INTRODUCTION

Indian writing in English today occupies a respectable position and

the credit for it goes to a good number of women writers, whose pens
have spilt much ink in bringing to light, the various aspects left
untouched and ignored by their male counterparts. These writings
describe not only their family fluids and their inferior status but also
depict the sores in their souls and their agonies as individuals. Their
writings expose the attitude of society towards woman which is based on
false and grandiose construction of the male ego, the absurd and artificial
polarities between male and female. Our Indian culture never believed in
segregation of humankind. These writings promote the point of view to
reorganize the world realities.

Women are paradoxically not treated on par with men in all

spheres of human activity. The disturbing picture of women is not
something new to India. It proves to be the predicament of women all
over the world. In the words of Ernest tine,
“Humanity recognizes no sex; mind recognizes nosex;
Life and death, pleasure and pain, happiness and
misery recognize no sex. Like man, woman comes
involuntarily into existence; like him, she possesses
physical and mental and moral powers……..like him,
she has to pay the penalty for disobeying
nature’s laws, and far greater penalties she
has to suffer from ignorance …….. Like men,
she also enjoys or suffers with her country;
yet she is not recognized as his equal” (P 1)
 In a male dominated society, woman has multifarious roles and as
she grows, the idea of self-abnegation ensues. A dichotomous perception
of woman exists in the Epics. She is deified as Goddess or Divine
forbearance and on the other hand, a woman is viewed as the precursor of
evil, epitome of lust. Vedic period gave women equal status as to that of
men. She equally participated in wars, yegnyas, and had equal footing
with men. She also enjoyed the privilege of choosing to get married or to
remain single. As A.S.Alterkar states, “the status of women is one of the
best gauges of “the spirit of a civilization, its excellences and its
limitations” (P 32). The images of Indian civilization, culture and
mythology are as diverse as the geographical, historical and other
influences that shaped them. The status and position of women degraded
and deteriorated with time. The double standard set up by Manu
worsened the position of women which was further put down by
restricting women to various limitations. Series of invasions by foreigners
jeopardized the security of women’s life and they were commodified with
their social liberties being impinged.

The objective for women’s liberation took a new leap with the birth
of two movements during the colonial rule. It paved the way for the
upliftment of women in society. The social Reform movement and the
Nationalist Movement had a great impact on the status of women.
Rajaram Mohan Ray made zealous efforts to bring about legal abolition
of evil practices like Sati and advocated window remarriage. He
challenged the laws that were different to men and women. If a wife dies
no man is asked to sacrifice his life; instead he becomes a new
bridegroom but in the case of women, she is forcibly thrown into the fire.
The physical tortures leveled upon them were something unbearable and
they were tagged as outcasts within their own society. Addressing these
issues, Ram Mohan Ray felt the need of the change in the mind set of
men and he encouraged men to end this brutality and accept remarriage as
a weapon to end gender discrimination. He held that the condition of
Indian women was the key factor that led to the degraded state of Indian
society.

Following Mohan Roy, Ishwarchandra Vidya Sagar made an

impact on Indian society by living his life with strong determination and
objectives to empower women in society. Being a great writer, educator
and social reformer, Ishwar, the man with a golden heart melted at the
pain and suffering imposed by society in the name of religion and
customs on women. Tagore and Bharatiar, through their verses expressed
the importance of gender diversity and empowerment of women.
Mahatma Gandhi played a pivotal role in eradicating the social wrongs
committed against women and he was instrumental in making women
realize and rediscover their self-esteem. In Gandhi’s words, “To call
women the weaker sex is man’s injustice to women”. According to
Gandhi, “Intellectually, mentally and spiritually, woman is equivalent to
man and she can participate in every activity”. He positioned women as a
superior place and women for Gandhi were embodiments of virtues like
knowledge, humility, tolerance, sacrifice and faith. Gandhi invoked the
instance of ancient and faith. Gandhi invoked the instances of ancient
role-models as epitomes of Indian womanhood like Draupati, Savitri, Sita
and Damayanti who showed that Indian women could never be feeble and
he stressed on the empowerment of women which was the only to
improve the quality of society.
 From times immemorial, women were silent spectators, puppets in
the hands of men. Violence against women, ill-treatment of women,
treating women as subordinates and weaker sex were the common themes
explored by many writers. Women revolted against these imposed
inequalities through their ‘pens’ i.e. in black and white’. Their growth
was steady and successful. Women were left bounded in thoughts, in
chains, sometimes that turned them iron like. The real, honest and
innermost impulses of women were found missing in the works/ writings
of men. The women writers unfurl the deep, personal, inner thoughts of
women who are kept in cages (be it gold or iron).

The women writers reveal the untouched corners of a women’s

heart. It shows how they are caught in their own world. The intricate
relationships of women and their complex experiences and the resultant
facts are explored with intense understanding and clarity. A woman is
presented in different temperaments-loving, sacrificing, sympathetic,
unselfish, caring, arrogant, selfish sensitive and insensitive.

The prominent women writers like Meena Alexader, Nayantara

Sahgal, Shashi Deshpande, Gita Hariharan, Anita Desai, Kamala
Markandaya can be taken into account while exploring the silenced lives.
The writers whether from West or East find themselves trapped in the
circumstances and their chances. There exists a common bond where
characteristics like courage, tolerance, forbearance, compassion, strong
will, power to face life’s trials and complexities. It presents how women
spread the message of love, forbearance and understanding. The Indian
women novelists have explored female subjectivity in order to establish
an identity. Women writers have moved away from the traditional
portrayal of women as victim. It marks the positive movement from
sacrificing women into those searching for identity. Contemporary
women’s presentation is more assertive and liberated.

Anita Nair is one such woman writer projecting women’s issues in

her fiction. The common themes projected by her are centred on women’s
suffering, subjugation, oppression, frustration, sexuality, freedom,
alienation, identity crisis, caste discrimination, transgression, mother
infidelity, emotional insecurity, social, psychological and emotional
issues. Nair’s writings condemn the patriarchal system and through her
novels, she holds up a mirror to the middle-class society. Being born at
Mundakottakuris near shornnur in Kerala, Anita Nair is a popular Indian
English writer and an efficient practitioner of fiction. She is considered as
a bold and straight forward writer whose novels depict the real life
experiences through various characters without hiding the world. She is a
fine writer with a great sense of character, a vivid knowledge of Indian
culture and an eye for expressing ideas with keen details.

Nair mesmerizes the reader with her evocative language and her
books are set in the everyday world of India. For her, Kerala is the source
of inspiration, weakness and strength. She strongly believes in artistic
integrity; the existing norms of society are the rights of women and
sideline their existence as human beings. Anita Nair expresses her
thoughts of being a writer through the lines. “Being a writer is a necessity
for me, an addiction. The best thing about being a writer is to be
anonymous in one’s writing, being genderless, ageless, classless-writing
about people completely different from myself” (P 106). Through her
works, Nair, no doubt, questions the dictates of society which gives
women a secondary role. Her women possess the power of endurance,
affinity, love and foresight which contributes a lot to the happiness of
others.

Nair’s India suffers from a patriarchal system which tries to

repress, humiliate and debase women. She tries to break the social norms
and boundaries set by the patriarchal world. She has portrayed some of
her protagonists as economically independent women who don’t have
control over their own lives. She brings to light the fact that women in
modern India are educated and financially independent but still they rope
their lives in the hands of others. Nair’s novels present the opposition
between the ideological appearances represented in the mythical and
metaphysical understanding of the material world and reality which is
represented by the material oppression of women on the basis of caste,
sexuality and class. She presents the contradictions in the fictional world
to the real world.

What is commonly visualized is that the writings by the

contemporary women writers provide insights, a wealth of understanding,
a reservoir of meanings and a basis for discussion. These women writers
present a different world focusing on women’s issues. A sense of identity
is a perennial sustaining creative force in a writer. Women have started
questioning the age old oppression. Freedom struggle constitutes the crux
of feminism in Indian literature. It does represent a search for identity and
a quest for the definition of the self.

The feminist perspectives in literature confront issues of male

chauvinism, sexist bias, psychological and physical exploitation, utter
disregard for the female’s psychological, cultural, familial and squiritual
quests. Writers like Kamala Markandaya, Anita Desai, Shashi
Deshpande, Anita Nair, Shoba De and Bharati Mukherjee have written
about women in a varied perspective. In some women, there is the
attitude of despondency, negation and rejection of life, while in others;
there is affirmation, an acceptance of life with a compromising attitude
leading to a deep sense of fulfillment. The feminist-writers give a
complete picture of what Indian women face in society, their struggle to
maintain a balance in life. Gajendra Kumar in his “Feminist critical
Theory and the Novels of Anita Desai” examines Desai’s novels in the
light of Feminist Critical Theory and notes the recurring themes like”
women’s struggles for self-realization and self-definition, the quest for
identity, pursuit for freedom, rebellion and protest against oppressions of
various kinds”(P 38). The critic Dubbe considers Anita Desai’s novel
Fire on the Mountain as a revolt against a world dominated by harsh
and cruel men. Mrs.Desai’s struggle for female autonomy played out
against the backdrop of patriarchal cultural pattern. Arundhati Roy in The
God of Small Things discusses the psychological trauma undergone or
experienced by the two characters Estha and Rahel. Women in the novel
are labeled as victims of Fate or Frivolity by Barche in his essay “women
in the God of Small Things”. The author shows how the decisions taken
by the women characters affect their life and it also traces out the factors
that defeat their decisions. All the women novelists probe deeper into the
causes of women’s inequality and social injustice and contend that
inequality between sexes is caused by the cultural constitution of gender
difference.

Anita Nair as feminist writer emphasizes or focuses psyche within

the context of south Indian family, representing women in their
traditional roles as mothers, wives, daughters. Her women characters
prove to be a sacrificial lamb for the upliftment/ betterment of their
family. Nair has an intense emotional understanding of human
motivations with sharp and flexible intelligence. She brings about a
chunk of society of all socio-economic levels and age groups through the
intimate conversation among the women characters as done in novels like
Ladies Coupe. Nair rather illuminates the lives of her characters in a
clear, simple and descriptive writing style with sympathy and knowledge.
Her characters do not postulate themselves as absolutes, to be acclaimed
or abandoned, rather inspire us to look honestly as our ‘real selves’ our
passions and our actions in family relationships and family.

Anita Nair like a skillful chess player slowly draws out her
characters and makes them pawns of use to her central character in a
significant way. Each character in her novels is chosen for a specific facet
to be projected. Each character of hers excels the other. Nair’s women are
bold and beautiful who are caught in the web of relationships; some strive
to come out of the pain and torture inflicted by society, while others
succumb to it. Nair has the magical ability to make her readers feel the
emotions as felt by her characters. Her female characters from Akhila in
Ladies Coupe to Radha in Mistress are all prototypes of Indian women.
Nair says that “Indian women have a core of steel that does not rust or
corrode. They are like silk-knots” (P 39) Nair questions in terms of
situations, the guilt of a man failing in his duties, the responsibilities on a
breadwinner, the inadequacies of the traditional family set ups, adultery,
lust and love. Her characters stand up tall even in their weak movements
and they become personalities despite their failings. Character-delineation
is the forte of Nair, which in her own words:
 “For me, it is crucial.
I am character-driven.
For me, it is the joy of creating
The parallel worlds” (P 23)

The sufferings of Nair’s characters become their strength and

weapon to fight out their predicaments as all levels.

Being a contemporary Indian women writer, Anita Nair has a

significant number of popular novels to her credit. As she is a native of
Kerala, her writings present her obsessions with its culture, and make her
bring out the cultural milieu in her maiden novel The Better Man. The
novel is set in the village namely Kaikurussi in northern Kerala, with a
fascinating exploration of the undercurrents that run beneath a seemingly
idyllic rural existence. In an interview, Anita Nair says:

“I wish I could tell you why Kerala

inspires me as it does. All I do know is
that it does; it is maddening to know that
whatever it is, defies description, perhaps
it is the sum total of the colours, the scents,
the landscapes of the people, their cussedness
and humour, the pretty politics & the larger
than life ideas…..just when you think you
have understood some facets of Kerala, it
contradicts itself. Perhaps that is
what is existing for me as a writer”(Interview 19)
 The novel The Better Man describes every individual’s attempt to
find a degree of inner peace and manner. Throughout the story, there is an
underlying message about how to have assurance on one’s own dreams
and strive hard to fulfill the same. In patriarchy, marriage is a matter that
worries the society as a whole and not just the two persons bluntly
involved. Every important decision a person takes, is examined in the
radiance of what cost it will have for their marriage. In the novel, The
Better Man, the portrayal of an educated woman indicates that the moral
code that applies to middleclass woman is in no manner anticipated from
woman of lower social status or class. The women in all ages remain
soundless in the narrative, thus proving the aspect between the privileged
and the prejudiced.

Anjana, in The Better Man, is brought up in a liberal atmosphere

by her parents. She is happy in her world of independence which gives
her a profound sense of self-fulfilment. At the age of 27, her
independence is lost in the name of marriage. In her married life, she
endures several injustices perpetrated by her because of her conventional
upbringing. Even a casual conversation between the two seems
impossible as Ravindran feels irritated at every word from Anjana. For
her, her husband’s place signifies a place of meaninglessness where she
feels like a stranger. She is eager to lead a healthy life with him which
seems unattainable. She longs for freedom and love in marriage, but it
breeds pain, misery and fury. With time, she develops hatred to all things
around her, even to herself. She feels that she has been victimized in the
name of customs and practices. Her marital relationship with her husband
is marked by loneliness and improper communication leading to lack of
confidence and trust in life.
 Anjana, like all women, is a victim and a subjugated woman but
not a passive silent sufferer-all restricted woman, yet she does not
question the man, her oppressor because she is more concerned in getting
on in her life and in finding a meaningful existence. Anita Nair tries to
establish a fact that it is not only the patriarchal setup which is
responsible for the condition of women in Indian society. The
responsibility also lies within the victim to refuse, to raise a voice and to
achieve the goal. The novel also traces the growth of character from a
state of weakness, feeling of failure to that of relaxation. All this strength
to fight back is achieved through self-assessment and self-criticism.
Anjana takes complete control of her life and knows where to strike a
balance. She sheds off the symbols of a distorted marriage and takes
complete authority of her life. She decides to lead a life of a spinster and
discards the perception of wifehood, maternity and marriage as the final
goal of woman’s life is ‘survival’.

Ladies Coupe explores women’s identities and their conflictual

relationship with patriarchy, gender discrimination and caste constraints
in the society. Ladies Coupe tries to find an answer to the question, “can
a woman stay single and be happy or does a woman need a man to feel
complete?”. It tells about the real journey a woman takes in her life. The
lives of the six main characters of Ladies Coupe are deeply affected by
caste, class and gender. These fictional women are seen as the mirrors of
Indian real women. Nair displays a compassionate understanding of
women, their complex world with all the entanglements of human
behavior. Akhila, a 45 year old spinster, is the chief protagonist of the
novel, faithfully fulfilling the roles of a perfect daughter, sister and a
friend. In the process, she loses her own identity as a woman. As the story
unfolds, the central character Akhila re-discovers the possibilities of life.
In the intimate atmosphere of Ladies Coupe, Akhila gets an opportunity
to perceive the true life experiences of the five women characters, Janaki,
the pampered wife and confused mother, Margaret Shanti, a chemistry
teacher, Prabha Devi-the pampered daughter of a rich family,
Marikolanthu-a victim of gender, class,caste and discrimination, The
common feature shared by all the female characters in the novel is that
most of them have forgotten the ‘woman’ in themselves. The
responsibilities of being a mother, a sister, a wife, a daughter has taken
away all their desires and ambitions. The novel moves on a strong note
that women can be strong if they are able to discover their inner strength
and possess strong determination.

Nair’s Lessons in Forgetting is a story about Jak and Meera who

through their personal tragedies and trauma. Meera is a corporate wife
who is deserted by her husband Giri. Jak is a cyclone expert who moves
to Bangalore to tend to his daughter Smiriti who suffers from comatose
after a brutal attack. The story is about how they find solace in each other,
through a series of coincidences. Lessons inForgetting is nothing but a
heart-warming story of redemption, forgiveness and second chances.
Mistress is a novel of art and adultery and a brilliant blend of imaginative
story-telling and deeply moving explorations in search of meaning. Here
in the novel Mistress, Anita Nair writes about man-woman relationships
and complex Kathakali aesthetics with equal felicity. She attempts to
show the quality of strength in a woman and in the process exhibits
plights, fears, dilemmas, ambitions and contradictions in the world of
women. Marriage between Ratha and Shyaam as portrayed by Anita Nair
in Mistress is more a misalliance than an alliance. Radha seems to have
no respect left out for her husband. Their marriage exists only in name,
without any effort on the part of Radha to keep it alive. The bitterness in
their married life is revealed through Radha’s words:

“Don’t I have a right to an opinion?

I am ur wife. Ur wife do you hear me?
But you treat me as if I am a kept woman.
A bloody Mistress to fulfill or sexual needs
And with no rights” (Mistress 73).

The protagonists Radha, Shyam, Chris add a sense of the weird that
complements the atmosphere of alienation and detachment. Anita Nair
draws characters from our daily life. The incidents and issues can easily
be associated with day-to-day life.

The three novels Ladies Coupe, The Better Man and Mistress
depict deep serious issues often seen or experienced in our day-to-day
life. If one deals with the sufferings of women, the other deals with the
problem of inferiority complex. The third novel Mistress has a parallel
between the life of a woman and the status enjoyed by art in the present
time. The common themes dealt with by Anita Nair are women’s
suffering, subjugation, oppression, frustration, freedom, alienation and
psychological issues. Taking into account the projection of various
themes stated above, the thesis has been classified into the following six
chapters i)Introduction ii) Feminism and Indian English Fiction: An
Introduction iii) The Impact of Women iv) Caste and Gender v)
Projection of Diasporic Consciousness vi) Social, Emotional and
Psychological issues. The Introductory chapter traces the origin and
growth of Indian English fiction and introduces beautifully Anita Nair as
a modern socially creative writer.
 Chapter - II Feminism and Indian English Fiction: An
Introduction traces the origin of feminism and feminist theory looking at
all aspects of life especially imparting of equal rights for women and
discusses how subordination of woman to man is prevalent in large parts
of the world picturing women as being subjected to discrimation,
humiliation, exploitation, oppression, control and violence at emotional,
psychological and societal levels in the patriarchal social and feminist
writings bringing to light the patriarchal ideology that justifies the
dominant, hierarchical, unequal and unjust structures, establishing
patriarchy as an ideology holding the prime place through which women
had internalized through Sridharma or Pativratha dharma to live up to the
ideal notion of womanhood constructed by society and how these
feminist issues get projected in the Indian English fiction both by the
male and women writers and also traces the popularity of Indian writers
in English and their contribution to Indian English fiction focusing
attention on many Indian themes and issues especially women’s issues at
all levels in the patriarchal society.

Chapter - III The Impact of Women projects Anita Nair as an

Indian writertrying to explore current and prevalent issues like rape,
male-domination, betrayal in marriage and discusses women’s right for
independence, woman as wife, daughter and mother and related
psychological issues. Portraying Nair’s women characters as those who
suffer but their sufferings turn out to be weapons to fight injustice. This
chapter beautifully describes the changing role of women in the Indian
society and Nair’s skill in effectively presenting the Post-Independent
women, the predicaments imposed upon them and their fight against
society to come out from their predetermined roles. It also examines how
Anita Nair in all the novels has dealt with gender issues, women
subjugation and their clash between traditions and modernity besides a
quest for self-identity and self-reliance.

Chapter-IV Caste andGender studies how caste, class and gender

are treated as definitive axes along which identity formation occurs in
India and Fiction is projected as an excellent tool in understanding the
complex caste dynamics of a heterogeneous multi-religious society like
India and how Anita Nair portrays the caste system and gender bias as
social realities deeply embedded in the psyche of most Indians
irrespective of the class or caste they are born into. It vividly analyses the
way in which through a variety of characters, shows how the perception
and responses to the caste phenomenon differ in varying degrees based on
the location, exposure to ideas and education of the individual and she
concentrates on the regional specificities of caste prejudices and gender
bias in India especially in the state of Kerala.

Chapter - V Projection of DiasporicConsciousness clearly

defines the meaning of Diaspora, explaining Indiaspora which refers to
persons of Indian birth or ethnicity living abroad and also to the historical
and contemporary presence of people of Indian subcontinental origin in
other areas of the world and beautifully locates the presence of diasporic
consciousness in the works of Anita Nair and examines how this
diasporic consciousness has provided her with a healthy location for
recreating home, country and her own identity. It vividly examines how
Anita Nair, unlike the conception of most of the people regarding the
trauma of exile, homelessness and relocation, shows how this state of
mind can experience something like diasporic exile. It is nothing but an
analysis of Nair’s migrant consciousness which is evident from the
continuous evocation of the motif of ‘return’ to the homeland in almost
all her major novels.
 Chapter - VI Social, Emotional and Psychological
issuesdiscusses the issues of modern women in her novels, especially
emotional, social and psychological set up of Indian society. This chapter
evaluates how a woman can strategize to get her own way under
innumerable conceptualizations of violence and the chapter while
discussing child abuse, female infanticide, rape, homosex, extra marital
or premarital affair, domestic disloyalty also takes note of the issue of
gender biased social system and the victim’s emotional, psychological
and social issues connected with above said problems in an elaborate
manner. In a world, the title “social, emotional and psychological issues”
in Anita Nair’s characters examines how her women get affected by the
manifestations and implications of gender - based violence and
demonstrates how the victims encounter serious difficulties and hostility
in their evdeavour to disclose their victimization. Moreover, the central
argument of this chapter is to prove that the phenomenon of gender-based
violence that has reached outrageous proportions due to the existing
social system, a tradition of silencing the problem the tradition of silence
on gender-based violence empowers victims to make themselves and
encourage other self-policing subjects to speak out and denounce the
male abusers.

“Conclusion” attests to the fact that Anita Nair is a creative writer

giving an answer to the question whether a woman can survive alone by
presenting an insight into the way of women living in India. It concludes
that Nair has touched upon many controversial and sensitive subjects
talking about untouchability, casteism, cultural and religious bias,
betrayal, abuse and disrespect of women, domination of power and
money and even homosexuality and sums up how Nair’s novels reveal
the effects of social conditioning on women.