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by Shashi Deshpande Published by Review |
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It is a mistake to dismiss this book as a feminist book as Deshpande's books are often characterised - although I am not quite sure what that means! This is not a story of an oppressed woman, or abusive marriage or monstrous men - the usual fare of feminist agenda among Indian writers! There are places where she takes a few digs at the patriarchy but it is essentially about a human being who has suffered terribly all her life and then finds the courage to take control of her life. Saru suffers from a nervous breakdown when she arrives at her parental home. The story that unfolds is the guilt she bears for her brother Dhruva's death, along with guilt of abandoning her parents, guilt about her mother's death which she learns about accidentally, which in turn permeates her entire life, her feelings about herself, her career as a physician, her marriage, her feelings towards her husband Manu and the kids. Back in her father's house she learns to see him in a new light, as someone she never knew he was, and we as readers see Saru's mother, now dead, through her eyes but we come to very different conclusions! What Saru feels and thinks and remembers and imagines are all coloured by the unresolved guilt and grief surrounding the death and this makes her dysfunctional. It also makes Saru an 'unreliable narrator'. This is why Deshpande's writing is so good. The 'rape' she endures every night with her husband, is the way she punishes herself, again brought on with a lot of guilt from her past and now combined with her doubts about her love for Manu, even her being ashamed of him. Coming home, getting into the routines that her mother did, transforming herself into her mother, young Madhav's presence in the house and him calling her Saruthai as Dhruva did, all these are mechanisms that help her towards healing herself. The last conversation she has with her father is very telling. She faces the fact that in the end it is SHE who has lost her love for Manu, and it is SHE who needs to make the decision about her life and marriage on her own. No one to blame, no one to give her easy answers, no absolutions. The nightmares that Saru has in the dark reflect the terror that Dhruva felt of the dark and the reason why he would beg to sleep with her as a little boy. She carries this image with her whenever she thinks of him. It is not the dark that holds the terror but what is in her own tormented mind. The physician who thought the body is the 'ultimate reality' realizes the real control that the mind has over matter and finally learns to heal herself. __________________ Review by Chandra
Holm |