriarchal tradition which is largely due to
subjugation and bondage under male culture. Her poetry shows a
rebellious will to fight for the cause of women and demands a world free
from discriminative values, hypocrisies and prejudiced rules and
demands the establishment of women‟s identity in the contemporary
world.
Early Life

Kalia was born in Vrindavan, Uttar Pradesh, and studied in Delhi,

earning an M.A. in English from the University of Delhi. Her father
worked for All India Radio, India's national broadcaster. Kalia taught at
the SNDT Women's University in Mumbai, and also at Women's Service
House Degree College in Allahabad, and retired from teaching in 2001.
Kalia's husband, Ravindra Kalia, was also a popular Hindi
author. Following her retirement, Kalia headed the Bharatiya Bhasha
Parishad, a literarary organization based in Kolkata, that publishes
translations of works of literature to and from Hindi.

Awards and Recognition

Kalia won the Vyas Samman, one of India's richest literary awards, for
her novel Dukkham Sukkham in 2017. The award was presented by
Mridula Sinha, the governor of Goa, who described the novel as having
"captured the essence of Indian culture. Kalia's previous

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novel, Beghar (Homeless) was very commercially successful, running to
five editions. She has written several novels and collections of short
stories, four collections of poetry, as well as two collections of plays. She
is currently writing a biography of her husband, as well as a book about
the history of Allahabad.Her writing engages with the lived experiences
of women, often in middle-class families in India.She has also won
several other literary awards, including the Yashpal Katha Samman,
Sahitya Bhushan Samman, Ram Manohar Lohiya Samman, Mahadevi
Varma Samman, and the Sita Award.

3.3.2 The poem: Tribute to Papa

Mamta Kalia is one of the first Indian women poets writing in English to
explore the paradoxes inherent in any process of identification. In
Anonymous (1979) she writes: “I no longer feel I am Mamta Kalia/I’m
Kamla/or Vimla/or Kanta or Shanta”. Her poems are marked by the
theme of free love posed against conventionality. In Tribute to Papa
(1970), she rebels against patriarchy and the inhibiting world of middle
class with its strict morals. Her poems explore the cribbing and
controlling influence of male dominance. In such poems as Break
Through the desire to break free from the world of routine housework
motivates an exploration of themes of madness.

Born in the late forties, Mamta Kalia published her first collection of
poems Tribute to Papa and Other Poems in 1970. In 1978, her Poems
’78 marked by the theme of free love and resistance to tradition and
conventionality appeared. Finely attuned to the rhythms of
contemporary English, Mamta Kalia employs a sophisticated vocabulary.
The intimacy with the English language is seen in most of her poems in
the ease and fluidity of their construction. Her poems Compulsions and
Tribute to Papa find their place in most of the anthologies.

'Tribute to Papa' by Mamta Kalia is a challenging poem in which Mamta

tries to compel the readers to understand the hardships of being a
woman that the society wants her to be. In this poem, she portrays men
dominance over women in all matters of life.
Mamta tries to question her father why should his traditional values
determine the fate of his daughter. She questions whether if he cared
enough for his daughter's own voice and opinion. Tribute to Papa pays a

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different kind of tribute to a father. It is rather the poet trying to sort out
the different values that she and her father had.

Tribute to Papa is a record of the poet’s feelings about patriarchy and

her rebellion against it. Her father represents patriarchy in the poem and
she tells him very clearly in the opening line, her resentment against
him. Why would the poet care for the father or for patriarchal norms?
“Who cares for you?” she says, and reiterates who really cares for
patriarchal values like

Clean thoughts, clean

words, clean teeth?

Who wants to be an angel like you?

Who wants it?

She just would not care for any of the man made laws. The rage within
her wants her to flout every norm in society and in the process even the
good ones are ignored. To her, the father is a very unsuccessful man
who just could not manage to have access to comfort and riches. The
poet finds fault with the father’s need to be a “model man” – “a sort of
idea”, she calls it.

When you can’t think of doing anything,

You start praying,

Spending useless hours at the temple

You want me to be like you, Papa.

Whatever may be the father’s desires for her, his wanting her to be like
him doing right by the world, or be like Rani Lakshmibai, a model
woman, the poet wants to defy it. She will:

give two donkey-claps for your greatness

And three for Rani Lakshmibai.

These days I am seriously thinking of disowning you, Papa.

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 You and your sacredness.

At least, if the father had smuggled watches and called it import-export

business, she would have admired him but he always lived a life of
limited dreams and the poet can only feel sorry for him for having the
strength to be straight forward. Feeling uneasy, angry, and kind of
disturbed about his way of living she wants to break loose from it. She
wants to know what the father would do if she starts calling:

Mr.Kapur, Lower

Division Clerk, Accounts Section?

Everything about you clashes with nearly everything about me.

You suspect I am having a love affair these days,
But you’re too shy to have it confirmed.

It is very clear from the tone of the author her disgust for a clean, clear
life and all because the rules have been laid down by patriarchy. She
teases the father, who does not want to confirm the daughter’s affair.

What if my tummy starts showing gradually?

And I refuse to have it curetted?

What is confusing in the poem is, when one can understand the anger of
a sensitive woman against patriarchal rigidity and disciplinary codes for
women folk, it is beyond our comprehension as to why she would be
against clean living and would rather prefer a smuggler’s life - indeed an
immature, romantic notion of an impulsive nature. However, in the
closing lines of the poem, she gives us a better picture of the poet when
she says:

But I’ll be careful, Papa

Or I know you’ll at once think of suicide.

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One is bemused by the fact that a rebellious nature should make
accommodation for other’s feelings. Inadvertently the speaker seems to
fall a pray to the blackmailing tactics of patriarchy.
The poem, like most of her other poems, earned Mamta Kalia the place
of a minor poet in Indian writing in English, the reasons being obvious.
Emotional and impulsive, the poet is just coming out of the clutches of
patriarchy and still floundering. After the initial anger is blown off, the
poet seems to get back to her cozy shell that tradition has built for her.
Detesting the father’s habits, lack of drive, wishes for the children to be
Lakshmibai, his spending long hours in prayers and threatening him
about having an affair and becoming pregnant, the poet in a moment
surrenders to the one strong (weakness) feminine emotion, namely,
concern/compassion.

Easy readability and simplicity renders the poem less analytical. The
scope of the poem being so limited, the reader must stand outside the
poem to analyse the psychology of women during the period and
discuss if the anger is legitimate and honest. It would be no
exaggeration to say that it is both and the only snag being the poem is
rather too very simple to stand for any ideology.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 3.3

Comment on the psychology of women as analysed by the
poet in Tribute to papa.

Note:
a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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SUMMARY

In this Unit, we gave you a brief account of the emergence of Sri Lankan
and Indian writing in English in order to provide a context for the
discussion that followed concerning women poets in English in both
these contexts. We began the Unit by chronicling the genesis of Sri
Lankan writing in English in general. Following this discussion, we
analysed Jasmin Goonaratne’s poem Big Match 1983, which using the
cricket metaphor delineated the havoc ethnic riots unleashed in Sri
Lanka. We then gave you a glimpse of Indian women poets writing in
English and presented a critique of Mamta Kalia’s poem, Tribute to
Papa, denouncing patriarchy.

REFERENCES

https://scholarblogs.emory.edu/postcolonialstudies/2014/06/10/goonerat
ne-yasmine/

https://www.austlit.edu.au/austlit/page/A29562
https://scholarblogs.emory.edu/postcolonialstudies/2014/06/10/goonerat
ne-yasmine/

http://www.tjprc.org/publishpapers/2-40-1392101606-
Sri%20Lankan%20Cultural%20Poetics%20recent.%20full.pdf
https://www.shethepeople.tv/home-top-video/kamala-das-poetry-
inspired-womanhood/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mamta_Kalia#:~:text=3%20Selected%20wo
rks-,Life

https://brainly.in/question/15444820

VIDEO LINK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CgaZkVJe2hI

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhPd93yJKXA

95
BLOCK- 3

UNIT – 4 ELAINE SHOWALTER AND KATE MILLETT

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

4.1 Feminist Criticism: An Introduction

4.2 Elaine Showalter
4.2.1 Early life and work
4.2.2 Towards a Feminist Poetics: The Essay
4.3 Kate Millett
4.3.1 A biography

4.3.2 A critique of Sexual Politics

Summary

OVERVIEW
In this Unit, we trace the evolution of feminist criticism with particular
reference to Elaine Showalter and Kate Millett. We will begin the Unit
with a brief discussion of feminist criticism. We will then analyse
Showalter’s Towards a Feminist Poetics and Kate Millett’s Sexual
Politics in the context of Chapter 3 in Part II.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 Trace the evolution of feminist criticism;

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 Give a critique analysis Towards a Feminist Poetics and Sexual
Politics.

4.1 FEMINIST CRITICISM: AN INTROUDCTION

The concept of ‘feminism’ may appear outwardly monolithic, unified or

singularly definable. However, the more closely we start reading feminist
criticism, the more we see the multiplicity of approaches within the
system. Though feminisms are multiple, feminists do share a few beliefs.
Feminist critics generally agree that the oppressions of women are a fact
of life, that gender leaves its traces in literary texts and on literary
history. Feminist literary criticism plays a worthwhile part in the struggle
to end oppression in the world outside the texts.

‘Gender’ is another rubric by which feminist criticism can usually be

identified. But ‘gender’ is a debatable term. Some writers use it to mean
biological sex, whereas others insist on making a distinction between
biology and culture. The latter theorists argue that masculinity and
femininity are not pre-determined by the body itself, but are constructed
within culture. The ‘female’ then is a matter of sex and the ‘feminine’ is a
matter of culture.

Some feminists use this distinction as a key for combating ‘essentialism’

or hold a deterministic view that ‘biology is destiny’. A few others
consider the biological facts of femaleness a potential libratory for
women, encouraging women to celebrate difference from the male
‘norm’. Still others resist the binary opposition of sex and gender,
arguing that the cultural differences are, after all, instilled on the basis of
the biological differences. All of these versions of what ‘gender’ means
have a bearing upon literary studies.

Feminist criticism has grown mainly out of the modern feminist

movement of the 1960s and 1970s, though earlier writers like Virginia
Woolf (A Room of one’s own, 1928) and Simone de Behauvoir (The
Second Sex, 1949) had already formed the dialectic. The 1960s and
1970s saw American, French and British schools trying, in their own

97
way, to continue the dialectics and all of them agreed that literary
analysis, largely in the hands of men, should be used by women to
control and influence meaning and to show that gender is a fundamental
determinant in literature and life.

Critics like Ellen Moers suggested the creating of a separate woman’s

tradition. Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar found in the already
canonised writers an essential pattern of repetition – the suppressed
female. Kate Millett was concerned with the fact that patriarchy
victimised women, and Elaine Showalter insisted on women forming a
subculture.

Feminist activists often find that issues of gender, race, ethnicity, class
and sexuality are woven together. Accordingly, feminist political work
struggles against systems of oppression generated by racism, sexism,
heterosexuality and class and often examines how women and other
identity groups, based on these divisions, have been marginalized by
social practices. The concept of “woman as other”, developed by
Simone de Behauvoir, has been used to explaining marginalisation.
Feminist activists work to undo institutional structures, habits and social
practices propounding and perpetrating the view that considers women
second-class citizens.

Academic feminism comprises a body of thought that builds upon the

following five commitments:

(1) Valuing women and their specific contributions to society.

(2) Critically analysing the past to understand how patriarchal practices

devalued women.

(3) Analysing sex-gender constructions that emphasise male-female

differences and examining differences among women, especially in
terms of race, ethnicity, sexuality, class, age, body shape and
religion as well as other categories of identity that are used to
denigrate, dismiss or de-legitimate persons without consideration of
the merit of their actions, thought or character.

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(4) Formulating new understandings that can transform social, political
and personal practices on the basis of women’s contributions, values
and experiences.

(5) Working towards social and personal transformations through

political activities designed to enable women to participate as full
citizens in public life.

These commitments together are termed as feminist theory, feminist

scholarship or gender analysis. Feminist scholars develop a value-
oriented analysis, and they consider it a contribution to political thought.
A variety of feminist approaches to scholarship have emerged with
differing assumptions about human nature, social values, political goals,
epistemological strategies and analyses of gender power relationships.

To understand feminist thought, one has to consider two of its key

aspects, which transformed western political thought. The first is the
assumption that women’s contributions are as significant as that of men
and the second is the suspicion of abstractions that may hide patriarchal
assumptions. Feminist scholars emphasise the particularity of women’s
experiences, and academic feminists use feminist values to reform
academic practices so that they can be transformed to include women
and women’s values.

In reforming social life, feminist scholars use four major approaches, and
these are:

(1) The new feminist empirical theory, which concentrates on gender-

inclusive issues.

(2) The radical feminists who begin with women’s experiences to reform
social thought from the bottom up. They begin with women’s lives to
theorise about society, without depending on the theories based on
men’s lives. They emphasise the ways in which women can work
with each other to develop new ways of thinking and new ways of
living.

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(3) By building on women’s values, feminists strive to reform society.
They emphasise the way in which women’s values, especially those
that women place on relationship and connection, are useful for
restructuring society.

(4) Represented by the post-modernists, this approach seeks political

transformation.

Thus, academic feminism represents diverse approaches to

understanding women’s situation. Nevertheless, they share the
common knowledge that the sex-gender system permeates human
existence.

While the approaches are not exhaustive, they suggest the major ways
in which contemporary feminist scholars see themselves as being
involved in transforming societies. Twentieth century feminism winds its
course through progressively new identities of ‘women’.

The movement from a ‘first wave’ feminism, which is principally

concerned with equalities, to a ‘second wave’ feminism, which uses
women’s difference to oppose the ‘legalities’ of a patriarchal world, is a
radical and visionary formation. Broadly speaking, 20 th century feminists
choose one of the two positions. While the ‘first wave’ feminism might
be said to have ended with Simone de Behauvoir’s Second Sex (1949),
the debate she set on regarding women’s individual and collective social
and political contribution is still carried on. The ‘second wave’ develops
the issues related to ‘reproduction’, ‘experience’ and ‘difference’.
‘Second wave’ feminists take as their starting point the politics of
reproduction, while sharing first wave feminisms politics of legal,
educational and economic equal rights for women.

With the popularisation of the French theory in the 1920s and 1930s,
women’s bodies became annexure of the heterosexual families, and
second wave feminists like Kate Millett engagingly ridiculed the notions
of Freud, and rendered him unreadable and obsolete. With Millett’s
1970 bestseller Sexual Politics, the politics of gender entered a new

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phase, and since that time, feminist criticism has been developed,
analysed and diversified as never before. In 1970, three revolutionary
books appeared within a few months of each other. Germaine Greer’s
Female Eunuch, Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics and Eva Fige’s Patriarchal
Attitudes through their witty, eloquent, wide ranging polemics crystallised
the crucial 1960s in the history of feminism.

Against this background in what follows in Sections 4.2 and 4.3, we will
take up Elaine Showalter and Kate Millett, respectively.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 4.1

Trace the evolution of feminist criticism.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

4.2 ELAINE SHOWALTER

In Subsections 4.2.1 and 4.2.2, we will introduce you to Elaine Showalter

and her essay, Towards a Feminist Poetics.

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Elane Showalter is an American Literary Critic, feminist and writer on
cultural and social issues. She is one of the founders of feminist literary
criticism in United States academia, developing the concept and practice
of gynocritics. In this section, you will learn about Elaine Showalter and
her work Towards a Feminist Poetics.

Elane Showalter
Introduction
Elaine Showalter (1941- ) is an American literary critic, feminist
and writer on cultural and social issues. Born in Boston, Showalter
studied at The University of California, Davis. Elaine Showalter,
American literary critic and teacher and founder of gynocritics, a school
of feminist criticism concerned with “woman as writer…with the history,
themes, genres, and structures of literature by women.”

4.2.1 Early life and work

Showalter studied English at Bryn Mawr College (B.A., 1962), Brandeis

University (M.A., 1964), and the University of California, Davis (Ph.D.,
1970). She joined the faculty of Douglass College, the women’s division
of Rutgers University, in 1969, where she developed women’s studies
courses and began editing and contributing articles to books and

102
periodicals about women’s literature. She later taught at Rutgers
and Princeton University, neither of which hired women when she began
her teaching career; she retired from Princeton as professor emeritus in
2003. Showalter also spent time as a freelance journalist and media
commentator.
Since 1984 she has been a professor at Rutgers and Princeton. She is
a specialist in Victorian literature and her most innovative and interesting
work has been in the field of madness and hysteria in literature,
specifically in women’s writing and the portrayal of female characters.
Her first critical work A Literature of their own: British Women Novelists
from Brontë to Lessing (1978) presented an alternative canon of writing
by women.

Showalter’s other works include The Female Malady: Women, Madness

and English Culture 1830-1980 (1985), Sexual Anarchy: Gender and
Culture at the Fin-de-Siecle (1991), The New Feminist Criticism (1985)
and Speaking of Gender (1989). Throughout her works, Showalter has
sought to ground literary criticism in an understanding of the historical
specificity of women’s writing. In Hystories: Hysterical Epidemics and
Modern Culture (1997), she explored six contemporary afflictions. The
essay Towards a Feminist Poetics (1979) gave a new coinage
‘gynocriticism’. Under the banner of ‘gynocriticism’, Showalter described
the entire history of women writers – their literary careers, their favorite
genres and their techniques.

The late 1970s and early 1980s saw the beginning of the enterprise of
mapping out the “tradition” of women’s writing. The impulse to tell the
story of women predecessors, not included in the “Great Tradition” was
strong. The theories of women’s traditions conceive literary development
in terms of “phases”, “models” or “moments” and they typically see
change as evidence in progress.

As early as 1977, however, Elaine Showalter’s A Literature of Their Own

concentrated on British women writers, who published novels after 1840
and found in their works, “An imaginative continuum, the recurrence of
certain patterns, themes, problems and images from generation to
generation.”

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Showalter is concerned by stereotypes of feminism that see feminist
critics as being ‘obsessed with the phallus’ and ‘obsessed with
destroying male artists’. Showalter wonders if such stereotypes emerge
from the fact that feminism lacks a fully articulated theory.

Another problem for Showalter is the way in which feminists turn away
from theory as a result of the attitudes of some male academics: theory
is their property. Showalter writes: ‘From this perspective, the academic
demand for theory can only be heard as a threat to the feminist need for
authenticity, and the visitor looking for a formula that he or she can take
away without personal encounter is not welcome’. In response,
Showalter wants to outline a poetics of feminist criticism.

She has attributed this to “the female subculture” which, in Victorian

England especially, ensured that women’s experience of living and of
writing would be pointedly distinct from that of men. She raises
questions about the comparative value of “major” and “minor” novelists’
outputs. She traces the effect of male criticism on nineteenth century
women novelists.

4.2.2 Towards a Feminist Poetics: The essay

In her 1979 essay, Towards a Feminist Poetics, Showalter points out
that feminist criticism can be divided into two distinct types.

The first type is concerned with “woman as reader” in which women

have been reading literature produced by men. Showalter terms the
analysis of the writings of male writers by female readers as ‘feminist
critique’. This analysis includes the images and stereotypes of women in
literature, the omission and misconception about women in criticism and
the lacuna in the male-constructed literary history. She points out as to
how the ‘feminist critique’ deals with the exploitation and manipulation of
the female audience, especially in popular culture and film.

The second type of feminist criticism is concerned with “woman as

writer” in which women are producers of texts concentrating on their
literary career and history. To describe the criticism of female writers,
Showalter uses the term “gynocriticism”. The ‘feminist critique’,
Showalter points out, is “political and polemical”, with theoretical
affiliations to Marxist sociology.

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The ‘feminist critique’ of ‘gynocriticism’ is male-oriented. It angrily
analyses the way in which men look at women and their experiences.
The critique tries to establish ‘femaleness’ by contradicting what male
writers present. In addition, it also has constructed a female framework
for the analysis of women’s literature, to develop new models based on
the study of female experience, rather than to adapt male models and
theories.

Showalter, thus, confirms the need to reconstruct the past, to rediscover

the scores of women novelists, poets and dramatists whose work has
been obscured by time, and to establish the continuity of the female
tradition. Such an exercise, she affirms, will help us identify the themes,
patterns and phases in the evolution of a female tradition. Women are
invited to speak for themselves, even if they continue to do so from
within a patriarchal culture. She also points out in the essay Towards
Feminist Poetics, how in her excellently documented A Literature of
Their Own (1979), she has identified the evolution of a female
subculture.

She defines the following three separate, but overlapping, phases:

“Feminine”, “Feminist” and “Female”.

 Feminine: In this first phase (1840-1880), women wrote mainly in

imitation of masculine models but with distinctively feminine
concerns. The distinguishing sign of this period is the male
pseudonym. The feminist content of feminine art is typically oblique,
displaced, ironic and subversive; one has to read in between the
lines, in the missed possibilities of the text.

 Feminist: In this second phase, which lasted until 1920, specifically

feminist protests and demands are formulated. This phase,
Showalter points out, is characterised by the winning of the vote and
the dramatization of the ordeals of wronged womanhood.

 Female: Beginning 1920, in this third phase, women’s writing has

moved increasingly towards self-discovering exploration of an inner

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 space of female experience and it rejects both imitation and protest,
two forms of dependency and turns instead to female experience as
the source of an autonomous art, extending the feminist culture to
the forms and techniques of literature. Representatives of the formal
female aesthetic, such as Dorothy Richardson and Virginia Wolf,
begin in terms of male and female sentences, and divide their work
into ‘masculine’ journalism and ‘feminine’ fictions redefining and
sexualising external and internal experience.

Women writers have been trying variety of theoretical approaches in

complex permutations and combinations. Showalter observes that the
most natural way in which feminist criticism has moved has been
revision and subversion of ideologies, especially of Marxist aesthetics
and structuralism. The reason for such a deviation is because feminist
criticism cannot go around forever in men’s ill-fitting hand-me-downs, the
Annie Hall of English studies, but must, as John Stuart Mill wrote about
women’s literature in 1869, emancipate itself from the influence of
accepted models and guide itself by its own impulses.

Gynocriticism

Showalter recommends in her essay Towards a Feminist Poetics that

literary feminists should follow the example of their sisters in other
disciplines and begin to study female subcultures. In a sense, Showalter
simply reiterates what Wolf herself had proposed half a century earlier.
Showalter, who is among the most consistently illuminating exponents of
this approach points out that the gynocritic dedicates herself to the
female author and character and develops theories and methodologies
based on female experience, the touchstone of authenticity.

The gynocritic discovers in her authors and characters an understanding

of female identity – not that she expects her authors and heroines to be
super-women, but be capable of essential struggle towards a coherent
identity, a realization of selfhood and autonomy.

The most popular sequence in a gynocritical reading is from reality, to

author, to reader, to reality: there is an objective reality which the author

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apprehends and describes truthfully in her text; the reader appreciates
the validity of the text and relates it to her understanding of her own life.
In this paradigm, author, character and reader can unite in an
exploration of what it means to be female. They can even assert a
collective identity as “we women” and the reader is gratified by having
her anger, experience, or hopes confirmed by the author and the
narrative.

Showalter identifies a two-tired system of ‘lower’ and ‘higher’ criticism,

the higher concerned with the ‘scientific’ problems of form and structure,
and the lower concerned with the humanistic problems of content and
interpretation.

She reiterates the need for women to find “exacting definitions and
suitable terminology” and the energy to theorise in the midst of a
struggle, to break from a male tradition, as women are both the
daughters of a male tradition, of our teachers, our professors, our
dissertation advisers and our publishers – a tradition, which asks us to
be rational, marginal and grateful; and sisters in a new women’s
movement, which engenders another kind of awareness and
commitment, which demands that we renounce the pseudo-success of
token womanhood and the ironic masks of academic debate.

Elaine Showalter: Towards a Feminist Poetics

Showalter concludes her argumentative essay by giving a clarion call to

the fellow feminist critics, “As women scholars in the 1970s, we have

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been given a great opportunity, a great intellectual challenge. The
anatomy, the rhetoric, the poetics and the history await our writing. The
task of feminist critics is to find a new language, a new way of reading
that can integrate our intelligence and our experience, our reason and
our suffering, our skepticism and our vision. One thing is certain: feminist
criticism is not visiting. It is here to stay, and we must make it a
permanent home.”

LEARNING ACTIVITY 4.2

Explain the concept of Geno criticism.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

4.3 KATE MILLETT

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Kate Millett

A feminist activist, writer, visual artist, filmmaker, teacher and human

rights advocate, Kate Millett has been described as one of the most
influential Americans of the twentieth century. In this section, you will
learn about Kale Millet and her writing A critique of Sexual Politics.

As a political activist, Dr. Millett has long fought for the rights of women,
gay liberation, mental patients and the elderly. Her first significant
contribution came in 1966, when she was named as the first Chair of the
Education Committee of the newly formed National Organization for
Women (NOW).

4.3.1 A biography

Katherine (Murray) Millett, a feminist critic and activist, autobiographer,

sculptor and painter was born in 1934 in St. Paul, Minnesota to Helen
(Feely), who supported three daughters after the departure of James
Murray. She attended the University of Minnesota and St. Hilda’s
College, Oxford. Supporting herself by teaching, she sculpted and
painted in New York, then spent two years in Japan, 1961-63, where she
had her first one-woman show. Back in New York, she married sculptor
Fumio Yoshimura, 1965 (and divorced later in 1984) and became active
in the Civil Rights and anti-war movements.

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Dr. Millett began her academic career as an English instructor at the
University of North Carolina, Greensboro, and has held several
additional teaching positions over the years. Some of the institutions
she has worked for include, Tokyo’s Waseda University, Barnard
College, Bryn Mawr College, Sacramento State University, and
University of California at Berkeley.
In 1968, she authored a pioneering report published by NOW, Token
Learning: A Study of Women’s Higher Education in America, in which
she challenged women’s colleges to provide educational opportunities
for women equal to those being provided to men.

A few years after joining NOW, Dr. Millett authored Sexual

Politics (1970), a landmark work in feminist theory that fueled the
second-wave of the women’s movement in the U.S. Since then, she has
authored numerous articles and essays and ten additional books.
In 1971, Dr. Millett formed Women’s Liberation Cinema and produced
the feminist classic, Three Lives. Between 1963 and 2009, she had
several international solo art exhibitions and installations in sculpture,
drawing, serigraphs and photography.

Her first work, Token Learning (1967), a criticism of curricula in women’s

colleges, was published by NOW, of which Kate Millett was an early
member. Her late Columbia PhD dissertation, which became the
feminist classic, Sexual Politics, marks the beginning of radical analysis
in the history of Feminist literary criticism. Attacking the canon, it
establishes the view that ‘sexual distinctions are political definitions’.
The same year, Kate Millett directed an all-woman film crew in the
making of the experimental documentary Three Lives, which allows
three women to speak their own lives on film.

Similarly, The Prostitution Papers (1971), Kate Millett’s edition of

prostitutes’ oral narratives, gives an insightful analysis of the ongoing
conflict between feminists and prostitutes. Millett’s intense and
exhaustively detailed autobiographical Flying (1974) narrates her
passionate relationships with politics, art, her friends and her lovers.
This deeply personal account provides an extraordinary history of
lesbian-feminist politics in the first intensity of this wave of the women’s
liberation movement.

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Her formal experiments extend the possibilities for autobiographical
writing as political history. After Sita (1977), a painful account of her loss
of a lover, and her gradual return to strength after the breakdown of her
marriage and her incarceration in a mental hospital (the basis of The
Looney Bin Trip, forthcoming), Kate Millett turned to a project that had
obsessed her for a decade during which she had sculpted only cages:
writing about the torture-murder of the 16-year old, Sylvia Likens. The
Basement (1979), is a study in the sexual politics of female identity: ‘I
was Sylvia Likens…she was what happens to girls.’ Going to Iran (1982)
documents Millett’s experiences in Iran, where she went after the
deposition of the Shah at the invitation of the Committee to Defend
Women’s Rights.

Kate Millett runs the Millett Farm, a tree farm and feminist artists’ colony
in New York.

4.3.2 A critique of Sexual Politics

Kate Millett's book Sexual Politics was pivotal for the developing second
wave feminist movement. It was regarded as very important both by
feminists at the time and by the media. Time magazine labelled Millett as
the Mao Tse-Tung of women's liberation, but the book is not as well
known today as might be expected for a work that had such an impact.
In this article I seek to remedy the neglect of Sexual Politics. I examine
the problem of why her work has been buried and suggest that the main
reason was the development of a pro-sex feminist politics in the
academy. Millett demonstrated the importance of sexual practice in the
subordination of women, she showed that sex was political. She showed
how male left intellectuals of the 1960s wrote famous erotica which
treated women as disgusting objects to be violated. She described many
of the misogynist ideas in these works which have formed the stock in
trade of the very profitable pornography industry which has developed in
recent decades. I argue that her work should be seen as a progenitor of
later anti-pornography campaigns and regarded with the respect
accorded to other significant social theorists.
Sexual Politics (1970), an important document of the second
wave feminism, argues that patriarchy was a political institution which
relied on subordinate roles of women, and that Western social
institutions are covert ways of manipulating power. Like de Beauvoir,

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Millett believed that women were subjected to artificially constructed
ideas of the feminine, and that all aspects of society and culture
functioned according to a sexual politics that encouraged women to
internalise their inferiority until it became psychologically rooted in them.
Millett identified literature as a tool for political ideology because it
recreated sexual inequalities and reinforced patriarchal values of
society. To expose the depth of this insidious indoctrination, Millett
examined the work of four 20th century male authors, including DH
Lawrence (Lady Chotterly’s Lover, in which Millett exposes a sustained
celebration of masculine sexuality and a misogynistic presumption of
female passivity). Millett’s analyses rocked the foundations of literary
canon by castigating classics — DH Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s
Lover, Henry Miller’s Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn, Norman
Mailer’s The Naked and the Dead for their use of sex to denigrate
women. In contrast, she applauds the gender politics of homosexual
writer Jean Genet. Millett is also noted for her distinction between the
concepts of “sex”, which is rooted in biology, and “gender”, which is
culturally acquired.

Before you read further, note that Sexual Politics is divided into three
parts: ‘Sexual Politics’, ‘Historical Background’ and ‘The Literary
Reflection’. The first part introduces us to Millett’s thesis about the
nature of power relationships between the two sexes. It tries to find
reasons for such a difference. The second part surveys feminist
struggle in the 19th Century and 20th centuries and has numerous
illustrations. It also highlights the factors, which led to a sexual
revolution and how literature documents it. The third section sets out to
describe how the power politics between the sexes is exploited in the
works of D.H. Lawrence, Henry Miller, Morman Mailer and Jean Genet.

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Kate Millett’s “Sexual Politics”- Cover Page
For the purpose of this Unit, we will deal only with a certain portion of
Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics, and to be precise, the Chapter 3 entitled
‘The Sexual Revolution: Literary Reflection’ in Part II.

The book opens with “instances of sexual politics” in the works of D.H.
Lawrence, Henry Miller, Norman Mailer and Jean Genet, and ends with
extensive chapters devoted with perceptive criticism to each of the four.
In its middle sections, the book is concerned with defining its title,
revealing the guises in which sexism is masked, exploring its deleterious
effects and sketching its history. Men view women much as Millett
claims, as the Whites view Blacks: inferior intelligence, an instinctual or
sensual gratification, an emotional nature both primitive and childlike, an
imagined prowess in or affinity for sexuality, a contentment with their
own lot which is in accord with a proof of its appropriateness, a wily habit
of deceit, and concealment of feeling. Isn’t our societal ‘worship’ of
woman merely a stratagem to lull her into submission, an extraordinary
piece of sexual politics, a game the master group plays in elevating its
subject to pedestal level?

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But, the truth is more complex than Millett will allow that men tend to
regard women as sexual objects who exist for male gratification. Henry
Miller has given voice to certain sentiments which masculine culture had
long experienced but always rather carefully suppressed: the yearning to
effect a complete depersonalisation of woman.

In a long and interesting section on sexual revolution and counter-

revolution, she argues that the rebellion against male dominion began
around 1830 and was “officially inaugurated” with the formation of the
Women’s Movement at Seneca Falls, New York, in 1848. The revolution
lasted a hundred years, she contends, and accomplished a great deal by
way of legal and economic gains, but floundered because it failed “to
challenge patriarchal ideology at a sufficiently deep and radical level to
break the conditioning process of status, temperament and role”; it was
“reform rather than revolution”.

The counter-revolution 1930-1960, Millett observes, was led by

Lawrence (“the most talented and fervid of sexual politicians”) and Freud
(possessor of “unflagging enthusiasm for glorifying the inestimable male
organ”), who recognised the threat to make suzerainty and moved to
thwart it. That judgement seems to have less to do with the actual
movement of history than with the psyches of Lawrence, Miller and
Mailer – “some of those who helped to build these (sexist) structures –
writers, who, after the usual manner of cultural agents, both reflected
and actually shaped attitudes.” The impact of all three cannot be
denied. But neither can we ignore their flamed sexuality and their
obsession with celebrating it.

Sexual Politics, based on the thesis of Millett, undertakes a radical

analysis of patriarchy as it operates in history, culture, religion,
psychoanalysis and, most centrally, literature. Providing witty and
innovative readings of Freud, D.H. Lawrence, Henry Miller, Normal
Mailer and Jean Genet, the book’s polemic urges a cultural revolution
headed by an oppressed and alienated minorities, predominantly
women.

Millett argues that humanity will be freed from the constrictions of sex,
race and class, by exposing and eliminating the grounds on which

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oppression operates. During the 1970s and after she put her theory into
practice, demonstrating for the Equal Rights Amendment, she became a
member of the Congress of Racial Equality. She visited Iran in 1979 to
advocate women’s rights after the revolution, but was expelled by
Khomeini’s government for her efforts.

She is concerned with the way in which, patriarchy has victimised

women, and tries to find out how Freud and his theories have
contributed to the oppression of women. She looks for evidence of
Patriarchal assumptions and finds Freud’s theory about women’s envy of
men’s virility, childish and undeveloped. Her Sexual Politics takes off
from this point and the five hundred and odd pages of audacious
argument testify the ‘elan’ with which it is done. The very term ‘sexual
politics’, a concept strange and contentious four decades ago, is the
measure of her achievement.

Two facets of Sexual Politics remain characteristic to feminist thinking.

The first facet is its comprehensiveness. She moves with confidence as

Mary Eagleton points out, across history, literature, sociology and
several other disciplines. She exemplifies a revolutionary scope intrinsic
to feminism: the whole world needs changing and all established canons
must be challenged. The second is the particular attention it warrants
towards cultural matters, an aspect about which Cora Kaplan, however,
raises questions in her comments on Millett.

Sexual Politics emerged as a stunning example of ‘feminist critique’, a

reading of male texts, which make a whole generation who came of age
as Lady Chatterley’s Lover entered the public domain and who naively
celebrated it as liberating narrative, look again – and again – the textual
politics of sexual narrative.

The reason for Millett’s success seems to be owing to the fact that she
could bridge the gap between institutional and non-institutional criticism.
The book earned Millett an academic degree at a reputed University,
and also placed her at the centre of the feminist movement. This book
established the feminist approach to literature as an essential critical
force. As Toril Moi points out, “Its impact makes it the ‘mother’ and

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precursor of all later works of feminist criticism.” In the Anglo-American
tradition, feminists of the 1970s and 1980s have never been reluctant to
acknowledge their debt to, or disagreement with, Millett’s path breaking
essay.

The most colourful aspect of Millett’s critical studies is her innovative

approach to reading a literary text. Her approach to the writers
mentioned in her book is devoid of conventional respect due to them.
Her importance as a literary critic lies in her relentless defense of the
reader’s right to put forward her/his own point of view rejecting the
received hierarchy of text and reader. As a reader, Millett is neither
submissive nor lady-like. Her approach to canonical texts destroys the
prevailing image of the reader/ critic as passive recipients of authority.

She wants women to carry on the exercise, question patriarchy and stop
being passive recipients of patriarchal authority. Her views on
patriarchal politics are obviously deeply influenced by Simone de
Beauvoir’s pioneering analysis in The Second Sex. But, Millett never
acknowledges it and makes only two tangential references to Beauvoir’s
essay. She also dismisses Virginia Woolf in one brief passage.

Sexual Politics deals only with male authors with the sole exception of
Charlotte Bronte. She discusses John Stuart Mill, but not Mary
Woolstonecraft. Her reasons for concentrating only on male writers are
concrete. Her definition of sexual politics is simple, namely, the process
by which the ruling sex spreads its power over the subordinate sex. Her
book is an elaboration of this one statement, and the examples are
chosen to illustrate this thesis. In various sections of the book, she
explores the political oppression of women and documents the feminist
revolution and reactions against it.

Reaction to Sexual Politics was varied and often extreme. Numerous

male critics chastised the feminist movement in general, and many were
taken aback by Millett’s militant, caustic tone. However, the majority of
reviewers instantly recognised Sexual Politics as significant criticism and
lauded Millett’s intelligent commentary and successful blend of rationality
and humour.

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Analysing the ideas of sexual revolutionaries (John Stuart Mill and
Engels) and their reactionary opposites (Ruskin and Freud), she writes
sometimes with the ferocious joviality of a Wyndham Lewis, more often
in a language so choked with righteous wrath that it is hard to catch her
exact meaning. The revolutionary aspect of her thesis is that she wants
to destroy altogether what she calls the ‘patriarchal structure’ by which
men run the world in their own interests.

Her ideas seem to envisage a condition of ideal communism, which

would liberate women from the controlling economic power of the
husband. This argument is behind rather than contained in her book, for
she writes hardly all about the ways in which women might achieve full
humanity. She does not deal with the easier theme of the counter-
revolution, seen chiefly in terms of sexual attitudes in the work of Jean
Genet, D.H. Lawrence and others. She deals with Victorian literature,
making a lively analysis of Tennyson’s Princess and compares Mill’s
essay on The Subjection of Women and Ruskin’s lecture “Of Queen’s
Gardens” to point up differences of attitude with much polemical skill.

Millett’s analysis is mostly based on the male writers’ attitude to sex.

This attitude is found in its most extreme form in the work of Genet,
whose pimps abuse and do not protect their slaves and are merely
amused when they are beaten or even killed. The ‘girl queen’ receives
only the promise of “an intensity of humiliation which constitutes identity
for those who despise themselves.” For women, in the eyes of these
male novelists, humiliation equals satisfaction, or at least it is the only
satisfaction they are likely to get what they describe, according to Kate
Millett, is a fantasy world of male domination and feminine subjection.

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Review of Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics in New York Times -
08/5/1970

What she has to say about these writers is often very funny, a fact,
which has not been much remarked: Sexual Congress in a Mailer novel
is always a matter of strenuous endeavour, rather like mountain
climbing. Lady Chatterley’s Lover provides the female with irrefutable
evidence that male supremacy is founded upon the most real and
incontrovertible grounds.

One carries away two impressions from Sexual Politics – of intelligence

and of confusion. Kate Millett is a social critic and not a literary critic.
The commentaries on Henry Miller’s Sexes rapidly followed by a more

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brutal passage from Mailer’s An American Dream, and an extract from
Genet’s The Thief Journal helps us understand how pornographic
elements have been carefully assimilated into imaginative literature.
The act of sexual description is itself aggressive, indulgent, attractive
and repulsive, as Millett points out, and she throws light on the power
politics of a patriarchal society as the hero subdues his women, with
desperate arrogance.

The close and original analysis of individual texts by Millett serves a

larger cause. Millett tries to bring out the fact that men divided and ruled
and used intimidation, flattery and provoke envy in order to persuade the
ladies that women’s weakness and maternal function needed protection
and worship, not civil rights. Millett points out how despite the
brainwashing by men, sexual revolution gained considerable advances
in education and more slowly, in legislative change, has started mooting
slowly changes in habits of mind, feeling and relationship.
All this has been made possible not because women have understood
the nature of men, but because of industrial revolution and the rapid rise
of the middle classes. Millett is of the opinion that the writings of men
again and again prevent women from coming out of their inferior status.
They let women believe that being conquered by a man physically and
mentally is what they are born for.

Millett manages brilliantly to analyse Tennyson’s “better-than-nothing”

struggles in The Princess, John Stuart Mill’s slightly underplayed
economics, which governs women’s lives, Engel’s courageous appraisal
of the future of the family, Genet’s analytical passages, Lawrence’s
exceptional recognition of women’s weakness, etc., throughout her
book. All her illustrations are used to highlight her thesis that when
women are struggling to stage a sexual revolution by recognising the
nature of men and their need for power, these writers have created a
counter-revolution by brainwashing women once again about their
subjugation to men.

Though the title of the second section of the book is ‘Sexual Revolution:
Literary Reflection’, it is far from being a literary criticism. It uses literary
texts to bring out sociological changes and requirements. By analysing
passages from literary texts, the author urges the reader and the women
to wake up to face the newer strategies of men to keep power to

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themselves. Millett’s Sexual Politics is a crucial milestone in feminist
tradition, and needs revival and rereading periodically to equip oneself to
face patriarchy and its strategies.

Quotes of Kate Millett

In 1970, Millett’s thesis, which she did not expect to be published and
ready by the mainstream, became a best seller. And now, it has
become a much-acknowledged basic feminist ideology – mostly, her
questioning patriarchy, which has assigned second-class citizenship to
half the human race. With Millett’s arguments about gender politics, the
world began to listen to the rumbling of female discontent. The brilliant,
articulate, attractive and passionate activist was landed as the
movement’s figurehead in the times. “I’m slammed with an identity that
can no longer say a word; mute with responsibility”, she wrote in Flying.
She was hailed as Mao-Tse-tung of women’s liberation by the Times
magazine. Today, Millett stands as an invincible force in feminist
thought.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 4.2
Explain what makes Kate Millet an invincible force in feminist
thought.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

SUMMARY

In this Unit, we traced the evolution of feminist criticism with particular

reference to Elaine Showalter and Kate Millett. We began the Unit with a
brief discussion of feminist criticism. We then analysed of Showalter’s
Towards a Feminist Poetics and Kate Millett’s Sexual Politics.

REFERENCE:

1. http://researchscholar.co.in/downloads/37-dr.-savita-rani.pdf
2. https://www.britannica.com/biography/Elaine-Showalter

3. https://www.slideshare.net/dilipbarad/feminism-feminist-criticism-
elaine-showalter
4. https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=IPGd9VqQlKI

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 5. https://www.womenofthehall.org/inductee/kate-millett/
6. https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fpyxis.
nymag.com
7. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S02775395
10000993
8. https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fcup-
us.imgix.net

9. https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fpbs.t
wimg.com%2Fmedia%2FEBM4rneW4AEvbfn.jpg
10. https://libquotes.com/kate-millett/quote/lbw7k0c

VIDEO LINK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uy8bKB-vGLM

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UNIT - 5 DEBI, GILBERT & GUBAR AND RADWAY

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

5.1 Debi and Amar Jiban

5.1.1 Early life and her work

5.1.2 Amar Jiban: The story
5.2 The Mad Woman in the Attic: An analysis
5.2.1 Introducing Gilbert and Gubar
5.2.2 The Mad Woman in the Attic: A critique
5.3 Romance Fiction and Radway

5.3.1 Romance fiction

5.3.2 Reading the romance: An analysis

Summary

OVERVIEW
In this Unit, we will take up four women writers in English for discussion.
First, we will give a brief biography of Rassundari Debi and analyse, on
the basis of her autobiography Amar Jiban, the status of women in her
society. Secondly, we will discuss the collaboratively written study The
Mad Woman in the Attic in the context of feminist criticism. Finally, we
will introduce you to romance fiction and in that context review Radway’s
scholarly study Reading the Romance.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

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 describe the status of women during the Amar Jiban days and relate
it with the contemporary scenario;
 analyse the question of ‘anxiety of authorship’ in the context of
women writers and feminist criticism;
 critically evaluate romantic fiction with reference to Reading the
romance.

5.1 DEBI AND AMAR JIBAN

In Subsections 5.1.1 and 5.1.2, we will consider a biography of

Rassundari Debi and her autobiography, Amar Jiban, respectively.

Rassundari Devi is among the earliest woman writers in Bengali

literature. Her autobiography Amar Jiban (My Life) is known as the first
published autobiography in Bengali language. It was an extraordinary
step towards change, considering the fact that Rassundari Devi was the
odd one of unusual authors: an economically challenged girl, religious
woman and a dedicated housewife. In this section, you will learn about
Devi and her work Amar Jiban.

It was tough for a female to provide education to girls. It was not even
allowed to be thought of. It portrays Rassundari's life as a whole: all the
incidents from her childhood to the advent of her marriage, married life
and life after marriage. On a deeper note it depicts the uneasiness,
dissatisfaction and even frustration she had gone through for being
forced to follow certain monotonous rules. Her marriage, her household
chores, everyday life– gives the reader an entry into the life of a feudal
housewife in 19th century reformist Bengal but also brings into light the
issues of inequality, oppression and lack of opportunity for women. The
book creates a picture of the changing world the status and role of
women and Rassundari Devi's own views on the changing times.

5.1.1 Early life and her work

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 Rassundari Debi

If it is true that autobiographies help reseed and create newer lineages

and traditions, then here is an autobiography from Rassundari Debi,
which can help women understand the struggle of their foremothers and
understand the direction in which women have moved since then. Such
transactions of women’s experiences into literature will help break new
grounds in our thinking and understanding of the range that a woman’s
life covers.

Born in 1809, Rassundari Devi, a self-taught woman, has left behind an

important autobiography. She was born in a remote village, Pabna, in
West Bengal in a very poor Hindu conservative family. Her father was
running a small Patasala at home where a missionary lady taught the
boys. Being a girl, Rassundari was not allowed to attend the classes but
she picked up on her own what little she could, by observing the young
learners. At the age of twelve, she was married to Sitanath Ray, a
landlord in Faridpur. As is the custom after marriage, she left her parents
and went to her husband’s place. Trained in domesticity and domestic
work, to be submissive and to think of the needs of others alone, her life
in her husband’s house from the age of twelve was one long period of
practising traditional notions of femininity.

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Rassundari Devi’s life was a series of actions and decisions that are
serious departures from the patriarchal social norms of her time and
are, therefore, ‘transgressions’ punishable by the society.
Rassundari Devi learned to read and write amidst the popular belief in
those days that women who gained literacy brought disaster upon their
families and were punished by God with widowhood. Not only did she
learn to read, but she also decided to record the events and details of
her everyday domestic life in a book and got it published. She had the
audacity to disclose her life in print and make it public to the people. By
doing this, she entered the public sphere which was strictly forbidden to
upper class Hindu women. A published work no longer remains a
private act of writing but enters the public domain where it is open and
available for perusal and interrogation by anyone. So there are three
major “transgressions” that Rassundari Devi commits according to
patriarchy: reading, writing entering the public sphere.
Rassundari also made a notable departure from the common
patriarchal belief that female worship can only be expressed in the form
of rituals like vratas (fasts), penance, and cooking bhoga (food for god).
Rassundari rejected these conventional, ritualistic forms of woman’s
devotion that served in maintaining the patriarchal social structures,
and established an intellectual relationship with her God by learning to
read Chaitanya Bhagavata. She chose to engage in a kind of worship
where she is an active participant (like her husband and other men),
not a passive devotee.

Despite her several children and demanding domestic chores, she learnt
to read and write on her own, and at the age of 59 in 1868, after she was
widowed, she published her autobiography in Amar Jiban (My Life). A
second part and a newer edition of it appeared in 1897 when she was
88.
A firsthand account of a woman’s life in the 19 th century, this book does
not find a mention in any survey of literature nor has her death been
mentioned anywhere. However, she has the honour of being the first
woman autobiographer in Bengal, and maybe in India.

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5.1.2 Amar Jiban: The story

Amar Jiban was written and published in two parts. The first consisted of
sixteen rachanas or compositions. The second part came out in the year
1906, consisting of fifteen rachanas or compositions. Every composition
is preceded by a devotional poem dedicated to her Dayamadhav, the
Vaishnav godhead whom Rassundari Devi had chosen.

Written in chaste Bangla, Amar Jiban narrates the life story of a

nineteenth century woman’s struggle for literacy. It portrays the changing
world of rural Bengal and situates women there. About the title of the
book, Tanika Sarkar writes:
“The book calls itself – with a thundering audacity – My Life. It makes a
bold and a bald statement, presumptuous in the extreme, in a woman
householder. A woman, moreover, who is not connected to a figure of
religious or temporal significance, who cannot claim any miraculous
powers or capacities. The life of such a woman would not be written –
far less read – before the 19th century.” (Sarkar, 1999)

Rassundari has narrated her life story in two ways. On one hand, she
writes that God’s mercy and benevolence towards her has made it
possible for her to achieve literacy. On the other hand, she also shows
how she has made her own decisions in life by learning to read despite
the fear of family disapproval and social ostracism. She praises
God’s leela, but also recounts all the hard work and self-determination
she has put in to learn reading.
Scholars like Tanika Sarkar and Meenakshi Malhotra have observed that
Rassundari Devi creates the persona of a “bhakt” (devotee) for herself,
and presents all the small and big events of her life as exemplars of

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God’s mercy or leela, including her access to the written word. Thus her
transgressive act of learning to read becomes an instance of godly
intervention, a divine purpose, a consequence of God’s will and mercy.
That is why, in the text, “the prayers tend to occur before she narrates
some departure she makes from given norms, so as to take away the
sting from her transgression.” (Sarkar, 1999)
Rassundari Devi has written Amar Jiban in retrospection. The struggle to
learn to read is being described when she has already mastered the art
of writing. She describes the past in terms of vivid immediacy of feelings;
she ignores dates, time, and other factual details, and focuses on
descriptions of her everyday household life. And yet sentimentality is not
something Rassundari would indulge in while writing. Amar Jiban is
written in a dispassionate, objective style. The prose is well-connected,
coherent and polished.
Tanika Sarkar observes that “her (Rassundari’s) writing is quite removed
from the everyday, colloquial forms – not only in the syntax and in
grammatical constructions, but also in the very nature of the prose that
she uses. It is not, in any noticeable way, gender marked.”
We will begin this Subsection with the third composition of the
autobiography.

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Amar Jiban by Rassundari Devi – Cover Page
The third composition of Amar Jiban narrates the story of Rassundari
Debi’s marriage at the age of twelve. As a child, the news made her very
happy and at the same time scared her:

“I would be married. There would be music. I would hear the women

ululating. How exciting that would be? Yet I felt scared at the same time.
I cannot express the apprehensions that came to my mind. Meanwhile
the various things necessary for the ceremony began to arrive. Relations
and guests began pouring in. I was scared to death by all this. I did not
talk to anyone and spent most of the time weeping. Everybody did their
best to reassure me. They embraced me, but the unspoken agony in my
mind did not lift.”

However, the child in her lost herself in the preparations for the wedding
and cheered up

looking at the ornaments, wedding sari and the music. The child did not
even understand the fact that she would be sent away with the
bridegroom’s family. She narrates in a fascinating way her ignorance
about her departure from home. As people around her clasped her and
shed tears preparatory to sending her off, she became panic-stricken.

She records effectively in a simple style her feelings then, as her mother
prepared her for the truth. “But I was trembling all over with fear. I was
quite unable to speak. Somehow I managed to say through my tears:
“Are you sure that God will go with me?” Mother promptly assured me
that he most certainly would… As a matter of fact, it is indeed a sad
thing to leave one’s parents, settle in some other place, and live under
other people…”

Nevertheless, she went away, surrounded by people who were not

known to her.

Fourth composition

The fourth composition captures the anguished mind of the author, her
questions, doubts and fears about her future. She writes about what she
felt then:

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“Only God will understand the predicament I was in - nobody else can
have any idea. Even now I remember those days. The caged bird, the
fish caught in the net… I am writing about what I felt at the time. I do not
know how other girls feel. Perhaps they do not feel as miserable as I
did…. well I was like a caged bird. I would have to remain in this cage for
life. I would never be freed…. Sorrow engulfed me like a raging forest
fire. Those who have had such experiences know how useless words
seem in times of sorrow.”

Fifth composition
The fifth composition shows her settled in her new house. Her days
began very early and there was no respite from housework till late in the
night. The fifth composition as well records the views of people in her
new environment about women rulers and women’s education.
“What is the world coming to?”, they used to say. “To think that women
will be doing the work of men! Never heard of it before… these days
women are becoming famous and men seem good for nothing. Such
strange things never happened before. There is even a woman ruler on
the throne. Who knows what other changes are in store for us! The way
things are going, a decent man will very soon lose his caste. Pretty soon
the womenfolk will get together and study books”.

Their conversation scared her. She knew she could never talk to them
about her desire to learn to read, write and to analyse. She prayed to her
god secretly to help her to learn so that she could read religious books.
The god who had brought her so far from the village of Potaja (three
days and three nights journey) to Ramdia is appealed to. Nobody knew
her sorrow and the book does not record any kind of exchange with
anyone else in the household or with the husband. However, she says:

“I must admit the people here are very good. They are fond of me.
Whenever I was physically ill they were so concerned that I forgot all the
discomfort. In fact, none of them was ever rude to me or showed
displeasure in any way. Everyone was extremely kind. And I include my
immediate family also, who are good beyond comparison.”

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Of the first eighteen years, six years were after marriage in a new set-
up. During this period, her only effort was, she writes, “to please people
through the work I did, in the house. My only regret was that I was not
able to read and write because I was a girl. Women of today are so
lucky. Many parents educate their daughters. I think this is a good
practice.”

After the first eighteen years, Debi’s life turned hectic, with the arrival of
children. Her first son was born when she was eighteen and the last of
her fourteen children was born when she was 41. “God only Knows” she
says, “what I had to go through during those twenty-three years. Nobody
else had any idea either”. With certain empathy and objectivity, one can
visualise the kind of time she would have had for herself, during those
twenty-three years between her first child and the last, with all those
children around her.

Debi’s recordings are faithful to the circumstances in which she lived.

There were numerous maids and servants in the house but being a
conservative Brahmin, the cooking had to be done only by her as well as
the various kinds of work in the inner quarters. She did all the work and
looked after the children too. She says:

“I had to work right through the day and the night, without a moment’s
rest. Suffice it to say that I had no time to think about my own health.
So much so, that I often did not eat either of the two meals. There were
days when the pressure of work did not let me have even one meal
during the course of the day.”

She goes on to narrate one such instance and says how for nearly two
days, she had to go without food. It was either a guest, or the children
who kept her from eating and her own reservation about eating at odd
times added on to the other problems.

“I had to serve the servant who was holding the baby. Then the baby
needed milk too. I attended to both of them and sat down with a plate of
rice, the baby in my lap. No sooner had I done so then, the baby
decided to have a motion and urinated in such a way that all the rice was
washed away.”

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The narration of the incident is common to most women even today
though the number of children and the volume of work have
considerably lessened.

This made her only laugh and it is rather interesting to know that
nowhere through the narration, does she show evidence of losing
patience, courage or good humour. She turns even the incident where
the plate of rice was washed away, and her having to go without food, to
her spiritual advantage. She thanks God for the lesson as, “It is only
through your good grace that I have come to know what it takes to bring
up a child, what agony the mother has to go through. I never knew that
a mother has to suffer so much for the sake of her children. People
never realise these things unless they go through similar pressures.
Now I know perfectly well the tortures the mother had to undergo
because of her children. Every human being should know this. Most
people do not have any knowledge about the matter.”

She says that everyone should be knowledgeable about mothers and

their work because she herself had neglected her mother. “A mother is a
very precious thing. It is my misfortune that I did not understand it. She
suffered so much for my sake. But I was not of any use to her.”

She was never allowed to go to her mother’s village, and when she was
allowed to visit her mother on occasions, it would be only for a short
duration. “I was allowed to go back to attend some family festival but
had to return in a couple of days like a slave.”

Sixth composition

The sixth composition expresses her innate desire to learn, to read and
write. She decides to read Chaitanya Bhagavatam, a religious text,
praising Lord Krishna. She goes on to narrate as to how she took away
a sheet of paper from the book when it was brought for her husband to
be read. She hides it in the store room in the kitchen, but finds it difficult
to find the time or space to read it

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Furtively, I would take out the sheet and put it back promptly before
anybody could see it. Wasn’t it a matter to be regretted? That I had to
go through all this humiliation just because I was a woman? Shut up like
a thief, even trying to learn was considered an offense. It is such a
pleasure to see the women today enjoying so much freedom. These
days’ parents of a single girl child take so much care to educate her. But
we had to struggle so much for that.

She goes on to say that the practices of her day prevented her from
being an entity on her own, despite her husband being a good person.
She comments about clothes, and jewellery and considers them to be
impediments for progress. The section ends with her inability to learn to
write, though she could learn to read a little, “I was deeply engrossed in
whatever I would read”, she says, “and the idea of writing did not cross
my mind.”

However, she subsequently learned to write too, and won the honour of
being the first autobiographer in Bengali literature.

A critique

Written in chaste Bangla, Amar Jiban portrays the changing world of

rural Bengal and the lives of women. She indulged in a unique act of
emancipation through her writing.

Often we find in life, women being questioned about “Where are your
great works?” A woman’s work and her contribution to society and
family have never been considered worthy of taking note. In fact, a
woman’s work is not considered as work at all. The answer to the
question about great works of women appeared in the form of a poem,
Letter from a Far Country by Gillian Clarke, a British poet in 1978. The
poem, itemises the work done by a woman through the day and raises a
question:

If we launch the boat and sail away

Who will rock the cradle? Who will stay?

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 If women wander over the sea
Who’ll be home when you come in for tea?

If we go hunting along with men

Who will light the fires and bake breads then?

Who’ll catch the nightmares and ride them away.

If we put to sea and sail away?

Will the men grow tender and children strong?

Who will teach the Mam iaith and sing them songs?

If we adventure more than a day

Who will do the loving while we’re away?

Autobiographies of this nature, as part of Recovery literature, help

women to recover their self-esteem, recognise their worth, gain the
balance, throw male chauvinism as ignorance and march ahead with
pride demanding attention and space to be cleared for a dignified living.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 5.1

State the central theme of Amar Jiban.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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5.2 THE MAD WOMAN IN THE ATTIC: AN

In this Subsection, we will introduce to you two celebrated authors in the

feminist criticism, Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar. Before we do so,
however, let us first touch upon feminist criticism (recall our discussion
of feminist criticism in Unit 4).

Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar

Gilbert and Gubar have analysed the nineteenth century for the position
of the woman novelist in The Madwoman in the Attic (1979), the 2-
volume No Man’s Land (1987-89) and their edition of The Norton
Anthology of Literature by Women (1985). Their interest, like Showalter,
is in the material conditions of the woman writer’s creativity. In this
section, you will learn about Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar And The
Mad Woman in the Attic.

5.2.1 Introducing Gilbert and Gubar

Feminist criticism

The 1979 publication of Susan Gubar and Sandra M. Gilbert’s ground-

breaking study The Madwoman in the Attic marked a founding moment

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in feminist literary history as much as feminist literary theory. In their
extensive study of nineteenth-century women’s writing, Gubar and
Gilbert offer radical re-readings of Jane Austen, the Brontës, Emily
Dickinson, George Eliot and Mary Shelley tracing a distinctive female
literary tradition and female literary aesthetic. Gubar and Gilbert raise
questions about canonisation that continue to resonate today, and model
the revolutionary importance of re-reading influential texts that may
seem all too familiar.

A dynamic alternative to traditional critical approaches, feminist literary

criticism, is a method of interpreting texts that lays emphasis on issues
related to gender stereotypes, the indifference of the publishers and
reviewers, and the relationship between the author’s gender and the
readers. Since its evolution as a separate discipline in University
departments and as a special paper in women’s studies, feminist
criticism has grown in dimension. The concerns of the feminist critics
are manifold. Feminist writers have been looking for reasons for racism,
classicism, heterosexism, xenophobia and multiculturalism and also
have been analysing the usefulness of a middle class white woman’s
arguments worldwide.

Feminist critics have revised a series of questions like ‘what is woman?’

‘Where is writing?’ ‘What and where are women and writing?’ and ‘When
are women writing about women?’ Gilbert and Gubars’ The Madwoman
in the Attic (1979) found in the already canonised writers an essential
pattern of repetition – the suppressed female. The authors agree that
women writers respond to socio-cultural constraints by creating symbolic
narratives that express common feelings of construction, exclusion and
dispossession. They connect textuality and sexuality, genre and gender,
psychosexual identity and cultural authority. With most of the early
critics, Gilbet and Gubar share their concern about nineteenth and early
twentieth century writers.

Sandra Gilbert

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Sandra Gilbert
Poet and critic Sandra M. Gilbert was born on December 27, 1936, in
New York City. She was educated at Cornell University, New York
University, and Columbia University, where she received her PhD in
1968.
Among Gilbert's most widely known works are her collaborations with
Susan Gubar, particularly The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman
Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination (1979), regarded
as a seminal work of feminist criticism. In 1995, she published Wrongful
Death: A Medical Tragedy, a prose memoir indicting medical malpractice
and eulogizing her husband, who had died four years earlier after routine
surgery for prostate cancer. Ghost Volcano, a book of poetry in memory
of her late husband, appeared the same year.
Gilbert's other collections of poetry include Aftermath: Poems (W. W.
Norton, 2011); Belongings (2006); The Italian Collection (Depot Books,
2003); Inventions of Farewell: A Book of Elegies (W. W. Norton,
2001), Kissing the Bread: New and Selected Poems (2000), Blood
Pressure (1988), The Summer Kitchen (1983), and In the Fourth
World (1978).
She is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the
National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Rockefeller
Foundation, among others. A member of the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences, she has served as President of the Modern Language
Association and earned an honorary degree from Wesleyan University.
Gilbert has taught at numerous colleges and universities across the
country and currently holds a position as a professor of English at the
University of California, Davis. She lives in Berkeley.

Professor Gilbert has achieved national and international

recognition for her work. She has worked as an Assistant Professor at

137
California State University at Hayward, Visiting Lecturer at St. Mary's
College in Moraga, California, and Associate Professor at Indiana
University. She joined the UC Davis faculty as an Associate Professor in
1975. By that time, she had already published more than forty poems
and essays as well as Acts of Attention, a highly respected book on D.
H. Lawrence's poetry. In 1979 Professor Gilbert co-authored with
Professor Susan Gubar The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer
and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination, which received much
critical acclaim.

In 1985, she left Davis to take up the distinguished C. Barnwell Stuart

Chair of English at Princeton University, only to be brought back to Davis
again in 1989. In recent years, she has presented lectures at a
conference on Emily Dickinson in Innsbruck and by invitation at the
Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the University of Liverpool and the
Universities of Washington, Missouri and Pennsylvania. In 1994,
Professor Gilbert was elected Second Vice President of the Modern
Language Association. In 1995, by rotation, she became First Vice
President and on January 1, 1996 she assumed the role of President of
this, the largest and most prestigious professional society for scholars of
literature.

Susan Gubar

Susan Gubar

Susan Gubar, a Distinguished Professor of English and Women's

Studies has taught at Indiana University for more than twenty years.
Along with Sandra M. Gilbert, she published The Madwoman in the Attic:
The Woman Writer and the 19th-Century Literary Imagination in 1979, a

138
runner-up for both The Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle
Award. Six years later, in 1985, the collaborators received a Ms. Woman
of the Year award for their compilation of the Norton Anthology of
Literature of Women, a work that appeared in a revised second edition in
1996. Gilbert and Gubar also followed up The Madwoman with a critical
trilogy entitled No Man's Land: The Place of the Woman Writer in the
Twentieth Century: The War of the Words (1988), Sex changes (1989)
and Letters from the Front (1994) use feminist criticism to understand
the achievements of British and American literary women in modern
times. Gilbert and Gubar's most recent jointly-authored enterprises
consist of a collection of poetry for and about mothers, Mother Songs
(1995), and a satire on the current state of literacy and cultural literacy,
Masterpiece Theatre: An Academic Melodrama (1995).

The recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the

Humanities and the Guggenheim Foundation, Susan Gubar published a
book on the centrality of cross-racial masquerade in American fiction,
photography, painting and film: Race changes: White Skin, Black Face
in American Culture (1997). She recently put together a collection of her
essays in a book, Critical Condition: Feminism at the Turn of the
Century, which was published by Columbia University Press in 2000.
She spent a year as a Laurence S. Rockefeller Fellow at Princeton
University's Center for Human Values to complete Poetry After
Auschwitz: Remembering What One Never Knew, which was published
by Indiana University in 2003. The recipient in 2003 of The Faculty
Mentor Award from IU's Graduate Professional Student Organization,
Susan Gubar continues to work with undergraduate and graduate
students interested in critical race and gender issues in twentieth-
century British and North American cultural contexts.
The authors have been more or less accepted as “great” writers and the
works range from as obscure a novel as Jane Austen’s Juvenilia to such
generally acknowledged masterpieces as George Eliot’s Middlemarch.

5.2.2 The Mad Woman in the Attic: An analysis

The Madwoman in the Attic, an almost 700-page long collaboratively

written study, elaborates a model of a woman’s tradition through scores
of reading of texts by women authors.

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Sandra M. Gilbert & Susan Gubar together, The cover page of The Mad
Woman in the Attic

The Madwoman in the Attic takes its title from the iconic early-Victorian
novel Jane Eyre. In this novel, Rochester's first wife, Bertha Mason, has
gone mad and is kept locked in an attic. Because Bertha Mason
Rochester was a wealthy Creole woman from Jamaica, she represents a
sort of monstrous "other" in the nation: passionate, exotic, and mad,
demonized by the novelist and the characters of the novel. In Gilbert and
Gubar's survey of Victorian female novelists and the portrayal of women
in Victorian literature, they consider Bertha to be a prototypical exemplar
of the "woman as monster." Among the major authors considered in the
book are Jane Austen, Mary Shelley, Emily Brontë, Charlotte Brontë,
and George Eliot.
Gilbert and Gubar argue that, within the patriarchal environment of
Victorian England, women struggled to create an identity as authors. As
part of this struggle, their portraits of women bifurcated female nature
into two extremes: "the angel in the house" (who was traditionally
"good," submissive, and virtuous) and the "madwoman in the attic" (the
image of woman's suppressed anger, rage, and power). Neither of these
two emblems of femininity, though, are whole or complete women, and
many novels by women would have paired characters each representing
half of the emotional range—with the monstrous woman often
channeling the author's genuine anger at patriarchal oppression.
Although the book remains a landmark in feminist literary criticism, more
recent scholars consider the analysis presented in the book
oversimplified and somewhat reductionist. It has also been criticized for
focusing on a very limited canon of white female authors and excluding
entire novelistic genres (such as the sensation novel, the Gothic novel,
and "penny dreadfuls" and writers such as M. E. Braddon or Anna
Laetitia Barbauld) as well as the lower class female experience.

Before you read any further, you must note that for the purpose of this
Course, we will deal only with the second chapter entitled “Infection in
the sentence: The woman writer and the Anxiety of Authorship”. This
second chapter, in fact, does give a key to the entire work’s stance.

The study analyses the women writers’ relation to their literary

foremothers in order to “reveal the extraordinary strength of women’s
literary accomplishments” against odds. Raising the question “What

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does it mean to be a woman writer in a culture whose fundamental
definitions of literary authority are, as we have seen both overtly and
covertly patriarchal?”, the authors go on to point out how literary tradition
of the 19th century presents the sweet dumb Snow White and the fierce
mad queen, as the major literary images, representing femininity and
femaleness.

“If the queen’s looking glass speaks with the king’s voice, how do its
perpetual kingly admonitions affect the queen’s own voice? Since his is
the chief voice she hears, does the queen try to sound like the king,
imitating his tone, his infections, his phrasing, his point of view? Or does
she “talk back” to him in her own vocabulary, her own timbre, insisting
on her own viewpoint.”

The chief concern of feminist literary criticism, Gilbert and Gubar

observe, is to know the language a woman used if it is a specifically
woman’s language or a man’s whom she tried to emulate.
In their expansion analysis of Victorian women’s writing, Sandra Gilbert
and Susan Gubar present women’s resistance to social and literary
constraint in terms of a theory of the anxiety of patriarchal influence. It
was a common theme for feminists of the early seventies that the
patriarchy they denounced was reinforced by psychoanalysis. Freud,
they maintained, was an arch-misogynist, and the role of the
psychoanalytic institution was to reinstate within the patriarchal order,
women who rebelled against it. Appropriating Harold Bloom’s model of
the writer struggling to overthrow the domination of a strong literary
father, Gilbert and Gubar trace in women’s writing the inscription of
tension, self-doubt, renunciation and above all, rage against the society
which confines them.

Being one of the foremost students of psychohistory, Harold Bloom

applied Freudian structures to literary genealogies, and has postulated
that the dynamics of literary history is born out of the writer’s anxiety
regarding the influences on him. Every writer is sensitive to being
compared to a predecessor and Harold Bloom is of the opinion that
there is a ‘literary paternity’ and that “A ‘strong poet’ must engage in
heroic warfare with his ‘precursor’, for, involved as he is in a literary
oedipal struggle, a man can only become a poet by somehow
invalidating his poetic father.”

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Gilbert and Gubar point out that Bloom’s model of literary history is
intensely (even exclusively) male, and necessarily patriarchal. For this
reason, it has seemed, and no doubt will continue to seem, offensively
sexist to some feminist critics. “Not only, after all, does Bloom describe
literary history as the crucial warfare of fathers and sons … he
metaphorically defines the poetic process as a sexual encounter
between a male poet and his female muse.” They question about a
woman writer’s place in such a scheme and what would be her
condition, if she can find no models, no precursors? Does she have a
muse, and what is its sex? Such questions are inevitable in any female
consideration of Bloomian poetics. And yet from a feminine perspective,
their inevitability may be just the point. They conclude that any male
oriented theory or approach cannot cover feminine preoccupations.
On the one hand, therefore, the woman writers’ male precursors
symbolize authority; on the other hand, despite their authority, they fail to
define the ways in which she experiences her own identity as a writer.

What the male poets experience as the anxiety of influence, the female
writers do as the anxiety of authorship, i.e., a radical fear that she cannot
create. A female author, who struggles against the patriarchal
traditionalism, has to revise the norms for writing. Her revisionary
struggle therefore is often a struggle for what Adrienne Rich described
as the act of looking back, of seeing with fresh eyes, of entering an old
text from a critical direction an act of survival. Frequently, moreover, she
can begin such a struggle only by actively seeking a ‘female’ precursor
who, far from representing a threatening force to be denied or killed,
proves by example that a revolt against patriarchal literary authority is
possible.

The need to find a female predecessor is intensified by the fact that the
parameters of male writing do not meet the requirements of the female
writers. The woman writer struggles for artistic self-definition and
distinction from her male counterpart. Thus, a viable tradition of a
female subculture is made a possibility. The debilitating anxiety of
authorship felt by women writers of the 18 th and 19th centuries made
them find ways and means of easing out conditions for the 20 th century
artists. But although the contemporary women writers are relatively free
of the “infection in the sentence” (the despair regarding authorship), the

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search for authorship still continues. Readings and revisioning of
patriarchal views about women of strong will, are being carried out by
the contemporary women writers.

Based on the women’s socially determined sense of their own biology,

this anxiety makes its way into women’s texts in recurring patterns of
themes, forms and motifs. The chapter places women’s anxiety about
disease and about their bodies in historical context, links it to authorial
anxiety, and begins sketching out strategies. Some nineteenth century
writers used to express their sense of “infection in the sentence” (as
Emily Dickinson called).
Thus, hysteria, the disease with which Freud so famously began his
investigations into the dynamic connections between ‘psyche’ and
‘soma’, is by definition a “female disease”, not so much because it takes
its name from the Greek word for womb hyster (the organ which was in
the nineteenth century supposed to “cause” this emotional disturbance),
but because hysteria did occur mainly among women in turn-of-the-
century Vienna, and because throughout the nineteenth century this
mental illness, like many other nervous disorders, was thought to be
caused by the female reproductive system, as if to elaborate upon
Aristotle’s notion that femaleness was in and of itself a deformity. And,
indeed, such diseases of maladjustment to the physical and social
environment as anorexia and agoraphobia did and do strike a
disproportionate number of women.

The diseases, Sandra and Gubar point out, are simply “patriarchal
definitions of ‘femininity’” and help describe a young girl with a lively
disposition but trained in docility. It is inevitable for women brought up to
live a life of privacy, reticence and domesticity to develop pathological
fears of public places and unconfined areas. In the nineteenth century,
the fear of the intellectual woman was so intense that such a person was
considered a breach of nature.

Quoting Anne Sexton, the authors suggest that writing like a woman,
trained by masculine perceptions can only dis-ease women’s writing.
Surrounded by images of disease, traditions of disease, and invitation
both to disease and to dis-ease, it is no wonder that the woman writer
has held many mirrors up to the discomforts of her own nature.

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Those first women writers were infected or sickened by self-doubt,
inadequacy and inferiority. As Elaine Showalter has shown, until the
end of the 19th century the woman writer really was supposed to take
second place to her literary brothers and fathers and as Gubar and
Gilbert observe, if the woman writer refused to be modest, self-
deprecating, subservient, refused to present her artistic productions as
mere trifles designed to divert and distract readers in moments of
idleness, she could expect to be ignored or (sometimes scurrilously)
attacked.

The authors refer to the American poet Anne Bradstreet and Margaret
Cavendish who write with despair about the male superiority among
writers. They quote the words of Cavendish and Virginia Wolf to
reiterate it. It may have been in a fleeting moment of despair and self-
confrontation that she wrote, “women live like Bats or Owls, labour like
beasts, and die like worms.” But eventually, as Virginia Wolf puts it, “the
people crowded round her coach when she issued out,” for “the crazy
Duchess became a bogey to frighten clever girls with.” Wolf in fact
implies that women who did not apologize for their literary efforts were
defined as mad and monstrous.

Gilbert and Gubar arguments in the rest of the chapter bring the theory
to bear upon authors from Aphra Behn to H.D., from Jane Austen to
Virginia Wolf, from George Eliot to Charlotte Perkins Gilman.

Literally, women like Dickinson, Bronte and Rossetti were imprisoned in

their homes, their father’s houses; indeed, almost all nineteenth century
women were in some sense imprisoned in men’s houses. Figuratively,
such women were, as we have seen, locked into male texts, texts from
which they could escape only through ingenuity and indirection. It is not
surprising, then, that spatial imagery of enclosure and escape,
elaborated with what frequently becomes obsessive intensity,
characterizes much of their writing. Anxieties about space, dominates
the literature of both nineteenth and twentieth century descendants.

Women authors, however, reflect the literal reality of their own

confinement in the constraints they depict, and so all at least begin with

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the same unconscious or conscious purpose in employing such spatial
imagery. Recording their own distinctively female experience, they are
secretly working through and within the conventions of literary texts to
define their own lives. Noting in The Poetics of Space that “the house
image would appear to have become the topography of our inmost
being”, Gaston Bacheland shows the ways in which houses, nests,
shells and wardrobes are in us as much as we are in them.

Gilbert and Gubar revise literary history to place the canonized women
writers in it. They establish the woman writer who is at a point of tension,
aware that her writing both challenges the conventional view of what is
appropriate for women and encroaches on what some see as a male
preserve. If the woman writer writes about women, she risks the label of
‘partiality’, ‘narrowness’, ‘a woman’s book’. While Virginia Woolf reveals
“the truth about my experiences as a body” Rich describes “experiencing
myself as a woman”, and writing as “ subversive function of the
imagination”.

Gilbert and Gubar go even further. They trace that literary history sees
writing as essentially ‘ male’, a kind of extension of the male generative
act, and confers on the male writer authority, the right to create, control
and possess. Phallic criticism thus finds the woman writer compromised,
unfeminine and presumptuous. In trying to negotiate such criticism
Gilbert and Gubar believe the woman writer to be involved in a complete
balancing act between apparent conformity to certain patriarchal literary
norms and a trenchant critique of those same standards. The figure of
the madwoman is an aspect of that critique, expressing the
unacceptable, the authorial rage, desire and antagonism.

Mary Jacobus and Toril Moi, the feminist critics contend with Gilbert and
Gubar’s arguments. While Jacobus feels that in their work women
writers become exceptionally articulate victims of a patriarchally
engendered plot, Moi observes, “How did women manage to write at all
given the relentless patriarchal indoctrination which surrounded them
from the moment they were born?”

Gubar and Gilbert point out that the problem for the woman writer lies
not only in the production of writing but in a equally rigid area of

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reception. “The anxiety of authorship”, Gilbert and Gubar have
assessed, has been created and maintained in part through the
practices of literary criticism, and partly by the publishers and reviewers.
Thus, as Virginia Woolf observed, the woman writer seemed locked into
a disconcerting double bind: She had to choose between admitting that
she was “only a woman” or protesting that she was “as good as a man.”

The most rebellious and innovative of the 19 th century women writers

solved the problem by adopting male names. For those women, the
cloak of maleness was a practical solution for double binds of
‘femininity’, which had given so much pain to Bradstreet, Finch and
Cavendish. The reason for such a disguise is simple: the ‘male
identified’ woman writer, felt that, dressed in the ‘male costume’ of her
pseudonym, she could walk more freely about the provinces of literature
that were ordinarily forbidden to ladies.

Many women writers have felt this dilemma and frustration and the
essay gives a long list of names including Aphra Behn, Elizabeth
Barrette Browning, George Sand and so on. It is Sand who actually
includes in her reading the contradictions of genre and gender and as
the authors point out “most western literary genres are, after all,
essentially male – devised by male authors to tell male stories about the
world.” Fiction as a genre has a masculine pattern and so also the great
tragedies. However, the irreconcilable contradictions of genre and
gender have often been the reason for anger among the women writers.

Gilbert and Gubar try to evolve strategies, which can help a woman
writer to overcome her anxiety of authorship. It is the woman writer’s
consciousness of her gender, and confidence in the power of her
gender, which should allow her to see meaning in what has previously
been looked at as empty space or diseased space. Questioning women
writers who thirst to write about their own stories must fill this other
space. This quest for self-definition alone can raise women from the
position of a madwoman of the 19th century writing.

Using the canonical texts like Jane Eyre, the authors comment that the
madwoman in female writings is actually the author’s ‘double’
representing her anxiety and rage. The 20 th century has certainly moved

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away from this rage and the anxiety of authorship has been replaced by
thirst for establishing one’s place in literature. While male writers have
always looked at women who “reject the submissive silences of
domesticity” as Gorgons, Sirens Goddess of death, madwoman and
monster, women writers of the 19 th and 20th century as summed up by
Charlotte Perkins Gilman knew, that the cure for female despair must be
spiritual, as well as physical aesthetic as well as social. What The
Yellow Wallpaper shows she knew, too, is that even when a supposedly
“mad” woman has been sentenced to imprisonment in the “infected”
house of her own body, she may discover that, as Sylvia Path was to put
it seventy years later, she has “a self to recover, a queen”.

Theme:

Jane Eyre The Madwoman in the Attic: Angel or Monster?

Jane Eyre The Madwoman in the Attic: Angel or Monster?

In “Jane Eyre,” the character of Bertha Mason serves as an ominous
representation of uncontrollable passion and madness. Her dark
sensuality and violent nature contrast sharply with Jane’s calm morality,
and it is no surprise that Bertha’s presence at Thornfield is a key factor
in transforming Mr. Rochester into a stereotypical Byronic hero.
Moreover, Bertha’s marriage to Mr. Rochester serves as the primary
conflict of the novel, and it is only after her death that Jane is able to
achieve personal happiness by marrying Mr. Rochester. However,
Bertha’s position as the “Madwoman in the Attic” also speaks to larger
social questions of femininity and authorship during the Victorian period.
In 1979, Sandra Gilbert and Susan Gubar made a breakthrough in
feminist criticism with their work “The Madwoman in the Attic: The
Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination.” In the
700-page text, Gilbert and Gubar use the figure of Bertha Mason as the
so-called “Madwoman in the Attic” to make an argument about
perceptions toward female literary characters during the time period.
According to Gilbert and Gubar, all female characters in male-authored
books can be categorized as either the “angel” or the “monster.”
The “angel” character was pure, dispassionate, and submissive; in other
words, the ideal female figure in a male-dominated society. Interestingly,
the term “angel” stems directly from Coventry Patmore’s 1854 poem
“The Angel in the House,” in which he described his meek and pious
wife. In sharp contrast to the “angel” figure, the “monster” female
character was sensual, passionate, rebellious, and decidedly

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uncontrollable: all qualities that caused a great deal of anxiety among
men during the Victorian period.
However, Charlotte Brontë (as well as many other contemporary female
authors) did not limit her characterizations to this strict dichotomy
between monster and angel. Jane Eyre possesses many of the qualities
of the so-called angel: she is pure, moral, and controlled in her behavior.
Yet, at the same time, she is extremely passionate, independent, and
courageous. She refuses to submit to a position of inferiority to the men
in her life, even when faced with a choice between love and autonomy,
and ultimately triumphs over social expectations. Moreover, Jane’s
childhood adventures demonstrate much of the same rebelliousness and
anger that characterize the “monster.” It is clear that Jane’s appearance
of control is only something that she learned during her time at Lowood
School; she still maintains the same fiery spirit that defined her character
as a child.
With the character of Bertha Mason, Brontë has a more difficult time
when it comes to blending the distinctions between angel and monster.
The readers only meet Bertha when she is in the depths of madness,
having been confined in the third-story attic of Thornfield for nearly
fifteen years, and there is not enough interaction between her and the
other characters to demonstrate any “angelic” behavior. Yet, Bertha’s
position as the obstacle to Jane’s happiness with Mr. Rochester, as well
as her state of complete imprisonment, suggest that her madness may
have been partially manufactured by the male-dominated society that
forced her to give up her wealth in marriage to Mr. Rochester. Moreover,
the similarities between Bertha’s behavior in the third-story attic and
Jane’s actions as a child in the red-room suggest that neither character
is full angel or full monster but rather a combination of the two.

While Brontë does not differentiate between angel and monster in her
portrayal of Jane and Bertha, she does, however, argue for moderation
of the passions in all of her characters. Mr. Rochester and Bertha both
have too much passion in their lives, while St. John Rivers has too little.
Bertha’s passion manifests as madness, while Mr. Rochester’s passion
is displayed in his debaucherous behavior on the continent and his
determination to make Jane his mistress. St. John, on the other hand,
suppresses all of his passion and love for Rosamond Oliver, and thus
becomes a cold and aloof man whose only desire is to fulfill his duty to
God. Of the three characters, Mr. Rochester is the only one who
eventually achieves a balance of passion; after Jane’s departure from
Thornfield and the loss of his eyesight, he becomes much more spiritual

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and is able to achieve the same emotional moderation that Jane exhibits
throughout the novel.
Although Bertha does serve as one of the seeming villains of the novel,
she should be seen more as a critique of a society in which passionate
woman are viewed as monsters or madwomen. Charlotte Brontë’s act of
writing a novel – particularly such a Gothic one - was no doubt equally
threatening to the men of her time period. In some ways, Brontë’s
decision to merge the identities of the “angel” and the “monster” in the
two primary female characters of her novel can be seen as a personal
statement about the conflict between passion and passivity in her own
life.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 5.2

What is the message in The Mad Woman in the Attic?
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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Radway

Janice Radway

Janice Radway is the Walter Dill Scott Professor of Communication

Studies and a professor of American studies and gender studies within
the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences. She has served as the
editor of American Quarterly, the official journal of the American Studies
Association. In this section, you will learn about Janice Radway and
her writng Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy and Popular
Literature (1984).

Janice A. Radway teaches in the literature program me at Duke

University. Before moving to Duke, she taught in the American
Civilization Department at the University of Pennsylvania. She says that
her teaching and research interests include the history of books and
literary production in the United States, together with the history of
reading and consumer culture, particularly as they bear on the lives of
women. Radway also teaches cultural studies and feminist theory. A
writer for Chronicle of Higher Education described Radway as "one of
the leaders in the booming interdisciplinary field of cultural studies." Her
first book, Reading the Romance (1984) has sold more than 30,00
copies in two editions. Her second book, A Feeling for Books: The Book-
of-the-Month Club, Literary Taste, and Middle-Class Desire appeared in
October of 1997. What follows is a topic-outline of the introduction to the
English version of her first book.

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Biography of Janice Radway

Radway holds a BA from Michigan State University, 1971, and a MA

from State University of New York, Stony Brook, 1972. She earned her
PhD from Michigan State University 1977 with the dissertation A
Phenomenological Theory of Popular and Elite Literature. She taught in
the American Civilization Department at the University of
Pennsylvania and in the Literature Program (which she also chaired)
at Duke University. She served as an editor of American Quarterly, and,
in 1998-99, as president of the American Studies Association. In 2008,
she became Walter Dill Scott Professor of Communication Studies
at Northwestern University. Radway is also professor emerita of
Literature and History at Duke University

Publications
 . Reading the Romance, 1984, 1991
 A Feeling for Books, 1999

 A History of the Book in America (co-editor), 2008

 American Studies: An Anthology (co-editor), 2009

5.3 ROMANCE FICTION AND RADWAY

Of the two Subsections that constitute this Section, the first will give you
an overview of romance fiction and the second discusses Janice
Radway’s Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy and Popular
Literature (1984).

5.3.1 Romance fiction

Romance fiction, a special genre in fiction, consists of a group of related

literary genres defined by a focus on courtship or marriage in which the
course of a love story provides both the structure and the value system
for the plot. Because the issues inherent in love stories are traditionally
to do with women’s concerns, romance fiction has always been
considered an escape reading for women.

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Romances have close affinities to other kinds of popular novels – the
gothic, historical fiction, mysteries, romantic suspense, science fiction,
fantasy and thrillers of novels of adventure. Romance novels have been
written from as early as 1741 with Richardson’s Pamela and the drama
of courtship and marriage has had a very strong impact on women for
over two centuries. The plot might have changed over the years, but the
narrative and the value structure have altered very little.

The post-World War II period has been very fruitful for the popular
romance novel. British authors like Mary Stewart, Victoria Holt, Dorothy
Eden, Georgette Heyer and Barbara Cartland as well as American Anya
Seton and Phyllis Whitney were read widely. The romance genre has
dramatically expanded since the 1970s with a more permissive view of
female sexuality. The first major change emerged with a sub-genre
called “bodice-ripper” “sweet-savage” or “erotic romance”. Even the most
conservative publisher of romances Mills and Boon/Harlequin, had
allowed authors to feature the sexuality of the heroines. The descriptions
of the private lives of the heroines were so explicit that they bordered on
pornography.

As women’s studies became more established academically, and with

emergence of new studies of popular culture, scholars of both literature
and history have been addressing issues related to romance fiction and
its popularity. Ellen Moers’ Literary Woman defines the conventions,
concerns and experience of women in literature and romance fiction.

Some feminist scholars who label romances “porn for women” have
waged an important and controversial argument about romances. Ann
Douglas and Ann Barr Snitow first raised the issue in two influential
articles. Although Snitow, writing about Mills and Boon romances in
Mass Market Romance: Pornography for Women is Different argues that
romances are pornographic because they are actually sexualised.

Douglas, in her article entitled “Soft-Porn Culture” published in the New

Republic, appears to use the term as if it had no necessary connection
to sex at all. Using as her examples “Harlequin Romance” and
“Presents” novels of the late 1970s, Douglas labels as “porn” the male
centred representations of male-female relations as well as the male

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domination of women, with or without the sexual content. She argues
that the gains of women’s liberation are under siege from popular culture
and that readers and viewers will see representations of men and
women, which will undermine female autonomy. Similar arguments are
found in various other essays too.

Beatrix Faust, another feminist writer in her 1980 book Women, Sex and
Pornography writes about rape scenes in bodice-rippers, which have
both sexual and violent content. Among the early critics of romance as
pornography, Faust has the most complete notion of how romances
work and what pornography might be; and she distinguishes between
differing sexual representations that appeal to men and to women. Like
Faust, Alison Assiter in her book Pornography, Feminism and the
Individual adopts a concrete definition that links sexuality with
domination.

In effect, all these critics on romance literature agree that romances

glory male domination of women, and promote female submissiveness.
In The Princess at the Window, Donna LaFramboise analyses the
sexual content in a contemporary novel and suggests that the increase
in explicit sex scenes and the acknowledgement that women too are
capable of desire are due to the very feminism that often raises its voice
against romance literature for being harmful to women.

Subverting the feminist critique of romances as pornography, Helen

Hazen’s Endless Rapture: Rape, Romance and the Female Imagination
defend sexual violence in romance novels. Hazen argues that the
aspects of romance that most offend feminists – implied violence against
women, rape fantasies etc., are precisely the needs, desires of women
that feminists conventional ignore.

Carol Thurston’s less politically changed book The Romance Revolution:

Erotic Novels for Women and the Quest for a New Sexual Identity charts
the rapid changes in romance formula that began with the original
“bodice-rippers” in the 1970s. Thurston uses a variety of method to
study these changes, including content analysis, reader questionnaires,
mail surveys of romance readers, and interviews with authors and
editors. She believed that the erotic romance that emerged in the early

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1980s represented a new synthesis of women’s concerns and behaviour
that empowered women to seek alternatives to traditional roles,
especially expressions of sexuality.

5.3.2 Reading the romance: An analysis

The most influential scholarly study of the romance to date is Janice A

Radway’s Reading the Romance: Women, Patriarchy and Popular
Literature (1984).

Based in ethnography and reader-response criticism, the study

examines romance reading as an act within a social context. Radway
begins her study with a chapter on the history of publishing romances.
She terms it “institutional matrix”. She turns to an ethnographic study of
forty-two romance readers in a mid-western city that she calls
“Smithton”. These readers have been guided in their reading by a
bookstore employee “Dorothy Evans” whose expertise in the field had
led her to begin writing reviews even in national publication.

These readers also represent to Radway a resource for understanding

how readers apprehend the reading experience, choose their books, and
explain their preferences. Radway rejects close reading of romance
texts as a strategy for understanding their meaning and appeal, although
she does engage in analysis of some specific texts identified as either
“ideal” or “failed” romances by the readers whom she studied. She finds
considerable differences between the two groups of novels and uses
those differences to understand how the romance fantasy appeals to

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readers. Additionally, she examines, the narrative and linguistic
strategies of romances with reader’s responses on questionnaires and in
interviews.

Intrigued and obviously puzzled by the overwhelming popularity of the

form, Radway’s interview of the believed to be connoisseur of the
romance is an exercise, which has implications far beyond popular
culture studies. The methodology she uses makes it stand at the
forefront of the new appraisals of literature being made by contemporary
reader response theorists. Her interview of “Dorothy Evans” makes her
ask for the logic behind the distinction between what is readable and
what is not.

She reads into the logic behind such a distinction and thereby parts
company from other critics who mostly lament the Omni-presence of the
romance in contemporary American Society, and, instead provides a
theoretically sophisticated, scholarly and (perhaps most important)
sensitive study of the responses of real readers.

She analyses and interprets these responses, collating them with the
particular novels they circumscribe, in order to elicit the underlying
structure, which govern reading the romance. She also points out how
those structures both ambivalently confirm and covertly counter the
patriarchal context in which both romances and their readers are
situated.

Radway concludes her study by observing that romance reading for the
Smithton women is an act that is at once “combative” and
“compensatory”. The readers whom she studied saw their reading as
something that they did for themselves, as a refusal for a period of time
to enact their expected nurturing roles in the family. Using Nancy
Chodorows’ psychoanalytical theories of a female development she also
examines the dynamics of gender relations in a patriarchal culture and
concludes that readers identify with the heroine and seek in the hero, a
figure that will satisfy the reader’s own needs for nurturing.

Romances, she argues, in focusing on male behavior in regard to female

heroines, serve to explain “male aloofness and strength as benign and

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to ameliorate reader’s fears of being hurt or dominated by men, thus
reconciling women to their traditional role in patriarchy.”

An earlier article by Radway, published in 1982, examines the language

of the popular gothic romance in a semiotic analysis of its effect on the
reader. Radway opines that unlike serious readers who revel in
ambiguity and the aesthetics of language, readers of popular literature
look for transparency, predictability and reassurance. The clichéd and
familiar language of mass-market novels responds to that desire.

While Radway’s conclusions are quite similar to those of feminist critics,

her methodology is decidedly different. She borrows as much from the
anthropologists as from the literary critics. As she readily admits, the
anthropologist too reads texts – texts of particular individuals and texts
of the society.

She is aware of the subjectivity of any act of reading, including her own.
Their “readers” are not hypothetical or implied. The “Smithton” reader
effectively articulate why they read – for education, for self-
enhancement, for pleasure, for escape from the routine lives of women
who have essentially accepted patriarchal “strictures” and “structures”.
Their reasons and Radway’s analysis of those reasons are more
eloquent and revealing than elitist jeremiads about the pernicious
popular forms.

Radway suggests that women who read romances seek both a better
understanding of what appears threatening in male behaviour and a new
vision of themselves through the hero’s eyes. Gothic novels, while
sharing some characteristics with Harlequin deal more directly with
women’s fears and the need to identify and destroy the source of the
danger to the self.

Radway’s study also pays particular attention to the literary history of

romances and gothics since the 18 th century and locates modern novels
in the context of enduring literary patterns. She is of the opinion that
romance reading is a response to real conditions experienced by women
in culture and that it is an effective mechanism for defusing anger and
fear.

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As a feminist she argues that women would be better off by not indulging
in fancies but by facing problems and reality. Arguing that romance is
more about power than about love, she also sees the elements of
romances as addressing women’s search for economic viability against
changing social conditions.

Books, Radway attests, are not simply texts to be deciphered in the

college literature class. Reading is a part of other experiences in a
reader’s life. Radway’s study critically assesses the reasons for a
culture being what it is. Praised as a brilliant study, it is found to open
new avenues of interpretation and investigation for the literary theorists,
scholar and cultural historian. It is a pioneering study of a very important
cultural phenomenon.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 5.3

What does Radway’s scholarly study convey regarding romance fiction?
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

157
SUMMARY

In this Unit, we discussed four women writers in English: Rassundari

Debi, Sandra Gilbert, Susan Gubar and Janice Radway. In the Unit, first,
we took Debi’s Amar Jiban for discussion. We said that it is an
autobiography and delineating the anguish suffered by women of the
author’s era through her narration. We then discussed the collaboratively
written study The Mad Woman in the Attic in the context of feminist
criticism. We closed the Unit by introducing you to romance fiction and in
that context reviewed Radway’s scholarly study Reading the Romance.

REFERENCE:
https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https%3A%2F%2Fpeoplepill.com.
https://feminisminindia.com/2017/03/23/rassundari-devi-essay/

https://poets.org/poet/sandra-m-gilbert
https://www.enotes.com/topics/madwoman-attic
https://www.gradesaver.com/jane-eyre/study-guide/the-madwoman-in-the-attic-
angel-or-monster
https://feminisminindia.com/2017/03/23/rassundari-devi-essay/

https://people.ucalgary.ca/~rseiler/radway.htm

VIDEO LINK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w8Y5slEY2h8

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BLOCK - 4

UNIT- 6 MAHASWETA DEVI AND MARSHA NORMAN

STRUCTURE

Overview

Learning Objectives

6.1 Devi and Rudali

6.1.1 Mahesweta Devi: A biography
6.1.2 Rudali: An analysis
6.2 Norman and ’Night Mother

6.2.1 Marsha Norman: A biography

6.2.2 ’Night, Mother: The play

6.2.2 ’Night, Mother: A critique

Summary

OVERVIEW
In this Unit, we will discuss one play each of Mahasweta Devi and
Marsha Norman. We will begin the Unit by providing a brief biography of
Devi and highlight her works on the nature of exploitation of the
disadvantaged in India, particularly women and tribal population. We will
then analyse Rudali, a short story adopted as a play capturing the
miserable life a poor woman leads. This is followed by the biography of
Marsha Norman, including her interest in working with emotionally
disturbed children. We will then consider ’Night, Mother, which delineate
the emotional upheavals in the lives of neglected women.
The focus of Devi and Norman is on the marginalised with particular
reference to women, who happen to occupy a special place as they are

159
doubly marginalised. They are doubly marginalised because even the
most downtrodden man is master to his woman. They are exploited
both vertically and horizontally: vertically, by the class system,
master/servant, husband/wife, the white/ coloured, etc., and horizontally,
among women in that in many a situation women do not get close to
each other to address their common concerns.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 understand the story of Rudali and ’Night, Mother;

 analyse these plays in the context of feminism.

6.1 DEVI AND RUDALI

In Subsection 6.1.1, we will give you a brief biographical sketch of

Mahasweta Devi, the celebrated author of Rudali, an analysis of which
we will consider in Subsection 6.1.2.

6.1.1 Mahasweta Devi:

Mahasweta Devi

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Mahasweta Devi was an eminent Bengali writer and social activist,
writing in the mid-1900s, who did not shy away from pointing out the
injustices plaguing society. Apart from being a powerful novelist, she is
also remembered for her activism, having fought for the rights of the
oppressed tribal communities. In this section, you will learn about
Mahasweta Devi and her work Rudali.

Introduction
Mahasweta Devi, widely acknowledged as India’s foremost writer, often
concentrates on the theme of double exploitation of women in her
writings. While she talks of the tribals, downtrodden and the teased, she
inadvertently concentrates on the women and their socio-economic
context. Whether she portrays the brutal reality of women’s experience
or carries her discussions to stark, unusual and unique forms of
resistance, Mahasweta Devi raises questions that need to be addressed
if our quest is for a humanistic society. Her work represents the erosion
of human dignity and value in all its unpalatable truth.

Early life

Mahasweta Devi was born on 14 Jan 1926 in Dacca , British

India (now Dhaka, Bangladesh). Her father, Manish Ghatak, was a well-
known poet and novelist of the Kallol movement, who used the
pseudonym Jubanashwa. Mahasweta Devi started her schooling in
Dhaka. After the partition of India, the family moved to West Bengal in
India. Devi's mother, Dharitri Devi, was also a writer and a social worker
whose brothers were very distinguished in various fields, such as the
noted sculptor Sankha Chaudhury and the founder-editor of Economic
and Political Weekly of India, Sachin Chaudhury. Mahasweta Devi's first
schooling was in Dhaka, Eden Montessori school (1930) but then she
moved to West Bengal (now in India). Then she studied in Midnapore
Mission Girls High School (1935). After that she was admitted to
Santiniketan (1936 to 1938). After that, she studied at Beltala Girls'
School (1939-1941) where she got her matric. Then in 1944 she got I.A.
from Asutosh College. Then she joined the Rabindranath Tagore-
founded Visva-Bharati University and completed a B.A. (Hons) in
English, and then finished an M.A. in English at Calcutta University.

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She started her career as a teacher and journalist and her first book
Jhansi Rani was published in 1956, thus marking a rich literary career.
Since then, Mahasweta Devi has published twenty collections of short
stories and close to hundred novels, and over a dozen plays, primarily in
her native language of Bengali. She has also been a regular contributor
to several literary magazines dedicated to the cause of oppressed
communities within India.

After retirement from her job in Calcutta University, Mahasweta Devi has
been concentrating on her writing and tribal welfare. She writes about
the lives of ordinary men and women, particularly adivasi people (e.g.,
the Santhals, Lodhas, Shabars and Mundas) in India. She is currently an
editorial advisor for Budhan, a denotified and nomadic tribes rights
action group newsletter, named after Budhan Sabar, who was brutally
killed in 1998.

As an activist, she has spent many years crusading for the rights of
tribals. Works like Araneyar Adhikar (i.e., Rights of the Forest), based
on the life of tribal freedom fighter Birsa Munda, Hazaar Chaurasi Ki
Maa recently filmed, Chotti Munda and His Arrows, Imaginary Maps
where she talks about “suffering spectators of the India that is traveling
towards the twenty first century”, One Non-Veg Cow, Bashai Tudu Titu
Mir, Old Women, Dust on the Road, Bitter Soil, Breast Stories, Body,
Dewana, Khoimala and the Holy Banyan Tree, Clouds in the
Southwestern Sky, Plays of Mahasweta Devi and Rudali earned her
much acclaim and made her the recipient of many literary awards. She
won the Sahitya Academy Award in 1979, and the Jhanpith, India’s
highest literary award, in 1995. She is the 36 th woman and 35th Indian to
receive the Magsaysay Award, considered to be Asia’s equivalent to the
Nobel Prize in 1996.

The Magsaysay Award was given to her for journalism, literature and
creative communication. She was cited for “her compassionate crusade
through art and activism to claim for tribal people’s a just and honorable
place in India’s national life.” On being asked to comment on winning
the award: “It is good to win an award, but my life is getting more and
more crowded and I am not getting time to write.”

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A committed citizen, Mahasweta Devi, travelled widely and in fact,
walked many kilometers in rural areas of West Bengal, to write about the
oppressed tribal people in the Bengali dailies. Nearing 80, she says with
fervour: “I will continue to work for the tribals, non-tribal poor and people
in distress and write for them. I think a creative writer should have a
social conscience. I have a duty towards society. Yet, I don’t really
know why I do these things. The sense of duty is an obsession. I must
remain accountable to myself.”

Writing the introduction to Mahasweta Devi’s Collection of Short Stories

translated into English, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak suggests that the
interplay of activism and literary writing in Devi’s writing can be of
substantial interest to current academic discussions.

Beginning with the story of Jhansir Rani who fought against the British
and died, Mahasweta Devi set a few more novels like Amrita Sanchars
(1964) and Andhanmalik (1967) in the colonial period. The naxalite
movement of the late 1960s and the early 1970s were also of an
important influence in her work. In a 1983 interview, she pointed to this
movement as the first major event that she felt like documenting.
Major Works
Mahasweta Devi has published more than 94 works of fiction which
include novels, short stories and plays. The most important among them
are, The Queen of Jhansi (biography, translated in English by Sagaree
and Mandira Sengupta from the 1956 first edition in bangle Jhansir
Rani). Hajar Churashir Maa (“Mother of 1084”, 1975; translated by
Samik Bandyopadhyay, Seagull Books, 1997). Bitter Soiltr, Ipsita
Chandra, Seagull, 1998. Four stories. AranyerAdhikar (The Occupation
of the Forest, 1977). Agnigarbha (Womb of Fire, 1978). Choti
Mundaevam Tar (Choti Munda and His Arrow, 1980). Imaginary Maps
(translated by Gayatri Spivak London). Dhowli (short story). Dust on
the Road (translated into English by Maitrayee Ghatak, Seagull,
Calcutta). Our Non-Veg Cow (Seagull Books, Calcutta, 1998,
Translated from Bengali by Paramita Banerjee). Dakatey kahini.

Translation Works After kurukshetra: Three stories. Trans.

AnjumKatyal. Calcutta: Seagull Books, 2005). The Armenian Champa
Tree. Trans. Nirmal Kanti Bhattacharjee. Calcutta: Seagull Books,
1998. Bedanabala. Trans. Sunadini Bannerjee. Calcutta. Seagull
Books, 2005. Bait: Four stories. Trans. Sumanta Bannerjee. Calcutta.

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Seagull Book, 2004. “Bhikhari Dusad or the Fundamental Right”.
Trans. Mahasweta Devi, Polygraph 4 (1990). DewanaKhoimala and
the Holy Banyan Tree. Trans. Pinky Bhattacharya. Calcutta: Seagull
Books, 2004. Romtha: the Selected Works of Mahasweta Devi. Trans.
Pinky Bhattacharya. Calcutta: Seagull Books. Calcutta: Seagull Books,
1997. “Salt”. Protest: An Anthology of Bengali short stories of the
70,s. Ed. Partha Chatarjee. Trans. Tapan Mitra. Calcutta: Achintya
Gupta, 1981. “Seeds”. Trans. Mahasweta Devi. Panorama:Anthology
of Modern Indian Short Stories. Eds. Mulk Raj Anand and S. BaluRao.
New Delhi: Sterling Publishers Private limited, 1986, pp. 20-43 Film
Based Works Sunghursh (1968), based on her story, which presented
a fictionalized account of Vendetta within a thug gee cult in the city of
Varanasi. Rudaali (1998). MaatiMaay (2006), based on short story,
Daayen. Hazaar Chaurasi Ki Maa (1998).

Awards and Recognition

 1979: Sahitya Akademi Award (Bengali): – Aranyer Adhikar (novel)

 1986: Padma Shri for Social Work

 1996: Jnanpith Award – the highest literary award from the
Bharatiya Jnanpith

 1997: Ramon Magsaysay Award – Journalism, Literature, and the

Creative Communication Arts for "compassionate crusade through
art and activism to claim for tribal peoples a just and honorable
place in India’s national life."

 2003: Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres

 2006: Padma Vibhushan – the second highest civilian award from
the Government of India

 2007: SAARC Literary Award

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 2009: Shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize
 2010: Yashwantrao Chavan National Award
 2011: Banga Bibhushan – the highest civilian award from the
Government of West Bengal

 2012: Nominated for Nobel Prize for Literature

 On 14 January 2018, Google honored Mahasweta Devi on her 92nd
birth anniversary, celebrating her work by creating a doodle on her.

6.1.2 Rudali: An analysis

Mahasweta Devi’s Rudaliis one of the most acclaimed short fiction. It is

the story of survival of a subaltern woman. It traces her personal
transformation as a Rudali ,the professional moaner, who cries at the
funerals of the maliks, the upper caste hypocrites. Tears are
commodified and Rudalis’ are hired to mourn the death as it enhanced
the prestige of the family.AnjunKatyal in the Metamorphosis of Rudali
states that“Greif is turned into a commodity and mourning is labor. If
sorrow is controlled by the imprisoned, tears can be used as a produce,
a source of earning by professional mourners”

Mahasweta Devi’s short story, Rudali (1980) adopted for a theatre in

1992 by Usha Ganguli of the Calcutta Theatre group, ‘Rangakarnee’, is
a literary document of Naxalite movement. It has had well over a
hundred shows, playing to packed houses and has had excellent
reviews written about it.

The story revolves around the life of the poor, low caste, Sanichari.
Many readers have looked at it as a feminist text, while the insightful
minority has seen the universality in the theme. The opening scene
situates Sanichari in the socio-economic context. She shares her
poverty with the rest of the population of the Tahad Village, where
Ganjus and Dushads were in majority. Sanichari is a Ganju by caste.
Sanichari gets her name from being born on a Saturday and her mother-
in-law, Somri, finds fault with her for being unlucky:

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 Somri: Why shouldn’t I say it? After all, you were born on an unlucky
day, Saturday. It’s your destiny to devour everyone around you.

Sanichari: And what great happiness did life bring you? You’re
Monday born, but you didn’t get a better deal, did you? Arre, I’ve
seen what lives they all live, those born on Tuesday, Wednesday,
Thursday. As for you, you do nothing but bitch, bitch, bitch, all day
long.

Sanichari is intelligent and would not attribute her suffering to her fate
but is practical enough to assign it to the socio-economic conditions.

Sanichari’s family consists of her old mother-in-law Somri, Son Budhua,

daughter in law Parbatia, and grandson Haroa. Her husband had died
long ago, and since then she had been the sole provider. Her son has
been ailing with consumptive lungs and his wife, quite young has been
allured by the moneyed Thakurs. She has been dissipating herself.
Sanichari on the other hand has been leading a tough life like the chakki
on which she grinds her grains. Soon her son dies and the daughter-in-
law goes out of the house, taking away all Sanichari’s savings, even as
the husband’s corpse is lying cold. The neighbours help Sanichari to do
the last rites and to be on her feet again. Soon her mother-in-law dies.

Sanichari brings up the boy Haroa, and when the boy is a young man,
instead of taking care of his grandmother, he walks out of the house
after calling her names. Sanichari, quite old and tired of life, meets her
old time friend Bikhni, accidentally on her way back from a mela.
Bikhni’s story is only slightly different from that of Sanichari. While
Sanichari is alone with no one left to care for her, Bikhni’s only son
leaves her and she is on her own. Bikhni is a non-stop eater and a good
worker.

Sanichari offers Bikhni her home and in turn finds camaraderie. Dulan,
a neighbour, suggests that they take up the work of professional
mourners or rudalis and earn well. While Sanichari hesitates, Bikhni
takes the challenge and they together hit it off well as rudalis. Time
passes. Bikhni decides to visit her son and granddaughter and soon
Sanichari receives news about her death. Again consoled and egged on

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by Dulan, she goes to the whore’s quarters to offer to the prostitutes the
job of rudalis.

Initially, though it is tough job for her convincing the whores to join her,
soon she succeeds. She takes a crowd of prostitutes with her to mourn
Gambhir Singh’s death, and quite ironically, it was Gambhir Singh who
had misused most of the women in the crowd. He had pushed them into
whoring and one of them Gulbadan happens to be his daughter. The
play ends with Gambhir Singh’s corpse removed for cremation and
Sanichari left in her space on the stage – a space she has created for
herself and poor people like her in a world ruled by the Thakurs and the
other landed men.

An analysis
Written in twelve scenes, the play Rudali is about how to survive in an
exploitative system. The whole system is exposed in the play. The
entire text is a critique of the socio-economic and religious systems and
the nexus between them. By showing the dire poverty of the villagers,
the ways in which they are exploited, the burden of ritualised religion, the
absolute power of the malik-mahajans, and the corruption within the
privileged classes, the author constructs a powerful indictment.

The villagers have nothing but cynical contempt for the greed,
miserliness and bankruptcy of their masters, though they are forced to
submit to their power. Dulan is particularly outspoken about the warped
way of the upper classes after a scathing account of how Nathuni Singh,
who owes all his wealth to his mother, is doing nothing to treat her, but
spent thirty thousand rupees on her Kriya ceremony.

The Thakurain, or the middle wife of Nathuni Singh, confirms it: “Son of
my foot! Despatched his mother to a wretched hut near the cowshed
and left her there to die…” All day long, his old mother would lie rotting in
her own piss and shit, while her son counted the days till the old woman
popped off and he could lay his hands on all her wealth and the
Thakurain herself had no authority whatsoever since she gave birth only
to a daughter, which was her big crime.

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The landed gentry would spend lavishly on their funerals but would
never think of parting with a decent sum to the poor. Gambhir Singh,
who used to parade through the Diwali Mela on elephant back, dies.
Dulan describes him as, “A big Zaminder – lord of five villages. He really
lived it up, drinking, womanizing – and now, in his old age, he’s paying
the price for it … His entire body’s rotted away. Swollen like a drum …
But the old man’s time has come … You’ll have to go there when it’s
time to mourn. He’s put in writing that he wants a lakh of rupees to be
spent on his death ceremonies. He wants to wash away all the sins of a
lifetime with a lakh of rupees.”

Dulan tells Sanichari, “Arre, if you sit around waiting for Bikhni you’ll
starve to death. I’m telling you, his Kriya is going to be a really grand
affair! Three different kinds of bands, horses, elephants, grain and cloth
are being distributed to the people of all five villages – Sanichari, you’ll
make enough to eat for six months!”

The contrast between wealth and poverty is so glaring and so also is the
moral depravity among the rich. When approached by Sanichari, the
whores hesitate to be the rudalis and Gulbadan, when she knows that it
is for Gambhir Singh, says: “Whether anyone else goes or not, I’m
definitely going. It’s my father who’s dead, you hear? My father! The
man who ruined me, who ruined my mother! How can I not mourn at his
‘’funeral.”

Mahasweta Devi brings out through such poignant scenes and dialogues
the social attitude widely internalised by women. Society holds a woman
solely responsible for all so-called ills and evils. The dramatist subverts
the traditional claim and reinstates in its wake a new perspective.
Meeting her long-time friend, Sanichari narrates her story to her: “I never
had the time to weep. They all died, one by one, my in-laws, my
brother-in-law and his wife, my husband, my son. I didn’t shed a single
tear. Call me a daain – say it’s as if I was born to devour others.”

When Bikhni agrees to stay with her, Sanichari finds her so helpful and
concerned: “Bikhni, in my whole life, nobody has ever done so much for
me. No one has even thought of me as a human being! …you know,
when I was a girl, my mother used to always tell me that a woman’s

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worst enemy was other women…” Bikhni answers crisply summing up
the past and revisioning traditional notion: “Arre, that’s all stuff made up
by men. Go on go to sleep.”

The dramatist focuses on how awareness and knowledge empower

human beings. Dulan gives the women tips on how to keep themselves
about potential jobs by keeping an ear open when they go to the
marketplace. He tells them to expand their business by hiring extra
rudalis from the whore bazaar. He teaches them how to make an
ordinary work a profession and when Sanichari expresses her worry
about being a rudali. He says: “I’m telling you, Sanichari, no god is more
important than your belly. One does whatever it takes to feed one’s
stomach and asks for his cut from their earnings of any job, he arranges
for them, and finds nothing wrong with it. Since everyone from the
Prime Minister down to the lowest untouchable takes cuts.”

Dulan’s voice criticises, accuses, condemns and highlights the moral

corruption of the upper classes. Parbatia offers an example of people
who err when their needs are in excess of what their daily life can give.
The boy Haroa, with no one to guide him goes astray and goes in search
of an easy life.

Mahasweta Devi has undone the common belief that the prostitutes,
truants and the poor are the ‘other’ and establishes that these are poor,
working men and women, trying to fill their stomachs like everyone else.
Sanichari and Bikhni work with them help them to get back to the
community. The play closes with Sanichari, organising and training the
prostitutes into a group. They are gathered into a space, which gives
them respectability. The evolution of Sanichari also evolves a social
ritual into a profession.

Sanichari whose poverty-ridden life is symbolised by the chakki, loses

everything but is aware that society represented by the rich, the
panchayat, has always exploited her. She was forced to perform two-
kriya ceremony for her husband, since the Tahad village panchayat felt
that the Tohri village, where her husband died should not have
conducted the kriya.

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“The Tohri ‘pandas’ told me that since you’re here, you must make the
pinda offering before you go. I paid a rupee and a quarter for an offering
of sand and sattu. What a to-do there was in our village panchayat over
this! That bastard Mohanlal said, how can a Tohri Brahmin know how we
hold a kriya ceremony in Tahad village! He landed me with a second
kriya ceremony. I had to feed the whole village on curds and chivda after
taking a loan from Ramavatar.”

Her awareness of exploitation at various levels does not make her

cynical but more kindly towards people like her. She draws back into the
fold her wretched daughter-in-law who left home, dying husband and an
infant son to be a whore and Gulbadan, whose self-worth is shattered
when her natural father orders her to submit to his nephew’s lust. But the
evolved Sanichari also is capable of seeing how the young, covetous
Parbatia is lured by the lecherous, avaricious, malik-mahajans whose
bodies would rot, bearing the stamp of their promiscuity and
deviousness.

Sanichari and Bikhni learn to negotiate with the gomasthas, showing no

hesitation or shyness: “Well, if we’re to prostrate ourselves on the
ground while wailing then its fifty rupees, and if we’re to beat our breasts
all the way to the cremation ground, then it’ll be sixty-five, and …”

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Mahasweta Devi expands the notion of the community/society to include
the prostitutes, old women with years of woe on their back, and the
marginalised in general, and she is firm in rejecting the label of feminist.
“For you it may be important that this story is written by a woman …
another woman has adapted it into a play … But I think a writer has
written the story, a director has adapted it into a play…It is not very
important to me whether it was done by a woman or not …I write as a
writer, not as a woman…”
A story of survival, Rudali subverts the existing traditional notions of right
and wrong. Parbatia, Gulbadan, Dolan and Sanichari are only trying to
survive. The play is built on an unusual kind of sensitivity that is
possible only for a person who has shared the agony of the people
about whom he / she writes. It is little wonder, therefore, that
Mahasweta Devi gave away the award money for tribal welfare, about
which she made it her mission to write.
The story ends with a major shift in the life of Sanichari, from a weak
woman to a fighter, from victimization to empowerment. All her
hesitations disappeared, she went to the randi market and called the
whores to join with her for rudali work. After all they are all the victims of
the upper class maliks and they have to earn a living. She entered with
nearly a hundred rudalis to mourn the death of Gambhir Singh.Gambhir
Singh’s nephew and his gomasthawere distressed at the sight. They
were very much worried about the supposed payment to rudalis. They
couldnot stop the rudalis from hitting their head or wailing as it had an
impact on their prestige in their society.
The randirudalis surrounded his [Gambhir Singh’s] swollen corpse and
started wailing, hitting their heads on the ground. The gomastha began
to weep tears of sorrow. Nothingwill be left! Cunning Sanichari! Hitting
their heads meant they had to be paid double! Heand the nephew were
reduced to helpless onlookers.
Sanichari manipulated the situation, to turn it in favor of her and trapped
the oppressors in their own hypocrisy. Leaders are born out of survival
such is Sanichari. She emerged as a natural leader to the
randirudalisand made thecommercialization of tears not only as a means
of survival but as a tool in the hands of the victims to strike back. A
woman who could not shed tears on her own grief, a sign of depression
became a professional mourner and inverted it as a sign of
empowerment.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 6.1
List outs the theme in Rudali.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

6.2 NORMAN AND NIGHT, MOTHER

In Subsections 6.2.1 and 6.2.2, we will discuss, respectively, the author

and her work. We will then give a critique of Night Mother in Subsection
6.2.3.

6.2.1 Marsha Norman:

Marsha Norman first came to public attention in this country in 1984

with the production at the Hampstead Theatre Club of her harrowing
play ′night Mother, a work which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1983 as well
as a host of other prizes. In this section, you will learn about Marsha
Norman and her work Mother.

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Marsha Norman

One of the most important American women playwrights to emerge after

the experimental decade of the 1970’s, Marsha Norman made her mark
on the theatre with her first play, Getting Out, and won the Pulitzer Prize
in drama only six years later with ’night, Mother, her fifth play.

Marsha Norman is the daughter of Billie Williams and Bertha Williams.

She was born in Louisville, Kentucky. After graduation, she married
Michael Norman, a teacher in 1974. After her M.A., she took a job,
teaching disturbed adolescents at the Kentucky State Hospital. Later,
she joined the staff of the Brown School for gifted children.

Probably, it is her work with the disturbed children, which has given her
great insight into the convoluted emotional upheavals faced by people.
Norman believed that it is in the voices unheard that reality is. She
believed in making heard the unheard. She often travelled by bus to pick
up snatches of conversation, which gives an insight into common travails
of life leading to torments in people. In such a way, she wrote some of
her plays. For example, Trudy Blue is a play based on misdiagnosis
leading to a woman’s torment for some weeks. In her interview with
Linda Ginter Brown, she says, “I write about people you would never
see, like me. This has got to change! We have got to have our stories
told!”

Early life

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Early years

Norman was born in Louisville, Kentucky, the oldest of four children of

Billie and Bertha Williams. As a child, she read and played the piano.
She later began attending productions by the newly founded Actors
Theatre of Louisville. She received a bachelor's degree from Agnes
Scott College and a master's degree from the University of Louisville.
She worked as a journalist for The Louisville Times newspaper, and also
wrote for Kentucky Educational Television. She taught young children
and adolescents in mental institutions and hospitals. These were
perhaps her biggest influence on her writing, especially a 13-year-old girl
who influenced her play Getting Out. She also taught English at the J.
Graham Brown School and Prestonia Elementary School in Louisville.

Career
Norman's first play Getting Out was produced at the Actors Theatre of
Louisville and then Off-Broadway in 1979.The play concerns a young
woman just paroled after an eight-year prison sentence for robbery,
kidnapping and manslaughter. It reflects Norman's experience working
with disturbed adolescents at Kentucky's Central State Hospital.
Norman's success with Getting Out led her to move to New York City
where she continued to write for the Actors Theatre of Louisville. Her
full-length play, Circus Valentine was produced at the Humana
Festival in 1978. The play concerns a travelling circus and its star
attraction, Siamese twins. Her next play, 'night, Mother, became her
best-known work, given its Broadway success and its star-powered film
version. The play brought Norman a great deal of recognition, dealing
frankly with the subject of suicide, and won the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for
Drama, the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, the Hull-Warriner, the Drama
Desk Award, and the 1986 Golden Plate Award of the American
Academy of Achievement. However, her follow-up play, Traveller in the
Dark received scathing reviews from the New York critics, some of
whom were as blunt to say she could not have written it. According to an
interview in The New York Times, "Ms. Norman stayed away from the
theater and turned to screenplays, including a 1986 movie adaptation of
'night, Mother that starred Sissy Spacek and Anne Bancroft and failed to
impress critics. She was in high demand in Hollywood, though not
always for films that she liked, or that studios would approve."

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Norman wrote the book and lyrics for the musical The Secret Garden, an
adaptation of the Frances Hodgson Burnett novel The Secret Garden,
and won the Tony Award for Best Book in 1991. Her work in musical
theatre continued with the book and lyrics for the musical The Red
Shoes, which failed on Broadway in 1993. Her one-act play, Trudy Blue,
was produced off-Broadway in 1999. That play revolved around a
woman who is mistakenly told that she has two months to live. She also
wrote the libretto for the musical version of The Color Purple which
opened on Broadway in 2005, receiving a Tony Award nomination for
Best Book of a Musical.

Norman and composer Jason Robert Brown made a symphonic

adaptation of the children's novel The Trumpet of the Swan, which
premiered at the Kennedy Center in 2008. Norman has since written the
libretto for the musical adaptation of the film The Bridges of Madison
County, with a score by Brown. The musical premiered at
the Williamstown Theatre Festival on August 1, 2013 and ran briefly on
Broadway from February 20, 2014.

Norman’s characters like Jessie, Arlie and Sam reel under emotional
impacts, fumble for tenderness, yearn for love and suffer from
heartbreak beyond tears but the remarkable thing is finally they find their
way out of their emotional blasts. The commonplace characters sort out
their emotions and regain their balance coming back to the mainstream
of life. In short they find the nerve to go on. In Marsha Norman’s words,
“I always write about the same thing, people having the nerve to go on.
The people I care about are those folks you wouldn’t even notice in life –
two women in a Laundromat late at night as you drive by, thin woman in
an ugly scarf standing over the luncheon meet at the grocery, a tiny grey
lady buying a big sack of chocolate covered raisins and a carton of
books…”

The nerve-racking experiences, the emotional trauma of very ordinary

people and the emotional resolution that they seek and find is what is
and will be in the world of human beings.
Jessie in Night, Mother has suffered severely by her various handicaps
but her final, long sensible detached conversation with her mother and
the way she deals with the practicalities of a sans-Jessie existence
which her mother has to face after Jessie quits shows the carefully
premeditated emotional resolution and balance that Jessie finally finds

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after her tortuous, arduous and dreary life. She asserts her identity by
deciding what to do with her life. Norman says in an interview, “My work
with disturbed kids was perhaps the most valuable work I ever did. What
we cannot escape seeing is that we are all disturbed kids. Emotionally
disturbed children make extraordinary efforts to survive and be sane.
What you see as their disturbed behaviour is simply their effort to stay
whole in some way.”

In 1976, Norman began writing full time. In 1977, her first play, Getting
Out was published in Louisville. This play was cited by the Theater
Critics Associations as an outstanding new play. She served as
playwright-in-residence in Third and Oak and Circus Valentine at Actors
Theater of Louisville during the 1978-79 season. Her Night, Mother was
presented off Broadway in November 1981, as a Circle Repertory
Theater in Cambridge, Mass (on the basis of which production, it was
awarded the Pulitzer prize) before winning its author’s second best play
designation. The later plays include The Hold Up (1983), Traveller in the
Dark (1984), Sara and Abrahim (1988), The Secret Garden (1990), D.
Boone (1992), The Red Shoes (1993) and Trudy Blue (1985), and the
novel The Fortune Teller (1987).

Awards and Recognition:

American Theater Critics Association named Getting Out the best play
produced in regional theatre during 1977-78; National Endowment for
the Arts grant, 1978-79, for Actors Theatre of Louisville; John Gassner
New Playwrights Medallion, Outer Critics Circle, and George
Oppenheimer-Newsday Award, both 1979, both for Getting

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Out; Rockefeller playwright-in-residence grant, 1979-80, at the Mark
Taper Forum; Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Antoinette Perry (Tony)
Award nomination for best play, Pulitzer Prize for drama, Columbia
University Graduate School of Journalism, and Elizabeth Hull-Kate
Warriner Award, Dramatists Guild, all 1983, all for 'Night,
Mother; Literary Lion Award, New York Public Library, 1986; Antoinette
Perry (Tony) Award for best book of a musical, Antoinette Perry (Tony)
Award nomination for best original score, 1991, and Drama Desk Award
for best book of a musical, all 1991, all for The Secret Garden; also
received grant from American Academy and Institute for Arts and
Letters.

6.2.2 ’Night, Mother: The play

’Night, Mother runs for ninety minutes without interruption in a single set,
the actual running time marked by an on-stage clock visible to the
audience. A widowed mother and divorced daughter live in a home on a
country road. Thelma Cates can live with the pointlessness, pettiness of
it all, easily so with Jessie to take care of her. But Jessie has had
enough. The father she loved is dead, the husband she loved left her,
her son’s whereabouts are unknown and he is headed to a life of crime,
she herself is fat, unattractive, epileptic and surpassingly bored with it
all.

A scene from the play

She has a gun – her father’s and the necessary bullets, she calmly tells
her mother she will use it on herself in a couple of hours. She has
ordered her mother’s affairs as far ahead as possible and just to go over
the details of the arrangements and few fundamental matters in a good
closing talk on a special night.

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In the ensuing talk, mother and daughter open up and every secret,
enigma and misunderstanding is explained, understood leading to a
closer meaningful bond between them. But the Mother’s entire repertoire
of tenderness, coaxing, resentment, revelation and beseeching do not
move Jessie from her decision. Jessie has greater intelligence and
resolve. Jessie says ‘night, Mother literally and figuratively and Thelma
finds herself going along almost enjoying all those final plans and
instructions.

The carefully premeditated act planned by Jessie is an attempt to

escape the physical confines and barriers erected by the epileptic
seizures (purely physical) and her social failures in the loss of her
husband’s interest and lack of control over the son.

A failed mother, an unattractive wife and unloved insecure daughter she

has lost interest in the relationships of her life as she has failed and
knows it. At a stage, where she realises that the people around are not
even worth fighting for is just when she realises that she wants to quit.

Jessie’s decision is taken not emotionally but coolly, clinically in direct

contrast to her mother who remonstrates with her. In a truly detached
sense Jessie seeks to liberate herself from the physical constraints of
her body which necessitates her to lead a life in the same boring
humdrum routine of pretended life.

Norman says of Jessie’s act of killing herself, “It may look despising from
the outside, but it has cost her everything she has. If Jessie says it’s
worth, it then it is”. Jessie takes action and passes the final test of life by
deciding what happens to her. She just quits after cleansing her soul of
all bitterness and grudges.

6.2.3 ’Night, Mother: A critique

In the play, Thelma, a widow and Jessie, a divorcee, live together in a

relatively new house built way out on a country road. Obviously, there
are not many problems. There’s plenty of everything in the house.
Nights are spent in relaxed pursuits like crocheting and watching
television.

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But on the particular Saturday night that we meet Thelma and Jessie in
the play, we learn that good life may not be so good at all. As the
daughter prepares to perform her weekly ritual of giving her mother a
manicure, she says calmly, almost as a throwaway comment, “I’m going
to kill myself, mama.” And over the next 90 minutes, Mama and the rest
of us must face the fact that Jessie is not kidding.

The play moves swiftly through shifting emotional and argumentative

strategies to its pre-oriented end; an offstage gunshot. It is a shattering
evening, which looks so simple. A totally realistic play, set in real time,
counted by onstage clocks, it shows us what happens after Jessie
makes her announcement. What happens unsurprisingly is that the first
skeptical and then terrified mother tries to cajole and talk her child out of
suicide. “People don’t really kill themselves”, argues Thelma, “unless
they’re retarded or deranged.”

But Jessie is not deranged. She has never felt better in her life and the
mother becomes aware that Jessie is already gone, alive now on
borrowed time like someone with a terminal illness. While the mother
changes under the pressure of the situation, the daughter remains static.
Her decision hangs over the house like a curse – the mood swings
between horror, swiftness, inevitability and sardonic humour to create a
powerful existential drama. The play is more complex than it looks,
more harrowing than even its plot suggests. As Marsha Norman
perfectly captures the intimate details of the two individuals, two ordinary
women, she also locates the emptiness that fills too many ordinary
homes on too many faceless streets in our vast world.

’Night, Mother is not a play with a message about the choice of

committing suicide. It is about `contemporary life and what gives or not
gives it value’. The set is an all American living room and kitchen,
homely with right appliances, and conventionally tasteful. But when the
bright lights are on, we see the house colourless and dead, a pair of
antiseptic model rooms, framed like a department store window.

Norman’s dialogue fills the vacuum. When Thelma at first mistakes

Jessie’s preoccupation with guns for a fear of burglars, she says, “We

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don’t have anything people would want.” Their lives are built on
neighbourhood gossip ritualised familial obligations and housekeeping.
They have never expressed their real feelings to one another before.
We realise, as the play moves on, that the most horrifying fact in the play
is not Jessie’s decision to end her life but her mother’s and the reader’s
awakening, to the inexorable logic of that decision.

The family provides a situation in which women can know each other
closely, while it can also mean stifling confinement and theft of identity.
Thelma is a kind of survivor of all this, getting along because she has an
indirect link to the future in her children. Her view, “Family is just
accident, Jessie. It’s nothing personal, hon. they don’t mean to get on
your nerves. They don’t even mean to be your family, they just are”, and
her response to life is to survive it. “I will stay here until they make me
go, until they drag me screaming and I mean screeching into my grave,
and you’re real smart to get away before them, because, I mean honey,
you’ve never heard noise like that in your life.”

This contrasts with Jessie’s irritation about life. “They know things about
you and they learned it before you had a chance to say whether you
wanted them to know it or not. They were there when it happened and it
don’t belong to them, it belongs to you, only they got it.” To her, reaction
to life is to quit it. “Mama, I know you used to ride the bus. Riding the
bus and its hot and bumpy and crowded and too noisy and more than
anything in the world you want to get off and the only reason in the world
you don’t get off is its still fifty blocks from where you’re going? Well, I
can get off right now if I want to, because even if I ride fifty more years
and get off, it’s the same place when I step down to it. Whenever I feel
like it I can get off. As soon as I’ve enough its my stop. I’ve had
enough.”

Jessie and Thelma spend this evening in a different kind of privacy, not
a privacy that is a man’s right but rather a privacy of women without
men. This is the way Jessie has analysed things. “It’s private. Tonight
is private. Yours and mine and I don’t want anybody else to have any of
it…I don’t want anybody else over here. Just you and me. If Dawson
comes over, it’ll make me feel stupid for not doing it ten years ago.”

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She does not want the I/You dialogue between the two of them to be
interrupted by the ‘he’ of Dawson’s (Jessie’s brother). They settle down
for the last talk, though much of it, of course, is not a talk at all but
shorthand and a second language; the concerned, attentive woman’s
language.

The competition between the two of them for the father’s favour is
brought up. The father chose to talk to his daughter and not to his wife.
Jessie loved him enough for both of them mother and daughter, and
Thelma’s lack of interest in him is plain. “Jessie, all the man ever did was
farm and sit… and try to think of somebody to sell the farm to…” Even
on his deathbed, he had nothing to say to Thelma.

But Thelma is sure of herself and her individual existence. “Well I wasn’t
here for his entertainment and I am not here for yours either, Jessie. I
don’t know what I am here for; but then I don’t think about it.” However,
she tries at this last moment to learn from Jessie what he was like, since
here she has only the daughter to carry to her the words, the father
rarely addressed to her directly.

Having talked to her mother about the past, Jessie moves on to pull out
lists of reminders for her mother as she cares for her in these last
moments – lists that indirectly cite housewifely lists that gather together
and organise, not concepts or ideas or public matters (a male bastion)
but instead masking tape, light bulbs, batteries, the contents of all the
drawers, whom to call to deliver groceries, who can be depended on not
to put the fudge in the bottom of the bag where it will be smashed.

She has drawn up a list of Christmas presents for her mother, for the
next twenty years, a list to be given to Dawson, and has also prepared a
cardboard of presents, “for whenever you need one” which contains
trivial things like a sample tube of toothpaste and other objects like
grandmother’s ring. These two remembrances, of different monetary
value are two different paradigms. Their intense significance and value
are rearranged in a new paradigm as reminders of Jessie.

The grandmother’s wedding ring and the traditional notion of mothering,

homemaking, future and grandchildren, the predictable fruits of a

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reproductive marriage is broken by Jessie who would not put up with
norms. “I can’t do anything either, about my life, to change it, make it
better; make me feel better about it. Like it better, make it work. But I
can stop it, shut it down, turn it off like the radio when there’s nothing on
I want to listen to. It’s all I really have that belongs to me and I’m going
to say what happens to it. And it’s going to stop. And I’m going to stop
it.”

There is so much that has been going on quietly beneath these

exchanges of information and humorous remarks, like why suicide
appeals to Jessie. Jessie would like to die because its “dark and quiet”
to which pat comes a reply from Thelma. “So is the backyard. Jessie!
Close your eyes. Stuff cotton in your ears. Take a nap! It’s quiet in your
room.”
There is a minute and gentle attempt to separate what is daughter from
what is mother, without cruelty or blame for either. Two different
attitudes of life and each is correct in its own way.

The ordinances of the scene and of the ostensible superficiality of the

things they talk about sets up the contrast between the residue of these
lives, its trivia, its topics based on the merits of various consumer goods,
its insignificances, and the real subjects at issue in the relationship
between them. What does a life like this mean, what difficulty in
meaning drives a daughter to suicide, what is the cost of this culturally
enforced dependency? What distance exists between mothers and
daughters?

The words they do exchange will be place markers, noise, as they hide
what is actually going on, which is too subtle, tenuous, dangerous in its
possibilities of loss to be articulated. It could only be articulated in
another language, and they do not yet have the words. If the most
important, deepest things are said and the suicide takes place anyway,
the effect of the loss will multiply exponentially; there will be no way for
Thelma to survive it, no world that can pull her back together afterward.
Like the metaphors that shelter us from fear, the words between them
assume intensity, a solidity that has nothing to do with their outward
meaning – banal words like, “I think I will stay here. All they’ve got is
Sanka” spoken by the mother after learning of her daughter’s carefully

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worked-out plan for her that night after her suicide, words whose banality
becomes a form of protection.

The ordinariness of these words are their mask and their mark, hiding a
dogged attempt on the mother’s part to grasp words as concrete objects
and to use them as instruments to stop the time that is moving toward
such a loss, instruments to cover over, and erase her daughter’s words,
as if in that way deny the very possibility of Jessie’s carrying out her
plan. She stuffs them like rags in the chinks between the minutes to try
to stop their movement. The rebellious and desperate attempt to
preserve ordinariness is what is going on in this subtle mother-daughter
conversation, and positions change by a hair’s width in an understanding
that is already so deep; only the most minute changes can occur.

From the mother’s point of view preserving ordinariness would mean

saving her daughter’s life, keeping the days, one just like the last,
without this hideous disruption for which her daughter has collected old
towels, the cushion of a lawn chair and plastic garbage bags to keep the
mess down. When the mother automatically, but unwittingly, says,
“Don’t go making a big mess” in the mechanical, banal phrase of the
nagging mother, its resonance is intensified by her growing despair at
what the mess will mean, her inability to say anything else but those
automatic words.

For the daughter, however, preserving ordinariness would prolong her

own living-death, her stranded position as an aging daughter serving as
mother to her mother, a mother who is really healthier than she is and
who still retains indirect control over her house, watched over from an
invisible, outside, public vantage point by the son, Dawson. A highly
dignified woman, the humiliations lead her to take a certain control. “This
life is all I really have that belongs to me and I’m going to say what
happens to it.”

Jessie, the daughter, a woman in her late thirties-early forties, pale and
normally taciturn, is talkative on this evening. The easy familiarity
between her and her mother suggests an affection that finds its
expression in their physical relation to each other onstage. Their
conversation paradoxically, articulated what women have long used with

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one another to deal with a language and a coded world that is not theirs,
a language of the glance, the touch, quick flashes of comprehension that
may escape men but are signs of an underground, oblique language
among women as a dominated group.

Thelma likes to talk, using words to suit the moment. She believes that
things are what she says they are. She has a strong sense of humour
and tells fanciful stories about a crazy friend named Agnes who keeps a
house full of birds. “And she says they just follow her home. Well, I
know for a fact she’s still paying on the last parrot she bought. You gotta
keep your life filled up, she says…It’s all that okra she eats. You can’t
just willy-nilly eat okra two meals a day and expect to get away with it.
Made her crazy.”

After sometime, when Jessie had laughed at her narration, she says,
“…and I only told you about it because I thought I might get a laugh out
of you for once even if it wasn’t the truth. Things don’t have to be true to
talk about ‘em you know.”

Language is not used to mean (anything). It is used to do what the

situation requires, to make people laugh, to persuade them, or to
console them. It is often small talk, pasting wounds over silences.
Jessie goes about her very careful operation. She had scheduled
everything she must do that evening, even planned the time when the
suicide should occur. “I don’t want you to wake Dawson and Loretta
when you call. I want them to still be up and dressed so they can get
right over.”

Thelma first does not understand what is happening and settles down
before the TV for a normal Saturday night. She even gives Jessie the
mother’s tired criticism that she watches too much television, accounting
for the way in which Jessie searches for her father’s gun. She even
laughs and says, “We don’t have anything anybody’d want, Jessie. I
mean I don’t even want what we got, Jessie.”

Jessie’s reference to the gun for protection brings up her son Ricky, who
as she says is the only criminal they know. He has been arrested
several times and has even stolen from her. He is like her. “We look at

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the world and see the same thing: Not Fair. And the only difference
between us is Ricky’s out there trying to get even. And he knows not to
trust anybody and he got it straight from me. And he knows not to try to
get work, and guess where he got that. He walks around like there’s a
loose board in the floor, and you know who laid that floor, I did.”

Ricky becomes a metaphor for the jumbled mismatch of her marriage.

“Ricky is the two of us together for all time in too small a space. And
we’re tearing each other apart, like always, inside that boy, and if you
don’t see it, then you’re just blind.” Like the attempt to measure the
extent that is required of women by a culture that always finds them
lacking, she was not enough for her husband and Ricky. “I never was
what he wanted to see, so it was better when he wasn’t looking at me all
the time.” Thelma has also the same thing to tell about her husband,
“How could I love him, Jessie? I didn’t have a thing he wanted. (Jessie
doesn’t answer).”

The daughter’s remark later to her mother’s lament that her husband
should have taken her with him when he left, succinctly sums up
patriarchal attitude of women. “Mama, you don’t pack your garbage
when you move”. This sharply contrasts with Jessie’s action next.
“Taking the bag to the big garbage can near the back door.” Thelma
doesn’t want her to call herself garbage. She claims that if Jessie has
the courage to kill herself, she certainly must have the courage to stay
alive; Jessie’s response is to agree: “It’s really a matter of where I’d
rather be.”

The sensitive feminine world thinks of others, even as it is coming to an

end. Jessie briefs her mother about the various arrangements she has
made for her for a comfortable living in her absence. She tells her about
milk that she has ordered for. Thelma does not like milk and left to
herself would not worry about it. Jessie had even thought about keeping
her mother engaged between the moment of her (Jessie’s) and the
arrival of others.

“Now, when you hear the shot, I don’t want you to come in. First of all,
you won’t be able to get in by yourself, but I don’t want you trying. Call
Dawson, then call the Police, and then call Agnes. And then you will

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need something to do till somebody gets here, so wash the hot-
chocolate pan. You wash that pan till you hear the door bell ring and I
don’t care if it’s an hour, you keep washing that pan.”

There is a difference between Jessie at present and Jessie in an old

baby picture. “Who I started out and this is what’s left… I am what
became your child […] I’m what was worth waiting for and I didn’t make
it. Me… who might have made a difference to me… I’m not going to
show up, so there’s no reason to stay, except to keep you company and
that’s …not reason enough because I’m not…very good company … Am
I”, and the mother’s heartbroken cry after the gun shot, “Jessie, Jessie,
child … forgive me (pause) I thought you were mine” and her holding the
pan tight as though her life depended on it, reveals how in this world of
mother and daughter, in this female world of closeness and
understanding, man’s language, male perspective and man’s world do
not figure.

Women’s invisible labour is priceless. It is something without which

nothing in men’s lives or their civilisation could continue to function, just
as male narratives would go nowhere if there were not female “subject-
less spaces” through which they could advance. Yet this priceless self-
effacing space is made into something worthless.

Marsha Norman’s ’Night, Mother is a 120 minutes’ sensitive lesson in

reworking our spaces and asking us to review our conditions, if women
decide to quit the world. Norman’s text, as Jill Dolan describes in detail,
has proved problematic for most male critics, apparently because of its
thematic focus on mother/daughter rather than on the traditional
father/son. Especially on the occasion of the Pulitzer award, much
debate was devoted to whether or not ’Night, Mother met canonical
measures of greatness, particularly that of universality. Jenny Spencer,
while not claiming feminism for the play, observes that women members
of the audience experienced the play on a different level. Men may
sympathise but not identify in the same way.

Modleski warns against subjective criticism of men. ’Night, Mother is a

feminist text and it challenges at a physical and psychological level the
power of the male world. Quite apart from the critical reception, the

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Pulitzer award, and the inclusion in the syllabi, the play has become a
basic rallying point for women who want to argue for the right to discuss
women and women experiences.

Marsha Norman says “… I felt with ‘Night, Mother that Jessie’s decision
to commit suicide was quite brave. She finally decided that she could
decide what to do with her life”. She says, “My life is all I have that really
belongs to me and I’m going to say what happens to it.” Now, it would
have been fine with me if she had decided to go to beauty school or get
a real estate licence. It probably wouldn’t have won the Pulitzer Prize,
but it would have been fine. The point was not to kill herself; the point
was to take charge.”

The subjects are suicide, love and the meaning of life – as huge as they
come; but they are treated with the specificity of threading a needle or
choosing the right breakfast for your needs. Humour and pathos pop us
as naturally as wild flowers or fences by the roadside; there is
psychological accuracy and nothing seems contrived; and there is that
bustle of minutely perceived existential details that bespeak the master.

Jessie Cates, in her late thirties or early forties is pale and a little
unsteady physically. It is just a year since she has gained control of her
mind and body. Now she feels, finds and after deep thought makes a
decision and sticks to it.

Usually a silent person and not good company, this night she is
communicative and filled with a sense of purpose. Jessie realises that
her mother needs her to take care of her. A woman of intelligence,
energy and good will, Jessie decides to end her life with reason. Her
every question and statement to her mother gleams with wisdom and is
filled with observed and comprehended reality. Jessie having been a
weak person all her life both physically and mentally, now after deep
thought coolly and clinically decides to take control of her life – she
exercises her will to the last.

Jessie does not blame anyone for her frailties and even consoles her
mother saying she is not to be blamed. It is just her individual failure.
This shows her generosity and self-knowledge.

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Jessie lacks the strength to act with freedom or control in the world and
her suicide is a way of taking control – death would give her the freedom
and fulfilment denied to her in life. Jessie’s emotional life is dominated
by a sense of helplessness, hopelessness and overpowering loneliness.
She says:

I can’t do anything either, about my life, to change it, makes

If better, make me feel better about it. Like it better,

Make it work. But I can stop it. Shut it down, turn it off

Like a radio when there’s nothing on I want to listen to.

It’s all I really have that belongs to me and I’m going to

Say what happens to it. And it’s going to stop. And I’m
Going to stop it. So, Let’s just have a good time.
Jessie’s decision and her desire reveal her self-autonomy and will
power, an impulse common in suicides.

Jessie has withstood the pain of divorce, bears the infidelity of her
husband, worries helplessly about the criminal tendencies of her son
Ricky and her self-centred mother. With dignity, she decides that at least
she will have a right to say what happens to her hereon. Her love and
care for her mother is shown in the meticulous planning of the domestic
details including listing of Birthday presents for the next ten years.

Her cool acceptance of her mother’s remonstrations, revelations and

denials reveal strength of mind and emotional balance. The last
confessional conversation liberates mother and daughter. Jessie comes
alive by her death. She gets reborn as a daughter with dignity. She
chooses to liberate her soul at a moment of choice – to her a perfect
moment.

The character of Thelma

Thelma Cates, ‘Mama’ is Jessie’s mother. She is in her late fifties or

early sixties. She leads an easy life. She speaks quickly and enjoys

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talking. Whatever she says she believes in it. She is very clear about her
house being her possession. She is chatty and nosy. She is definitely
self-centred and wants Jessie to live on more for her sake than Jessie’s
She has got used to having her daughter around and had not given
much thought as to how the silent, weak Jessie might be feeling.
Thelma’s zest for life is in direct contrast to Jessie’s sad acceptance and
surrender. Thelma dislikes the idea of death and shuns even the thought
of it. She cannot accept her daughter’s longing for quiet death. Thelma is
a survivor. She knows what she wants and gets it. She is also realistic.
She advises Jessie that “Family is just accident.” People are what they
are. She is not a responsible housekeeper. She tells Jessie she has no
idea of what they have. Thelma is emotional and she switches from
expressing regret to Jessie to accusing her the next moment. In spite of
everything she feels sad about Jessie’s decisions and blames herself.
Her remonstrations and beseeching reveal her affection. Mama lives on
hope and is an optimist. Jessie is devoid of hope and knows nothing can
be done to help her.
In the last moments of the play, a desperate mother, Thelma sticks to
her daughter and she is pushed aside. Jessie leaves the room with her
muted farewell 'night, Mother. She goes and locks herself in her room.
After a few second, a gunshot is heard from the room and Thelma cries
calling her son, Dawson.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 6.2

Comment on the character of Jessie.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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SUMMARY

In this Unit, we discussed Mahssweta Devi’s Rudali and Marsha

Norman’s ’Night, Mother. In analysing these plays, we implied that both
are concerned with the lives of the marginalised. We began the Unit with
a brief biography of Devi and said that the focus of her works largely was
on the nature of exploitation of the disadvantaged in India, particularly
women and tribal population. We then analysed Rudali, a short story
adopted as a play capturing the miserable life a poor woman leads.
Subsequently, we discussed Marsha Norman’s ’Night, Mother,
delineating the mental anguish of neglected women.

REFERENCE

https://www.shethepeople.tv/home-top-video/author-mahasweta-devi-
activist-india
https://feminisminindia.com/2019/02/08/draupadi-review-mahasweta-
devi/
https://www.thebetterindia.com/63913/mahasweta-devi-stories/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahasweta_Devi#:~:text=Mahasweta

https://www.ijsr.net/archive/v9i3/SR20306234836.pdf
https://www.gradesaver.com/mahasweta-devi-short-
stories/wikipedia/awards-and-recognition
https://sites.google.com/site/jeltals/archive/vol-6-no-1-july---december-
2018/7-mahasweta-devi-s-rudali-a-story-of-survival-from-tears-to-
triumph---s-guru-shobana

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007%2F978-1-349-24086-9_10
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsha_Norman
https://www.encyclopedia.com/arts/educational-magazines/norman-
marsha-1947

VIDEO LINK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyLjmxVm0W

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BLOCK - 5

UNIT- 7 CHARLOTTE BRONTE: JANE EYRE

STRUCTURE

Overview

Learning Objectives

7.1 Charlotte Bronte: A Biography

7.2 Jane Eyre: The Story
7.3 Jane Eyre: A Critique
7.4 Themes
7.4.1 Romance

7.4.2 Religion
7.4.3 Female independence

7.4.4 Class system

7.5 Character Sketch
7.5.1 Jane Eyre

7.5.2 Rochester

Summary

OVERVIEW

This Unit begins with a biography of Charlotte Bronte, which, among

others, mentions how the novelist has to adopt a pseudonym to publish
her novels. It then gives an outline of the story of Jane Eyre, a story
about the life of an orphaned girl from her childhood to marriage. The

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Unit then analyses the novel in all its facets of romance, religion, female
independence and class system.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 give the biographical details of Charlotte Bronte;

 summarise the story of Jane Eyre;
 make a critique of, and bring out the themes, in Jane Eyre.

7.1 CHARLOTTE BRONTE: A BIOGRAPHY

One of the most famous Victorian women writers, and a prolific poet,
Charlotte Brontë is best known for her novels, including Jane
Eyre (1847), her most popular. Here, you will learn about Charlotte
Bronte and her work Jane Eyre. In this section, you will learn about
Charlotte Bronte and her work Jane Eyre.

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Charlotte Brontë
Charlotte Brontë, like her contemporary Elizabeth Barrett Browning,
experimented with the poetic forms that became the characteristic
modes of the Victorian period that is the long narrative poem and the
dramatic monologue but unlike Browning, Bronte gave up writing poetry
after the success of Jane Eyre. Brontë’s decision to abandon poetry for
novel writing exemplifies the dramatic shift in literary tastes and the
marketability of literary genres from poetry to prose fiction that occurred
in the 1830s and 1840s. Her experience as a poet thus reflects the
dominant trends in early Victorian literary culture and demonstrates her
centrality to the history of 19th-century literature.

Early Life

Charlotte Bronte was born in 1816, as the third daughter of a Parson.

The parsonage at Haworth in Yorkshire a bleak and isolated place, was
home for most of her life. Her father was Patrick Brontë (1777–1861),
an Anglican clergyman. Irish-born, he had changed his name from the
more commonplace Brunty. After serving in several parishes, he moved
with his wife, Maria Branwell Brontë, and their six small children
to Haworth amid the Yorkshire moors in 1820, having been awarded a
rectorship there. Soon after, Mrs. Brontë and the two eldest children
(Maria and Elizabeth) died, leaving the father to care for the remaining
three girls Charlotte, Emily, and Anne and a boy, Branwell. Their
upbringing was aided by an aunt, Elizabeth Branwell, who left her
native Cornwall and took up residence with the family at Haworth.
In 1824 Charlotte and Emily, together with their elder sisters before their
deaths, attended Clergy Daughters’ School at Cowan Bridge, near
Kirkby Lonsdale, Lancashire.

The school, which was harsh and austere, left only unhappy memories
in Charlotte’s mind and the loss of her sisters there added to her bitter
feeling against the school.

The depiction of the regimentation of Lowood and the tyrannical nature

of Mr. Brocklehurst in the novel are drawn directly from this period of her
life. She returned to the parsonage after the death of the sisters and
was left in charge of her younger siblings, Emily, Anne and Brasswell.
Apart from another stint at a different boarding school, she remained
mostly at the parsonage. As she was, like her siblings, immensely fond

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of literature and had very active imagination, the isolated condition later
helped her to put down in writing what her fertile mind imagined during
the lonely hours.

Charlotte was described by Lady Gaskell as “quiet, thoughtful and very

small in figure – almost stunted, with large, well-shaped reddish brown
peculiar eyes.” She had the responsibility of directing the family.
Gaskell, her biographer observes that stoicism was Charlotte’s habitual
state, and its tenacity and depth was tested hard not only by external
circumstances but also by her own delicate health.

The Brontes were four in all, historically speaking and that included apart
from the three Bronte sisters, Patrick the brother. However, it is only the
three sisters Emily, Anne and Charlotte who are known to the students
of English literature, of which Emily is known for her poems also. The
three wrote, altogether seven novels of which Emily Brontes’ Wuthering
Heights Charlotte Brontes’ Jane Eyre and Anne Brontes’ Agnes Grey
have immense literary recognition.

Charlotte also taught for much of her life; for three years she taught at
Roe Head School and served for some years as governess in private
households. She also studied and taught languages in Brussels. In
1854, she accepted her third offer of marriage and wed her father’s
curate Nicholls and in the subsequent year she died.

It was rather inevitable for the sisters to become novelists. They were
avid readers and writers, and had the leisure that is needed for the
career in writing. However it was an extremely difficult task for women
to publish in the 19th century, and the sisters had to adopt pseudonyms
of Currer, Ellis and Acton Bell. Charlotte published her novels Shirley
Villette, The Professor and Jane Eyre under the name of Currer.
Though they were received with reservations then, the novels have
come to be considered as major classics now.

Jane Eyre received general and critical acclaim overnight. It ran to three
editions in its first winter and the lending libraries were besieged for
copies by their subscribers. William Thackeray’s encomiums crowned
its success and gave the author her most intensely felt satisfaction. “It

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interested me so much” wrote Thackeray to the publisher. That I have
lost (or won if you like) a whole day in reading it… Who the author can
be I can’t guess, if a woman she shows her language better than most
ladies do or has had ‘classical’ education. It is a fine book, the man and
woman capital, the style very generous and upright, so to speak… Give
my respects and thanks to the author, whose novel is the first English
one (and the French are only romances now) that I’ve been able to read
for many a day.”

What recommended Jane Eyre to the great novelist was the quality of
the writing, the clean, forceful, inartificial writing, so different from the
usual productions of the lady contributors. The other quality he
especially noticed was the book’s “upright character”. Rectitude was a
basic Bronte quality. Applied to fiction, it contributed a new dimension to
literature. Unconsciously, critics acclaim, that Currer Bell, with her
scrupulous regard for truth and critical self-analysis, had advanced the
novel by half a century.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 7.1

Introduction of Charlotte Bronte.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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7.2 JANE EYRE: THE STORY

A Scene from Jane Eyre

Orphaned as a baby, Jane Eyre is placed in the care of a cold-hearted
aunt, Mrs. Reed of Gateshead Hall. Mrs. Reed’s husband, a brother of
Jane’s mother, instructs his wife on his deathbed to care as tenderly for
Jane as for her own three children. But Mrs. Reed, a sombre and
severe woman, ignores this request for the ten miserable years that
Jane spends under her roof. She pampers her own spoiled children and
brings Jane up as little better than a servant. One day, as punishment
for a bit of childish wilfulness, she puts Jane into the room in which Mr.
Reed died. The highly imaginative child falls into a faint and becomes
very ill.

After being nursed back to health by Bessie Leaven, a sympathetic

nurse at Gateshead, Jane is sent to the Lowood School, fifty miles away.
Although life in this school is very austere, it is generally a relief after
Gateshead Hall. Jane is befriended by a Miss Temple and learns her
lessons rapidly. Tragedy strikes when an epidemic kills some of the
girls at Lowood. This leads to an investigation into conditions at the
school and some subsequent improvements.

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Jane becomes a teacher at the school, but leaves at eighteen to become
Governess to the precocious Adele Varens, who lives in isolated
Thornfield Manor near Millcote.

Jane does not at first meet Edward Rochester, the girl’s guardian. She
is engaged by the kindly and capable Mrs. Fairfax, chief housekeeper
and relative of the Lord of the Manor. Jane finds contentment in the
quiet, rustic life at the manor and in her imaginative young charge, but
she is puzzled when Mrs. Fairfax warns her that she is never to enter a
mysterious locked room on the third floor. One day, Jane hears a shrill,
blood-curdling laugh coming from the room, but Mrs. Fairfax pretends
that Grace Poole, a rather dumpy, unprepossessing servant, made the
maniacal noise.

One January afternoon, while out walking, Jane meets her employer, Mr.
Rochester in the field. He has been thrown by his horse, and his dog
comes to Jane seeking help. But the gruff, surly Rochester insists on
getting home unaided, although he is in great pain. He questions Jane
and learns she is the new Governess. Rochester’s manner to her
becomes more gracious when she is obviously not cowed by his
overbearing manner. In confidence, he tells her that little Adele is his
daughter by a French ballerina, who deserted both father and child long
ago.

One night, Jane is awakened by the same shrill scream she had heard
before. Opening her door, she sees smoke billowing from Rochester’s
room. Jane wakes up Rochester just in time, as his bed is in fire. He
refuses to allow her to awaken the household, telling her the fire may
have been set by Grace Poole, who had periodic fits of insanity. The
rest of the servants are told that a lighted candle caused the fire
accidentally.

Jane, sensing that her employer is suffering from the consequences of

some mysterious sin of the past, gives him all her sympathy and
gradually finds herself falling in love with him. But her hopes are
thwarted when Rochester begins going to parties in the neighbourhood,
where he is courting the beautiful, frivolous Blanche Ingram. At a party
Rochester gives in Thornfield Manor, the aristocratic Blanche and her

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friends treat Jane with haughty condescension. Jane feels she can
never compete with these snobbish, elegant people.

While the house-guests are staying at Thornfield, Rochester receives a

mysterious caller – a Mr. Mason from the West Indies. That night, Jane
hears a scuffle and a cry for help in the room just above hers.
Rochester quiets the household’s alarm but asks Jane privately to help
nurse Mr. Mason who is bleeding and unconscious. Before dawn the
wounded is spirited away from the house.

One day soon after, Jane is enjoying the lovely midsummer evening in
an orchard, when Rochester comes upon her and informs her that he is
shortly to be married. Jane, feeling miserable, assumes he intends to
marry Blanche Ingram. She asks him tearfully how he can expect her to
remain on at Thornfield under the circumstances. Rochester kisses her
and tells her it is she whom he wishes to marry.

Jane’s happy excitement before the wedding is interrupted one night

when she awakens in horror to see a strange, ugly woman trying on her
bridal veil and then tearing it to pieces. Rochester assures her it is only
a bad dream, but in the morning Jane finds the ripped fragments of the
veil.

On the wedding day, Mr. Mason interrupts the service announcing that
the marriage is illegal because Rochester still has a living wife. Forced
to reveal the truth at last, Rochester takes Jane to the forbidden
chamber on the third floor where Jane sees a hideous creature, crawling
on all fours in her madness. It was she who had attacked Mason and
torn Jane’s wedding veil. Rochester explains that the creature is
Mason’s sister Bertha whom he had been tricked into marrying fifteen
years before in Jamaica and who comes from a family of lunatics and
degenerates. His married life has been an unmitigated hell with the
insane Mrs. Rochester kept under lock and key in the care of Grace
Poole.

Jane is filled with sympathy for the misanthropic Rochester.

Nevertheless, she realises she must now depart. Taking just a little
money with her, she wanders about the Midland moors, vainly seeking
employment. Close to starvation, she is finally befriended and nursed

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back to health by a clergyman named St. John Rivers and his two
sisters, Mary and Diana. Under the new name of Jane Elliot, she finds a
job as village schoolmistress and tries to forget her seemingly hopeless
love for Rochester.

One day, Rivers learns that an uncle of Jane’s, John Eyre has recently
died in Madeira and has left Jane 20,000 pounds. Jane insists on
sharing this legacy with Rivers and his sisters who, a lawyer discovers,
are really her cousins. St. John Rivers asks Jane to be his wife and to
go with him to India where he plans to become a missionary. Although,
he is not in love with her, he feels she would make an admirable
assistant in his mission.

While Jane is considering the offer, she has a dream that Rochester is
calling for her. Failing to find him in the neighbourhood the next
morning, she journeys back to Thornfield, where she is shocked to find
the great manor house gutted by fire and completely in ruins. Making
inquiries at the local inn, she discovers that Mrs. Rochester one night
succeeded in setting the house on fire. Rochester managed to lead the
servants to safety and then went back into the burning mansion to
rescue his wife. She eluded him, was able to climb to the roof, and was
then killed in a plunge to the ground.

Rochester barely managed to get out of the burning house alive himself.
A flaming staircase had fallen, blinded him and crushing one arm so
badly it had to be amputated. Rochester is now living in morose solitude
at the lonely nearby manor of Ferndean. Jane hurries to see him.
Overjoyed that she has come to him, Rochester asks her to become his
wife. She happily accepts and they are married. They soon have a
child. Two years later, Rochester regains the sight of one eye.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 7.2
Explain jane Eyre: the story
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

7.3 JANE EYRE: A CRITIQUE

Jane Eyre is a great novel, which appeals to several levels of

comprehension and appreciation. Its greatest attraction is its superb
narrative. The characters in Jane Eyre are not created in one single
mode. Some are naturalistic and some are fantastic, even bizarre.
Because of this mixture, the novel seems, particularly to the
undemanding reader, typically ‘romantic’. The novel employs this mode
in a number of ways and has helped to create the archetypal romantic
novel, for it is not only dominated by the subject of love but of love beset
to the end by near-impossible obstacles.

Jane Eyre is clearly divisible into the three sections, covering Jane’s
sojourns first at Lowood School, then with Rochester at Thornfield Hall

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and finally with Rivers at Moor House. The first part of the novel is
devoted to the establishment of a tremendous sense of emotional
identification with the heroine. The second part extends and makes
subtle this theme, while at the same time broadening the narrative
interest of the novel.

We can get a sense of period in Jane Eyre and the cue comes from St.
John Rivers’ conversation with Jane. “I have brought you a book for
evening solace”, and he laid on the table a new publication – a poem:
one of those genuine productions so often vouchsafed to the fortunate
public of those days – the golden age of modern literature. “

The ‘new publication’, which St John Rivers brings Jane Eyre, at that
stage in her life when she is a village schoolmistress, is Marmion (1808).
The allusion to Marmion suggests that without creating any sense of
period in her novel, Charlotte Bronte almost instinctively placed her
heroine in that period whose literature she found most inspiring, the hey-
day of Romanticism, the ‘golden age’ of modern literature.

For a majority of readers, major ‘romantic’ appeal of Jane Eyre lies in its
heroine, who is placed in a succession of situations, which bare her
vulnerability – physical, mental, spiritual, emotional and moral – and in
its hero, Rochester, who is physically powerful, magnetic in personality
and capable of a wide range of responses to its environment and those
who inhabit it. He can, in turn, display a firmness of will, which seems
only a short step away from cruelty, and a tenderness, which at times
veers towards sentimentality.

Conventional romantic novels of love are essentially optimistic because

they are expected to, and almost invariably do, conclude with the
achievement of a much-frustrated union of hero and heroine. But they
achieve the sunlight only after a prolonged sojourn in the darkness of
despair, anger and danger. The final happy outcome is greater because
of the encircling gloom out of which it has leapt. The ending of Jane
Eyre to a superficial reader is ‘happy’ but the novel, which has suffering,
anger, deprivation, doubt, skepticism and moral qualms, has more to it
than ordinary happiness. The novel’s concluding pages have a gravity

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that contributes to the superiority of the novel over the other romantic
novels.

The diminutive Governess, Jane, is the very centre of the novel.

Arguably, her presence penetrates more comprehensively than does
that of any of Charlotte’s other heroines. So strong is it that some
readers confidently assume that the novel is Charlotte’s autobiography.
Yet there are others who regard the novel as a religious one because it
is the record of the fidelity of a young woman to the inexorable laws of
God as she sees them. However, the novel cannot but be considered a
romantic novel.

The gothic elements in it – the Byronic hero with a past, the mad wife
locked up in an attic and so on – constitute only a small part of the
romantic element in the novel. Far more important is the
characteristically romantic theme of the novel, namely the struggle of an
individual consciousness towards self-fulfilment and the romantic
imagery of landscape, seascape, sun, moon and the elements through
which this theme is expressed. The peculiarity of the novel lies in the
fact that it is not totally towards self-fulfilment but is held back by an
allegiance to the ethical precepts of the Christian code and an
acknowledgement of the necessity of exercising reason in human affairs.
Jane’s comment after Rochester’s first marriage has been revealed and
her realisation of her duty to leave him, epitomises the struggle within
her between these two systems of value: “Conscience, turned tyrants,
held passion by the throat”.

The dominant energies and sympathies of the novel are on the side of
passion. “Feeling without judgement is a washy draught in deed; but
judgement untempered by feeling is too bitter and husky a draught for
human deglutition.” We are frequently reminded that Jane herself is
passionate. “You are passionate, Jane, “that you must allow”, says Mrs.
Reed. Jane accepts it: “I know no medium; I never in my life have
known any medium in my dealings with positive, hard characters,
antagonistic to my own, between absolute submission and determined
revolt. I have always faithfully observed the one, up to the very moment
of bursting. Sometimes with volcanic vehemence, into the other.”

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But, at the beginning of the story, as an under-privileged, oppressed
child, she rebels against the authoritative Mrs. Reed: “My soul began to
expand, to exult, with the strangest sense of freedom, of triumph I ever
felt”. She is sent to Lowood School where she is more oppressed than
before. But for the first time she finds something different from suffering
and injustice by knowing what it is to be stoical.

She tells Helen Burns: “When we are struck at without a reason, we

should strike back again very hard; I am sure we should – so hard as to
teach a person who struck us never to do it again.” To which, Helen
replies, “You will change your mind, I hope, when you grow older, as yet
you are but a little untaught girl.”

Inspired by her words and supported by Miss Temple, her teacher, Jane
endures her life in Lowood. Speaking of her teacher, she says, “I had
imbibed from her something of her nature and much of her habits; more
harmonious thoughts; what seemed better-regulated feelings had
become the inmates of my mind. I had given in allegiance to duty and
order; I was quiet; I believed I was content.”

When Temple leaves the school, Jane felt, “I was left in my natural
element and beginning to feel the stir of old emotions… now I
remembered that the real world was wide, and that a varied field of
hopes and fears, of sensation and excitements, awaited those who had
courage to go forth into its expanse, to see real knowledge of life amidst
its perils.”

She yearns to expand with the expansion of world outside and says, “My
eyes passed all other objects to rest on those remote, the blue peaks: it
was those I longed to surmount; all within their boundary of rock and
heath seemed prison-ground, exile limits. I traced the white road
winding round the base of one mountain, and vanishing in a gorge
between the two: how I longed to follow it further.” She follows it and
lands in Rochester’s Thornfield Hall, as governess to his ward. He is a
kindred spirit, passionate, vital and unconventional. He makes Jane
believe in concretising in a human relationship a romantic ideal.

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But, she finds a different lesson in Thornfield of the potential danger and
disaster that passions can bring. The first of these comes in the form of
a conflict she faces when she has to choose between livings as
Rochester’s mistress or follow the law of conscience and leave him.
She chooses the second course of action passively. The second crisis
comes in the form of a proposal of loveless marriage to St John Rivers,
and work as a missionary. Jane refuses, a wise choice indeed, and
plods on alone till in the end she is united with Rochester, her love, in a
lawful manner.

The novel thus effectively blends the realistic world of social behaviour
and the romantic world of passionate self-consciousness. David Lodge,
the literary critic sums up the achievement thus:

“On the one hand, the loneliness and misery of the young child in the
Reed household, or the humiliations and discomforts of Lowood School,
or the description of Jane, destitute and drenched with rain, peering
through a window into the snug interior of Moor House; and on the other
hand, the descriptions of Jane’s paintings or the scene of Rochester’s
proposals. When the chestnut tree is struck by lightning or the extended
image of a summer landscape invaded by icy winter through which Jane
expresses her feelings when her marriage is prevented; on the one
hand, writing which is firmly realistic and literal, keenly sensitive to
common emotions and sensations, insisting on the value of animal
comfort, domestic happiness, ordinary human affection; and on the other
hand, writing which is visionary and poetic evocative of heightened
states of feeling, insisting on the value of individual self-fulfilment won
from a conflict between passion and reason conducted at an
extraordinary pitch of imaginative perception.” This sense of unity that
pervades the novel includes the conventional terms of plot and the
characters. The novel, it is generally agreed, is about emotional life:
manners and morals, the characteristic concerns of the novel-form, and
is about the inner life of the heroine.

“Altogether the auto-biography of Jane Eyre is pre-eminently an anti-

Christian composition. There is throughout it a murmuring against the
comforts of the rich and against the privations of the poor, which, as far as
each individual is concerned, is a murmuring against God's
appointment—there is a proud and perpetual assertion of the rights of

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man, for which we find no authority either in God's word or in God's
providence—there is that pervading tone of ungodly discontent which is at
once the most prominent and most subtle evil which the law and the
pulpit, which all civilized society in fact has at the present day to contend
with. We do not hesitate to say that the tone of mind and thought which
has overthrown authority and violated every code human and divine
abroad, and fostered Chartism and rebellion at home, is the same which
has also written Jane Eyre.”
The most obvious element in the novel is the simple single-story about
the narrator Jane herself, and her friendship with Rochester. It is, in
fact, Jane who is the heroine of the novel. The novel can be called a
love story. This would be true in one way, as it ends on marriage, and it
can be called a moral story, since by the time the marriage is arrived at,
the novel represents the resolution of moral and emotional conflicts and
the growth of moral and emotional grasp of life as a whole. The story
examines the period of life in which the heroine, makes the most
influential decisions in her life; the period which triggers the most
extreme emotion of which her nature is capable, and brings out the tests
and strength of the moral principles which rule her.

“Such complex concentration on the moral and emotional growth of the

individual”, says W. A. Craik, “had not been attempted before.”
Charlotte Bronte did something new and has created a form of fiction
called ‘fictional autobiography’. We perceive only what the character
perceives and we share in the character’s growth and self-knowledge.
For instance, consider the following passages:

“Jane, you look blooming, and smiling, and pretty”, said he, “truly pretty
this morning. Is this my pale little elf? Is this my mustard seed? This
little sunny faced girl with the dimpled cheek and rosy lips; the satin-
smooth hazel hair and the radiant hazel-eyes (I had green eyes, reader;
but you must excuse the mistake; for him they were new dyed, I
suppose)”

“Gentle reader, may you never feel what I then felt! May your eyes never
shed such stormy scalding, heart-rung tears as poured from mine. May
you never appeal to Heaven in prayers so hopeless and so agonized as
in that hour left my lips; for never may you, like me, dread to be the
instrument of evil to what you wholly love.”

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“The caged eagle, whose gold-ringed eyes cruelty has extinguished,
might look as looked that sightless Samson. And reader, do you think I
feared him in his blind ferocity? – if you do, you little know me.”

The constant reference to the reader is a clear call from the author for
the reader to draw closer and share in the experience and also to detach
oneself, from something that may dull one’s moral awareness.

Autobiographies generally involve a simple narrative viewpoint, and the

view is that of the narrator of the story. There are two obvious narrative
stances in the novel – the story can either be seen and revealed by Jane
at the age at which she experiences it or it can be interpreted by Jane
who looks back at her youth from the age of about thirty – the age she
claims to be in the last chapter, where she says she has been married
ten years. The method is established right at the beginning of the novel.

From the magnificently simple and dramatic opening paragraphs,

describing John, Georgiana and Eliza Reed, in the drawing room and
Jane reading Bewick in the window of the breakfast room. Charlotte
Bronte moves to Jane’s opinions on her book: The words in these
introductory pages connected themselves with the succeeding vignettes,
and gave significance to the rock standing up alone in a sea of billow
and spray; to the broken boat stranded on a desolate coast; to the cold
and ghastly moon glancing through bars of cloud at a wreck just sinking.

Thus, the novel oscillates between Jane’s life and her opinions about so
many things and the reader along with the heroine grows up. The
Gateshead section is a complete plot in itself, the story of an oppressed
child who rises against her tyrants and succeeds in escaping them; so is
the Lowood story, that of a lonely girl, who through Helen Burns,
experiences suffering and death and the value of friendship; even more
striking is the completely separate Moor House story, where Jane begins
a new life as a village schoolmistress, acquires three new cousins,
comes into a fortune and is sought in marriage by St John Rivers.

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All these plots are more realistic and likely than the central one – of a
man of property, with an insane wife concealed in the house he actually
uses, who courts the governess of his illegitimate daughter, attempts to
commit bigamy, and when that has failed, loses his sight and his hand in
his attempt to save the life of his wife, before being reunited with the
woman he has injured. The author provides a sound structural base.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 7.3

Explain Jane Eyre : a critique
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

7.4 THEMES

The novel deals with several themes and a few emerge very powerful,
some of which we will touch upon in Subsections 7.4.1 to 7.4.4.

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7.4.1 Romance

Bronte uses a very simple love story to weave a difficult pattern. Jane
and Rochester are both passionate characters that have an enormous
capacity to love. Neither one of them is physically attractive which is
advantageous since beauty would often deflect attention away from
characters. The two are clearly well suited to each other though they
have to be separated in order to experience an individual time of
character development before they can be finally united.
“Jane Eyre is very much the story of a quest to be loved. Jane searches,
not just for romantic love, but also for a sense of being valued, of
belonging. Thus Jane says to Helen Burns: “to gain some real affection
from you, or Miss Temple, or any other whom I truly love, I would
willingly submit to have the bone of my arm broken, or to let a bull toss
me, or to stand behind a kicking horse, and let it dash its hoof at my
chest” (Chapter 8). Yet, over the course of the book, Jane must learn
how to gain love without sacrificing and harming herself in the process.

Her fear of losing her autonomy motivates her refusal of Rochester’s

marriage proposal. Jane believes that “marrying” Rochester while he
remains legally tied to Bertha would mean rendering herself a mistress
and sacrificing her own integrity for the sake of emotional gratification.
On the other hand, her life at Moor House tests her in the opposite
manner. There, she enjoys economic independence and engages in
worthwhile and useful work, teaching the poor; yet she lacks emotional
sustenance. Although St. John proposes marriage, offering her a
partnership built around a common purpose, Jane knows their marriage
would remain loveless.
Nonetheless, the events of Jane’s stay at Moor House are necessary
tests of Jane’s autonomy. Only after proving her self-sufficiency to
herself can she marry Rochester and not be asymmetrically dependent
upon him as her “master.” The marriage can be one between equals. As
Jane says: “I am my husband’s life as fully as he is mine. . . . To be
together is for us to be at once as free as in solitude, as gay as in
company. . . . We are precisely suited in character—perfect concord is
the result” (Chapter 38).”

Jane needs to become Rochester’s equal in independence and maturity:

her physical struggle and emotional torment strengthen her character
and turn her into a woman rather than a naive girl. Rochester has
committed a selfless act and proves that he has seen the error of his

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former ways in order to become good once again, needing Jane as
much as she needs him. Ironically, he is a better man without his sight
and arm than when he was whole, and Jane loves him better for being
vulnerable than when he was fiercely independent.

The nature of marriage and true love is examined in the novel with
reference to other characters also. For instance, Aunt Reed’s refusal to
keep her promise to her dead husband, the scornful description of
cousin Georgiana’s “advantageous match”, the prospect of a union
between Rochester and Blanche Ingram, clearly good financially and
socially, but not true love and the prospect of a marriage of duty and
convenience between Jane and St. John, passionately rejected by Jane:
“I scorn your idea of love. I scorn the counterfeit sentiment you offer.”

7.4.2 Religion

The second most important theme happens to be religion.

“Throughout the novel, Jane struggles to find the right balance between
moral duty and earthly pleasure, between obligation to her spirit and
attention to her body. She encounters three main religious figures: Mr.
Brocklehurst, Helen Burns, and St. John Rivers. Each represents a
model of religion that Jane ultimately rejects as she forms her own ideas
about faith and principle, and their practical consequences.”

The nature of Christianity is explored in great detail throughout the

novel, so much so that many people say that it is as much a book about
religion as about love. Jane’s system of value judgement is founded on
a strict moral code. Jane’s moral integrity and her faith in the other are
brought out in the following dialogue:

Jane you understand what I want of you?” Just this promise –

“I’ll be yours, Mr.Rochester” Mr. Rochester, I’ll not be yours.

Another long silence

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Jane! Recommenced he, with a gentleness that broke me down
with grief, and turned me stone-cold with ominous terror – for this
still voice was the part of a lion rising – Jane, do you mean to go
one way in the world and to let me go another?

I do Jane (bending towards and embracing me). Do you mean it

now?

I do And now? Softly kissing my forehead and cheek.

I do, extricating myself from restraint rapidly and completely.

Oh Jane, this is bitter! This. this is wicked. It would not be

wicked to love me.

It would to obey you …

What shall I do, Jane? Where turn for a companion, and for
some hope?

Do as I do: trust in God, and yourself.

Believe in heaven. Hope to meet again there.

Then you will not yield?

No.

Then you condemn me to live wretched, and to die accursed?

His voice rose. I advise you to live sinless and I wish you to die
tranquil.

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The character, theme and action in this passage merge together and
what stands out most is the character’s moral integrity and the worth of
such moral itself. Jane’s speech appears cold beside his passionate
appeals but such is religion, and thoughts about higher ideals. They
part, not to be reunited until he has suffered terribly. In trying to rescue
his mad wife, from the fire she had started, he loses his hand and
eyesight. His maiming is a price he has to pay for his sins, his sacrifice
a mark of his redemption and his reward is union with Jane.

Contrasting this is St John Rivers, who has a cold passion, expressed in

his ruthless dedication of himself to a missionary life. If Brockleburst
seems to represent one, and that a repulsive, form of Victorian
Evangelicalism, Rivers may be said to represent another, that form of
Evangelical heroism, which took the Christian gospel to the corners of
the earth at the cost of personal happiness.

In pursuit of his ideal St. John destroys all feeling for himself and is led
to expect from others a similar self-abnegation. Others in fact, have to
become slaves of his intent. While Rochester wants Jane in love without
marriage Rivers suggests marriage without love.
And what does your heart say? Demanded St. John.

My heart is mute, my heart is mute, I answered, struck and

thrilled.

Then I must speak for it, continued the deep, relentless choice.
Jane come with me to India; come as my helpmate and fellow-
labourer…

I am not fit for it: I have no vocation, I said…

“Humility, Jane”, said he “is the ground work of Christian Virtues”
… Think like me, Jane – trust like me. It is the Rock of Ages I
ask you to lean on: do not doubt but it will bear the weight of your
human weakness.

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There are several religious people in the novel, and it is quite interesting
to note Jane’s reaction to each of them. While she admires and
condemns, she keeps her own system of belief throughout. Her reaction
to Helen Burns’ idea of turning the other cheek is quite interesting.
Helen suffers terribly but never complains even when badly treated.

Mr. Brocklehurst who is fearsome and tyrannical, uses religion as a

justification of cruelty and neglect. Eliza Reed on the other hand, a cold
and fervent woman gives her life to God by joining a nunnery. Jane
views this with detached cynicism, “You are not without sense cousin
Eliza, but what you have I suppose in another year will be walled up
alive in a French Convent.”

Jane chooses to believe in the midst of all those, that she is entitled to
lead a happy life and that in doing so she can still serve God: “If ever I
thought a good thought, if ever I prayed a sincere and blameless prayer
– if ever I wished a righteous wish – I am rewarded now. To be your
wife is, for me, to be happy as I can be on earth.”

7.4.3 Female independence

Jane chooses a path similar to Miss Temple, Diana and Mary Rivers,
which reinforce the rightness of her decision.

Charlotte Bronte, herself being a fiercely independent woman, explores

the feminine spirit of independence in the novel. The novel Jane Eyre is
very often said to be a political book because it explores the idea of a
woman alone, in charge of her own life and making her own decisions.
Jane could easily be described as a ‘feminist’. She rejects the man she
loves until such time as she can be his equal. She would rather be
alone and independent than with Rochester on his terms.

Miss Temple, Diana and Mary Rivers all possess the values Jane
admires. They all have to work for their living, and are therefore
financially dependent on others. They all marry for love men who
deserve them, rather than settling for financial security at the expense of
happiness. Jane is very conscious that these women are not treated as

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they deserve to be and her observation of Brocklehurst’s admonition of
Miss Temple and her reaction to it proves this: “She now gazed straight
before her, and her face actually pale as marble, appeared to be
assuming also the coldness and fixity of that material.”

She hates the thought of Diana and Mary wasting their talent as
governesses in houses whose wealthy and haughty members they were
regarded only as humble dependents, and who neither new nor sought
one of their innate excellences. It, therefore, becomes essential for the
novel to end with them also finding happiness in equal relationship.

Throughout the novel, as in the personal life of the author, Jane is

placed in situations where she is dependent on others. She learns to
keep her passionate and assertive side quiet except when driven to
extremes: “I never in my life have known any medium in my dealings
with positive, hard characters, antagonistic to my own, between absolute
submission and determined revolt.”

There are three episodes in the novel, which point out this clearly –
Jane’s outburst towards Mrs.Reed, her refusal of Rochester and her
refusal of St. John. Jane is an assertive heroine. She is confident and
eloquent throughout and especially in her dealings with Rochester from
the beginning. She is neither meek nor subservient to anyone and she
often chooses to keep quiet rather than speak her mind unguardedly, but
when called upon she is forthright and powerfully honest in her opinions.

7.4.4 Class system

The fourth prominent theme in the novel is the existence of a rigid class
system. Money is a guiding factor in such a system. The characters
seem to divide into two categories – the rich landed gentry and the
dependent classes who have to work to earn money. Characters like Ms
Ingram, Rosamond Oliver, Mrs Reed, Miss Temple, Rochester and St
John Rivers need to be studied closely to understand the class system.

Although Jane is not rich, she has been brought up to be lady like and
therefore very different from the working class farming people with whom

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she associates in March End. “Some of them unmannered, rough,
intractable, as well as ignorant… I must nor forget that these coarsely
clad little peasants are of flesh and blood as good as the scions of
gender genealogy”.

The peculiar reaction of Jane to social class is because of her parents’

marriage. Her mother was cast off for marrying someone inferior to her.
Bronte gives a view of the fundamental distinction in social life between
the classes in her novel. Her incisive style renders poignant what other
writers gloss over.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 7.4

Explain Jane Eyre : a critique
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

7.5 CHARACTERS SKETCH

In any novel, characters and events can never be dissociated from each
other. The characters in fact give the story its much envied unified
structure. Innumerable threads of associations of thoughts in the

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characters minds link section-to-section and incident-to-incident. There
remain only two people at the heart of the book. Mr. Rochester and
Jane. Rochester has been termed by many as the dark, Byronic hero.
“No flesh and blood man could be so exclusively composed of violence
and visibility and masculine vanity as Mr. Rochester”, says David Cecil
in his Early Victorian Novelists.

Characters in the novel move the plot through the various events to its
culmination. Jane Eyre has the unique feature of a strong combination
of characters, event and plot woven carefully and skilfully to create a
drama of a lifetime.

7.5.1 Jane Eyre

Jane is an eponymous heroine. Strong willed and passionate, her

search for true love and happiness forms ‘the story of the novel’. She
has a well-developed sense of right and wrong from an early age. She
is a very good judge of character as a child, warming instantly to Miss
Temple and Helen Burns, whilst loathing Mrs Reed and Brocklehurst.

Her personality stands out because of the vehemence with which she
protects her personal integrity. She is alone and this starts very early in
her life. Orphaned, her treatment under Mrs. Reed begins her
sufferings. The sense of oppression, which she first feels at Gateshead
continues through her school days. Indeed, the transition from
Gateshead to Lowood is marked by a vicious report against her by Mr.
Brocklehurst. Although she claims that the late years at Lowood were

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pleasant enough, these are rather sketchily treated, and it is not until she
reaches Thornfield that a convincingly pleasanter phase of her life
begins. Even here, however, she is isolated.

Her very position as governess, superior to the servants but inferior

(Blanche Ingram makes sure that Jane is aware of this) to the
household, emphasizes this. This isolation is further stressed by Jane’s
apparently hopeless love. Not wanting to sacrifice her personal integrity
she goes away from Rochester and Thornfield and at the end
supernaturally driven to return to both. One has to bear in mind the
essentially religious quality of her outlook when we make an attempt to
read her character.

7.5.2 Rochester

Rochester is both the remote hero and the man whom Jane understands
because she is ‘akin; to him, he is a man whose moral nature is like
Jane’s, who is yet the one who tempts her to evil; he is a good man who
suffers a dreadful punishment for his sin. A fascinating, romantic figure
he is a very unhappy man when we first meet him. At a very young age
his father and elder brother tricked him into a marriage with Bertha
Mason we are told, in order to gain a fat dowry.

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Jane Eyre with Rochester
The subsequent discovery of her insanity leaves him the sole member to
bear the responsibility and he occupies Thornfield Hall with her after his
brother’s death. He leads an immoral life and tries to forget his troubles
thus. Bertha’s existence makes him bitter and he tries to win Jane too to
be his mistress. However, his pure love for her eventually brings a
change in him. Till the turn of the 20 th Century, Rochester has been
viewed sympathetically a wronged man who could be forgiven his many
sins and ruthlessness. Even locking up his wife in a windowless room
for ten years has been considered an action born out of his concern for
her.

The suffragette movement, the writings of Virginia Woolf and the rising
of the feminist writings have reread, revisioned and deconstructed the
text to present it from the wronged wife’s point of view. However, from
within the premises of Jane Eyre, Rochester emerges as a person

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capable of redeeming himself by trying to save his wife from the fire,
which she has set. He is a man who has recognized the ‘error of his
ways’. “I began to see and acknowledge God in my doom. I began to
experience remorse, repentance the wish for reconcilement with my
maker.”

His blinded and crippled status has been seen as a metaphor for the
loss of his arrogance and pride. Rochester at first is a figure of folklore;
his dog is perhaps the Gytrash, and he himself is described in terms,
which are both physical and violent, and remote from the common place.
There is physical vigor even in “the swelling back of the chair”, his
“massive head” recalls Pilots ‘lion-like’ one. Throughout there is a
suggestion of something superhuman about him.

Others

The characters other than Jane and Rochester are of widely different
types and are presented in very different styles. For instance, Mrs
Farifax Bessie, or St John Rivers. None of these characters can exist
and stand-alone as characters can when the narrator is the author.
They exist as Jane sees them, not as Bronte might have. These
characters are drawn from the society in which Jane moves. The first
people we meet besides Jane herself are her cousins Eliza, John and
Georgiana, her aunt Mrs Reed, the nurse Bessie and the apothecary
Mrs. Lloyd.

The Reed families are a demonstration of Jane’s power to overcome her

circumstances, and link with and balance the Rivers – another family of
two sisters and a brother, whose relations with Jane are another, more
searching, test of her powers of resistance. If Georgiana and Eliza are
soulless John Reed is a spoilt brute: his sisters physique represents
their mentality. John is wholly physical, lives tortures Jane and dies in
physical terms. Mrs Reed is a more developed person, adult and
dangerous. She is no mere childhood monster, and Jane is painfully fair
in speaking of her:

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She was an exact, clever manager; her household and tenantry were
thoroughly under her control … She dressed well, and had a presence
and port calculated to set off handsome attire.

Bessie has as much importance as the Reeds though less thematic

relevance, and is in many ways more interesting. She attracts our
attention by being the only person to show any affection for Jane, though
again there is no concession to sentimentality: Brocklehurst is a link
between Gateshead and Lowood, and is comically grotesque. Both
Helen and Miss Temple demonstrate Jane’s need simply for human
affection and her power to inspire it, before she meets Rochester. Mrs
Fairfax is a placid tempered, kind natured woman, of competent
education and average intelligence, “kindly as usual – and as usual
rather trite”.

Bertha Mason, on the other hand, is the incubus of Thornfield, who has
no character till Rochester reveals her history. Mrs Rochester is an
intriguing subject. She is an elusive figure who never speaks and is only
seen twice, and yet she dominates the central action of the novel. Jane
felt her presence the moment she enters Thornfield – it was a curious
laugh, distinct, formal mirthless.

Bertha’s actions are dramatic and violent and very interesting to

interpret. She attacks Rochester twice, once by attempting to burn his
bed, and second by flying at him when he presents her to Jane and the
others. She attacks her brother when he comes to visit her. She tears
Jane’s wedding veil the night before her marriage. And her final act
before her suicide is to set fire to Jane’s bed.

Rochester is vague on the subject of her illness. Her actions suggest

that she is aware of what is going on in Thornfield. Could she have
been driven to madness by an unsympathetic husband? There is
jealousy in her actions against Jane. She cannot, in short, be ignored in
the novel. In her The Wide Sargassa Sea, Jean Rhys presents a
different perspective, other than what is offered by Rochester. Many
feminist interpretations since then have been sympathetic to Bertha and
several rereading have been made of the novel. She also gave the
platform for Sandra and Susan to write their eloquent argument of

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feminine sensibilities in their Mad Woman in the Attic (which we studied
earlier).

In sharp contrast to those in Thornfiled are those at Morton: St. John,

Diana and Mary Rivers, Hannah, Rosamond Oliver and the few villagers
and farmers. The servant Hannah like Bessie helps Jane to return to
society and to re-establish her own place in it. Mary never appears
without Diana. They are very similar to Jane: educated, interesting, kind
and gentle. Jane blossoms in their company, becoming more relaxed
and confident because she is liked and respected by those who she
likes and respects.

They have a significant function in helping Jane perfect herself. But the
brother overshadows his sisters. St. John is a finely observed study of a
man who turns egotism and ambition to service and religion. He is the
most important single character other than Rochester, and is obviously
his antithesis. A religious fanatic, he is so inflexible with himself and with
others. His decision to become a missionary saddens his sisters and is
against his dead father’s wishes.

A scene from Jane Eyre

Moor House is a symbol of security and family unity, a place Jane can
‘care for’ in the most practical sense, as the ‘cleaning down’ process with
Hannah proves. It provides Jane with a family and a function, but
subjects her to more anxiety than Thornfield ever did, when St. John’s
calls her to submit to a soulless and self-destroying marriage of duty. It
is also a fitting background for St. John, astern setting for his stern

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proposals, which are made in the high hills where “The mountain shook
off turf and flower, had only heath for raiment, and crag for gem – where
it exaggerated the wild to the savage, and exchanged the fresh for the
frowning – where it guarded the forlorn hope of solitude and a last refuge
for silence.”

LEARNING ACTIVITY 7.3

Describe Jane Eyre as a romantic novel.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

SUMMARY

Beginning this Unit with a biography of Charlotte Bronte, we pointed out,

among others, that the conditions in the 19th century was such for
women writers that Charlotte Bronte had to adopt a pseudonym to
publish her novels. We then discussed the storyline of Jane Eyre, a story
about the life of an orphaned girl from her childhood to marriage. We
also analysed the novel and said it is more than a romantic novel as it
dealt with such themes as religion, female independence and class
system, apart from romance. We closed the Unit with a character sketch
of some important characters in the novel.

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REFERENCE

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/charlotte-bronte

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bront%C3%AB_family

https://www.123helpme.com/essay/Criticisms-of-Jane-Eyre-22857#:~:
https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/themes/

https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/janeeyre/themes/

VIDEO LINK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JBAivTU1vw

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UNIT - 8 JANE AUSTEN SENSE AND SENSIBILITY

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

8.1 Jane Austen and Her Works

8.2 Sense and Sensibility: The Story
8.3 Sense and Sensibility: A Critique
8.3.1 Social comedy
8.3.2 The novel as a burlesque
8.3.3 The element of surprise

Summary

OVERVIEW

In this Unit, we will take up for discussion one of the novels of Jane
Austen, Sense and Sensibility. We will first give you some biographical
details of the author as well as touch upon some of her works. We will
then give you the story line of Sense and Sensibility. Finally, we will
analyse the novel as a social comedy, a burlesque and as a novel with
elements of surprise.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 give a biographical sketch of Jane Austen;

 present the story of Sense and Sensibility

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 evaluate the novel as a social comedy and a novel with surprise
elements.

8.1 JANE AUSTEN

Jane Austen
Jane Austen was an English novelist known primarily for her six major
novels, which interpret, critique and comment upon the British landed
gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots often explore the
dependence of women on marriage in the pursuit of favourable social
standing and economic security. Here, you will learn about Jane Austen
and her work Sense and Sensibility.

Jane Austen ( 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English

novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique
and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th
century. Austen's plots often explore the dependence of women on
marriage in the pursuit of favourable social standing and economic
security. Her works critique the novels of sensibility of the second half of
the 18th century and are part of the transition to 19th-century literary
realism. Her use of biting irony, along with her realism, humour, and
social commentary, has long earned her acclaim among critics, scholars,
and popular audiences alike.

Early life and her Works

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Born in 1875, Jane Austen was the seventh of eight children born to the
rector of Steventon Hampshire. Austen began writing at the age of
eleven. Her notebook containing “novels”, (chiefly parodies of the
eighteenth-century sentimental novels) were passed around her family
for their entertainment. Austen and her family were, as she said, “great
Novel-readers and not ashamed of being so.” Some of her works include
Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma,
Northanger Abbey, Persuasion and Lady Susan.
“For much of Jane's life, her father, George Austen (1731–1805), served
as the rector of the Anglican parishes at Steventon and at
nearby Deane. He came from an old, respected, and wealthy family of
wool merchants. Over the centuries as each generation of eldest
sons received inheritances, their wealth was divided, and George's
branch of the family fell into poverty. He and his two sisters were
orphaned as children and had to be taken in by relatives. His sister
Philadelphia went to India to find a husband and George entered St
John's College, Oxford on a fellowship, where he most likely met
Cassandra Leigh (1739–1827). She came from the
prominent Leigh family; her father was rector at All Souls College,
Oxford, where she grew up among the gentry. Her eldest brother James
inherited a fortune and large estate from his great-aunt Perrot, with the
only condition that he changes his name to Leigh-Perrot.”

George and Cassandra exchanged miniatures in 1763 and probably

were engaged around that time. George received the living for the
Steventon parish from the wealthy husband of his second cousin,
Thomas Knight, who owned Steventon and its associated farms, one of
which the Austen family rented to live in. Two months after Cassandra's
father died, they married on 26 April 1764 at St Swithin's Church in Bath,
by licence, in a simple ceremony.

In 1783, Austen and her sister Cassandra were sent to Oxford to be

educated by Mrs Ann Cawley who took them with her
to Southampton when she moved there later in the year. In the autumn
both girls were sent home when they caught typhus and Austen nearly
died. Austen was from then home educated, until she attended boarding
school in Reading with her sister from early in 1785 at the Reading
Abbey Girls' School, ruled by Mrs La Tournelle, who possessed a cork
leg and a passion for theatre. The school curriculum probably included
some French, spelling, needlework, dancing and music and, perhaps,
drama. The sisters returned home before December 1786 because the

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school fees for the two girls were too high for the Austen family. After
1786, Austen "never again lived anywhere beyond the bounds of her
immediate family environment".
The remainder of her education came from reading, guided by her father
and brothers James and Henry.

A “small square two inches of ivory” is the way Austen described her
own work. Yet this same work, apparently being lightly dismissed is the
most enduring and most popular literature of the nineteenth century.
Categorised as novels of manners, the careful detail given to both
setting and character in Austen’s works has captivated readers for over
a century.

Austen’s writing and publishing history is somewhat confusing. Her

writing falls into two groups of three novels with a “silent” decade
between, yet her publishing history does not reflect this division. Many
scholars believe that Austen’s silent period was caused by
discouragement after First Impressions was rejected unread and
Northanger Abbey was picked up by a publisher in 1803 for a pittance
but never issued, after which Austen bought back the manuscript in
1816.

Although she probably made some minor revisions, Northanger Abbey

appears to be the earliest example of Austen’s work. It is, however, a
mistake to differentiate too sharply between the novels of the two
periods. For the three of the first group were being revised while Austen
was writing the three of the second group. The most obvious influence
occurs in the change of genre in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and
Prejudice. In their original forms, Elinor and Marianne and First
Impressions were both epistolary novels, a technique Austen dropped in
revision and never again employed.

According to Austen, “three or four Families in Country Village is [the]

very thing to work upon.” She concentrated on the limited part of English
society, provincial gentry and the aligning of the rural upper- middle
class with the aristocracy. Austen wrote about that with which she was
familiar; and when her niece sought her advice about a novel, Austen
advised her “to stick to Bath” where she was “quite at home”.

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Austen herself resisted the temptation to stray from familiar ground,
even when nudged by royalty. When the domestic chaplain to the
Prince of Wales suggested that in her next novel, she might delineate
the character of a clergyman, Austen realised that the hints he supplied
were based on his own experiences. Austen replied, somewhat
mischievously that she might be able to do “the comic parts of the
characters” but “not the good, the enthusiastic, the literary.”

Such an answer, with its somewhat stinging implications, was typical of

Austen. Her satirical treatment of social standards and literary
expectations in her novels and her acidic comments in her letters have
earned Austen a reputation for a sharp tongue. After Austen’s death in
1817 her sister, Cassandra, burned many of Austen’s letters, implying to
some critics that the worst, and the sharpest of the letters were
destroyed. But it is more likely that the more personal letters, the ones
most likely to show the gentler side, were destroyed to protect Austen’s
privacy even after death. For it is important to realise how fiercely
Austen and her family regarded her privacy. All her novels were
published anonymously and their authorship was a well-kept secret.
Nevertheless, much of Austen’s personality, tastes and interests can be
discerned through her novels, a snapshot of some of which is given
below:

Works of Austen
Novels

 Sense and Sensibility (1811)

 Pride and Prejudice (1813)

 Mansfield Park (1814)

 Emma (1815)
 Northanger Abbey (1818, posthumous)

 Persuasion (1818, posthumous)

 Lady Susan (1871, posthumous)

Unfinished fiction
 The Watsons (1804)

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 Sanditon (1817)

Other works

 Sir Charles Grandison (adapted play) (1793, 1800)[r]

 Plan of a Novel (1815)

 Poems (1796–1817)

 Prayers (1796–1817)
 Letters (1796–1817)
Juvenilia—Volume the First (1787–1793)[s]

 Frederic & Elfrida

 Jack & Alice

 Edgar & Emma

 Henry and Eliza

 The Adventures of Mr. Harley

 Sir William Mountague

 Memoirs of Mr. Clifford
 The Beautifull Cassandra

 Amelia Webster

 The Visit
 The Mystery
 The Three Sisters

 A beautiful description
 The generous Curate

 Ode to Pity
Juvenilia—Volume the Second (1787–1793)
 Love and Friendship

 Lesley Castle

 The History of England

 A Collection of Letters

 The female philosopher

 The first Act of a Comedy

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 A Letter from a Young Lady
 A Tour through Wales

 A Tale
Juvenilia—Volume the Third (1787–1793)

 Evelyn

 Catharine, or The Bower

Northanger Abbey
In Northanger Abbey, Austen satirises gothic romantic mysteries
(Radcliffe’s Mysteries of Udolpho, in particular) and presents what was
to become a recurrent theme: feminine self-delusion. Austen picks up
the latter theme again in Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice
but demonstrates its pitfalls by contrasting the actions and reactions of
two sisters. In Sense and Sensibility, the two sisters, Elinor and
Marianne Dashwood, represent “sense” and “sensibility”, respectively.

Each is deserted by a young man from whom she has been led to
expect a matrimonial offer. Reacting with sense, Elinor eventually
untangles the complications surrounding her lover and they become
engaged; Marianne, on the other hand, reacts with sensibility and
impetuosity. She gradually comes to realize the foolishness of her love
and sees her real affection for another, a quieter and more serious lover.
In Pride and Prejudice, the contrast between the two sisters is more
subtle and complicated by a parallel side pairing,

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Pride and Prejudice
One of the most popular Austen’s novels, Pride and Prejudice introduces
many of the stylistic devices commonly associated with Austen‘s work:
witty, cutting dialogue between couples; strong-willed heroines without a
strong role model (her mother is either weak, ineffectual or dead);
settings that reveal the underlying character of the male protagonist (in
this instance, Pemberly), and an ironic undertone, often established in
the opening lines of the novel (“it is a truth universally acknowledged that
a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife.”)

A Scene from Pride and Prejudice

Mansfield Park

This marks a slight diversion from the pattern established in Austen’s

earlier novels, for here the heroine is an orphan adopted into her rich
uncle’s family. Despite being condescendingly treated as a poor relation,
Fanny’s honesty and modest disposition gradually make her an
indispensable part of the household, particularly when her uncle is away
on business for an extended period and the family’s sense of discipline
is relaxed. In this novel it is the male characters, particularly Edmund
Bertram and Henry Crawford, who represent contrasting personalities,
and it is Edmund who is self-deluded and eventually comes to see
Fanny’s virtues.

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To many critics Mansfield Park is one of Austen’s lesser novels, perhaps
because of her reversal of her usual male and female portrayals, a
reversal she did not repeat.

Emma and Persuasion

In contrast, the novels, which followed – Emma and Persuasion – are

considered by many to be her best works. The heroine Emma is again
virtually alone in the world: her mother is dead, her father is
absentminded and ineffectual, and her governess-companion has left to
be married. But unlike Fanny in Mansfield Park, Emma is not especially
wise. In this novel Austen again deals with the theme of feminine self-
delusion, but the focus on a strong-willed character makes the impact
stronger than in the previous works.

In Persuasion, Austen returns to the contrasting of sisters but focuses

primarily on the second of the three (Anne Elliot). Anne is pretty,
intelligent, amiable, but also malleable. Lady Russell, a trusted friend,
persuaded her to break off a long-standing engagement, despite her
feelings for her lover. During the resulting confusion both lovers become
entangled in other relationships but eventually realise that their affection
for each other still exists. In this, Austen’s last complete work, the satire
and ridicule take a milder form, the tone is graver and tenderer, the
interest lies in a more subtle interplay of characters. Austen herself
apparently recognised the difference in tone for she wrote of Anne: “She
is almost too good for me.”

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Although well received, Austen was not immediately successful; few of
her works reached a second edition during her lifetime. In fact, the
collected edition of 1833 supplied the market until 1882. Attention began
to rise during the 1890s as indicated by the appearance of biographies
and critical pieces. Today, almost 175 years later, all of her books are in
print and Austen is one of the top-selling authors. No doubt much of her
popularity is due to a desire to escape to a better place and time. Yet,
because much of her work depends on character analysis, many
readers still identify with much of her work.

Others are captivated by her style, her careful construction and use of
dramatic method where characters are introduced through dialogue
before putting in an appearance. To some she is one of the greatest
ironists who ever lived. And to most, she is a challenge. As Austen
herself put in, “I do not write for dull elves, who cannot think for
themselves.”

The publication of Jane Austen’s six novels between 1811 and 1817
marked a turning point in the development of English fiction. To her
contemporary audience, they revealed that the novel was capable of
unsuspected power that it was not to be dismissed as a mere pastime
but was not to be taken seriously as a form of literature, on a level with
poetry and drama.

In the words of George Moore, Jane Austen turned the washtub into the
vase. In effect, she transformed the eighteenth century novel, which
was clumsy and primitive, uncertain in its technique, into a work of art.
She gave elegance and form to its shaping, style to its writing and
narrative skill to the presentation of the story.
She invented her own special mode of fiction, the domestic comedy of
middle-class manners. Her account of this world is limited and highly
selective. Her focus is upon the experiences of young women on the
path of marriage. The modesty of fictional world is caught in her remark
to a novel-writing niece that “3 or 4 families in a country village is the
very thing to work upon”, and her famous comment to a novel-writing
nephew about “the little bit (two inches wide) of Ivory on which I work
with so fine a Brush”, which “produces little effect after much labour.”

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Jane Austen presents an account of society from the woman’s point of
view – the woman’s experience of men, of other women, of their
families, the social circles to which they were confined, and ultimately
their experiences. For the first time in English literature since
Shakespeare, the reader comes across heroines who are credible, with
minds, with the capacity to think for themselves, with ambition and wit,
with an interior life independent of men and the will to challenge them
emotionally and intellectually, with the energy to shape their
relationships.

The six novels are repeated dramatisations of this theme. Each of these
heroines travels the path of self-discovery and growth. Jane Austen
leaves it an open question, open to us as readers to decide, how far they
win and how far they fail.
“In focusing on the manners and morals of rural middle-class English
life, particularly on the ordering dance of matrimony that gives shape to
society and situation to young ladies, Austen emphasizes rather than
evades reality. The microcosm she depicts is convincing because she
understands, though seldom explicitly assesses, its connections to the
larger order. Her characters have clear social positions but are not just
social types; the genius of such comic creations as Mrs. Bennet, Mr.
Woodhouse, and Miss Bates is that each is a sparkling refinement on a
quality or set of qualities existing at all times and on all levels. A proof of
Austen’s power (no one questions her polish) is that she succeeds in
making whole communities live in the reader’s imagination with little
recourse to the stock device of the mere novelist of manners: descriptive
detail. If a sparely drawn likeness is to convince, every line must count.
The artist must understand what is omitted as well as what is supplied.”

Jane Austen’s attitude towards things is not extraordinary. She has no

exciting messages and no doctrines for women’s liberation. Her view is
coldly realistic. The novels confirm that life is a comedy to those who
think. A thinking novelist, she has created thinking-heroines. But the
other side of the truth is: life is also a tragedy to those who feel. And the
deepest and most powerful tension arises from Jane Austen’s struggle
to maintain a hold over experiences that threaten the comic surface of
the novels with the “feeling” tones of tragedy.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 8.1
Describe Jane Austen and Her works.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

8.2 SENSE AND SENSIBILITY: THE STORY

Sense and Sensibility, novel by Jane Austen that was published

anonymously in three volumes in 1811 and that became a classic. The
satirical, comic work offers a vivid depiction of 19th-century middle-class
life as it follows the romantic relationships of Elinor and Marianne
Dashwood.
Sense and Sensibility was a success upon publication, and it later was
adapted for film, stage, and television. Among the most
notable adaptations is the 1995 movie, which was directed by Ang
Lee and starred Emma Thompson (Elinor), who won an Academy
Award for her adapted screenplay; Kate Winslet (Marianne); Hugh
Grant (Edward Ferrars); and Alan Rickman (Colonel Brandon). A critical
and commercial success, the movie spurred a resurgence of interest in
Austen’s novels.

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In the novel, Mr. and Mrs. Dashwood and their three daughters live at
Norland Park, an estate in Sussex. Unfortunately, Mr. Dashwood's wife
and daughters are left with very little when Mr. Dashwood dies and the
estate goes to his son, John Dashwood. John and his wife Fanny (see
Ferrars) have a great deal of money yet refuse to help his half-sisters
and their mother.

A Scene from Sense and Sensibility

Elinor, one of the Dashwood girls, is entirely sensible and prudent, while
her sister, Marianne, is very emotional and never moderate. Margaret,
the youngest sister, is young and good-natured. Mrs. Dashwood and her
daughters stay at Norland for a few months, mostly because of the
promising friendship developing between Elinor and Edward Ferrars,
Fanny's shy, but very kind, brother. Elinor likes Edward, but is not
convinced her feelings are mutual. Fanny is especially displeased by
their apparent regard, as Edward's mother wants him to marry very well.

A relative of Mrs. Dashwood, Sir John Middleton, offers them a cottage

at Barton Park in Devonshire. The family must accept the offer and are
sad at leaving their home and having to separate Edward and Elinor.
They find Barton Cottage and the countryside around it charming, and
Sir John Middleton a very kind and obliging host. His wife, Lady

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Middleton, is cold and passionless; still, they accept frequent invitations
to dinners and parties at Barton Park.

The Dashwoods meet Mrs. Jennings, Sir John's mother-in-law, a merry,

somewhat vulgar older woman, and Colonel Brandon, a gentleman and
a bachelor. The Colonel is soon taken with Marianne, but Marianne
objects to Mrs. Jennings attempts to get them together, the "advanced"
age of 35 and the serious demeanor of the Colonel. Marianne falls and
twists her ankle, while walking.

She is lucky enough to be found and carried home by a dashing man

named Willoughby. Marianne and Willoughby have a similar romantic
temperament and Marianne is much pleased to find that Willoughby has
a passion for art, poetry and music. Willoughby and Marianne's
attachment develops steadily, though Elinor believes that they should be
more restrained in showing their regard publicly.

One pleasant day, the Middletons, the Dashwoods and Willoughby are
supposed to go on a picnic with the Colonel, but their plans are ditched
when Colonel Brandon is forced to leave because of distressing news.
Willoughby becomes an even more attentive guest at the cottage,
spending a great deal more time there than that Allenham spent with his
aunt. Willoughby openly confesses his affections for Marianne and for all
of them, and hopes they will always think of him as fondly as he does of
them. This leaves Mrs. Dashwood and Elinor convinced that if Marianne
and Willoughby are not engaged, they soon will be.

One morning, Mrs. Dashwood, Elinor and Margaret leave the couple,
hoping for a proposal. When they return, they find Marianne crying and
Willoughby saying that he must immediately go to London. Mrs.
Dashwood and Elinor are completely unsettled by this hasty departure,
and Elinor fears that they might have had a fall-out. Marianne is torn up
by Willoughby's departure and Elinor begins to question whether
Willoughby's intentions were honourable. But, whether Willoughby and
Marianne are engaged remains a mystery, as Marianne will not speak of
it.

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Edward comes to visit them at Barton and is welcomed very warmly as
their guest. It is soon apparent that Edward is unhappy and doesn't show
as much affection for Elinor. When they spot a ring he is wearing, with a
lock of hair suspiciously similar to Elinor's, even Elinor is baffled. Edward
finally forces himself to leave, still seeming distressed.

Sir John and Mrs. Jennings soon introduce Mrs. Jennings' other
daughter, Mrs. Palmer, and her husband to the family. Mrs. Palmer says
that people in town believe that Willoughby and Marianne will soon be
married, which puzzles Elinor, as she knows of no such arrangements
herself. Elinor and Marianne meet the Middletons' new guests, the Miss
Steeles, apparently cousins; they find Miss Steele to be nothing
remarkable, while Lucy is very pretty but not much better company.
However, the Miss Steeles instantly gains Lady Middleton's admiration
by paying endless attention to her obnoxious children.

Elinor, unfortunately, becomes the preferred companion of Lucy. Lucy

inquires of Mrs. Ferrars, which prompts Elinor to ask about her
acquaintance with the Ferrars family. Lucy then reveals that she is
secretly engaged to Edward. It turns out that Edward and Lucy knew
each other while Edward studied with Lucy's uncle, Mr. Pratt, and has
been engaged for some years. Although Elinor is first angry about
Edward's secrecy, she soon sees that marrying Lucy will be punishment
enough, as she is unpolished, manipulative and jealous of Edward's high
regard for Elinor.

The Miss Steeles ends up staying at Barton Park for two months. Mrs.
Jennings invites Marianne and Elinor to spend the winter with her in
London. Marianne is determined to go to see Willoughby, and Elinor
decides she must go too, because Marianne needs Elinor's polite
guidance. They accept the invitation, and leave in January. Once in
town, they find Mrs. Jennings' house comfortable, and their company
less than ideal; still, they try their best to enjoy it all.

Marianne anxiously awaits Willoughby's arrival, while Elinor finds her

greatest enjoyment in Colonel Brandon's daily visits. Elinor is much
disturbed when Colonel Brandon tells her that the engagement between
Marianne and Willoughby is widely known throughout town. At a party,

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Elinor and Marianne see Willoughby. Marianne approaches him,
although he avoids Marianne, and his behaviour is insulting.

Marianne angrily writes Willoughby, and receives a reply in which he

denies having loved Marianne, and says he hopes he didn't lead her on.
Marianne is deeply grieved at being deceived and dumped so coldly.
Elinor feels only anger at Willoughby's unpardonable behaviour.
Marianne then reveals that she and Willoughby were never engaged,
and Elinor observes that Marianne should have been more prudent in
her affections. Apparently, Willoughby is to marry the wealthy Lady Grey
due to his constant need for money.

Colonel Brandon calls after hearing the news and offers up his
knowledge of Willoughby's character to Elinor. Colonel Brandon was
once in love with a ward to his family, Eliza, who became a fallen woman
and had an illegitimate daughter. Colonel Brandon placed the daughter,
Miss Williams, in care after her mother's death. The Colonel learned on
the day of the Delaford picnic that she had become pregnant and was
abandoned by Willoughby. Elinor is shocked, though the Colonel
sincerely hopes that this will help Marianne feel better about losing
Willoughby, since he was not of solid character.

The story convinces Marianne of Willoughby's guilt, though it does not

ease her mind. Out of sympathy, Marianne also stops avoiding the
Colonel's company and becomes more civil to him. Willoughby is soon
married, which Marianne is grieved to hear; then, again unfortunately,
the Miss Steeles comes to stay with the Middletons.

John and Fanny Dashwood arrive and are introduced to Mrs. Jennings,
and to Sir John and Lady Middleton, deeming them a worthy company.
John reveals to Elinor that Edward is soon to be married to Miss Morton,
an orphan with a great deal of money left to her, as per the plans of his
mother. At a dinner party given by John and Fanny for their new
acquaintance, Mrs. Ferrars is present, along with the entire Barton party.
Mrs. Ferrars turns out to be sallow, unpleasant and uncivil. She slights
Elinor, which hurts Marianne deeply, as she is Edward's mother.

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Miss Steeles is invited to stay with John and Fanny. But, Mrs. Jennings
soon informs them that Miss Steeles told Fanny of Lucy and Edward's
engagement, and that the Ferrars family threw the Steele girls out in a
rage. Marianne is much grieved to hear of the engagement, and cannot
believe that Elinor has also kept her knowledge of it a secret for so long.
Edward is to be disinherited if he chooses to marry Lucy; unfortunately,
Edward is too honourable to reject Lucy, even if he no longer loves her.

Financial obstacles to their marriage remain; he must find a position in

the church that pays enough to allow them to marry. Much to Elinor's
chagrin, the Colonel, although he barely knows Edward, generously
offers the small parish at Delaford to him. Elinor is to convey the offer to
Edward, though she regrets that it might help the marriage.

Edward is surprised at the generous offer, since he hardly knows the

Colonel. Edward decides to accept the position; they say goodbye, as
Elinor is to leave town soon. Much to Elinor's surprise, Robert Ferrars,
Edward's selfish, vain, and rather dim brother, is now to marry Miss
Morton; he has also received Edward's inheritance and money, and
doesn't care about Edward's grim situation.

It is April, and the Dashwood girls, the Palmers, and Mrs. Jennings, and
Colonel Brandon set out for Cleveland, the Palmer's estate. Marianne is
still feeling grief over Willoughby; she soon becomes ill after her walks in
the rain, and gets a serious fever. The Palmers leave with her child. Mrs.
Jennings, though, helps Elinor nurse Marianne and insists that Colonel
Brandon stay, since he is anxious about Marianne's health. Colonel
Brandon soon sets off to get Mrs. Dashwood from Barton when
Marianne's illness worsens. At last, Marianne's state improves, right in
time for her mother and the Colonel's arrival; but Willoughby makes an
unexpected visit.

Elinor is horrified at seeing him; he has come to inquire after Marianne's

health and to explain his past actions. Willoughby says he led Marianne
on at first out of vanity; he finally began to love her as well, and would
have proposed to her, if not for the money.

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By saying that, he also has no regard for his wife, and still loves
Marianne, he attempts to gain Elinor's compassion. Elinor's opinion of
him is somewhat improved in being assured of his regard for Marianne.
Elinor cannot think him a total blackguard since he has been punished
for his mistakes, and tells him so. Willoughby leaves with this assurance,
lamenting that Marianne is lost to him forever.

Mrs. Dashwood finally arrives, and Elinor assures her that Marianne is
out of danger. Both Mrs. Dashwood and the Colonel are relieved. Mrs.
Dashwood tells Elinor that the Colonel had confessed his love for
Marianne during the journey from Barton. Mrs. Dashwood wishes the
Colonel and Marianne to be married. Elinor wishes the Colonel well in
securing Marianne's affections, but is more pessimistic regarding
Marianne's ability to accept the Colonel after disliking him for so long.

Marianne makes a quick recovery, thanking Colonel Brandon for his help
and acting friendly toward him. Marianne finally seems calm and happy
as they leave for Barton, which Elinor believes to signal Marianne's
recovery from Willoughby. She is also far more mature, keeping herself
busy and refusing to let herself languish in her grief.

When Marianne decides to talk about Willoughby, Elinor takes the

opportunity to tell her what Willoughby had said at Cleveland, and
Marianne takes this very well. Marianne also laments her selfishness
towards Elinor, and her lack of civility towards most of their
acquaintance. Marianne finally says that she could not have been happy
with Willoughby, after hearing of his cruelty toward Miss Williams, and
no longer regrets him.

The family is stunned when one of their servants returns with news that
Edward is married to Lucy, as he just saw them in the village. Elinor
knows now that Edward is lost to her forever. Mrs. Dashwood sees how
upset Elinor is, and realises that Elinor felt more for Edward than she
ever revealed. One afternoon, Elinor is convinced that the Colonel has
arrived at the cottage, but is surprised to find that it is Edward instead.

Their meeting is awkward at best; he soon informs them that it is his

brother who has been married to Lucy, and not him. Elinor immediately

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runs from the room, crying out of joy; Edward then senses Elinor's
regard for him, and proposes to her that afternoon. Elinor accepts and
he gains Mrs. Dashwood's consent to the match.
Edward admits that any regard he had for Lucy was formed out of
idleness and lack of knowledge; he came to regret the engagement soon
after it was formed. After leaving London, Edward received a letter from
Lucy saying that she had married his brother Robert, and has not seen
her since; thus, he was honourably relieved of the engagement. After
receiving the letter, he set out for Barton immediately to see Elinor.
Edward will still accept the position at Delaford, although he and Elinor
again will not have enough money to live on comfortably. The Colonel
visits Barton, and he and Edward become good friends.

Edward then becomes reconciled with his family, although he does not
regain his inheritance from Robert. His mother even gives her consent
for his marriage to Elinor, however much she is displeased by it; she
gives them ten thousand pounds, the interest of which will allow them to
live comfortably. Edward and Elinor are married at Barton that fall.

Mrs. Dashwood and her two remaining daughters spend most of their
time at Delaford, both to be near Elinor, and out of the hope that
Marianne might accept the Colonel. In the two years that have passed,
Marianne has become more mature and more grounded; and she does
finally change her mind about the Colonel, and accepts his offer of
marriage.

The Colonel becomes far more cheerful, and soon Marianne grows to
love him as much as she ever loved Willoughby. Mrs. Dashwood
remains at Barton with Margaret, now fifteen, much to the delight of Sir
John, who retains their company. And Elinor and Marianne both live
together at Delaford, and remain good friends with each other and each
other's husbands.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 8.2
Explain sense and sensibility:
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

8.3 SENSE AND SENSIBILITY: A CRITIQUE

In what follows in this Section, we will describe the different dimensions

of the novel, Sense and Sensibility.

8.3.1 Social comedy

The underlying theme of Jane Austen’s social comedy is the

predicament of being a woman in a man’s world – a world ruled by men
and run for their advantage, in which marriage looms as the most
important and decisive act of a woman and where the prevailing view is
“Marriage has …no natural relation to love. Marriage belongs to society;
it is a social contract” (Coleridge). Jane Austen herself viewed it as

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“single women have a dreadful propensity of being poor – which is one
very strong argument in favor of matrimony”.

This crushing force of the system is expounded succinctly in the opening

pages of Sense and Sensibility, with a history of the Dashwood estate,
its preservation from generation to generation through the elaborate
legalities of inheritance and succession. While Pride and Prejudice
shows how a man can triumph over them, in Sense and Sensibility, Jane
Austen shows a woman broken by societal pressures.

Jane Austen’s clarity of description towards what is moral and rational

towards judgement is based upon clear thinking and right feeling. When
Marianne Dashwood hears the news of Lucy Steele’s marriage, “To her
own heart it was a delightful affair, to her imagination it was even a
ridiculous one, but to her reason, her judgement, it was completely a
puzzle.” Fanny Price, who at Portsmouth was quite shocked by a
squabble in the family, registers the same impression differently: “Every
feeling of duty, honor and tenderness was wounded by her sister’s
speech and her mother’s reply”. She receives a stab when she realises
Edmund Bertram’s marriage to Mar Crawford as inevitable. She grieves
to see someone she loves like a brother caught in the toils of a
seductress whom she detests. She is heartbroken, dejected, but
determined to “endeavor to be rational, and to deserve the right of
judging Miss Crawford’s character and the privilege of true solicitude for
him by a sound intellect and an honest heart”.

Jane Austen sets a high value on self-knowledge and the novel can be
analyzed in terms of the progress made by the heroine, regarding
knowledge of life and duty. She created a new and flexible medium in
which the individual and society could be revealed together, and it is the
dominant gift of her genius. While the novelists before her tended to tilt
the balance towards either the private world or the public world, Austen
has a controlled and profound imaginative grasp of the individual life and
collective life. The readers move from the innermost recesses of the
heart and mind to the most extrovert social occasions. And we move
from one to the other with perfect ease and smoothness. She builds up
her social surface as steadily and as carefully as her characters through
many observations. We find all kinds of characters – major and minor in
her novels and the relationship between them is rather intricate.

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8.3.2 The novel as a burlesque

The title, Sense and Sensibility, can be paraphrased as meaning

something like “common sense and sensitivity.” The semantic drama of
the novel is signalled in the title, and within the novel we can follow the
scheme of characterization in which the meaning of the words are
brought out. Marianne and Elinor represent sensibility and sense. The
opposing natures of Elinor – prudent, rational, governed by sense; and
of Marianne – impulsive, incautious, over powered by the dictates of
quivering sensibility – don’t make them incompatible as sisters.

Certainly, throughout the novel Jane Austen sympathises with Elinor, but
ironically both girls suffer misfortunes in love. How can Elinor a
principled lady, waiting patiently for her suitor to claim her, observing
always the rules of decorum and controlled opinion, match the force of
his prejudiced mother and a scheming rival? How can Marianne,
disarmed by a rampant sensibility, avoid humiliation and despair before
a scoundrel whose intentions vary according to his purse?

During Jane Austen’s lifetime, provincial society was manoeuvering for

the best advantage it could obtain: the less privileged class was
scrambling for power and getting it; the aristocracy was attempting to
compromise in order not to capitulate. So in the novel, as morality and
sensitivity and conveniently sacrificed to self-interest, shallowness and
sham set in. When John Dashwood learns of Edwards’s proposal to
marry Lucy, which has cut him off from his mother. He perceives the rift
only in terms of pounds and shillings: ”Can anything be more galling to
the spirit of a man”, continued John, “than to see his younger brother in
possession of an estate which might have been his own? Poor Edward!
I feel for him sincerely.”

In this “moral climate”, those who express their feelings and passions
without any restraint, do so at their own peril as much as those who act
on principles and ethics. Thus Marianne and Elinor suffer deeply as
they pursue their hopes, but not without making us smile.

Sense and Sensibility is, in many ways, a burlesque. In it, Jane Austen
jabs at the cults of sensibility and the picturesque, a phenomenon of the

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18th century, embodied here in the soul-suffering Marianne. Austen
does redeem her. While Elinor stoically suffers her anguish, Marianne
resolves to discipline herself. The motivation for Marianne’s change in
character comes directly out of suffering and revelation, the two
measures of intense living. We laugh at her but we like her: there is
something compelling about a girl who has been immersed so
completely in life.

Cautious, sensible, stable, even genuinely compassionate, Elinor just

misses achieving her sisters’ full measure of intense living, which
educates most of Austen’s heroines out of their mistakes. Her prudence
and suspiciousness are honed a little too finely. We gladly approve at
her flighty mother’s admonition: Oh! Elinor, how incomprehensible are
your feelings! Are no probabilities to be accepted, merely because they
are not certainties?”

8.3.3 Element of surprise

One of Jane Austen’s most brilliant gifts is her ability to surprise.

Though her art deals in the staple of the novel and the drama-
expectation, she can astonish and arrest the reader. The astonishment
is profoundly instructive as well as thrilling. In each novel there is a
piece of transforming news. In Sense and Sensibility Lucy Steele’s
information about her engagement to Edward Ferrars brings about the
change. Lucy takes her time to disclose it, first prefacing a question
about Mrs Ferrars with “you will think my question an odd one”, (Elinor
does), and then persisting in spite of Elinor’s politely cool refusal to
satisfy “what seemed impertinent curiosity.”

Throughout her skirting and scouting we are aware of Lucy’s look, which
is sharp baleful and controlled. She first eyes Elinor attentively, later
looks down in amiable bashfulness “with only one side glance at her
companion to observe its effect on her.” Just before coming to the point
and announcing her engagement to Mr Robert Ferrar’s “elder brother”,
she fixes her eyes upon Elinor. But if Lucy is snakelike, Elinor is no
rabbit, and Jane Austen sets her this cruel listening test in order to let
her powers of control show the advantage of practice.

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What did Elinor feel at that moment? Astonishment, that would have
been as painful as it was, strong, had not an immediate disbelief of the
assertion attended it. She turned towards Lucy in silent amazement,
unable to divine the reason or object of such a declaration, and though
her complexion varied, she stood firm in incredulity and felt in no danger
of a hysterical fit, or a swoon.

Incredulity preserves her control initially, but this is succeeded by the

desire to question. She feels “an exertion of spirits, which increased
with her increase of emotion.” Despite her defenses, the totally
unexpected revelation leaves her “mortified, shocked, confounded.” And
the reader shares the shock. Jane Austen’s surprises bring the reader
and character together – we feel Elinor’s mortification, her shock and
incredulity.

Elinor’s politeness, sympathy, reserve and intelligence doom her to be a

confidant in painful circumstances. “Indeed you wrong me”, replied Lucy
with great solemnity; “I know nobody of whose judgement I think so
highly as I do of yours; and I do really believe, that if you was to say to
me, I advice you by all means to put an end to your engagement with
Edward Ferrars, it will be more for the happiness of both of you”, I
should resolve upon doing it immediately.”

Elinor blushed for the insincerity of Edward’s future wife, and replied
“This compliment would effectually frighten men from giving any opinion
on the subject had I formed one. It raises my influence much too high;
the power of dividing two people so tenderly attached is too much for an
indifferent person”

“’Tis because you are indifferent person,” said Lucy, with some pique
and laying a particular stress on those words, that your judgement might
justly have such weight with me. If you could be supposed to be biased
in any respect by your own feelings, your opinion would not be worth
having.”

Elinor thought it wisest to make no answer to this, lest they might

provoke each other an unsuitable increase of ease and unreserved.

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The second astonishing story is also told to Elinor. It is Willoughby’s
confession. Like Lucy’s confidence, it also has a full and fully justified
emotional urgency. Willoughby descends on Elinor when she is
recovering from the agitating fears and hopes of Marianne’s fever, and
alone at night, is waiting for the sound of her mother’s carriage, rather
earlier than she had expected, she looks out and, seeing that it is drawn
by four horses instead of two, concludes that her mother had arrived
speedily for some reason: “Never in her life had Elinor found it so difficult
to be calm, as at that moment… The bustle in the vestibule, as she had
passed along an inner lobby, assured her that they were already in the
house. She rushed forward towards the drawing room she entered it
and saw only Willoughby”.

Willoughby sets out to tell his long story; and by the time he is gone,
Elinor finds herself shaken. She is an experienced listener, and it is a
vital test for her sense and sensibility. The story is astonishing, but the
listener’s astonishment is equally interesting. The novel is full of such
bursts of news, good and bad. Most startling are such inner disclosures,
which have a double effect, within the novel. Such narrative revelations
keep the novel progressing. When Elinor is told the true story of Lucy’s
marriage, and the true story about Edward’s past, the novel is nearly
over. The marriage of Marianne to Colonel Brandon, and Elinor’s
destiny, bring the whole novel to an end. However, the story that we
learn at the end is not a simple one. Confidences, confessions, blurted-
out secrets and transient attempts to deceive, complicate the story.

Jane Austen’s telling and listening presentation is much more than a

formal device. “It is an analysis and evaluation of human mind.”
Marianne Dashwood tells a story to her mother, certainly not a new one
but obviously hers and from her point of view and therefore fresh. It is
about the past and about the future and hence it is memories and
imagination.

“Nay mama, if he is not to be animated by Cowper! – but we must allow

for difference of taste. Elinor has not my feelings, and therefore she
may overlook it, and be happy with him. But it would have broken my
heart had I loved him, to hear him read with so little sensibility. Mama,
the more I know of the world, the more am I convinced that I shall never

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see a man whom I can really love. I require so much! He must have all
Edward’s virtues, and his person and manners must ornament his
goodness with every possible charm.”
“Remember, my love, that you are not seventeen. It is yet too early in
life to despair of such a happiness. Why should you be less fortunate
than your mother? In one circumstance only, my Marianne, may your
destiny be different from her’s!”

On the other hand, the story Elinor tells Marianne is new and it is about
a new acquaintance.
“In my heart, I feel little – scarcely any doubt of his preference. But there
are other points to be considered besides his inclination. He is very far
from being independent. What his mother really is we cannot know; but
from Fanny’s occasional mention of her conduct and opinions, we have
never been disposed to think amiable; and I am very much mistaken if
Edward is not himself aware that there would be many difficulties in his
way, if he were to wish to marry a woman who had not either a great
fortune or high rank!”
Marianne was astonished to find how much the imagination of her
mother and herself had outstripped the truth.

“And you really are not engaged to him’ said she. ‘Yet it certainly soon
will happen. But two advantages will proceed from this delay. I shall not
lose you so soon, and Edward will have greater opportunity of improving
that natural taste for your favourite pursuit, which must be so
indispensably necessary to your future felicity. Oh! If he should be so far
stimulated by your genius as to learn to draw himself, how delightful it
would be.”
When later, after moving to Barton when Marianne confides in her
mother her fear about Edward Ferrars being ill and not visiting them, he
mother replies: “I rather think you are mistaken, for when I was talking to
you yesterday of getting a new grate for the spare bedchamber, she
observed that there was no immediate hurry for it, as it was not likely
that the room would be wanted for some time.”
“How strange this is! What can be the meaning of it! But the whole of
their behavior to each other has been unaccountable! How cold, how
composed were their last adieus! How languid their conversation the
last evening of their being together! In Edward’s farewell there was no
distinction between Elinor and me: it was the good wishes of an
affectionate brother to both. Twice did I leave them purposely together
in the course of the last morning, and each time did he most

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unaccountably follow me out of the room. And Elinor is quitting Norland
and Edward, cried not as I did. Even now her self-command is
invariable. When is she dejected or melancholy? When does she try to
avoid society, or appear restless and dissatisfied in it?”

“The flow of the domestic novel”, Barbara Hardy observes consists to a

large extent of this kind of speculative exchange, intimate bit also
ignorant. Jane Austen is reflecting a truth about family life in showing its
constant surmise and limited confidence, its secrets and its isolations.
She uses such internal narrations for the purposes of her own largest
narrative tension.

The family narrative is not totally unreserved and open. As in all

families, even close ones, people talk to each other, about each other,
and behind each other’s back. The structure of feeling is revealed and
created in such telling.

Sarcasm and satire

Jane Austen analyses the daily storytelling, but her interest in narrative
often strikes us as a particularly professional interest, and such an
analyses aims at looking at art as well as life. The stories that the
various characters tell in Sense and Sensibility illustrate ‘sense’ and
‘sensibility’.
Memory is an important mode of storytelling as imagination is. As Jane
Austen allows the everyday narratives of common life merge with the
effect of memory and imagination, she reveals the strength of mind of
her characters. Sense and Sensibility begins with changes brought
about in two branches of a family by deaths and inheritance. The story
is kept moving with numerous narratives from different characters. The
novelist links the scenes smoothly and tensely, and levels her criticisms
at the social structure where flattery is endemic. Her satire on vulgarity
and mercenariness is not restricted to the social climbers. The have-
nots may be greedy, but the haves behave as if they were have-nots.
The author’s voice is heard in the novel rather discreetly. Sense and
Sensibility offers more sparing use of authorial commentary. The
author’s voice is reserved for criticism. The only occasion of the
authorial ‘I’ is conspicuous but disconcertingly trivial, though the triviality
is the occasion for an ironic over-emphasis. The introduction “I come
now to the relation of a misfortune which about this time befell Mrs. John
Dash wood” rather portentously leads us on to an anticlimax. The
comment on Elinor’s and Edward’s talks: “Between them no subject is

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finished, no communication is ever made till it has been made at least
twenty times over.” The author criticizes the rational lovers: he did not,
upon the whole, expect a very cruel reception. It was his business,
however, to say that he did, and he said it very prettily. What he might
say on the subject a twelvemonth after must be referred to the
imagination of husbands and wives.
The ironic, sententious summary of Lucy’s career and the hardness of
the farewell to Willoughby are more clearly appropriate. And even the
final summary of the novel among the merits and the happiness of Elinor
and Marianne, let it not be ranked as the least considerable, that though
sisters, and living almost within sight of each other, they could live
without disagreement between themselves, or producing coolness
between their husbands.

The lives of Austen’s people are played out in the exclusiveness of the
mansion house, in the ballroom, in the dooryard and bedroom of the
country cottage or the drawing room of the town house. Her people
thrive on dances and gossip; despair over reluctant suitors; manoeuvre
incessantly to make profitable match for their daughters, protect their
superiority, advance their social status and to guard their lives against
debt, spinsterhood and jarring change.
The drawing room scenes are small Austen worlds writ even smaller; the
parlor reflects the village; the dramatic clash between two people
reproduces what one critic has termed “the moral climate” in which the
dilemmas of Austen’s heroines “grow”. The two heroines of the novel
who practice the codes of ‘sense’ and ‘sensibility’ also transmit the pride,
the precious insulation or intolerance and the excessive affirmation of
individual identity that characterize society at large. Jane Austen’s
double theme echoes back and forth between the town and the drawing
room and sounds a truth that speaks even to the readers of a nuclear
age.
She is one of the most consistent satirists in the whole of literature…
One after another she creates her fools, her prigs, her wordings… She
encircles them with the lash of a whip-like phrase, which, as it round
them, cuts out their silhouettes forever…. Sometimes it seems as if her
creatures were born merely to give Jane Austen the supreme delight of
slicing their heads off… the wit of Jane Austen has for partner the
perfection of her taste. Her fool is a fool, her snob is a snob, because he
departs from the model of sanity and sense, which she has in mind and
conveys to us unmistakably even while she makes us laugh. Never did
any novelist make more use of an impeccable sense of human values. It

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is against the disc of an unerring heart, and unfailing good taste, an
almost stern morality that shows up those deviations from kindness,
truth, and sincerity, which are among the most delightful things in
English literature.

She never exaggerated. Her delicious sense of humour prevented that.

Yet she managed to extract fun from her scrutiny of the villagers and the
country gentry she knew! Never has a keener eye been open to the
foibles, the illusions, the pretenses, the weaknesses of us all, for she
shames present readers by obliging them to see themselves in the
people she made the targets of her lively but gentle irony. Human nature
has changed very little since the day when Jane Austen flashed the
lantern of her sincerity in the faces of her acquaintances and found them
all amusing.

Few of her personages escape her playful sarcasm. She thought them
all made of clay. In them she found comedy, sometimes farce, but never
tragedy. Her wit punctures her characters but leaves no lasting injury, no
rankling. For it is a subtle wit, fused of sharpness and sympathy, the
sharpness of one who perceives flaws mingled with the sympathy of one
who numbers herself among fellow mortals. It is the kind of wit and the
brand of humour to be appreciated only by the intelligent.

The delicate art, the astonishing perfection of Jane Austen has

fascinated every succeeding generation of English readers. Her acute
sense of character, her bland irony, her exquisite powers of organization
and presentation turned the uneventful lives of well-fed people in quiet
corners into enchanting novels.

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 8.3
Who Mrs. Dashwood?
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

SUMMARY
In this Unit, we discussed one of the novels of Jane Austen, Sense and
Sensibility. We first gave you some biographical details of the author and
touched upon some of her works. We then gave you the story line of
Sense and Sensibility. Finally, we analysed the novel as a social
comedy, a burlesque and as a novel with elements of surprise.

REFERENCE
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Austen#:~:text=Jane%20Austen%20(
%2F%CB%88%C9%92s,end%20of%20the%2018th%20century.

https://thegreatestbooks.org/authors/4728
https://literariness.org/2019/03/31/analysis-of-jane-austens-novels/

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Sense-and-Sensibility

VIDEO LINK

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eJTezY4TL4g

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UNIT - 9 VIRGINIA WOOLF AND MARGARET ATWOOD

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

9.1 Virginia Woolf: The Author

9.1.1 Early Life and Work

9.1.2 Woolf as an essayist
9.1.3 Woolf as a literary critic
9.1.4 Woolf as a novelist
9.2 Mrs. Dallowy: The Novel
9.2.1 The story

9.2.2 A critique
9.2.3 Themes

9.3 Margaret Atwood: The Author

9.4 The Edible Woman: The Novel
9.4.1 The story

9.4.2 A critique

Summary

OVERVIEW

In this Unit, we will first provide you with a brief biography of Virginia
Woolf and discuss Woolf as an essayist, a novelist and a literary critic.
We will then analyse one of her novels, Mrs. Dalloway, in all its
dimensions including the themes treated in the novel. We will
subsequently introduce Margaret Atwood and her contribution to the
Canadian literature. Following this introduction, we will discuss one of
her novels, The Edible Woman, and bring out its central theme of
patriarchy.

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LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing this Unit, you should be able to:

 discuss Virginia Woolf as an essayist, novelist and a literary critic;

 make a critique of Mrs. Dalloway;

 give a brief biography of Margaret Atwood and list some of her

works;
 Critically evaluate The Edible Woman.

9.1 VIRGINIA WOOLF THE AUTHOR

Virginia Woolf
In Subsections 9.1.1 to 9.1.4, we will give you a biography of Virginia
Woolf and describe the versatility of the author insofar as she proved to
be as an essayist, as a literary critic and novelist.

Virginia Woolf was an English author and novelist who wrote modernist
classics. Not only is she known as a pioneer of modernism, but also as
the greatest modernist literary personality of the twentieth century. She

254
pioneered feminist texts as well. She is known for her works like ‘To the
Lighthouse,’ ‘Mrs. Dalloway,’ ‘Orlando,’ and an essay titled ‘A Room of
One's Own.’ An important figure in the ‘Victorian Literary Society,’ as
well as an influential figure in the Bloomsbury group of intellectuals,
Woolf was an innovator of English literature who used experimental
language. This unit aims to give an introduction about the author and her
work Mrs. Dallowy.

Virginia Woolf was an English author, feminist, essayist, publisher, and

critic, considered as one of the foremost modernists of the twentieth
century along with T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, James Joyce, and Gertrude
Stein. Her parents were Sir Leslie Stephen (1832–1904), who was a
notable historian, author, critic and mountaineer, and Julia Prinsep
Duckworth (1846–1895), a renowned beauty. According to Woolf's
memoirs, her most vivid childhood memories were not of London but of
St. Ives in Cornwall, where the family spent every summer until 1895.
This place inspired her to write one of her masterpieces, To the
Lighthouse.

9.1.1 Early Life and Work

Born on January 25, 1882, Adeline Virginia Stephen was raised in a

remarkable household. Her father, Sir Leslie Stephen, was a historian
and author, as well as one of the most prominent figures in the golden
age of mountaineering. Woolf’s mother, Julia Prinsep Stephen (née
Jackson), had been born in India and later served as a model for several
Pre-Raphaelite painters. She was also a nurse and wrote a book on the
profession. Woolf had three siblings Thoby, Vanessa and Adrian and
four half-siblings Laura Makepeace Stephen and George, Gerald and
Stella Duckworth. The eight children lived under one roof at 22 Hyde
Park Gate, Kensington. While Adeline received no formal education,
she was raised in a cultured and literary atmosphere, receiving her
education from her father’s extensive library and from conversing with
his friends, many of whom were prominent writers of the era. Adeline’s
mother died in 1895, and, following the death of her father in 1904, she
settled in the Bloomsbury district of London with her sister, Vanessa,
and her brothers Thoby and Adrian. Their house became a gathering-
place where such friends as J.M. Keynes, Lyton Strachey, Roger Fry
and E.M. Forster congregated for lively discussions about philosophy,
art, music and literature. A complex network of friendships and love
affairs developed among various participants, serving to increase the
solidarity of what became known as the Bloomsbury Group. It was at

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this congregation of friends that Adeline met Leonard Woolf, the author,
politician and economist whom she married in 1912.

Adeline Virginia Stephen Woolf is an English essayist, novelist, critic,

short story writer, diarist and biographer. Woolf is one of the most
prominent literary figures of the twentieth century, and her essays
contain some of her most respected prose. Throughout her life she
wrote book reviews, biographical and autobiographical sketches, social
and literary criticism, personal essays and commemorative articles
treating a wide range of topics.

Because of Woolf’s renown as an innovative novelist, in particular for her

contributions to the development of stream-of-consciousness narrative
technique, commentary on her essays, at first, focused on the insight
they afforded into her own fiction. Subsequently, however, Woolf’s
essays received attention for their perceptive observations on nearly the
entire range of English literature, as well as on many social and political
concerns of the early twentieth century.

9.1.2 Woolf as an essayist

Woolf left much insight into the writer's mind as a diarist and essayist,
along with her numerous books of fiction and nonfiction. She
encouraged women to write about whatever fascinated them and to dare
to be creators. This was encapsulated in A Room of One's Own, one of
her best-known works of nonfiction.

Woolf flourished in the unconventional atmosphere that she and her

siblings had devised. The freedom afforded by the Bloomsbury milieu
was conducive to her literary inclinations, and the need to earn money
led her to begin submitting book reviews and essays to various
publications. Her first published works – literary reviews for the most
part – began appearing anonymously in 1904 in the Guardian, a weekly
newspaper for Anglo-Catholic clergy.

Subsequently, Woolf published reviews and essays in a number of other

periodicals, including the National Review, Cornhill and the Times
Literary Supplement (TLS). Bruce Richmond, who edited TLS from

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1902 to 1938, assigned novels, biographies, histories and travel books
for her to review and did thoughtful editing of her submissions. She later
credited Richmond with helping to shape her style as an essayist: “I
learnt a lot of my craft writing for him: how to compress; how to enliven;
and also was made to read with a pen and notebook, seriously.”

Woolf’s letters and diaries reveal that her journalism occupied much of
her time and thought between 1904 and 1909. By the later year,
however, she was becoming absorbed in work on her first novel,
eventually published in 1915 as The Voyage Out. Although, she
attained great renown as a novelist and short story writer thereafter, she
continued to write and publish essays throughout her career.

Woolf maintained that the purpose of writing an essay was to give

pleasure to the reader, and she endeavoured to do this with witty, supple
prose, apt literary and cultural references, and a wide range of subjects.
Aiming to identify closely with her audience, she adopted a persona she
termed “the common reader”: an intelligent, educated person with the
will and inclination to be challenged by what he or she reads.

While the majority of Woolf’s essays are devoted to literary matters,

some of her most highly regarded non-fiction writings are topical and
occasional essays that treat such subjects as war and peace, feminism,
life and death, sex and class issues, even the death of a family pet. She
addressed social and feminist concerns in greatest depth in A Room of
One’s Own and Three Guineas, discussing the cultural and economic
pressures that hinder women’s scholarly pursuits and exploring the
underlying causes of war.

9.1.3 Woolf as a literary critic

As a literary critic, Woolf undertook the appraisal of a wide range of

authors. She reviewed and wrote extended critical commentary on her
literary contemporaries, including Rupert Brooke, E.M. Forster, Henry
James, Rudyard Kipling and D.H. Lawrence; the great Victorian and
Romantic poets and novelists; major figures of the eighteenth century
and the Elizabethian age; and many less-known literary and historical
characters.

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Her literary criticism is largely appreciative and impressionistic,
containing little that can be called objective or analytical. Woolf’s
commentary on works by authors of the past usually includes a full
consideration of the society in which the work originated, and critics
have found these essays the most effective among her works.

One of the best and most famous of her literary essays is Mr. Bennett
and Mrs. Brown, in which Modernist fiction, which Woolf’s own works
exemplify, is contrasted with the Realist-Naturalist tradition represented
by H.G. Wells, John Galsworthy and Arnold Bennett. In this essay, she
provided through a few deft paragraphs, a vivid character sketch of an
old woman in a train compartment, and then parodied the methods of
description that would be used by the trio of Edwardian novelists. Their
polemical approach to fiction, Woolf charged, would leave no room for
the character and sensibility of the fictional Mrs. Brown to take shape.

Commentators have occasionally found Woolf’s assessments of her

contemporaries faulty. Her early published criticism of D.H. Lawrence,
for example, was severely critical and has been assessed as
unperceptive. However, her notebooks reveal that she eventually
revised her opinion of Lawrence, expressing appreciation of his literary
achievement.

Scholars stress the value of studying Woolf’s private papers together

with her published criticism in order to arrive at a true estimation of her
literary opinions. In fact, her notebooks, diaries, and letters often reveal
more acute critical estimations than those found in the literary reviews.

During her lifetime, Woolf collected and edited only two volumes of her
essays, The Common Reader and The Common Reader: Second
Series. After her death, her husband published a number of others,
including The Death of the Moth, The Moment, The Captain’s Death
Bed, Hours in a Library and Granite and Rainbow, as well as a four-
volume edition, Collected Essays. In this collection, Leonard Woolf
included all the essays that Woolf herself had prepared for book
publication and a number of others that had not been reprinted since
their initial periodical appearance. He divided the essays into two

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groups, ‘literary and critical’ and ‘biographical’, and arranged them
chronologically by subject.

9.1.4 Woolf as a novelist

As a novelist, Woolf’s method is usually to use a plot, which has a

simple outline, and to exploit it with an impressionism, which seizes
upon every detail, however minute, and to order these details not in a
rational arrangement but as they stream through the mind of one of her
characters. The novel is thus becoming an interior soliloquy, though
diffuseness is avoided by the retention of the central and well-ordered
theme.

“In Virginia Woolf’s novels we find a rare artistic integrity and they
display a well-developed sense of form. To communicate her experience
she had to invent conventions as rigid or more rigid than the old ones
that she discarded. And this she does in her best novels of the middle
and the final period—Mrs. Dalloway, To The Lighthouse, The
Waves and Between the Acts. In each case a small group of people is
selected, and through their closely interrelated experience the reader
receives his total impression. We also find that in each case certain
images, phrases and symbols bind the whole together. So there are
certain resemblances between them in structure or style. Apart from
these general resemblances each of these novels is a fresh attempt to
solve the problems raised by the departure from traditional conventions.
So it is observed that each of her novels grows out of the preceding one
and we see the germ of her later works in their predecessors. Another
significant point is that in Mrs. Woolf’s novels from Jacob’s
Rooms to The Waves there is far less scene-setting and novel of it is
obvious; deliberate stage managing disappears, in fact concealed;
hence the method is poetic, the unity is a poetic unity. But the unity is
there and is deliberately achieved.”

She is armed with an acute intelligence, which makes the perception of

every evanescent mood possible, while a diffused romantic quality adds
to the buoyancy of narration.

Wit accompanies her intelligence as can be seen most obviously in

Orlando. Tenderness without sentimentality aids her in evoking these

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previously unapprehended human relations. Woolf’s novels are
psychologically and technically complex novels.

Her fictional works include The Common Reader (essays and criticism
1925), A Room of One’s Own (essay 1929), The Voyage Out (1915),
Night and Day (1919), Jacob’s Room (1922), Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To
the Lighthouse (1927), Orlando: A Biography (1928), The Waves (1931)
and The Years (1937).
Suicide and Legacy

Woolf's husband, Leonard, always by her side, was quite aware of any
signs that pointed to his wife’s descent into depression. He saw, as she
was working on what would be her final manuscript, Between the
Acts (published posthumously in 1941), that she was sinking into
deepening despair. At the time, World War II was raging on and the
couple decided if England was invaded by Germany, they would commit
suicide together, fearing that Leonard, who was Jewish, would be in
particular danger. In 1940, the couple’s London home was destroyed
during the Blitz, the Germans bombing of the city.
Unable to cope with her despair, Woolf pulled on her overcoat, filled
its pockets with stones and walked into the River Ouse on March 28,
1941. As she waded into the water, the stream took her with it. The
authorities found her body three weeks later. Leonard Woolf had her
cremated and her remains were scattered at their home, Monk's House.
Although her popularity decreased after World War II, Woolf's work
resonated again with a new generation of readers during the feminist
movement of the 1970s. Woolf remains one of the most influential
authors of the 21st century.
Awards and Recognition

Her work ‘To the Lighthouse’ was ranked number 15 by the ‘Modern
Library’ in 1998, on its list of ‘100 best English language novels of the
20th century.’ The ‘TIME’ magazine also chose it as one of the best
English language novels published between 1923 and 2005.

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LEARNING ACTIVITY 8.2
Listout works of Virginia woolf.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

9.2 MRS. DALLOWAY: THE NOVEL

In Subsections 9.1.2 to 9.2.3, we will exclusively deal with the novel,

Mrs. Dalloway, and on that front, we will first give you the storyline
followed by a critique. We will also discuss some of the themes
employed in the novel.

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9.2.1 The story

Mrs Dalloway is a novel by Virginia Woolf that details a day in the life
of Clarissa Dalloway, a fictional high-society woman in post–First World
War England.

One fine, hot June morning, Clarissa Dalloway emerges from her
handsome home in Westminster to go shopping. She is giving an
important dinner party that night. On the street she meets an old friend,
Hugh Whitbread, now grown fat and rather pompous. Hugh is in town,
Mrs. Dalloway knows, to consult a doctor about his constantly ailing wife,
Evelyn. Clarissa wonders what sort of present would be appropriate to
take to Evelyn in the nursing home. But she decides to buy some
flowers first for her party.

While she is ordering flowers, Mrs. Dalloway sees a grand limousine pull
up to the curb. Its drawn curtains arouse the curiosity of the passers-by.
Is the Queen inside or an important Cabinet Minister – perhaps even the
Prime Minister? Mrs. Dalloway’s husband is a Member of Parliament,
but for some reason, his career has never advanced as it should have.
He will never be a Minister of the Cabinet. When the limousine pulls into
Buckingham Palace, Mrs. Dalloway is sure the Queen is inside.

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A plane flies overhead skywriting an advertisement for some toffee.
Skywriting being a novelty in the 1920s, and Mrs. Dalloway feels at one
with all the Londoners craning to see the marvel.

The bustle and spectacle of London remind her of her past. She was a
well-bred girl whose father’s house in the country was always filled with
guests. Among these, Clarissa’s favourite was Sally Seton, a lively,
iconoclastic girl for whom Clarissa had a schoolgirl crush. Sally was
careless and mischievous. When she was made fun of the stuffy
Richard Dalloway, with whom Clarissa had fallen in love one evening,
the friendship cooled. Now, the Dalloways have an almost grown-up
daughter, Elizabeth, whose schoolgirl crush on Doris Kilman, an odious,
embittered, religious fanatic, worries Mrs. Dalloway.

Before she married Richard Dalloway, Clarissa had been in love with the
handsome, brilliant Peter Walsh, but he always mocked her family’s
pretensions and sided with Sally Seton against Richard Dalloway. Then
he had left for India, and Clarissa had heard he had gotten married en
route. All these memories of the past bring a warm feeling of nostalgia
to Clarissa, as she is enjoying her shopping, the fine weather, and the
thought of the party she is to give.
But, another soul wandering the streets of London is not so happy.
Septimus Warren Smith is a shell-shocked war veteran with an Italian
wife, Lucrezia. Smith is haunted by the memory of Evans, his great
friend and commanding officer in the war. Shortly before the armistice,
Evans had been killed, and Smith is shocked to realise that he really did
not feel one way or another about his closest friend’s death.

He himself idealistically, enlisting early in the war, showed valour in

action, fighting, as he believed, for the England of Shakespeare. Now,
he is obsessed with the vileness of human beings and is haunted by the
dead Evans. His wife, Lucrezia, lost in foreign London, does not know
what to do. Smith, who married her soon after the war, refuses to have
any children. Instead, he broods about life and death. The bluff, hearty
Dr. Holmes, who is treating him, has warned Lucrezia that, at all costs,
he must avoid shock and excitement. Septimus loathes the insensitive,
dull doctor and refuses to see him.

263
Meanwhile, Clarissa Dalloway has returned home with her flowers to
learn that her husband has been invited – without her – to have lunch
with Millicent Bruton, a clever, ruthless woman. Mrs. Dalloway is hurt at
not being invited (Lady Bruton’s luncheons are reputed to be so very
entertaining) but realises that Lady Bruton cannot abide the wives of her
men friends, especially if she thinks they have held their husbands back
politically.

While she is sewing up her dress, Mrs. Dalloway receives a surprise visit
from Peter Walsh, just back after five years in India. He has not
changed at all: he still makes fun of Clarissa for being so caught up with
society. He tells her that he has fallen in love with Daisy, a married
woman in India, and is in London to consult with lawyers about her
divorce. He has been divorced, his career is in shambles, and he hopes
that Hugh Whitbread will help find him a job in London to support Daisy
and her two children.

When Clarissa introduces Peter to her daughter, Elizebeth, Peter

realises what he has missed in life. But, when Clarissa reminds him not
to forget her dinner party, Peter Walsh suddenly sees her life, so filled
with social events, as empty and trivial.

At Lady Bruton’s luncheon, meanwhile, Richard Dalloway and Hugh

Whitbread help their hostess compose a letter to the Times about some
petty matter. Lady Bruton is all for political “causes”, but she is too
scatterbrained even to write a letter to a newspaper. Hugh Whitbread
composes appropriately pompous and cliché-ridden letter for her.

Meanwhile, Lucrezia is deeply worried about her husband. Because he

has refused to see the jovial Dr. Holmes, Lucrezia has engaged the
services of the wealthy, impressive Harley Street psychiatrist, Sir William
Bradshaw; but even the innocent Lucrezia can see that Bradshaw is a
selfish, unsympathetic man. Sir William suggests that, to avoid the
possibility of suicide, Septimus may have to go to a rest home in the
country – where Lucrezia cannot join him – as long as his fits of
depression persist.

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Late that afternoon, when Dr. Holmes blunders his way upstairs to see
Smith in his apartment, the haunted veteran leaps out of the window,
impaling himself on the rusty grating outside, and dies. Dr. Holmes
cannot understand why a young man with a beautiful wife and a brilliant
future should do such a rash, unnatural thing. Lucrezia is completely
crushed by her husband’s suicide.

During the same afternoon, Doris Kilman comes to take Elizabeth

shopping. Mrs. Dalloway cannot help hating the woman Richard hired
as a tutor for their daughter. Miss Kilman is a poor woman who
despises and envies the Dalloways for their wealth and easy life. A
highly intelligent but unprepossessing student of modern history, she
had lost her post in a school during the war because of her German
ancestry and sympathies.

Ugly and lonely, Miss Kilman has turned to religion for consolation. The
liberal, easygoing Mrs. Dalloway is shocked to find that Miss Kilman is
indoctrinating Elizabeth in church ritual. “Love and religion!” Mrs.
Dalloway muses. “How detestable they are!” Why cannot people leave
others alone, lead their own lives, and not impose their wills on others?
Knowing she is wrong to hate anyone, Mrs.Dalloway, nevertheless, finds
herself loathing the unfortunate Doris Kilman.

By now, the hour for the party has arrived. After some initial
awkwardness, it proves a great success. The Prime Minister’s arrival
causes quite a stir. Everyone agrees that Clarissa Dalloway is a
remarkable hostess.

Only Peter Walsh is unhappy. An overwhelming sense of age comes

over him when he meets Sally Seton, now Lady Rossetter, and the
mother of five sons. The once vivacious iconoclastic Sally becomes
selfish and class-conscious. She still despises Clarissa for marrying the
socially acceptable unromantic Richard Dalloway. Peter, who had
revealed in his return to civilised London, begins to wonder if he can
bear society again.

In the midst of the party, Sir William Bradshaw and his wife arrive. They
are late, he explains, because one of his patients, a war veteran, has

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just committed suicide. Perhaps, he suggests to Richard Dalloway,
Parliament ought to take up the matter of veterans suffering from
delayed shell shock.

Wealthy and self-assured, Sir William has no personal sympathy for the
dead Septimus Smith. But, when Clarissa hears the story, she feels a
sudden sense of identification with the haunted youth although she had
never known him. Her life too, she perceives in an instant, has been a
failure, and she completely understands any suicide. But, after most of
the guests have gone, Peter Walsh comes to her and senses the
excitement in her presence that he had felt long before, realising that he
is still in love with the aging but still beautiful Clarissa Dalloway.

9.2.2 A critique

Woolf’s work as a novelist falls roughly, as D.S. Savage, points out into
three periods. The early period is represented by her first two novels of
conventional fiction writing, i.e., The Voyage Out and Night and Day.
The next period of experiment included Jacob’s Room – the first novel in
which the reader recognises the Virginia Woolf style and this is followed
by Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse and finally the descent into an
“Increasingly despairing vacuousness and dissipation of perception” is
seen in the novels, The Waves, The Years and Between the Acts,
represents the third period.

Woolf’s novels in general are tenuous, amorphous and vague and her
prose expresses a complex psychic process in the characters. Mrs.
Dalloway represents Woolf’s first successful attempt to produce a novel
in her own distinctive narrative, style, rejecting the boundaries of
traditional European narrative form, which she believed had become too
artificial and, therefore, restricted the increasingly poetic and
impressionistic rendering of life.

The novel marks the emergence of Woolf’s mature narrative voice, as

well as the perfection of the experimental narrative technique employed
tentatively in her preceding novel, Jacob’s Room, in which she threw
light on various aspects of the characters through interior monologues.

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Encompassing one day in the life of an introspective, upper class,
Westminister woman.

Mrs. Dalloway is often compared with James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922).

Though both the novels were written in stream of consciousness
technique, critics agree that the novels differ greatly. In her strikingly
individual prose style, Woolf composed one of the most subtly powerful
and memorable English novels of the post-World War I era.

Deriving its title from the protagonist, Clarissa Dalloway, the novel is a
study of character. Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers
herself… “I will come”, said Peter, but he sat on for a moment. “What is
this terror?” “What is this ecstacy?” he thought to himself. “What is it that
fills me with extraordinary excitement?” “It is Clarissa”, he said for there
she was.

In between the ‘Mrs Dalloway’ of the first line and the Clarissa of the last
line of Mrs. Dalloway, the reader is led to an awareness of the enormous
complexity of the character in question. On a simple level, we can say
that we move from a view of Mrs. Dalloway – the married women
bearing her husband’s name and thus seen in terms of her relationship
with other people – to Clarissa, a person in her own right.

Virginia Woolf recorded in her diary during the first stages of the novel,
“In this book, I have almost too many ideas. I want to give life and
death, sanity and insanity; I want to criticise the social system and to
show it at work, at its most intense.” And, she did exactly that.

9.2.3 Themes

Woolf portrayed her protagonist as the embodiment of nearly all the

dominant themes of the novel.

Symbolically, according to critics, Clarissa Dalloway represents clarity,

purity and sensitivity to the moment. Her marriage to Richard Dalloway,
a Member of Parliament, is one not of passion but of convenience and

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respectability. Several modern critics contend that the chief conflict of
the novel concerns Clarissa Dalloway’s sexual identity.

“Woolf also strived to illustrate the vain artificiality of Clarissa's life and
her involvement in it. The detail given and thought provoked in one day
of a woman's preparation for a party, a simple social event, exposes the
flimsy lifestyle of England's upper classes at the time of the novel. Even
though Clarissa is effected by Septimus' death and is bombarded by
profound thoughts throughout the novel, she is also a woman for whom
a party is her greatest offering to society. The thread of the Prime
Minister throughout, the near fulfilling of Peter's prophecy concerning
Clarissa's role, and the characters of the doctors, Hugh Whitbread,
and Lady Bruton as compared to the tragically mishandled plight of
Septimus, throw a critical light upon the social circle examined by
Woolf.”

Through Woolf’s process of character development, in which characters

recall and reflect upon pivotal points in their pasts, we learn of an
epiphanic moment, which occurred sometime before the Dalloway’s
marriage when, Clarissa was kissed by a close female friend Sally
Seton. The moment, however, was interrupted by the appearance of
Peter Walsh, a vibrant young man, who wants to marry Clarissa.
Ultimately, Clarissa rejects both Walsh and Seton in favour of Dalloway,
who she concludes will be the least demanding and most socially
respectable marital partner. Critic Emily Jensen terms this decision as
Clarissa’s “respectable suicide” – a living death in which she sacrifices
personal integrity for social standing and security.

Woolf created the character of the mentally stricken war veteran

Septimus Warren Smith to be Clarissa Dalloway’s “double”. Like Sally
Seton, he also profoundly affects Clarissa’s understanding of herself and
her relationship to the world. Although the two never meet, they are
closely linked thematically. At the beginning of the novel, Clarissa, while
gazing into a bookstore window, reads the dirge from Shakespeare’s
Cymbeline, which begins, “Fear no more the heat o’ the sun/Nor the
furious winters’ rages.”

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She repeats the phrase throughout the day, as does Septimus, who near
the end of the novel, commits suicide after realising that his psychiatrist,
like society in general, wishes him to conform to a life incompatible with
his nature and a temporal, romantic view of life. In addition to
heightening the affinities between Septimus and Clarissa, the passage
from Shakespeare has suggested to some critics, Woolf’s acceptance of
suicide as a viable means of obtaining personal freedom by defying
constrictive society, which she continuously challenged.

The Threat of Oppression

Oppression is a constant threat for Clarissa and Septimus in Mrs.
Dalloway, and Septimus dies in order to escape what he perceives to be
an oppressive social pressure to conform. It comes in many guises,
including religion, science, or social convention. Miss Kilman and Sir
William Bradshaw are two of the major oppressors in the novel: Miss
Kilman dreams of felling Clarissa in the name of religion, and Sir William
would like to subdue all those who challenge his conception of the world.
Both wish to convert the world to their belief systems in order to gain
power and dominate others, and their rigidity oppresses all who come
into contact with them. More subtle oppressors, even those who do not
intend to, do harm by supporting the repressive English social system.
Though Clarissa herself lives under the weight of that system and often
feels oppressed by it, her acceptance of patriarchal English society
makes her, in part, responsible for Septimus’s death. Thus she too is an
oppressor of sorts. At the end of the novel, she reflects on his suicide:
“Somehow it was her disaster—her disgrace.” She accepts
responsibility, though other characters are equally or more fully to
blame, which suggests that everyone is in some way complicit in the
oppression of others.

The plot
The plot in Mrs. Dalloway is made to act out the meaning of the reveries
in the most interesting manner. As the heroine reflects on the nature of
the self and its relation to others, on the importance of contact and the
need to keep the self-inviolable, of the extremes of isolation and
domination – the other character in London at the same time – known
and not known in Mrs. Dalloway, illustrate in their behaviour and
thoughts, different aspects of what she thinks of. Hugh Whitbread who
she meets early in the morning shopping is the perfect social man,

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handsome, well bred “with his little job in court” who has almost lost his
personality in fulfilling a social function.

Mrs. Dalloway reflects “he is not a positive imbecile as Peter made out:
not a mere barber’s block”. It is quite significant to know that Peter
comes to her mind at that moment – the individual who never really
adjusts to society and who stands for the independent assertive self. He
is invited to her party that evening, where he takes his place both as part
of Mrs. Dalloway’s past and as a particular kind of sensibility recording
the present. The delicate working out of different degrees of selfhood
and social adjustment that we find in the novel can be compared to that
of Jane Austen’s own attempts.

Jane Austen’s description of such differing degrees of selfhood and of

adjustment in Pride and Prejudice have moral implications. Such a
moral pattern, depending on the belief that an ideal adjustment between
self and society, both desirable and possible, is not found in Virginia
Woolf, who sees the problem as psychological rather than as moral.

Nevertheless, as David Daichess points out, there are moral implications

of a much more personal kind in Mrs. Dalloway. Stephen Warren Smith,
whose experiences in the war has led him to a state of mind in which he
cannot respond at all to the reality of the existence of other people, is
driven mad by this meaningless isolation of the self, and his madness
exacerbates into suicide.

The doctors advise him to imitate the society around, and Spetimus sees
through the meaninglessness of this advice, when he sees Bradshaw’s
wife – a creature bullied into nothingness by the public image of her
husband. Later in the evening, when the Bradshaws attend the party at
the Dalloways’, and when Sir William Bradshaw narrates the story of the
young man’s suicide, Clarissa feels a pang of sympathy for the unknown
young man and a revulsion against Sir William.
She sees Sir William as “obscurely evil” “extremely polite to women, but
capable of some indescribable outrage – forcing your soul, that was it”.
She associates the death of the young man with themes of her own
meditations that have been traced throughout the novel. This kind of
plot weaving goes on, revealing to us the magic of recognising the real

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personality which emerges out of the waters of time and flow of
consciousness in the world of other selves.

Mrs. Dalloway watches through her window an old lady in the opposite
house retiring to go to bed and as she looks through the glass, we are
made to understand the symbol of how human beings are related to
each other – through an invisible glass. Once the old lady puts out her
light and goes to bed, the contact is lost. Mrs. Dalloway returns to the
party and Peter Walsh is seized by an extraordinary excitement by her
presence and says, “It is Clarissa, he said, For there she was.”

The novel ends establishing the identity. But, it does not establish the
only identity. Recognising her presence is only a phase in an endless
pattern made up of personality, consciousness, time, relationship,
loneliness and love. As Jeremy Hawthorn in his essay Mrs. Dalloway:
A Study in Alienation has observed, the novel is an extended
investigation of the paradoxes contained implicitly in the opening and
closing lines of the novel.

Clarissa Dalloway is seen as an individual whose identity varies

according to the situation in which she finds herself; at different times
and with different people. She appears to be a different person. And yet
‘there she was’. Along with Peter Walsh, the reader feels that in spite of
the multiple, even contradictory aspects of her personality, which are
revealed to him, Clarissa Dalloway is there, distinct, unique.

Throughout the novel, we find the words ‘self’ and ‘soul’ used to suggest
the irreducible centre of the personality, which exists independently.
The novel insists on the importance of a respect for the privacy of the
soul. Sir William Bradshaw wants to dabble his fingers in Septimus’
soul; he is introduced, ironically we feel, as one who has “understanding
of the human soul” but Clarissa feels that he is capable of “forcing your
soul”.

Miss Kilman’s desire to subdue Clarissa’s soul and its mockery is

likewise seen as an inexcusable desire to intrude into the privacy of
another person’s inner-self. Septimus kills himself rather than surrender
the privacy of his soul and Clarissa rejects Peter Walsh, for in marriage

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a little licence, a little independence there must be between people living
together day in and day out in the same house, which Richard gave her,
and she him. She, nevertheless, needs her privacy to be tempered with
human contact.

She had a sense of comedy that was really exquisite, but she needed
people, always, people, to bring it out with the inevitable result that she
frittered time away, lunching, dining, giving these incessant parties of
hers, talking nonsense, saying things she didn’t mean, blunting the edge
of her mind, losing her discrimination.

What is the novel about?

Mrs. Dalloway, unlike the “classical novels” of the nineteenth century,
presents the reader with no moral or other overview within which all
contradictions can be subsumed, or by reference to which all conflicts
can be resolved. The novel is saturated with the problems of a society,
which embodies – and in that sense causes – alienation. The words,
“To whom?” recur a number of times in the novel and are associated
with the major characters like Peter Walsh, Septimus and Clarissa. All
these characters feel that they have something to do, give or say, but to
whom they do not know.

Mrs. Dalloway is a novel, which portrays a complex sense of life. Woolf

recorded her wonder regarding life thus: “Life is a shower of ever-falling
atoms of experience – not a narrative line. It is a luminous halo, a semi-
transparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of
consciousness to the end.” Woolf, as is revealed in her novels, seems to
share an intuition with Walter Paters, the great aesthetician of the era.
To Paters “every moment some form grows more perfect in hand or
face: …some mood of passion or insight or intellectual excitement is
irresistibly real and attractive for – for that moment only”. Mrs Dalloway
seems to bear witness to this rather abstract idea.

‘What are they looking at?’ said Clarissa Dalloway to the maid who
opened the door. The hall of the house was cool as a vault. Mrs
Dalloway raised her hand to her eyes, and as the maid shut the door,
she heard the swish of Lucy’s skirts, she felt like a nun who has left the

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world. The cook was whistling in the kitchen. She heard the click of the
typewriter.

It was her life, and, bending her head over the hall table, she bowed
beneath the influence, felt blessed and purified, saying to herself, as she
took the pad with the telephone message on it, how moments like this
are buds on the tree of life, flowers of darkness they are. She thought as
if some lovely rose had blossomed for her eyes only. Not for a moment
did she believe in God; but all the more, she thought, taking up the pad,
must one repay in daily life to servants, dogs and canaries, above all to
Richard her husband, who was the foundation of it – of the gay sounds
of the green lights, of the cook Mrs. Walker’s whistling (as an Irish she
whistled all day long) – one must payback from this secret deposit of
exquisite moments, she thought, lifting the pad, while Lucy stood by her,
trying to explain how.

Like Paters, her attitude to experience is aesthetic. Transience is the

very stuff of her material. In a novel like Mrs Dalloway, one sees life as
in a state of constant creation, changing endlessly from moment to
moment, like a fountain, the moment being the individual drop of water
of the fountain.

Woolf’s characters are abnormally aware of the moment as it passes,

and this very awareness gives it a remarkable complexity, for it is
compounded not only of the character’s thought, feeling, mood at the
instant of apprehension, but also of a most delicate sensuous though
perhaps not more than half conscious apprehension of the physical
world in which the character moves; and at the same time, the moment
experienced is bound to recapitulate moments of similar experience in
the past through the links of association”.

The time span of the novel

The novelist imposes the same limitations of mathematical time. The

action takes place in a few hours of a day, years apart. The whole
action revolves round a fashionable lady Mrs. Dalloway who gives a
party, a man who has been in love with her comes back from India, a
young man suffering from war neurosis commits suicide. Mrs. Dalloway,

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Peter Walsh and Septimus “begin to search among the infinite series of
impressions which time had laid down, leaf upon leaf, fold upon fold,
softly, incessantly upon their brains.”

To Woolf, it is this ceaseless fall of the atoms upon the consciousness

that creates human identity. In the book, we live among these myriad
impressions, from the past and the immediate present, which have
patterned personality and from which the texture of experience is woven.
“Her art has a bubble like iridescence and part of its end is simply to
convey a bubble-like evanescence.”

But the world created in it is solid. London is as much ‘there’ as in the

novels of other writers, but it is not in any sense a detachable
background, but caught, rejected and refracted through the
consciousness of the characters moving through it. The individual
characters are brought into relationship with a number of others of
whose existence they may be quite ignorant; brought into relationship by
the shared experience, of watching a motor-car in which the queen may
be sitting, of gazing at an aeroplane sky-writing and even of being
vaguely aware of the chimes of Big Ben striking through the day. In Mrs
Dalloway, these together create the illusion of many lives lived
simultaneously of a specific place and a sense of community.

Two sides of the same coin

Woolf intended to present the world seen by the sane and the insane
side by side – as seen by Mrs. Dalloway and her double Septimus
Warren Smith. The coldness at the centre of Mrs. Dalloway makes
Peter wake up suddenly, thinking of her, with the phrase ‘death of the
soul’ on his lips. It was her manner that annoyed him; timid, hard,
something arrogant; unimaginative and prudish. He had said that
instinctively ticketing the moment as he used to do – the death of her
soul.

On the other hand, Septimus is mad, and he has visited the ‘sleeping
depths’. “I leant over the edge of the boat and fell down, he thought. I
went under the sea. I have been dead and yet am now alive, but let me
rest still, he begged (he was talking to himself again – it was awful,

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awful!) He had only to open his eyes; but a weight was on them; a fear.”
In them both, some of the hidden impulses at the roots of our nature are
exposed. Clarissa ‘as cool as a vault’ feels ‘like a nun who has left the
world and feels all round her the familiar veils and the response to old
devotions’; at the beginning of the novel. But the novel is about her
progress toward selfhood. It is at the same time an unlocking and
unfreezing of the chill at the depths releasing in her the seas of pity.

While Clarissa’s problem is her coldness, Septimus also thinks that after
the war “something failed him and he could not feel”. But the truth is
that, Septimus has felt too deeply, has been shaken and numbed by
shell shock and the war, specifically by the death of his friend Evans. He
has never gone beyond the first paralysing numbness to see constantly,
the reality of his emotions.

When Evans was killed, Septimus far from showing any emotion or
recognising that here was the end of a friendship, congratulated himself
upon feeling very little and very reasonably. The war had taught him. It
was sublime. He had gone through the whole show, friendship,
European War, death, had won promotion, was still under thirty and was
bound to survive, he was right there.

The initial failure remains in the foreground of his awareness as ‘real’

and his distorted view of reality gathers strength as his madness
deepens. The result is a loss of identity as a character in The Waves
comments “I came to the puddle. I could not cross it. Identity failed me.
We are nothing, I said, and fell… I returned very painfully, drawing
myself back into my body over the gray cadaverous space of the
puddle.”

So Lucrezia Warren Smith thinks, “He was not Septimus now”. The
distinction between himself and the world is blurred. Septimus’ madness
therefore stems from a lack of self-recognition, which by the time we
meet him, has become incurable. His is “the madness of the vital truth”,
in one sense and thus pertinent to Mrs. Dalloway, the “sane” member of
the pair. Septimus has recognised certain necessities evaded by
Clarissa, or perhaps never encountered by her. His idea that he cannot
feel is false; but his reaction to this supposed fact is true.

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The failure becomes an “appalling crime” “the sin for which human
nature had condemned him to death; that he did not feel”. As a result of
this intuition, Septimus is burdened with guilt and haunted by the dead
man. He has recognised the seriousness of his “failure”. And, in the
end, he executes the severe penalty for it upon himself. Peter Walsh
had thought of some undefined failure in Mrs. Dalloway as “the death of
her soul”. Septimus’ emotional paralysis causes, though indirectly, the
death of his body.

Peter and Sally, being ordinary creatures with human failings, are
ignored by society as of no consequence. Cultivated, and with their
critical faculties wide awake, Peter and Sally are able to see through
people. Peter was able to see through Clarissa’s worldliness and
pronounce that she had the making of, what he called, a “perfect
hostess”. He was also able to judge the faults and failings of Richard
Dalloway and Hugh Whitbread. Sally too, tried to “get hold of things by
the right end”. She saw through “the admirable Hugh – when Clarissa
and the rest were at his feet.”

These two symbolise that minority of intelligentsia who are aware of the
shortcomings of modern society. Sally Seton had “a sort of
abandonment, as if she would say anything, do anything”; she would
walk in “quite unexpectedly without a penny in her pocket, one night
after dinner”. She would run along the passage without a stitch of
clothing; having forgotten her sponge; unmindful of gentlemen seeing
her; she would smoke cigars, would paint, would write. Thus, she
becomes a symbol of freedom loving rebels who break the rigid
senseless conventionalities.

On the whole, Mrs Dalloway, in John Hawley Roberts’ words “asks us to

respond to the positive-negative relationship, the polarity of Clarissa
Dalloway and Septimus Warren Smith”. They are not separate and
individualised characters, but opposite phases of an idea of life itself.
Their reality consists not of themselves as persons, but of their
relationship to each other as forms. Our ‘joy’ in the novel consists in our
recognition of the rightness of this basic design, that is, “of the way in
which Clarissa and Septimus complement each other – Clarissa’s
elementary love of life matching Septimus’ repudiation of it. These two

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emotions complete each other to form a whole and thus producing a
complicated sense of life.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 9.2

Comment on the theme of Mrs. Dalloway.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

9.3 MARGARET ATWOOD: THE AUTHOR

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Margaret Atwood
Margaret Atwood is a Canadian writer best known for her prose fiction
and for her feminist perspective. Role reversal and new beginnings are
recurrent themes in her novels, all of them centred on women seeking
their relationship to the world and the individuals around them. Here, you
will learn about the life and works of Margaret Atwood and her work The
Edible Woman.

Margaret Eleanor Atwood is a Canadian poet, novelist, short story writer,

critic and author of children’s books. Internationally acclaimed, Margaret
Atwood has emerged as a major figure in Canadian letters. Using such
devices as irony, symbolism and self-conscious narrators, she explores
the relationship between humanity and nature, the dark side of human
behaviour, and power as it pertains to gender and politics. Popular with
both literary scholars and the reading public, Atwood has helped define
and identify the goals of contemporary Canadian literature and has
earned a distinguished reputation among feminist writers for her
exploration of women’s issues.

Early Life and work

Atwood was born in Ottawa and grew up in suburban Toronto. As a
child, she spent her summers at her family’s cottage in the wilderness of
northern Quebec, where her father, a forest entomologist, conducted
research. She first began to write while in high school, contributing
poetry, short stories, and cartoons to the school newspaper. As an
undergraduate, at the University of Toronto, Atwood was influenced by
critic Northrop Frye, who introduced her to the poetry of William Blake.

Impressed with Blake’s use of mythological imagery, Atwood published

her first volume of poetry, Double Persephone, in 1961. In 1962,
Atwood completed her Master’s degree at Radcliffe College of Harvard
University. She returned to Toronto in 1963, when she began
collaborating with artist Charles Pachter, who designed and illustrated
several volumes of her poetry. In 1964, Atwood moved to Vancouver,
where she taught English at the University of British Columbia for a year
and completed her first novel, The Edible Woman (1969).

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After a year of teaching Victorian and American literature at Sir George
Williams University in Montreal in 1967, Atwood began teaching creative
writing at the University of Alberta, while continuing to write and publish
poetry. Her poetry collection The Circle Game (1966) won the 1967
Governor General’s Award, Canada’s highest literary honour. Atwood
public visibility increased significantly with the publication of Power
Politics in 1971.

Requiring an escape from increasing media attention, Atwood left a

teaching position at the University of Toronto to move to a farm near
Alliston, Ontario, with her husband, Graeme Gibson. Atwood received
the Governor General’s Award again in 1986 for her novel The
Handmaid’s Tale, which was published that same year. She continues
to be a prominent voice in Canada’s cultural and political life.

Since 1961, Atwood has produced a highly acclaimed body of work that
includes fiction, poetry and literary criticism. The Circle Game
established the major themes of Atwood’s writing: inconsistencies of
self-perception, the paradoxical nature of language, the issue of
Canadian identity, and conflicts between humankind and nature. In the
same year, she published her second novel, Surfacing (1972).

Atwood also earned a widespread attention through Survival (1972), a

seminal critical analysis of Canadian literature that served as a rallying
point for the country’s cultural nationalists. In the poetry collection, The
Journals of Susanna Moodie (1970), Atwood devoted her attention to,
what she calls, the schizoid or double, nature of Canada. Based on the
autobiographies of a Canadian pioneer woman, The Journals of
Susanna Moodie examines why Canadians came to develop ambivalent
feelings towards their country.

Atwood further developed this dichotomy in Power Politics, in which she

explores the relationship between sexual roles and power structures by
focusing on personal relationships. Atwood’s novels explore the
relationship between personal behaviours and political issues as well.
These include Lady Oracle (1976), about a protagonist who fakes her
own death and thereby creates a new life for herself; The Handmaid’s
Tale, a dystopian novel concerning an oppressive future society; Cat’s

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Eye (1990), a coming-of-age novel that contains autobiographical
elements and The Robber Bride (1993), a contemporary recasting of a
folktale, which explores jealousy and sexual manipulation.

Criticism of Atwood’s work has tended to emphasise her political and

social views. Many critics identify her use of grotesque, shocking
imagery and heavy irony as hallmarks of her style. Because her poetry
and fiction often portray physical and psychological violence in
relationships between men and women, some commentators have
labelled Atwood pessimistic, and dismissed her as little more than an
ideologue, but other critics have found her visionary interpreter of
feminist thought.

The Handmaid’s Tale, for example, has been favourably compared with
George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949) and other distinguished
dystopian novels for its disturbing extension of contemporary trends and
its allegorical portrait of political extremism. The many critics who praise
Atwood’s work admire her spareness of language, emotional restraint,
and willingness to examine the harsh realities of both society and the
natural world.

Her principal works include Double Persephone (poetry, 1961), The

Circle Game (poetry, 1966), The Animals in That Country (poetry, 1968),
The Edible Woman (novel, 1969), The Journals of Susanna Moodie
(poetry, 1970), Procedures for Underground (poetry, 1970), Power
politics (poetry, 1971), Surfacing (poetry, 1972), Survival: A Thematic
Guide to Canadian Literature (criticism, 1972), You are Happy (poetry,
1974), Lady Oracle (novel, 1976), Selected Poems (poetry, 1976),
Dancing Girls and Other Stories (short stories, 1977), Two-Headed
Poems (poetry, 1978), Up in the Tree (juvenilia, 1978), Life before Man
(novel, 1979), True Stories (poetry, 1981), Bodily Harm (novel, 1982),
Second Works: Selected Critical Prose (criticism, 1982), Bluebeard’s
Egg (short stories, 1983), Murder in the Dark: Short Fictions and Prose
Poems (short stories and poetry, 1983), Interlunar (poetry, 1984), The
Handmaid’s Tale (novel, 1986), Selected Poems II: Poems Selected
and New, 1976-1986 (poetry, 1987), Cat’s Eye (novel, 1990),
Wilderness Tips (short stories, 1991), Good Bones (short stories, 1992)
and The Robber Bride (novel, 1993).

Awards and Recognition

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Atwood holds numerous honorary degrees from various institutions
including The Sorbonne, NUI Galway as well
as Oxford and Cambridge universities.

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Awards

 Governor General's Award, 1966, 1985

 Companion of the Order of Canada, 1981
 Guggenheim fellowship, 1981

 Los Angeles Times Fiction Award, 1986

 American Humanist Association Humanist of the Year, 1987

 Nebula Award, 1986 and Prometheus Award, 1987 nominations,

 both science fiction awards.

 Arthur C. Clarke Award for best Science Fiction, 1987

 Foreign Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1988

 Canadian Booksellers Association Author of the Year, 1989

 Outstanding Canadian Award – Armenian Community Centre of Toronto, 1989

 Trillium Book Award, 1991, 1993, 1995

 Government of France's Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, 1994
 Helmerich Award, 1999, by the Tulsa Library Trust.
 Booker Prize, 2000, 2019

 Kenyon Review Award for Literary Achievement, 2007

 Prince of Asturias Award for Literature, 2008

 Nelly Sachs Prize, Germany, 2010
 Dan David Prize, Israel, 2010

 Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal, Canada, 2012

 Los Angeles Times Book Prize "Innovator's Award", 2012

 Gold medal of the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, 2015

 Golden Wreath of Struga Poetry Evenings, Macedonia, 2016
 Franz Kafka Prize, Czech Republic, 2017

 Peace Prize of the German Book Trade, Germany, 2017

 Companion of Honour, 2019

 Joint winner of the Booker Prize, 2019

 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, 2020

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 LEARNING ACTIVITY 9.3
Give a brief Biography of Atwood.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

9.4 THE EDIBLE WOMAN: THE NOVEL

In Subsections 9.4.1 and 9.4.2, we will discuss the story of The Edible
Woman and give a critique of the novel.

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9.4.1 The story

The Edible Woman is a 1969 novel that helped to establish Margaret

Atwood as a prose writer of major significance. It is the story of a
young woman whose sane, structured, consumer-oriented world starts
to slip out of focus. Following her engagement, Marian feels her body
and herself are becoming separated.

Marian MacAlpin, the first-person narrator of the first and third sections
of The Edible Woman and the central character in the second section, is
an apparently normal, average young woman who develops an aversion
to food soon after she becomes engaged to Peter. At first, she finds
only that she cannot eat red meat, but her phobia extends to other kinds
of food as her wedding day approaches. Her behaviour becomes erratic
in other ways as well.

On one occasion, she runs through the streets at night, fleeing from
Peter and Leonard Slank, a friend, although she knows that such
behaviour will enrage Peter. She befriends an unemotional but
manipulative student, Duncan, trying to unsuccessfully evoke some kind
of response from him. She finds her job with a market research
company less and less bearable.

Marian’s decision to marry Peter is based on his suitability. He is a

conventional young man; destined for success, exactly the kind of
husband for which her upbringing and her friends have prepared her.
He decides to marry her because he believes that she understands him,
which is true, but what he takes for understanding is in reality Marian’s
willingness to accept him without complaint. All the male friends with
whom he played adolescent games have married, in a sense betraying
him, so he believes that he might as well marry.

Marian, in order to marry him, believes that she is willing to be

something like a servant, doing what Peter wishes, fetching for him, and
meeting his sexual needs. As time goes on, however, she feels more
and more uncomfortable with this role and that discomfort is the cause of
her inability to eat.

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Marian’s restlessness causes her to continue relationship with Duncan,
whom she first meets in a Laundromat. Duncan is a compulsive liar,
telling untruths for no reason other than his own amusement. He is also
entirely irresponsible; happily letting his two roommates look out for him.
He has reached a state of total boredom with his graduate studies but
sees no reason to try to do anything else. Faced with the prospect of a
lifetime of responsible living with Peter, his career, and the children they
will have, Marian finds herself drawn to Duncan’s total rejection of
responsibility.

In the end, Marian helps Peter give a party, at which her disaffection
comes to a climax. Decked out in a dress and a new hairdo which are
totally inappropriate for her – but which would be suitable for the wife of
a rising attorney – she becomes more and more uncomfortable. She
flees the party before she can be included in a group picture and tracks
down Duncan at the Laundromat where they first met; they spend the
night in a sleazy hotel.

The next day, Marian learns that their sexual encounter has meant no
more to him than anything else in his affectionless life. Freed by the
flight from the party and the events of the night, Marian returns to her
apartment and bakes a cake, which she arranges in the shape of a
woman. When Peter comes to remonstrate with her, she offers him the
cake. He leaves, offended, and Marian happily eats the cake, sharing it
with Duncan, who drops in casually.

9.4.2 A critique

Margaret Atwood’s concern in The Edible Woman, as in her most

famous novel Surfacing (1972) and in The Handmaid’s Tale (1986), is
the problem of the woman who is unable to accept the roles provided for
her by a male-dominated society. Marian is not consciously a rebel, nor
does she think of herself as abnormal in her hopes and expectations.
Her job, her way of living and her friends are all ordinary. She has no
conscious belief that her experiences and her college education had
prepared her for something more in life, and she does not find Peter in
any way objectionable.

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If he can be demanding, he is also reliable, potentially successful,
everything, which she thinks she ought to want. Marian is, however,
unable to take the next logical step in the life for which society has
prepared her. Her inability to eat is the result of her inability; literally, to
stomach the kind of life her family and friends expect her to live.

Atwood does not provide alternative possibilities. At the end of the

novel, there is no suggestion of what Marian will do next or what kind of
life she may begin to lead. The important question for Atwood is always
whether her protagonists can assert their individuality and begin the
process of discovering who they are. The Edible Woman is more rooted
in the processes of everyday living and less allegorical than is Surfacing,
but the central concern is the same: Will the protagonist allow her job,
her family, and her friends to dictate what she will be?

Atwood is pessimistic about social change. Nothing in her novels

suggests that society is recognising the need for women for self-
realisation, although her novels are clear demands for such change. At
the same time, her protagonist does come to an intuitive understanding
of herself and of her own needs. Marian MacAlpin survives her trials,
and the novel concludes with her assertion of her own personality.

Atwood is among the most powerful and successful of the women

writers who have presented the central concerns of feminism. The
Edible Woman, her first novel, is very much a product of the late 1960s
in the way it poses the central problem of its protagonist. Neither
Marian’s life nor the lives of those around her give any hint that careers
or life-styles other than the most conventional are open to women. In
this regard, the protagonist is even more limited than is the heroine of
Surfacing. In this novel, there is no hint that women might pursue
interesting careers, and the character of Ainsley seems to suggest that
even those who aim for independence find that they must quickly
conform.

Atwood shows little sympathy for the men in her female characters’ lives.
Marian’s place of employment symbolises men’s advantages and
women’s limitations in the world of work. The men in the company

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occupy executive positions and work on the floors above; the women, on
the lower floors, can have no hope of advancement and can only hope
to be rescued from their meaningless jobs by marriage. Among Marian’s
friends, Joe is cooperative and amiable, but sees nothing wrong with
what has happened to Clara, who was once one of his students. Len,
once he recognises that Ainsley has seduced him coldly, reacts with
great resentment, insists that he will never marry her (she does not want
him to), and is so distraught by her behaviour that he becomes a
recluse, living in Joe and Clara’s home. Duncan is totally self-indulgent.
Peter is, under the outward signs of success, a void.

One of the problems in The Edible Woman is that none of the characters
is much more than a type. Ainsley is somewhat amusing, and her cold-
bloodedness in identifying a potential father for her child makes her
unusual, but in other ways she is a caricature of the superficial female.
The minor characters are typified by Marian’s landlady, a stereotype in
her insistence on genteel behaviour and her overprotection of a
repulsive teenage daughter, and by the three virgins in Marian’s office,
with their single-minded dedication to finding a suitable husband. Even
the more important characters seem to have little depth. Peter
represents the unthinking acceptance of male dominance, Len the
libertine who lacks the courage of his convictions and so on.

Because Marian narrates much of the book and because the remainder
is told from her point of view, she is a more fully realised character.
Nevertheless, although it is made clear that she has had a university
education, there is no suggestion that it has affected her in any way.
Nor is there much in her behaviour, apart from her anorexia, to engage
the reader’s interest. She is made interesting because she is at the
centre of attention, not because of any inherent qualities.

It is clearly central to Atwood’s intention to make her protagonist as

ordinary as possible, to avoid the implication that only extraordinary
women are victimised by modern society. It was also evidently part of
her intention to sacrifice the conventional means of developing reader
interest (unique characters, interesting in setting, suspenseful plot) to
her social message. To a very considerable extent, Atwood has
overcome the hazards, which she created.

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Margaret Atwood surrounds Marian MacAlpin with characters, who seem
to offer alternative ways of dealing with life. Her roommate, Ainsley,
begins as a radical feminist. She wants a child but does not want
marriage, so she coldly chooses Len to be its father. After becoming
pregnant, however, she reads a book that warns that children brought up
without a father figure are likely to become homosexual. Ainsley, who
does not want to live with Len, quickly finds another man. Ironically, it is
one of the roommates who have cared for Duncan.

More ironically, Ainsley at the end denounces Marian for betraying her
womanhood. Marian’s friends Joe and Clara live in happy fecundity,
producing child after child. Joe earns a living and cares for the house
and children, while Clara functions only to bear offspring. The ‘three
virgins’, who are Marian’s office friends, live in the unlikely hope that an
eligible young man will marry them. So desperate are they that
immediately after Marian’s flight from the party, one of them, Lucy,
moves in on Peter.

Peter offers Marian a thoroughly conventional, affluent, and predictable

life as a housewife. He is too conventional in his life-style and in his
expectations to provide any kind of interest or excitement. Marian
herself is not really aware of why she reacts as she does to the prospect
of marriage, but her reactions show that she is rebelling against what
she subconsciously recognises will be the destruction of her personality.

Duncan, who professes to be bored by all of life, shows her what total
non-involvement can mean and her reaction to him indicates that her life
force is too strong. She cannot remove herself from life. Her gesture of
baking and eating the cake at the end is a statement of Marian’s
newfound ability to go on with her life as an independent individual.

Victimisation and survival are twin themes explored by Atwood in all her
works. As a Canadian woman writer, Atwood deals with issues of
victimisation and survival as conditions of both the Canadian national
experience and female experience. Atwood sees the similarity between
the nation and women and observed “I have always seen Canadian
nationalism and the concern for women’s rights as part of a larger, non
exclusive picture”.

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She felt that power politics was common for both. Power structures,
which have been built on female psyche and the national consciousness
needed to be broken and writers like Atwood made it their mission to do
it. The politics of gender and nationalism is the theme of her novels and
the writings explore the possibilities of breaking the patriarchal
structures.
Atwood analyses four victim positions in her novel The Edible Woman –
at the hands of patriarchy, capitalism and consumerism. The
protagonist Marian McAlpine, her friends, colleagues and acquaintances
illustrate various attitudes towards their status as women.

The official virgins, Lucy, Emma and Millie are the unaware victims of a
patriarchal society. They accept without questioning society’s definition
of a woman and just will not mind stereotyped roles for themselves.
They are husband-seekers and their ambitions in life is all that. Artificial
blondes, their aim lies in being charming to men. But unfortunately for
them, despite their visits to the likely places for companions, “those men,
the right kind, weren’t biting. Or were snapping at a different kind of bait”.
When Marion announces her betrothal to Peter, Lucy asks simply “How
on earth did you ever catch him”. They are eager to have men to “walk
miraculously through the door, drop to one knee and propose” and
anxiously surround men who are “single and available”. They try to
attract the men by fluttering their eyelids and paying them open
compliments like, “you are even handsomer than you sound on phone”.
When Mary disappears at the party one of them latch on to Peter, so
much so Peter becomes thoroughly impressed by her concern and says
“Damn nice of her to take the trouble, its’ nice to know there are some
considerate women left around”.

The landlady of Marion’s apartment drifts through life accepting the

traditional expectation of society of a woman. She stands for bourgeois
morality and disapproves and repels rebels like Ainsley. Clara, Marian’s
classmate and a natural blonde, is “everyone’s ideal of translucent
perfume advertisement of femininity”. Swept into matrimony and
motherhood, she “greeted her first pregnancy with astonishment” the
“second with dismay” and third with a “grim and weird fatalism”.

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All the characters quite effectively, through their diction, bring out the
fact that they accept their victim position as something inevitable and
destined. Some respond passively and some are angry.

Sara looks at it as inevitability. Nevertheless, she is angry at her children

being ‘leeches’, ‘barnacles’ and ‘all covered with suckers like Octopus’.
Multiple-motherhood has sapped her of all energy and Ainsley is angry
at her passivity. “She just lies there and that man does all the work! She
lets herself be treated like a thing”. Ainsley wants Clara to finish her
degree, and the protection attitude of Clara’s husband Joe irritates her.
She sees in that attitude, prevention of women from progressing. Joe is
of the opinion that an educated woman would unnecessarily complicate
her thinking and life. May be, women shouldn’t be allowed to the
university at all; then they wouldn’t always be feeling later on that they’ve
missed out on the life of the mind .

The only strategy of survival for women according to men like Joe is
being ignorant. Clara is pushed to achieve it and she settles down
beautifully when she takes her membership with the ‘Burial Society’ – a
symbolic gesture of being buried alive, walled away from her
individuality, brick by brick. Ainsley repudiates the role assigned to
women by society and tradition. She rejects marriage, as it would
exploit her. But she would nevertheless want children and motherhood
to fulfil her ‘deepest femininity’. She is firm that husbands ruined
families and therefore would dispense with one. She wants a man with
decent heredity, who would father her child and would leave her without
making much ado about marriage. She reverses the traditional role of a
victim – victimiser in hunting Len Slank, down for fulfilling her ambition.

She makes Len believe that he is the victor and when Len comes to
know the truth, it is a shock to him. To give her child the psychological
support needed from a father figure, she latches on to Fischer Symthe
and treats him as a spare part. Marion herself moves about in the novel
in three victim positions. She accepts her victim role initially. She
dresses to hunt men and finds nothing wrong in it, and panics at the
thought of becoming a spinster pensioner. She is subconsciously
looking forward to fulfilling the role of a wife, and the ultimate destiny of
womanhood. She marries Peter, adjusts to his moods and expectations
but nevertheless with restlessness.

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When Peter would question her on their relationship, though she would
say “marvelous”, she would think to herself “one of these days I should
say ‘rotten’ just to see what he should do”. She is, however, emotionally
dependent on Peter and is emotionally hurt when he ignores her. She
would be just the mirror image of his idea “small and oval mirrored in his
eyes”.

When Peter becomes her proprietor and owner, she finds it difficult to
accept it. Her subordinate role in marriage, despite her granting Peter
the choice of making big decisions, irritates her and bogs her down. She
is submissive because she believes that is the right thing to do. But she
rebels because her inner consciousness tells her to be an equal. Her
becoming her master’s voice goes against her core.

Marian’s loss of individuality is reflected in the narrative structure of the

novel. It is Peter who would ‘make up their minds’ as though they had
one mind between them and that is his mind. Duncan identifies the
restlessness in her “you’re probably representative of modern youth,
rebelling against the system”.

Peter, however, continues to dismantle her and put it back according to

his own image of a woman. She feels herself disintegrating and
fragmenting all at once she was afraid that she was dissolving, coming
apart layer by layer like a piece of cardboard in a gutter puddle feels like
a vegetable when she is dressed as per his instructions for a party and
feels quite scared to even blink when she wears a face to his liking as
though “this applied face would crack and flake with the strain”.

Her subconscious rejection of her role is brought to the conscious level

by two events: Duncan’s question, “who the hell are you supposed to
be?” makes her realise her sham appearance. The other question is
Peter’s approval of her sham appearance. Contrasting the two in her
mind, she runs away from Peter’s house (her house) and his party and
thus rejects with finality her victim role.

Having crossed thus the unaware-aware threshold she enters the world
of the aware and Duncan helps her to achieve it, who insists on her
making decisions on her own. Thus left alone, for the first time, Marian

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takes shape through her decisions. She bakes a cake in the shape of a
woman reminding herself of her earlier position as a victim – the edible
woman for a man’s consumption – the only consumer in society. The
creation makes her happy, the created work makes her thoughtful and
her consumption of it makes her aware that even she, even women can
become consumers in the society by breaking traditional formulas. The
energy of a woman must be spent in order to make herself better and
not the man.

Woman will get only that, if they are food for men, but would get much
more if they would only serve themselves first. Her answer to Peter’s
demand for an explanation for her conduct is simple yet straight: “You’ve
been trying to destroy me, haven’t you? You’ve been trying to assimilate
me. But I’ve made you a substitute, something you’ll like much better.
This is what you really wanted all along, isn’t it?” She then offers him the
cake. She breaks clean from the gender-stereotyped position. “Now that
I was thinking of myself in the first person singular again, I found my own
situation much more interesting than his.”

Critics have often found this ending intriguing and ambiguous. But an
insightful reading of the last lines and the reversal of the narrative to the
first person singular will help us understand that there is no puzzle and
that Marian would take firm steps towards setting herself up as an
individual and live life on equal terms with a man.

The Edible Woman shows matrimony and motherhood as limiting and

patriarchal expectation of women exploitative. Atwood has succeeded in
deconstructing the patriarchal framework for women. Marian who has
the pleasure of being “the only one who knew where I really was”
recognises in her life “the invisible hand that is wiping away my
signature”, a ghostly body “smiling, fluttering in the white empty space”.

Her identity struggles and when she bakes the edible woman - a man’s
woman only to be consumed, which gives her the rational that a
woman’s woman needs to be created. In the novel, Atwood shows how
deep is the cultural injury done to women. She dramatises insistently
the self-crisis of Marian McAlpin. Atwood’s Marian suffers from a
deficient sense of self. Fearing that her ‘core’ identity is threatened by

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the female roles she is expected to assume – those of wife and mother –
she experiences recurrent and increasingly frightening episodes of
disintegration anxiety.

Central to this drama is a fierce desire for escape and rescue. Though
no ultimate apparent rescue is provided, the end is obviously a turn in
Marian’s life. The novel shows how female passivity and submersion in
the traditional wife and mother roles can pose a serious threat to the
very survival of the self. One of the premises of Atwood’s narrative is
that women are defined by their culture as passive objects for male
consumerism.

The fact that Peter’s grisly hunting story about killing a rabbit prefaces
his pursuit of and proposal to Marian underlines the texts’ view of the
sexual hunt as a form of predation. When Marian is attempting to
escape the inevitable, flees only to be pursued and caught by Peter, she
identifies with the helpless rabbit in the story. Peter is at once a “rescuer
from chaos” and a potential destroyer who endangers Marian’s fragile
self.

The narrative insistently thematises Marian’s anxiety, i.e., her ‘bridal

nerves’ as symptomatic of her repudiation of femininity. As Marian finds
herself being dominated by Peter and fears immersion in the suffocating,
amorphous world of femininity, her disintegration anxiety vividly
surfaces. In a dream that occurs early in the text, in the Alice in
Wonderland passage, Marian imagines that her body is dissolving: I had
looked down and seen my feet beginning to dissolve, like melting jelly,
and had put on a pair of rubber boots just in time only to find that the
ends of my fingers were turning transparent.

When she wakes up in the morning after she has accepted Peter’s
proposal, Marian feels that her ‘mind’ is ‘as empty as though someone
had scooped out the inside’ of her skull She fears losing her shape,
spreading out, not able to contain herself. It is interesting to note that
when proximity to Marian becomes potentially unsettling, Atwood shifts
from first-person to third-person narration. It is true that Atwood does
this both to make a political statement – that Marian is being objectified
by her culture – and to dramatize Marian’s protective dissociation from
her painful feelings.

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Readers of traditional novels begin with the assumption that a pattern of
significance will emerge. Readers look for relevance. Atwood thwarts
the traditional readers’ desire for a definitive closure. She does openly
address the critic-reader’s need for textual pattern and design. The
patterns emerge as one sexual role after another is presented in the
novel. The Alice in Wonderland passage presents the key to the entire
novel. It expresses the sexual identity – crisis that Marian faces. The
novel is a structured, controlled narrative and is a convincing one of a
personal growth.

The Edible Woman tends to be divided on the question of whether

Marian, the novel’s heroine achieves ‘liberation’ from the economic and
power system of the early 1960s that scripts her subordination. The
criticism of the novel generally turns on the meaning of the ‘edible
woman’ (a cake shaped as a woman). Taking the cake as a
consummate image for the novel, critics tend to read it as either a
symbol of Marian’s liberation from or as her re-entry into the field of
consumer capitalism.

The cake is, of course, a deliberate symbol of the artificial womanhood,

which her world has tried to impose on her and with the ‘crazy feast’ at
the novel’s conclusion “Marian breaks out of the expected special
pattern”. By baking, decorating serving and consuming the cake, the
woman image she has been conditioned to project, Marian announces to
herself and to others, that she is not food. The cake lady, critics agree,
is a powerful symbol, a gesture of resistance to a system that would
devour her. Marian evolves from pray to predator.

The Edible Woman, which spans a few months in Marian’s life, is told in
three parts. Part I, written in the first person point of view, shows Marian
engaged to Peter and experiencing an escalating paranoia, as she is
alienated from her work-situation, colleagues and friends. In part II, the
longest section in the novel, the narrative abruptly shifts into the third-
person point of view and Marian gradually becomes anorexic. It is of a
peculiar nature and she not only loses her ability to eat but also haunted
by the idea that she is being consumed.

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At the end of part III, Marian bakes and serves Peter a cake ‘edible
woman’ and rejects him as marriage partner. The third part witnesses
the emergence of Marian from the third-person anorectic space: she
regains her ability to eat and speak for herself.

The novel begins with paranoia that leads to decomposition. Part II,
which is only five pages long, sets the decomposition at pace. Marian’s
description of her company Seymour Surveys is revealing. “The
company is layered like an ice cream sandwich with three floors, the
upper crust, the lower crust and our department the gooey layer in the
middle. On the floor above are the executives and the psychologists –
referred to as the men upstairs, since they are all men … Below us are
the machines – mimeo machines. LBM machines for counting and
sorting and tabulating the information… Our department is the link
between the two: we are supposed to take care of the human element.”
The interviewers themselves reflect the social reality of a certain class of
female workers in the early 1960s especially the reality of the
“Secretarial Proletariat”. Becoming a woman in such conditions meant
going beyond identity and subjectivity. In The Edible Woman, Marian
McAlpin’s breakdowns can be seen as breakthroughs.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 9.4

Comment on the theme of The Edible Woman
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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SUMMARY

In this Unit, we first provided you with a brief biography of Virginia Woolf
and discussed her as an essayist, a novelist and a literary critic. We then
analysed one of her novels, Mrs. Dalloway, in all its dimensions
including the themes treated in the novel. We subsequently introduced
Margaret Atwood and her contribution to the Canadian literature. We
closed the Unit by discussing one of her novels, The Edible Woman,
highlighting its central theme of patriarchy.

REFERENCE

https://www.ijellh.com/OJS/index.php/OJS/article/download/3628/3296/4
378
https://www.myenglishpages.com/site_php_files/reading-virginia-
woolf.php

https://www.literaryladiesguide.com/author-biography/virginia-
woolf/#:~:text=Woolf%20left%20much%20insight%20into,best%2Dknow
n%20works%20of%20nonfiction.

https://neoenglish.wordpress.com/2010/12/11/the-chief-characteristics-
of-virginia-woolf%E2%80%99s-art-as-a-novelist/
http://www.bibliotequeslh.cat/utils/obreFitxer.ashx?Fw9EVw48XS5Z5Wg
khFrZMvaxejwbeGhkbA6hGm18pAi9P6MqbvRb6AvCAZXBEZvi

https://www.biography.com/writer/virginia-woolf
https://www.gradesaver.com/mrs-dalloway/study-guide/themes

https://www.sparknotes.com/lit/dalloway/themes/
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Margaret-Atwood

VIDEO LINK

https://www.britannica.com/video/186464/discussion-Virginia-Woolf-
writing

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UNIT -10 TONI MORRISON AND KAMALA MARKANDAYA

STRUCTURE

Overview
Learning Objectives

10.1 Toni Morrison: A Biography

10.2 The Bluest Eye: The Novel
10.2.1 The story
10.2.2 A critique
10.3 Kamala Markandaya: The Author
10.3.1 Nectar in the Sieve: The Novel

10.3.2 The story

10.3.3 An analysis

10.3.4 A character sketch

Summary

OVERVIEW

This Unit begins with a biography of Toni Morrison followed by a

discussion of her highly acclaimed novel, The Bluest Eye, the story of a
Black girl yearning for blue eyes, a representation of the class conscious
society. The Unit then discusses Kamala Markandaya’s Nectar in the
Sieve. A novel set in the rural Indian environs, it exposes the abject
poverty and ordeals of life rural India faces.

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LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After completing the Unit, you should be able to:

 give a short biography of Toni Morrison;

 analyse the social backdrop to The Bluest Eye
 discuss Nectar in the Sieve as a representation of rual India.

10.1 TONI MORRISON: A BIOGRAPHY

Toni Morrison is the first African-American woman to win the Nobel Prize
in Literature and best known for her nuanced discussion of race in
America. Among her best-known novels are 'The Bluest Eye,' 'Song of
Solomon,' 'Beloved' and 'A Mercy.' In this section, we will learn about
Toni Morrison and her work The Bluest Eye.

Toni Morrison was a Nobel Prize- and Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist,

editor and professor. Her novels are known for their epic themes,
exquisite language and richly detailed African American characters who
are central to their narratives. Among her best-known novels are The
Bluest Eye, Sula, Song of Solomon, Beloved, Jazz, Love and A Mercy.
Morrison earned a plethora of book-world accolades and honorary
degrees, also receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.

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Early Life

Born in 1931, Born Chloe Anthony Wofford on February 18, 1931, in

Lorain, Ohio, Toni Morrison was the second oldest of four children. Her
father, George Wofford, worked primarily as a welder but held several
jobs at once to support the family. Her mother, Ramah, was a domestic
worker. Morrison later credited her parents with instilling in her a love of
reading, music and folklore along with clarity and perspective.

Living in an integrated neighborhood, Morrison did not become fully

aware of racial divisions until she was in her teens. "When I was in first
grade, nobody thought I was inferior. I was the only Black in the class
and the only child who could read," she later told a reporter from The
New York Times. Dedicated to her studies, Morrison took Latin in school
and read many great works of European literature. She graduated from
Lorain High School with honors in 1949.

Her Contribution

Morrison is an American novelist, editor, critic, essayist and playwright.

Considered one of the foremost in contemporary American fiction,
Morrison has won international acclaim for works in which she examines
the role of race in American society. Using unconventional narrative
structures, poetic language, myth, and folklore, Morrison addresses such
issues as black victimisation, the emotional and social effects of racial
and sexual oppression, and the difficulties African- Americans face in
trying to achieve a sense of identity in a society dominated by white
cultural values.

In her explorations of such complex social, political, and philosophical

concerns, Morrison acknowledges that reality is ambiguous and that
truth is frequently impossible to apprehend. Catherine Rainwater, in
addressing the principal themes in Morrison’s works, has stated that,
“[Morrison’s] novels are strategic attacks on ‘innocent’ readers, who
assume that art (or any other form of human communication) carries
reliable messages to or from the obscure territory of the inner self.” In
awarding Morrison the Nobel Prize for Literature, the Swedish Academy
praised her for giving “life to an essential aspect of American reality” in
novels “characterized by visionary force and poetic import.”

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Morrison was born and raised in Lorain, Ohio. As a child, she became
well acquainted with the myths and folklores, which figure prominently in
her works. Her parents frequently told her ghost stories, and her
grandmother kept a journal in which she documented her dreams,
believing they could foretell the future. Morrison read avidly as an
adolescent, with her interests ranging from classic Russian novels to the
works of Jane Austen to Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary (1857).
Morrison later commented thus:

“These books were not written for a little black girl in Lorain, Ohio, but
they were so magnificently done that I got them anyway – they spoke
directly to me out of their own specificity. I wasn’t thinking of writing
them . . . but when I wrote my first novel [The Bluest Eye] years later, I
wanted to capture that same specificity about the nature and feeling of
the culture I grew up in.”

After graduating from Howard University with a bachelor’s degree in

1953, Morrison earned a master’s degree in English from Cornell
University in 1955. She began working as an editor for a textbook
subsidiary of Random House in Syracuse, New York, in 1966 and a few
years later obtained an editorial position at Random House in New York
City.

She was instrumental in publishing the autobiographies of such figures

as Muhammad Ali and Angela Davis as well as the fictions of such
African-American authors as Toni Cade Bambara, Henry Dumas, and
Gayl Jones. Morrison left Random House in 1987 to focus on teaching
and writing. She has taught at such institutions as Yale University, Bard
College, and Princeton University.

Awards and Recognition

Studied humanities at Howard and Cornell Universities, followed by an

academic career at Texas Southern University, Howard University, Yale,
and since 1989, a chair at Princeton University. She has also worked as
an editor for Random House, a critic, and given numerous public
lectures, specializing in African-American literature. She made her debut
as a novelist in 1970, soon gaining the attention of both critics and a
wider audience for her epic power, unerring ear for dialogue, and her

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poetically-charged and richly-expressive depictions of Black America. A
member since 1981 of the American Academy of Arts and Letters, she
has been awarded a number of literary distinctions.

Morrison won the National Book Award in 1974, National Book Critics
Circle Award 1977, Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988 and finally the Nobel
Prize in 1993. Her principal works include The Bluest Eye (1970), Sula
(1973), The Black Book (non-fiction, 1974), Song of Solomon (1977),
Tar Baby (1981), Dreaming Emmet (drama, 1986), Beloved (1987), Jazz
(1992), Playing in the Dark (essay, 1992), Paradise (1993) and Love
(2004).

LEARNING ACTIVITY 10.1

Give a short biography of Toni Morrison.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

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10.2 THE BLUEST EYE: THE NOVEL

In Subsections 10.2.1 and 10.2.2, we will respectively take up for

discussion the story and plot of The Bluest Eye.

10.2.1 The story

The Bluest Eye provides an extended depiction of the ways in which

internalized white beauty standards deform the lives of black girls and
women. She connects beauty with being loved and believes that if she
possesses blue eyes, the cruelty in her life will be replaced by affection
and respect.

The Bluest Eye focuses on Pecola Breedlove, an eleven-year-old black

girl, who believes she is ugly and longs for blue eyes. Her fixation turns
to insanity, however, after she is raped by her father and subsequently
gives birth to a premature baby who later dies. Pecola eventually
withdraws into a world of fantasy, believing that no one has eyes as blue
as hers. In this work, Morrison addresses the conflicts between black
identity and while cultural values, the social repercussions of
marginalising the impoverished members of the American Society and
the psychological and emotional effects of victimisation.

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At the end of the novel, the author observes that Pecola was all the
waste and beauty of the world. “All of our waste which we dumped on
her and which she absorbed. And all of our beauty, which was her first
and which she gave to us. All of us – all know her – felt so wholesome
after we cleaned ourselves on her.”

The reaction to The Bluest Eye was positive, and critics acclaimed
Morrison for her exploration of complex themes, her accessible
narrative, and her use of poetic language.

10.2.2 A critique

The events in The Bluest Eye are seen from the point of view of Claudia
MacTeer. As the novel begins, Claudia is looking back at the year when
she was nine and when her friend Pecola Breedlove, then eleven,
became pregnant, having been raped by her own father, Cholly
Breedlove. In the summer of 1941, Claudia and her sister, Frieda,
planted marigold seeds in the childish belief that if the marigolds
survived, so would Pecola’s baby. Even as the novel opens, however,
the reader knows that the seeds never germinated and that the baby
died. Years later, it is still impossible for Claudia to explain why the
events of that year happened, so the novel becomes instead her
account of how they happened.

The Bluest Eye has two structuring devices. One is the four seasons,
which provide the four major divisions of the book. Claudia begins her
account with the fall of 1940, when Pecola is placed temporarily in the
MacTeer home because her father has tried to burn down the storefront
apartment that serves as the Breedlove’s home. In the spring, Pecola is
raped by her father, and by summer, her increasingly obvious pregnancy
is the subject of gossip all over town. Pecola herself has retreated into
madness, kept company in the fantasy world of her own mind by an
imaginary friend.

Also giving structure to the novel is a passage that imitates the Dick-
and-Jane readers, once so popular in elementary schools. The picture
that the passage presents of the perfect white family – Mother and
Father, Dick and Jane, the dog and the cat, all living happily in their

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pretty green and white house – contrasts sharply with the world of the
Breedloves and the MacTeers, the world of poor blacks.

To show the contrast, Morrison repeats the passage three times: first, as
it would normally appear on the printed page; then, with all punctuation
removed; and finally, with even the spaces between words removed.
The Dick-and-Jane story degenerates on the page into a jumble of
letters; lines from the storybook-perfect account of its characters’ lives
are interspersed throughout the Breedloves’ story to emphasize the
contrasting ugliness and disorder of theirs. A few run-together
sentences describe Dick and Jane’s pretty house.

The Breedloves’ home is a converted store with beaverboard panels

providing the only inner walls. The mother from the world of Dick and
Jane is laughing and playful. Pecola’s mother, Pauline Breedlove, has
seen all of her dreams fade into nothingness. She finds escape from the
ugliness of the storefront and her life there as a maid in a white family’s
home as a clean and orderly as the world in which Dick and Jane live.
Her own family is an intrusion into that orderly world, and she returns
from that world each day to fight with her husband and to beat her
children into respectability.

The father, too, unlike the smiling father of Dick and Jane, has seen his
dreams shattered and has suffered the humiliation associated with
growing up black in a white-dominated world. He has responded to the
ill treatment he has received with violence. Ironically, even the love that
he wants to express to his daughter takes a violent form when he returns
home drunk one afternoon and rapes her.

Early in the novel, Pecola lies in bed listening to her parents going
through the mechanical but painful ritual of their fights. She longs to
make herself disappear, and in her mind she does make her eyes go
away. Eyes become the centre of Pecola’s life and of her constant
search for love. She believes that if only she had beautiful blue eyes,
the world would look prettier – that even her parents would be hesitant to
fight in front of such pretty blue eyes.

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After the rape and the resulting pregnancy and suspension from school,
Pecola goes to Lorain’s “Spiritual and Psychic Reader”, Soaphead
Church, to ask him to give her blue eyes. Fraud that he is, he in a sense
grants her wish. Soaphead knows that from that day on, Pecola will
have blue eyes, but only in her own mind. Before she leaves the house,
Soaphead uses Pecola to rid himself of a nuisance: a mangy old dog
that spends its days on his doorstep.

He gives Pecola poisoned meat to feed the dog, telling her that the dog’s
response will be the sign to her whether she will get her wish. Pecola
watches in horror as the dog stumbles around the yard and dies. This
episode, combined with the earlier rape as well as a second assault on
her by her father, drives Pecola over the edge into insanity. In her
madness, Pecola does have blue eyes, although no one sees them
except for her and the imaginary friend that she invents to reassure her
constantly that her eyes are indeed the bluest in the world.

The Bluest Eye (1970) is a female “Bildungsroman”, a novel of growing

up young and black and female in America. The story centres round the
lives of two black families, the McTeers and Breedloves, migrants from
the south, living in Lorain, Ohio. But its emphasis is on the children,
Claudia and Frieda McTeer and Pecola Breedlove – their happy and
painful experiences in growing up, their formal and informal education.
In The Bluest Eye, the dominant theme is, in fact, education by the
school and society.

The novel opens with three versions of the ‘Dick and Jane’ reader, so
prevalent in the public schools during the 1940s, which also is the time
in which the novel is set. The ironic duality of the home and school
experiences is brought out through the ingenious structure of the novel.
The Dick-Jane world is an ideal middle-class, secure, suburban white
atmosphere, where the mother is a housewife and the father easy going.

The novel opens with the description of this typical American family.
“Here is the house. It is green and white. It has a red door. It is very
pretty. Here is the family. Mother, Father, Dick and Jane live in the
green-white house. They are very happy. See Jane. She has a red

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dress. She wants to play. Who will play with Jane? See the cat. It goes
meow-meow. Come and play. Come play with Jane.”

“The kitten will not play. See Mother. Mother is very nice. Mother, will
you play with Jane? Mother laughs. Laugh, mother, laugh. See Father.
He is big and strong. Father, will you play with Jane? Father is smiling.
Smile, Father, smile. Father, smile. See the Dog. Run, dog,run. Look,
look. Here comes a friend. The friend will play with Jane. They will play a
good game. Play, Jane, play.”

We find this description reappear as chapter headings for the story of

black lives, all removed in various degrees from the textbook “reality”.
The first version is rendered in Standard English, correct and white. The
second version, while repeating the message exactly, assumes a
different visual appearance on the page without proper capitals or
punctuation. The third, the wording of which is likewise unaltered, is
completely run together, one long collection of consonants and vowels
signifying nothing. The jumble of the real world of the blacks is portrayed
in the third version.

The three versions are symbolic of the lifestyles that the author explores
in the novel either directly or implicitly. The first is clearly a white family,
which impinges upon the lives of the blacks and at the same time
excludes them. The second is that of McTeer family, run by poor but
loving parents, who care for their children’s welfare despite their poverty.
The Breedloves lives like the third, is the distorted version of Dick and
Jane, and Pecola lives in a misshapen world, which finally destroys her.
The three manifest individually the social concept of the family.

The three paragraphs are identical except for the fact that circumstances
have changed the premise in the second and the third. The mother-
father-Dick-Jane formula is transmuted to the Mrs. Breedlove-Cholly-
Sammy-Pecola situation. The transmutation is Morrison’s indirect
criticism of the whites excluding the black family situations.

The white primer no way relates to the black child. The blacks are
attacked emotionally from childhood, living in two impossible worlds: the
fairy tale world of lies when in contact with the white world and the
equally incredible, grim world of black life. The simulated “here is the

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house” with its variants serves several purposes. It serves as a
synopsis of the story that is to follow and as a comment on a society,
which educates without including the other cultures in it.

The epitome of the good, the true and the beautiful, of course is Shirley
Temple. The contrast between Shirley Temple (a film star) and Pecola
is used like the contrasting versions of the ‘Dick-Jane’. Pecolas’ actual
experience cannot be found in Dick and Jane. The society has denied
her existence in the school primer. In yearning to be Shirley Temple,
she denies her own existence. A little black girl yearns for the blue eyes
of a little white girl and the horror at the heart of her yearning is
exceeded only by the evil of fulfilment

Very early in the novel, Pecolas’ terribly pathetic desire to be Shirley

Temple is demonstrated by her fascination with Frieda’s blue-and-white
Shirley Temple mug. Shirley Temple becomes a particularly destructive
ego, ideal for Pecola who drinks large quantities of milk just to handle
the mug with Shirley Temple’s face on it. She would gaze fondly into the
blue eyes on Shirley Temple’s dimpled face.

The child is prepared to go to any lengths to acquire the film stars’ blue
eyes, which she innocently equates with the happiness, beauty and love
that are missing in her own life. Through the Shirley Temple mug the
author demonstrates how racial tropes have shaped cultural products
that might appear to have nothing to do with race:

Pecola does not have joy and love to balance the pain and ugliness of
her normal everyday experiences. Growing gradually into puberty is a
luxury denied to her. So she retreats into madness, a madness that
includes the blue eyes she has prayed for, bestowed upon her by a
“magic man”, Soaphead Church, a strange outcast of a man suffering
from his own delusions. Through madness, Pecola believes that blue
eyes have finally been granted to her, tries to walk flapping her arms like
wings, convinced that she can fly. Secure in her madness, she has no
idea that she has become an outsider to the town.

In contrast to Pecola, Maureen Peal is beautiful, light-skinned, long-

haired, rich, spoilt and widely adored. The girl induces feelings of

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inferiority, hatred, envy and incomprehension in other black children,
who are at a loss to understand the secret of her popularity: “Dolls we
could destroy, but we could not destroy the honey voices of parents and
aunts, the obedience in the eyes of our peers, the slippery light in the
eyes of our teachers when they encountered, the Maureen Peals of the
world? What was the secret? What did we lack?”

Embodying the values of the dominant culture as she does, Maureen

might simply function as a hate-object, but, the young narrator realises
that it is not Maureen who is the problem. And all the time we knew that
Maureen Peal was not the enemy and not worthy of such intense hatred.
The thing to fear was the thing that made her beautiful and not us.

The cult of Shirley Temple, to which the children in The Bluest Eye
succumb, also originates in the movies: “It was a small step to Shirley
Temple. I learned much later to worship her, just as I learned to delight
in cleanliness, knowing, even as I learned, that the change was
adjustment without improvement.”

Claudia is given a big, blue-eyed baby doll as a Christmas present.

Adults, older girls, shops, magazines, newspapers, window signs – all
the world had agreed that a blue-eyed, yellow-haired, pink-skinned doll
was what every girl child treasured. But not all black little girls were
susceptible to such pressures. The strong-willed Claudia, who
embodies a different, more compassionate and more critical set of
values than many of the adults around her, refuses to love the alien doll
which she surreptitiously dismembers, carefully examining its parts out
of curiosity to discover what it is that all the world finds lovable.

Morrison deals through children, the element of belief of many blacks,

that an ultimate glory is possible. Pecola’s yearning for blue eyes is the
next best thing to being a white. Blue eyes become for her, a symbol of
pride and dignity.

In short, The Bluest Eye portrays in poignant terms the tragic conditions
of blacks in a racist America. In her criticism of American life, the author
has structured her novel in triadic patterns. Beginning with the
reproduction of a passage, three different times in three different ways,

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she continues the triadic pattern through the novel. Her presentation of
the tragedy of black life in relation to blacks, whites, and God or
existential circumstances is a thematic approach leading to problems of
sex, racism, love or lack of love.

The triadic pattern is presented through the scapegoats – cat, dog and a
girl. She also has tried out the typology of characterisation affecting the
three black family women – Geraldine, Mrs. MacTeer and Mrs.
Breedlove and the three black prostitutes – The Maginotline, China and
Poland. The triadic pattern in the novel is concretised by a famous
dictum: “if you are white you are all right: if you are brown you can stick
around: but if you are black…get back”.

Running through the novel, alongside racism, is the theme of scapegoat:

Geraldine’s cat, Bob the dog, and Pecola are the scapegoats supposed
to cleanse American society through their involvement in some violent
rituals. Pecola is associated with a black cat with blue eyes, whose eyes
in the moment of death were transformed into “blue streaks of horror”.

Clauida says, “All of us – all who knew her – felt so wholesome after we
cleaned ourselves on her. We were so beautiful when we stood astride
her ugliness. Her simplicity decorated us, her guilt sanctified us, her
pain made us glow with health, her awkwardness made us think we had
a sense of humour. Her inarticulateness made us believe we were
eloquent. Her poverty kept us generous. Even her waking dreams we
used – to silence our own nightmares. And she let us, and thereby
deserved our contempt. We honed our egos on her, padded our
character with her frailty and yawned in the fantasy of her strength.”

Pecola is the epitome of the victim in a world that reduces persons to

objects and then makes them feel inferior as objects. In this world, light-
skinned women can feel superior to dark ones, married women to
whores, men over women and so on and on. Society encourages the
hierarchies, which allow someone to feel superior to someone else.
Only the very unlucky or the truly free are outside this system.

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Pecola is ‘outside’ the centre of the system – excluded from reality by
gender, age, class, race and personal history – she goes mad, wanting
to have blue eyes – to fit into the system. She is freed through
madness. The damage done was total. She spent her days, her tendril,
sap-green days, walking up and down, up and down, her head jerking to
the beat of a drummer so distant only she could hear. Elbows bent,
hands on shoulders, she flailed her arms like a bird in an eternal,
grotesquely futile effort to fly. Beating the air, a winged but grounded
bird, intent on the blue void it could not reach – could not even see – but
which filled the valleys of the mind.

The whores are also freed by their exclusion from society. Morrison
strongly suggests in the novel that freedom of this nature is more
deprivation than fulfilment. The novel is a pictorial history of African-
American Society without editorial comment of any kind, which was
intended to depict the diversity of ways in which life had been lived by
black Americans. In a country where whiteness is felt to be the only
human condition, which can define normality, the blacks are constantly
put out of doors.

The narrator Claudia comments that the worst fear for the blacks is of
being outdoors. “Being a minority in both caste and class, we moved
about anyway on the hem of life, struggling to consolidate our weakness
and hang on, or to creep singly up into the major folds of the garment?
Our peripheral existence, however, was something we had learned to
deal with – probably because it was abstract but the concreteness of
being outdoors is another matter.”

Morrison is deeply critical of the standards whereby happiness is judged

in terms of material success and of the deleterious effects, which the
American dream (the acquisition of success, fame, status, riches and
happiness) has had on the generations of African Americans.

This is not only because the American dream is precisely that – a

chimera that eludes the vast majority of the American population which it
supposedly encompasses – but also because aspiring to white
standards of beauty (blue eyes, light skin), material success (immaculate

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houses, beautiful kitchens) or behaviour (restrained individualistic)
usually results in African- Americans abandoning their own values,
behaviour and traditions. The Bluest Eye provides three contrasting
examples of interior domestic spaces, which may be read as
synecdoches.

The first is the Fisher Familys’ beautiful kitchen with its sparkling
surfaces and gleaming utensils over which Pauline Breedlove
(patronisingly renamed, Polly) presides as a trusted servant. The kitchen
gives the black woman all the power and luxury for which she longs, but
it is from this kitchen that her own daughter is summarily expelled so that
she can attend on a white girl. By contrast, the McTeer’s kitchen is a
place of communal security and warmth where the whole family gathers.
Claudia’s dream is to sit on a stool in the kitchen clutching a bunch of
lilacs and listening to Big papa playing his violin. The Breeedlove living
room is simply a squalid poorly furnished room in which there are no
memories to be cherished; no furniture to which anyone is attached; no
songs are ever sung around the piano, and no visitors ever call. All we
are told about the Breedlove’s kitchen is that it is a room at the back of
their shack. It is not a space in which the laughter, gossip, celebrations
and rituals, which find families together, have ever found expression.

In the novel, Morrison suggests that the socialisation of children in their

formative years is largely responsible for their unrealistic expectations of
material success and happiness. In reality, there can be very few
houses like that in which ‘Jane and Dick’ live happily with their mother
and father which is depicted in a school primer reproduced in the
opening lines of The Bluest Eye.

This image of the house was instilled into a generation of American

Children who went to school in the 1940s, with the first words they were
taught to read. The novel makes use of each familiar item in the primer
in an ironic way. Pecola’s father is not ‘big and strong’. Her mother is
not ‘very nice’. The ramshackle house in which the family lives, an
abandoned store, which nobody else visits, is not ‘very pretty’. Morrison
explains that the primer with white children was the way life was
presented to black people. She wanted the primer version broken up as
the novel progresses.

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The characters in The Bluest Eye are not only black, but also poor and
in the case of the Breedloves, almost destitute:
“The Breedloves did not live in a storefront because they were having
temporary difficulty adjusting to the cutbacks at the plant. They lived
there because they were poor and black, and they stayed there because
they believed they were ugly. Although their poverty was traditional and
stultifying it was not unique. But their ugliness was unique. No one
could have convinced them that they were not relentlessly and
aggressively ugly.”
Morrison depicts how economic deprivation and social class both play a
crucial role in determining the expectations and behaviour of individuals
and groups. Childhood is represented as a time of danger rather than
safety; of furtively acquired sexual knowledge rather than innocence. To
be a girl is to be especially vulnerable to abuse. Morrison shows how
sexual violence is primarily a domestic phenomenon, and that a girl isn’t
safe in a family of men. In the novel, Pecola and Frieda are sexually
abused by a member of the family and by a friend of the household
respectively.

The landscape, like the central character of the novel, is desolate. As

the narrator Claudia sorrowfully observes, “This soil is bad for certain
kinds of flowers. Certain seeds it will not nurture, certain fruit it will not
bear, and when the land kills of its own volition, we acquiesce and say
the victim had no right to live.”

Morrison sets out to question in the novel the hegemonic notions of

beauty and to show how blackness, ugliness and powerlessness have
come to be linked. It details the story of young black women searching
for self-esteem.
Claudia is very conscious of the perversity of this position and of its roots
in racist society. As a child she says, she hated Shirley Temple. Not
because she was cute, but because she danced with Bojangles, who
was my friend, my uncle, my daddy, and who ought to have been soft-
shoeing it and chuckling with me.

She recognises the division between herself and her world and the white
world, its values, babies, dolls and movie stars. She had been
fascinated by those images because they were “lovable” to everyone but

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her. She tried to “dissect” them, to discover or possess the “magic they
weaved on others” but finally learned “shame” at her lack of feeling.
Claudia knew, even as a child, the force of alien cultural images. She
knew that white “ideals” denied her reality by forcing it into strange forms
of reality. She felt “disinterested violence” for something, which
regulated her life without any relevance to it.

The child Claudia learns false love from the only model offered to her.
But the adult narrator Claudia sees that Shirley Temple cannot be really
loved or imitated because she is just a doll, an image without a self
behind it. The crime of the white society, the novel seems to say, is not
only the theft of black reality. It also seems to dictate an alternative. If
blacks are slaves, the whites are the masters. There seems to be very
little choice. The whites attribute rejected qualities to the blacks. And
the position of the black woman is doubly difficult. Black women in
Morrison’s fiction seem to discover that they are neither white nor male
and that all freedom and triumph are forbidden to them. Womanhood
like blackness is the “other” in society and the dilemma of women in a
patriarchal society is similar to the black’s dilemma in a racist one.

Lorain, Ohio, the setting of the novel, is a world of grotesques –

individuals whose psyches have been deformed by their efforts to
assume false identities, their failures to achieve meaningful identities or
simply their inability to retain and communicate love. The novel ends
with an ambiguity. Morrison suggests that Pecola, insanely believing in
her blue eyes, is perhaps nobler than the townspeople who achieved a
false superiority by presuming themselves to possess the opposite of
her ugliness, her guilt, her pain, her inarticulateness, her poverty. “We
honed our egos on her, padded our characters with her frailty and
yawned in the fantasy of our strength”, the narrator concludes:

“Nature serves as the unifying element in the novel. Each of the major
sections is designated by season from autumn to summer. Time moves
back and forth for the characters, whose loves unfold against the natural
and the unnatural, between the aberrations of nature and those of man.
What makes the earth unyielding? What aborts life and stunts the
growth of natures’ off springs?”

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These are questions explored by the novelist through the marigold
imagery and through the pattern of relationships intricately worked out
around an act of violence against a child. The idyllic atmosphere
created through a lyrical narrative creates an effective mood for the
narrator’s recollection of a seemingly innocent world, in which she, nine
years old, naively observed the trauma of an Afro-American girl forced to
find love in incest and to define beauty as the possession of blue eyes.

Claudia, lives in the idyllic world as revealed in the primers. Her idyll is
marred only by the fact that her house is old and green. Nevertheless,
the occasional pain due to contrast is mild because Love, thick and dark
as Algae syrup, eased up into that cracked window (of her house). I
could smell it – taste it – sweet, musty, with an edge of wintergreen in its
base – everywhere in that house. By the end of the novel Claudia begins
to understand the nature of the real world.

She overhears the gossip about adultery and sees her parents’ roomer
flirt with three prostitutes whom society term wicked. She quarrels with a
pretty Afro-American schoolmate who feels superior because of her
family’s financial status, her light skin and long hair. Claudia learns that
her father had beaten the roomer because he fondled the budding
breasts of her sister. Above all, she learns that Cholly Breedlove has
impregnated his daughter Pecola, a playmate of hers. And now that she
is older, she knows that the reason the marigolds did not bloom that year
in 1941 is that certain seeds like Pecola’s child, could not grow.

Since Claudia’s perspective is a little distorted as a result of her having

been sheltered under her parents’ loving care, the author uses an
omniscient narrator to tell the grimmer side of the story. It is primarily
the story of the dark-skinned Pecola, who knowing she is considered
ugly, believes that people would like her if she had blue eyes.

It is the story of Pecola, who was raped by her father, the first time,
takes his further advances as demonstrations of his love for her. It is the
story of Pecola’s mother, who gives her attention and love to the child of
her white employee with whom she identifies herself. It is of Pecola’s
father who, abandoned by his parents and bewildered by his marriage,

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takes to drinking. It is the story of Geraldine and Whitcomb who lend
substance to the novel.

Although ‘Dick-Jane-Shirley Temple’ techniques set up the dichotomy

between black experience and white culture, the issue of growth and
development set into the framework of the Bildungroman points to the
common nature of human experiences. The rites of passage, initiating
the young into womanhood is sensitively dealt with. As critics would
agree, “it is a novel for all seasons”. Morrison calls her novels “village
literature” and “peasant literature” an unusual term in the context of
United States and they indeed portray a world of her childhood, in which
the everyday black life comes alive through the folklore, magic,
superstition fable, song and myth. Characters are nicknamed from the
Bible and Morrison’s clear language tinged with humour, conceives
situations in an extraordinary manner. She presents the trauma in black
life, with blacks as much victims of black cruelty as of white indifference.

The purity of language, economy of structure, strong narrative voice and

a sensitive yet surgical delineation of the miseries of black life make the
novel good for reading. Morrison is an extraordinarily good writer. Few
pages of reading into the novel, one feels the power of her language and
the emotional authority behind it. The world she creates is dense with
an atmosphere through which, her characters move slowly in ignorance,
pain and hunger.

And the readers along with them penetrate that dark and painful terrain
and get the feel of the miserable human life. In its structure, the novel
resembles James Baldwin’s novels and her themes remind one of Ralph
Ellison. Most characters in the novel are made typical. Geraldine is cast
out as an old black bourgeoisie, who shares with the whites “the
contempt and stereo-typed views about the lower class Negros as the
outer society. And when it comes to sex, the orthodox middle-class
Negro is far more rigid, repressed and neurotic than any other female in
America.”

Morrison, by giving old problems in a fresh language and a fresh

perspective has achieved, what no other black writer achieved before
her – namely making the black masses wake up to their rights.

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Morrison’s attempt at creating a black aesthetics through her writing has
influenced not only other Afro-American writers to continue the work, but
has provided the framework for the marginalised all over the world.

Toni Morrison really makes the reader question beauty, the pressure put
on people to fit in with untrue ideas. This novel will not leave the reader
without making them evaluate the dangers of social standards and
changing the way you look at how society works.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 10.2

Describe the theme of The Bluest Eye.

Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

10.3 KAMALA MARKANDAYA: THE AUTHOR

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Kamala Markandaya was a pseudonym used by Kamala Purnaiya
Taylor, an Indian novelist and journalist. A native of Mysore, India,
Markandaya was a graduate of Madras University, and afterwards
published several short stories in Indian newspapers. In this section, you
will learn about Kama Markandaya and her work Nectar in the Sieve.

Markandaya is praised for her vivid recreation of life in India’s villages

and cities and for her examination of contemporary social issues. In her
works she often focuses on the clash between traditional Indian lifestyle
and the challenges of modernisation. These conflicts are frequently
intensified by cultural differences between her Indian and English
characters. Among Markandaya’s best-known works are Nectar in a
Sieve (1954), her first novel, and The Golden Honeycomb (1977), both
of which won critical and popular acclaim.

Early Life
Having made a mark with her early novels, Markandaya, who spent
most of her life in the UK, was welcomed only as long as she was seen
as a storyteller of India.
As the poet and critic Nissim Ezekiel scoffed in a 1979 review, “An
Indian writer living permanently abroad can always be trusted to write
knowingly about life in an Indian village."
Kamala Markandaya was born in a small town in Mysore, India on
January 1, 1924 and went on to graduate from Madras University with a
degree in History. Markandaya then went on to be a journalist and writer
in life. Her work, majorly short stories, were published in various Indian

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newspapers of that time. There was a certain shade of controversy
attached to her transnational marriage. She settled in Britain after India
retrieved its independence in 1948 and got married to Bertrand Taylor,
an Englishman. Markandaya had not always lived abroad. Born Kamala
Purnaiya in 1924 in princely Mysore, as a student in 1940s Chennai she
was briefly also a journalist. At some point, she decided to spend 18
months in a village “out of curiosity". This inspired the setting of her first
novel, centred on Rukmani and her former husband, who negotiate not
only nature’s cruel whimsies but also change in the disruptive form of a
modern tannery.

Nectar in a Sieve centres on an Indian woman who witnesses many

hardships, during the course of her life. Set in an Indian village, the
novel explores the effects of nature on its inhabitants and the problems
that ensue when a manufacturing plant is built nearby. In her second
novel, Some Inner Fury (1955), Markandaya depicts the tensions that
arise when a young Brahmin woman falls in love with a visiting
Englishman. A Silence of Desire (1960), her next novel, centres on
conflicts between old and new Indian customs in a story of a woman
who prefers to have her illnesses treated by a faith healer rather than by
a doctor.

Conflicts between Eastern and Western cultures are developed in

several of Markandaya’s works. Possession (1963) concerns a talented
young Indian artist who is dominated by an English woman. Critics note
that the relationship between the two characters is reflective of Anglo-
Indian relations. The Nowhere Man (1972) depicts the effects of
widespread racism following World War II on an aged Indian man living
in a London suburb. In Shalimar (1982), a Western corporation
constructs a luxurious resort in an isolated fishing village, altering the
traditional lifestyle of the villagers.

The Golden Honeycomb is a historical novel in which Markandaya

focuses on life in India from the late nineteenth century to the beginning
of World War I. Critics particularly admired Markandaya’s blend of exotic
and the realistic in her depiction of the social problems of this era.

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Charles R. Larson considers The Golden Honeycomb “the major novel
of [Markandaya’s] literary career. ”It is not surprising, given the
importance of village life in India, that Kamala Markandaya should have
set her first novel in a primitive village, with peasants as her main
characters. The admirable thing is that she crafted an international best-
seller out of the story of a simple woman who never loses her faith in life
or her love for her husband and children – despite her long, unceasing
battle against nature, changing times, and dire poverty. The elemental
plot is simple to follow and deeply moving.
Awards and Recognition
Kamala Markandaya was awarded the National Association of
Independent Schools Award (USA) in 1967 and the Asian Prize in
1974.

10.3.1 Nectar In The Sieve: The Novel

Subsections 10.4.1 and 10.4.2, respectively, give an outline of the story

and an analysis of the novel.

10.3.2 The story

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Nectar in a Sieve presents familial love and familial sacrifice as the
most important aspect of life. While this point of view is beautiful and
inspiring, it's also poignant because Rukmani's deep love for her family
coexists with her inability to protect and provide for them.
Portraying the lives of Indian subsistence farmers, Nectar in a Sieve is
permeated by unflinching depictions of unspeakable suffering. Even at
the best of times, Rukmani's family is only precariously secure, growing
just enough to eat. When beset by sickness or agricultural failure, they
have no resources to sustain them, and when they are evicted from their
land, they have no other way to make a living.
The narrator of this novel is Rukmani, a literate widow, who tells in
flashback the major events of her life. Given in marriage to Nathan, a
tenant farmer, she has never seen before, she is taken to a small
thatched hut, set near a paddy field, which is to become her home. A
garland of mango leaves in the door way, symbol of happiness and good
fortune, hangs dry in the breeze and presages the barren periods that
will often plague her and her family. Nathan patiently allows her time to
adjust to life with him, but Rukmani’s education always places her a cut

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above her fellow women, particularly Kali, Janaki, and Kunthi, the three
gossips.

After the birth of a daughter, Irawaddy (named after one of the great
rivers of Asia), Rukmani becomes anxious about her failure to have
sons. She is treated by Kenny, a foreign doctor, who is forthright and
critical of Indian superstitions, even as he is compassionate to poor
people. In due course, she bears several sons – Arjun, Thumbi,
Murugan, Raja, Selvam, and Kuti – and arranges the marriage of
Irawaddy, who is barely out of puberty. Old Granny, a vegetable vendor,
serves as a go-between, but the arrangement ends in failure, when
Irawaddy proves to be barren and is returned to her family by her
husband.

Other problems abound. The tyrannically exploitative landowner sends

Sivaji to collect his dues from Rukmani and her people. Sivaji is
humane, but he cannot afford to ignore his master’s bidding. Besides
this oppression and the savagery of nature, the villagers have to contend
with a new tannery, a symbol of modernisation. Rukmani, alone among
her group, opposes the tannery for its disturbance of the pace and
quality of village life.

Her viewpoint is validated by the voracious expansion of the industry,

which results in the loss of farmland and the appearance of a little colony
of elite tannery officials, many of whom are Muslim and, hence,
uncongenial to the Hindu villagers. Rukmani’s antagonism is sharpened
when two of her sons desert the paddy fields to work in the tannery, and
the “slow, calm beauty” of natural village life wilts in the blast from town.
Rukmani finds herself rebellious protesting, and restless.

Nature follows its relentlessly whimsical course, blighting the land with
drought. Rukmani sells her best clothes to Biswas, the only merchant,
who casts aspersions on her friendship with Kenny. To compound her
misery, Nathan is blackmailed by Kunthi and is forced to confess that he
fathered two of her sons illegitimately, years ago.

Then, Raja is killed by tannery watchmen in ambiguous circumstances,

but the tannery evades legal censure. Life becomes a sequence of

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disasters and tribulations for Rukmani. Irawaddy, disgraced by her failed
marriage, sells sexual favours and is brutally attacked. Rukmani’s
youngest son dies of hunger; ironically, his death is followed by a period
of bountiful harvest.

10.3.3 An analysis

The novel has two disproportionate sections.

The first part is approximately seventy percent of the whole. For

example, by the end of the first part, the lives of Rukmani’s family have
been altered irreversibly. Irawaddy falls pregnant out of wedlock and
gives birth to an albino; Selvam leaves the village to train at a hospital;
Murugan marries a girl from the town where he works as a servant; and
Nathan and Rukmani are evicted when the tannery officials decide on
expansion.

The second part of the novel opens with Rukmani and Nathan’s journey
to the town where Murugan lives. Once again, the emphasis is on
suffering, counter-pointed by hope. The couple becomes temple-
beggars and requires the assistance of Puli, a leper boy, to find
Murugan’s home. There, they discover that their son has deserted his
wife and boy. Their courageous forbearance put to its fullest test, they
reach a point of total exhaustion. Broken in both body and spirit, Nathan
dies, and Rukmani returns to the village with Puli, whom she and Nathan
adopted. The bittersweet ending sentimentalises her courage.

The novel demonstrates virtues in action. There are major instances of

faith, hope, and love in Rukmani’s life, but of these, hope is the greatest
theme. Between the marriage of Rukmani (with its symbols of fertility
and good fortune) and her widowhood lie many dire tests of this hope.
But Nectar in a Sieve is characteristically Indian in its vindication of
suffering and the attitude that, no matter what, life can go on.

The novel cleverly combines opposite symbols from the outset as if to

suggest the pivotal conflict between hope and fear. The dry mango
leaves garlanding the doorway to Rukmani and Nathan’s hut presage a
barren future. Yet, Nathan has a rich hoard of grain to counter-balance

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the pessimistic fear. Then, the three women who make themselves part
of Rukmani’s village life combine opposites again: Kali’s ample size and
sensuality and Kunthi’s physical allure are, at first, positive qualities in
contrast to Janaki’s homeliness.

They see only gain in the creation of the tannery – and so are opposed
to Rukmani’s fear for the loss of pastoral innocence. Their false hope for
a golden future is counter-pointed by Rukmani’s fear for an irretrievable
past, but by the end of the story, it is the trio who are defeated in various
ways by life, whereas it is Rukmani who survives her afflictions.

Nature tests human hope by magnifying people’s fears, but in the end
though never subdued by human beings, nature is not granted the
ultimate victory. Its savage agitation does destroy its victims, and its
cruel force is best resisted by a quiet spiritual force. This battle of nature
against spirit is typified in the cycle of seasons, where hunger and
despair are often consequences of nature’s assault.

Where nature’s force is quick and brutal, the spirit is slow and patient. It
takes Rukmani virtually a lifetime to learn her lesson of hope. Ironically,
just as nature punishes the spirit, it also supplies the metaphor for
uplifting it. As Rukmani puts it, “The sowing of seed disciplines the body
and the sprouting of the seed uplifts the spirit.”

Nectar in a Sieve was named a Notable Book of 1955 by the American

Library Association. It won very favourable reviews. The New York
Times praised its “wonderful, quiet authority” and lack of excess.
Saturday Review identified its greatest appeal in its answers to real
questions: “What is the day-to-day life of the villager like? How does a
village woman really think of herself? What goes through the minds of
people who are starving?

Certainly, there is no denying the peasant ethos – probably quality of

Indo-English novels, as in the cases of R.K. Narayan, Raja Rao, Mulk
Raj Anand, and Bhabani Bhattacharya – or the problems of encroaching
modernisation, but the social issues of the story are ultimately
transcended by spiritual values. It is no accident that Markandaya
usually avoids naming her settings. This evasion, her critics contend,

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fits in with her general refusal to face life directly. The misfortunes are
real enough in the plot. There is real hunger or real vice or real death.
Rukmani’s attitude of hopeful resignation, however, is hardly the stuff of
Social Realism. The pattern of final reintegration – where Rukmani
returns to the village – conforms to the Indian preference for an almost
scriptural composure.

The problem of the novel, quiet apart from the underlying philosophical
attitude of acceptance, is a literary style, which often seems far too
Western in diction for either the narrator or the pattern of the story. In
striving to glorify the human spirit, Markandaya often uses a heightened
language (with words such as “assuagements”, “decorous,” “garrulous,”
or “dissembling”) and a syntax that is far too eloquent for any villager,
though she may be descended from a headman. This style puts the
novel outside the realm of primary English as used so effectively by
Narayan, for example, and it works against the physical simplicity of the
setting and characters.

Perhaps, however, this flaw can be attributed to the fact that the novel
was the first in Markandaya’s career, and the author had not as yet
learned how to adapt a colonial language to indigenous characters and
conflicts.

On the positive side, it can be said that Western readers seem not to
have minded this defect, for Nectar in a Sieve continues to attract
readers and praise for its affecting heroine, poetic beauty, and controlled
sentiment.

A tale of rural life

Nectar in a Sieve is primarily a tale of rural life in South Indian and the
life of toil and uncertainty lived by the tenant farmers of India who
compromise the bulk of the population. It is the lot of Nathan to till the
land, which belongs to another. Paying exorbitant rent for it and getting
hardly a square meal a day as reward even after the best harvest. The
ravage caused by draught or by excessive rains is graphically described.
When a harvest fails, the farmer not only faces starvation but also has to
sell his possession like vessels and clothes in order to pay the rent.

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There is genuine pathos and tragic intensity in he description of the
youngest child of Nathan slowly dying of starvation.

But in all of this Kutti suffered the most. He had never been a healthy
child; now he was constantly ailing. At first he asked for rice, water and
cried because there was none, but later he gave up asking and merely
cried. Even in his sleep he whimpered, twisting and turning endlessly,
permitting no one to rest. Ira was gentlest with him, and tirelessly
patient, nursing him in her skinny arms and giving him most of what
came to her.

Insecurity and privation are not the only calamities suffered by the
peasant. He in fact is prepared to face them. Starvation and sickness
are within the normal range of the peasant’s experience and he has
strength enough to endure them. What is hard for him to bear is to be
forcibly dispossessed of the land, which he and forebears have tilled for
generations without ever having been able to call it their own.

The bitterness of being dispossessed is poignantly conveyed in the

words of Rukmani: “This home my husband had built for me with his own
hands in the time he was waiting for me; brought me to it with a pride
which I, used to better living, had so very nearly crushed. In it we had
lain together and our children had been born. The hut with all its
memories was to be taken from us, for it stood on land that belonged to
another and the land itself by which we lived. It is a cruel thing I thought.
They do not know what they do to us. “

Kamala Markandaya knows that hardship and suffering are the lot, of the
poor peasants and of manual labourers, in urban areas. Nathan and
Rukmani, after their eviction from their home and their futile attempt at
finding one of their sons supposed to be working in the city, are
compelled to work as stonebreakers in a quarry. The painful nature of
the job on a rainy day is thus described in the words of Rukmani:

“Rain. Not heavy now but monotonous dripping on to us, splashing on

the stones. No shelter on that bare hillside. The wind came whistling
round it and struck at the crouched wet bodies. Hammer on stone. Stone
on stone. Clink – clank – drip.”

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The novels of Kamala Markandaya have sociological interest, as they
allude to several features of Indian society. As a keen observer of life in
India, she has recorded the continuing hold of casteism, regionalism on
our society. The way in which marriages are generally arranged in India
by the parents, the relationship between the dowry that the bride’s father
can afford to give and the status of the bridegroom he is able to secure,
the wedding ceremony with its mixture of religion, music, noise and
feasting are aptly described in Nectar in a Sieve.

Several aspects of social life in India are alluded to in the novels of

Markandaya without elaboration. The ‘gosha’ system, Muslim in its origin
is referred to in Nectar in a Sieve; Rukmani sells home grown
vegetables to a Muslim lady whom she sees at close quarters only when
she removes her veil. Speaking about this experience she says, “There
was something about those closed doors and shuttered windows that
struck coldly at me, used as I was to open fields and the sky and the
unfettered sight of the sun.”

The contempt with which a childless woman is regarded in certain

sections of Indian society is indicated in Nectar in a Sieve. Nathan’s
daughter Ira, is rejected by her husband because she is childless even
five years after marriage, and by the time she is cured of her barrenness
by medical treatment and taken to her husband’s home, he has taken
another wife. Nobody thinks of protesting. Even the rejected girl’s mother
merely tells her, “You must not blame him. He has taken another
woman.”

Effects of poverty
The novelist is impressed by the effects of poverty on the characters.
She views it sympathetically. The sad recourse to prostitution by Ira, in a
desperate attempt to save her dying child-brother is an eye opener
about poverty giving rise to immorality. Referring to the decent funeral
provided for the old woman, Granny, after her death from starvation, the
novelist makes this comment:

“Once a human being is dead, there are people enough to provide the
last decencies; perhaps it is so because only then can there be no

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question of further on recurring assistance being sought. Death after all
is final”.

A fatalistic attitude to life and a philosophy of passive suffering are

indicated by Markandaya as typical of India. The important characters in
Nectar in a Sieve silently suffer life. Typical of the stoical is old Granny
who lives miserable existence sitting all day in the street selling nuts and
vegetables. When Rukmani expresses her fear of such a life, Granny
tells her, “It is not unbearable. One gets used to it.”

Rukmani, while discussing her lot with the missionary Kenny, remarks
“Want is our companion from birth to death, familiar as the seasons or
the earth, varying only in degrees. What profit to bewail that, which has
always been and cannot change.”

The novelist shows that charity is very much a part of the Indian social
system. The feeding of the poor at the temple described in Nectar in a
Sieve may not be perfect charity, but it represents something that is
firmly established in India. So also the author tries to bring about aspects
of Indian character through the simple, lowly and the poor. Nathan is a
gentle, docile soul who sells everything at home to pay up the rent for
the land and quietly leaves his home when the land has been sold. He
endures his lot without any thought of rebellion. The author also draws
our attention to the fact that notwithstanding pessimism and despair on
the surface, there is an undercurrent of optimism and confidence in
Indian character.

Nectar in a Sieve is a tragic story with themes of suffering starvation and

death, but the story ends on a positive note of quiet strength and
resolution. Rukmani has just returned from her wanderings during which
she had lost Nathan. Her son, Selvam, on whom the whole responsibility
of supporting the family now devolves, reassuringly tells his mother: “Do
not worry. We shall manage.” The last words in the novel are spoken by
Rukmani describing the death of her husband: “It was gentle passing. I
will tell you later.” Along with the inherent stoicism regarding death, the
strength of family ties is also brought out in the novel.

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Kamala Markandaya has rightly chosen her title from a British poem,
which has a line “work without hope draws Nectar in a Sieve.” She has
quite powerfully, through various incidents in the novel shown how the
poor of India use it as a dictum to do their work without any expectation
of or rather desire for bigger things – the inherent philosophy that
Bhagvad Gita preaches.

10.3.4 A character sketch

Rukmani and Kenny are the novel’s most memorable characters,
because they are poles apart in their fundamental attitudes to life.
Rukmani, in one sense, defies credibility as a character, for she uses a
diction that is overwhelmingly Western and far too sophisticated for her
background. Kamala Markandaya obviously needed an articulate voice
for the description of conflicts, and Rukmani’s eloquence highlights the
gallantry of her struggle.

At heart, however, she is a peasant, for she never loses her appreciation
of the land or village life; nor does she make an attempt to repudiate
nature. A knowing victim of the vagaries of nature, she exhibits a
characteristically Indian acceptance of custom, duty, and fate. In this,
she bolstered by Nathan’s patience and persistence and by an innate
pastoral sense that is drawn to “the sweet quiet of village life,”
untampered by modern technology. Although there are periods when her
composure cracks and she becomes restlessly rebellious, she is not an
adversary of tradition.

She is bound to the very land that claims her husband and sons, and
although her optimism is her grace, it is also her constraint. Where every
agony is borne with the implicit conviction that nothing can really
change, the hope in survival is simply a weak bargain with fate.
Certainly, she endures. Certainly, her spirit is strong – but her poignant
suffering redeems the tyranny of nature or lessens its sting?

Kenny, the foreign doctor, embodies a challenge to Rukmani’s

philosophy of acceptance. Although he is not given the sort of dramatic
force he deserves, he is the outsider cast in the role of critical witness.
His love for children and his chosen vocation draw him into village
suffering and soften his personality, which would otherwise be brittle and

328
taciturn. With children, he is a kind of Pied Piper without music; with
adults, he is more withdrawn.

He comes and goes when he likes, and he resists the usual

encumbrances that men have – wife, children, home. His strange nature
is not cold one; it is simply that his sensitivity to suffering is counter-
pointed by his anger at the victims’ passive acceptance, of custom,
history, and fate. He tires of the villagers’ follies and stupidities, their
“eternal, shameful poverty.” He can, he confesses, take Indians only in
small doses. What is striking about Kenny, besides his passionate
indictment of Indian docility and acceptance, is his privacy. It is only
more than halfway through the story that his private life is revealed in
any measure – and that only through laconic revelations that his wife
has left him and that his son has been taught to forget him.

Were he less vulnerable himself, Kenny would not have as much appeal
as he does in the novel. When he sounds bitter and weary, his forlorn
spirit touches that of Rukmani. The fact that he has his own miseries and
doubts puts his aloofness in perspective and makes him seem credibly
realistic. There is an aching poignancy about his earnest desire to
alleviate the suffering of a people who, to him, simply condemn
themselves to perpetual affliction by their meekness and simplistic view
of life.

The third major character is Nathan – the honest, patient labourer,

illiterate but eloquent in his acts of love, sacrifice, and hope. It is he who
incarnates the idea of hope, for in the midst of the most calamitous
upheavals of nature or man, he points to the joys and comfort that
sustain him. A man of few words, his example is all, and it teaches
Rukmani an important lesson of life.

When he suffers from nightmares, he has only to turn to his beloved wife
to allay his fears. Nature often shows blind indifference to his fate, and
he is often relegated to the background in the plot, but Nathan’s role is to
be the beloved, the one who wins pity for his trials and admiration for his
strength of purpose.

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The other characters, while not without their interesting qualities, are
rather automatically presented as foils to the three major characters and
serve only to further the plot or dramatize the conflict between hope and
fear.

LEARNING ACTIVITY 10.3

Write the story of Nectar in the Sieve.
Note:

a) Write your answer in the space given below.

SUMMARY
This Unit began with a biography of Toni Morrison followed by a
discussion of her highly acclaimed novel, The Bluest Eyes, the story of a
Black girl yearning for blue eyes, a representation of the class conscious
society. The Unit then discussed Kamala Markandaya’s Nectar in the
Sieve. A novel set in the rural Indian environs, we said, it exposes the
abject poverty and ordeals of life rural India faces.

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REFERENCE:

1. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/14/learning/lesson-plans/her-
subject-is-america-teaching-toni-morrison-with-the-new-york-
times.html
2. https://www.facebook.com/beaumontlibrarydistrict/posts/2892091
104396955
3. https://www.biography.com/writer/toni-morrison
4. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literature/1993/morrison/biogra
phical/?theme=ea
5. http://www.languageinindia.com/sep2019/minhazulbluesteyestoni
morrison.pdf
6. https://www.theguardian.com/childrens-books-
site/2016/jan/11/the-bluest-eye-toni-morrison-review
7. https://www.livemint.com/Leisure/Yju1fS4xvKt0klT8Of3N4L/Kam
ala-Markandaya-A-novelist-lost-in-literary-oblivion.html
8. https://www.litcharts.com/lit/nectar-in-a-sieve/themes/family

VIDEO LINK
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ePflWkpyOU

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 MODEL SPOT ASSIGNMENT QUESTION PAPER

Note: A learner has to submit three assignments for MEG-13. Each

assignment has 15 Marks. The average of three assignment will be
taken into account of the final result.

ASSIGNMENT – 1 Max.: 15 Marks

Answer any one of the question not exceeding 1000 words

1. What is ecriture feminism?

2. Discuss the feminist tendencies that are reflected in Adrienne
Rich’s poem.
3. Discuss Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eyes as a typical feminist
text.

ASSIGNMENT – 2 Max.: 15 Marks

Answer any one of the question not exceeding 1000 words

1. Explain the position of women dealt in Amar Jiban.

2. Women are shown as ignorant, suspended and emergent in Toni
Morrison’s ‘The Bluest Eye’. Explain.
3. Discuss Elaine Showalter’s views on women and writing.

ASSIGNMENT– 3 Max.: 15 Marks

Answer any one of the question not exceeding 1000 words

1. Write about feministic attitude as shown in ‘Sense and

Sensibility’.
2. Discuss Elaine Showalter’s ‘Towards a feminist poetics’ from the
feminist perspective.
3. Critically analyze the feministic aspects in Kate Millet’s works

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 MODEL TERM END EXAMINATION QUESTION PAPER

Time: 3 Hours Maximum Marks: 70

Part – A (5X5=25 Marks)

Answer any Five questions out of Eight questions in 300 words

All questions carry equal marks

1. What is the theme of the novel ‘North anger Abbey’?

2. What does Austen mean by the terms “sense” and “sensibility” in her

novel Sense and Sensibility?

3. Analyse the performance of feminine gender roles in Margaret

Atwood’s The Edible Woman?

4. Give an analysis of the images and symbols used in the poem “Aunt
Jennifer’s Tiger”.

5. Analyse the depiction of father figure in the poem “Tribute to Papa”.

6. Explain the stream of consciousness technique used by Virginia
Woolf

in Mrs. Dalloway?

7. Sketch the character of Bertha Mason Rochester.

8. What have been the salient features of Women's writing in India?

Part – B (3X15=45 Marks)

Answer any Three questions out of Five questions in 1000 words

All questions carry equal marks

9. How does Radway analyse the romance novel genre in her book

Reading the Romance Woman, Patriarchy and Popular Culture?

10. Analyse Jane Eyre as a feminist novel.

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11. Write an essay on the theme of Kamala Markandaya’s novel Nectar
in the Sieve?

12. Critically analyse the theme of Sub alternity in Mahasweta Dcvi’s

“Rudali”.

13. Analyze the performance of feminine gender roles in Margaret

Atwood's The Edible Woman.

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